One summer when I was 15, I worked on a farm/ranch in western Nebraska. I worked twelve-hour days six days a week harvesting hay, helping out with dehorning/deballing of steers (not a fun task!), and general farm maintenance activities. Only day off was on Sundays. It was a hot, hard, smelly job. I personally enjoyed it (I treated it like an extended Boy Scout Summer Camp that I got paid for), but the bulk of the other teens out there complained and found it far too hard for them.
If you compare the general conditions of the Foxconn factories to the working conditions in the rural countryside, I would be willing to bet that it's far better to be a Foxconn employee than a farm worker (or other such rural worker). And honestly, if you don't have a job in China (for all their vaunted "Socialist" (socialist in name only, IMHO)) it's better than starving. It probably does amount to slavery, unfortunately.
In this case it's pretty obvious that Zynga game is essentially a knock-off, but how "different" do 2 games have to be to satisfy you in a legal sense for you to consider it not copying?
Because that's the question of fact that courts get to decide, it's also where the actual law gets "made"..
That's where the problem arises. If a big company is taken to court, they can (and will) stall out the smaller competitor, and basically run up the legal expenses to a point where the little company can't survive. There does need to be some sort of process that levels out the playing field between the two companies/people so that actual justice gets done.
Of course, I would also like a pony with that too.
Actually, the best backpacks (ones for long-distance hiking) tend to have the weight more on the hips than on the waist. Ideally, the shoulder straps should be relatively loose, and the bulk of the weight transferred down to the hip belt. The purpose for the shoulder straps is to to keep it relatively stable.
All it took was for me to suddenly become more self-confident and unafraid of the bullies, and they sensed it as a dog senses you are not afraid, and they went off in search of easier prey.
Therein lines the truth of the matter. I was picked on in elementary school and early Junior High. Once I realized that looking down and not making eye contact with people was telling them that I was a push-over, I started carrying myself with confidence on the outside and inside. Lo and behold, people started to treat me a lot more friendly, and I was able to make a lot more friends in school.
Most bullies are manipulators, and they know how the system works. They will attempt to provoke you in a way that can make their assault seem like they are the ones defending themselves.
Oh so true. I was in 9th grade in a Social Studies class. I was going to my desk when a kid pushed me (deliberately) and tried to pick a fight with me. He wanted me to try and take the first swing at him. I calmly stood up, took off my glasses and crossed my arms over my chest, and replied "I'm not that stupid". Ended up in a sort of a Mexican standoff where I wasn't going to be bullied into swinging at him, and he couldn't back down because he picked the fight. The teacher told me to sit down, and I replied to her that I wasn't the one who started it. She told both of us to stop it and sit down - and at that point he did a quick jab to my face.
I ended up going to the Nurse's office to treat a black eye. He ended up getting suspended and transferred to a relatively poor school along with his brother (who also came by a few days later to threaten me). I found out later that both he and his brother were Golden Glove champions of my city, and if I had been so stupid as to try to hit him first, I would have been plastered.
For example, I doubt it is possible to truly understand the history of the United States without understanding the role of religious belief. It's just too intertwined.
And yet, if you even dare mention the role that Religion/Christianity/Judaism/ has in a textbook, it's not allowed because of "Separation of Church and State". Seriously, the role of religion in History has been marginalized to such an extent you can't hardly see it anymore (with the possible exception of the Pilgrims, and then it's treated almost as how bad they were towards the Native Americans).
2) AFAIK, being allergic to peanut oil it self is very very rare. Typically it's the proteins that you are allergic to. Peanut oil manufacturers go to a lot of lengths to make sure their oil is pure oil and has no chunks of peanut in it.
Fortunately for me, my son doesn't react to the peanut oil, only the peanut proteins. We went to a Chick-Filet restaurant one day for lunch, and after my son was done with his meal we discovered that they cook everything in peanut oil. No effects from that, but we were rather concerned for a while (unnecessarily, thankfully)
I'm sorry, and I mean no offense, but that's not evidence. The problem with parents who tell these tales about how peanuts are like kryptonite to their kids or they're allergic to X in food is also he reason why we shouldn't base public policy on anecdotal evidence (there's another comment below about someone "who knows a family with a son who...")
