As an amateur cook, this makes perfect sense to me. A good chef would never accept just any old knife that somebody told him to use. Along the same lines, a lot of carpenters own their own tools as well. As an office worker, desk supplies are largely interchangeable. I'm able to find something in the supply cabinet that's comfortable to use. In the kitchen, though, I've grown accustomed to certain tools and it would be inconvenient if I had to use an unfamiliar knife.
Probably because the speech for the cutscenes is mixed into the spreadsheet with all of the other speech. The voice actors have no more context to recognize speech that occurs within a cutscene than any other.
What is a metre? Traditionally, one ten millionth of a quarter of the circumference of the earth. Now, it is defined as the distance that light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second. At some point, somebody has to make an arbitrary decision about how to define distance. So what is an inch? Who cares? If we must be pedantic, it's the distance that light travels in a vacuum in 10,000/76,147,284,332 of a second.
Base 12 is an excellent base. Metric/decimal is okay but we're not monkeys anymore. Can't we please get over the fact that we have just 10 fingers? Base 12 makes it a lot easier to work with common fractions. Halves, quarters, AND thirds are all easy to calculate. Assuming you accept that the inch is no more or less arbitrary than the centimetre as a unit of measure, then in base 12, feet and yards become completely sensible. A great gross of yards (12^3 = 1728 yards = 5184 feet) is pretty close to today's arbitrary mile. 12-hour days make a lot more sense too. If I remember correctly (and I might not; I welcome corrections if this is wrong), we do it that way in the first place because our timekeeping system evolved from Babylonian timekeeping and the Babylonians used a base-12 number system.
Of course, in base 12, pi is no longer 3.14159. It approximates to 3.18480. I wouldn't mind selecting a definition of pi day that frees us both from the Gregorian calendar AND from our monkey-finger numeric base.
Homestarrunner.com also hasn't updated since last October. (For the record, I've purchased merchandise from them.)
You missed my point, though. HSR.com can support itself on merchandise at least in part because it's an entertainment site. People like having merch that shows their support for their entertainments. The same model does not seem that it would apply nearly so well to a news site.
This sort of argument, as it pertains to piracy, is pretty darned common over at TechDirt, which I also read. I have a lot of sympathy for the creators of "boring" content, like news sites. At least a musician can do live performances and sell merchandise; an author can do lectures and book signings. People used to pay for content so we blame the content creators for having a bad business model and challenge them to come up with something that we'll buy. But we still want the content and we want the money-making good/service to be related to the content too. What is a news site supposed to do? How many people are going to buy an Ars Technica t-shirt? So they make money by selling ads to third parties but people find ways to avoid looking at the ads. Some people would argue that this is Ars Technica's problem and that if they can't find a service that people will buy, they "deserve" to go out of business. How can people have this kind of attitude and then wonder why the content that remains is spineless and pandering? It's because we've driven the real content creators away and all that's left are marketers with delusions of creativity.
To carry that analogy, I think this would be more like Ford offering "free gas for life" with the car and not allowing you to transfer the free gas to somebody else.
The company is selling you access to a service along with the physical goods containing the game software. You're saying that they must allow you to resell access to the service? I don't think so.
Somebody else suggested that unless they refund buyers who don't want access to the multiplayer functions, they're still wrong. I don't see why that should be so. They're selling a bundle and they're under no obligation to unbundle it for anybody. Let the market sort it out. If people don't want it, they won't buy it.
By the reasoning that you've used, I think that one has to endorse what Sony's doing here. After reading through most of the comments, I think I do anyway. All Sony's doing, after all, is competing more effectively. Their competitor is a reseller. Therefore, is there really anything wrong with Sony creating a product that is more useful when purchased new than when purchased from their competitor? Let's try a different spin on this: Sony isn't selling crippled software. They're selling software bundled with a one-time use subscription code. $30 for the software, $20 for the code. Sorry, no refunds, though. If you're interested in just the single-player experience, you should buy the game used. It's fine if you choose to sell the software but the new user will also have to subscribe.
Could somebody explain to me, then, how the Higgs Boson is supposed to be responsible for the existence of mass? Until reading this, I had always heard that the Higgs is responsible for mass and I just assumed that massive particles contained Higgs Bosons - that the Higgs was the mass quantum. If they're many times more massive than other particles we know to be massive, in what manner are they responsible for mass?
