Might I suggest an easier method? Back in the good ol days when computers were huge and geeks were single they used parallel port dongles to activate software perhaps we should return to this model with a twist go USB instead.
Could work pretty well for boxed games that need fairly modern hardware- you're definitely going to have USB available and it wouldn't be too hard to mass produce these things and leave one in the box the game comes in. Some of the more expensive software I muck around with uses USB dongles, and I'm pretty sure there are a few places that make these dongles to on-sell to software developers.
Could grind the USB ports into dust after enough plugging and replugging though, unless you want a USB hedgehog by leaving all of your game dongles in at once.;)
And of course, you're left with the warez version being better again- no dongle to worry about.
Online-purchased games- doesn't work so well. The basic idea is sound though. If there was some way to create a physical token of some sort that the PC could subsequently check, then you'd be set. The trick is though... how?
I used to buy a fair few more music CDs until the funny games they started playing to stop me playing my entirely-legitimately-purchased CDs on my PC. It was a gradual thing- I just started getting sick of half of my purchased music CDs not working when I got them home to listen to whilst I worked. Over time I just stopped buying them so often.
I used to buy a fair few more PC games. After some of the nastier games the bigger vendors started playing, I stopped buying larger commercial games and moved on to games made by smaller indies (okay, there were some other reasons to, but that's a discussion for another day). They are far less likely to install crap on your system or make you jump through hoops post-purchase.
Until recently. I purchased a game from a larger indie and then found out I had to "activate" it (after they got my money, of course). They "promise" it'll all be okay, they've got money aside in case they go out of business (which they'll never touch, of course, promise promise). But it's okay because "Windows does it too". I'd name-and-shame them but they did make an effort to make it right when I kicked up. And honestly, I don't want this fight. So let's just say it was a good indie game.
So I'll be buying less and less games over time, I guess.
So where are we now? Here I am, along with other paying customers, doing the right thing- and I get shafted as a result. I can get a better copy with less restrictions by going to the local warez-are-us. That copy won't stop working ten years later when the developer shuts down. It won't phone home and refuse to run. It won't refuse to run without a net connection sending God-knows-what to their activation server.
As a software developer I can completely understand the reason to protect your software from being casually distributed, but dammit- CD driver replacements, rootkits, web trojans, privilege elevation servers, surprise "activation". Why are you subjecting your legitimate customers to this nonsense, when the people ripping you off are just going to get it from someone who has already stripped this stuff out? Don't you realise the logical conclusion of making your product considerably worse that the warez version? Of making every software install a risk of hosing the system?
You know, it'd be nice when rolling out these huge links to the country areas if they stopped for a few moments and looked at those of us in modern suburbs who cannot get broadband for love nor money- even when there is complete and total ultra-high speed coverage four streets away in every single direction.
There are a whole bunch of blackspots through the country, reasonably new suburbs where Telstra cheaped out on the phone connectivity initially and won't pay a damn cent to upgrade it. 12Mbit/s to the country? How about letting us have something better than.056Mbit/s over dialup modem here in the suburbs without splashing out for ultra-expensive wireless?
This is so right!! I'm currently a CS student at Edinburgh UK, have been for four years now. I managed to fail first year twice, and dya know why? Cus of a mixture of two things. One they couldn't teach for shit and I lost interest!! And two, the material was sooooo boring!! I've been programming bits and pieces since I was twelve so I go to uni to be taught what an integer is, and how to use a for loop. Cmon!! Stupidity.
Hi. I am the realisation of the person you believe that you are, that you are not.
I've been coding since an earlier age than yourself. I found many elements of my first year in CS boring. The difference between you and me though, is the results I got. Damn near 100% in every assignment and the exam, and I finished at the top of the class.
I hate to break it to you, but you didn't fail because it was boring. If it was boring, you would have sat the final exam after three hours half studying the material, and half watching cartoons, like I did, and also topped the class. You would have been doing your assignments in twenty minutes and polishing them for a few hours before getting top marks. For fun, you'd help out some other people too.
I've had lousy teachers/lecturers before, and through my degree I discovered it is just best to avoid the ones who can't teach, even if you like the subject. But one thing I do know is that if you know the material well enough (and can learn it on your own) it is very hard to fail, even if your lecturers and markers are blithering idiots. Sure, your mark at the end won't be fair, but failing you would take quite some effort on the part of the markers.
