I've played it to the end, and the most annoying thing was how long it took to kill the Bosses.
It's meant to have a ridiculous plot, does have kinda cool graphics, and it got just a bit too preachy towards the end - but the reason I actually finished it was *for* the little info snippets.
E.g. the presentations on the Death Tax, and the percentage of tax breaks going towards the top 20% & 1% earners in the US.
The political bias is pretty open right from the start, but what I found really worrying is I'm not seeing how someone else could come up with a more positive spin on some of those stats - other than covering them up, of course.:(
And last note, the most disturbing thing about the Voltron sequences for me was - the balls move...
I feel bad when I don't buy my products carefully.
Yes, it's in the April edition of Scientific American. It's not "Affluent White Male Guilt", it's the inevitable freakout experienced by people who believe they have to make the best possible decision in any circumstance, when that's really not possible considering the amount of choice we're exposed to these days.
Suggestion? Deal with it. Accept that not only will you not always make the best decision, most of the time you don't need too. Once a choice has been made - don't worry about it. Your mental happiness is more valuable than the money you may or may not have saved, so if you're worrying, stop, and see if there's something that you'd prefer to be thinking about, rather than (ironically) wasting time worrying!
I remember most of my dreams, to the extent that I don't bother remembering 90% of them, because they weren't interesting enough. Still - I view it almost as another form of entertainment.
Most people don't remember their dreams at all, or only remember snatches, and think they're from different dreams, whereas they were probably from one ongoing changing one - at least that's the case for me, since I do remember the long dream sometimes.
And yes, dreams are generally incredibly weird, but I'd tend to say surreal, rather than disturbing - part of it could have been your medications as well. The only thing that makes something a nightmare for me, is not being able to *control* my situation in the dream.
I'm *usually* vaguely aware that I'm dreaming, so I can change things if I really need to, but I often find it too much effort - instead of just letting events unfold, it's like I have to choreograph everything around me, so I don't usually bother.
In one of my more interesting dreams, I started off as a blue iBook laptop. I was in the ocean and I'd float down to the bottom of the ocean where there'd been a shipwreck and would scoop myself under coins, cups and knicknacks, then float up to the surface where a hand would reach down and take things off my case. Later in that dream I was a human, a hobbit, and nearly got eaten by some (dream) cannibal parents of a friend.
I often have very Indiana Jones type dreams - running from destruction, or stopping it, or getting treasure or something. E.g. jumping from stone to stone over a pool of red-hot lava while a bunch of rough space crew guys do the Can-Can to distract a giant space monster.
*shrug*
While it's usually weirder than even the most 'special' B-movies, it more fun than TV because you can actually interact.:)
I've opened my eyes while lucid dreaming. I mean, physically opened my eyes and viewed my surroundings, while still dreaming.
In my dream I was standing on the street in a city looking around me, and I could hear birds tweeting, smell coffee from a coffee stall, and feel the weight of a big square candle in my arms - and realised that if I didn't already know I was dreaming, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference. It seemed so real that in my dream state I wondered if maybe I could take something 'back' with me if I tried hard enough.
So I opened my eyes. I was lying in bed and could see sunlight streaming in the room around me - and I could still feel the candle in my arms! And then felt a bit weird because it *also* still felt like I was standing upright, and I could hear & feel a 'city' around me, despite the fact I was viewing my room from a prone position. So I closed my eyes, and it was like I'd opened my eyes in the 'city' again.
I woke up soon afterward, but it was a very interesting experience.
I'd definately disagree with this. Going by the 4 point model of the political spectrum, you have right wing, left wing, anti-authoritarian & authoritarian.
Libertarianism is supposedly at the anti-authoritarian point, however those I've met, and read, most are actually more towards right wing anti-authoritarianism. Part of this may be due to the fact that many left wing anti-authoritarians are more likely to refer to themselves as anarchists, or just, anti-authoritarian.
But going back to those four points, just because you're anti-authoritarian, or 'Libertarian', doesn't mean that you can't also be extremely Right or Left wing - as many are.
