I used to hate all the outsourcing businesses but have come to realize that I make a pretty damn good living fixing other people's shitty code irrespective of their nationality. Yes, I'd prefer to just do things right the first time, but if US companies stupidly insist on sending design work to cheaper, less qualified people, I will happily keep taking their money to fix the shitty code they get for having done so. Penny wise, pound foolish...
If films etc weren't sold at a lower price in countries with lower wages then they would have higher prices in the countries where they are sold in order to cover the lost revenue.
"From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." -- Karl Marx
You really don't want the phone companies to be able to refuse service to anybody...
You're right, not to anybody. But corporations are not people. Corporations do not deserve to be treated as if they have the rights of human beings because they are merely legal entities. When society finally gets this right, a lot of other screwed up things will be fixed, too. Just saying...
There's a fixed amount of bandwidth available, and you have to decide who gets it.
You have N people sucking bits, so you can fairly divide by N the bandwidth each can get from the total available. In CPU scheduling its called timesharing where you share a limited resource (CPU) evenly among N processes that wish to run.
If you want unfair distribution of the bandwidth, you're right, you have to decide.
This is why I hardly ever buy on eBay any more (sell yes, buy no). I buy stuff on craigslist.org precisely because I can inspect stuff myself first hand before buying, and if I'm stupid enough (or want) to buy a fake, that's my problem. Not surprisingly, eBay owns 25 percent of craigslist now, but buying remotely, sight unseen, from "discount sellers" though eBay is, IMHO synonymous with asking to get ripped off. Its just too easy, as other posters have pointed out, to rip people off, and neither eBay nor Paypal do a damn thing about it.
I wonder if any claim that video game violence causing someone to commit a violent act has examined whether the person committing the real violence was, in fact, very good as a game player?
Perhaps real game related violence is correlated with people being very frustrated because they suck as gamers!!
Since when does helping have anything to do with the DHS does or with any of the bogeyman "terrorist" propaganda or spying on its own citizens that the US Government has engaged in for the last 8 years?
Eloquently put. Along with the point about building tolerance of increasingly draconian laws, I think its worth mentioning that discouraging air travel has a possible strategic value: limiting or preventing private communications. The thought that any of us can communicate very privately today, other than face-to-face, seems dubious. What better way to snoop on us all than to discourage air travel, forcing us to use phones, email, etc. instead, which are blatantly tapped, logged, indexed, searched, and so on.
Prank call: "Got fascism in the can? Well its got VD you better let it out!"
But seriously, anybody else think the US NSA just let this out (though Siemens) for others to use so they can "legally" collect data on US citizens through a built in back door?
Its worth pointing out that IBM would probably have never given away the OS franchise for the PC if they weren't tired of the ongoing expense of the anti-trust suit waged against them for the decade preceding the PC. They knew that if they just made the hardware, they could avoid further anti-trust legal risks. Otherwise, I'm sure they would have gladly fleeced everyone, just the way Bill Gates did...
Back around 1990 Apple was struggling internally whether to "bifurcate" the MacOS into a "low end" OS version suited for entry level and educational platforms and a "high end" version for power users and business. Apple eventually decided to keep their "one size fits all" approach, largely for fear of pissing off developers who might be forced to develop 2 versions of everything. I think Microsoft has now found themselves in pretty much this same position. Vista is bloatware that runs like a truck, even on expensive hardware, when compared to XP, and especially when compared to Linux. Does Vista make sense for entry level and educational platforms? I don't believe so.
So here comes a new class of highly popular computers, ultra mobiles like the ASUS eee (I love mine!), and at least part of Microsoft is trying to respond and not lose the market segment. Does this raise the question whether people will accept a "one size fits all" OS model? I think it does and it has. YMMV.
There is jack shit any other country can do to influence the outcome of this You're right about others changing what the Swiss do, but what if the countries claiming damage due to loss of tax revenue simply make it illegal for their citizens to deposit money in Swiss accounts? That would seem to leave the Swiss to do banking as they see fit and place the onus of change on the parties claiming to be injured. Goes beyond "jack shit", too.
Australia... have strict gun control because having a large bore semi-auto isn't as useful as knowing that muggers and bank theives (sic) don't have them. Bullshit, mate. Everywhere guns are outlawed, the outlaws have guns. And let's see how effective the Australian ban has been (from http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/cfi/cfi066.html):
In 1991, there were 629 firearm related deaths compared to 333 deaths in 2001. This represents a 47 per cent decrease in firearm related deaths over the period 1991 to 2001. So in the 10 year period the ~300/year reduction in firearm related deaths only cost the the entire nation of Australia the freedom to protect oneself. And is 300 deaths per 20,000,000 population statistically significant? How many deaths by automobile accident occurred in the same period? Did the Australian government consider banning autos?
Gun control is most favored by fascists and people who have never needed to protect themselves.
What a troll. How can you change anything for the better when the choices are "crooks owned by bankers" and "other crooks owned by the same bankers"? You are a fool for thinking you have any real choice as long as the bankers control the printing presses.
Its been my experience that technology companies that crow about how great their culture is, and/or how great their employees are, are typically a pain in the ass to be employed by. Their claims of great culture are most typically used to justify crappy compensation, and the purported star employees are typically elitists who have rarely, if ever, shipped any product of consequence. YMMV, but when I hear such claims, I get out as fast as possible.
Or to sum up this entire post, isn't it bad if we each need our own personal lawyer just to be able to *OBEY* the law? If enough laws are made, everyone is a criminal. Under these conditions laws are used as a tool of the privileged to selectively punish people, and where politics and influence ultimately invalidate the concept of justice in the law.