The difference between us, you may notice, is that you managed to fail first year twice. If the material was boring, and you had a complete mastery of it, this would not have happened. Even if the markers were completely incompetent, a hotshot would have been able to produce answers of such quality that it would have been hard to fail you. You would have passed without effort, and probably with distinction.
But you didn't. Ask yourself again why you failed.
Users should simply be able to sit down at a system, log in and have all of the applications they need (and no more) available at the touch of a button. They should be unable to break the system, or otherwise infect it with spyware or viruses. And it should work that way day in, day out without fail....
Really this is down to poor IT leadership.
Drivers should be able to get into a car, state the destination, and take a nap whilst the car plans a safe route and flies them to the correct location, gently waking them upon arrival. Mechanical difficulties should be automatically diagnosed and the results made available to the driver in a simple, easily understood form.
The fact that this is not the case is not due to poor automotive leadership. It is because the market infrastructure that drives car manufacture is not conducive to coming up with an elegant solution to a complex problem. Basically people are content paying up to tens of thousands of dollars for a car that runs on basic infrastructure rather than hundreds of thousands of dollars to work on an idealised system and universal agreement on infrastructure and maintenance. It isn't going to happen any time soon.
It is not the fault of automotive leadership that people are content with what they have and aren't demanding (and willing to fund) a better solution. The current solution is "good enough"- for the cost.
IT is in a sad and sorry state. The dominant user operating system is one of the worst available for the task and multiple points of lock-in exist that ensure its continued dominance. Standards are anything but. Cheap vendors produce components that skirt the rules just that little bit and cause a bucket of problems down the road. Users are conditioned to accept weird behaviour, non-repairing crashes, and unintuitive interfaces. Spam is a large problem that could be solved with universal coordination, but there will never be universal coordination. It could be much better. But it would cost. No more cheap PC's for hundreds, you'd be looking at tens or hundreds of thousands. You'd need dedicated infrastructure, boundaries, standards, and validation for those standards. It also isn't going to happen any time soon.
It is not the fault of IT leadership that people are content with what they have and aren't demanding (and willing to fund) a better solution. The current solution is also "good enough"- again, for the cost.
This is probably just posturing to get a better deal.
The TV networks probably aren't getting as sweet a deal as they'd like from Google/YouTube, so they're threatening to create a rival and use them exclusively. They just want Google to cave to their terms.
Chances are Google won't.
Chances are the TV networks won't be able to agree on exactly what they want for some time, will find out how hideously expensive creating a rival would be, and then realise they have to solve the problem as to how to get people to watch their rival as well. This will cost a hefty bucket of money, and there's no way they'll be able to agree how to split the cost fairly.
Then it'll be back to the negotiating table. Google will give them a token step towards their terms to protect their shattered egos, and the TV execs may or may not take it. Or, possibly, Google will give one TV network a sweet deal and refuse to budge on the others, and the others will effectively be forced to accept a crappy deal or face irrelevance.
But paying for "virtual stuff" in a virtual world?! That's a waste of money and time.
Not really. They are paying for entertainment. Sometimes performing the same repetitive action over and over for hours to get a virtual item you desire is... well... boring. So people will fork out money to play the fun bits more and grind less.
And why do people desire virtual items? The usual reasons. To discover new content (games are an entertainment media after all). To feel superior to others. For a feeling of importance. The usual suspects.
The question is, why do people allow themselves to hop on the treadmill in the first place? Surely there are other games around with less grind...
It could be stopped, and pressure applied, if people voted for representatives to create laws to apply some sort of penalty for buying from such regimes. No such laws have been created. Says a lot about the representatives and the people voting for them, doesn't it?
You don't even need to be so extreme as to be a single issue voter.
I've never thought much of single-issue representatives, nor was I talking about voting on a single issue. I was talking along the lines of representatives being upfront about what they support and following through. It just doesn't seem to qualify as an important issue, and I think that reflects badly on all involved.
A simple consumer boycott would do wonders
If you can successfully coordinate the vast majority of the customers of a particular organisation, yes, it may work, gradually. But the problem with boycotts is that you often are just a vocal minority, and the savings for a company cheating and using the cheap labour generally far outweigh any impact the minority doing the right thing cost them.
Hence, making it political.
