Well said. Spending a few extra bytes on the home page for a link to "What is Net Neutrality?" would have garnered a lot of goodwill.
The explanation wouldn't have to be lengthy, simply a few paragraphs with examples, written in layman's English, would have been very effective in dispelling all the FUD about net neutrality.
For non-technical folks like yourself, it's worth mentioning that deleting an "icon" (the picture that shows you AOL) won't always take care of the problem. In that case it will because it's a simple link but with most of the junk, no. It runs much deeper.
Here's why. The computer can actually do more than one thing at a time. So while you're in Facebook it may seem like nothing else is happening but there can be many other things running in what's called the "background".
You can see these things by starting a program called "Task Manager" but it's a little too technical to go into. Suffice it to say that you would need to go through an uninstall process for most of the preinstalled junk to truly get rid of it. Even then it may not remove it entirely.
So just deleting the icon won't do what you think it does. And deleting the software manually from the hard disk can cause a lot of problems because it messes up something in Windows called the "Registry" (again, too technical to get into).
It's very difficult to truly clean up this stuff in Microsoft Windows whereas the Apple MacIntosh or Linux operating systems don't have this problem. If you know someone familiar with computers the best bet is to ask them to help you out.
To be fair, there is a difference between serious, accredited universities and paper mills. If he's enrolled in one of the schools profiled in the Frontline documentary below, then he may simply be getting ripped off.
True, and poisoning the surveillance would be pretty easy through a grass roots effort. Imagine just a few hundred thousand different ips associated with the query "child bestiality porn" entered into the logs each day. The man always seems to underestimate the collective power of disgruntled netizens.
Alas, you're probably right. Although it's an interesting mental exercise to imagine someone like Jobs replacing Ballmer. Just in terms of CEO talent and risk taking, not the reality distortion field stuff.
It's hard to imagine someone like that standing by in a broken company and not taking the risk of "swinging the meat cleaver".
Microsoft wasted time on Vista and Ballmer. The fact that Apple's market cap is so close to Microsoft's now is the ultimate embarrassment. Shareholders shouldn't be happy about the lack of "innovation" through his tenure.
And it affects us all. Even if you don't own MSFT directly, you probably have skin in the game through your 401-k, mutual funds, etc.
He's like that nasty fart in an elevator that you really, truly want to get away from but just can't. Shareholders need to pry the door open and let in some fresh air.
My guess is you're thinking of "Influence" by Robert Cialdini. Great book. Lots of studies about marketing tricks and human nature in general. http://amzn.com/006124189X
FYI, the hdparm package includes wiper.sh that can be set up to run every few days. That can be set up to run via cron so the inconvenience isn't too high. Combined with proper partition alignment, my OCZ Vertex has been working flawlessly for a few months now.
But won't all this lead to competition for Sharepoint/IIS/Office for Windows users? Why would Microsoft want to sanction any alternatives to their proprietary offerings? In other words, what's the angle?
Yeah, +5 funny but the comments are proof that this type of marketing works:
NoSympathy from Cincinnati, OH "I have two def tech 7006 towers hooked up to a denon 1909 and my TV running into my reciever with this cable to I can get sound from my antenna. Sounds pretty good to me. I know I could go with an M series monster cable that would destroy this cable , but for what I use it for, it works for me!"
By caramella from san antonio, tx: "I just got this from my new home theater system and it's great. Sound quality is awesome. Better than my last cables . Also durable with mesh covering. Won't have to worry about torn cables."
Slashdot Mirror
It's a sine of the times.
Well said. Spending a few extra bytes on the home page for a link to "What is Net Neutrality?" would have garnered a lot of goodwill.
The explanation wouldn't have to be lengthy, simply a few paragraphs with examples, written in layman's English, would have been very effective in dispelling all the FUD about net neutrality.
Alas, it's not there.
For non-technical folks like yourself, it's worth mentioning that deleting an "icon" (the picture that shows you AOL) won't always take care of the problem. In that case it will because it's a simple link but with most of the junk, no. It runs much deeper.
Here's why. The computer can actually do more than one thing at a time. So while you're in Facebook it may seem like nothing else is happening but there can be many other things running in what's called the "background".
