Objectivist Center and the Reason Foundation. The Reason Foundation publishes the libertarian magazine Reason and as Doom Ihl' Varia said in a previous post, the OC is concerned with promoting Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism. Both are entities which support laissez-faire capitalism.
I am surprised they joined in on this. Not because the project is in line with their ideas, but because they should (according to their beliefs) be promoting the removal of the state from regulatory functions such as these.
Re:Today's diesel engines are WAY better
on
239 MPG Car
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· Score: 1
Modern computer design has improved diesel engines to the point that the clattering sound you hear from old-style engines no longer exists on a 2002-manufactured diesel engine.
While I do not doubt this at all, at least on the 2002 VW Golf TDI I have, one of the ways VW cut down on the clattering isusing a rubber/poly timing belt rather than a timing chain. It makes the engine much quieter, but presents the possibility of a maintenance horror story if that belt fails. It's supposed to last 60,000 miles but there's no way I'm going to let it go that long.
I've had the TDI since Sept '01 and have never had a mechanical problem with it. I reliably get 600 mile tanks, it smokes only a bit on cold start-ups and under hard acceleration, and the performance is better than I expected. It should last me ten years.
That reasoning doesn't make sense. Nissan reportedly employs 80,000 people in North America. How many people does the company which uses Nissan.com employ? Certainly, if you are going to base your standard on the "greatest good" then that would be served better by giving the URL to the car company which (very likely) employs and affects a far larger number of people.
Personally, I think these lawsuits are baseless unless the website owner is making an effort to maliciously imitate or mislead people into thinking that site represents Nissan Motor Company. But your "needs of the people" bit doesn't stand up when you compare the number of people affected on each side. Granted, a ruling may impact future rulings and weigh them one way or another. You didn't indicate that, however.
Bob Massa, president of SearchKing., Inc. and PR Ad Network, filed a lawsuit today against Google on the grounds the organization arbitrarily and purposefully devalued his companies' and his customers' web sites, causing his business to suffer financially. Massa is asking that the court grant preliminary and permanent injunctions against Google.
SearchKing began business as an Internet search engine and web hosting company in 1997, approximately a year before Google's inception. In August 2002, PR Ad Network began placing text ads for businesses on web sites with a high PageRank from Google, thereby becoming one of very few competitors to Google's advertising service. According to the lawsuit, once Google became aware of this, it lowered SearchKing's PageRank and the ranking of the web sites it hosts.
PageRank (PR) is a Google-developed system of determining the value of a particular website. The PR of a site, which ranges from one to 10 (10 being the highest), is displayed publicly on each site visited through the use of the Google tool bar, which can be down loaded to any computer for free, PR value is determined several ways, including calculating the number of web pages (links) pointing to a particular page and how relevant they are to the topic at hand.
"From February of 2001 to last month, SearchKing's PageRank was seven" Massa said. "Within 30 days of launching PR Ad Network's services, our PageRank dropped to four"
Due to the high value associated with PR, Massa claims in his lawsuit that the purposeful reduction of SearchKing and its related web sites' rankings has damaged the company's reputation and diminished its value.
[...]
"This action by Google clearly demonstrates the free-trade threat that now faces all businesses with an Internet presence," Massa said. "If using the PageRank were a threat to Google, why would they release it to the public? In many ways, our use of PageRank serves only to validate the system."
This isn't a threat to free trade. Real threats to free trade come from government intervention and business fraud. Google, for reasons it choose on it's own (or maybe even through automated processes out of it's day-to-day monitoring), changed the rank of some webpages. This affected advertising revenue...but there is no mention of any contract among Google, SearchKing, and PR Ad Network formally laying out some mutually-beneficial binding system. This suit seems more like a grasping of straws rather than a serious case.
Seven bucks multiplied by (conservatively) hundreds of people.
If you are ever robbed, I hope you repeat those immortal words: "Who cares if he is a thief? Get off your high horse." Because, your stuff is "measly" compared to the wants of the needy, eh?
I was lucky enough to see Koyaanisqatsi in a theater with Glass and his orchestra doing the music live at the UT campus in Austin, TX. It's the only time I've seen it and even though I don't subscribe the environmentalist and anti-globalization movement's views of the film, I will admit it was an enjoyable experience.
