"You want to send text only email, then send text only emails"
OK, no problem. But, in addition, I'd like to *receive* text only emails. If you'd like you mail reader to support all sorts of bells and whistles, feel free to use one that does. If how your email looks is important to you, I don't see how that's my problem, or my mail readers. (And frankly, if your email has some look that isn't easily achieved with close to plain text, I'm just going to delete it unread anyway; I've never seen a flashy-looking email worth reading.)
I do beleive he was assuming the previous poster, and then you, were trying to say something with some possible relevance, and attempting to devine what that might be. So rather than getting all upset he guessed wrong, perhaps you could enlighten us?
"engineered obsolescence" certainly implies some intent; Do you suggest a $100 dollar laptop, or any laptop, could possibly be designed such that it would not become obsolete?
"You're basing your 'reasonable expectation' argument on the average user's ignorance of technical details of the Internet"
Yes, absolutely. Just as my ignorance of modern eavesdropping techniques does not impact my expectation of privacy in my living room. Frankly, I'd assume there is some sort of tech that would let someone across the street hear everything going on in my living room. But I quite reasonable expect them not to do it. One's expectation of privacy is not based entirely (or even chiefly) on others technical capabilities, but on societal norms. I expect conversations with my wife in our living room are private not because I expect nobody could listen in on them, but because I expect that in a civil society, nobody ought to listen in on them. If the government wants to violate that social norm, they need a warrant.
"The only wrinkle might be that the relationship is vendor/customer instead of employer/employee"
I'd call that more than a wrinkle.
"given the current nature of privacy legislation (eg all your data are belong to the government) I doubt that would stand up"
My understanding of privacy-related court rulings, is that (exactly that) has held up, repeatedly.
"There is no wiretap legislation that applies to Internet traffic"
But there absolutely is wiretap legislation that applies to wiretapping, period, no matter what is on the wire. The hypothetical average persons ignorance of technology, and awareness of social norms is absolutely relevant in *determining* what the law is in regard to privacy. It is not the same thing as a specific persons ignorance of what the law has already been determined to be when they violate it.
At root though, my "expectation of privacy" is not about anyones technological ability to surviel me. It is about the societal norms regarding whether they ought to. Whether they are the government or my ISP, even though they can, people ought not read private emails I send. I didn't send it to them, and I expect they will not read it. If they want to violate that expectation, they should get a warrant.
I grabbed the first number I found on line and rounded.
Based on further research, Wikipedia says 1.45 million in multiple articles, with no apperent dissent on otherwise active disscusion pages. So you might want to head over there and set them straight. On the other hand, Information Please says various numbers in the 1.3 / 1.4 million range over the past several years.
I don't know where your 495,112 number comes from; at a guess, it looks about right for just the Army.
In any case, do you mean to stand by your 30:1 researcher to soldier claim? Even by your numbers that's 15 million researchers; 1 in 20 Americans.
I understand militry spending makes a big difference to you; I'm happy for you that you're getting your education paid for. But that doesn't mean military spending is a remotely efficient way to promote research. The vast majority of that money doesn't go to research, but to paying soldiers, feeding them, clothing them, putting gass in their trucks, etc. In the scope of the military budget, all of DARPA is a little footnote.
I (and the Supreme Court) disagree. A reasonable persons expectation is in fact the standard for privacy rights. I cannot really parse your example, except that it seems to be pointing out that a lawyer could potentially argue something some unreasonable way. Lawyers can of course argue whatever they like; Judges don't have to go along just because a lawyer can say it.
I have a reasonable expectation that my phone calls are not being listened in on, so the government needs a warrant if they want to do it. I sometimes visit an office where the phones are a hybrid system that uses both VOIP and regular land lines. When I pick up the phone there, I don't know which I'm getting, so it's impossible for that to impact my expectation of privacy.
While you or I may think it's ridiculous, most people think their un-encrypted email is private. The whole discussion at hand is whether data being stored on some ISPs machine renders it non-private. Since most everyone has no idea how the technical details of email work, I don't see how those technical details can impact their expectations.
