I doubt that Apple saved anything with Intel chips -- at least on this round. Apple may have to customize Intel chips or at least a few custom pieces of silicon.
Aren't the two chips they are using "firsts" for Intel? Nobody else is using the ViiV yet, are they?
Also, Apple will probably only guarantee the OS on a limited number of chips to limit compatibility issues.
My guess is, that it will be about two years before Apple will be spending less to be using an Intel chipset. But, that is total wild ass speculation.
Also, INTEL has WiMax and a better position for DRM on hollywood videos. Being able to run WinTel applications transparently on the MacIntel, will help to position OS X as best of breed.
Imagine the lack of viruses, the coolness, the usability.
But really, to get to the home market -- you need games. The rest is all a convenient rational.
The only good thing about 9/11 was that it changed the excuse for government overreach of power from the old "save the kids" crap.
Does this government care about kids the nanosecond they are ejected from the womb? Reduced funding for education, no protection from crappy foods -- rampant poverty and lack of support for single moms.
No, this is another nose of the camel under the tent. They get access for "kiddie molesters" AND then BushCo can have president to start surching for things like "Bush sucks."
But even the idea the the government is "looking" at what you are searching will have a chilling effect. People will modify their behaviour because they will FEAR government reprisal. Nothing you can be sure of -- but the fear is enough to shut most people up.
I'd also like to point out that all the spying has shown no real results on the "war on terror." What little progress they've made has been through traditional, constitutional means.
Much of this surveillance has got to be to get dirt on "political enemies" that can be useful to blackmail them.
I think the fleet is sent after the Hairdressers and telephone repairmen who were in the ship that was supposed to be destroyed, but crashed on earth -- thus adding human life.
Anyway --it's been months since I've seen a "Guide" reference.
If there is fuel -- farming is a lot easier. No fuel and that means people are plowing to plant -- that scenario means tremendous world-wide famine, plagues and probably war. Available and relatively cheap fuel is what allows so much food to be grown now.
Take away water and fuel -- and most don't have food.
Hopefully, survivors could only make it to the arctic when things have stabilized. I could imagine one hungry family could deplete the entire store in a desperate month.
The remoteness is also a good idea for the seeds survival. The point is to have something left -- not something convenient.
There have been a few times where diseases and plagues have almost removed almost all of a certain plant.
Dutch Elm disease.
Most all grape vines were destroyed by blight in Europe and actually come from vines in the United States.
The SouthEast used to be covered with deciduous trees and not these ugly southern pines -- a lot more Black Walnut -- which is now pretty rare.
Anywho -- this project makes a lot of sense. Some species could become extinct while we are preoccupied -- either with a large war or while trying to combat droughts and storms of a severe nature. I could see a lot of scenarios where we would have to deal with a lot of global emergencies and turn around and find we have no more of a certain species -- even a common one.
I hope they do genetic samples, plasm, and embryos of many animals as well. Ideally they would just organize them by ecosystem -- grab everything from a specific area and preserve a small representative patch (freeze-dried and vacuum sealed).
As well as lead lining -- add some graphite for good neutrino safety.
why, when I went browsing for some good film on the History of George Bush I got these innocent recommendations;
The Rise and Fall of the Nazis Party.
Crime and Prejudice, the Musical.
The Key Stone Cops.
I mean, could it be the same bad writer? Or a release date? Or perhaps people who bought a documentary about Bush were interested in funny, Incompetent policemen.
I'm especially impressed by how you don't know the difference between the FBI and the NSA and the difference in the laws that govern those two different agencies.
Hey, you can forgive me for getting them confused, can't you? They both are doing domestic spying, as well as the CIA -- so you tell me what is supposed to be the difference? Your making a nonsense argument without discussing the issue.
Yes, it is an editorial that I pointed to -- which is a good jumping off place for actual documents that support the issue at hand. And you don't seem to recognize that this is about domestic spying and not foreign. Who said the 4th amendment is about foreigners? And the FISA laws have nothing to do with recording public events -- so who are you arguing with? You're dismissing my point with a misconception -- very shrewd.
The government is using taxpayer money to monitor peace activist groups. They seem to have abandoned known hate groups and militias -- all to make sure that Quakers aren't a threat. Are you completely obtuse about the issue here? This is about monitoring opposition to the government by legal and peaceful means -- it is about power. I'm hearing little that has to do with protecting Americans from a foreign threat. We've heard the excuses for the need for all this secrecy and power, and now we've had a peak behinds the scenes. Incompetence and paranoia. It appears that the Bush administration considers its greatest threats to be from Liberals and people fighting for open government.
I agree that the internet appliances were before their time. There are certain functionalities that people want from a computer; managing email, web browsing/shopping, storing contacts and information, and managing photos and music. Now that we have printers that can print right from a digital camera -- I think it's time to revisit the internet appliance -- especially if they can be made more reliable than they once were.
However, I think that the next Apple Entertainment Appliance will create this new market and dominate it like the iPod. A mini mac running Intel and WiMax to connect everything together. DRM for downloading videos, but with the ability to share the video anywhere in the house. Also, it is expected to have a dedicated h.264 compressor/decompressor.
So, HD video, iTunes-like simplicity and interface, and virus-free internet browsing. Probably for the price of an XBox 360.
Ultranova said; "Imagining that free markets and the invisible hand of market forces will cure all the ills of the world is simply modern superstition."
I totally agree. I'm frustrated that it is so hard now to have a basic discussion on any industry and not have to drop down into fighting off all the Economics 101 experts. With them, any statement that hurts profits is a pro-communist statement. Unfettered capitalism ends up becoming anarchy or a tyranny fairly quickly--we've had 3 or 4 instances now in this country of living with Robber Baron tyranny -- and obviously, the lessons of the past have all been removed from our consciousness while we slept.