The technical challenge is pretty interesting. I like to see tasks completed by a physical analogue. The art is pretty sketchy, though. I've seen "pencil sketch" photo booths in the mall that make prettier artwork. Those have the advantage of going straight from the converted photograph to a printout of course. When they figure out how to let a machine do shaded sketches with a stick of charcoal, I think that this will be ready to jump from technical oddity to marketable novelty.
There was a History Channel program (about porn!) the other day that mentioned the case involving Max Hardcore. Although this ruling appears to be about the internet, I believe that Max Hardcore was also responsible for mailing offending pornographic media to an undercover police officer in a community in Florida whose obscenity laws prohibited it.
Actually, in this instance, counting states is perfectly appropriate. The goal of this law would be restoration of states' authority and reduction of federal authority. Federal authority has always touted the will of the whole people of the country as its mandate and it is by that argument that persons in Florida have come to have authority over persons in California. If a proposed law were nullified by this method, I don't really see a breach of democracy. If those states who didn't object to the law liked it enough, then they can make it a state law instead. If it only works as a federal law, well, that's why the original poster called it the "Protect the 9th and 10th Amendments" Act. The purpose is for the states to reclaim the power to govern themselves from an overreaching federal government.
Even besides contract killing, there are other forms of contract crime. Could I pay neighborhood kids a pittance to shoplift for me? Are protection rackets and blackmail now legal? Organized crime is a lot like a business that happens to be engaged in illegal services. What happens when the guy with the money all of a sudden bears no legal responsibility for the crimes from which he profits?
I'm curious. Does a "not to exceed" clause violate the law? Say a client and lawyer agree on a fee of $1000 but the jury awards the client just $500. Is it acceptable for the agreement to be "$1000, but not to exceed the awarded damages?"
The last time I was part of a union was when I worked at a grocery store in high school. I was just a bargaining chip. They promised me one thing and then told me later (in less honest language) "We had to concede what we promised you to get more important benefits for more important employees." Maybe I couldn't even have gotten as good a deal as I got without union representation but what I remember most vividly about them is that they broke their promise to me because I wasn't important enough for them to care about keeping it.
People have donated their bodies for medical research and education. Medical students dissect cadavers and I would bet that's been recorded and/or televised before. Is there something intrinsically creepier about using a cadaver to study mummification than human anatomy?
This comment seems to highlight one of the major problems in the workplace. Most people effectively wish that their employees or their co-workers will be maladjusted workaholics who will devote their lives to their career, so they fulfill a disproportionate burden of the responsibilities. I always feel a little bit upset about a mentality that, pared down to its core, amounts to, "I'm glad that some people have no life." Nursie, I'm not trying to pick on you specifically. You just happened to say words that reminded me of past employers who thought that I was unprofessional to object to a 6-day work week or the manager who tried to convince me that I should drop out of college to work for him full time.
A lot of what the parent poster was talking about sounded similar to Kurzweil's singularity idea. My understanding is that the processor power to simulate a Lamborghini will be yours in the same way that the power to imagine a Lamborghini is yours now. You will be a collection of advanced processing and simulation equipment and the difference between imagination and simulation will cease to exist.
Let's assume that they're not doing anything illegal with your data. Let's even assume they're not doing anything shady like trying to install software that you won't be able to get rid of later. Is anybody else even a little bit sympathetic to the argument that this is how Facebook makes money? They don't charge their users. The only "product" they have to sell is their users' freely-given information. The Slashdot crowd tends to be more security conscious than others but I've actually thought about this one. Am I willing to trade some of my anonymity for the use of an interesting, free service? Yeah, a little bit, I am. Cue the zealots shouting about how I deserve to have my identity stolen and my credit trampled into the ground for my heresy.
Are you suggesting that our nation's food scientists have relevant input into the problem of Iran's nuclear program? Or are you going a step further and suggesting that universities shouldn't fund their food service programs as long as Iran has a nuclear program to worry us?
The fact of the matter is, we will continue to produce food scientists and their work will have nothing whatsoever to do with Iran's nuclear program. They will formulate new flavour additives, design new labeling methods, and improve preservation techniques.