In this day an age of warrantless searches and National Security Letters, is it really a Good Thing to have everything that ever passes through your computer be stored forever? Or not be easily and permanently deleted?
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I used to hate all the outsourcing businesses but have come to realize that I make a pretty damn good living fixing other people's shitty code irrespective of their nationality. Yes, I'd prefer to just do things right the first time, but if US companies stupidly insist on sending design work to cheaper, less qualified people, I will happily keep taking their money to fix the shitty code they get for having done so. Penny wise, pound foolish...
"From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." -- Karl Marx
You really don't want the phone companies to be able to refuse service to anybody...
You're right, not to anybody. But corporations are not people. Corporations do not deserve to be treated as if they have the rights of human beings because they are merely legal entities. When society finally gets this right, a lot of other screwed up things will be fixed, too. Just saying...
There's a fixed amount of bandwidth available, and you have to decide who gets it.
You have N people sucking bits, so you can fairly divide by N the bandwidth each can get from the total available. In CPU scheduling its called timesharing where you share a limited resource (CPU) evenly among N processes that wish to run.
If you want unfair distribution of the bandwidth, you're right, you have to decide.
This is why I hardly ever buy on eBay any more (sell yes, buy no). I buy stuff on craigslist.org precisely because I can inspect stuff myself first hand before buying, and if I'm stupid enough (or want) to buy a fake, that's my problem. Not surprisingly, eBay owns 25 percent of craigslist now, but buying remotely, sight unseen, from "discount sellers" though eBay is, IMHO synonymous with asking to get ripped off. Its just too easy, as other posters have pointed out, to rip people off, and neither eBay nor Paypal do a damn thing about it.
I wonder if any claim that video game violence causing someone to commit a violent act has examined whether the person committing the real violence was, in fact, very good as a game player?
Perhaps real game related violence is correlated with people being very frustrated because they suck as gamers!!
So how is this going to help?
Since when does helping have anything to do with the DHS does or with any of the bogeyman "terrorist" propaganda or spying on its own citizens that the US Government has engaged in for the last 8 years?
I truly hope that teh execs at motorla rot in hell with ken lay.
What convinces you that Ken Lay is actually dead?
Eloquently put. Along with the point about building tolerance of increasingly draconian laws, I think its worth mentioning that discouraging air travel has a possible strategic value: limiting or preventing private communications. The thought that any of us can communicate very privately today, other than face-to-face, seems dubious. What better way to snoop on us all than to discourage air travel, forcing us to use phones, email, etc. instead, which are blatantly tapped, logged, indexed, searched, and so on.
I wonder if any of the probe's development was outsourced?
Stop the wrong people from getting into power instead.
Just take away fiat money and you take away the incentive the "wrong people" have for wanting to be in power in the first place.
Oh yeah, I forgot, that's already happening right now. New currency to replace the US Dollar, anyone?
IT unions would turn Silicon Valley into the next Detroit.
Oh, you mean instead of the current walking dead, Dot Com ground zero that it has become?
Prank call: "Got fascism in the can? Well its got VD you better let it out!"
But seriously, anybody else think the US NSA just let this out (though Siemens) for others to use so they can "legally" collect data on US citizens through a built in back door?
Nah...
Blanket licensing is nothing more than Yet Another Blank Tape Tax.
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_Home_Recording_Act
There should be no penalty for selling your vote, but anyone buying a vote should be heavily prosecuted.
IBM handed Microsoft a monopoly
Its worth pointing out that IBM would probably have never given away the OS franchise for the PC if they weren't tired of the ongoing expense of the anti-trust suit waged against them for the decade preceding the PC. They knew that if they just made the hardware, they could avoid further anti-trust legal risks. Otherwise, I'm sure they would have gladly fleeced everyone, just the way Bill Gates did...Back around 1990 Apple was struggling internally whether to "bifurcate" the MacOS into a "low end" OS version suited for entry level and educational platforms and a "high end" version for power users and business. Apple eventually decided to keep their "one size fits all" approach, largely for fear of pissing off developers who might be forced to develop 2 versions of everything. I think Microsoft has now found themselves in pretty much this same position. Vista is bloatware that runs like a truck, even on expensive hardware, when compared to XP, and especially when compared to Linux. Does Vista make sense for entry level and educational platforms? I don't believe so.
So here comes a new class of highly popular computers, ultra mobiles like the ASUS eee (I love mine!), and at least part of Microsoft is trying to respond and not lose the market segment. Does this raise the question whether people will accept a "one size fits all" OS model? I think it does and it has. YMMV.
What's the big fuss? Since the NSA listens to everything and spies on everyone, just get the backups from them.
Personally, I am learning Verilog. I'm tired of the hardware guys telling me how hard it is to design ASICs.
Gun control is most favored by fascists and people who have never needed to protect themselves.
G'day, mate.
What a troll. How can you change anything for the better when the choices are "crooks owned by bankers" and "other crooks owned by the same bankers"? You are a fool for thinking you have any real choice as long as the bankers control the printing presses.
See also George Carlin's comments here: http://youtube.com/watch?v=ktIECyzf4YM
Oh, and Happy New Year.
Its been my experience that technology companies that crow about how great their culture is, and/or how great their employees are, are typically a pain in the ass to be employed by. Their claims of great culture are most typically used to justify crappy compensation, and the purported star employees are typically elitists who have rarely, if ever, shipped any product of consequence. YMMV, but when I hear such claims, I get out as fast as possible.
In this day an age of warrantless searches and National Security Letters, is it really a Good Thing to have everything that ever passes through your computer be stored forever? Or not be easily and permanently deleted?