Their economics were basically other people get engagement by posting stuff, and they ride the coattails to make money off of it.
Years ago, when the service was moderately popular, they could've just implemented a system by which people who have a *lot* of followers have to pay money to tweet to them.
Set up something like people get 100k points a day, and you can store up to 1M points. If you have 10k followers, you can send 10 tweets a day for free... anything over that, you pay for. And you can tweet for free to 1 million followers if you're only tweeting every 10 days.
But those people paying for bots to follow them *also* have to pay twitter for the right to send messages to those bots. Corporations and people getting paid as 'influencers' have to give some money back to twitter for using their network to send messages to their followers.
I'm just throwing out some numbers here... maybe you don't have a hard cap, but you have it so you can carry over a percentage from day to day. The basic idea is that those people who profit from your service have to pay in... and those people still trying to build a following get to participate free 'til they hit some threshold
There's only a handful, but it's taking death metal songs, and changing the lyrics to cooking lessons.
I'm more of a heavy metal / thrash metal person, though... Ministry, Gwar, and Prong are typically the closest to death metal that I regularly listen to. (although I *do* have Napalm Death's Utopia Banished in my library)
Why did all of us who have data in SQL databases have to convert over to use noSQL type logic in web browsers?
Because every browser used SQLite to implement WebSQL. That's only one implementation, and therefore, w3c dropped it... so we all had to convert over our code to use IndexedDB instead.
This would basically leave us with WebKit and Chromium... if they didn't both agree to implement something (and do it differently), you couldn't have a w3c recommendation.
It was one of those why I bitched about HTTPS Only... and seemed to be the only person who complained about it:
https://github.com/GSA/https/i...... but I'm actually surprised that these websites are up at all. In 2013, we were told to take down all servers that weren't necessary for the protection of government property or human life, because we wouldn't be able to monitor them if someone were to hack them. I had a couple that were serving space weather data, and had to deal with being 'essential on-call' or whatever that horrible designation was.
I'm glad I don't have to deal with crap like this any more... unfortunately, the group that I get paid through now gets most of their money through NSF, so I can work on my grant, but won't be able to get my invoices paid after mid-February.
Oh... and the certs in question use the Department of Commerce CA, but most browsers (all except MSIE?) don't trust them.
I'm also on an SE. And I only bought that because when they started taking the headphone back, I bought it for when my Palm Pre3 finally died. (about 6 months later, when the security certs were slowly expiring, then I cracked the screen).
I've been on it for almost 2 years now, and I'm really not a fan. I can't even sync it to my laptop, as I stopped updating the OS when my Adobe Creative Suite started losing applications that would run. (you'd think keeping iOS and MacOS both on older versions would work, but nope, iTunes refuses to see the phone, even though photos transfer across just fine... and without iTunes, I can't set it up for wireless sync)
I'm only wedded to MacOS because of software (BBEdit, bits of Adobe CS that still work (*sob* not InDesign)... but even then, I generally get 5+ years out of a laptop, and I have no desire to go to one of the touchbar ones.
What I'd really like to find is anyone who's mapped out what apps best replicate WebOS on Android. (a calendar program that doesn't show you midnight to 8am when all of your entries for that day are in the evening; a mail program that lets you have more than one message open so you can copy & paste from them; a way to select w/out having your finger block what you're selecting; probably too much to ask for a real keyboard.)
But well, if companies want to sell luxury products to the masses, they need masses that have money... and although people might not be as bad off as they were a few years back, I suspect that much is become of belt tightening, not just marginally better income)
(I was also a sysadmin for a company that had moved over to Apple XServes... by the time I left last year, they were using Mac Minis w/ attached storage because of our problems w/ other companies... but that also mean we had less CPU and RAM as we were "upgrading" our machines. And Penguin RAIDs are a bit of a PITA under linux)
Years ago, I helped a friend learn python, which is a language that I didn't know or use at the time. Her job didn't actually requiring programming, but she had to clean up a few CSV files that she had.
She got one of the programmers on her team to write something to merge the files. Basically, one had a list of items and numerical IDs, and the other one was new inputs that needed to be stemmed and have the appropriate IDs inserted if there was one.