"For every troop that is getting paid to be on base, the military is probably putting food on the tables of 30 researchers or engineers to develop new technologies"
Active troop strength is something like 1.5 million, so by your estimate that's 45 million researchers bettering the world on the militaries dime. Almost 1 in 6 Americans are military funded scientists! Wow, I had no idea.
You'll forgive me if I take the rest of your rosy assesment with a little grain of salt?
"you don't have any expectation of privacy using a VOIP phone"
Of course I do. I expect that a conversation I'm having over the phone is private, regardless of what transmission methods that phone may use. Notably, I don't even always know if I'm using a VOIP phone or a regular phone, so that can't very well impact my expectations.
The whole reason the phrase "expectation of privacy" gets bandied about in these conversations is that the standard is a reasonable persons expectations.
I can understand your confusion, since "mainstream" typically implies "unutterably horrid", but this is not actually a requirement. Despite being occasionally worth listening to, NPR must be considered mainstream by it's number of listeners alone. (As should the particular peice of the donation-supported-non-profit-radio world that produced this piece, which as I undertand it, is not actually NPR)
Well, again, the one existing "whole building" rotator I've heard about actually had an outside theat rotated around a non-rotating core. Each floor was a single apartment whose kitchen, bathroom, and access to the elevator/stairs were in the non-rotating middle. Do you know of a building where the whole thing actually roatates, or are you speculating? I'm just curious; not trying to run down speculating. My own speculation is that a sufficiently reliable rotating water hookup is harder than you think. Friction, of course, is a matter of not just surface area, but the force (weight) between those surfaces. I expect higher-than-bottom-level connections would either make little difference, or actually help.
I've been in several rotating restraunts and observation decks. All had a non-rotating 'core' containing everything that used water/sewer/gas, elevators, and stairs. I'm sure it might be possible to put all that in a rotating section, but my experience suggests that in the past engineers who have actually needed to do it have concluded it's much easier to do a non-rotating core.
Stores which Apple has never heard of, that don't even cary iPods, have big displays of speakers and cases designed aroungd the iPod, manufactured by companies Apple has never heard of. That's what a massive "installed base" gets you. Not even MS has the cash to simulate that level of market saturation. Even if they did, it would obviously be stupid; nobody buys the iPod to go with their belt holster.
"I imagine things will be a little bit different when Best Buy has a whole aisle for nothing but Zune protective cases, like the do for iPods right now."
You say that like it was ever going to happen. The aisle of accessories follows the market share, not the other way around. The wide availability of acessories helps keep the leader in place perhaps; but nobody will make, and best buy wouldn't stock, a ton of accessories for a player that isn't already owned by a ton of customers.
My prediction: the Zune ceases production within the year.
New York (Manhattan in particular) has a very regular grid system, and a complete novice can pretty much find their way around.
DC is deceptive. There's a regular grid of streets with a predictable naming system. These streets are useless to you. To get anywhere, you must use the overlayed jumble of diagonal-running avenues named (in random fasion) after states. But with directions or a map, it's doable.
Boston: forget it. He street plan is based on routes taken by cows over a radically different landscape (no, literally). It's like London, but the cabbies don't know either. The only way to find a place is to go there and ask directions from someone who is at your destination.
How about a statement a the beginning of the year of science class that nothing is ever "proven". Some theories get treated like "fact" because of how sure about them we are. Theories like "The sun will rise tommorow".
Obviously, if one is going to make specific reference to Evolution, one would want to use terms like "fabulously well supported", "the foundation of the modern science of biology", and "on the same essential footing as the theory that the sun will rise tommorow"
I guess I would oppose specific reference to creationism, but it wouldn't be a big deal as long as it was acurately described. Perhaps "Creationism is utterly devoid of, and indeed logically incapable of: evidentiary backing, predictive ability, or scientific worth of any kind."
I mean, my only problem with creationism is it being discussed as theory instead of as pointless solipsistic wanking.