More to the point, they're talking about FLASH not 'Flash Player' - which the browser plugin that you can run however you want.
Flash is the authoring tool that makes Flash animations, that are viewed with Flash Player. It's the difference between Adobe Acrobat & Acrobat Reader/Adobe Reader.
I can definately see that having happened to someone, or at best, it being a composite persona.:(
I spent an hour unsucessfully trying to show my Nana just how to use a *mouse*. She repetitively touched the screen whenever I told her to click on something, she must have seen a touchscreen computer at some point, and couldn't get past that. Or, she'd pick up the mouse and move it round, but worse, she just didn't seem to see the relation between moving the mouse, and the little arrow on the screen moving. It was horrible. And my Nana is usually pretty on to it, she lives in her own home, volunteers several days a week at goodwill shops, visits 'older folk' and babysits my 5 younger cousins quite regularly. But this... this just seemed completely beyond her comprehension.
And my Mother! I'm really proud of her, she just got a computer recently, and is learning to use it, and sends me emails, which is great... However, she stores all her emails in folders on her desktop (I showed her how to delete & rename them on one visit), only types in ALL CAPS, hasn't yet mastered copy & paste (she just sends the same email to all the family), and when she wants to send me a link to a webpage, she saves the page to her computer, attaches the.html file in the email, and sends it to me (generally it's the pictures she wants to show me, so I search the text on Google to find the page). Then there's the first time she used a 3.5" disk. She saw the CD drive, opened it, but it was obviously not the right shape. Then she noticed there was a round disk *inside* the 3.5" disk. Figuring the square shape was some kind of cover, with some effort, she removed the inside circle (assuming there was an easier way to open them that she didn't know) and placed it in the CD drive.
So that's why the CD drive is broken at the moment. But, it's not really needed anyway.
She was pretty embarrased about it, but I can see the logic... in a very twisted way. I then related to her all the other stupid things I have personally heard of people doing (CD = Cup Holder etc) which made her feel better.
I wish I could help her more, but she lives really far away. She has a little book with instructions (which can still be taken unusually ie reading the instructions on how to make folders, and storing her emails like that), and occasionally I manage to explain something via email (eg email forwarding, but I think she only did it once:( ).
And just so you don't get the wrong idea, I'm also female, in the 2nd year of a Comp Sci degree, which I find fun & if kinda easy (it's getting more interesting though).
I used to think that Loki was pretty much a rat-bastard, but after reading a bit more mythology, he did have a good side, and was definately more of a trickster God.
Also, the events leading up to Ragnarok are necessary, as Ragnarok is fated and necessary. All the dead Gods will be reborn...
Male. At least 35. Uses broadband. College educated.
This does not equal someone who 'works with computers'.
You got caught by marketing lingo that just gives a particular demographic a cute name. In this case, 'Techie'. But, hey, we don't need to be so biased as to say Computer Geeks are the only techies in the world.
The sample as stated includes any college education, so you've got all the French & Business majors in there as well (and those that failed).
It's still not too bad for statistical data. Except in it's implications for Linux, which still, to me at least, sound pretty accurate.
From talking to a bunch of first year Computer Science students (I decided to go get a degree *shrug*), I wouldn't expect more than 2/3 maximum to know about Linux when starting. The computer labs use OpenBSD & KDE. I mentioned to a second year student (apparently doing pretty well) I was maybe going to try the same setup at home, and they told me to get the KDE distribution of linux. Close enough I guess.:(
Wow, it's either been a really long time since you read it, or you have a really bad memory (don't worry, so do I).
They specifically threw rocks (which was cool in itself, who needs missiles when you can use gravity & big rocks?) at the most *unpopulated* areas they could find. And, they broadcast the locations they would be targeting to the world. Which was their mistake. Because no one thought they had any weapons, therefore large groups of people actually *travelled* to those spots, to be 'funny'. And got kaboomed. Which sounds vaguely realistic, actually.
I admit going to the moon just for (greenhouse) farming and low-g uses does seem a bit pointless, as is the Earth ever going to get overcrowded enough that putting greenhouses on the moon is easier than just chucking it on a mountain? Ah well. But hell, we have people at Antartica all the time, there may be some future use for the Moon, we haven't really looked much yet, have we?