And yet there was *no* *way* that the code would run to completion (a bad loop in the stemmer), or even run at all (other coding mistakes). It used too much memory (it read both files into arrays, rather than read the smaller one and process the larger one line by line), and it was horribly inefficient (it re-parsed the file of IDs for each line it was trying to find the ID for, rather than building a hash table).
When I finally got the program to run to completion, it took 30+ minutes. I fixed the problems above, and it ran in ~20 seconds.... but the output was bad... it hardly found any matches, as the stemming didn't bother to actually do anything. I re-wrote it in perl so I could pre-compile a few regexes to do the stemming, and it ran in 1 sec, and it actually worked.... and then she told me it came from one of the best programmers in her group, who made at least 3x what I did. But she worked for a major social media company in Silicon Valley, and I worked for a NASA contractor near DC, so there might have been *some* locality issues, but 3x as much for someone who can't code for crap, and he's their best programmer?
The problem is, he might not actually think he's a fraud... but in my eyes, this is the sort of crap I'd expect out of someone who hadn't coded for more than a year, at least, not professionally.
It's one thing if it's the people riding the scooters are the ones getting injured.
It's another thing if it's people they run into, or someone trips on a scooter that some idiot just dumped on the ground (because none of these things have stations to park them, like rental bikes)
You'd make a fortune in Kentucky. When I lived there ~20 years ago if you saw someone use their turn signals on I64, it was even odds that they had out-of-state plates.
I have no idea what the situation is now, but based on my co-workers being surprised when I turned my head to check my blind spot when changing lanes, I'm guessing it hasn't changed much.
Data is singular when it's an abbreviation of the collective noun 'dataset'. The only people that I know that insist 'data' is plural are 60+ year old scientists who speak Latin.
For those of you who insist that 'data' is plural, then by that same logic, 'agenda' (a collection of agendum) is also plural.
You don't build a satellite, then get the lowest bidder. You have to figure out where you want the spacecraft, then which launch vehicles are powerful enough to get something around the weight you estimate into the proper place. Then you have all of the fiddly bits to make sure it's small enough and light enough so you can still reach the right orbit.
(disclaimer: I used to work for the Solar Data Analysis Center)
STEREO's launch was almost delayed (even further than it already was because of the strike + spy satellites cutting in line) because they had to swap to a heavier battery for the self destruct of the second stage... JPL managed to find an alternate orbit that they could achieve with the extra weight that would still let the mission have a chance at accomplishing its goals.
Too bad Tensor was a real prick. But it got me working with Cletus before he started Fark. (Nooster, Cheyenne and I were the other early admins on there)
Apple's been telling people that to protect their smaller devices, they basically need to put *something* around it. (remember the sock? or that band to deal with antenna issues?)
But wireless charging uses induction, and the further apart the induction pads are, the worse the charging performance (which might be related to their overheating problems, as they need to use move power). So if Apple's really serious about this, they need to come up with a phone that doesn't need a case... which might piss off other companies in the accessory ecosystem.
I'd love to use wireless charging again... but I'm not giving up a headphone port for it. I went from a Palm Pre (with the replaced back for wireless charging) and Pre3 to an iphone SE... because it had a headphone jack. But even as a 30+ year apple user, I doubt I'll be getting another iphone, as the OS just pisses me off too much.
I worked for a university that had a 'no changing your username... ever' policy. In 1994, we set up a new machine, and had the typical login name land-grab.
One of the people was really excited about getting in early enough to get 'john@...'.
I don't remember how long it was before he came back begging us to let him change his account because he was getting so many e-mails of 'are you John (whatever)?' as people who didn't know about 'finger' would spray e-mails trying to find people, but I know he didn't last the year.
I suspect that it's a little of both -- higher ups think that good schools are only about metric, but you're right in that vocational classes (shop, automotive, printing, home ec) cost a hell of a lot more to start and operate vs. a "normal" classroom:
They take up more space
They need special equipment that has to be purchased & maintained: bandsaws, lathes, small engines, presses, stoves, sewing machines
They require "stuff" to operate: wood, screws, oil, gasoline, paper, food, fabric
They can cause injuries (so either pay-outs or insurance) : severed thumbs, crushed fingers, burns, etc.