Companies really don't take much pressure before they cave, they simply need to feel like their actions matter enough that consumers actually notice and the few cents less they make is made up in good will and a few more product purchases.
In my experience most organisations are phenomenally resistant to any change at all, without a very good reason.
Of course, the first damn near impossible step is to get consumers to actually care.
This is indeed the basis of the whole problem, which jams up both political means and boycotts.
Really, I don't know why any US companies can do business with China.
Initially, greed. For those competing against them, necessity.
China does terrible, horrible things to their people. We're talking on par with Cuba, Iraq, and many rogue African and S. American countries. Yet for some reason we seem to turn a blind eye to it. I've never understood it.
Because there is no immediately visible consequence to saving 50% on items made in China versus elsewhere apart from the immediate savings to that person. The decision for one person not to makes no difference. It is the decision of many people that creates the market.
It could be stopped, and pressure applied, if people voted for representatives to create laws to apply some sort of penalty for buying from such regimes. No such laws have been created. Says a lot about the representatives and the people voting for them, doesn't it?
Uh, I think you're mistaken here: Facebook != Friendster. He's using Friendster as a cautionary tale, not dissing his alleged former friend's business, Facebook.
You are quite correct, my bad.
My point should still stand, albeit more weakly with one of the legs chopped off from under it.;)
I doubt this person ever really knew Mark Z. The whole thing sounds like sour grapes + a crappy plug for a late-to-the-game / rip-off college social network service to me.
From the sounds of it he may have been in some was associated with MZ at some point, maybe felt he was cheated out of something, and is taking revenge.
Guaranteed they have not been "friends" for some time, possibly never. MZ is probably completely pissed at him.
Or he is working for someone who is looking to make a bid, so they are attempting to devalue the business to save some dosh.
A few weeks ago I wrote an open letter to my former friend from school, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, telling him to take Yahoo's money before it's too late. It was meant partly as a joke, and partly as a way to set the record straight on his company's origins, since in financial terms he'll be fine no matter what happens. Now the New York Times has written a story on Friendster, the social network no one talks about anymore. It seems that while history repeats itself every few decades in the global scheme of things, the period of recurrence in Silicon Valley is quite a bit shorter. The moral here: take the billion dollars while you still can."
So we have: - an open letter saying to take the money and run, implying that the business is not worth the money. - you call his business: "Friendster, the social network no one talks about anymore" - in case the letter doesn't drum it in, you add: "The moral here: take the billion dollars while you still can." - you get it posted to Slashdot.
Ever wonder why he is a "former friend"? My God you're an asshole. Don't ever be my friend, please.
If we find the toilet seat down, we put it up and do our thing. We dont yell or bitch about it being up or down.
WHY dont women do the same ?
Way offtopic, but it's a struggle for dominance thing. You are being tested to see how you will react to an irrational and illogical request. It sets the tone for the rest of the interactions between you and that person.
Ah, the great Slashdot, bastion of toilet politics.;)
The new initiative is intended to protect consumers from pirated software
Could the Editors please spend a little time coming up with a summary rather than regurgitating press releases? Pretty please?
Protect consumers (customers?) from pirated software my ass. If I want marketing doublespeak, I'll go to the site myself, but please, typos and broken links aside, Slashdot is much better than this.
Why is it that when ATT got sued by pretty much everyone at once over the NSA illegal wiretapping, their stocks didn't plummet?
Probably depends on the relative size of the players, the strength of their arguments, and likelihood of victory.
Why doesn't Microsoft's plummet after pretty much everything they do?
Why should it? They have the office productivity, OS, OEM market, and US administration exactly where they want them, and have a warchest if someone does take them on.
UMG are just playing dirty. They are trying to negotiate with YouTube and MySpace and things aren't going (entirely) their way, so out comes the threat of potential future lawsuits with a nice big number (tens of meeeellions of dollars!) to crash the stock value of YouTube and MySpace today. The threat is basically: "Look at what we can do to your stock with a few choice words. Accept our last offer or we hit you again."
1. Many (NOT ALL) IT guys are socially awkward. A female with techie skills being around them for more than mere moments is unfamiliar and scary. They will like you being around, probably fall head-over-heels in love with you if you comment that you like the top they are wearing today, and will generally be awkward around you.
