It seems that the dominant paradigm from about 50 years ago was that the man would contribute to the home by bringing in salary and the woman would contribute to the home by doing domestic work
That is until the work required heavy physical labour (moving furniture) or technical skill (eg. handywork, fixing electronics). Getting on a ladder and changing a high lightglobe is somehow not seen as housework.
My point was simply that a shift where both parties are now expected to contribute to the home by bringing in salary should also be accompanied by a shift in how the parties share the domestic work....and yet if a man wants to take 6 months off to raise his child, in most circumstances he'd be ridiculed.
By the same token, if the couple is NOT doing the two-income-household thing, there's theoretically no problem with a choice of the salaried party to focus on career and a choice of the non-salaried party to focus on domestic matters....and yet few housewives are happy to do all the chores.
. As a female law student, I found it insulting for interviewing law firms to always make it a point to pair female candidates with female attorneys so they can talk about maternity leave and work/life balance and options for going part time in the future when the female candidate decides to have children...and yet when women are teamed up with men they complain that they can't relate or that the workplace is male dominated.
I may or may not go that route, but I don't like having that assumption in front of me right off the bat. I don't have any way of knowing how male candidates are interacted with during interviews though. So my serious question for you (as, I assume, a male in a demanding profession): Are companies discussing family emphasis with young male candidates to the same extent that they discuss it with young female candidates? If not, do you think they should?
I think what should have happened is that there should have been a shift in work life balance for both sexes. It should be expected that the male will also take time off to help raise children. I don't have that choice. The only way I could take paternity leave is if I took it unpaid, and even then only if my wife was working full time. As it happens I'd make a terrible stay at home dad. I'm just not good with kids. (we could debate whether that too was because I never got the chance to learn to be around children, but at the end of the day I don't think I have those innate qualities anyway). My point is women always complain that they're treated unfairly and have social expectations placed on them yet men are also treated unfairly and have social expectations placed on them. Part of it probably is biology but a lot of it is just social convention. When the day comes where male graduates at your law firm sit down with their male mentors and discuss taking time off to raise a family, THEN you'll have your equality.
That's just a fancy way of saying she gets to juggle a full time job in an office with a full time job as a homemaker and mother and whatever else (because Dear Hubby is so tired after a hard day's work that he couldn't possibly help with chores).
Do you have any idea how insulting that is to those men who do contribute to the household as well as work? Funny how when the woman does it she's taking on twice the work. When a man isn't out of the house 13 hrs a day, then coming home and helping with the housework AND the child and spending ALL his waking time on a combination of the 3 he's scum. When the woman puts her child down for a nap, and watches daytime tv she's just doing what she has to do to cope. When a man has no friends or social life to speak of because he's spending all his time on his family that's just expected. When a woman takes her child to playgroups, mother's groups, swim classes etc. that's just part of her hard work.
Even though our society supposedly treats men and women the same, it really doesn't. Raising children still generally falls on the woman's shoulders, whether or not she has a man around to help out. If there is one, he usually sits on the couch watching sports while the woman cooks meals, changes diapers, etc. If she's really lucky, he'll actually hold a regular job and bring home a paycheck.
Can I just say as a father that's out of the house 5 days a week 13 hours a day, then comes home to do chores including laundry, bins, picking up after, clearing the table, the dishes, feeding the pets and yes nappies and bottles, handywork, handles the finances, and after all that still gets grief that I'm not spending enough time with my 7 month old son, I find your remarks insulting.
The whole men vs women thing is just old and just plain destructive. The reality is when a woman was expected to stay home, she had a full time job tending house and looking after the children. Now neither the male or the female earns enough to support the family long term. BOTH have to work to do it, and then somehow in their spare time find time to raise the children and do the chores. Instead of blaming employers for not providing a living wage, women and men turn on each other. Pathetic. Equality would have been the man spending less time at work, and the woman spending more time at work with the man looking after the children while the woman was at work. What we have instead is indentured servitude and a frenzied lifestyle where no one can fulfill their role.
In Jefferson's time, people regularly fought and died for their beliefs. Today, you may be right, but when Jefferson wrote those words, HE was right. And he still is. If no one is willing to risk death for freedom, then liberty will wither away (like it has been doing).
Have you SEEN what these fools are pirating? I wouldn't risk life or limb for the latest Guns And Roses Album. Hell I wouldn't even risk a slice of toast for that rubbish. There's risking your life for freedom, then there's risking it to listen to Britney Spear's so called singing. One is sane. The other not so much.
Our school systems tell our kids that they all have the potential for greatness. Not just being good at something, but great at something......We don't all shine on. Very few of us do. Unfortunately, too many teachers preach Lennon's line at students. You don't want to discourage students from trying to reach higher, but you also want them to be realistic about the world.
You misunderstand. Shining is not about being great in other people's eyes or achieving fame and fortune. It's about being happy with the things you have and doing what you do as well as you can.
What people don't understand is life under the spotlight is a pain in the neck. Very few of us would actually want to be there. You can still achieve great things in your own life. They just don't have significance to others, and THAT is alright.