To conclude, no point telling you to re-read a book you don't want to, but it may be a bit different to how you're recalling it.
How did you just manage to imply that a country with only two (very similar) major political parties is more politically diverse than a countries with 7 or 8?
I'm impressed.
I know most Americans seem to get told since kindergarten that America is the best country in the world (because it's not other countries don't have freedom of speech or the right to vote or anything...), but while liking and being proud of your country is known as patriotism, liking and being proud of your country to the extent that you regard the rest of the world as inferior, is Nationalism of the German 1930's style.
The article didn't seem that coherent. There were some interesting questions asked, and completely different answers given.
E.g. "Could you explain why the emergence of nonprofit foundations in the hacker culture appears to be a contradiction in terms?" Why anyone would think it is a contradiction in terms is possibly an interesting question, and it isn't answered. Yes, Open Source projects often operate on a meritocracy, and those who do the work, often make the decisions - and may become 'board members' etc when it makes sense to set up a non-profit foundation.
Also, how much of a model is a 'non-profit foundation'? As overlayed on an opensource project? It may not actually have that much relevance as to how decisions are made, and the project develops.
Also, could someone explain what Prof. Stark means when she refers to 'community forms'?
When I occasionally see something I want on ebay, the seller has usually listed it 'US Only' or just as bad, seems to have found the most expensive possible means of shipping.
Being a poor student who lives in New Zealand, I just send a note to the seller asking if they'd be willing to sell to me, but most importantly, including details of USPS's Global Priority Mail - Flat-rate Envelope (large) which is US$9, and asking if they'd be willing to send the item (usually books) in that, and that I'll be paying by Paypal (maybe not the best, but the most accepted).
Most sellers are just worried about the hassle of shipping, and making sure they get paid. If I make it easy for them, most people have no problem.
Of course, getting a company to do so is a whole different ball game. :(
The FSF doesn't want people who are just using "Open Source" software. They don't even want people to just be using "Free Software" - they want you to agree with all of the FSF's ideas, Closed source is not just bad, it's evil, etc.
They don't want Open Source/Free Software to be popular!
They only want "pure" converts to the cause. If you are using Free Software but don't agree with all their ideas, you're a heretic.
Look at their tactics - the term "Open Source" is alot easier for people to understand, and has gained alot more publicity, and introduced alot more people to Open Source/Free Software than the term "Free Software" ever could, but again, they aren't interested in Linux/Open Source being widely used.
Personally, I am.
GNU/Linux is harder to say, has less brand value (this is important!) and personally, I see it as disparaging the non-GNU software that gets packaged with the Linux kernal - are you going to call it XFree86/KDE/GNU/etc/Linux? No.
As far as tactics go, the FSF is treating like a religious matter, so lets go with that example: In the early years of the Christian Church in Europe, a conscious decision was made to place Churches in places of Holy significance to local Pagans, and establish Christian Holidays (holy-days) at the times of the local Pagans Holy days. Christmas - Winter soltice/Yule, Candlemas (Candle Mass) - Imbolc, Easter - Ostara... there's parallels for every major Christian holiday. Pagan deities were often established as Christian Saints, eg Breed/Bride/Brigid - Saint Bridget.
The point of all this, is that it worked. It was a stroke of Marketing genius! Christmas is, today, a celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ - and yet placing the holiday at Winter Solstice (seing as the exact date of Jesus's birth was unknown) tied the birth of the Son of God in with the birth of the Sun God, and converted many local pagans who would otherwise have been more resistant.
The FSF is not interested in the local Pagans though (read: Windows users), they're more worried about the heretics (read:Open Source/Linux vs Free Software/GNU/Linux). Everybody knows this already, but RMS refuses to talk to Linux User Groups unless they're GNU/Linux User Groups.
I want Open Source as a whole to be more widely used, so as my little stand, I am actively REFUSING to use the #@$! term "GNU/Linux". Vive la Linux! Vive la Open Source!
