So who are we paying to translate all that voice to text? Yes, we could automate it, but unless that NSA/FBI/CIA/Aliens have technology leagues ahead of ours, then computers still suck at it. Especially when we consider that we're dealing with 250 million unique ways of speaking, spread across umpteen dialects, and all the various slangs.
And what does this get? Nothing. the simplest scheme can thwart this. "I need to get some eggs at the supermarket" could conceal loads of information, without ever raising suspicions.
You're also ignoring the HUGE amounts of data transferred everyday. I'm guessing the amount of computer-computer communications is approaching, or exceeding an exobyte a day. Caching all this is pretty hopeless.
Taking your premise as true, now we need to work out a way to make any of this data even slightly useful. If we have an exobyte of data, how are we supposed to find that one useful conversation?
Computer data is MUCH more difficult to handle than voice. In the course of a week I throw around millions of packets, to thousands of servers, from an unknown number of computers, many of which can't be linked to me. Then you still have the ease of concealing messages in code, and worse now we have stenagraphy. How are we to know that that lolcat I just sent out from an internet cafe is really a lolcat, or just a container hiding a message about sexual deviance and the evils of Christianity? This isn't to mention regular encryption, the NSA would still have to break my 128k key, or whatnot, which is computationally nontrivial.
And then again, we must ask, for what ends? This amount of data would be useless. And do we actually think our government is REALLY competent enough to pull this off? Hell, they can't even illegally torture people without it leaking.
This isn't to say that I don't worry about my privacy, but I don't think the time for the tinfoil hat is now. I worry more about old-fashioned violations.
Minor quibble, I don't think "fascist" is the proper term here, "totalitarian" might fit your ends a bit better. There also is a line between public health and individual inconvenience, where this falls on that line is up for debate (I think it might be a little much), but ultimately this is not a bunch of tourist's call.
That is my main point, it's their country, it's their rules. No matter how tyrannical us outsiders view it, its between their citizens and their government. If you choose to travel somewhere, you have to play by their rules.
Quarantine procedures are also, at times, completely justified. Not saying they are in this case, but in some cases they are. When you become a hazard to others, we (the people) have the right to remove you until you no longer are a hazard. This isn't tyranny, this is the social contract in its purest form.
Ah, so you're one of those people that believes everything they read.
No, I'm not. BUT we are discussing the article, and thus I'm taking it as true. Until, of course someone can prove it is not. So far no one in this thread has even come close to doing this. So if we're going to have a discussion, we might as well take the article as true, even if it isn't, for the sake of discussion.
From the sounds of it, though, there is some potential for truth here, since cases have been traced back to travelers, and said travelers took fever reducers. Thus, if they were aware of the procedures, they were "cheating" and concealing something that native officials barred.
To put this shoe on a different foot: "Ah, so you're one of those people that disbelieves everything they read."
Come on, the TSA is full of dishonesty, why should we expect any different from the Vietnamese equivalent (well, not really, since this is the Health Department, but they are commenting on airport security matters, so it stands to reason that they got their information from their airport security personnel, or worse, are talking out their asses)? All those people with encrypted laptop hard drives or who forgot to toss their 16 oz bottle of water are obviously willfully trying to circumvent security regulations, amirite?
Apples and oranges. If you are aware that the country your entering has a policy against entering with a fever, and you enter anyways your violating the law. It isn't up to foreign individuals to ignore laws as they see fit. We'd frown on it in the US, so I wholly expect others to do so. No matter how dumb I find these laws.
I see no evidence of intent.
I'm taking this as a given. Lets refrase this "IF there was intent; then they are wrong", "IF not; then Vietnamese officials should have made the policy clearer", "if the second condition was true, and people still entered with fevers; then they are wrong".
And if you know that the country your visiting has a quarantine policy for people entering the country with a fever, and you refuse to disclose this after taking your fever reducer, then yes it is cheating. If they were ignorant of the quarantine policy, then I can see this, if they weren't then yes, they were cheating.
When you choose to visit another country, you must follow their laws. If you try to get around their laws, then you deserve whats coming, whether you agree or not. Imagine if foreign people visiting the US could ignore our laws, and only follow the laws of their homeland, would that be a good policy?
You are assuming that people are deliberately trying to avoid getting caught. People who have fevers take cold medicine to make them feel better, not to evade thermal scans. Most people don't even know that they do such things at some air
This being the topic of TFA, is a given. And by doing so they were violating Vietnamese law. Pretty cut and dry now, eh?