I would *love* to see more vo-tech classes. I'm pretty sure that most "core" classes could be centered around cooking classes (reading, math, chemistry, physics, history, geography, health). Writing is the only strange one (food blogging? writing clear recipes?) and if they still teach civics (rice vs. wheat cultures?)
I do agree that 'indoctrination' is blatant over reach. Unless of course that you consider that the school system was set up in some areas so that factories had a supply of capable drones, and we had citizens with skills so they didn't become a burden on society.
My only reluctance towards bringing back votech classes today is that with today's American teaching style (stressing out the kids) and without stable families, you have many more disruptive kids than when I was in school 25+ years ago. The kids who could most benefit from votech (lower income neighborhoods) are more likely to believe that education isn't important and thus more detached from class. You get someone disruptive in a votech class, and you now have a disruptive kid with access to weapons.
What I *have* heard about is high schools that are attached to senior centers; they tend to have a calming effect (scared of your grandmother finding out what you've done?), and it'd be a great way for retirees to pass down their knowledge to a new generation.
You can't outsource a plumber. Or an auto mechanic. Maybe they can find someone a little bit cheaper, but you're not competing with people on the other side of the world.
But unless you have a specialist niche, you are easily replaced. Or at least, management thinks so. (I've been fired/"let go" twice, and both times it took three people to replace me as I have a strange combination of skills; and both tried getting me to come back afterwards)
My older brother is a college dropout who made more money than me (master's degree) as an auto mechanic. He changed jobs last year (to advising car dealerships) because he didn't want to work every other Saturday now that he has three young kids... and he still makes more than me.
It's also worth mentioning that he's been on This Old House this last season, as they've added apprenticing to the shows (which I really like, as they have someone to ask questions about why they're doing something) :
There was something I saw years ago, where people were able to identify photoshopped images by looking at shadows -- if you put an object into a picture, the lighting on it might not match.
If you could automate it, that might be one test to see how 'authentic' it is... but you'd have to have it not trigger on things like text or logos added in.
I set it up after pestering from one of my classmates in grad school to bulk up numbers for a group for our program.
Years later, after they had opened it up, and it wasn't just for '.edu' addresses, one of my friends mentions it, and how great it is. So I casually mentioned that I had an account.
And the next time I see him, he insisted that I didn't, because he searched for me. I explained that's because I didn't put my last name on it (as there are less than a dozen in the US with it, and I had a stalker during undergrad), so he'd have to search by e-mail.
The next time I see him, he said he looked. So I reminded him that I got it back when you had to have a '.edu' address.
The next time, I see him he said he looked... and I reminded him that no, I got fired from that university, and they forced me to change e-mail addresses (I pissed off management when I was a sysadmin, so they locked the account I had gotten 10 years before in undergrad, but had to give me a new one as I was still taking classes)
Again, he complains that it's not there. I asked him if he remembered that I said I got it during grad school, which was at a different school.
And that night, I get an email about a friend request. I logged in, friended his wife, his brother-in-law, and an ex (a mutual friend)... and not him.
I logged in the next day to see that they had all been accepted.
I haven't logged in since.
I thought about deleting it when they changed their privacy policy a decade or so ago, but I suspected that I'd have to agree to the new policy to get in there far enough to delete the account... so they have my first name, last initial, where I went to grad school, and potentially a few people that I know.
The only possible explanation that I could come up with is if the commercial was supposed to be someone from the future, and they're talking to someone so old that they were from today's era.
But if you're going to do that, you need some flying cars or something to suggest that it's in the future.
As it is now, it's just a free-range child mouthing off to her neighbor.