I'd disagree with you as to the symptoms of my son not being considered evidence (e.g. the swelling, difficulty of breath he got during these episodes). Your point, however, is correct - too many parents of kids who have these allergies get overly paranoid, and want to throw out the peanuts altogether just because. (Also, didn't feel targeted).
Yes, he did come into contact with some peanut based foods, and the extreme sickness he got sent us to the doctors where we did get the testing done, and education for us to identify how to recognize the symptoms, and how to deal with it (e.g Benedryl/anti-histamine first, then if they start throwing up and can't keep Benedryl down or face is swelling a lot/breathing issues then apply the Epi-Pen and get to hospital).
So now, when your son doesn't feel well, on a field trip, or at school, everyone looks around for the nuts. And lo and behold, you're next to a peanut farm. Or a kid at the table is having a PB&J. Or you find out his playmate had peanut butter pancakes that morning, or a snack made in a facility processing pine nuts. Or whatever. And you have your "explanation."
Actually, we don't. If he has the specific symptoms of anaphylaxic shock (e.g. swelling of face, breathing, and throwing up) we treat the symptoms as we were taught. However, if he gets sick and isn't showing these symptoms, we do the normal care we would for any other normal kid (when H1N1 went through my house, we didn't go searching for the peanut bogeyman).
Except that you don't actually know how frequently your son is exposed to "peanut dust" or "contaminated surfaces" or whatever, and doesn't have a reaction. Maybe he's allergic to something else, or maybe not. Or maybe it goes down exactly as you suspect.
Excellent point - you're correct, we really don't know. However, in my son's case, we did have him tested (and unfortunately for him he tested out at the top of the sensitivity scale). We do take proper precautions (e.g. have some space between kids if one is having a PBJ sandwich) to make sure that he doesn't get unnecessarily exposed, but we don't worry too much about it now. However, the last thing I want to do is to ban all peanuts from everywhere - it's something that my son is aware of, and knows how to live with.
Can anybody provide any real evidence that nut allergies are triggered by the "smell" of nuts?
I can. My oldest son is extremely allergic to peanuts, almonds, and most other kinds of nuts. He has to carry an epi-pen with him wherever he goes. One day, my son's class went on a field trip to a farm. He started looking sick, and his face started to swell. Fortunately, the teacher saw it, gave him some Benadryl and he was fine for the rest of the afternoon. Turns out that the farm was near some peanut-growing farms and it was right in the midst of harvest season, so the peanut dust was in the air.
We've also had instances where my son was near some kids at school who were having a peanut butter sandwich for lunch, and my son started getting sick. Again, Benedryl was administered, and the school made sure that if someone had peanut butter in their lunches, they had to sit at least one or two seats away. Worst case, my son had to sit at a different table (although some classmates did come and sit by him).
It's not fun, dealing with allergies like this, but taking sensible precautions helps avoid a true life-or-death problem.
But almost everyone is using a strawman (as Microsoft is). The point is not to replace Windows, it's an OS for web surfing. It's not for playing World of Warcraft, doing heavy photo editing, video editing, etc. Everyone is writing the "Google vs. Microsoft" article they want to write, instead of the tougher article about how Google is basically working to define a new class of computer (something of a netbook that's not running a general OS).
My mother-in-law is nearing 80 years old, and I have her doing pretty much everything on the web using Google services. It's a pain to maintain her PC from 2000 miles away. Once they perfect this (calling it a Webbook would be more apropos) I'd gladly replace the Windows laptop she has with one of these things, and reduce my maintenance headaches.
Really? If you could steal with absolutely no chance of ever being caught, and no-one being hurt by your actions, you wouldn't do it because of your moral stance
No, I wouldn't. Case in point: I was doing some contracting work for a company that had some poor financial controls for this one division. About eight times, they doublepaid my invoices to them, and each time I quietly called the man who was in charge of the books for that portion of the company, and told him what had happened. He was rather frustrated with the corporate comptroller's system, but was very impressed with my honesty. Each time he told me that it would have likely gotten passed over each time if I had not come forward with the news of the overpayment.
Another time, (in a similar vein) I was paying for lunch at the cafeteria, and paid for my lunch with a ten dollar bill. The cashier gave me back $15 in change, and I told her that I had given her $10 and not $20, she was very grateful because she would have been under the gun when her till came up short. The person right behind me in line complimented me because of my honesty - and he was the corporate VP in charge of finance for the company in North America.