You could stay home when other people are sick. Not sure where in the constitution it says healthy people have right to travel when sick people don't.
No one mentioned the word "rights" here, nor is it even a question. Nor is the U.S. Constitution relevant in even the slightest of ways. I really doubt that the Vietnamese, must less most of the world really care one bit about our constitution, nor should they. Countries have the right to restrict foreign travelers, if you break their entry laws, your breaking laws and are free to accept the consequences. This too is fine. If you don't like their laws, no one is forcing you to go there.
Most Government's, including the U.S. have the right to quarantine people for the good of the public health. This is also fine. If you, exercising your rights to be an inconsiderate asshat, endanger hundreds of people, then your rights to travel can, and should, be temporarily suspended. This makes perfect sense.
Can we please stop with this "the Constitution says I have the right to do whatever the hell I please" meme. It doesn't, and it goes against the legal and philosophical trends that lead to the foundation of the US. Your rights stop the second they infringe on someone else's. You don't have the right to be a dick.
Also can we stop with this "The U.S Constitution is somehow universally relevant to other sovereign nations" bull. No one cares. Hell, we decided the Constitution isn't even valid to large swaths of people in the US, or held against their will on US soil. Why should any country treat us differently?
It isn't perfect by any means, and as the person who replied to you states, it have been getting progressively worse with time. I first tried it, and got hooked on it in 2001 or 2002, when it was much more oriented on music management and not on connecting 80000 peripherals I don't have/care about, and at that time I was using WinAmp, which generally sucks.
I haven't notice any speed problems on the PC (I have on some Macs, though, oddly), and I don't use it for audio books, so I'm not sure how it handles them.
I do like being able to just drag music to my library and forget about it. iTunes fits that very well, I can't even imagine going through my large music library by hand anymore. The iPod interface is frustrating at times, though, I agree.
I guess the main thing is that we like what we're used to, and I haven't stumbled on a substantially better music app yet. Though its getting to be time, since both Apple and Google have decided that my computer is theirs in which to load any strange TSR/Service that they want. An aspect of modern software design that is beginning to wear on me.
I like it, but I'm not going to go out of my way to be a cheerleader for it.
No. iTunes is good for putting stuff on you iPod, it also is a decent media player. I started using iTunes for my music a year or so before I got an iPod (or even a Mac). Part of my getting an iPod and a Mac was because I really liked how iTunes handled music. I'd probably be using it even if I didn't have a supported device (though I might migrate to Songbird, which is basically an iTunes clone).
iTunes was one of the first players that didn't force me to play with directories, or use self-imposed naming conventions for my music library.
I.e. there goes the nice quiet neighborhood the locals probably recently moved out of California to get.
So the Californians are shocked that other Californians are making the area into California?
Not from NM, but AZ has the same problems. Oddly, in some small towns here (Congress, for example) the Californians are building mini-walled subdivisions (with sideways houses and minuscule yards). Nothing quite as amusing as seeing a walled sub-division surrounded by 100 square miles of undeveloped desert.
Another fun fact, the parts of Arizona that have the terrain of California, and now EXACTLY like California, even the property values, and length of commute.
What, because an unreliable wireless connection is so much better than sticking with wires? Actual price of it is $100, but it's hardly a requirement
Actually, it is somewhat a requirement, depending on how old your house is. In my current apartment (built in the early 70s) there is one cable jack in the whole apartment, meaning my placement of a modem is limited to one wall, in the middle of the living room. So, in order to have a computer in any other room, or an Xbox, I need a wifi router.
My girlfriends apartment is even worse (built in the early-mid-60's), she only has one cable jack, and only has 2 functioning phone jacks. So basically she needs wifi to have any choice in placement.
[citation needed] By my count, it's somewhere in the $500 games for a full setup, including games. Good luck getting a decent computer for that much.
Or you could just throw a $100 video card in your existing computer, and have a decent gaming box (if it was made in the last 3 years), if you really want to be risque, you could throw in an extra $75 of RAM in as well. Most people have existent computers, so there is no need to buy a new one.
So $175 is much cheaper than $500.
I'm sure you could build a better computer than an Xbox for around $500 (sans monitor), and even if it went over, a computer is more useful for more things than a console.
To quibble; Even then, to communicate directly with the nerves the signal will have to be converted to analogue, no matter how far down the neurological perception ladder we move, there still be have to be an analogue step for it to be perceived by humans.