**Notes** I'm a Neopagan. Hey, I don't mind sharing my holidays... But I'm not French.
when those same people could then lob huge rocks at the earth at will
From 'The Moon is a Harsh Mistress' by Robert A. Heinlein, right? Do you really think it'd be easier to build giant catapults on the moon/redirect stray meteors etc, rather than just using a nuclear missile?
In above book, they didn't have nuclear weapons, so they had an excuse.
Er, in many sci-fi stories, clones actually have your memories as well, they are pretty much you. Then there's those who are just genetic twins. If you both had the same memories, I'd consider it masturbation. (Question not asked, but anyway...) In both cases, technically it would be incest, but in the second case, more so? Seeing as people come in infinite shades between gay & straight: If the only same-sex person you ever wanted to sleep with was yourself, then you're still pretty damn straight, but it would count towards being a little more gay. But even then, would you be treating yourself (or twin) as a sex-toy, or would you want to like, marry them?
Having the moral highground, if you could figure it out, may help your own ego if you sleep with your girlfriends clones, but it doesn't mean jack-shit. What matters is if your girlfriend thinks it's cheating. If she thinks it's not, then it's not. Although really, according to all the polyamorous people out there, if your SO knows about it and is ok with it, then it isn't cheating to begin with. If they had the same memories, you could argue that it isn't really cheating on her, it's not breaking up with one of her.
The question is, if you sleep with your clone, is it cheating on your girlfriend?
(Ha. I would, to all of the above. But then, I don't have a girlfriend - I am girl. And since I don't have a boyfriend at the moment, I'm fully willing to hypothetically break up with them over hypothetical scandals. Although many guys are into the idea of two girls together... But if I had a male clone - same answer. Wait, what if hypothetical boyfriend had clone? Meh, I'm not a hypocrite. Go ahead. (Growing realisation I'm a pervert...) Actually, I'd want to watch. And skip it being a clone.)
Actually, the very first anecdote in the first chapter of Influence: The Pyschology of Persuasion relates to this (use the 'look inside' feature to read it). Basically, tourists in a small shop bought out an allotment of turquoise jewellery, only after it was mistakenly labelled at double the price.
People who don't have the information or technical knowledge to assess the true worth of a product or service, will often fall back on Expensive = Good.
Unless you're dealing with someone who has some technical knowlege of what you are doing, and so can assess your worth accurately, try just as hard not to be the lowest bidder, as the highest.:P
That, or get them to read the book.:)
Re:What still surprises me
on
Hacker Survey
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· Score: 1
Dammit, that's a depressing statistic. And why? I dunno.
I don't know any programming languages, but if I did I'd probably play around with open source projects.
I don't even know javascript, but it's simple enough that I can set up Dave's Quick Search Deskbar with all the sites I use, and simple measurement converters etc. I may spend more time setting them up than I save the the shortcuts, but I do because it's actually fun, interesting. I can etc.
Making changes, improvements, or fixing errors in a proper program that I use regularly would be even cooler.
So ha! Who needs sleep? I wanna learn to program! Where's that C++ for Dummies? I'm going to put my money where my mouth is...
I live in New Zealand, so we'd be fine for electricity because almost all of it's hydropower. No cars would not be good though (even though I don't own one). The railway systems would have to be hella lot better even just for transporting goods town to town etc, but - wouldn't be the end of civilisation as we know it. However, even if we did become a nice little south pacific ecotopia, it'd be isolated. No aircraft, no freighters. Yachts maybe? But, that may not be all bad if the rest of the world was gonna go a bit Mad Max-ish. *lol*
Re:Windmills Er, why on earth would you import windmills from Europe when all you need are the plans?
Slashdot Mirror
Example: www.bushgame.com
:(
I've played it to the end, and the most annoying thing was how long it took to kill the Bosses.
It's meant to have a ridiculous plot, does have kinda cool graphics, and it got just a bit too preachy towards the end - but the reason I actually finished it was *for* the little info snippets.
E.g. the presentations on the Death Tax, and the percentage of tax breaks going towards the top 20% & 1% earners in the US.