We are in a Socialist Democracy that uses a regulated capitalist system. All the really ignorant people now are convinced that they understand everything and it's all about supply and demand and that markets are self-correcting and regulating. Utter, complete Bullshit.
Why is the vocabulary so damn black and white. You are a Capitalist or a Communist. Well, it's just this sort of simplistic thinking that is careening this country headlong towards becoming a Corporatist State. Just like Italy under Mussolini.
*** By the way Dada21, "I have nearly 98% of my currency in the only true store of wealth: gold and silver." I think that is a very shrewd dicision right now. But some of your previous statements sound a lot like someone who has been weened on the Supply-side Economics propaganda. I'm not a non-supporter of business -- I don't see how that is possible. I have to buy things. And don't you need some money in cash for your business?
Anywho, we are all probably in for a rough ride soon on the economy. I wish I had my money in gold right now.
That's their product. Farmers don't need to buy it.
You don't think a lot of "foreign aide" doesn't get tied to how a third world country treats a Multinational Corporation? There's always this assumption about a FREE Market and CHOICE. Do I have a choice about taking a car to work? No. I can't get there with a bus or a train or a bike in a reasonable amount of time and we have very little mass transit services in Georgia. So, I HAVE to have a car. So I have to have a drivers license and I have to have auto insurance. Heck, I can CHOOSE to get DSL from the local baby bell, or to never actually get it by one of the other providers. It's hard to always fight the current -- so we end up "choosing" to go the path of least resistance. That's life -- there's nothing free about it.
Can I go without a phone? Maybe -- would I be able to keep my job -- maybe not.
I'm not an expert on what means Monsanto and ADM use to make sure people buy their product. I'm sure it is good product -- but I'm not so sure about there being many options on who you can get seeds from. I'll admit ignorance. It's just that I think it is pretty foolish to assume that the Market is ever Free. If NAFTA were really about Free Trade, why is it thousands of pages long?
And, the Anonymous Biologist posting is very right that Patents and IP hurt the small farmer. If I want to grow my own crops and use seeds or even sell them -- I have to spend a lot of money to make sure I haven't infringed on a copyright. Wow. Talk about pulling up the ladder. The same thing is happening with programming -- there may come a time (soon), where more is spent reviewing what is legal to provide in software than there is actually writing the algorithms. How much "free choice" is there when you can only choose a few huge companies to provide you with your means of making a living?
"msuarezalvarez" hit the nail on the head; a "free market" is an abstraction. We've never had one. The true balance of "the marketplace" is between ownership and labor. All of these struggles come down to people who own wanting money for owning the means, or the ideas, or the property of someone else who has to do labor. Now, there should be compensation for owners, but where is the balance? Why is it, we have to have fund raisers for "farm aide" and yet, Monsanto or ADM reap huge profits year over year? And why do we send 80% or more of the government subsidies for farming to the very companies that are already making these huge profits? Simple, they've lobbied (bought) politicians to make the market more FREE towards their interests. They often OWN the land, the seeds and the licenses and the farmer gets to own the debt.
Everyone, will of course understand what I'm saying and agree with me -- after we've all been turned into indenbtured servants and the only good paying jobs will be for saying nice things about all the great owners that we could never possibly do anything without.
This sort of reminds me of the conundrum created by Virus Protection software. There is a cottage industry of hackers who submit new viruses for a bounty that gets paid by the virus protection company. The "wink, wink, nudge, nudge" here is that the un-spoken secret is that many of these Virus bounty hunters are writing the new viruses. While plenty of spyware and trojan horses are out there helping zombify computers for other reasons -- the anti-virus economy creates a "habitat" for virus writers.
Where there is money to be made, there will be labor.
There are a lot of unintended consequences of genetically altered plants. Putting the genes of one plant into another creates a new vector for diseases. Or, allows a trait to be taken on by a related species of plant that never had that trait -- in this case weeds. The weed is probably very similar genetically to the protected crop. Even a tomato plant or a new grass can be a "weed" if it grows where it shouldn't.
Other unintended consequences abound. In England, I've read that a lot of wild song birds are dying, because the altered crops are not providing insects. Some may say; "what's the big deal?" Well, it is something that nobody predicted. All the "side effects" that keep "cropping up" show that the Monsanto's of the world are not being careful enough. When things happen differently from your predictions, it means you didn't test enough. We have been assured that genes can't jump to other plants or that some crops won't grow wild and out of control -- pretty much the attitude of "dada21", who seems to think that if the world doesn't get destroyed, why should anybody be whining. Well, we have plenty of food -- we actually pay farmers in this country to allow fields to go fallow. Why can't we be slow and careful? If some scientists say that we could cause Global Cooling or Global Warming -- shouldn't we look into it? And if the prediction is wrong, the greatest threat is that some company didn't make as big a profit as they wanted to.
Because that's the balance here; you have concerned scientists and environmentalists and you have companies. Steadily, the "right to profit" for the company is seen as paramount. No environmentalist action can be taken if it hurts profits and cannot be proven. Government is abdicating its role to protect the greater good.
I mean, it would sure make nuclear energy cheaper if we just dumped the waste in a big pile. But, the pollution that would cause would cost society many times more than the profits of the company. It's shifting the burden and costs from companies and to society.
And as the previous poster mentioned; "Actually, they do it to put some IP in their seeds, and then prevent farmers to reuse their seeds the next year. Do you think they do it to reduce the usage of chemicals ? Actually, they also produce the chemicals, that you cannot use without agreeing to use their seeds." Yeah. That was some of the first laws written into the books for the New Iraqi government. They can't keep seeds, and they can't grow any crops but those from Monsanto or ADM. Talk about control. Would you want the future of your food supply dependent upon a hostile foreign power who could decide not to give you next years crop?