2. The remainder of IT guys who do possess basic social skills will be wary. They know if they say the wrong thing around you and you are mean spirited then they don't have a chance fighting the peer and HR assault afterwards. When confronted with a situation like this, most people will just avoid the problem, by avoiding YOU.
3. Some of the IT guys will be working on the assumption that you are probably incompetent. Smarter IT people are often annoyed with incompetent people, but are disproportionately annoyed by female incompetent IT people.
4. A small number of IT guys will throw caution to the wind and hit on you because you are a novelty in their world. If you scorn their advances, they will try to save face by making you look like the bad guy (er... girl?).
Sucks huh?
What to do? Be aware of it. Don't complain about the sky being blue, it just is. Figure out where each person is coming from and react accordingly.
For group #1, chat with them. Show common interests and talk about geeky topics. Change the subject if it gets onto awkward attraction-based stuff. The first instant you get, invite as many of these people out for lunch/drinks at once as you can, together. Don't ever catch up with them on their own outside of work until they are comfortable with you in normal social situations. They will get the wrong idea, they will get hurt, and they will lash out.
For group #2, just say an off-colour joke, and swear once. As soon as you give the impression that you are not an uptight prude who will scream "sexual harassment" for saying "hi" to them, this group will love you. Be one of the guys and you will be one of the guys. You don't have to change anything you do, just show that you're not going to cost them their job.
For group #3, just be competent. Show your knowledge. The instant you show you've got brains you're sweet with this group. Don't humiliate anyone, but do show you've got a working brain. If someone talks down to you, do correct them. If you have an opinion and you're confident you're right, offer it. This group will test your knowledge. Be ready. You pass those tests, and they'll grudgingly accept you. Show you're brilliant and they'll worship the ground you walk on.
For group #4, avoid. Say that you're not really interested if they persist. This group will be the minority so mesh with the others and you'll be safe. Peer pressure will take care of them. Just remember that you don't have to be friends with everyone.
Expect to get hit on eventually. Say "I'm flattered, but no", change the subject immediately, and noone gets their pride wounded.
I know those clauses. The "we own everything you've ever done unless you list it" ones. I'm in the unfortunate situation where it is completely impossible for me to list everything I've ever worked on, so I'm pretty much forced to decline such contracts. As such, I've never signed one.
Personally, such things make me furious. Furious that such an absurd "protection" is becoming boilerplate, and furious that some people sign them without thinking how it will affect them in the future.
Think about it. Do you need the work so bad that you're willing to risk losing something you've worked on in the past that you've forgotten about? Something that might be worth nothing now but could be worth a lot in the future? Want to risk being caught in the firefight between this employer/customer and a past one because you worked on something that they are now both trying to claim? What if you sign two of these things in your life. All of a sudden everything you've ever done is potentially owned by two sets of people, and guess whose ass it will be if they fight (hint: you've promised the same thing to two entities in legal contracts).
If it isn't worth the risk, get a replacement drawn up, or strike the relevant lines. Say that you're happy to work for them but you can not- and will not- sign an agreement with such a clause. And be prepared to be knocked back if they have other options, because they may just want the easy way out.
Or bend over and take it. But please, weigh up if it is really worth it.
Ah, so we've moved up from missing cables to cables obscured by the bottle. Well, I don't know about you, but I've been sufficiently convinced to sell everything I own to invest in as much stock as I can.
Unfortunately, my current investments are in Sydney infrastructure, perhaps I can interest you in a stock trade. Pictures of my current investment can be found here.
Coke bottles... Raman spectroscopy... heck, add the occasional takeaway pizza and we could power cities on the free energy from college students!
More seriously, if any of these claims are even vaguely remotely true, the person who discovered them can look forward to fame (prove it!) or riches from unlimited energy (profit from it!). In fact, probably both. It would be a world transformed if such a thing were true; heck, even cheap energy would do that.
Slashdot Mirror
Might I suggest an easier method? Back in the good ol days when computers were huge and geeks were single they used parallel port dongles to activate software perhaps we should return to this model with a twist go USB instead.
;)
Could work pretty well for boxed games that need fairly modern hardware- you're definitely going to have USB available and it wouldn't be too hard to mass produce these things and leave one in the box the game comes in. Some of the more expensive software I muck around with uses USB dongles, and I'm pretty sure there are a few places that make these dongles to on-sell to software developers.
Could grind the USB ports into dust after enough plugging and replugging though, unless you want a USB hedgehog by leaving all of your game dongles in at once.