The list was dramatically expanded after 9/11, as agencies rushed to put all sorts of people on it. If it was at all useful before that, it sure isn't now.
14 of the 9/11 hijackers were added to the list, along with many other people known to be dead. But they didn't add anyone they suspected of being a active terrorist agents; because the names of those people are secrect, and the list is too widely disseminated to allow that.
The no-fly list wastes a lot of money to make trouble for people who happen to have the same name as someone on it. It won't stop any terrorists because while it's trivial to circumvent, they wouldn't have to because their names aren't on it.
"Don't adwords work by ordering the ad results by highest bidder?"
No, or at least not entirely, since I can't claim to perfectly understand how the ranking does work. But even if they did work that way, and even if Google just magiaclly awarded themselves the top slot (whcih it appears they don't), taking the top slot would presumably mean the next non-google bidder would be willing to pay somewhat less for slot number two, and there's your cost to Google. If a bidder is willing to pay just as much when the best they can do if slot number two, then clearly they think slot numbers 1 & 2 are equally valuable, so they should have no complaint about which one they get.
One way or another, opportunity cost really is real, and so there is no such thing as a free lunch. Google understands this, and so their marketing department acts like just another customer of their ad-selling department, and both the cost and income presumably go on their seperate balance sheets; the fact that the customer they are selling ads to is actually just a diferent division of the same company is interesting trivia, but doesn't make the ads cost any less.
Slashdot Mirror
"You want to send text only email, then send text only emails"
OK, no problem. But, in addition, I'd like to *receive* text only emails. If you'd like you mail reader to support all sorts of bells and whistles, feel free to use one that does. If how your email looks is important to you, I don't see how that's my problem, or my mail readers. (And frankly, if your email has some look that isn't easily achieved with close to plain text, I'm just going to delete it unread anyway; I've never seen a flashy-looking email worth reading.)
"A North Sea oil platform isn't exactly an 'island paradise.'"
It's a WWII gun platform, not an oil platform. Which is to say, your point holds, only more so.
I understand what engineeered obsolecence is. Still waiting on a comment of possible relevance to the discussion at hand.
I do beleive he was assuming the previous poster, and then you, were trying to say something with some possible relevance, and attempting to devine what that might be. So rather than getting all upset he guessed wrong, perhaps you could enlighten us?
"engineered obsolescence" certainly implies some intent; Do you suggest a $100 dollar laptop, or any laptop, could possibly be designed such that it would not become obsolete?
"You're basing your 'reasonable expectation' argument on the average user's ignorance of technical details of the Internet"
Yes, absolutely. Just as my ignorance of modern eavesdropping techniques does not impact my expectation of privacy in my living room. Frankly, I'd assume there is some sort of tech that would let someone across the street hear everything going on in my living room. But I quite reasonable expect them not to do it. One's expectation of privacy is not based entirely (or even chiefly) on others technical capabilities, but on societal norms. I expect conversations with my wife in our living room are private not because I expect nobody could listen in on them, but because I expect that in a civil society, nobody ought to listen in on them. If the government wants to violate that social norm, they need a warrant.
"The only wrinkle might be that the relationship is vendor/customer instead of employer/employee"
I'd call that more than a wrinkle.
"given the current nature of privacy legislation (eg all your data are belong to the government) I doubt that would stand up"
My understanding of privacy-related court rulings, is that (exactly that) has held up, repeatedly.
"There is no wiretap legislation that applies to Internet traffic"
But there absolutely is wiretap legislation that applies to wiretapping, period, no matter what is on the wire. The hypothetical average persons ignorance of technology, and awareness of social norms is absolutely relevant in *determining* what the law is in regard to privacy. It is not the same thing as a specific persons ignorance of what the law has already been determined to be when they violate it.
At root though, my "expectation of privacy" is not about anyones technological ability to surviel me. It is about the societal norms regarding whether they ought to. Whether they are the government or my ISP, even though they can, people ought not read private emails I send. I didn't send it to them, and I expect they will not read it. If they want to violate that expectation, they should get a warrant.