And as the anonymous scientist posted before, you don't have to be a "greenie" to have a rational notion that these sorts of things need to be done very carefully. The only guiding principle controlling ADM and Monsanto right now is profit. It isn't very profitable to make people self-sufficient and independent of you. Much more profitable is a system of addiction and dependence.
Also notice, that if you want to make a good living as a "speaker" or an "expert" on TV -- you just have to pick an industry that does damage and come up with theories to explain them away. Or, are we going to say all the Pulmonary Doctors who used to push the idea that cigarettes were good for you weren't influenced? I'm not saying this as a blanket statement for all companies. But the
In a lawsuit, Apple vs. Microsoft, concerning Video for Windows 1.4d (I believe), Microsoft was found guilty of stealing code. In fact, when comparing the API of Microsoft's early entry into video on computers, the actual BINARIES MATCHED UP -- meaning, no code was changed. This was done by a third party -- but it was proved that Microsoft had knowledge of it. That was the time that Steve Jobs got Microsoft to "invest" in Apple and to share networking code and cross-license patents for a time. It was a brilliant move -- instead of just getting some petty cash from Microsoft, Steve bought some security and credibility for his company.
Bill Gates started his illustrious career with the programming language BASIC. Only, we was in a user group of pioneering computer geeks who were freely swapping this language to help them control computer boards. Bill Gates took all the open code and copyrighted it. It started his whole career.
A few years later, IBM was looking for a simple OS that would help them run some lower end computers. They went to the creator of CPM who blew them off. Then, knowing of Bill Gates enterprising nature, they went to him to try and get a "third party" copy of CPM. Bill farmed this job out to another person who hacked CPM and gave it back to him. The difference between CPM and MS-DOS at the time was that the "C:" drive and "A:" drive letters were swapped. One of the reasons IBM never took license of the DOS was that they were afraid they would get sued and wanted to keep a buffer between them and the creator of CPM. This kind of explains the best "luck" in the history of comptuers -- how Bill Gates was a contractor allowed to own the OS.
You can go back and look up other interesting stories of Excell and VisiCalc.
Early windows "borrowed" heavily from Apple -- Bill Gates had a lot of insider knowledge being a developer with Apple. Steve Jobs has made many legal mistakes in his life when it comes to covering is butt in copyrights. His limited licensing of Apple APIs gave a loop hole that allowed Bill to borrow a lot of designs of his. Please don't go back to the "Xerox" thing -- that's another issue and it's been misconstrued a lot.
Anyway, there is a lot more, like OLE (object Linking and Embedding) which was taken from an MS developer.
ActiveX controls utilize some patented techniques -- I forget the lawsuit that quietly went away on that.
Google Stacker Software.... I haven't even touched much more thorough and comprehensive lists on this subject.
But personally, I feel pretty safe from a "Slander charge" because, to sue me, Microsoft would have to open up code to a jury and prove that they hadn't "borrowed" anything. Then there would be all the entries I could just clip out of old newspapers.
And, I think Microsoft licensed most of their web code from SpyGlass -- not Mosaic. SpyGlass made their living for a time just licensing out web browser code. Again though, I think there was also a lawsuit the buried concerning the TCPIP stack.
I wasn't flamebait/trolling -- I just thought I was stating common knowledge and it would be tiresome to go back and reference it. I think that's why you got a "0" on the mod points.
Well, If everyone OBEYED the secrecy laws provided for by the Patriot Act -- I'm sure that such an accusation would be speculation.
The only people who have anything to fear are those who are terrorists? Somehow, our government is secretly competent -- while they brilliantly throw off the enemy by being totally incompetent in public. To take the handling of Katrina and the bungling of the rebuilding of Iraq and then assume that our glorious leaders are going to get it right when they aren't in the public eye is perhaps the greatest of faith-based tin foil hat theories.
Domestic spying. People can be secretly arrested and never charged. The government has all the ability to disappear anyone they don't like and call them a terrorist and they never have to see a court. It doesn't matter that you can reassure us that it HASN"T happened yet. You don't know that anymore than I do. All power is supposed to be in the hands of the people, when not explicitly allowed to the government. You don't allow the government the "ability to torture" and then they promise that they won't. What sort of logic is that?
Well, I found my own way to interpret this "mash-up" data.
Take the total # of flaws of the Linux distros; 2,328. The number of distros including Mac -- by pulling a guess out of my hat; 12 Since, we can assume that most UNIX distros are similiar, and we'll be kind by saying the Mac has the same number of flaws, Just divide the total by the platforms and you get... 194.
And, since we can assume this is an "independent analyst" paid for by Microsoft -- we can safely assume that they buried vulnerabilities from Internet Explorer, Entourage/Outlook, and Microsoft Office as the flaws affected multiple operating systems while just throwing in the app flaws that came with the *NIX boxes. So, you can assume that 80% of all vulnerabilities in applications are from these three Microsoft apps. So 2,058 *.80 gives us 1,646 rounded down.
So any single UNIX has about 194 flaws versus 2,458 flaws attributed to Microsoft products. Of course, I could be wrong, but since we are pulling figures our of our collective butts here -- what the hey, right?
But, if you are purchasing software per flaw (and well call the LINUX distros free except for Mac) so, it is still more expensive for each flaw that you get on all combined *NIX's -- since the author assumes you are buying every NIX to acquire every flaw you possibly can. Windows comes out ahead on less cost per flaw.
I really didn't add in SUN -- that would reduce the number of flaws per NIX and greatly increase the cost per flaw. UNIX really needs to step up here -- a user has to really invest in a lot of platforms to achieve a good allotment of flaws.
This war has seen the largest protests in the history of the world. When Bush last visited England, they had half the police force protecting him and holding off protesters.