Our brains, and all their components, "speak" analogue, so any digital signal will have to end as analogue at some point in time.
The problem was DVD was a decent improvement over VHS, at a decent cost-point (Laserdisk was too, but NOT at a good cost point, that and the size of those things was annoying). Also, you could use DVD on your existent TV without any problems, with an improvement on sound and picture quality.
Blue Ray isn't a very large improvement over DVDs, not enough to warrant spending any amount of extra money on, at least. On a SDTV, Blue Ray is nothing but a waste of money (if it even plays thanks to restrictive DRM). To get the full benefit of Blue Ray (which still isn't very noticeable by the placement of most people's TVs), you need to go buy a new TV. A lot of people can't afford to, or don't want to be forced to buy a new dvd/TV combo, just to gain a small difference. This is especially true in the economy.
It also is a pain in the ass to set up at times. the DRM crap, and the need to update it is a pain.
Blue Ray will only be accepted when all the perfectly functional SDTVs die off naturally, or when Blue Ray becomes a ubiquitous storage medium, like CDs and DVDs did (which helped their market share and price). But the question is, will these things come to pass before we move onto to a purely online model? I'm guessing this Blue Ray crap is nothing but a transitional measure to where physical media dies off.
More importantly, it is less effort (which also is a cost) than the illegal free equivalent. Sure, you can download the show ad-free in 10-30 minutes, but with Hulu (at least for those of us in the US), you can immediately watch the show.
I wonder what the statistics are for the rate of piracy on the selection of shows on Hulu before and after the service became popular.
If these hypothetical stats (rolling 2d10 says it went down 59%) bear me out, then perhaps some Hollywood bigwig should put up a Hulu for movies, have then in 720p, have them streaming, and have them ad-sponsored with no barrier to entry. I'm guessing this would remove some piracy, while keeping the incentive to actually buy DVDs. I'm guessing most people who pirate a film are doing it for a one-off viewing, and not to keep as a permanent copy. (hypothetically this will reduce movie piracy by 2d20=78%)
Music will always be more problematic, since it isn't really made for passive listening. People want to take it with them to a higher degree than TV shows or movies, and also want a higher degree of control over the content. iTunes, Amazon, and eMusic are good starts in making legal solutions somewhat competitive with piracy, but it still isn't as convenient, especially with the need for specialty clients. I can find free pirated tracks in the exact same amount of time as I could find them on a pay site.
I still know a lot of people who listen to AM radio on their commutes. The fact that every broadcast area has at least one right-wing AM radio station attests to this.
I personally don't think there is any great fortress of liberalism, or conservatism. I think we're dealing with a squeaky wheel problem, the vocal minority gets the attention, the centrist majority (wrong choice in words perhaps, lets say the majority who picks and chooses emulating centrism) gets ignored.
If the media was so leftist, then how can you explain Bush being elected twice. Either your premise is wrong, or no one cares. Either way, then, it doesn't matter to much.
Notice how both sides complain about this.
Personally I think anyone who identifies with the left or the right are morons. Both parties, views, have good points and bad, but to accept a whole package is rather... lazy.
Personally I'm a social libertarian, and a socialist. Not completely, but they are the closest labels. I think the "liberals" should stay out of social laws (as should the religious factions), and the "conservatives" should bugger out of the economy. But not completely for either preposition.
They're paying to use thier CAR on the street, not their bikes.
I'd take it to mean their paying to use the streets. But this is largely a matter of semantics, unless you have some relevant law on hand that says otherwise, this point is not ever resolvable. Other taxes besides gas taxes go towards streets (sales and state income taxes, mostly here, thanks to idiotic congressmen).
Really? Discussion on how my tax money is spent is meaningliess? Sorry you find it boring, but I feel I pay enough as it is, and am working on ways to CUT what I pay, not increase it. Certainly not pay more for a minority of people.
No matter how either of us feel, it is. We have different opinions, and can probably cite different experts and theories until we're both blue in the face with no resolution. I would be okay with paying MORE taxes if I was met with an equal amount of useful services. Its just different philosophies, both are equally valid (and invalid). Thats the great thing about democracy (especially the American one) is that you always have two or more groups of people completely at odds, and in the end none of them are ever happy. It works.
To continue the argument though; you dislike cyclists, so therefore building infrastructure to keep them off roads would benefit you, since I doubt anyone would ever ban bicycles, or regulate them to the point of complete uselessness. Keeping this in mind, we have a simple equation, are bicycles on the streets/sidewalks a bigger nuisance than paying a marginal amount of extra taxes to remove the nuisance.