Teaching kids they're all mundane will make even the great ones mundane, and will leave them all depressed. Self esteem needs to be based on reality. Actually assess them on the work they do and give them praise for what they actually do achieve when it is clear they are trying their best or clsoe to it, but don't make them feel bad for not achieving higher. In other words, tell little johnny that 2 + 2 = 5 is wrong and grade him accordingly, but don't make him feel bad for not doing even better when he does get the answer right. Part of building self esteem is learning to deal with criticism and understanding the difference between getting it right and screwing up, and learning to cope with both. The school system doesn't recognise that and sees any time the child feels bad as some sort of damage. I feel sorry for kids who make it out into the workforce and suddenly have to cope with learning that their boss doesn't pat them on the back when they bollox things up. It's not the new generation's fault. It's the educators that need a reality check.
I find this sentence funny. Why? Because from episode 216 to episode 522, JMS wrote every single episode except two. Not "writers" just one writer.
So let's ignore the work on the first couple of seasons, and focus on the fact that he wrote lots of excellent episodes. Does that give him the right to lock up work he's already released, call fans thieves because they distribute it when he can offer no legitimate way to do so, or otherwise behave like an ass?
As for Crusade, it would have been great if TNT had not rewritten half the episodes (the first six) against JMS wishes. The show was going to evolve into another Shadow-oriented story, strung over five years, just like Babylon 5 was. Unfortunately the show ended just prior to the major "arc" stories and season 1 cliffhanger.
Should've, could've, would've but didn't. What matters is the end product. As it was, Crusade was unmemorable. JMS chose to sell the right to the episodes and allowed others to change them as they saw fit. Perhaps his choices were very limited, but regardless you can't possibly believe that because Crusade could or should have been better, that we can't judge JMS on his work. I suppose if the fans got their hands on the original versions of those episodes, he'd have called them thieves for that too.
I find hero worship distasteful. JMS did some excellent work on B5, just as Lucas did some excellent work on the original SW trilogy. Doesn't mean that gives these guys the right to behave like assholes or produce crap while we all bow to their glory, or make excuses for their shortcomings.
As with your previous comment about Bablyon 5 "writers" (when in fact it was almost-all just one writer), this comment is also erroneous
Please stop talking out of your ass. He wrote season 1 on his own. He wrote the overall plot arc, and he consulted with the writers. He did not write the whole series single handed.
If you don't believe me, take a look at the lurkers guide, amongst other sources: http://www.ntua.gr/lurk/making/creators.html "Harlan Ellison is the conceptual consultant for the series. He has written a "manifesto" for the show that explains to other writers how to write science fiction for television and Babylon 5 in particular."
"Well-known science fiction writers, including Ellison, David Gerrold, Peter David, and D.C. Fontana, are contributing scripts to the show."
. JMS' work has been released on VHS, DVD, and in book form.
Yes it has. So what? How is that even relevant?
You kinda remind me of that Ford Thaxton fellow who offers opinion as facts - but the "facts" are completely wrong.
Amazing. You spout nonsense that you don't back up, then accuse me of being incorrect. If you're going to do that get your own fucking facts straight. People like you give me the shits.
As for the Crusade scripts, JMS didn't want them to be available online because he wanted to sell them for his own income (just released last year). I see nothing wrong with that desire. Even JMS wants to put food on his table rather than starve.
Yeah look you're an asshole to boot for implying that I want the creative staff of my favourite show to starve. What kind of asshole would want that? Peddle your strawmen elsewhere. I haven't pirated his work. I have no intention of doing so, but when a writer would rather his work were buried in case he might one day sell it instead of having it come out, and when a writer releases something, renegs, then goes off on a tirade at his fans I think that writer has, if you'll pardon the pun, lost the plot.
Writers recycle failed ideas in a new light on occasion. I can understand him wanting to keep that private so that he can use it on future stuff. Who knows, 5 years from now he may come up with something quite good. (I know, suspend your skepticism. It/could/ happen.) Imagine if Joss Whedon's notebooks or failed pre-Firefly stuff were all publically known (and I don't mean just Buffy and his other series).
Sorry. I don't buy that. He can always come up with new ideas. Crusade was lame compared to the original B5 series. The reason these scripts didn't make the cut is probably quite simply because they were sub par. My understanding is that he did release them in some limited way, they were leaked...and he attacked his own fans over wanting to continue to follow the characters and plots he wrote and which they fell in love with.
Is it his right to keep them to himself? Perhaps. It really does depend on how he released them which is detail I don't care to find out more about. Does a man with lots of food surrounded by starving people have a right to withhold his food because he owns it? Perhaps, but he's still an asshole if he does it. That is of course a much more extreme example. JMS' fans won't literally starve to death if he doesn't hand over his scripts, but to go on a rant against them is childish and makes him an asshole, despite his earlier good work. Men like that don't deserve to have fans of their work at all.