You can see these things by starting a program called "Task Manager" but it's a little too technical to go into. Suffice it to say that you would need to go through an uninstall process for most of the preinstalled junk to truly get rid of it. Even then it may not remove it entirely.
So just deleting the icon won't do what you think it does. And deleting the software manually from the hard disk can cause a lot of problems because it messes up something in Windows called the "Registry" (again, too technical to get into).
It's very difficult to truly clean up this stuff in Microsoft Windows whereas the Apple MacIntosh or Linux operating systems don't have this problem. If you know someone familiar with computers the best bet is to ask them to help you out.
Hope that helps.
Very nicely stated.
To be fair, there is a difference between serious, accredited universities and paper mills. If he's enrolled in one of the schools profiled in the Frontline documentary below, then he may simply be getting ripped off.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/collegeinc/?utm_campaign=homepage&utm_medium=proglist&utm_source=proglist
It's pretty sad since these folks really are trying to better themselves.
"We don't care, we don't have to...we're the operating system company."
funny + insightful = +1 funful
Agreed, maybe a newspaper+internet analogy would work better.
Would Google's index (and infrastructure) be as good as it is if they relied on high schoolers?
Umm...no.
Non-cookie cutter programming requires serious, well-educated people.
Were you purposely fishing for spelling Nazis? And all caps is like a shiny lure?
On the fliip side of the coin, Flash ads get blocked implicitly.
on Windows.
The sequel: Bing strikes back, turning every result into a "Dickroll" and rendering Bing more useful than it was.
True, and poisoning the surveillance would be pretty easy through a grass roots effort. Imagine just a few hundred thousand different ips associated with the query "child bestiality porn" entered into the logs each day. The man always seems to underestimate the collective power of disgruntled netizens.
As long as he doesn't talk about his 9' penis, we're ok.
Further, a dog licking his anus is akin to lobbyists courting Congressmen.
Alas, you're probably right. Although it's an interesting mental exercise to imagine someone like Jobs replacing Ballmer. Just in terms of CEO talent and risk taking, not the reality distortion field stuff.
It's hard to imagine someone like that standing by in a broken company and not taking the risk of "swinging the meat cleaver".
Microsoft wasted time on Vista and Ballmer. The fact that Apple's market cap is so close to Microsoft's now is the ultimate embarrassment. Shareholders shouldn't be happy about the lack of "innovation" through his tenure.
And it affects us all. Even if you don't own MSFT directly, you probably have skin in the game through your 401-k, mutual funds, etc.
He's like that nasty fart in an elevator that you really, truly want to get away from but just can't. Shareholders need to pry the door open and let in some fresh air.
Interesting post. Excuse my ignorance; can you expand on what "wait and see litigation" means?
I agree. Conservative mediaites like Rush Limbaugh say it was the liberals who blew up the rig intentionally:
http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/limbaugh_obama_blew_up_oil_rigs/
After reading that I was able to think for myself and shake free from the "factual" bonds of the liberal media.
Sigh.
My guess is you're thinking of "Influence" by Robert Cialdini. Great book. Lots of studies about marketing tricks and human nature in general. http://amzn.com/006124189X
FYI, the hdparm package includes wiper.sh that can be set up to run every few days. That can be set up to run via cron so the inconvenience isn't too high. Combined with proper partition alignment, my OCZ Vertex has been working flawlessly for a few months now.
But won't all this lead to competition for Sharepoint/IIS/Office for Windows users? Why would Microsoft want to sanction any alternatives to their proprietary offerings? In other words, what's the angle?
Yeah, +5 funny but the comments are proof that this type of marketing works:
NoSympathy from Cincinnati, OH
"I have two def tech 7006 towers hooked up to a denon 1909 and my TV running into my reciever with this cable to I can get sound from my antenna. Sounds pretty good to me. I know I could go with an M series monster cable that would destroy this cable , but for what I use it for, it works for me!"
By caramella from san antonio, tx:
"I just got this from my new home theater system and it's great. Sound quality is awesome. Better than my last cables . Also durable with mesh covering. Won't have to worry about torn cables."
Ouch.
Here's an alternate article from Ars. A little less technical but explains things clearly:
http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/03/why-new-hard-disks-might-not-be-much-fun-for-xp-users.ars