Some people have complained that the film is too gimmicky and repetative. If they understood that this isn't supposed to be a regular film, they wouldn't have such a problem with it...they're pigeonholing the arc of the "story" and trying to fit a square peg into a triangular hole. The use of time-lapse photography is dismissed as gimmicky, but at the time was a novel and new way of filming. Just as the classic films of the 20th century have parts that feel clichéd, it's only because they either invented that way of telling a story or rode the wave of a new tide of using that method.
I thought the movie rocked. I'd love to get it on DVD.
The "perfect copy" is only partially true. It is rare for the original copy to be a "perfect" one in respect to resolution and quality since it is almost always downgraded/compressed to make it easier for others to download. It is true, however, that "perfect copies" of that original can be made and are. If that source copy is good enough, the distinction is lost on the masses and they accept the myth.
But wouldn't that time get lost in the lag from the Net? I have DSL at home (latest IE & latest 6x Opera) and use the office LAN at work (IE 5.5 & Opera 5.12) and the biggest delay is not in the page rendering, but the delay with the server it's on.
My generalization, based on the people I've interacted with since I've formed memories. This population includes people I see every day (family, work, friends, etc.), people I talk to occasionally (business clients, friends of friends, etc.), and people I meet either rarely or only one time (on the road, while shopping, far flung-friends and family, you-get-the-idea). Also included in this population are all the thousands of opinions, statements, and comments made by those I read online.
After several years of observing this ever-growing population, I've come to some general conclusions, only one of which is pertinent to this discussion.
Your Random Person is incapable of any technical computer work beyond reistalling software, rebooting, uninstalling programs, using Plug-n-Play devices, and creating desktop shortcuts. This technological ignorance, while not itself a necessarily good or bad thing, directly leads to a state where Random Person can be lead around more easily by 30-second soundbites and alarmist headlines. For example, I work with some pretty able IT folks in my department. They do web programming and database analysis, and yet they were frankly amazed when I told them I load 10 CDs worth of music on a single disc and play them on my car MP3 player. I believe the Average American is not technically proficient enough to effectively grasp the true nature of issues such as the RIAA vs. Fair Use. Hell, I wouldn't even call myself well-informed in many areas.
This may come off as elitist, but I mean no insult. I simply believe that a majority of Americans don't know enough about technology to usefully parse news reports to get at the heart of current issues. We rely too much on second hand sources, hearsay from relatives and friends, and accept what some authority figures say as fact.
So, when I say "Great job...give the media and the average American more reason to think the people the RIAA are against are little more than immature 'hackers'," I mean I don't believe it helps persuading Average Americans out there that what our opponents are saying about us are either outright lies, factual twists, hypocrisy, or contradiction. By doing exactly what our opponents decry is immoral, illegal, and wrong, we start the debate off on the wrong foot by giving the other side ammunition strong enough that it is persuasive to the point where I see people reading the headline and saying, "Damn hackers! They just can't stop messing around where they don't belong. Stealing music and software isn't enough, apparently. Now they do these traffic-jam net hacks."
Yeah, my sample is biased and my interpretation may be as well. However, that is all I have to go on and I believe that the generalization stands, generally. Obviously, this is a diverse country with millions of people who defy categorization. It doesn't change what I've experienced in my life.
It didn't look to me as though they were so much attacking the search engine per se, as they were simply commenting on it. Or that they were "attacking" anything, really--that's just the story submitter's slant.
No, the NYT article was slanted so far in the favor of one side, it should be considered an attack. It is just directed at all the companies and people that archive and publish information that others make available. However, it's kinda vile to mention Google not only in the TITLE of the article, but EIGHT other times within it. As someone else said earlier, it seems rather odd/wrong/unobjective for the article's author to make such a case for something and then devote merely a few lines for the other side's defense. It isn't as if contacting some admins at Google, other archival sites, or a goverment web admin and get their input is difficult for a reporter to do. It comes off more as a hit piece rather than news reporting.
Granted, this is more along the lines of those fluffy "personal interest" pieces, but that shouldn't be a barrier to the presentation of both sides of an arguement.