Yes, your ideology will dictate one or the other as some absolute truth, but thankfully government usually never caters to people who think they are right to the exclusion of other groups.
I actually have more of an idea, since I am doing my own informal study. As it stands now (I've been doing this about 8 months now), 92% of cyclists are breaking important laws; they're on sidewalks, not yielding, running red lights and stops signs. I simply tick down when I see a cyclist, and another tick in another column if they do something illegal. Most of it is running stop signs and red lights, if you're interested. If as many cars were running lights and stop signs as bikes, our roads would look like a demolition derby.
I personally have noticed very few bicyclists breaking the law of late (no hard numbers). This, though, is colored by their relative scarcity here. Even when I lived in a town heavy with bikes, and with the infrastructure, I hardly noticed people breaking the law.
What does this mean? Not much. It might vary by region, or what existant infrastructure there is.
they're on sidewalks
If I can't ride on the street, where else would I be? If there is an existant bike route/trail this is a bad thing to do, if not it is the safest thing to do. Pick one or the other, since as stated, bikes are probably here to stay. Maybe they should, or shouldn't be, but that has nothing to do with reality.
Actually no, most motorcylists I've seen actually obey the law. I am nervous around them because they can be harder to see, and of course I wouldn't want to hit one for fear of injuring the rider, but for the most part they're doing what they're supposed to.
I've noticed the opposite, again, especially from the people riding faster Japanese style bikes.
Anecdotal evidence is anecdotal.
Besides, whether or not there are SOME cars or motocycles that break the rules is irrlevent; it's whether or not the majority do, and they do. The same can't be said of cyclists, hence my anti-cyclist sentiments.
So, if your impromptu stats are true, go petition your local government, if other people noticed the same thing you could get something done. Nothing stopping you from this. When it comes to larger issues, your impromptu stats don't matter, since it might vary.
My quick observation, again not tallied just anecdotal, is that cyclists are more reckless here in
Why is it the people rabidly defending the Wii sound so much like those who were rabidly dismissing it two years ago?
Its called cognitive dissonance, a cognitive bias towards justifying purchases you made retro-actively.
Same thing with the silly OS debates.
"I bought a Wii, and I'd like to think of myself as a smart person. Therefore me buying the Wii is a smart thing. This person pointed out a flaw in my system, and are thus saying I'm not as smart a person as I think I am. Therefore strong emotional response to keep my self-justifications in check."
Irrational, but then again so are we all. Its pretty common, replace the term "Wii" with your favorite car, operating system, or any other thing you had to dedicate time, effort, or money to.
Maybe its because no one even TRIES to make a decent Wii game. Thats my biggest problem with the console. the platform rocks, but no one makes anything worthwhile for it.
Where are my RPGs and RTS titles? Its not hard to make one, especially since we repealed the law against using sprites instead of 9^32 poly models.
So we should dumb down language for the lowest common denominator? How dumb can we make everything before even the dumbest among us won't be able to use it towards the ends of incomprehensible stupidity?
Damn, I might have used too many syllables, a moron might get angry at their lack of reading skills.
So... Ebola hurts tourism in the Ebola river valley, and Marlburg hurts German tourism in that region, not to mention German measles.
Swine flu is appropriate, pork industry be damned. It is genetically close to the original swine flu pandemic of 1914, and the subsequent outbreaks. Mexican flu would be more appropriate if it was a new virus, though it still would be O.K. in general usage terms. Swine flue, OTH, works just fine, and I will continue to call it that, pork lobby be damned, I'm not changing my language for corporate interests.
Actually, I refuse to change my language just to make thin skinned people happy. Eat that Squaw Peak, Mount McKinley (now Denali for no good reason), and Elk (now wapiti, for even dumber reasons). Doesn't anyone see a connection between this and newspeak?
Slashdot Mirror
The best way to avoid illicit government mind reading is not having one. Or so I've heard.
So who are we paying to translate all that voice to text? Yes, we could automate it, but unless that NSA/FBI/CIA/Aliens have technology leagues ahead of ours, then computers still suck at it. Especially when we consider that we're dealing with 250 million unique ways of speaking, spread across umpteen dialects, and all the various slangs.
And what does this get? Nothing. the simplest scheme can thwart this. "I need to get some eggs at the supermarket" could conceal loads of information, without ever raising suspicions.
