People take the dumbest statistics at face value. Best started his book Damned Lies and Statistics with a journal article's statistic that "Every year since 1950, the number of American children gunned down has doubled".
Those of us who have put grains of rice on a chess board know that North America is pretty desolate now.
Wattage is the new penis size
on
Building a Green PC
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· Score: 2, Informative
Not my original quote. It's true. I replaced the PS on 24/7 MythTV and DSL web server machines and my 17 hour/day desktop with 300 w 80Plus PSes. Work fine. Dropped my power bill by $10-12/month.
I have to believe some huge corporation will catch on to this and _demand_ 80Plus for their next thousands of machines and in 10 years we'll be amazed that computers were sold without efficient power supplies.
Knowing that a Radio Shack nibbling tool is perfect for cutting another slot in your 5-1/4" DS disks so you can use both sides in your Commodore. _That's_ obsolete.
Not much on its own. Is it anecdotal or did they really do that at MIT just to see what would develop?
True or not, it seems a fitting synopsis of the MIT gearhead magical mindset that hardware will spontaneously emerge consciousness. And Kurzweil is the figurehead that drives me friggin' crazy. There is a whole branch of contemporary philosophy that is trying to get a grip on mind and consciousness. Do the systems analysis (if you will) of constructing a person. Why don't they get publicity and more think tank funding instead of some dude who picks dates out of his ass?
Sometimes I think futurists give predicting the future a bad name. Used to be a respectable profession called science fiction writer.
"One policeman's child's laptop"? After a year, what are the odds it hasn't been sold minus hard drive on auction? In a very third world manner, the sale of confiscated materials seems to have become a real moneymaker at the local police force level. Anything to protect the children.
I actually have taste; I can look at a web site and tell you if it's good or not, but taking a blank page and putting something tasteful (key word) on it is just something I can't do.
Tell me about it. I picked up most of an art history major. My wife is a BFA turned web designer. Sometimes it's best to sketch out some goals and let someone else do it.
'medication non-adherence.' In the US alone, it is estimated that this accounts for 10% of all hospital visits and costs the healthcare system $100 billion per year and $60 billion to the pharmaceutical industry.
I assume the latter is not the least concern.
Some quack must have been watching TV and recently put my mother on Vytorin. Pick your favorite Google result on how worthless that drug is.
I guess that's the silver lining. We aren't the _worst_ country in the world yet and aren't likely to be the worst country in the world anytime soon. If that and a shiny piece of string keep you happy.....
In the liberal arts circles this has been recognized for ages. Many people still think those "Aha" moments are supposed to just burst forth regularly from the unique depths of your individual Romantic coolness. It's very uncool to work diligently in the arts. Unless it's working on your image of bohemian slothfulness.
But contrast that with most other ages where skilled craftsmen of all types have worked together in shops all day. The emphasis on individual "aha" moments is an historical anomaly.
America has come so, so far from my childhood when Popular Electronics (the terrorist, mob unleashing scum) would run feature articles on building the latest geiger counter kit.
'Key to Mr. Gates's plan will be for businesses to dedicate their top people to poor issues'
Me often hearem that and thinkem much Bwana no understandum native.
I've heard Former U.N. leader Kofi Annan speak live and one of his favorite stories involves ear muffs. Growing up in Ghana he spent his first year of college in Minnesota freezing his ears off because he wasn't going to wear anything as stupid as earmuffs. Finally, he broke down and understood that the locals know best how to adapt to their own conditions. Most important lesson of his life.
Hopefully, Gates understands this or the top-down management he picks to shoulder the White Man's Burden will be leading the charge back to the 19th century.
Wouldn't hurt Gates to read "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man" either to help him get a grasp on how the third world "went wrong".
Oh, we still dream. It's just that we've replaced aspirations with fantasies.
As an Apollo-era teenager I share my age group's frustrations that I don't have my jet car on Mars yet. Heck, we quit following the last few missions. Been there, done that. But all this smacks of back seat desperation. _IF_ by now we had created a huge space station that had learned to be self-sustaining with zero resupply/repair ferries for years, then it _might_ be reasonable to talk about multi-year manned missions around the inner solar system. But as it is, it's more than a little ugly. Sure, you'd get enough volunteers. But watching them die 30 million miles from earth because something and its backup broke is PR that would set your gamble back many years.
Been to the moon so why bother to go back? Why do we have a permanent presence in antarctica -- the favorable corn-growing season?
And, sadly, I also wonder whether this is likely to be some weird propaganda that costs nothing during any particular year of a presidency but keeps the Star Trek voter happy.
I can't wait until some tele-evangeli$t worms nematodes' sexual organs into his sermon about how Jesus will help you get rich in real estate.