With the federalization of airport security, the never-ending barrage of new and intrusive legislation (DMCA, CBDTPA, CIPA, etc.) which erodes economic and civil liberty, the recently-placed tariffs on imported steel, a federal budget that grows larger every year, and so forth...your assertion that the United States is more capitalist every day is a joke. All the substantive advances (like the recent voucher ruling and the essence of last year's tax cuts) are offset by the system's inertia.
Capitalists value human life over everything else. Otherwise, how would capital and value be created without human reason to act upon the environment? Capitalists also value freedom over it's opposite (socialism) because that freedom allows humans to actually create and accumulate that capital.
I've never timed it, but my Win2k machine has been up for weeks at a time with no problems. I think it depends more on how you use your computer than an assumed intrinsic shittyness of the system you're on. Computer geeks tend to have the knowledge and skill to keep their machines going. Their parents, calling every weekend to plead for their help to fix their latest screw-up, don't. =)
The Millipede chip consists of a layer of plexiglass a couple of billionths of an inch thick laid on a silicon chip. To write a bit of data, a microscope tip, heated to 750 degrees Fahrenheit, softens the plexiglass and dents it.
To read data, the tip is heated to 570 degrees -- not hot enough to deform the plexiglass -- and pulled across the surface. When it falls into a dent, the tip cools because more surface area is in contact with the cooler plexiglass. That temperature drop reduces its electrical resistance, which can be easily measured.
To erase data, a hot tip is passed over the dent, causing it to pop up.
Those are pretty high temperatures. Might they affect reliability in the long run? Also, what about the actual lifetime of the plexiglass material they're heating up? How many times can it take the read/write/read/write process? Still, it's a nifty idea. Kudos to IBM.
Re:Blogs (and /.) are most definitely journalism!
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Blogging for Dummies?
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· Score: 1
Indeed, after reading news reports over the last few years, I've grown weary of the much-overused "senior administration official" or other source-naming cop-outs. It seems like half of what we're supposed to take seriously in the news media is anonymously spoken. I hate it on several fronts, the two most important being the requisite level of trust we must have in order to believe these vindictive and lying bastards and the distressing conclusion that far too many people in positions of power would rather speak their mind from the shadows rather than be honest and open about it. Yeah, there are occasions when source secrecy is very important and essential to the story being reported...but it's gone way, way too far.
As for the opinons of some who believe weblogs don't create news, I totally disagree. See the current turmoil created by Eric Alterman's recent foray into blogging (after commenting on the phenomenon negatively for some time), the community of readers who disseminate and discuss what Mickey Kaus and Glenn Reynolds have to say, Andrew Sullivan's staunch stance on the Catholic scandals, the rise of the American Prospect's and National Review's reporting and commentary and other cases where the bloggers themselves created news by commenting on something else. And let's be honest here, just because the news they created wasn't reported on by the AP or UPI and didn't make Nightline or Good Morning America doesn't lessen its news status, for it is news to the community they are part of.
Slashdot Mirror
Objectivist Center and the Reason Foundation. The Reason Foundation publishes the libertarian magazine Reason and as Doom Ihl' Varia said in a previous post, the OC is concerned with promoting Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism. Both are entities which support laissez-faire capitalism.
I am surprised they joined in on this. Not because the project is in line with their ideas, but because they should (according to their beliefs) be promoting the removal of the state from regulatory functions such as these.
Modern computer design has improved diesel engines to the point that the clattering sound you hear from old-style engines no longer exists on a 2002-manufactured diesel engine.
While I do not doubt this at all, at least on the 2002 VW Golf TDI I have, one of the ways VW cut down on the clattering isusing a rubber/poly timing belt rather than a timing chain. It makes the engine much quieter, but presents the possibility of a maintenance horror story if that belt fails. It's supposed to last 60,000 miles but there's no way I'm going to let it go that long.
I've had the TDI since Sept '01 and have never had a mechanical problem with it. I reliably get 600 mile tanks, it smokes only a bit on cold start-ups and under hard acceleration, and the performance is better than I expected. It should last me ten years.
That reasoning doesn't make sense. Nissan reportedly employs 80,000 people in North America. How many people does the company which uses Nissan.com employ? Certainly, if you are going to base your standard on the "greatest good" then that would be served better by giving the URL to the car company which (very likely) employs and affects a far larger number of people.