You're also ignoring the HUGE amounts of data transferred everyday. I'm guessing the amount of computer-computer communications is approaching, or exceeding an exobyte a day. Caching all this is pretty hopeless.
Taking your premise as true, now we need to work out a way to make any of this data even slightly useful. If we have an exobyte of data, how are we supposed to find that one useful conversation?
Computer data is MUCH more difficult to handle than voice. In the course of a week I throw around millions of packets, to thousands of servers, from an unknown number of computers, many of which can't be linked to me. Then you still have the ease of concealing messages in code, and worse now we have stenagraphy. How are we to know that that lolcat I just sent out from an internet cafe is really a lolcat, or just a container hiding a message about sexual deviance and the evils of Christianity? This isn't to mention regular encryption, the NSA would still have to break my 128k key, or whatnot, which is computationally nontrivial.
And then again, we must ask, for what ends? This amount of data would be useless. And do we actually think our government is REALLY competent enough to pull this off? Hell, they can't even illegally torture people without it leaking.
This isn't to say that I don't worry about my privacy, but I don't think the time for the tinfoil hat is now. I worry more about old-fashioned violations.
Minor quibble, I don't think "fascist" is the proper term here, "totalitarian" might fit your ends a bit better. There also is a line between public health and individual inconvenience, where this falls on that line is up for debate (I think it might be a little much), but ultimately this is not a bunch of tourist's call.
That is my main point, it's their country, it's their rules. No matter how tyrannical us outsiders view it, its between their citizens and their government. If you choose to travel somewhere, you have to play by their rules.
Quarantine procedures are also, at times, completely justified. Not saying they are in this case, but in some cases they are. When you become a hazard to others, we (the people) have the right to remove you until you no longer are a hazard. This isn't tyranny, this is the social contract in its purest form.
Ah, so you're one of those people that believes everything they read.
No, I'm not. BUT we are discussing the article, and thus I'm taking it as true. Until, of course someone can prove it is not. So far no one in this thread has even come close to doing this. So if we're going to have a discussion, we might as well take the article as true, even if it isn't, for the sake of discussion.
From the sounds of it, though, there is some potential for truth here, since cases have been traced back to travelers, and said travelers took fever reducers. Thus, if they were aware of the procedures, they were "cheating" and concealing something that native officials barred.
To put this shoe on a different foot:
"Ah, so you're one of those people that disbelieves everything they read."
Come on, the TSA is full of dishonesty, why should we expect any different from the Vietnamese equivalent (well, not really, since this is the Health Department, but they are commenting on airport security matters, so it stands to reason that they got their information from their airport security personnel, or worse, are talking out their asses)? All those people with encrypted laptop hard drives or who forgot to toss their 16 oz bottle of water are obviously willfully trying to circumvent security regulations, amirite?
Apples and oranges. If you are aware that the country your entering has a policy against entering with a fever, and you enter anyways your violating the law. It isn't up to foreign individuals to ignore laws as they see fit. We'd frown on it in the US, so I wholly expect others to do so. No matter how dumb I find these laws.
I see no evidence of intent.
I'm taking this as a given. Lets refrase this "IF there was intent; then they are wrong", "IF not; then Vietnamese officials should have made the policy clearer", "if the second condition was true, and people still entered with fevers; then they are wrong".
And if you know that the country your visiting has a quarantine policy for people entering the country with a fever, and you refuse to disclose this after taking your fever reducer, then yes it is cheating. If they were ignorant of the quarantine policy, then I can see this, if they weren't then yes, they were cheating.
When you choose to visit another country, you must follow their laws. If you try to get around their laws, then you deserve whats coming, whether you agree or not. Imagine if foreign people visiting the US could ignore our laws, and only follow the laws of their homeland, would that be a good policy?
If they took asprin to consciously break another countries laws; I agree. Get'em.
You are assuming that people are deliberately trying to avoid getting caught. People who have fevers take cold medicine to make them feel better, not to evade thermal scans. Most people don't even know that they do such things at some air
This being the topic of TFA, is a given. And by doing so they were violating Vietnamese law. Pretty cut and dry now, eh?
You could stay home when other people are sick. Not sure where in the constitution it says healthy people have right to travel when sick people don't.
No one mentioned the word "rights" here, nor is it even a question. Nor is the U.S. Constitution relevant in even the slightest of ways. I really doubt that the Vietnamese, must less most of the world really care one bit about our constitution, nor should they. Countries have the right to restrict foreign travelers, if you break their entry laws, your breaking laws and are free to accept the consequences. This too is fine. If you don't like their laws, no one is forcing you to go there.