I wish I had bought CS6 when I knew what was happening. I use InDesign at most 3 times a year for scientific posters... but InDesign CS5 doesn't work on more recent versions of MacOSX. (I know it crashed on load in Yosemite and after... CS6 might also)
I don't need recent features, I just need to make my posters, and I'm used to it. (after having to learn it after they killed PageMaker)
The laptop that I'm limping along is probably 7+ years old, and the battery's shot. (won't hold a charge... which really sucks with the mag connector)
When I next have to make posters, I'll probably spend the $400 for Quark XPress rather than give money to Adobe.. but that also means that I'll likely need to allocate extra time to learn how to use it, set up a new design template, etc. (and I assume I'll still keep the old laptop around, for when I need to extract things from my old posters and such)
Most people don't know that there are a LOT of dark archives out there. They're used to back up journals and rare books to ensure that they should something happen (publishers go out of business, fires, etc.)
I saw a talk once about a dark archive for music research. (I think it was at Research Data Access and Preservation, but could've been ASIS&T). They allowed people to submit jobs to run against it, but it was important that the results couldn't be used to recreate the music (possibly in conjunction with other results), as that could violate copyright.
It would be nice if Google would do something similar. It could be used to find when words and phrases were first used (although maybe not in context, but could give a reference), etc
That's not to say that finding better families for foster care wouldn't help a lot of kids w/ mental problems. (especially if there's one neglected kid who starts taking it out on the other kids, resulting in all ending up with issues)...
But my first thought about this was 'doesn't suicide rate go up for the holidays?' Those are the times we spend with family. Now, maybe it's because people can't afford presents for the kids after getting laid off and they see themselves as a failure (so it's related to the materialism).
But for others, it's just dealing with family. Is my mom/grandmom/whoever going to pester me about not having a (boy|girl)friend/not liking my (boy|girl)friend/not being married/not having kids/not having a job/not having a good enough job/not being straight/whatever else?
I'd hang out w/ one of my brothers more... perhaps some cousins... maybe see my dad more than once every 5 years or so... but the rest of the family? I'll pass.
Slashdot Mirror
Their economics were basically other people get engagement by posting stuff, and they ride the coattails to make money off of it.
Years ago, when the service was moderately popular, they could've just implemented a system by which people who have a *lot* of followers have to pay money to tweet to them.
Set up something like people get 100k points a day, and you can store up to 1M points. If you have 10k followers, you can send 10 tweets a day for free ... anything over that, you pay for. And you can tweet for free to 1 million followers if you're only tweeting every 10 days.
But those people paying for bots to follow them *also* have to pay twitter for the right to send messages to those bots. Corporations and people getting paid as 'influencers' have to give some money back to twitter for using their network to send messages to their followers.
I'm just throwing out some numbers here ... maybe you don't have a hard cap, but you have it so you can carry over a percentage from day to day. The basic idea is that those people who profit from your service have to pay in ... and those people still trying to build a following get to participate free 'til they hit some threshold
Linzey Rae's Metal Kitchen never fails to make me smile:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
There's only a handful, but it's taking death metal songs, and changing the lyrics to cooking lessons.
I'm more of a heavy metal / thrash metal person, though ... Ministry, Gwar, and Prong are typically the closest to death metal that I regularly listen to. (although I *do* have Napalm Death's Utopia Banished in my library)
Why did all of us who have data in SQL databases have to convert over to use noSQL type logic in web browsers?
Because every browser used SQLite to implement WebSQL. That's only one implementation, and therefore, w3c dropped it ... so we all had to convert over our code to use IndexedDB instead.
This would basically leave us with WebKit and Chromium ... if they didn't both agree to implement something (and do it differently), you couldn't have a w3c recommendation.
It was one of those why I bitched about HTTPS Only ... and seemed to be the only person who complained about it:
https://github.com/GSA/https/i... ... but I'm actually surprised that these websites are up at all. In 2013, we were told to take down all servers that weren't necessary for the protection of government property or human life, because we wouldn't be able to monitor them if someone were to hack them. I had a couple that were serving space weather data, and had to deal with being 'essential on-call' or whatever that horrible designation was.
I'm glad I don't have to deal with crap like this any more ... unfortunately, the group that I get paid through now gets most of their money through NSF, so I can work on my grant, but won't be able to get my invoices paid after mid-February.
Oh ... and the certs in question use the Department of Commerce CA, but most browsers (all except MSIE?) don't trust them.