I lost all respect for him because his work is never going to be released by the networks and he'd rather see it waste away in a vault than in the hands of fans. He's clearly more interested in his own personal gain than the art he's created or the fans who've elevated his show to cult status. He feels that since he created it he's got the right to bury it as well, even after it has been leaked. He was not speaking about work that was being sold but that people to download instead. He was talking about leaked work that will never be made into a show.
I lost ALL respect for the man when he wrote that. I loved Babylon 5. (Didn't think as much of Crusade). B5 is the only thing I have on VHS and DVD. Legit copies from major retailers but I did wait until they were on special. I still enjoy them but I don't think of him with quite the same fondness and awe. His rant was a lot like finding out one of your childhood heroes is a douche bag that beats up his hookers while he's snorting his hash. Never mind, I was past the age of having any true idols anyway.
As for B5 vs Crusade, it showed. Though I own it on DVD, I've only ever watched Crusade once and wouldn't consider watching it again. B5 I'll watch over and over. It wasn't all JMS either. The cast was brilliant, and he had some good writers on B5. I don't know what the creative process was on Crusade, but I do know that I don't care.
Those of us that are photographers (whether hobbyist or professional) get hit with a double whammy. The search for the perfect camera bag is relentless, and ultimately futile. We all know this, but like an addicted gambler each of us thinks we're somehow going to beat the odds
Speak for yourself. My SLRs live in $20 SLR bags that are fantastic. In 4 years a zipper's been replaced on one of them. I'd much rather spend money on a lens than a bag, since I can get a bag that does the job well without breaking the bank. Wish I could say the same for the damned lenses.
Do you mean many as a lot of people or many as in a very vocal minority?
He means people who don't think it's awesome to flash random bookmarks that may not have been visited for years at passers by when typing something into the location bar, nor think it's awesome to use up screen realestate on unnecessary bling that offers no new functionality. That's not a vocal minority. That's most sane security conscious users who care about the UI design of their browser. Ridiculing people who don't agree with you or putting down their point of view as a fringe minority concern is childish and unhelpful.
After reading the original report I tried to reproduce a simple test for the adobe home page. I used Firefox 3.0.7 and pre-loaded the adobe home page (as suggested in the report), I closed the tab and opened a new one and reloaded the adobe home page. It loaded in 2 or 3 seconds instead of the 9 seconds in the report. I am not sure what to make of this report if a simple experiment to reproduce the measurements fails on the first try. I ran the test on Windows XP Professional SP3.
You did this on a different machine with different specs and are wondering why you didn't get the same results because the App and OS versions happen to match???
Seriously? And it's modded as informative? Which means at least 4 other people don't understand how to do a simple benchmark or reproduce a simple test.
As usual with Firefox features, if you don't like it, you can probably fix it. Try the oldbar extension. There is probably a way to disable it without an extension, ISTR there is a setting in about:config for 3.0 at least, but you can google that yourself. Personally I love the awesome bar, although I don't think I will flip out about the new version for a whole 6 months, but each to their own.
NO. The about:config setting got removed on purpose so that you'd have to jump through hoops if you didn't want to use awesomebar. THIS is the kind of BS that is starting to turn people off Firefox.
To get back your old behaviour you either need these extensions:
Even then A) your behaviour won't be exactly the same as pre-FF 3.0 B) You'll have to wait for updated versions of the extension to work with FF 3.1 beta or 3.5 or whatever they release it as. Currently they work with 3.0.x.
So please stop spreading lies.
Showing people who walk by everything in your bookmarks every time you type something into the location bar and taking up twice the screen realestate is not awesome. It's retarded.
You seem to think that firing the local staff and offshoring means the company is "failing".
I didn't say Pacific Brands was failing. I said CEOs get large payouts regardless of whether or not the company is failing. Get some comprehension skills.
In this case the CEO is doing s completely different thing wrong. They're burning good will and burning the value of the brand, which are the only thing that distinguishes the company from other clothing retailers. Regardless of offshoring the actual manufacture I doubt the company's going to remain profitable in the long term competing with companies run entirely in Asia. Oh and there's also that little thing about sweatshop labour and ethics.
The CEOs job is to maximise shareholder value - to get the best return on their investment.
Not at the expense of everything else. In case you haven't noticed focus on short term profits at the expense of assets, ethics and everything else doesn't work and has led to a global financial meltdown. One job the CEO has is to keep the company profitable, but that doesn't mean they get to neglect everything else with no consequences.
I don't know any more than you've told me about this case but if she's figured out she can improve profits by lowering costs, then she's doing her job and deserves the payrise.
Well I hope you like working for peanuts, because I'm willing to bet no matter what you do, someone else can do it for cheaper. That's the direct result of your logic: Everyone gets paid barely enough to subsist as they are constantly undercut. You're also neglecting the fact that if everyone is fired and replaced by the cheapest possible labour there's no one left to buy the product. What use is it being able to make t-shirts for $3 instead of $5 if the working wage for your target market is $5 a month?
If company performance improves then the CEO is doing well and the shareholders win. How on earth are shareholders losing in this scenario? The company can't be "sold our from under them" - they own the company! You clearly have a poor grasp of economics.