Let's extend demand for houses to demand for all things that are generally considered necessary to a dignified, healthy life: houses, food, clothing, etc. If demand for those things is being met for everybody, by whatever means, then people will no longer need to toil just to survive. At that point, is monetary gain really a necessary motivation? If one new person needs a house, don't you suppose that enough people would be motivated by altruism to help that person out? Right now, a large part of the reason why so many people are unmotivated to donate to charity is the mindset that their contribution can't make a difference. If the problem of poverty is made small enough that there's a clear and obvious way in which one person's contribution will make a difference, then I think you'll see more people willing to contribute.
I liken this idea to voluntary socialism. A system in which people take care of their neighbors even though they are not coerced into it by government. Unfortunately, we have a self-perpetuating problem of glamorizing unrestrained self interest. The two things I think we need to do first are 1) stop measuring "utility" in dollars and devise a philosophy that more accurately describes the good that those dollars actually generate and 2) stop telling ourselves that everybody else is selfish and our own wellbeing depends on us being selfish too.
It's a good question and I'll try to give you as complete an answer as I can.
First, it's fair to admit that I was raised Christian and that certainly inclines me to remain a Christian as an adult. I can recognize that my faith is lacking in the components required for logical certainty but it holds a position of equal esteem, if not of equal rigour. Put another way, I believe in matters of faith just as firmly as I accept scientific principles. When the two clearly conflict, however, I side with science.
Second, as a matter of reason, I understand that God is an unnecessary entity to our understanding of the material universe. I readily grasp that our universe does not, by any rational mechanism, require a Creator. On the other hand, as a matter of reason (but not as a matter of faith), I also recognize that God is not strictly necessary for me to be comfortable and happy. The existence of happy, comfortable atheists obviously disproves any such notion. In this regard, I object to the suggestion that I need "fairies and unicorns to be happy."
On the other side, as a matter of faith, I accept that God exists. There certainly exist questions that reason can not, at this time, answer. Intuitively, it appears to me that there may be questions that reason will never be able to answer. Those ideas are fully in the realm of faith. I suggest that there is a grey area between matters that are strictly of reason and matters that are strictly of faith. I poetically call those the "mysteries." If reason mines a nugget out of there from time to time, great. If the holy book that I choose to read does not address them, then I'm satisfied addressing them with pseudo-rational speculation. One might argue that if it can not be known by reason that it can not be known. A sufficiently tight definition of knowledge probably affirms that statement. However, I deny the truth of that statement and furthermore suggest that it requires a leap of faith to make it. (The only way that one can ascertain by reason that the only path to knowledge is through reason is by creating a circular definition of "knowledge" that precludes wisdom gained by other means.)
God's existence is aesthetically appealing to me. Or, as Stephen Colbert might say, it is "truthy." Because I appreciate rigour, I do my utmost to retain an internally consistent faith. Anything less would fail aesthetically. Furthermore, as noted above, I maintain a faith that does not openly contradict the positive findings of reason. (I admit that it is irrational or, at least arational to make a positive assertion of unproven or unprovable hypotheses.)
Finally, while I admit that this argument is probably circular, I choose to believe because what I believe is true. Rationally absurd? Of course. That does not, however, mean that it is wrong - just that I can't prove that it is true. I am open to the possibility that revelation, along with research, is a mechanism by which truth can be discovered. It is also, of course, a method by which hoaxes or insane gibberish can be propagated. I am sufficiently satisfied with the documentary record to believe that the Christian scriptures are at least sane and sincere. I can't ascertain with scientific rigour that they are accurate, but they at least point to something that may lie beyond the scope of reason.
Why do I believe in Christianity and not Islam or Buddhism? To be perfectly honest, I haven't gotten that far yet. I'm still plumbing the depths of my own faith and I can't claim that another faith won't prove to be more aesthetically appealing to me.
Christianity remains plausible to me and lends itself to an internally consistent worldview that also does not undermine my rational worldview. It addresses matters that reason does not presently address, some of which it seems unlikely that reason will ever address.
Slashdot Mirror
I throw pieces of rubber at metal poles for two hours at a time sometimes. Two hours is about right for 27 holes of disc golf.