Let's Encrypt is bad, but it's still better than the self-signed crap that the feds keep deploying.
But I'll still count this under #3 of why I said this was a bad idea: https://github.com/GSA/https/i...
I'm also on an SE. And I only bought that because when they started taking the headphone back, I bought it for when my Palm Pre3 finally died. (about 6 months later, when the security certs were slowly expiring, then I cracked the screen).
I've been on it for almost 2 years now, and I'm really not a fan. I can't even sync it to my laptop, as I stopped updating the OS when my Adobe Creative Suite started losing applications that would run. (you'd think keeping iOS and MacOS both on older versions would work, but nope, iTunes refuses to see the phone, even though photos transfer across just fine ... and without iTunes, I can't set it up for wireless sync)
I'm only wedded to MacOS because of software (BBEdit, bits of Adobe CS that still work (*sob* not InDesign) ... but even then, I generally get 5+ years out of a laptop, and I have no desire to go to one of the touchbar ones.
What I'd really like to find is anyone who's mapped out what apps best replicate WebOS on Android. (a calendar program that doesn't show you midnight to 8am when all of your entries for that day are in the evening; a mail program that lets you have more than one message open so you can copy & paste from them; a way to select w/out having your finger block what you're selecting; probably too much to ask for a real keyboard.)
But well, if companies want to sell luxury products to the masses, they need masses that have money ... and although people might not be as bad off as they were a few years back, I suspect that much is become of belt tightening, not just marginally better income)
(I was also a sysadmin for a company that had moved over to Apple XServes ... by the time I left last year, they were using Mac Minis w/ attached storage because of our problems w/ other companies ... but that also mean we had less CPU and RAM as we were "upgrading" our machines. And Penguin RAIDs are a bit of a PITA under linux)
Years ago, I helped a friend learn python, which is a language that I didn't know or use at the time. Her job didn't actually requiring programming, but she had to clean up a few CSV files that she had.
She got one of the programmers on her team to write something to merge the files. Basically, one had a list of items and numerical IDs, and the other one was new inputs that needed to be stemmed and have the appropriate IDs inserted if there was one.
And yet there was *no* *way* that the code would run to completion (a bad loop in the stemmer), or even run at all (other coding mistakes). It used too much memory (it read both files into arrays, rather than read the smaller one and process the larger one line by line), and it was horribly inefficient (it re-parsed the file of IDs for each line it was trying to find the ID for, rather than building a hash table).
When I finally got the program to run to completion, it took 30+ minutes. I fixed the problems above, and it ran in ~20 seconds. ... but the output was bad ... it hardly found any matches, as the stemming didn't bother to actually do anything. I re-wrote it in perl so I could pre-compile a few regexes to do the stemming, and it ran in 1 sec, and it actually worked. ... and then she told me it came from one of the best programmers in her group, who made at least 3x what I did. But she worked for a major social media company in Silicon Valley, and I worked for a NASA contractor near DC, so there might have been *some* locality issues, but 3x as much for someone who can't code for crap, and he's their best programmer?
The problem is, he might not actually think he's a fraud ... but in my eyes, this is the sort of crap I'd expect out of someone who hadn't coded for more than a year, at least, not professionally.
It's one thing if it's the people riding the scooters are the ones getting injured.
It's another thing if it's people they run into, or someone trips on a scooter that some idiot just dumped on the ground (because none of these things have stations to park them, like rental bikes)
You'd make a fortune in Kentucky. When I lived there ~20 years ago if you saw someone use their turn signals on I64, it was even odds that they had out-of-state plates.
I have no idea what the situation is now, but based on my co-workers being surprised when I turned my head to check my blind spot when changing lanes, I'm guessing it hasn't changed much.
Data is singular when it's an abbreviation of the collective noun 'dataset'. The only people that I know that insist 'data' is plural are 60+ year old scientists who speak Latin.
For those of you who insist that 'data' is plural, then by that same logic, 'agenda' (a collection of agendum) is also plural.
Because it's been planned for YEARS.