I grabbed the first number I found on line and rounded.
Based on further research, Wikipedia says 1.45 million in multiple articles, with no apperent dissent on otherwise active disscusion pages. So you might want to head over there and set them straight. On the other hand, Information Please says various numbers in the 1.3 / 1.4 million range over the past several years.
I don't know where your 495,112 number comes from; at a guess, it looks about right for just the Army.
In any case, do you mean to stand by your 30:1 researcher to soldier claim? Even by your numbers that's 15 million researchers; 1 in 20 Americans.
I understand militry spending makes a big difference to you; I'm happy for you that you're getting your education paid for. But that doesn't mean military spending is a remotely efficient way to promote research. The vast majority of that money doesn't go to research, but to paying soldiers, feeding them, clothing them, putting gass in their trucks, etc. In the scope of the military budget, all of DARPA is a little footnote.
"Which renders the definition meaningless"
I (and the Supreme Court) disagree. A reasonable persons expectation is in fact the standard for privacy rights. I cannot really parse your example, except that it seems to be pointing out that a lawyer could potentially argue something some unreasonable way. Lawyers can of course argue whatever they like; Judges don't have to go along just because a lawyer can say it.
I have a reasonable expectation that my phone calls are not being listened in on, so the government needs a warrant if they want to do it. I sometimes visit an office where the phones are a hybrid system that uses both VOIP and regular land lines. When I pick up the phone there, I don't know which I'm getting, so it's impossible for that to impact my expectation of privacy.
While you or I may think it's ridiculous, most people think their un-encrypted email is private. The whole discussion at hand is whether data being stored on some ISPs machine renders it non-private. Since most everyone has no idea how the technical details of email work, I don't see how those technical details can impact their expectations.
"For every troop that is getting paid to be on base, the military is probably putting food on the tables of 30 researchers or engineers to develop new technologies"
Active troop strength is something like 1.5 million, so by your estimate that's 45 million researchers bettering the world on the militaries dime. Almost 1 in 6 Americans are military funded scientists! Wow, I had no idea.
You'll forgive me if I take the rest of your rosy assesment with a little grain of salt?
"you don't have any expectation of privacy using a VOIP phone"
Of course I do. I expect that a conversation I'm having over the phone is private, regardless of what transmission methods that phone may use. Notably, I don't even always know if I'm using a VOIP phone or a regular phone, so that can't very well impact my expectations.
The whole reason the phrase "expectation of privacy" gets bandied about in these conversations is that the standard is a reasonable persons expectations.
I can understand your confusion, since "mainstream" typically implies "unutterably horrid", but this is not actually a requirement. Despite being occasionally worth listening to, NPR must be considered mainstream by it's number of listeners alone. (As should the particular peice of the donation-supported-non-profit-radio world that produced this piece, which as I undertand it, is not actually NPR)
Well, again, the one existing "whole building" rotator I've heard about actually had an outside theat rotated around a non-rotating core. Each floor was a single apartment whose kitchen, bathroom, and access to the elevator/stairs were in the non-rotating middle. Do you know of a building where the whole thing actually roatates, or are you speculating?
I'm just curious; not trying to run down speculating. My own speculation is that a sufficiently reliable rotating water hookup is harder than you think. Friction, of course, is a matter of not just surface area, but the force (weight) between those surfaces. I expect higher-than-bottom-level connections would either make little difference, or actually help.
I've been in several rotating restraunts and observation decks. All had a non-rotating 'core' containing everything that used water/sewer/gas, elevators, and stairs. I'm sure it might be possible to put all that in a rotating section, but my experience suggests that in the past engineers who have actually needed to do it have concluded it's much easier to do a non-rotating core.
"you should be informed that in the 4th century the Koreans used blimps to successfully invade and conquer Japan."
You should be informed that you are making shit up.