More Europeans will come to see the light as the Islamists continue attacking Europeans in Europe. It is amazing how quickly that clears the mind. So, how's that war on terror going? The Taliban has been good for GWB and GWB has been good for the Taliban. Terrorism is a tactic, and will always be with us as it is the only way for armies that are poor and don't have cruise missiles and tanks to fight superior enemies. My tactic for a war on terror would be using international police cooperation, and enforcing better labor practices around the world so that more people are employed and more people can be fed. Also, by not commiting acts of terrorism ourselves and supporting tyrants. You know, like Saudi Arabia, where 17 of the 19 terrorists came from who hit the world trade centers (although not so sure of this now, since some of them have shown up alive and are working as commerical pilots in Egypt and Saudi Arabia).
NATO is in Afghanistan So what is your point? Yes, even the French are helping us there. Even still, the rebuilding is being botched there and we only have control by bribing warlords. Opium production is off the charts.
Coalition forces in Iraq now number fewer than 23,000 from 24 countries, down from about 50,000 from 38 countries in 2003. Yes, the ones we bribed or harassed into going are pulling out. Many because of the unpopularity. Other than England, their sole purpose was to make it look like we had support. Costa Rica and Uzbekistan? Were they used as an honor guard?
The Cuban Missile Crisis... If Kennedy had provided air support they probably would have been successful -- but he chickened out. One of his biggest mistakes. Actual missiles aimed at us, I would think, is a compelling reason. They even had photos of the missiles -- not drawings that Colin Powell had to trot out. The less known part of this story, is that Kennedy agreed to pull out his missiles from Turkey if Russia would pull out missiles from Cuba. It repaired Kennedy's image somewhat -- but it was also a good trade. Actually protecting the people of America is a good thing.
Collin Powel could have been another Eisenhower, unfortunately, many on the left would find a black moderate Republican president intollerable.
I think we liberals should be allowed to talk for ourselves. Dems voted in a Moderate with Clinton. Powel never defined himself by either party. If you bothered to check, the polls and the actual interests of Dems showed a big interest in Powel as a president. But he hitched his horses with Bush. Then, he made the biggest mistake of his life (his words) when he presented that phony evidence before the UN. Why don't you point to actual events to make a point? If we'd had our choice of Republicans, Powel would have been more palatable to Liberals than Bush. Perhaps the DLC would have an issue -- but that's their own game of playing politics. I can easily distinguish the two.
Oddly enough, JF Kennedy is more similar to GWB in terms of foreign and domestic policy than to JF Kerry. Did JFK fail at every business he ran? Did he take property by the power of the government and give it to financial backers? Did JFK murder the English language and embarass the country? They both had corrupt ancestors -- so, maybe that's what you mean by similiar.
We poured enormous resources into WW2. This war is being fought practically on a shoe string budget in comparison. WW2 was a real war. In Iraq, we invaded a more or less defenseless nation. Before the "declaired war" in Iraq, our planes were dropping ordinance on Iraq to soften them up for about 6 months (heard that from a pilot). The Iraq war could have been run on a shoestring budget if we had hired Iraqis to help rebuild -- and if we had people who k
Hastert got about $120,000 from Abramoff to make sure that he got a "right of way" on the Indian Gambling.
So, for a top tier politician, I'm guessing it is about $20k per "incident". Maybe just $5k for a lower Congressman per vote -- if the "leaders" can't get enough to votes. Beyond just committees, I'm guessing actual votes cost more -- and then if you get into onerous issues like the Bankruptcy Reform Bill, you have to hire a few flunkies like Neal Boortz to tell everyone how toxic sludge is good for you (I think that became a book or a movie, right?). So, it kind of depends upon scale. But $5k to $20k sounds about right to me -- per incident. Multiply that by the number you need to buy and whether it is an election year (X4 for election year on a bad vote). Still, pennies on the dollar for the profits that a corporation makes from buying a Politico or two. About 1,000 to 1 ROI.
If only I could "invest" and buy a percentage of the Republican Party -- not a whole Senator or anything, just a portion. In the last 5 years, stock in the RP must have gone up like 2000 %. Best investment going, if you ask me.
This won't dry up. Winning the IP war is too important for this government. It isn't about Music or Movies -- it's about OWNERSHIP being more important than LABOR. You can work for a living and starve and not educate your kids,... but darn anyone who gets in the way of dividend profits.
Patenting genes and outlawing seeds is the future. You may not even have RIGHTS to your memories or parts of your body. No, expect the strongest political pressure to come from the US government to get Russia to adopt the RIAA rules. A lot of taxpayer money will be used as a carrot for Russia to accept this. The RIAA will not be allowed to go bankrupt.
I think you should keep quite about the "buy Gold" comment.
Just tell your friends and Pro-Liberty Progressives.
Keep it on the "down low" you know? I've decided my new years resolution was not to interfere with people who don't know their own best interest and are determined to self-destruct. When it "hits the fan" you at least get the satisfaction of hearing these folks say; "Wow, this financial collapse came as a complete surprise -- nobody could have foreseen that Trickle Down would have been such a dismal failure." Almost has humorous as Media Coverage of; "Rich people missing, somehow, all the American companies are now Bermuda companies -- amazing. Unfortunately, we don't have any experts around to explain this to you, because they are also, all missing."
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I doubt that Apple saved anything with Intel chips -- at least on this round. Apple may have to customize Intel chips or at least a few custom pieces of silicon.
Aren't the two chips they are using "firsts" for Intel? Nobody else is using the ViiV yet, are they?
Also, Apple will probably only guarantee the OS on a limited number of chips to limit compatibility issues.
My guess is, that it will be about two years before Apple will be spending less to be using an Intel chipset. But, that is total wild ass speculation.
The parent post is correct.