As an amateur cook, this makes perfect sense to me. A good chef would never accept just any old knife that somebody told him to use. Along the same lines, a lot of carpenters own their own tools as well. As an office worker, desk supplies are largely interchangeable. I'm able to find something in the supply cabinet that's comfortable to use. In the kitchen, though, I've grown accustomed to certain tools and it would be inconvenient if I had to use an unfamiliar knife.
Cocaine!? I thought that you were setting up for an alpaca joke.
Probably because the speech for the cutscenes is mixed into the spreadsheet with all of the other speech. The voice actors have no more context to recognize speech that occurs within a cutscene than any other.
What is a metre? Traditionally, one ten millionth of a quarter of the circumference of the earth. Now, it is defined as the distance that light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second. At some point, somebody has to make an arbitrary decision about how to define distance. So what is an inch? Who cares? If we must be pedantic, it's the distance that light travels in a vacuum in 10,000/76,147,284,332 of a second.
Base 12 is an excellent base. Metric/decimal is okay but we're not monkeys anymore. Can't we please get over the fact that we have just 10 fingers? Base 12 makes it a lot easier to work with common fractions. Halves, quarters, AND thirds are all easy to calculate. Assuming you accept that the inch is no more or less arbitrary than the centimetre as a unit of measure, then in base 12, feet and yards become completely sensible. A great gross of yards (12^3 = 1728 yards = 5184 feet) is pretty close to today's arbitrary mile. 12-hour days make a lot more sense too. If I remember correctly (and I might not; I welcome corrections if this is wrong), we do it that way in the first place because our timekeeping system evolved from Babylonian timekeeping and the Babylonians used a base-12 number system.
Of course, in base 12, pi is no longer 3.14159. It approximates to 3.18480. I wouldn't mind selecting a definition of pi day that frees us both from the Gregorian calendar AND from our monkey-finger numeric base.
Homestarrunner.com also hasn't updated since last October. (For the record, I've purchased merchandise from them.)
You missed my point, though. HSR.com can support itself on merchandise at least in part because it's an entertainment site. People like having merch that shows their support for their entertainments. The same model does not seem that it would apply nearly so well to a news site.
This sort of argument, as it pertains to piracy, is pretty darned common over at TechDirt, which I also read. I have a lot of sympathy for the creators of "boring" content, like news sites. At least a musician can do live performances and sell merchandise; an author can do lectures and book signings. People used to pay for content so we blame the content creators for having a bad business model and challenge them to come up with something that we'll buy. But we still want the content and we want the money-making good/service to be related to the content too. What is a news site supposed to do? How many people are going to buy an Ars Technica t-shirt? So they make money by selling ads to third parties but people find ways to avoid looking at the ads. Some people would argue that this is Ars Technica's problem and that if they can't find a service that people will buy, they "deserve" to go out of business. How can people have this kind of attitude and then wonder why the content that remains is spineless and pandering? It's because we've driven the real content creators away and all that's left are marketers with delusions of creativity.
To carry that analogy, I think this would be more like Ford offering "free gas for life" with the car and not allowing you to transfer the free gas to somebody else.
Traitor? Really?
The company is selling you access to a service along with the physical goods containing the game software. You're saying that they must allow you to resell access to the service? I don't think so.
Somebody else suggested that unless they refund buyers who don't want access to the multiplayer functions, they're still wrong. I don't see why that should be so. They're selling a bundle and they're under no obligation to unbundle it for anybody. Let the market sort it out. If people don't want it, they won't buy it.
By the reasoning that you've used, I think that one has to endorse what Sony's doing here. After reading through most of the comments, I think I do anyway. All Sony's doing, after all, is competing more effectively. Their competitor is a reseller. Therefore, is there really anything wrong with Sony creating a product that is more useful when purchased new than when purchased from their competitor? Let's try a different spin on this: Sony isn't selling crippled software. They're selling software bundled with a one-time use subscription code. $30 for the software, $20 for the code. Sorry, no refunds, though. If you're interested in just the single-player experience, you should buy the game used. It's fine if you choose to sell the software but the new user will also have to subscribe.