And of course, you're left with the warez version being better again- no dongle to worry about.
Online-purchased games- doesn't work so well. The basic idea is sound though. If there was some way to create a physical token of some sort that the PC could subsequently check, then you'd be set. The trick is though... how?
I used to buy a fair few more music CDs until the funny games they started playing to stop me playing my entirely-legitimately-purchased CDs on my PC. It was a gradual thing- I just started getting sick of half of my purchased music CDs not working when I got them home to listen to whilst I worked. Over time I just stopped buying them so often.
I used to buy a fair few more PC games. After some of the nastier games the bigger vendors started playing, I stopped buying larger commercial games and moved on to games made by smaller indies (okay, there were some other reasons to, but that's a discussion for another day). They are far less likely to install crap on your system or make you jump through hoops post-purchase.
Until recently. I purchased a game from a larger indie and then found out I had to "activate" it (after they got my money, of course). They "promise" it'll all be okay, they've got money aside in case they go out of business (which they'll never touch, of course, promise promise). But it's okay because "Windows does it too". I'd name-and-shame them but they did make an effort to make it right when I kicked up. And honestly, I don't want this fight. So let's just say it was a good indie game.
So I'll be buying less and less games over time, I guess.
So where are we now? Here I am, along with other paying customers, doing the right thing- and I get shafted as a result. I can get a better copy with less restrictions by going to the local warez-are-us. That copy won't stop working ten years later when the developer shuts down. It won't phone home and refuse to run. It won't refuse to run without a net connection sending God-knows-what to their activation server.
As a software developer I can completely understand the reason to protect your software from being casually distributed, but dammit- CD driver replacements, rootkits, web trojans, privilege elevation servers, surprise "activation". Why are you subjecting your legitimate customers to this nonsense, when the people ripping you off are just going to get it from someone who has already stripped this stuff out? Don't you realise the logical conclusion of making your product considerably worse that the warez version? Of making every software install a risk of hosing the system?
You know, it'd be nice when rolling out these huge links to the country areas if they stopped for a few moments and looked at those of us in modern suburbs who cannot get broadband for love nor money- even when there is complete and total ultra-high speed coverage four streets away in every single direction.
.056Mbit/s over dialup modem here in the suburbs without splashing out for ultra-expensive wireless?
There are a whole bunch of blackspots through the country, reasonably new suburbs where Telstra cheaped out on the phone connectivity initially and won't pay a damn cent to upgrade it. 12Mbit/s to the country? How about letting us have something better than
Normally companies break out the patent portfolio for a last minute cash-dash as they run down the gurgler.
Perhaps there is a bright side to this.
This is so right!! I'm currently a CS student at Edinburgh UK, have been for four years now. I managed to fail first year twice, and dya know why? Cus of a mixture of two things. One they couldn't teach for shit and I lost interest!! And two, the material was sooooo boring!! I've been programming bits and pieces since I was twelve so I go to uni to be taught what an integer is, and how to use a for loop. Cmon!! Stupidity.
Hi. I am the realisation of the person you believe that you are, that you are not.
I've been coding since an earlier age than yourself. I found many elements of my first year in CS boring. The difference between you and me though, is the results I got. Damn near 100% in every assignment and the exam, and I finished at the top of the class.
I hate to break it to you, but you didn't fail because it was boring. If it was boring, you would have sat the final exam after three hours half studying the material, and half watching cartoons, like I did, and also topped the class. You would have been doing your assignments in twenty minutes and polishing them for a few hours before getting top marks. For fun, you'd help out some other people too.
I've had lousy teachers/lecturers before, and through my degree I discovered it is just best to avoid the ones who can't teach, even if you like the subject. But one thing I do know is that if you know the material well enough (and can learn it on your own) it is very hard to fail, even if your lecturers and markers are blithering idiots. Sure, your mark at the end won't be fair, but failing you would take quite some effort on the part of the markers.
The difference between us, you may notice, is that you managed to fail first year twice. If the material was boring, and you had a complete mastery of it, this would not have happened. Even if the markers were completely incompetent, a hotshot would have been able to produce answers of such quality that it would have been hard to fail you. You would have passed without effort, and probably with distinction.
But you didn't. Ask yourself again why you failed.