You don't build a satellite, then get the lowest bidder. You have to figure out where you want the spacecraft, then which launch vehicles are powerful enough to get something around the weight you estimate into the proper place. Then you have all of the fiddly bits to make sure it's small enough and light enough so you can still reach the right orbit.
(disclaimer: I used to work for the Solar Data Analysis Center)
STEREO's launch was almost delayed (even further than it already was because of the strike + spy satellites cutting in line) because they had to swap to a heavier battery for the self destruct of the second stage ... JPL managed to find an alternate orbit that they could achieve with the extra weight that would still let the mission have a chance at accomplishing its goals.
Too bad Tensor was a real prick. But it got me working with Cletus before he started Fark. (Nooster, Cheyenne and I were the other early admins on there)
Apple's been telling people that to protect their smaller devices, they basically need to put *something* around it. (remember the sock? or that band to deal with antenna issues?)
But wireless charging uses induction, and the further apart the induction pads are, the worse the charging performance (which might be related to their overheating problems, as they need to use move power). So if Apple's really serious about this, they need to come up with a phone that doesn't need a case ... which might piss off other companies in the accessory ecosystem.
I'd love to use wireless charging again ... but I'm not giving up a headphone port for it. I went from a Palm Pre (with the replaced back for wireless charging) and Pre3 to an iphone SE ... because it had a headphone jack. But even as a 30+ year apple user, I doubt I'll be getting another iphone, as the OS just pisses me off too much.
I worked for a university that had a 'no changing your username ... ever' policy. In 1994, we set up a new machine, and had the typical login name land-grab.
One of the people was really excited about getting in early enough to get 'john@...'.
I don't remember how long it was before he came back begging us to let him change his account because he was getting so many e-mails of 'are you John (whatever)?' as people who didn't know about 'finger' would spray e-mails trying to find people, but I know he didn't last the year.
I suspect that it's a little of both -- higher ups think that good schools are only about metric, but you're right in that vocational classes (shop, automotive, printing, home ec) cost a hell of a lot more to start and operate vs. a "normal" classroom:
I would *love* to see more vo-tech classes. I'm pretty sure that most "core" classes could be centered around cooking classes (reading, math, chemistry, physics, history, geography, health). Writing is the only strange one (food blogging? writing clear recipes?) and if they still teach civics (rice vs. wheat cultures?)
I do agree that 'indoctrination' is blatant over reach. Unless of course that you consider that the school system was set up in some areas so that factories had a supply of capable drones, and we had citizens with skills so they didn't become a burden on society.
My only reluctance towards bringing back votech classes today is that with today's American teaching style (stressing out the kids) and without stable families, you have many more disruptive kids than when I was in school 25+ years ago. The kids who could most benefit from votech (lower income neighborhoods) are more likely to believe that education isn't important and thus more detached from class. You get someone disruptive in a votech class, and you now have a disruptive kid with access to weapons.
What I *have* heard about is high schools that are attached to senior centers; they tend to have a calming effect (scared of your grandmother finding out what you've done?), and it'd be a great way for retirees to pass down their knowledge to a new generation.
You can't outsource a plumber. Or an auto mechanic. Maybe they can find someone a little bit cheaper, but you're not competing with people on the other side of the world.
But in IT, we have American universities outsourcing to India , even though they could get cheap student labor (it's how I got started; my undergrad is CivE).
But unless you have a specialist niche, you are easily replaced. Or at least, management thinks so. (I've been fired/"let go" twice, and both times it took three people to replace me as I have a strange combination of skills; and both tried getting me to come back afterwards)
My older brother is a college dropout who made more money than me (master's degree) as an auto mechanic. He changed jobs last year (to advising car dealerships) because he didn't want to work every other Saturday now that he has three young kids ... and he still makes more than me.
His response:
http://mikerowe.com/2018/04/ot...
And interested students have until June 4th to submit an application for a scholarship from his foundation:
http://profoundlydisconnected....
It's also worth mentioning that he's been on This Old House this last season, as they've added apprenticing to the shows (which I really like, as they have someone to ask questions about why they're doing something) :
https://www.thisoldhouse.com/i...