Also, INTEL has WiMax and a better position for DRM on hollywood videos. Being able to run WinTel applications transparently on the MacIntel, will help to position OS X as best of breed.
Imagine the lack of viruses, the coolness, the usability.
But really, to get to the home market -- you need games. The rest is all a convenient rational.
The only good thing about 9/11 was that it changed the excuse for government overreach of power from the old "save the kids" crap.
Does this government care about kids the nanosecond they are ejected from the womb? Reduced funding for education, no protection from crappy foods -- rampant poverty and lack of support for single moms.
No, this is another nose of the camel under the tent. They get access for "kiddie molesters" AND then BushCo can have president to start surching for things like "Bush sucks."
But even the idea the the government is "looking" at what you are searching will have a chilling effect. People will modify their behaviour because they will FEAR government reprisal. Nothing you can be sure of -- but the fear is enough to shut most people up.
I'd also like to point out that all the spying has shown no real results on the "war on terror." What little progress they've made has been through traditional, constitutional means.
Much of this surveillance has got to be to get dirt on "political enemies" that can be useful to blackmail them.
NO!
You must tell me. I can't believe I forgot that one. Is it in "so long and thanks for all the fish?"
I'd google but that would spoil the sport here.
Any Dirk Gently references you can throw out?
Hitchhikers guide, man.
I think the fleet is sent after the Hairdressers and telephone repairmen who were in the ship that was supposed to be destroyed, but crashed on earth -- thus adding human life.
Anyway --it's been months since I've seen a "Guide" reference.
But then again why do you personally care, or for that matter why should anyone?
How very Republican of you.
You'd probably want to store fertilized embryos. In liquid Nitrogen they should have a good shelf life.
If there is fuel -- farming is a lot easier. No fuel and that means people are plowing to plant -- that scenario means tremendous world-wide famine, plagues and probably war. Available and relatively cheap fuel is what allows so much food to be grown now.
Take away water and fuel -- and most don't have food.
If you don't have food -- fuel doesn't matter.
Hopefully, survivors could only make it to the arctic when things have stabilized. I could imagine one hungry family could deplete the entire store in a desperate month.
The remoteness is also a good idea for the seeds survival. The point is to have something left -- not something convenient.
There have been a few times where diseases and plagues have almost removed almost all of a certain plant.
Dutch Elm disease.
Most all grape vines were destroyed by blight in Europe and actually come from vines in the United States.
The SouthEast used to be covered with deciduous trees and not these ugly southern pines -- a lot more Black Walnut -- which is now pretty rare.
Anywho -- this project makes a lot of sense. Some species could become extinct while we are preoccupied -- either with a large war or while trying to combat droughts and storms of a severe nature. I could see a lot of scenarios where we would have to deal with a lot of global emergencies and turn around and find we have no more of a certain species -- even a common one.
I hope they do genetic samples, plasm, and embryos of many animals as well. Ideally they would just organize them by ecosystem -- grab everything from a specific area and preserve a small representative patch (freeze-dried and vacuum sealed).
As well as lead lining -- add some graphite for good neutrino safety.
Why, I agree it's totally innocent.
why, when I went browsing for some good film on the History of George Bush I got these innocent recommendations;
The Rise and Fall of the Nazis Party.
Crime and Prejudice, the Musical.
The Key Stone Cops.
I mean, could it be the same bad writer? Or a release date? Or perhaps people who bought a documentary about Bush were interested in funny, Incompetent policemen.
I'm especially impressed by how you don't know the difference between the FBI and the NSA and the difference in the laws that govern those two different agencies.
Hey, you can forgive me for getting them confused, can't you? They both are doing domestic spying, as well as the CIA -- so you tell me what is supposed to be the difference? Your making a nonsense argument without discussing the issue.
Yes, it is an editorial that I pointed to -- which is a good jumping off place for actual documents that support the issue at hand. And you don't seem to recognize that this is about domestic spying and not foreign. Who said the 4th amendment is about foreigners? And the FISA laws have nothing to do with recording public events -- so who are you arguing with? You're dismissing my point with a misconception -- very shrewd.
The government is using taxpayer money to monitor peace activist groups. They seem to have abandoned known hate groups and militias -- all to make sure that Quakers aren't a threat. Are you completely obtuse about the issue here? This is about monitoring opposition to the government by legal and peaceful means -- it is about power. I'm hearing little that has to do with protecting Americans from a foreign threat. We've heard the excuses for the need for all this secrecy and power, and now we've had a peak behinds the scenes. Incompetence and paranoia. It appears that the Bush administration considers its greatest threats to be from Liberals and people fighting for open government.
I agree that the internet appliances were before their time.
There are certain functionalities that people want from a computer; managing email, web browsing/shopping, storing contacts and information, and managing photos and music. Now that we have printers that can print right from a digital camera -- I think it's time to revisit the internet appliance -- especially if they can be made more reliable than they once were.
However, I think that the next Apple Entertainment Appliance will create this new market and dominate it like the iPod. A mini mac running Intel and WiMax to connect everything together. DRM for downloading videos, but with the ability to share the video anywhere in the house. Also, it is expected to have a dedicated h.264 compressor/decompressor.
So, HD video, iTunes-like simplicity and interface, and virus-free internet browsing. Probably for the price of an XBox 360.
You mother is going to want one.
That I'd have first post 2006 on SlashDot!
Yeah foor me!
Ultranova said; "Imagining that free markets and the invisible hand of market forces will cure all the ills of the world is simply modern superstition."
I totally agree. I'm frustrated that it is so hard now to have a basic discussion on any industry and not have to drop down into fighting off all the Economics 101 experts. With them, any statement that hurts profits is a pro-communist statement. Unfettered capitalism ends up becoming anarchy or a tyranny fairly quickly--we've had 3 or 4 instances now in this country of living with Robber Baron tyranny -- and obviously, the lessons of the past have all been removed from our consciousness while we slept.