It's fun slinging insults isn't it? You clearly are an abrasive fool who has no comprehension skills.
Please read the above. Try to comprehend it. When you fail, try again. Your suposedly superior grasp of economics is nothing more than a rant about basic unfettered capitalism, which doesn't bloody work.
That's about the same logic as the wingnuts who claim that video games lead to real-life violence.
Sorry but a video game is fantasy and unambiguously so. Locker room bravado is meant to sound like a real life account and big note the person. Even if he wouldn't actually do it, such actions become more plausible to others.
I don't know about general social mores in the US, and perhaps calling people Sir is something that everyone does, but here in Australia nobody calls anybody Sir except for people employed in the service industry and some children to adults.
I live in Australia, and on the perhaps 3 occassions I've been pulled over by police, I've called the officer sir out of respect for their position and to make it damn clear that I'm being polite and cooperative. Grovelling? Perhaps you could argue that, but the police easily wield as much power here as in the US, if not more and only an idiot will put someone who has power over them off side when it's as easy as saying "sir" to make it clear you're not being disrespectful.
I also call other people sir or ma'am on the street or on public transport. Some people are incredibly impressed if you greet them respecfully and it can be the difference between your first impression being to put someone off or them taking a liking to you.
Also before spouting on about how US citizens aren't free consider that in Australia we do not have a right to remain silent, we don't have fair use rights (we still can't even legally backup our DVDs for crying out loud), we certainly haven't got the right to bear arms (which I'm not so phased by given that there are some violent idiots here...but when you extend the law to define laser pointers as weapons because idiots here think it's funny to blind pilots with them you have to wonder). Hell I've even been forced against my will to keep a minute by minute diary of my activities (albeit only for a few days) for our census. That's right I had to report to our government when I went pee pee on penalty of going to jail if I didn't. I wouldn't be crowing about the US' lack of freedom.
In fact, the victim has a Duty to Retreat, sometimes even within their own homes. It is laws like these that have made the public scared and powerless. For the convenience of the government, it is better for ordinary people to simply lay down and die when face with criminal activity.
From the wikipedia article you linked:
In the criminal law, the duty to retreat is a specific component which sometimes appears in the defence of self-defence, and which must be addressed if the defendant is to prove that his or her conduct was justified. In those jurisdictions where the requirement exists, the burden of proof is on the defence to show that the defendant was acting reasonably. This is often taken to mean that the defendant had first avoided conflict and secondly, had taken reasonable steps to retreat and so demonstrated an intention not to fight before eventually using force.
To meet the requirement I recommend you say: "Hey buddy, I want no trouble", then feint left while sucker punching right. Do I need to mention IANAL? Actually I'm not into that sort of kinkiness, but I'm not a lawyer.
You get a chance to fly into freaking space (ok LEO, but it's still space) and you're going to say no because the craft needs some maintenance? I'm going to guess you never bungie-jumped or sky dived.
If I was about to go bungy jumping or sky diving and 3 times they stopped me as I was preparing and told me there would be a delay while they fixed the gear so it was safe, I'd consider finding a different company to get my thrill from. Of course bungy chords and parachutes aren't as complex as the Shuttle, and no bungy or skydiving company has a monopoly so it's not a perfect analogy. However there's nothing wrong with placing a bit of value on your life and expecting gear to be safe when it's literally life or death.
So if the owners are paying the managers ridiculously large wages while the people actually doing the "real work" are getting cheated then the entrepreneur will not be in business very long.
Is that why CEOs are paid so many million whether or not the company is failing? Everything up until that paragraph was BS, but that really clinched it.
Here in Australia we have a scandal going on where an iconic Australian clothing company called Pacific Brands is firing thousands of local staff to move their operations offshore. Anyone that quits early loses their redundancy payouts. Meanwhile the CEO doubled her salary. This is possible because company executives have all the power and are able to decide where to make cuts first. Meanwhile they also pat each other on the back and increase their own wages if company performance improves as a result. Their money doesn't come from the money fairy. The employees and the share holders all lose out as the company is sold out from under them.
One of the key differences between humans and animals is that humans have a much more advanced ability to predict what will happen in the future and to make preparations to deal with that prediction....Animals just don't tend to plan ahead, and it's exciting that this one did.
You obviously don't own a pet dog. They'll not only anticipate feeding time, they'll pester you for food if you don't provide it in a timely manner. Predicting what's about to happen isn't reserved for higher primates. Now my dog doesn't prepare a weapons cache in case I don't feed him on time, but it's not such a stretch that a higher primate would.
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It seems that the dominant paradigm from about 50 years ago was that the man would contribute to the home by bringing in salary and the woman would contribute to the home by doing domestic work
That is until the work required heavy physical labour (moving furniture) or technical skill (eg. handywork, fixing electronics). Getting on a ladder and changing a high lightglobe is somehow not seen as housework.