Users should simply be able to sit down at a system, log in and have all of the applications they need (and no more) available at the touch of a button. They should be unable to break the system, or otherwise infect it with spyware or viruses. And it should work that way day in, day out without fail. ...
Really this is down to poor IT leadership.
Drivers should be able to get into a car, state the destination, and take a nap whilst the car plans a safe route and flies them to the correct location, gently waking them upon arrival. Mechanical difficulties should be automatically diagnosed and the results made available to the driver in a simple, easily understood form.
The fact that this is not the case is not due to poor automotive leadership. It is because the market infrastructure that drives car manufacture is not conducive to coming up with an elegant solution to a complex problem. Basically people are content paying up to tens of thousands of dollars for a car that runs on basic infrastructure rather than hundreds of thousands of dollars to work on an idealised system and universal agreement on infrastructure and maintenance. It isn't going to happen any time soon.
It is not the fault of automotive leadership that people are content with what they have and aren't demanding (and willing to fund) a better solution. The current solution is "good enough"- for the cost.
IT is in a sad and sorry state. The dominant user operating system is one of the worst available for the task and multiple points of lock-in exist that ensure its continued dominance. Standards are anything but. Cheap vendors produce components that skirt the rules just that little bit and cause a bucket of problems down the road. Users are conditioned to accept weird behaviour, non-repairing crashes, and unintuitive interfaces. Spam is a large problem that could be solved with universal coordination, but there will never be universal coordination. It could be much better. But it would cost. No more cheap PC's for hundreds, you'd be looking at tens or hundreds of thousands. You'd need dedicated infrastructure, boundaries, standards, and validation for those standards. It also isn't going to happen any time soon.
It is not the fault of IT leadership that people are content with what they have and aren't demanding (and willing to fund) a better solution. The current solution is also "good enough"- again, for the cost.
This is probably just posturing to get a better deal.
The TV networks probably aren't getting as sweet a deal as they'd like from Google/YouTube, so they're threatening to create a rival and use them exclusively. They just want Google to cave to their terms.
Chances are Google won't.
Chances are the TV networks won't be able to agree on exactly what they want for some time, will find out how hideously expensive creating a rival would be, and then realise they have to solve the problem as to how to get people to watch their rival as well. This will cost a hefty bucket of money, and there's no way they'll be able to agree how to split the cost fairly.
Then it'll be back to the negotiating table. Google will give them a token step towards their terms to protect their shattered egos, and the TV execs may or may not take it. Or, possibly, Google will give one TV network a sweet deal and refuse to budge on the others, and the others will effectively be forced to accept a crappy deal or face irrelevance.
But paying for "virtual stuff" in a virtual world?! That's a waste of money and time.
Not really. They are paying for entertainment. Sometimes performing the same repetitive action over and over for hours to get a virtual item you desire is... well... boring. So people will fork out money to play the fun bits more and grind less.
And why do people desire virtual items? The usual reasons. To discover new content (games are an entertainment media after all). To feel superior to others. For a feeling of importance. The usual suspects.
The question is, why do people allow themselves to hop on the treadmill in the first place? Surely there are other games around with less grind...
Hiring the best is not "cheating."
And I said "best"... where?
I am talking specifically about hiring from countries with weaker labour laws. When I say "cheating", I mean in this context.
It could be stopped, and pressure applied, if people voted for representatives to create laws to apply some sort of penalty for buying from such regimes. No such laws have been created. Says a lot about the representatives and the people voting for them, doesn't it?
You don't even need to be so extreme as to be a single issue voter.
I've never thought much of single-issue representatives, nor was I talking about voting on a single issue. I was talking along the lines of representatives being upfront about what they support and following through. It just doesn't seem to qualify as an important issue, and I think that reflects badly on all involved.
A simple consumer boycott would do wonders
If you can successfully coordinate the vast majority of the customers of a particular organisation, yes, it may work, gradually. But the problem with boycotts is that you often are just a vocal minority, and the savings for a company cheating and using the cheap labour generally far outweigh any impact the minority doing the right thing cost them.
Hence, making it political.
Companies really don't take much pressure before they cave, they simply need to feel like their actions matter enough that consumers actually notice and the few cents less they make is made up in good will and a few more product purchases.
In my experience most organisations are phenomenally resistant to any change at all, without a very good reason.
Of course, the first damn near impossible step is to get consumers to actually care.