The political bias is pretty open right from the start, but what I found really worrying is I'm not seeing how someone else could come up with a more positive spin on some of those stats - other than covering them up, of course.
And last note, the most disturbing thing about the Voltron sequences for me was - the balls move...
See: Scientific American April '04
Suggestion?
Deal with it. Accept that not only will you not always make the best decision, most of the time you don't need too.
Once a choice has been made - don't worry about it. Your mental happiness is more valuable than the money you may or may not have saved, so if you're worrying, stop, and see if there's something that you'd prefer to be thinking about, rather than (ironically) wasting time worrying!
I remember most of my dreams, to the extent that I don't bother remembering 90% of them, because they weren't interesting enough. Still - I view it almost as another form of entertainment.
:)
Most people don't remember their dreams at all, or only remember snatches, and think they're from different dreams, whereas they were probably from one ongoing changing one - at least that's the case for me, since I do remember the long dream sometimes.
And yes, dreams are generally incredibly weird, but I'd tend to say surreal, rather than disturbing - part of it could have been your medications as well. The only thing that makes something a nightmare for me, is not being able to *control* my situation in the dream.
I'm *usually* vaguely aware that I'm dreaming, so I can change things if I really need to, but I often find it too much effort - instead of just letting events unfold, it's like I have to choreograph everything around me, so I don't usually bother.
In one of my more interesting dreams, I started off as a blue iBook laptop. I was in the ocean and I'd float down to the bottom of the ocean where there'd been a shipwreck and would scoop myself under coins, cups and knicknacks, then float up to the surface where a hand would reach down and take things off my case. Later in that dream I was a human, a hobbit, and nearly got eaten by some (dream) cannibal parents of a friend.
I often have very Indiana Jones type dreams - running from destruction, or stopping it, or getting treasure or something.
E.g. jumping from stone to stone over a pool of red-hot lava while a bunch of rough space crew guys do the Can-Can to distract a giant space monster.
*shrug*
While it's usually weirder than even the most 'special' B-movies, it more fun than TV because you can actually interact.
I've opened my eyes while lucid dreaming.
I mean, physically opened my eyes and viewed my surroundings, while still dreaming.
In my dream I was standing on the street in a city looking around me, and I could hear birds tweeting, smell coffee from a coffee stall, and feel the weight of a big square candle in my arms - and realised that if I didn't already know I was dreaming, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference. It seemed so real that in my dream state I wondered if maybe I could take something 'back' with me if I tried hard enough.
So I opened my eyes.
I was lying in bed and could see sunlight streaming in the room around me - and I could still feel the candle in my arms!
And then felt a bit weird because it *also* still felt like I was standing upright, and I could hear & feel a 'city' around me, despite the fact I was viewing my room from a prone position.
So I closed my eyes, and it was like I'd opened my eyes in the 'city' again.
I woke up soon afterward, but it was a very interesting experience.
I'd definately disagree with this.
Going by the 4 point model of the political spectrum, you have right wing, left wing, anti-authoritarian & authoritarian.
Libertarianism is supposedly at the anti-authoritarian point, however those I've met, and read, most are actually more towards right wing anti-authoritarianism.
Part of this may be due to the fact that many left wing anti-authoritarians are more likely to refer to themselves as anarchists, or just, anti-authoritarian.
But going back to those four points, just because you're anti-authoritarian, or 'Libertarian', doesn't mean that you can't also be extremely Right or Left wing - as many are.
There are two types of people in this world...
More to the point, they're talking about FLASH not 'Flash Player' - which the browser plugin that you can run however you want.
Flash is the authoring tool that makes Flash animations, that are viewed with Flash Player. It's the difference between Adobe Acrobat & Acrobat Reader/Adobe Reader.
Ha!
:(
.html file in the email, and sends it to me (generally it's the pictures she wants to show me, so I search the text on Google to find the page).
:( ).
That's what *you* think.
I can definately see that having happened to someone, or at best, it being a composite persona.