Most Government's, including the U.S. have the right to quarantine people for the good of the public health. This is also fine. If you, exercising your rights to be an inconsiderate asshat, endanger hundreds of people, then your rights to travel can, and should, be temporarily suspended. This makes perfect sense.
Can we please stop with this "the Constitution says I have the right to do whatever the hell I please" meme. It doesn't, and it goes against the legal and philosophical trends that lead to the foundation of the US. Your rights stop the second they infringe on someone else's. You don't have the right to be a dick.
Also can we stop with this "The U.S Constitution is somehow universally relevant to other sovereign nations" bull. No one cares. Hell, we decided the Constitution isn't even valid to large swaths of people in the US, or held against their will on US soil. Why should any country treat us differently?
It isn't perfect by any means, and as the person who replied to you states, it have been getting progressively worse with time. I first tried it, and got hooked on it in 2001 or 2002, when it was much more oriented on music management and not on connecting 80000 peripherals I don't have/care about, and at that time I was using WinAmp, which generally sucks.
I haven't notice any speed problems on the PC (I have on some Macs, though, oddly), and I don't use it for audio books, so I'm not sure how it handles them.
I do like being able to just drag music to my library and forget about it. iTunes fits that very well, I can't even imagine going through my large music library by hand anymore. The iPod interface is frustrating at times, though, I agree.
I guess the main thing is that we like what we're used to, and I haven't stumbled on a substantially better music app yet. Though its getting to be time, since both Apple and Google have decided that my computer is theirs in which to load any strange TSR/Service that they want. An aspect of modern software design that is beginning to wear on me.
I like it, but I'm not going to go out of my way to be a cheerleader for it.
2. You shouldn't pirate now...
"The pricing model is bad and too expensive!"
Introduce scaling pricing with popularity.
More like:
"The pricing model is bad, and too expensive"
Raise pricing on popular songs, keep prices on the crap the same.
Not trying to invalidate your argument, just a quibble. Show me one service that actually lowered prices (even the average price).
Your also missing the ethical question; why shouldn't someone pirate?
No. iTunes is good for putting stuff on you iPod, it also is a decent media player. I started using iTunes for my music a year or so before I got an iPod (or even a Mac). Part of my getting an iPod and a Mac was because I really liked how iTunes handled music. I'd probably be using it even if I didn't have a supported device (though I might migrate to Songbird, which is basically an iTunes clone).
iTunes was one of the first players that didn't force me to play with directories, or use self-imposed naming conventions for my music library.
I.e. there goes the nice quiet neighborhood the locals probably recently moved out of California to get.
So the Californians are shocked that other Californians are making the area into California?
Not from NM, but AZ has the same problems. Oddly, in some small towns here (Congress, for example) the Californians are building mini-walled subdivisions (with sideways houses and minuscule yards). Nothing quite as amusing as seeing a walled sub-division surrounded by 100 square miles of undeveloped desert.
Another fun fact, the parts of Arizona that have the terrain of California, and now EXACTLY like California, even the property values, and length of commute.
What, because an unreliable wireless connection is so much better than sticking with wires? Actual price of it is $100, but it's hardly a requirement
Actually, it is somewhat a requirement, depending on how old your house is. In my current apartment (built in the early 70s) there is one cable jack in the whole apartment, meaning my placement of a modem is limited to one wall, in the middle of the living room. So, in order to have a computer in any other room, or an Xbox, I need a wifi router.
My girlfriends apartment is even worse (built in the early-mid-60's), she only has one cable jack, and only has 2 functioning phone jacks. So basically she needs wifi to have any choice in placement.
[citation needed] By my count, it's somewhere in the $500 games for a full setup, including games. Good luck getting a decent computer for that much.
Or you could just throw a $100 video card in your existing computer, and have a decent gaming box (if it was made in the last 3 years), if you really want to be risque, you could throw in an extra $75 of RAM in as well. Most people have existent computers, so there is no need to buy a new one.
So $175 is much cheaper than $500.
I'm sure you could build a better computer than an Xbox for around $500 (sans monitor), and even if it went over, a computer is more useful for more things than a console.
To quibble; Even then, to communicate directly with the nerves the signal will have to be converted to analogue, no matter how far down the neurological perception ladder we move, there still be have to be an analogue step for it to be perceived by humans.