You missed the boat entirely by claiming that the federal and state governments failed to overreact to Hurricane Katrina. Governmental response were almost negligently nonchalant. With a storm bearing down on a densely-populated city, the government did not order a mandatory evacuation. They did not activate the National Guard to help evacuations. They did not bus people out in advance of the storms.
It was the responsibility of the State and local government (City of New Orleans) to order a mandatory evacuation of New Orleans. It was the responsibility of the State of Louisiana to activate the National Guard. It was the responsibility of the State of Louisiana and the City of New Orleans to bus people out in advance of the storm. Instead, neither the local or the state government did anything other than sit on their hands and whine that the Federal government (which was not intended to be on the scene immediately) wasn't there.
Now, we have this travesty of a supposed epidemic getting all of the politicians worried about their future careers if they give a realistic view of the problems about this swine flu pandemic. It feels to me like we've become a nation of cowards about any natural event, whether it is disease, earthquake or fire.
I know I shouldn't respond to this, but am I the only one that read it and thought most of it didn't sound half bad? I always thought public service was a good thing.
There's nothing wrong with public service, as long as the person serving is doing it voluntarily. I know, wartime is a different issue which necessitates a draft, but for peacetime if you wish to serve, go ahead. Just don't require it, because if you do you tend to turn people off from doing it on their own rather than being forced. Too often you see people lining their pockets at the trough of "public service".
In other words, if you want to inspire people by doing public service, I applaud you. Just don't force people to do something that should come from within.
Your words aren't allowed to be spoken in a public forum (like radio or TV), or you can't demonstrate your feelings in public.
Letting the community(who actually owns the airwave) determine what agreement that want it license said airwaves.
The problem comes in how the "community" determines what it wants on the airwaves. Suppose there's a city that's very liberal (for sake of argument, 75% liberal and 25% conservative). A radio station based there wants to start airing Rush Limbaugh, and they've gotten enough advertisers to fill the advertising spots for the three hour show. Many people object to the radio program - should the "community" shut it down? The radio program is reaching out to a portion of the "community", but it's not something the majority want.
The reverse would be true of a "conservative" city as well. It would be equally wrong to stop a conservative voice on the radio as it would be a liberal voice.
Any way, the internet will change AM radio far more then these plans.
I seriously doubt that - unless everyone is carrying smartphones all of the time (that has an always-on connection) and can listen to a program anytime they want, AM radio will always be there.
Do you think the "fairness doctrine" is an attempt to regulate free speech?
Personally, I believe that it is - free speech on talk radio, that is. All of the proposals revolve around re-regulating the AM band of the radio so that it is "evenly" balanced - like it was in the 1970's. The problem with that is that talk radio (which is heavily weighted towards conservative viewpoints) does compete with other forms of communication (like TV) that tends to more liberal viewpoints.
If the "Fairness Doctrine" is reimposed by Congress (contrary to what I believe free speech should be) or the other proposal floated by the Obama campaign (forcing radio stations to reapply for their license every two years, but mandating a panel that must "solicit public input on how the station is meeting community needs"), I predict that AM radio will be what I remember it to be - a wasteland of traffic reports, weather reports and the daily stockyard figures.
Yes, you may feel that Rush Limbaugh/Sean Hannity/ shouldn't be on the radio, but if you feel that words on TV shouldn't be censored, then why should the conservative talk radio's words be censored? Let them all be on, and let the people (rather than Congress) decide.
That assumes that your parents were willing for you to make a mistake on something your purchased. The problem we have nowadays so much is that we're not willing to let our kids make a mistake with their money.
Case in point: My youngest kids both whined to my wife to purchase a cheap $1 toy at a Dollar Tree the other day. Well, of course within a few hours both toys broke. Both of them cried about the toy, and we calmly explained to them that it was what was to be expected. Did we replace the toy? No, because my wife had told them not to buy it (with their own allowance money) but they bought it instead.
My oldest boy, though, did look, and decided that the toys were junk, and decided to save his money for something that he really wanted. I praised him (in private) for his maturity and good decision in saving his money. And he's now interested in opening up a savings account so that he can start earning money on his savings.
We have to be willing to allow our kids to fail - but to be willing to teach them a lesson.