I spent an hour unsucessfully trying to show my Nana just how to use a *mouse*. She repetitively touched the screen whenever I told her to click on something, she must have seen a touchscreen computer at some point, and couldn't get past that. Or, she'd pick up the mouse and move it round, but worse, she just didn't seem to see the relation between moving the mouse, and the little arrow on the screen moving.
It was horrible.
And my Nana is usually pretty on to it, she lives in her own home, volunteers several days a week at goodwill shops, visits 'older folk' and babysits my 5 younger cousins quite regularly.
But this... this just seemed completely beyond her comprehension.
And my Mother!
I'm really proud of her, she just got a computer recently, and is learning to use it, and sends me emails, which is great...
However, she stores all her emails in folders on her desktop (I showed her how to delete & rename them on one visit), only types in ALL CAPS, hasn't yet mastered copy & paste (she just sends the same email to all the family), and when she wants to send me a link to a webpage, she saves the page to her computer, attaches the
Then there's the first time she used a 3.5" disk.
She saw the CD drive, opened it, but it was obviously not the right shape. Then she noticed there was a round disk *inside* the 3.5" disk. Figuring the square shape was some kind of cover, with some effort, she removed the inside circle (assuming there was an easier way to open them that she didn't know) and placed it in the CD drive.
So that's why the CD drive is broken at the moment.
But, it's not really needed anyway.
She was pretty embarrased about it, but I can see the logic... in a very twisted way. I then related to her all the other stupid things I have personally heard of people doing (CD = Cup Holder etc) which made her feel better.
I wish I could help her more, but she lives really far away. She has a little book with instructions (which can still be taken unusually ie reading the instructions on how to make folders, and storing her emails like that), and occasionally I manage to explain something via email (eg email forwarding, but I think she only did it once
And just so you don't get the wrong idea, I'm also female, in the 2nd year of a Comp Sci degree, which I find fun & if kinda easy (it's getting more interesting though).
No really, that's gotta be my favourite tale about Loki!
Where Odin's horse Sleipnir came from
I used to think that Loki was pretty much a rat-bastard, but after reading a bit more mythology, he did have a good side, and was definately more of a trickster God.
Also, the events leading up to Ragnarok are necessary, as Ragnarok is fated and necessary.
All the dead Gods will be reborn...
Hold up a moment and read what you just quoted.
:(
Male.
At least 35.
Uses broadband.
College educated.
This does not equal someone who 'works with computers'.
You got caught by marketing lingo that just gives a particular demographic a cute name. In this case, 'Techie'. But, hey, we don't need to be so biased as to say Computer Geeks are the only techies in the world.
The sample as stated includes any college education, so you've got all the French & Business majors in there as well (and those that failed).
It's still not too bad for statistical data. Except in it's implications for Linux, which still, to me at least, sound pretty accurate.
From talking to a bunch of first year Computer Science students (I decided to go get a degree *shrug*), I wouldn't expect more than 2/3 maximum to know about Linux when starting.
The computer labs use OpenBSD & KDE.
I mentioned to a second year student (apparently doing pretty well) I was maybe going to try the same setup at home, and they told me to get the KDE distribution of linux.
Close enough I guess.
Christian != Creationist :)
You can be a Christian without being a creationist. And you can still poke fun of the creationists too.
Wow, it's either been a really long time since you read it, or you have a really bad memory (don't worry, so do I).
They specifically threw rocks (which was cool in itself, who needs missiles when you can use gravity & big rocks?) at the most *unpopulated* areas they could find.
And, they broadcast the locations they would be targeting to the world.
Which was their mistake. Because no one thought they had any weapons, therefore large groups of people actually *travelled* to those spots, to be 'funny'. And got kaboomed.
Which sounds vaguely realistic, actually.
I admit going to the moon just for (greenhouse) farming and low-g uses does seem a bit pointless, as is the Earth ever going to get overcrowded enough that putting greenhouses on the moon is easier than just chucking it on a mountain? Ah well.
But hell, we have people at Antartica all the time, there may be some future use for the Moon, we haven't really looked much yet, have we?
To conclude, no point telling you to re-read a book you don't want to, but it may be a bit different to how you're recalling it.
Stops.
Stares...