Our brains, and all their components, "speak" analogue, so any digital signal will have to end as analogue at some point in time.
The problem was DVD was a decent improvement over VHS, at a decent cost-point (Laserdisk was too, but NOT at a good cost point, that and the size of those things was annoying). Also, you could use DVD on your existent TV without any problems, with an improvement on sound and picture quality.
Blue Ray isn't a very large improvement over DVDs, not enough to warrant spending any amount of extra money on, at least. On a SDTV, Blue Ray is nothing but a waste of money (if it even plays thanks to restrictive DRM). To get the full benefit of Blue Ray (which still isn't very noticeable by the placement of most people's TVs), you need to go buy a new TV. A lot of people can't afford to, or don't want to be forced to buy a new dvd/TV combo, just to gain a small difference. This is especially true in the economy.
It also is a pain in the ass to set up at times. the DRM crap, and the need to update it is a pain.
Blue Ray will only be accepted when all the perfectly functional SDTVs die off naturally, or when Blue Ray becomes a ubiquitous storage medium, like CDs and DVDs did (which helped their market share and price). But the question is, will these things come to pass before we move onto to a purely online model? I'm guessing this Blue Ray crap is nothing but a transitional measure to where physical media dies off.
More importantly, it is less effort (which also is a cost) than the illegal free equivalent. Sure, you can download the show ad-free in 10-30 minutes, but with Hulu (at least for those of us in the US), you can immediately watch the show.
I wonder what the statistics are for the rate of piracy on the selection of shows on Hulu before and after the service became popular.
If these hypothetical stats (rolling 2d10 says it went down 59%) bear me out, then perhaps some Hollywood bigwig should put up a Hulu for movies, have then in 720p, have them streaming, and have them ad-sponsored with no barrier to entry. I'm guessing this would remove some piracy, while keeping the incentive to actually buy DVDs. I'm guessing most people who pirate a film are doing it for a one-off viewing, and not to keep as a permanent copy. (hypothetically this will reduce movie piracy by 2d20=78%)
Music will always be more problematic, since it isn't really made for passive listening. People want to take it with them to a higher degree than TV shows or movies, and also want a higher degree of control over the content. iTunes, Amazon, and eMusic are good starts in making legal solutions somewhat competitive with piracy, but it still isn't as convenient, especially with the need for specialty clients. I can find free pirated tracks in the exact same amount of time as I could find them on a pay site.
I still know a lot of people who listen to AM radio on their commutes. The fact that every broadcast area has at least one right-wing AM radio station attests to this.
I personally don't think there is any great fortress of liberalism, or conservatism. I think we're dealing with a squeaky wheel problem, the vocal minority gets the attention, the centrist majority (wrong choice in words perhaps, lets say the majority who picks and chooses emulating centrism) gets ignored.
If the media was so leftist, then how can you explain Bush being elected twice. Either your premise is wrong, or no one cares. Either way, then, it doesn't matter to much.
Notice how both sides complain about this.
Personally I think anyone who identifies with the left or the right are morons. Both parties, views, have good points and bad, but to accept a whole package is rather... lazy.
Personally I'm a social libertarian, and a socialist. Not completely, but they are the closest labels. I think the "liberals" should stay out of social laws (as should the religious factions), and the "conservatives" should bugger out of the economy. But not completely for either preposition.
They're paying to use thier CAR on the street, not their bikes.
I'd take it to mean their paying to use the streets. But this is largely a matter of semantics, unless you have some relevant law on hand that says otherwise, this point is not ever resolvable. Other taxes besides gas taxes go towards streets (sales and state income taxes, mostly here, thanks to idiotic congressmen).
Really? Discussion on how my tax money is spent is meaningliess? Sorry you find it boring, but I feel I pay enough as it is, and am working on ways to CUT what I pay, not increase it. Certainly not pay more for a minority of people.
No matter how either of us feel, it is. We have different opinions, and can probably cite different experts and theories until we're both blue in the face with no resolution. I would be okay with paying MORE taxes if I was met with an equal amount of useful services. Its just different philosophies, both are equally valid (and invalid). Thats the great thing about democracy (especially the American one) is that you always have two or more groups of people completely at odds, and in the end none of them are ever happy. It works.
To continue the argument though; you dislike cyclists, so therefore building infrastructure to keep them off roads would benefit you, since I doubt anyone would ever ban bicycles, or regulate them to the point of complete uselessness. Keeping this in mind, we have a simple equation, are bicycles on the streets/sidewalks a bigger nuisance than paying a marginal amount of extra taxes to remove the nuisance.