This is indeed the basis of the whole problem, which jams up both political means and boycotts.
Really, I don't know why any US companies can do business with China.
Initially, greed. For those competing against them, necessity.
China does terrible, horrible things to their people. We're talking on par with Cuba, Iraq, and many rogue African and S. American countries. Yet for some reason we seem to turn a blind eye to it. I've never understood it.
Because there is no immediately visible consequence to saving 50% on items made in China versus elsewhere apart from the immediate savings to that person. The decision for one person not to makes no difference. It is the decision of many people that creates the market.
It could be stopped, and pressure applied, if people voted for representatives to create laws to apply some sort of penalty for buying from such regimes. No such laws have been created. Says a lot about the representatives and the people voting for them, doesn't it?
Uh, I think you're mistaken here: Facebook != Friendster. He's using Friendster as a cautionary tale, not dissing his alleged former friend's business, Facebook.
;)
You are quite correct, my bad.
My point should still stand, albeit more weakly with one of the legs chopped off from under it.
I doubt this person ever really knew Mark Z. The whole thing sounds like sour grapes + a crappy plug for a late-to-the-game / rip-off college social network service to me.
From the sounds of it he may have been in some was associated with MZ at some point, maybe felt he was cheated out of something, and is taking revenge.
Guaranteed they have not been "friends" for some time, possibly never. MZ is probably completely pissed at him.
Or he is working for someone who is looking to make a bid, so they are attempting to devalue the business to save some dosh.
From the summary:
A few weeks ago I wrote an open letter to my former friend from school, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, telling him to take Yahoo's money before it's too late. It was meant partly as a joke, and partly as a way to set the record straight on his company's origins, since in financial terms he'll be fine no matter what happens. Now the New York Times has written a story on Friendster, the social network no one talks about anymore. It seems that while history repeats itself every few decades in the global scheme of things, the period of recurrence in Silicon Valley is quite a bit shorter. The moral here: take the billion dollars while you still can."
So we have:
- an open letter saying to take the money and run, implying that the business is not worth the money.
- you call his business: "Friendster, the social network no one talks about anymore"
- in case the letter doesn't drum it in, you add: "The moral here: take the billion dollars while you still can."
- you get it posted to Slashdot.
Ever wonder why he is a "former friend"? My God you're an asshole. Don't ever be my friend, please.
for some reason they think it's sexy when the guy does the dishes.
I understand this completely. I have a dishwasher and damn if it isn't the sexiest thing in the house to me when the kitchen is full of dishes.
If we find the toilet seat down, we put it up and do our thing. We dont yell or bitch about it being up or down.
;)
WHY dont women do the same ?
Way offtopic, but it's a struggle for dominance thing. You are being tested to see how you will react to an irrational and illogical request. It sets the tone for the rest of the interactions between you and that person.
Ah, the great Slashdot, bastion of toilet politics.
Form the story summary:
The new initiative is intended to protect consumers from pirated software
Could the Editors please spend a little time coming up with a summary rather than regurgitating press releases? Pretty please?
Protect consumers (customers?) from pirated software my ass. If I want marketing doublespeak, I'll go to the site myself, but please, typos and broken links aside, Slashdot is much better than this.
FINISH HIM!
;)
Oh, sorry, wrong thread.
Hang on a sec... maybe not.
Looks like Novell and IBM are going for the finishing blow. And if IBM are true to form, this will be very, very slow and very, very public.
My regret is that the scum who participated in this little pump-and-dump will get to hang on to the money they made.
Why is it that when ATT got sued by pretty much everyone at once over the NSA illegal wiretapping, their stocks didn't plummet?
Probably depends on the relative size of the players, the strength of their arguments, and likelihood of victory.
Why doesn't Microsoft's plummet after pretty much everything they do?
Why should it? They have the office productivity, OS, OEM market, and US administration exactly where they want them, and have a warchest if someone does take them on.
UMG are just playing dirty. They are trying to negotiate with YouTube and MySpace and things aren't going (entirely) their way, so out comes the threat of potential future lawsuits with a nice big number (tens of meeeellions of dollars!) to crash the stock value of YouTube and MySpace today. The threat is basically: "Look at what we can do to your stock with a few choice words. Accept our last offer or we hit you again."