How did you just manage to imply that a country with only two (very similar) major political parties is more politically diverse than a countries with 7 or 8?
I'm impressed.
I know most Americans seem to get told since kindergarten that America is the best country in the world (because it's not other countries don't have freedom of speech or the right to vote or anything...), but while liking and being proud of your country is known as patriotism, liking and being proud of your country to the extent that you regard the rest of the world as inferior, is Nationalism of the German 1930's style.
The article didn't seem that coherent. There were some interesting questions asked, and completely different answers given.
E.g.
"Could you explain why the emergence of nonprofit foundations in the hacker culture appears to be a contradiction in terms?"
Why anyone would think it is a contradiction in terms is possibly an interesting question, and it isn't answered. Yes, Open Source projects often operate on a meritocracy, and those who do the work, often make the decisions - and may become 'board members' etc when it makes sense to set up a non-profit foundation.
Also, how much of a model is a 'non-profit foundation'? As overlayed on an opensource project? It may not actually have that much relevance as to how decisions are made, and the project develops.
Also, could someone explain what Prof. Stark means when she refers to 'community forms'?
When I occasionally see something I want on ebay, the seller has usually listed it 'US Only' or just as bad, seems to have found the most expensive possible means of shipping.
:(
Being a poor student who lives in New Zealand, I just send a note to the seller asking if they'd be willing to sell to me, but most importantly, including details of USPS's Global Priority Mail - Flat-rate Envelope (large) which is US$9, and asking if they'd be willing to send the item (usually books) in that, and that I'll be paying by Paypal (maybe not the best, but the most accepted).
Most sellers are just worried about the hassle of shipping, and making sure they get paid. If I make it easy for them, most people have no problem.
Of course, getting a company to do so is a whole different ball game.
Sounds great.
Why face the job market alone when you can face it with all your co-workers?
An urban legend, according to Sun at least.
"So apparently, it's ok for Americans to break Russian law if they're in the U.S., but not ok for Russians to break U.S. law, even while in Russia."
Yeah, so what else is new?
This basically sums up America's foreign policy.
The FSF doesn't want people who are just using "Open Source" software.
They don't even want people to just be using "Free Software" - they want you to agree with all of the FSF's ideas, Closed source is not just bad, it's evil, etc.
They don't want Open Source/Free Software to be popular!
They only want "pure" converts to the cause. If you are using Free Software but don't agree with all their ideas, you're a heretic.
Look at their tactics - the term "Open Source" is alot easier for people to understand, and has gained alot more publicity, and introduced alot more people to Open Source/Free Software than the term "Free Software" ever could, but again, they aren't interested in Linux/Open Source being widely used.
Personally, I am.
GNU/Linux is harder to say, has less brand value (this is important!) and personally, I see it as disparaging the non-GNU software that gets packaged with the Linux kernal - are you going to call it XFree86/KDE/GNU/etc/Linux? No.
As far as tactics go, the FSF is treating like a religious matter, so lets go with that example:
In the early years of the Christian Church in Europe, a conscious decision was made to place Churches in places of Holy significance to local Pagans, and establish Christian Holidays (holy-days) at the times of the local Pagans Holy days.
Christmas - Winter soltice/Yule, Candlemas (Candle Mass) - Imbolc, Easter - Ostara... there's parallels for every major Christian holiday.
Pagan deities were often established as Christian Saints, eg Breed/Bride/Brigid - Saint Bridget.
The point of all this, is that it worked. It was a stroke of Marketing genius!
Christmas is, today, a celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ - and yet placing the holiday at Winter Solstice (seing as the exact date of Jesus's birth was unknown) tied the birth of the Son of God in with the birth of the Sun God, and converted many local pagans who would otherwise have been more resistant.
The FSF is not interested in the local Pagans though (read: Windows users), they're more worried about the heretics (read:Open Source/Linux vs Free Software/GNU/Linux).
Everybody knows this already, but RMS refuses to talk to Linux User Groups unless they're GNU/Linux User Groups.
I want Open Source as a whole to be more widely used, so as my little stand, I am actively REFUSING to use the #@$! term "GNU/Linux".