We are in a Socialist Democracy that uses a regulated capitalist system. All the really ignorant people now are convinced that they understand everything and it's all about supply and demand and that markets are self-correcting and regulating. Utter, complete Bullshit.
Why is the vocabulary so damn black and white. You are a Capitalist or a Communist. Well, it's just this sort of simplistic thinking that is careening this country headlong towards becoming a Corporatist State. Just like Italy under Mussolini.
***
By the way Dada21, "I have nearly 98% of my currency in the only true store of wealth: gold and silver." I think that is a very shrewd dicision right now. But some of your previous statements sound a lot like someone who has been weened on the Supply-side Economics propaganda. I'm not a non-supporter of business -- I don't see how that is possible. I have to buy things. And don't you need some money in cash for your business?
Anywho, we are all probably in for a rough ride soon on the economy. I wish I had my money in gold right now.
That's their product. Farmers don't need to buy it.
You don't think a lot of "foreign aide" doesn't get tied to how a third world country treats a Multinational Corporation? There's always this assumption about a FREE Market and CHOICE. Do I have a choice about taking a car to work? No. I can't get there with a bus or a train or a bike in a reasonable amount of time and we have very little mass transit services in Georgia. So, I HAVE to have a car. So I have to have a drivers license and I have to have auto insurance. Heck, I can CHOOSE to get DSL from the local baby bell, or to never actually get it by one of the other providers. It's hard to always fight the current -- so we end up "choosing" to go the path of least resistance. That's life -- there's nothing free about it.
Can I go without a phone? Maybe -- would I be able to keep my job -- maybe not.
I'm not an expert on what means Monsanto and ADM use to make sure people buy their product. I'm sure it is good product -- but I'm not so sure about there being many options on who you can get seeds from. I'll admit ignorance. It's just that I think it is pretty foolish to assume that the Market is ever Free. If NAFTA were really about Free Trade, why is it thousands of pages long?
And, the Anonymous Biologist posting is very right that Patents and IP hurt the small farmer. If I want to grow my own crops and use seeds or even sell them -- I have to spend a lot of money to make sure I haven't infringed on a copyright. Wow. Talk about pulling up the ladder. The same thing is happening with programming -- there may come a time (soon), where more is spent reviewing what is legal to provide in software than there is actually writing the algorithms. How much "free choice" is there when you can only choose a few huge companies to provide you with your means of making a living?
"msuarezalvarez" hit the nail on the head; a "free market" is an abstraction. We've never had one. The true balance of "the marketplace" is between ownership and labor. All of these struggles come down to people who own wanting money for owning the means, or the ideas, or the property of someone else who has to do labor. Now, there should be compensation for owners, but where is the balance? Why is it, we have to have fund raisers for "farm aide" and yet, Monsanto or ADM reap huge profits year over year? And why do we send 80% or more of the government subsidies for farming to the very companies that are already making these huge profits? Simple, they've lobbied (bought) politicians to make the market more FREE towards their interests. They often OWN the land, the seeds and the licenses and the farmer gets to own the debt.
Everyone, will of course understand what I'm saying and agree with me -- after we've all been turned into indenbtured servants and the only good paying jobs will be for saying nice things about all the great owners that we could never possibly do anything without.
This sort of reminds me of the conundrum created by Virus Protection software. There is a cottage industry of hackers who submit new viruses for a bounty that gets paid by the virus protection company. The "wink, wink, nudge, nudge" here is that the un-spoken secret is that many of these Virus bounty hunters are writing the new viruses. While plenty of spyware and trojan horses are out there helping zombify computers for other reasons -- the anti-virus economy creates a "habitat" for virus writers.
Where there is money to be made, there will be labor.
There are a lot of unintended consequences of genetically altered plants. Putting the genes of one plant into another creates a new vector for diseases. Or, allows a trait to be taken on by a related species of plant that never had that trait -- in this case weeds. The weed is probably very similar genetically to the protected crop. Even a tomato plant or a new grass can be a "weed" if it grows where it shouldn't.
Other unintended consequences abound. In England, I've read that a lot of wild song birds are dying, because the altered crops are not providing insects. Some may say; "what's the big deal?" Well, it is something that nobody predicted. All the "side effects" that keep "cropping up" show that the Monsanto's of the world are not being careful enough. When things happen differently from your predictions, it means you didn't test enough. We have been assured that genes can't jump to other plants or that some crops won't grow wild and out of control -- pretty much the attitude of "dada21", who seems to think that if the world doesn't get destroyed, why should anybody be whining. Well, we have plenty of food -- we actually pay farmers in this country to allow fields to go fallow. Why can't we be slow and careful? If some scientists say that we could cause Global Cooling or Global Warming -- shouldn't we look into it? And if the prediction is wrong, the greatest threat is that some company didn't make as big a profit as they wanted to.
Because that's the balance here; you have concerned scientists and environmentalists and you have companies. Steadily, the "right to profit" for the company is seen as paramount. No environmentalist action can be taken if it hurts profits and cannot be proven. Government is abdicating its role to protect the greater good.
I mean, it would sure make nuclear energy cheaper if we just dumped the waste in a big pile. But, the pollution that would cause would cost society many times more than the profits of the company. It's shifting the burden and costs from companies and to society.
And as the previous poster mentioned; "Actually, they do it to put some IP in their seeds, and then prevent farmers to reuse their seeds the next year. Do you think they do it to reduce the usage of chemicals ? Actually, they also produce the chemicals, that you cannot use without agreeing to use their seeds."
Yeah. That was some of the first laws written into the books for the New Iraqi government. They can't keep seeds, and they can't grow any crops but those from Monsanto or ADM. Talk about control. Would you want the future of your food supply dependent upon a hostile foreign power who could decide not to give you next years crop?