Could somebody explain to me, then, how the Higgs Boson is supposed to be responsible for the existence of mass? Until reading this, I had always heard that the Higgs is responsible for mass and I just assumed that massive particles contained Higgs Bosons - that the Higgs was the mass quantum. If they're many times more massive than other particles we know to be massive, in what manner are they responsible for mass?
The technical challenge is pretty interesting. I like to see tasks completed by a physical analogue. The art is pretty sketchy, though. I've seen "pencil sketch" photo booths in the mall that make prettier artwork. Those have the advantage of going straight from the converted photograph to a printout of course. When they figure out how to let a machine do shaded sketches with a stick of charcoal, I think that this will be ready to jump from technical oddity to marketable novelty.
There was a History Channel program (about porn!) the other day that mentioned the case involving Max Hardcore. Although this ruling appears to be about the internet, I believe that Max Hardcore was also responsible for mailing offending pornographic media to an undercover police officer in a community in Florida whose obscenity laws prohibited it.
Actually, in this instance, counting states is perfectly appropriate. The goal of this law would be restoration of states' authority and reduction of federal authority. Federal authority has always touted the will of the whole people of the country as its mandate and it is by that argument that persons in Florida have come to have authority over persons in California. If a proposed law were nullified by this method, I don't really see a breach of democracy. If those states who didn't object to the law liked it enough, then they can make it a state law instead. If it only works as a federal law, well, that's why the original poster called it the "Protect the 9th and 10th Amendments" Act. The purpose is for the states to reclaim the power to govern themselves from an overreaching federal government.
Even besides contract killing, there are other forms of contract crime. Could I pay neighborhood kids a pittance to shoplift for me? Are protection rackets and blackmail now legal? Organized crime is a lot like a business that happens to be engaged in illegal services. What happens when the guy with the money all of a sudden bears no legal responsibility for the crimes from which he profits?
I'm curious. Does a "not to exceed" clause violate the law? Say a client and lawyer agree on a fee of $1000 but the jury awards the client just $500. Is it acceptable for the agreement to be "$1000, but not to exceed the awarded damages?"
The last time I was part of a union was when I worked at a grocery store in high school. I was just a bargaining chip. They promised me one thing and then told me later (in less honest language) "We had to concede what we promised you to get more important benefits for more important employees." Maybe I couldn't even have gotten as good a deal as I got without union representation but what I remember most vividly about them is that they broke their promise to me because I wasn't important enough for them to care about keeping it.
People have donated their bodies for medical research and education. Medical students dissect cadavers and I would bet that's been recorded and/or televised before. Is there something intrinsically creepier about using a cadaver to study mummification than human anatomy?
This comment seems to highlight one of the major problems in the workplace. Most people effectively wish that their employees or their co-workers will be maladjusted workaholics who will devote their lives to their career, so they fulfill a disproportionate burden of the responsibilities. I always feel a little bit upset about a mentality that, pared down to its core, amounts to, "I'm glad that some people have no life." Nursie, I'm not trying to pick on you specifically. You just happened to say words that reminded me of past employers who thought that I was unprofessional to object to a 6-day work week or the manager who tried to convince me that I should drop out of college to work for him full time.
A lot of what the parent poster was talking about sounded similar to Kurzweil's singularity idea. My understanding is that the processor power to simulate a Lamborghini will be yours in the same way that the power to imagine a Lamborghini is yours now. You will be a collection of advanced processing and simulation equipment and the difference between imagination and simulation will cease to exist.
Let's assume that they're not doing anything illegal with your data. Let's even assume they're not doing anything shady like trying to install software that you won't be able to get rid of later. Is anybody else even a little bit sympathetic to the argument that this is how Facebook makes money? They don't charge their users. The only "product" they have to sell is their users' freely-given information. The Slashdot crowd tends to be more security conscious than others but I've actually thought about this one. Am I willing to trade some of my anonymity for the use of an interesting, free service? Yeah, a little bit, I am. Cue the zealots shouting about how I deserve to have my identity stolen and my credit trampled into the ground for my heresy.
Are you suggesting that our nation's food scientists have relevant input into the problem of Iran's nuclear program? Or are you going a step further and suggesting that universities shouldn't fund their food service programs as long as Iran has a nuclear program to worry us?