Yes, your ideology will dictate one or the other as some absolute truth, but thankfully government usually never caters to people who think they are right to the exclusion of other groups.
I actually have more of an idea, since I am doing my own informal study. As it stands now (I've been doing this about 8 months now), 92% of cyclists are breaking important laws; they're on sidewalks, not yielding, running red lights and stops signs. I simply tick down when I see a cyclist, and another tick in another column if they do something illegal. Most of it is running stop signs and red lights, if you're interested. If as many cars were running lights and stop signs as bikes, our roads would look like a demolition derby.
I personally have noticed very few bicyclists breaking the law of late (no hard numbers). This, though, is colored by their relative scarcity here. Even when I lived in a town heavy with bikes, and with the infrastructure, I hardly noticed people breaking the law.
What does this mean? Not much. It might vary by region, or what existant infrastructure there is.
they're on sidewalks
If I can't ride on the street, where else would I be? If there is an existant bike route/trail this is a bad thing to do, if not it is the safest thing to do. Pick one or the other, since as stated, bikes are probably here to stay. Maybe they should, or shouldn't be, but that has nothing to do with reality.
Actually no, most motorcylists I've seen actually obey the law. I am nervous around them because they can be harder to see, and of course I wouldn't want to hit one for fear of injuring the rider, but for the most part they're doing what they're supposed to.
I've noticed the opposite, again, especially from the people riding faster Japanese style bikes.
Anecdotal evidence is anecdotal.
Besides, whether or not there are SOME cars or motocycles that break the rules is irrlevent; it's whether or not the majority do, and they do. The same can't be said of cyclists, hence my anti-cyclist sentiments.
So, if your impromptu stats are true, go petition your local government, if other people noticed the same thing you could get something done. Nothing stopping you from this. When it comes to larger issues, your impromptu stats don't matter, since it might vary.
My quick observation, again not tallied just anecdotal, is that cyclists are more reckless here in
And thats why D&D, and other rule-based tabletop/pen & paper games were not invented, much less popular.
Good games should be simple to learn, but really insanely complex to master, like Tetris.
Why is it the people rabidly defending the Wii sound so much like those who were rabidly dismissing it two years ago?
Its called cognitive dissonance, a cognitive bias towards justifying purchases you made retro-actively.
Same thing with the silly OS debates.
"I bought a Wii, and I'd like to think of myself as a smart person. Therefore me buying the Wii is a smart thing. This person pointed out a flaw in my system, and are thus saying I'm not as smart a person as I think I am. Therefore strong emotional response to keep my self-justifications in check."
Irrational, but then again so are we all. Its pretty common, replace the term "Wii" with your favorite car, operating system, or any other thing you had to dedicate time, effort, or money to.
Maybe its because no one even TRIES to make a decent Wii game. Thats my biggest problem with the console. the platform rocks, but no one makes anything worthwhile for it.
Where are my RPGs and RTS titles? Its not hard to make one, especially since we repealed the law against using sprites instead of 9^32 poly models.
Post-DNA living (possibly on computer chips like the analog FACETS) would mean no more influenza.
But then we'll have to worry about conficker, and who knows what else (damn, I clicked that attachment, and now I've got AIDs!)
So we should dumb down language for the lowest common denominator? How dumb can we make everything before even the dumbest among us won't be able to use it towards the ends of incomprehensible stupidity?
Damn, I might have used too many syllables, a moron might get angry at their lack of reading skills.
Why then is it the only flu strain that doesn't have a name?
Even if it is related, via proteins, to what we used to call "swine flu"?
Why didn't anyone get up in arms about the "bird flu" hubbub?
So... Ebola hurts tourism in the Ebola river valley, and Marlburg hurts German tourism in that region, not to mention German measles.
Swine flu is appropriate, pork industry be damned. It is genetically close to the original swine flu pandemic of 1914, and the subsequent outbreaks. Mexican flu would be more appropriate if it was a new virus, though it still would be O.K. in general usage terms. Swine flue, OTH, works just fine, and I will continue to call it that, pork lobby be damned, I'm not changing my language for corporate interests.
Actually, I refuse to change my language just to make thin skinned people happy. Eat that Squaw Peak, Mount McKinley (now Denali for no good reason), and Elk (now wapiti, for even dumber reasons). Doesn't anyone see a connection between this and newspeak?