Re:Great news
on
Sun Buys MySQL
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
I started with C/S on Oracle too and I've noticed that. I think it's one reason I like PostgreSQL and find MySQL annoying. So why do people like MySQL? Is it familiar to people who started with SQL Server or something? Or just the first db they encountered when they picked up a LAMP book?
I remember a chart some time ago. Being a PostgreSQL supporter myself, I don't remember MySQL even on the chart but I do remember that Oracle, DB2 and PostgreSQL were at the top with nearly a straight line in scaling and SQL Server started to choke around 200 connections.
First home computer was a Sinclair ZX81 and the version of Pac Man in ZX Magazine where you entered the assembly by hand was _much_ better than the Pac Man cassette released in the U.S.
In the Microsoft spirit of breaking compatibility, these idiots thought you would enjoy relearning how to type in order to type with a genuine Microsoft keyboard. 4,5,6 on the index finger of the left hand and 7 on the index finger of the right hand.
Actually, the Ur-mother of the 32-bit desktop was probably OS2. Virtually unknown today and only spoken of among a small cult who cherish the old ways. There are rumors Microsoft itself indulged in the rites of OS2 before a conversion experience.
I would say the earlier Windows versions up to about 6 were the zenith of Word Processing. Novell was one thing but when Corel got it, ugh. Became buggy in their quest to dumb it down to "Wordishness".
I've never quite understood the bloatware bitching. If there are a lot of features you don't like, then shut up, sit down and don't use them for Chrissake. You can write your novel very happily in AbiWord I'm sure but don't complain because I want something that can do more. I used WP to do double-sided tri-folds. I don't know what I would have done without reveal codes for micromanaging stuff that as often as not was in text and graphics boxes rotated this way or that. Get a publishing package you say. Why? WordPerfect produced the B&W laserprinted trifolds we needed. Used macros to take a delimited server db addresses dump, convert it to a WP data file and do the merge and print. Routinely ran a whole bunch of lists that way for years with WP as the core program.
When Microsoft used their OS monopoly money to dump Office 97 on the market it was one of the most shameful examples of a monopoly murdering quality with artificial underpricing.
Slashdot Mirror
Speaking as someone who paid something like $150 for the Fun House tapes years ago.
People take the dumbest statistics at face value. Best started his book Damned Lies and Statistics with a journal article's statistic that "Every year since 1950, the number of American children gunned down has doubled".
Those of us who have put grains of rice on a chess board know that North America is pretty desolate now.
Not my original quote. It's true. I replaced the PS on 24/7 MythTV and DSL web server machines and my 17 hour/day desktop with 300 w 80Plus PSes. Work fine. Dropped my power bill by $10-12/month.
I have to believe some huge corporation will catch on to this and _demand_ 80Plus for their next thousands of machines and in 10 years we'll be amazed that computers were sold without efficient power supplies.
CPU magazine will be surprised.
Knowing that a Radio Shack nibbling tool is perfect for cutting another slot in your 5-1/4" DS disks so you can use both sides in your Commodore. _That's_ obsolete.
Not much on its own. Is it anecdotal or did they really do that at MIT just to see what would develop?
True or not, it seems a fitting synopsis of the MIT gearhead magical mindset that hardware will spontaneously emerge consciousness. And Kurzweil is the figurehead that drives me friggin' crazy. There is a whole branch of contemporary philosophy that is trying to get a grip on mind and consciousness. Do the systems analysis (if you will) of constructing a person. Why don't they get publicity and more think tank funding instead of some dude who picks dates out of his ass?
Sometimes I think futurists give predicting the future a bad name. Used to be a respectable profession called science fiction writer.
"One policeman's child's laptop"? After a year, what are the odds it hasn't been sold minus hard drive on auction? In a very third world manner, the sale of confiscated materials seems to have become a real moneymaker at the local police force level. Anything to protect the children.
I actually have taste; I can look at a web site and tell you if it's good or not, but taking a blank page and putting something tasteful (key word) on it is just something I can't do.
Tell me about it. I picked up most of an art history major. My wife is a BFA turned web designer. Sometimes it's best to sketch out some goals and let someone else do it.
'medication non-adherence.' In the US alone, it is estimated that this accounts for 10% of all hospital visits and costs the healthcare system $100 billion per year and $60 billion to the pharmaceutical industry.
I assume the latter is not the least concern.
Some quack must have been watching TV and recently put my mother on Vytorin. Pick your favorite Google result on how worthless that drug is.
Yeah we are so oppressed here,
I guess that's the silver lining. We aren't the _worst_ country in the world yet and aren't likely to be the worst country in the world anytime soon. If that and a shiny piece of string keep you happy.....
The last person to change the Access database before the time runs out wins?