Vive la Linux!
Vive la Open Source!
**Notes** I'm a Neopagan. Hey, I don't mind sharing my holidays...
But I'm not French.
when those same people could then lob huge rocks at the earth at will
From 'The Moon is a Harsh Mistress' by Robert A. Heinlein, right?
Do you really think it'd be easier to build giant catapults on the moon/redirect stray meteors etc, rather than just using a nuclear missile?
In above book, they didn't have nuclear weapons, so they had an excuse.
Er, in many sci-fi stories, clones actually have your memories as well, they are pretty much you. Then there's those who are just genetic twins.
If you both had the same memories, I'd consider it masturbation.
(Question not asked, but anyway...) In both cases, technically it would be incest, but in the second case, more so?
Seeing as people come in infinite shades between gay & straight: If the only same-sex person you ever wanted to sleep with was yourself, then you're still pretty damn straight, but it would count towards being a little more gay. But even then, would you be treating yourself (or twin) as a sex-toy, or would you want to like, marry them?
Having the moral highground, if you could figure it out, may help your own ego if you sleep with your girlfriends clones, but it doesn't mean jack-shit. What matters is if your girlfriend thinks it's cheating.
If she thinks it's not, then it's not.
Although really, according to all the polyamorous people out there, if your SO knows about it and is ok with it, then it isn't cheating to begin with.
If they had the same memories, you could argue that it isn't really cheating on her, it's not breaking up with one of her.
The question is, if you sleep with your clone, is it cheating on your girlfriend?
(Ha. I would, to all of the above. But then, I don't have a girlfriend - I am girl. And since I don't have a boyfriend at the moment, I'm fully willing to hypothetically break up with them over hypothetical scandals.
Although many guys are into the idea of two girls together... But if I had a male clone - same answer.
Wait, what if hypothetical boyfriend had clone?
Meh, I'm not a hypocrite. Go ahead.
(Growing realisation I'm a pervert...) Actually, I'd want to watch. And skip it being a clone.)
Actually, the very first anecdote in the first chapter of Influence: The Pyschology of Persuasion relates to this (use the 'look inside' feature to read it).
:P
:)
Basically, tourists in a small shop bought out an allotment of turquoise jewellery, only after it was mistakenly labelled at double the price.
People who don't have the information or technical knowledge to assess the true worth of a product or service, will often fall back on Expensive = Good.
Unless you're dealing with someone who has some technical knowlege of what you are doing, and so can assess your worth accurately, try just as hard not to be the lowest bidder, as the highest.
That, or get them to read the book.
Dammit, that's a depressing statistic. And why?
I dunno.
I don't know any programming languages, but if I did I'd probably play around with open source projects.
I don't even know javascript, but it's simple enough that I can set up Dave's Quick Search Deskbar with all the sites I use, and simple measurement converters etc. I may spend more time setting them up than I save the the shortcuts, but I do because it's actually fun, interesting. I can etc.
Making changes, improvements, or fixing errors in a proper program that I use regularly would be even cooler.
So ha! Who needs sleep? I wanna learn to program!
Where's that C++ for Dummies? I'm going to put my money where my mouth is...
All've dem on one page
My favourite would've been No. 2, if they'd removed the yellow background. *ick*
I live in New Zealand, so we'd be fine for electricity because almost all of it's hydropower.
No cars would not be good though (even though I don't own one). The railway systems would have to be hella lot better even just for transporting goods town to town etc, but - wouldn't be the end of civilisation as we know it.
However, even if we did become a nice little south pacific ecotopia, it'd be isolated.
No aircraft, no freighters. Yachts maybe?
But, that may not be all bad if the rest of the world was gonna go a bit Mad Max-ish.
*lol*
Re:Windmills
Er, why on earth would you import windmills from Europe when all you need are the plans?
Er, I can think of a few movies where the child actors seemed better than the adults...
Wait - adult personality.
Ok, then I'd add the girl that played Claudia in Interview with a Vampire.
Kirsten Dunst? Which makes it in IMHO her best role.