I remember back in the 1970's when we had a rash of plane hijackings (think Entebbe). The policy experts of the time said that the best thing to do was to meekly go ahead with the hijackers, do whatever they wanted, etc. So what if they wanted to fly to Cuba! It just means that you get a visit to a foreign country.
Then 9/11 happened.
Never again.
You need to respond to force - "The Shores of Tripoli" still resonates today.
We don't yell at GM for not making its On-star open to everyone.
I work at the factory where the Onstar modules are built. BMW, among other auto manufacturers, also have the same Onstar modules for their cars. It may be a different name, but it's the same product - I know. The only difference is the STIDs and some different flash programming, but under the hood it's the same product.
Actually, I knew a guy in College who's name was Peter Cox. He was a dorm chaplain in a large dorm on campus. He got married right after he graduated, and changed his name to his mother's maiden name, Van Waard. He got real tired of all of the jokes as well.
I would add to this three things.
1. Determine how long you can afford to be without your system. If you can't be without your system for a reasonable period of time, you need to backup both your applications and data. If you can live without the system for a week or so, just back up the data and restore the applications from the original application source. In other words, make sure you have the data, and once you've got the OS and applications on there again, restore the data. This overall process is called Business Impact Assessment at my company.
2. Make more than one copy of your data. You may have a great backup somewhere, but if that backup of your data is corrupt, you're hosed again. Don't rely on only one physical piece of media to back up your information.
3. Offsite storage of your backups is critical. If it's in your home and your home burns down, you've lost all of your data as well.
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One summer when I was 15, I worked on a farm/ranch in western Nebraska. I worked twelve-hour days six days a week harvesting hay, helping out with dehorning/deballing of steers (not a fun task!), and general farm maintenance activities. Only day off was on Sundays. It was a hot, hard, smelly job. I personally enjoyed it (I treated it like an extended Boy Scout Summer Camp that I got paid for), but the bulk of the other teens out there complained and found it far too hard for them.
If you compare the general conditions of the Foxconn factories to the working conditions in the rural countryside, I would be willing to bet that it's far better to be a Foxconn employee than a farm worker (or other such rural worker). And honestly, if you don't have a job in China (for all their vaunted "Socialist" (socialist in name only, IMHO)) it's better than starving. It probably does amount to slavery, unfortunately.
In this case it's pretty obvious that Zynga game is essentially a knock-off, but how "different" do 2 games have to be to satisfy you in a legal sense for you to consider it not copying?
Because that's the question of fact that courts get to decide, it's also where the actual law gets "made". .
That's where the problem arises. If a big company is taken to court, they can (and will) stall out the smaller competitor, and basically run up the legal expenses to a point where the little company can't survive. There does need to be some sort of process that levels out the playing field between the two companies/people so that actual justice gets done.
Of course, I would also like a pony with that too.
Or be the current President of the United States.
Actually, the best backpacks (ones for long-distance hiking) tend to have the weight more on the hips than on the waist. Ideally, the shoulder straps should be relatively loose, and the bulk of the weight transferred down to the hip belt. The purpose for the shoulder straps is to to keep it relatively stable.
Therein lines the truth of the matter. I was picked on in elementary school and early Junior High. Once I realized that looking down and not making eye contact with people was telling them that I was a push-over, I started carrying myself with confidence on the outside and inside. Lo and behold, people started to treat me a lot more friendly, and I was able to make a lot more friends in school.
Oh so true. I was in 9th grade in a Social Studies class. I was going to my desk when a kid pushed me (deliberately) and tried to pick a fight with me. He wanted me to try and take the first swing at him. I calmly stood up, took off my glasses and crossed my arms over my chest, and replied "I'm not that stupid". Ended up in a sort of a Mexican standoff where I wasn't going to be bullied into swinging at him, and he couldn't back down because he picked the fight. The teacher told me to sit down, and I replied to her that I wasn't the one who started it. She told both of us to stop it and sit down - and at that point he did a quick jab to my face.
I ended up going to the Nurse's office to treat a black eye. He ended up getting suspended and transferred to a relatively poor school along with his brother (who also came by a few days later to threaten me). I found out later that both he and his brother were Golden Glove champions of my city, and if I had been so stupid as to try to hit him first, I would have been plastered.