You'd think they'd go with IBM. Their track record supporting Hitler was so impressive:
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2001/jun2001/ibm-j27.shtml
But will they use linux?
In the liberal arts circles this has been recognized for ages. Many people still think those "Aha" moments are supposed to just burst forth regularly from the unique depths of your individual Romantic coolness. It's very uncool to work diligently in the arts. Unless it's working on your image of bohemian slothfulness.
But contrast that with most other ages where skilled craftsmen of all types have worked together in shops all day. The emphasis on individual "aha" moments is an historical anomaly.
As if people didn't have enough on their plates worrying about the rats and boa constrictors coming up their toilets.
America has come so, so far from my childhood when Popular Electronics (the terrorist, mob unleashing scum) would run feature articles on building the latest geiger counter kit.
You know that's what somebody at IBM is thinking.
OK, I guess. But it's hardly Office for linux.
'Key to Mr. Gates's plan will be for businesses to dedicate their top people to poor issues'
Me often hearem that and thinkem much Bwana no understandum native.
I've heard Former U.N. leader Kofi Annan speak live and one of his favorite stories involves ear muffs. Growing up in Ghana he spent his first year of college in Minnesota freezing his ears off because he wasn't going to wear anything as stupid as earmuffs. Finally, he broke down and understood that the locals know best how to adapt to their own conditions. Most important lesson of his life.
Hopefully, Gates understands this or the top-down management he picks to shoulder the White Man's Burden will be leading the charge back to the 19th century.
Wouldn't hurt Gates to read "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man" either to help him get a grasp on how the third world "went wrong".
How do you stuff a rattlesnake in an email box?
Oh, we still dream. It's just that we've replaced aspirations with fantasies.
As an Apollo-era teenager I share my age group's frustrations that I don't have my jet car on Mars yet. Heck, we quit following the last few missions. Been there, done that. But all this smacks of back seat desperation. _IF_ by now we had created a huge space station that had learned to be self-sustaining with zero resupply/repair ferries for years, then it _might_ be reasonable to talk about multi-year manned missions around the inner solar system. But as it is, it's more than a little ugly. Sure, you'd get enough volunteers. But watching them die 30 million miles from earth because something and its backup broke is PR that would set your gamble back many years.
Been to the moon so why bother to go back? Why do we have a permanent presence in antarctica -- the favorable corn-growing season?
And, sadly, I also wonder whether this is likely to be some weird propaganda that costs nothing during any particular year of a presidency but keeps the Star Trek voter happy.
I can't wait until some tele-evangeli$t worms nematodes' sexual organs into his sermon about how Jesus will help you get rich in real estate.
I started with C/S on Oracle too and I've noticed that. I think it's one reason I like PostgreSQL and find MySQL annoying. So why do people like MySQL? Is it familiar to people who started with SQL Server or something? Or just the first db they encountered when they picked up a LAMP book?
I remember a chart some time ago. Being a PostgreSQL supporter myself, I don't remember MySQL even on the chart but I do remember that Oracle, DB2 and PostgreSQL were at the top with nearly a straight line in scaling and SQL Server started to choke around 200 connections.
First home computer was a Sinclair ZX81 and the version of Pac Man in ZX Magazine where you entered the assembly by hand was _much_ better than the Pac Man cassette released in the U.S.
In the Microsoft spirit of breaking compatibility, these idiots thought you would enjoy relearning how to type in order to type with a genuine Microsoft keyboard. 4,5,6 on the index finger of the left hand and 7 on the index finger of the right hand.
Actually, the Ur-mother of the 32-bit desktop was probably OS2. Virtually unknown today and only spoken of among a small cult who cherish the old ways. There are rumors Microsoft itself indulged in the rites of OS2 before a conversion experience.
I would say the earlier Windows versions up to about 6 were the zenith of Word Processing. Novell was one thing but when Corel got it, ugh. Became buggy in their quest to dumb it down to "Wordishness".
I've never quite understood the bloatware bitching. If there are a lot of features you don't like, then shut up, sit down and don't use them for Chrissake. You can write your novel very happily in AbiWord I'm sure but don't complain because I want something that can do more. I used WP to do double-sided tri-folds. I don't know what I would have done without reveal codes for micromanaging stuff that as often as not was in text and graphics boxes rotated this way or that. Get a publishing package you say. Why? WordPerfect produced the B&W laserprinted trifolds we needed. Used macros to take a delimited server db addresses dump, convert it to a WP data file and do the merge and print. Routinely ran a whole bunch of lists that way for years with WP as the core program.
When Microsoft used their OS monopoly money to dump Office 97 on the market it was one of the most shameful examples of a monopoly murdering quality with artificial underpricing.