My point was simply that a shift where both parties are now expected to contribute to the home by bringing in salary should also be accompanied by a shift in how the parties share the domestic work. ...and yet if a man wants to take 6 months off to raise his child, in most circumstances he'd be ridiculed.
By the same token, if the couple is NOT doing the two-income-household thing, there's theoretically no problem with a choice of the salaried party to focus on career and a choice of the non-salaried party to focus on domestic matters. ...and yet few housewives are happy to do all the chores.
. As a female law student, I found it insulting for interviewing law firms to always make it a point to pair female candidates with female attorneys so they can talk about maternity leave and work/life balance and options for going part time in the future when the female candidate decides to have children ...and yet when women are teamed up with men they complain that they can't relate or that the workplace is male dominated.
I may or may not go that route, but I don't like having that assumption in front of me right off the bat. I don't have any way of knowing how male candidates are interacted with during interviews though. So my serious question for you (as, I assume, a male in a demanding profession): Are companies discussing family emphasis with young male candidates to the same extent that they discuss it with young female candidates? If not, do you think they should?
I think what should have happened is that there should have been a shift in work life balance for both sexes. It should be expected that the male will also take time off to help raise children. I don't have that choice. The only way I could take paternity leave is if I took it unpaid, and even then only if my wife was working full time. As it happens I'd make a terrible stay at home dad. I'm just not good with kids. (we could debate whether that too was because I never got the chance to learn to be around children, but at the end of the day I don't think I have those innate qualities anyway). My point is women always complain that they're treated unfairly and have social expectations placed on them yet men are also treated unfairly and have social expectations placed on them. Part of it probably is biology but a lot of it is just social convention. When the day comes where male graduates at your law firm sit down with their male mentors and discuss taking time off to raise a family, THEN you'll have your equality.
That's just a fancy way of saying she gets to juggle a full time job in an office with a full time job as a homemaker and mother and whatever else (because Dear Hubby is so tired after a hard day's work that he couldn't possibly help with chores).
Do you have any idea how insulting that is to those men who do contribute to the household as well as work? Funny how when the woman does it she's taking on twice the work. When a man isn't out of the house 13 hrs a day, then coming home and helping with the housework AND the child and spending ALL his waking time on a combination of the 3 he's scum. When the woman puts her child down for a nap, and watches daytime tv she's just doing what she has to do to cope. When a man has no friends or social life to speak of because he's spending all his time on his family that's just expected. When a woman takes her child to playgroups, mother's groups, swim classes etc. that's just part of her hard work.
Gimme a break.
Even though our society supposedly treats men and women the same, it really doesn't. Raising children still generally falls on the woman's shoulders, whether or not she has a man around to help out. If there is one, he usually sits on the couch watching sports while the woman cooks meals, changes diapers, etc. If she's really lucky, he'll actually hold a regular job and bring home a paycheck.
Can I just say as a father that's out of the house 5 days a week 13 hours a day, then comes home to do chores including laundry, bins, picking up after, clearing the table, the dishes, feeding the pets and yes nappies and bottles, handywork, handles the finances, and after all that still gets grief that I'm not spending enough time with my 7 month old son, I find your remarks insulting.
The whole men vs women thing is just old and just plain destructive. The reality is when a woman was expected to stay home, she had a full time job tending house and looking after the children. Now neither the male or the female earns enough to support the family long term. BOTH have to work to do it, and then somehow in their spare time find time to raise the children and do the chores. Instead of blaming employers for not providing a living wage, women and men turn on each other. Pathetic. Equality would have been the man spending less time at work, and the woman spending more time at work with the man looking after the children while the woman was at work. What we have instead is indentured servitude and a frenzied lifestyle where no one can fulfill their role.
The reason "Western" countries thrive because the police & judiciary are strong, respected, and are (mostly) corruption free
Mod -1 naive.
In Jefferson's time, people regularly fought and died for their beliefs. Today, you may be right, but when Jefferson wrote those words, HE was right. And he still is. If no one is willing to risk death for freedom, then liberty will wither away (like it has been doing).
Have you SEEN what these fools are pirating? I wouldn't risk life or limb for the latest Guns And Roses Album. Hell I wouldn't even risk a slice of toast for that rubbish. There's risking your life for freedom, then there's risking it to listen to Britney Spear's so called singing. One is sane. The other not so much.
Our school systems tell our kids that they all have the potential for greatness. Not just being good at something, but great at something......We don't all shine on. Very few of us do. Unfortunately, too many teachers preach Lennon's line at students. You don't want to discourage students from trying to reach higher, but you also want them to be realistic about the world.
You misunderstand. Shining is not about being great in other people's eyes or achieving fame and fortune. It's about being happy with the things you have and doing what you do as well as you can.
What people don't understand is life under the spotlight is a pain in the neck. Very few of us would actually want to be there. You can still achieve great things in your own life. They just don't have significance to others, and THAT is alright.