1. Many (NOT ALL) IT guys are socially awkward. A female with techie skills being around them for more than mere moments is unfamiliar and scary. They will like you being around, probably fall head-over-heels in love with you if you comment that you like the top they are wearing today, and will generally be awkward around you.
2. The remainder of IT guys who do possess basic social skills will be wary. They know if they say the wrong thing around you and you are mean spirited then they don't have a chance fighting the peer and HR assault afterwards. When confronted with a situation like this, most people will just avoid the problem, by avoiding YOU.
3. Some of the IT guys will be working on the assumption that you are probably incompetent. Smarter IT people are often annoyed with incompetent people, but are disproportionately annoyed by female incompetent IT people.
4. A small number of IT guys will throw caution to the wind and hit on you because you are a novelty in their world. If you scorn their advances, they will try to save face by making you look like the bad guy (er... girl?).
Sucks huh?
What to do? Be aware of it. Don't complain about the sky being blue, it just is. Figure out where each person is coming from and react accordingly.
For group #1, chat with them. Show common interests and talk about geeky topics. Change the subject if it gets onto awkward attraction-based stuff. The first instant you get, invite as many of these people out for lunch/drinks at once as you can, together. Don't ever catch up with them on their own outside of work until they are comfortable with you in normal social situations. They will get the wrong idea, they will get hurt, and they will lash out.
For group #2, just say an off-colour joke, and swear once. As soon as you give the impression that you are not an uptight prude who will scream "sexual harassment" for saying "hi" to them, this group will love you. Be one of the guys and you will be one of the guys. You don't have to change anything you do, just show that you're not going to cost them their job.
For group #3, just be competent. Show your knowledge. The instant you show you've got brains you're sweet with this group. Don't humiliate anyone, but do show you've got a working brain. If someone talks down to you, do correct them. If you have an opinion and you're confident you're right, offer it. This group will test your knowledge. Be ready. You pass those tests, and they'll grudgingly accept you. Show you're brilliant and they'll worship the ground you walk on.
For group #4, avoid. Say that you're not really interested if they persist. This group will be the minority so mesh with the others and you'll be safe. Peer pressure will take care of them. Just remember that you don't have to be friends with everyone.
Expect to get hit on eventually. Say "I'm flattered, but no", change the subject immediately, and noone gets their pride wounded.
Walk.
I know those clauses. The "we own everything you've ever done unless you list it" ones. I'm in the unfortunate situation where it is completely impossible for me to list everything I've ever worked on, so I'm pretty much forced to decline such contracts. As such, I've never signed one.
Personally, such things make me furious. Furious that such an absurd "protection" is becoming boilerplate, and furious that some people sign them without thinking how it will affect them in the future.
Think about it. Do you need the work so bad that you're willing to risk losing something you've worked on in the past that you've forgotten about? Something that might be worth nothing now but could be worth a lot in the future? Want to risk being caught in the firefight between this employer/customer and a past one because you worked on something that they are now both trying to claim? What if you sign two of these things in your life. All of a sudden everything you've ever done is potentially owned by two sets of people, and guess whose ass it will be if they fight (hint: you've promised the same thing to two entities in legal contracts).
If it isn't worth the risk, get a replacement drawn up, or strike the relevant lines. Say that you're happy to work for them but you can not- and will not- sign an agreement with such a clause. And be prepared to be knocked back if they have other options, because they may just want the easy way out.
Or bend over and take it. But please, weigh up if it is really worth it.
Here you have an original picture
Ah, so we've moved up from missing cables to cables obscured by the bottle. Well, I don't know about you, but I've been sufficiently convinced to sell everything I own to invest in as much stock as I can.
Unfortunately, my current investments are in Sydney infrastructure, perhaps I can interest you in a stock trade. Pictures of my current investment can be found here.
Coke bottles... Raman spectroscopy... heck, add the occasional takeaway pizza and we could power cities on the free energy from college students!
More seriously, if any of these claims are even vaguely remotely true, the person who discovered them can look forward to fame (prove it!) or riches from unlimited energy (profit from it!). In fact, probably both. It would be a world transformed if such a thing were true; heck, even cheap energy would do that.
Need a proof .... Check these photo's.
"Proof"
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Incidentally, I love how every picture on the site you give has the leads leaving the picture before reaching the meter. Very cute.
Pluton eh? Six letters long, good chance of annoying at least two groups now. Now I know what to call my next game. ;)