The fact of the matter is, we will continue to produce food scientists and their work will have nothing whatsoever to do with Iran's nuclear program. They will formulate new flavour additives, design new labeling methods, and improve preservation techniques.
Warning. Idealism ahead.
Let's extend demand for houses to demand for all things that are generally considered necessary to a dignified, healthy life: houses, food, clothing, etc. If demand for those things is being met for everybody, by whatever means, then people will no longer need to toil just to survive. At that point, is monetary gain really a necessary motivation? If one new person needs a house, don't you suppose that enough people would be motivated by altruism to help that person out? Right now, a large part of the reason why so many people are unmotivated to donate to charity is the mindset that their contribution can't make a difference. If the problem of poverty is made small enough that there's a clear and obvious way in which one person's contribution will make a difference, then I think you'll see more people willing to contribute.
I liken this idea to voluntary socialism. A system in which people take care of their neighbors even though they are not coerced into it by government. Unfortunately, we have a self-perpetuating problem of glamorizing unrestrained self interest. The two things I think we need to do first are 1) stop measuring "utility" in dollars and devise a philosophy that more accurately describes the good that those dollars actually generate and 2) stop telling ourselves that everybody else is selfish and our own wellbeing depends on us being selfish too.
It's a good question and I'll try to give you as complete an answer as I can.
First, it's fair to admit that I was raised Christian and that certainly inclines me to remain a Christian as an adult. I can recognize that my faith is lacking in the components required for logical certainty but it holds a position of equal esteem, if not of equal rigour. Put another way, I believe in matters of faith just as firmly as I accept scientific principles. When the two clearly conflict, however, I side with science.
Second, as a matter of reason, I understand that God is an unnecessary entity to our understanding of the material universe. I readily grasp that our universe does not, by any rational mechanism, require a Creator. On the other hand, as a matter of reason (but not as a matter of faith), I also recognize that God is not strictly necessary for me to be comfortable and happy. The existence of happy, comfortable atheists obviously disproves any such notion. In this regard, I object to the suggestion that I need "fairies and unicorns to be happy."
On the other side, as a matter of faith, I accept that God exists. There certainly exist questions that reason can not, at this time, answer. Intuitively, it appears to me that there may be questions that reason will never be able to answer. Those ideas are fully in the realm of faith. I suggest that there is a grey area between matters that are strictly of reason and matters that are strictly of faith. I poetically call those the "mysteries." If reason mines a nugget out of there from time to time, great. If the holy book that I choose to read does not address them, then I'm satisfied addressing them with pseudo-rational speculation. One might argue that if it can not be known by reason that it can not be known. A sufficiently tight definition of knowledge probably affirms that statement. However, I deny the truth of that statement and furthermore suggest that it requires a leap of faith to make it. (The only way that one can ascertain by reason that the only path to knowledge is through reason is by creating a circular definition of "knowledge" that precludes wisdom gained by other means.)
God's existence is aesthetically appealing to me. Or, as Stephen Colbert might say, it is "truthy." Because I appreciate rigour, I do my utmost to retain an internally consistent faith. Anything less would fail aesthetically. Furthermore, as noted above, I maintain a faith that does not openly contradict the positive findings of reason. (I admit that it is irrational or, at least arational to make a positive assertion of unproven or unprovable hypotheses.)
Finally, while I admit that this argument is probably circular, I choose to believe because what I believe is true. Rationally absurd? Of course. That does not, however, mean that it is wrong - just that I can't prove that it is true. I am open to the possibility that revelation, along with research, is a mechanism by which truth can be discovered. It is also, of course, a method by which hoaxes or insane gibberish can be propagated. I am sufficiently satisfied with the documentary record to believe that the Christian scriptures are at least sane and sincere. I can't ascertain with scientific rigour that they are accurate, but they at least point to something that may lie beyond the scope of reason.
Why do I believe in Christianity and not Islam or Buddhism? To be perfectly honest, I haven't gotten that far yet. I'm still plumbing the depths of my own faith and I can't claim that another faith won't prove to be more aesthetically appealing to me.
Christianity remains plausible to me and lends itself to an internally consistent worldview that also does not undermine my rational worldview. It addresses matters that reason does not presently address, some of which it seems unlikely that reason will ever address.