And yet, if you even dare mention the role that Religion/Christianity/Judaism/ has in a textbook, it's not allowed because of "Separation of Church and State". Seriously, the role of religion in History has been marginalized to such an extent you can't hardly see it anymore (with the possible exception of the Pilgrims, and then it's treated almost as how bad they were towards the Native Americans).
These jokes are getting a little twisty on me. All alike.
Fortunately for me, my son doesn't react to the peanut oil, only the peanut proteins. We went to a Chick-Filet restaurant one day for lunch, and after my son was done with his meal we discovered that they cook everything in peanut oil. No effects from that, but we were rather concerned for a while (unnecessarily, thankfully)
I'd disagree with you as to the symptoms of my son not being considered evidence (e.g. the swelling, difficulty of breath he got during these episodes). Your point, however, is correct - too many parents of kids who have these allergies get overly paranoid, and want to throw out the peanuts altogether just because. (Also, didn't feel targeted).
Yes, he did come into contact with some peanut based foods, and the extreme sickness he got sent us to the doctors where we did get the testing done, and education for us to identify how to recognize the symptoms, and how to deal with it (e.g Benedryl/anti-histamine first, then if they start throwing up and can't keep Benedryl down or face is swelling a lot/breathing issues then apply the Epi-Pen and get to hospital).
Actually, we don't. If he has the specific symptoms of anaphylaxic shock (e.g. swelling of face, breathing, and throwing up) we treat the symptoms as we were taught. However, if he gets sick and isn't showing these symptoms, we do the normal care we would for any other normal kid (when H1N1 went through my house, we didn't go searching for the peanut bogeyman).
Excellent point - you're correct, we really don't know. However, in my son's case, we did have him tested (and unfortunately for him he tested out at the top of the sensitivity scale). We do take proper precautions (e.g. have some space between kids if one is having a PBJ sandwich) to make sure that he doesn't get unnecessarily exposed, but we don't worry too much about it now. However, the last thing I want to do is to ban all peanuts from everywhere - it's something that my son is aware of, and knows how to live with.
I can. My oldest son is extremely allergic to peanuts, almonds, and most other kinds of nuts. He has to carry an epi-pen with him wherever he goes. One day, my son's class went on a field trip to a farm. He started looking sick, and his face started to swell. Fortunately, the teacher saw it, gave him some Benadryl and he was fine for the rest of the afternoon. Turns out that the farm was near some peanut-growing farms and it was right in the midst of harvest season, so the peanut dust was in the air.
We've also had instances where my son was near some kids at school who were having a peanut butter sandwich for lunch, and my son started getting sick. Again, Benedryl was administered, and the school made sure that if someone had peanut butter in their lunches, they had to sit at least one or two seats away. Worst case, my son had to sit at a different table (although some classmates did come and sit by him).
It's not fun, dealing with allergies like this, but taking sensible precautions helps avoid a true life-or-death problem.
This does have the possibility of eclipsing anything else the Agency does.
My mother-in-law is nearing 80 years old, and I have her doing pretty much everything on the web using Google services. It's a pain to maintain her PC from 2000 miles away. Once they perfect this (calling it a Webbook would be more apropos) I'd gladly replace the Windows laptop she has with one of these things, and reduce my maintenance headaches.
No, I wouldn't. Case in point: I was doing some contracting work for a company that had some poor financial controls for this one division. About eight times, they doublepaid my invoices to them, and each time I quietly called the man who was in charge of the books for that portion of the company, and told him what had happened. He was rather frustrated with the corporate comptroller's system, but was very impressed with my honesty. Each time he told me that it would have likely gotten passed over each time if I had not come forward with the news of the overpayment.
Another time, (in a similar vein) I was paying for lunch at the cafeteria, and paid for my lunch with a ten dollar bill. The cashier gave me back $15 in change, and I told her that I had given her $10 and not $20, she was very grateful because she would have been under the gun when her till came up short. The person right behind me in line complimented me because of my honesty - and he was the corporate VP in charge of finance for the company in North America.
So yes, I still wouldn't do it.
It was the responsibility of the State and local government (City of New Orleans) to order a mandatory evacuation of New Orleans. It was the responsibility of the State of Louisiana to activate the National Guard. It was the responsibility of the State of Louisiana and the City of New Orleans to bus people out in advance of the storm. Instead, neither the local or the state government did anything other than sit on their hands and whine that the Federal government (which was not intended to be on the scene immediately) wasn't there.