There was something I saw years ago, where people were able to identify photoshopped images by looking at shadows -- if you put an object into a picture, the lighting on it might not match.
If you could automate it, that might be one test to see how 'authentic' it is ... but you'd have to have it not trigger on things like text or logos added in.
There is. WindowsOS.
Wait, no ... Firefox OS.
Symbian?
I have an account.
I set it up after pestering from one of my classmates in grad school to bulk up numbers for a group for our program.
Years later, after they had opened it up, and it wasn't just for '.edu' addresses, one of my friends mentions it, and how great it is. So I casually mentioned that I had an account.
And the next time I see him, he insisted that I didn't, because he searched for me. I explained that's because I didn't put my last name on it (as there are less than a dozen in the US with it, and I had a stalker during undergrad), so he'd have to search by e-mail.
The next time I see him, he said he looked. So I reminded him that I got it back when you had to have a '.edu' address.
The next time, I see him he said he looked ... and I reminded him that no, I got fired from that university, and they forced me to change e-mail addresses (I pissed off management when I was a sysadmin, so they locked the account I had gotten 10 years before in undergrad, but had to give me a new one as I was still taking classes)
Again, he complains that it's not there. I asked him if he remembered that I said I got it during grad school, which was at a different school.
And that night, I get an email about a friend request. I logged in, friended his wife, his brother-in-law, and an ex (a mutual friend) ... and not him.
I logged in the next day to see that they had all been accepted.
I haven't logged in since.
I thought about deleting it when they changed their privacy policy a decade or so ago, but I suspected that I'd have to agree to the new policy to get in there far enough to delete the account ... so they have my first name, last initial, where I went to grad school, and potentially a few people that I know.
The only possible explanation that I could come up with is if the commercial was supposed to be someone from the future, and they're talking to someone so old that they were from today's era.
But if you're going to do that, you need some flying cars or something to suggest that it's in the future.
As it is now, it's just a free-range child mouthing off to her neighbor.
hotmail.com is more affluent?
Maybe they're just older, as they give out 'live.com' these days, I thought.
I wish I had bought CS6 when I knew what was happening. I use InDesign at most 3 times a year for scientific posters ... but InDesign CS5 doesn't work on more recent versions of MacOSX. (I know it crashed on load in Yosemite and after ... CS6 might also)
I don't need recent features, I just need to make my posters, and I'm used to it. (after having to learn it after they killed PageMaker)
The laptop that I'm limping along is probably 7+ years old, and the battery's shot. (won't hold a charge ... which really sucks with the mag connector)
When I next have to make posters, I'll probably spend the $400 for Quark XPress rather than give money to Adobe .. but that also means that I'll likely need to allocate extra time to learn how to use it, set up a new design template, etc. (and I assume I'll still keep the old laptop around, for when I need to extract things from my old posters and such)
Most people don't know that there are a LOT of dark archives out there. They're used to back up journals and rare books to ensure that they should something happen (publishers go out of business, fires, etc.)
I saw a talk once about a dark archive for music research. (I think it was at Research Data Access and Preservation, but could've been ASIS&T). They allowed people to submit jobs to run against it, but it was important that the results couldn't be used to recreate the music (possibly in conjunction with other results), as that could violate copyright.
It would be nice if Google would do something similar. It could be used to find when words and phrases were first used (although maybe not in context, but could give a reference), etc
That's not to say that finding better families for foster care wouldn't help a lot of kids w/ mental problems. (especially if there's one neglected kid who starts taking it out on the other kids, resulting in all ending up with issues) ...
But my first thought about this was 'doesn't suicide rate go up for the holidays?' Those are the times we spend with family. Now, maybe it's because people can't afford presents for the kids after getting laid off and they see themselves as a failure (so it's related to the materialism).
But for others, it's just dealing with family. Is my mom/grandmom/whoever going to pester me about not having a (boy|girl)friend/not liking my (boy|girl)friend/not being married/not having kids/not having a job/not having a good enough job/not being straight/whatever else?
I'd hang out w/ one of my brothers more ... perhaps some cousins ... maybe see my dad more than once every 5 years or so ... but the rest of the family? I'll pass.