Teaching kids they're all mundane will make even the great ones mundane, and will leave them all depressed. Self esteem needs to be based on reality. Actually assess them on the work they do and give them praise for what they actually do achieve when it is clear they are trying their best or clsoe to it, but don't make them feel bad for not achieving higher. In other words, tell little johnny that 2 + 2 = 5 is wrong and grade him accordingly, but don't make him feel bad for not doing even better when he does get the answer right. Part of building self esteem is learning to deal with criticism and understanding the difference between getting it right and screwing up, and learning to cope with both. The school system doesn't recognise that and sees any time the child feels bad as some sort of damage. I feel sorry for kids who make it out into the workforce and suddenly have to cope with learning that their boss doesn't pat them on the back when they bollox things up. It's not the new generation's fault. It's the educators that need a reality check.
I find this sentence funny. Why? Because from episode 216 to episode 522, JMS wrote every single episode except two. Not "writers" just one writer.
So let's ignore the work on the first couple of seasons, and focus on the fact that he wrote lots of excellent episodes. Does that give him the right to lock up work he's already released, call fans thieves because they distribute it when he can offer no legitimate way to do so, or otherwise behave like an ass?
As for Crusade, it would have been great if TNT had not rewritten half the episodes (the first six) against JMS wishes. The show was going to evolve into another Shadow-oriented story, strung over five years, just like Babylon 5 was. Unfortunately the show ended just prior to the major "arc" stories and season 1 cliffhanger.
Should've, could've, would've but didn't. What matters is the end product. As it was, Crusade was unmemorable. JMS chose to sell the right to the episodes and allowed others to change them as they saw fit. Perhaps his choices were very limited, but regardless you can't possibly believe that because Crusade could or should have been better, that we can't judge JMS on his work. I suppose if the fans got their hands on the original versions of those episodes, he'd have called them thieves for that too.
I find hero worship distasteful. JMS did some excellent work on B5, just as Lucas did some excellent work on the original SW trilogy. Doesn't mean that gives these guys the right to behave like assholes or produce crap while we all bow to their glory, or make excuses for their shortcomings.
As with your previous comment about Bablyon 5 "writers" (when in fact it was almost-all just one writer), this comment is also erroneous
Please stop talking out of your ass. He wrote season 1 on his own. He wrote the overall plot arc, and he consulted with the writers. He did not write the whole series single handed.
If you don't believe me, take a look at the lurkers guide, amongst other sources:
http://www.ntua.gr/lurk/making/creators.html
"Harlan Ellison is the conceptual consultant for the series. He has written a "manifesto" for the show that explains to other writers how to write science fiction for television and Babylon 5 in particular."
"Well-known science fiction writers, including Ellison, David Gerrold, Peter David, and D.C. Fontana, are contributing scripts to the show."
. JMS' work has been released on VHS, DVD, and in book form.
Yes it has. So what? How is that even relevant?
You kinda remind me of that Ford Thaxton fellow who offers opinion as facts - but the "facts" are completely wrong.
Amazing. You spout nonsense that you don't back up, then accuse me of being incorrect. If you're going to do that get your own fucking facts straight. People like you give me the shits.
As for the Crusade scripts, JMS didn't want them to be available online because he wanted to sell them for his own income (just released last year). I see nothing wrong with that desire. Even JMS wants to put food on his table rather than starve.
Yeah look you're an asshole to boot for implying that I want the creative staff of my favourite show to starve. What kind of asshole would want that? Peddle your strawmen elsewhere. I haven't pirated his work. I have no intention of doing so, but when a writer would rather his work were buried in case he might one day sell it instead of having it come out, and when a writer releases something, renegs, then goes off on a tirade at his fans I think that writer has, if you'll pardon the pun, lost the plot.
Writers recycle failed ideas in a new light on occasion. I can understand him wanting to keep that private so that he can use it on future stuff. Who knows, 5 years from now he may come up with something quite good. (I know, suspend your skepticism. It /could/ happen.) Imagine if Joss Whedon's notebooks or failed pre-Firefly stuff were all publically known (and I don't mean just Buffy and his other series).
Sorry. I don't buy that. He can always come up with new ideas. Crusade was lame compared to the original B5 series. The reason these scripts didn't make the cut is probably quite simply because they were sub par. My understanding is that he did release them in some limited way, they were leaked...and he attacked his own fans over wanting to continue to follow the characters and plots he wrote and which they fell in love with.
Is it his right to keep them to himself? Perhaps. It really does depend on how he released them which is detail I don't care to find out more about. Does a man with lots of food surrounded by starving people have a right to withhold his food because he owns it? Perhaps, but he's still an asshole if he does it. That is of course a much more extreme example. JMS' fans won't literally starve to death if he doesn't hand over his scripts, but to go on a rant against them is childish and makes him an asshole, despite his earlier good work. Men like that don't deserve to have fans of their work at all.
I lost all respect for him because his work is never going to be released by the networks and he'd rather see it waste away in a vault than in the hands of fans. He's clearly more interested in his own personal gain than the art he's created or the fans who've elevated his show to cult status. He feels that since he created it he's got the right to bury it as well, even after it has been leaked. He was not speaking about work that was being sold but that people to download instead. He was talking about leaked work that will never be made into a show.