Now, we have this travesty of a supposed epidemic getting all of the politicians worried about their future careers if they give a realistic view of the problems about this swine flu pandemic. It feels to me like we've become a nation of cowards about any natural event, whether it is disease, earthquake or fire.
There's nothing wrong with public service, as long as the person serving is doing it voluntarily. I know, wartime is a different issue which necessitates a draft, but for peacetime if you wish to serve, go ahead. Just don't require it, because if you do you tend to turn people off from doing it on their own rather than being forced. Too often you see people lining their pockets at the trough of "public service".
In other words, if you want to inspire people by doing public service, I applaud you. Just don't force people to do something that should come from within.
Your words aren't allowed to be spoken in a public forum (like radio or TV), or you can't demonstrate your feelings in public.
The problem comes in how the "community" determines what it wants on the airwaves. Suppose there's a city that's very liberal (for sake of argument, 75% liberal and 25% conservative). A radio station based there wants to start airing Rush Limbaugh, and they've gotten enough advertisers to fill the advertising spots for the three hour show. Many people object to the radio program - should the "community" shut it down? The radio program is reaching out to a portion of the "community", but it's not something the majority want.
The reverse would be true of a "conservative" city as well. It would be equally wrong to stop a conservative voice on the radio as it would be a liberal voice.
I seriously doubt that - unless everyone is carrying smartphones all of the time (that has an always-on connection) and can listen to a program anytime they want, AM radio will always be there.
Personally, I believe that it is - free speech on talk radio, that is. All of the proposals revolve around re-regulating the AM band of the radio so that it is "evenly" balanced - like it was in the 1970's. The problem with that is that talk radio (which is heavily weighted towards conservative viewpoints) does compete with other forms of communication (like TV) that tends to more liberal viewpoints.
If the "Fairness Doctrine" is reimposed by Congress (contrary to what I believe free speech should be) or the other proposal floated by the Obama campaign (forcing radio stations to reapply for their license every two years, but mandating a panel that must "solicit public input on how the station is meeting community needs"), I predict that AM radio will be what I remember it to be - a wasteland of traffic reports, weather reports and the daily stockyard figures.
Yes, you may feel that Rush Limbaugh/Sean Hannity/ shouldn't be on the radio, but if you feel that words on TV shouldn't be censored, then why should the conservative talk radio's words be censored? Let them all be on, and let the people (rather than Congress) decide.
Case in point: My youngest kids both whined to my wife to purchase a cheap $1 toy at a Dollar Tree the other day. Well, of course within a few hours both toys broke. Both of them cried about the toy, and we calmly explained to them that it was what was to be expected. Did we replace the toy? No, because my wife had told them not to buy it (with their own allowance money) but they bought it instead.
My oldest boy, though, did look, and decided that the toys were junk, and decided to save his money for something that he really wanted. I praised him (in private) for his maturity and good decision in saving his money. And he's now interested in opening up a savings account so that he can start earning money on his savings.
We have to be willing to allow our kids to fail - but to be willing to teach them a lesson.
Then 9/11 happened.
Never again.
You need to respond to force - "The Shores of Tripoli" still resonates today.
I work at the factory where the Onstar modules are built. BMW, among other auto manufacturers, also have the same Onstar modules for their cars. It may be a different name, but it's the same product - I know. The only difference is the STIDs and some different flash programming, but under the hood it's the same product.
This post seems a little fishy ... Ah, what the heck, I'll post just for the halibut.
Actually, I knew a guy in College who's name was Peter Cox. He was a dorm chaplain in a large dorm on campus. He got married right after he graduated, and changed his name to his mother's maiden name, Van Waard. He got real tired of all of the jokes as well.
I would add to this three things.
1. Determine how long you can afford to be without your system. If you can't be without your system for a reasonable period of time, you need to backup both your applications and data. If you can live without the system for a week or so, just back up the data and restore the applications from the original application source. In other words, make sure you have the data, and once you've got the OS and applications on there again, restore the data. This overall process is called Business Impact Assessment at my company.
2. Make more than one copy of your data. You may have a great backup somewhere, but if that backup of your data is corrupt, you're hosed again. Don't rely on only one physical piece of media to back up your information.
3. Offsite storage of your backups is critical. If it's in your home and your home burns down, you've lost all of your data as well.