And as the anonymous scientist posted before, you don't have to be a "greenie" to have a rational notion that these sorts of things need to be done very carefully. The only guiding principle controlling ADM and Monsanto right now is profit. It isn't very profitable to make people self-sufficient and independent of you. Much more profitable is a system of addiction and dependence.
Also notice, that if you want to make a good living as a "speaker" or an "expert" on TV -- you just have to pick an industry that does damage and come up with theories to explain them away. Or, are we going to say all the Pulmonary Doctors who used to push the idea that cigarettes were good for you weren't influenced? I'm not saying this as a blanket statement for all companies. But the
In a lawsuit, Apple vs. Microsoft, concerning Video for Windows 1.4d (I believe), Microsoft was found guilty of stealing code. In fact, when comparing the API of Microsoft's early entry into video on computers, the actual BINARIES MATCHED UP -- meaning, no code was changed. This was done by a third party -- but it was proved that Microsoft had knowledge of it. That was the time that Steve Jobs got Microsoft to "invest" in Apple and to share networking code and cross-license patents for a time. It was a brilliant move -- instead of just getting some petty cash from Microsoft, Steve bought some security and credibility for his company.
... I haven't even touched much more thorough and comprehensive lists on this subject.
Bill Gates started his illustrious career with the programming language BASIC. Only, we was in a user group of pioneering computer geeks who were freely swapping this language to help them control computer boards. Bill Gates took all the open code and copyrighted it. It started his whole career.
A few years later, IBM was looking for a simple OS that would help them run some lower end computers. They went to the creator of CPM who blew them off. Then, knowing of Bill Gates enterprising nature, they went to him to try and get a "third party" copy of CPM. Bill farmed this job out to another person who hacked CPM and gave it back to him. The difference between CPM and MS-DOS at the time was that the "C:" drive and "A:" drive letters were swapped. One of the reasons IBM never took license of the DOS was that they were afraid they would get sued and wanted to keep a buffer between them and the creator of CPM. This kind of explains the best "luck" in the history of comptuers -- how Bill Gates was a contractor allowed to own the OS.
You can go back and look up other interesting stories of Excell and VisiCalc.
Early windows "borrowed" heavily from Apple -- Bill Gates had a lot of insider knowledge being a developer with Apple. Steve Jobs has made many legal mistakes in his life when it comes to covering is butt in copyrights. His limited licensing of Apple APIs gave a loop hole that allowed Bill to borrow a lot of designs of his. Please don't go back to the "Xerox" thing -- that's another issue and it's been misconstrued a lot.
Anyway, there is a lot more, like OLE (object Linking and Embedding) which was taken from an MS developer.
ActiveX controls utilize some patented techniques -- I forget the lawsuit that quietly went away on that.
Google Stacker Software.
But personally, I feel pretty safe from a "Slander charge" because, to sue me, Microsoft would have to open up code to a jury and prove that they hadn't "borrowed" anything. Then there would be all the entries I could just clip out of old newspapers.
And, I think Microsoft licensed most of their web code from SpyGlass -- not Mosaic. SpyGlass made their living for a time just licensing out web browser code. Again though, I think there was also a lawsuit the buried concerning the TCPIP stack.
I wasn't flamebait/trolling -- I just thought I was stating common knowledge and it would be tiresome to go back and reference it. I think that's why you got a "0" on the mod points.
Well, If everyone OBEYED the secrecy laws provided for by the Patriot Act -- I'm sure that such an accusation would be speculation.
p ost/012499
The only people who have anything to fear are those who are terrorists? Somehow, our government is secretly competent -- while they brilliantly throw off the enemy by being totally incompetent in public. To take the handling of Katrina and the bungling of the rebuilding of Iraq and then assume that our glorious leaders are going to get it right when they aren't in the public eye is perhaps the greatest of faith-based tin foil hat theories.
Here's an article, and it links to a 400 page NSA document where, the students aren't random -- but anti war. You know, Peace mongers -- real threats like Quakers; http://news.yahoo.com/s/huffpost/20051218/cm_huff
Domestic spying. People can be secretly arrested and never charged. The government has all the ability to disappear anyone they don't like and call them a terrorist and they never have to see a court. It doesn't matter that you can reassure us that it HASN"T happened yet. You don't know that anymore than I do. All power is supposed to be in the hands of the people, when not explicitly allowed to the government. You don't allow the government the "ability to torture" and then they promise that they won't. What sort of logic is that?
Well, I found my own way to interpret this "mash-up" data.
.80 gives us 1,646 rounded down.
Take the total # of flaws of the Linux distros; 2,328.
The number of distros including Mac -- by pulling a guess out of my hat; 12
Since, we can assume that most UNIX distros are similiar, and we'll be kind by saying the Mac has the same number of flaws, Just divide the total by the platforms and you get... 194.
And, since we can assume this is an "independent analyst" paid for by Microsoft -- we can safely assume that they buried vulnerabilities from Internet Explorer, Entourage/Outlook, and Microsoft Office as the flaws affected multiple operating systems while just throwing in the app flaws that came with the *NIX boxes. So, you can assume that 80% of all vulnerabilities in applications are from these three Microsoft apps. So 2,058 *
So any single UNIX has about 194 flaws versus 2,458 flaws attributed to Microsoft products. Of course, I could be wrong, but since we are pulling figures our of our collective butts here -- what the hey, right?
But, if you are purchasing software per flaw (and well call the LINUX distros free except for Mac) so, it is still more expensive for each flaw that you get on all combined *NIX's -- since the author assumes you are buying every NIX to acquire every flaw you possibly can. Windows comes out ahead on less cost per flaw.