Steak and Blowjob day has already claimed March 14th.
As long as you don't expect the steak to give you a blow job before you kill and eat it.
I lost some respect for JMS when he wrote that
I lost ALL respect for the man when he wrote that. I loved Babylon 5. (Didn't think as much of Crusade). B5 is the only thing I have on VHS and DVD. Legit copies from major retailers but I did wait until they were on special. I still enjoy them but I don't think of him with quite the same fondness and awe. His rant was a lot like finding out one of your childhood heroes is a douche bag that beats up his hookers while he's snorting his hash. Never mind, I was past the age of having any true idols anyway.
As for B5 vs Crusade, it showed. Though I own it on DVD, I've only ever watched Crusade once and wouldn't consider watching it again. B5 I'll watch over and over. It wasn't all JMS either. The cast was brilliant, and he had some good writers on B5. I don't know what the creative process was on Crusade, but I do know that I don't care.
Those of us that are photographers (whether hobbyist or professional) get hit with a double whammy. The search for the perfect camera bag is relentless, and ultimately futile. We all know this, but like an addicted gambler each of us thinks we're somehow going to beat the odds
Speak for yourself. My SLRs live in $20 SLR bags that are fantastic. In 4 years a zipper's been replaced on one of them. I'd much rather spend money on a lens than a bag, since I can get a bag that does the job well without breaking the bank. Wish I could say the same for the damned lenses.
Wow. Only 5 comments and the site is already returning 500 errors.
All the geeks want to point and laugh at the bag that stupid people with too much money buy. I'm dying to know what it looks like!
what if your reaction is "this looks and sounds like ass" ?
Then you're not the target audience: 12 year olds on Ritalin.
Do you mean many as a lot of people or many as in a very vocal minority?
He means people who don't think it's awesome to flash random bookmarks that may not have been visited for years at passers by when typing something into the location bar, nor think it's awesome to use up screen realestate on unnecessary bling that offers no new functionality. That's not a vocal minority. That's most sane security conscious users who care about the UI design of their browser. Ridiculing people who don't agree with you or putting down their point of view as a fringe minority concern is childish and unhelpful.
After reading the original report I tried to reproduce a simple test for the adobe home page. I used Firefox 3.0.7 and pre-loaded the adobe home page (as suggested in the report), I closed the tab and opened a new one and reloaded the adobe home page. It loaded in 2 or 3 seconds instead of the 9 seconds in the report. I am not sure what to make of this report if a simple experiment to reproduce the measurements fails on the first try. I ran the test on Windows XP Professional SP3.
You did this on a different machine with different specs and are wondering why you didn't get the same results because the App and OS versions happen to match???
Seriously? And it's modded as informative? Which means at least 4 other people don't understand how to do a simple benchmark or reproduce a simple test.
As usual with Firefox features, if you don't like it, you can probably fix it. Try the oldbar extension. There is probably a way to disable it without an extension, ISTR there is a setting in about:config for 3.0 at least, but you can google that yourself. Personally I love the awesome bar, although I don't think I will flip out about the new version for a whole 6 months, but each to their own.
NO. The about:config setting got removed on purpose so that you'd have to jump through hoops if you didn't want to use awesomebar. THIS is the kind of BS that is starting to turn people off Firefox.
To get back your old behaviour you either need these extensions:
Option 1) Hideunivisted AND oldbar
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/7429
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/6227
OR
2) Old Location BAR (but you'll need to create an account and log in because it's experimental
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/7637
Even then
A) your behaviour won't be exactly the same as pre-FF 3.0
B) You'll have to wait for updated versions of the extension to work with FF 3.1 beta or 3.5 or whatever they release it as. Currently they work with 3.0.x.
So please stop spreading lies.
Showing people who walk by everything in your bookmarks every time you type something into the location bar and taking up twice the screen realestate is not awesome. It's retarded.
You seem to think that firing the local staff and offshoring means the company is "failing".
I didn't say Pacific Brands was failing. I said CEOs get large payouts regardless of whether or not the company is failing. Get some comprehension skills.
In this case the CEO is doing s completely different thing wrong. They're burning good will and burning the value of the brand, which are the only thing that distinguishes the company from other clothing retailers. Regardless of offshoring the actual manufacture I doubt the company's going to remain profitable in the long term competing with companies run entirely in Asia. Oh and there's also that little thing about sweatshop labour and ethics.
The CEOs job is to maximise shareholder value - to get the best return on their investment.
Not at the expense of everything else. In case you haven't noticed focus on short term profits at the expense of assets, ethics and everything else doesn't work and has led to a global financial meltdown. One job the CEO has is to keep the company profitable, but that doesn't mean they get to neglect everything else with no consequences.
I don't know any more than you've told me about this case but if she's figured out she can improve profits by lowering costs, then she's doing her job and deserves the payrise.