Stores which Apple has never heard of, that don't even cary iPods, have big displays of speakers and cases designed aroungd the iPod, manufactured by companies Apple has never heard of. That's what a massive "installed base" gets you. Not even MS has the cash to simulate that level of market saturation. Even if they did, it would obviously be stupid; nobody buys the iPod to go with their belt holster.
"I imagine things will be a little bit different when Best Buy has a whole aisle for nothing but Zune protective cases, like the do for iPods right now."
You say that like it was ever going to happen. The aisle of accessories follows the market share, not the other way around. The wide availability of acessories helps keep the leader in place perhaps; but nobody will make, and best buy wouldn't stock, a ton of accessories for a player that isn't already owned by a ton of customers.
My prediction: the Zune ceases production within the year.
Of course! We all do so constantly.
It is probably true that you won't get hit by a bus tommorow. Do you want to actually go outside on that basis?
From my experience:
New York (Manhattan in particular) has a very regular grid system, and a complete novice can pretty much find their way around.
DC is deceptive. There's a regular grid of streets with a predictable naming system. These streets are useless to you. To get anywhere, you must use the overlayed jumble of diagonal-running avenues named (in random fasion) after states. But with directions or a map, it's doable.
Boston: forget it. He street plan is based on routes taken by cows over a radically different landscape (no, literally). It's like London, but the cabbies don't know either. The only way to find a place is to go there and ask directions from someone who is at your destination.
That's not a sensible, or even gramatical, exerpt.
US Constitution, Article 1, section 9, Paragraph 2:
"The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it."
Lincoln, I think, is covered. Bush, not so much.
Reading about Nerdcore documentaries on slashdot? Pretty geeky.
Felling the need to brag about how you're getting some to unknown strangers in a discussion of nerdcore documentaries on slashdot? Just kinda sad.
How about a statement a the beginning of the year of science class that nothing is ever "proven". Some theories get treated like "fact" because of how sure about them we are. Theories like "The sun will rise tommorow".
Obviously, if one is going to make specific reference to Evolution, one would want to use terms like "fabulously well supported", "the foundation of the modern science of biology", and "on the same essential footing as the theory that the sun will rise tommorow"
I guess I would oppose specific reference to creationism, but it wouldn't be a big deal as long as it was acurately described. Perhaps "Creationism is utterly devoid of, and indeed logically incapable of: evidentiary backing, predictive ability, or scientific worth of any kind."
I mean, my only problem with creationism is it being discussed as theory instead of as pointless solipsistic wanking.
"Excuse me,"
You're excused.
"was I talking to you?"
Yes.
The list was dramatically expanded after 9/11, as agencies rushed to put all sorts of people on it. If it was at all useful before that, it sure isn't now.
14 of the 9/11 hijackers were added to the list, along with many other people known to be dead. But they didn't add anyone they suspected of being a active terrorist agents; because the names of those people are secrect, and the list is too widely disseminated to allow that.
The no-fly list wastes a lot of money to make trouble for people who happen to have the same name as someone on it. It won't stop any terrorists because while it's trivial to circumvent, they wouldn't have to because their names aren't on it.
"Don't adwords work by ordering the ad results by highest bidder?"
No, or at least not entirely, since I can't claim to perfectly understand how the ranking does work. But even if they did work that way, and even if Google just magiaclly awarded themselves the top slot (whcih it appears they don't), taking the top slot would presumably mean the next non-google bidder would be willing to pay somewhat less for slot number two, and there's your cost to Google. If a bidder is willing to pay just as much when the best they can do if slot number two, then clearly they think slot numbers 1 & 2 are equally valuable, so they should have no complaint about which one they get.
One way or another, opportunity cost really is real, and so there is no such thing as a free lunch. Google understands this, and so their marketing department acts like just another customer of their ad-selling department, and both the cost and income presumably go on their seperate balance sheets; the fact that the customer they are selling ads to is actually just a diferent division of the same company is interesting trivia, but doesn't make the ads cost any less.
A reasonable mapping of the abstract concept "-1" to the world of oranges; there are reasonable mappings of complex numbers to the physical world too.