Personally, I think these lawsuits are baseless unless the website owner is making an effort to maliciously imitate or mislead people into thinking that site represents Nissan Motor Company. But your "needs of the people" bit doesn't stand up when you compare the number of people affected on each side. Granted, a ruling may impact future rulings and weigh them one way or another. You didn't indicate that, however.
Fucking hilarious! :)
Did they say what the bomb was made out of? Specifically, would "x-ray vision" reveal explosives like C4 or Semtex?
Seven bucks multiplied by (conservatively) hundreds of people.
If you are ever robbed, I hope you repeat those immortal words: "Who cares if he is a thief? Get off your high horse." Because, your stuff is "measly" compared to the wants of the needy, eh?
What is that...35 years in Internet time?
I was lucky enough to see Koyaanisqatsi in a theater with Glass and his orchestra doing the music live at the UT campus in Austin, TX. It's the only time I've seen it and even though I don't subscribe the environmentalist and anti-globalization movement's views of the film, I will admit it was an enjoyable experience.
Some people have complained that the film is too gimmicky and repetative. If they understood that this isn't supposed to be a regular film, they wouldn't have such a problem with it...they're pigeonholing the arc of the "story" and trying to fit a square peg into a triangular hole. The use of time-lapse photography is dismissed as gimmicky, but at the time was a novel and new way of filming. Just as the classic films of the 20th century have parts that feel clichéd, it's only because they either invented that way of telling a story or rode the wave of a new tide of using that method.
I thought the movie rocked. I'd love to get it on DVD.
You own the box to do as you see fit. Microsoft owns the right to make the box as they see fit. Stop yer bitchin' and work around it.
Andrew Sullivan's Book Club discussion of the book
Bjorn Lomborg's responses to critics
Third-party response to Scientific American's attack on the book
We have to be stoned in order to ease the pain of listening to hundreds of whiners bitch about "hacking."
The "perfect copy" is only partially true. It is rare for the original copy to be a "perfect" one in respect to resolution and quality since it is almost always downgraded/compressed to make it easier for others to download. It is true, however, that "perfect copies" of that original can be made and are. If that source copy is good enough, the distinction is lost on the masses and they accept the myth.
But wouldn't that time get lost in the lag from the Net? I have DSL at home (latest IE & latest 6x Opera) and use the office LAN at work (IE 5.5 & Opera 5.12) and the biggest delay is not in the page rendering, but the delay with the server it's on.
I know it's fashionable to dislike the Taliban...
This makes it sound as if you believe that dislike is inappropriate. Is it wrong to dislike such a repressive and viciously un-democratic theocracy?
Mmm...five pints of Bass Pale Ale is one pint too short! Keep'em coming!
Average American-
n.
My generalization, based on the people I've interacted with since I've formed memories. This population includes people I see every day (family, work, friends, etc.), people I talk to occasionally (business clients, friends of friends, etc.), and people I meet either rarely or only one time (on the road, while shopping, far flung-friends and family, you-get-the-idea). Also included in this population are all the thousands of opinions, statements, and comments made by those I read online.
After several years of observing this ever-growing population, I've come to some general conclusions, only one of which is pertinent to this discussion.
Your Random Person is incapable of any technical computer work beyond reistalling software, rebooting, uninstalling programs, using Plug-n-Play devices, and creating desktop shortcuts. This technological ignorance, while not itself a necessarily good or bad thing, directly leads to a state where Random Person can be lead around more easily by 30-second soundbites and alarmist headlines. For example, I work with some pretty able IT folks in my department. They do web programming and database analysis, and yet they were frankly amazed when I told them I load 10 CDs worth of music on a single disc and play them on my car MP3 player. I believe the Average American is not technically proficient enough to effectively grasp the true nature of issues such as the RIAA vs. Fair Use. Hell, I wouldn't even call myself well-informed in many areas.
This may come off as elitist, but I mean no insult. I simply believe that a majority of Americans don't know enough about technology to usefully parse news reports to get at the heart of current issues. We rely too much on second hand sources, hearsay from relatives and friends, and accept what some authority figures say as fact.