I really didn't add in SUN -- that would reduce the number of flaws per NIX and greatly increase the cost per flaw. UNIX really needs to step up here -- a user has to really invest in a lot of platforms to achieve a good allotment of flaws.
I'd mod this a +5 Alternate Reality.
This war has seen the largest protests in the history of the world.
When Bush last visited England, they had half the police force protecting him and holding off protesters.
More Europeans will come to see the light as the Islamists continue attacking Europeans in Europe. It is amazing how quickly that clears the mind.
So, how's that war on terror going? The Taliban has been good for GWB and GWB has been good for the Taliban. Terrorism is a tactic, and will always be with us as it is the only way for armies that are poor and don't have cruise missiles and tanks to fight superior enemies. My tactic for a war on terror would be using international police cooperation, and enforcing better labor practices around the world so that more people are employed and more people can be fed. Also, by not commiting acts of terrorism ourselves and supporting tyrants. You know, like Saudi Arabia, where 17 of the 19 terrorists came from who hit the world trade centers (although not so sure of this now, since some of them have shown up alive and are working as commerical pilots in Egypt and Saudi Arabia).
NATO is in Afghanistan So what is your point? Yes, even the French are helping us there. Even still, the rebuilding is being botched there and we only have control by bribing warlords. Opium production is off the charts.
Coalition forces in Iraq now number fewer than 23,000 from 24 countries, down from about 50,000 from 38 countries in 2003.
Yes, the ones we bribed or harassed into going are pulling out. Many because of the unpopularity. Other than England, their sole purpose was to make it look like we had support. Costa Rica and Uzbekistan? Were they used as an honor guard?
The Cuban Missile Crisis...
If Kennedy had provided air support they probably would have been successful -- but he chickened out. One of his biggest mistakes. Actual missiles aimed at us, I would think, is a compelling reason. They even had photos of the missiles -- not drawings that Colin Powell had to trot out. The less known part of this story, is that Kennedy agreed to pull out his missiles from Turkey if Russia would pull out missiles from Cuba. It repaired Kennedy's image somewhat -- but it was also a good trade. Actually protecting the people of America is a good thing.
Collin Powel could have been another Eisenhower, unfortunately, many on the left would find a black moderate Republican president intollerable.
I think we liberals should be allowed to talk for ourselves. Dems voted in a Moderate with Clinton. Powel never defined himself by either party. If you bothered to check, the polls and the actual interests of Dems showed a big interest in Powel as a president. But he hitched his horses with Bush. Then, he made the biggest mistake of his life (his words) when he presented that phony evidence before the UN. Why don't you point to actual events to make a point? If we'd had our choice of Republicans, Powel would have been more palatable to Liberals than Bush. Perhaps the DLC would have an issue -- but that's their own game of playing politics. I can easily distinguish the two.
Oddly enough, JF Kennedy is more similar to GWB in terms of foreign and domestic policy than to JF Kerry.
Did JFK fail at every business he ran? Did he take property by the power of the government and give it to financial backers? Did JFK murder the English language and embarass the country? They both had corrupt ancestors -- so, maybe that's what you mean by similiar.
We poured enormous resources into WW2. This war is being fought practically on a shoe string budget in comparison.
WW2 was a real war. In Iraq, we invaded a more or less defenseless nation. Before the "declaired war" in Iraq, our planes were dropping ordinance on Iraq to soften them up for about 6 months (heard that from a pilot). The Iraq war could have been run on a shoestring budget if we had hired Iraqis to help rebuild -- and if we had people who k
Hastert got about $120,000 from Abramoff to make sure that he got a "right of way" on the Indian Gambling.
So, for a top tier politician, I'm guessing it is about $20k per "incident". Maybe just $5k for a lower Congressman per vote -- if the "leaders" can't get enough to votes. Beyond just committees, I'm guessing actual votes cost more -- and then if you get into onerous issues like the Bankruptcy Reform Bill, you have to hire a few flunkies like Neal Boortz to tell everyone how toxic sludge is good for you (I think that became a book or a movie, right?). So, it kind of depends upon scale. But $5k to $20k sounds about right to me -- per incident. Multiply that by the number you need to buy and whether it is an election year (X4 for election year on a bad vote). Still, pennies on the dollar for the profits that a corporation makes from buying a Politico or two. About 1,000 to 1 ROI.
If only I could "invest" and buy a percentage of the Republican Party -- not a whole Senator or anything, just a portion. In the last 5 years, stock in the RP must have gone up like 2000 %. Best investment going, if you ask me.
This won't dry up. Winning the IP war is too important for this government. It isn't about Music or Movies -- it's about OWNERSHIP being more important than LABOR. You can work for a living and starve and not educate your kids,... but darn anyone who gets in the way of dividend profits.
Patenting genes and outlawing seeds is the future. You may not even have RIGHTS to your memories or parts of your body. No, expect the strongest political pressure to come from the US government to get Russia to adopt the RIAA rules. A lot of taxpayer money will be used as a carrot for Russia to accept this. The RIAA will not be allowed to go bankrupt.
Funny and true.
The only reason they make fun of people wearing "tin foil hats" is because THEY, don't want you wearing the tin foil hats.
Everyone insightful these days is a "conspiracy theorist." What an effective conspiracy!
I think you should keep quite about the "buy Gold" comment.
Just tell your friends and Pro-Liberty Progressives.
Keep it on the "down low" you know? I've decided my new years resolution was not to interfere with people who don't know their own best interest and are determined to self-destruct. When it "hits the fan" you at least get the satisfaction of hearing these folks say; "Wow, this financial collapse came as a complete surprise -- nobody could have foreseen that Trickle Down would have been such a dismal failure." Almost has humorous as Media Coverage of; "Rich people missing, somehow, all the American companies are now Bermuda companies -- amazing. Unfortunately, we don't have any experts around to explain this to you, because they are also, all missing."