Well I hope you like working for peanuts, because I'm willing to bet no matter what you do, someone else can do it for cheaper. That's the direct result of your logic: Everyone gets paid barely enough to subsist as they are constantly undercut. You're also neglecting the fact that if everyone is fired and replaced by the cheapest possible labour there's no one left to buy the product. What use is it being able to make t-shirts for $3 instead of $5 if the working wage for your target market is $5 a month?
If company performance improves then the CEO is doing well and the shareholders win. How on earth are shareholders losing in this scenario? The company can't be "sold our from under them" - they own the company! You clearly have a poor grasp of economics.
It's fun slinging insults isn't it? You clearly are an abrasive fool who has no comprehension skills.
Please read the above. Try to comprehend it. When you fail, try again. Your suposedly superior grasp of economics is nothing more than a rant about basic unfettered capitalism, which doesn't bloody work.
That's about the same logic as the wingnuts who claim that video games lead to real-life violence.
Sorry but a video game is fantasy and unambiguously so. Locker room bravado is meant to sound like a real life account and big note the person. Even if he wouldn't actually do it, such actions become more plausible to others.
I don't know about general social mores in the US, and perhaps calling people Sir is something that everyone does, but here in Australia nobody calls anybody Sir except for people employed in the service industry and some children to adults.
I live in Australia, and on the perhaps 3 occassions I've been pulled over by police, I've called the officer sir out of respect for their position and to make it damn clear that I'm being polite and cooperative. Grovelling? Perhaps you could argue that, but the police easily wield as much power here as in the US, if not more and only an idiot will put someone who has power over them off side when it's as easy as saying "sir" to make it clear you're not being disrespectful.
I also call other people sir or ma'am on the street or on public transport. Some people are incredibly impressed if you greet them respecfully and it can be the difference between your first impression being to put someone off or them taking a liking to you.
Also before spouting on about how US citizens aren't free consider that in Australia we do not have a right to remain silent, we don't have fair use rights (we still can't even legally backup our DVDs for crying out loud), we certainly haven't got the right to bear arms (which I'm not so phased by given that there are some violent idiots here...but when you extend the law to define laser pointers as weapons because idiots here think it's funny to blind pilots with them you have to wonder). Hell I've even been forced against my will to keep a minute by minute diary of my activities (albeit only for a few days) for our census. That's right I had to report to our government when I went pee pee on penalty of going to jail if I didn't. I wouldn't be crowing about the US' lack of freedom.
In fact, the victim has a Duty to Retreat, sometimes even within their own homes. It is laws like these that have made the public scared and powerless. For the convenience of the government, it is better for ordinary people to simply lay down and die when face with criminal activity.
From the wikipedia article you linked:
In the criminal law, the duty to retreat is a specific component which sometimes appears in the defence of self-defence, and which must be addressed if the defendant is to prove that his or her conduct was justified. In those jurisdictions where the requirement exists, the burden of proof is on the defence to show that the defendant was acting reasonably. This is often taken to mean that the defendant had first avoided conflict and secondly, had taken reasonable steps to retreat and so demonstrated an intention not to fight before eventually using force.
To meet the requirement I recommend you say: "Hey buddy, I want no trouble", then feint left while sucker punching right. Do I need to mention IANAL? Actually I'm not into that sort of kinkiness, but I'm not a lawyer.
You get a chance to fly into freaking space (ok LEO, but it's still space) and you're going to say no because the craft needs some maintenance? I'm going to guess you never bungie-jumped or sky dived.
If I was about to go bungy jumping or sky diving and 3 times they stopped me as I was preparing and told me there would be a delay while they fixed the gear so it was safe, I'd consider finding a different company to get my thrill from. Of course bungy chords and parachutes aren't as complex as the Shuttle, and no bungy or skydiving company has a monopoly so it's not a perfect analogy. However there's nothing wrong with placing a bit of value on your life and expecting gear to be safe when it's literally life or death.
So if the owners are paying the managers ridiculously large wages while the people actually doing the "real work" are getting cheated then the entrepreneur will not be in business very long.
Is that why CEOs are paid so many million whether or not the company is failing? Everything up until that paragraph was BS, but that really clinched it.
Here in Australia we have a scandal going on where an iconic Australian clothing company called Pacific Brands is firing thousands of local staff to move their operations offshore. Anyone that quits early loses their redundancy payouts. Meanwhile the CEO doubled her salary. This is possible because company executives have all the power and are able to decide where to make cuts first. Meanwhile they also pat each other on the back and increase their own wages if company performance improves as a result. Their money doesn't come from the money fairy. The employees and the share holders all lose out as the company is sold out from under them.
One of the key differences between humans and animals is that humans have a much more advanced ability to predict what will happen in the future and to make preparations to deal with that prediction....Animals just don't tend to plan ahead, and it's exciting that this one did.
You obviously don't own a pet dog. They'll not only anticipate feeding time, they'll pester you for food if you don't provide it in a timely manner. Predicting what's about to happen isn't reserved for higher primates. Now my dog doesn't prepare a weapons cache in case I don't feed him on time, but it's not such a stretch that a higher primate would.