So, when I say "Great job...give the media and the average American more reason to think the people the RIAA are against are little more than immature 'hackers'," I mean I don't believe it helps persuading Average Americans out there that what our opponents are saying about us are either outright lies, factual twists, hypocrisy, or contradiction. By doing exactly what our opponents decry is immoral, illegal, and wrong, we start the debate off on the wrong foot by giving the other side ammunition strong enough that it is persuasive to the point where I see people reading the headline and saying, "Damn hackers! They just can't stop messing around where they don't belong. Stealing music and software isn't enough, apparently. Now they do these traffic-jam net hacks."
Yeah, my sample is biased and my interpretation may be as well. However, that is all I have to go on and I believe that the generalization stands, generally. Obviously, this is a diverse country with millions of people who defy categorization. It doesn't change what I've experienced in my life.
Give the media and the average American more reason to think the people the RIAA are against are little more than immature "hackers."
It didn't look to me as though they were so much attacking the search engine per se, as they were simply commenting on it. Or that they were "attacking" anything, really--that's just the story submitter's slant.
No, the NYT article was slanted so far in the favor of one side, it should be considered an attack. It is just directed at all the companies and people that archive and publish information that others make available. However, it's kinda vile to mention Google not only in the TITLE of the article, but EIGHT other times within it. As someone else said earlier, it seems rather odd/wrong/unobjective for the article's author to make such a case for something and then devote merely a few lines for the other side's defense. It isn't as if contacting some admins at Google, other archival sites, or a goverment web admin and get their input is difficult for a reporter to do. It comes off more as a hit piece rather than news reporting.
Granted, this is more along the lines of those fluffy "personal interest" pieces, but that shouldn't be a barrier to the presentation of both sides of an arguement.
With the federalization of airport security, the never-ending barrage of new and intrusive legislation (DMCA, CBDTPA, CIPA, etc.) which erodes economic and civil liberty, the recently-placed tariffs on imported steel, a federal budget that grows larger every year, and so forth...your assertion that the United States is more capitalist every day is a joke. All the substantive advances (like the recent voucher ruling and the essence of last year's tax cuts) are offset by the system's inertia.
Capitalists value human life over everything else. Otherwise, how would capital and value be created without human reason to act upon the environment? Capitalists also value freedom over it's opposite (socialism) because that freedom allows humans to actually create and accumulate that capital.
...there must come a point where financially there is no reason to buy a bigger drive because consumers cannot use it up.
*insert Bill Gate's memory quote here*
If for no other reason at all, that extra space will be filled with bloated software.
AOL CD's are now air dropped over your house instead of the mail - their small size lets them flutter down like little, shiny snowflakes.
But think of the fun that could be had with batting practice!
*WACK! WACK! WACK!*
If those robots had been equipped properly, they'd have nothing to worry about. =)
I've never timed it, but my Win2k machine has been up for weeks at a time with no problems. I think it depends more on how you use your computer than an assumed intrinsic shittyness of the system you're on. Computer geeks tend to have the knowledge and skill to keep their machines going. Their parents, calling every weekend to plead for their help to fix their latest screw-up, don't. =)
Indeed, after reading news reports over the last few years, I've grown weary of the much-overused "senior administration official" or other source-naming cop-outs. It seems like half of what we're supposed to take seriously in the news media is anonymously spoken. I hate it on several fronts, the two most important being the requisite level of trust we must have in order to believe these vindictive and lying bastards and the distressing conclusion that far too many people in positions of power would rather speak their mind from the shadows rather than be honest and open about it. Yeah, there are occasions when source secrecy is very important and essential to the story being reported...but it's gone way, way too far.
As for the opinons of some who believe weblogs don't create news, I totally disagree. See the current turmoil created by Eric Alterman's recent foray into blogging (after commenting on the phenomenon negatively for some time), the community of readers who disseminate and discuss what Mickey Kaus and Glenn Reynolds have to say, Andrew Sullivan's staunch stance on the Catholic scandals, the rise of the American Prospect's and National Review's reporting and commentary and other cases where the bloggers themselves created news by commenting on something else. And let's be honest here, just because the news they created wasn't reported on by the AP or UPI and didn't make Nightline or Good Morning America doesn't lessen its news status, for it is news to the community they are part of.