I agree with the sentiments posted here (leaving the country, violent resistence, etc.)
But I think that, in the long run, perhaps it would be more useful to develop and support technologies that take power away from big governments in the first place -- things like Bittorrent, Wikileaks, solar power...
I've been doing a lot of reading in the cognitive sciences and how they see that most thought is unconscious, most thought is below your awareness... about 98%.
Uhm. What does that even mean? I hate to nitpick. I've been doing a lot of reading in the cognitive sciences, too. A lot of those numbers ("people only use 10% of their brains", "Einstein only used 10% of his brain") are totally bogus. Where does that number come from?
Re:About to buy my first CD in months..!
on
An Ode To Al
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· Score: 1
I actually find it safer to download my music now.
Interesting. That makes me think: I wonder what the expectation value is for the cost of fixing up a PC that's been infected by Sony, compared to the expectation value of getting sued by RIAA? Meaning: the odds of getting infected by a media company * the cost of repairing the damage, vs the odds of getting sued by a media company * the cost of settling.
At some point it becomes more cost-effective to break the law. Not that I'm suggesting that anyone break the law. Cause, you know, it's illegal and all. (Of course, on the other hand, it was more cost-effective to break the law before RIAA started the lawsuits... that didn't make it right. Or, well, legal, anyway.)
That's the thing. He talks about how cool the Internet is, getting rid of the middle-man, then he starts doing business with a middle-man, Amazon. He's not really participating in the "new" economy: he wants to sell dead trees through a middle-man. (That's fine, if that's what he wants to do.)
But the new economy that he claims to be studying would have him publishing his content directly online, digitally. No dead trees or intermediaries required.
Maybe that's what he wants to do, maybe not. But he's confusing two different things.
Man, that's awesome. I've had a similar idea as to how telecommunications ought to work.
I think that how it should work is this:
The city owns all of the dark fiber (just like they own all of those empty streets with no cars on them).
A property owner will have a handful of fiber lines coming onto their plot of land. Some of those fiber lines go off to one wiring closet somewhere in some part of town, and some go off to another wiring closet somewhere else (ie, physical redundancy).
The property owner has visitation rights to the other end of their little strip of fiber-optic cable. Ordinarily, the property owner will sign these rights over to a third-party, an ISP. So the property owner and the ISP enter into a contract to light up the dark fiber.
In this way, anyone can compete. Also, let's say that a private business had two offices, and they wanted to get a 1 Gbps (or even 10 Gbps) point-to-point connection between the offices, they could probably get it done in a day or two. And they could deal with real human beings (local businesses) to get the job done.
Re:Nothing beats yahoo and mutt
on
Gmail vs Pine
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· Score: 1
However, both pine and mutt are locally-installable applications, and that is why I made the comparison between them (as opposed to between pine and gmail, which is about like comparing pumpkins to gym socks IMO).
Comparing the comparison of pine to gmail to the comparison of pumpkins to gym socks is like comparing cherry blossoms to the comparison of maple syrup to communism: nobody would ever stick that crap in their nose.
I find it terribly interesting how "either/or" or posting is.
but we would rather talk to them and rein them in a touch rather than accept the alternative -- a totally secular, moral relativist society with no social norms whatsoever.
ie, If we don't vote Bush, then we will have no social norms whatsoever. There's nothing in-between.
Understand that for people like us, no amount of repackaging Socialism, secular humanism, or Communism-lite will work.
You seem to suggest that going slightly left is tantamount to communism or socialism. There's no in-between for you.
With Bush, you "largely feel there is more good than bad." You "agree with him on ideological grounds." You vote against things because you "disagree with them on grounds of principle." (emphasis mine)
But nowhere do you mention making your votes based on logic or empirical evidence.
The best feature of Debian is the way is the fabled system update feature: apt. This simple tool allows you to update all packages on your system with one simple command; "apt-get update;apt-get upgrade". This command updates the database of available packages and then upgrades all packages on the system.
On FC, you can update all packages on your system with one simple command: "up2date -uf". This command upgrades all the available packages on the system.
It has worked flawlessly, out-of-the-box, on any Fedora system I've installed in the past year or so.
No more "RPM-Hell" for me!
Me neither. That's one of the reasons why Fedora is so cool.
I can guarantee that most of the Slashdotters who hate MS so much would really enjoy working here. Though many would never even consider it.
My guess is that I would enjoy the culture there (well, the techie-crowd culture), but would they pay me to work on Linux all day? That's really my primary requirement if you want me to do computer work... other than that, there's plenty of other things I'd rather do with my time.
The thing that makes a real-time application seem laggy is that someone else is downloading a big file: your packets have to wait in line for all of those other big chunks of data to get through. With QoS, some packets get to be 'bumped up' in line. The same number of packets get through, the same number of bytes get through, it's just that the ordering is different.
Overall, yes, the QoS'd application would, on average, get slightly more bandwidth. But let's say that your VoIP application is using ~20kbps (that's just a wild-ass example... I dunno the real bandwidth). If the bitTorrent is saturating the rest of the line, getting ~500kbps, then having it on a higher priority isn't going to give it much more bandwidth. (And if the VoIP were using a connection-oriented protocol, like TCP, then all of it's packets would eventually get through anyway, so, in that case, the torrent wouldn't gain anything at all...)
I think that, in most situations, there would be a fairly small benefit to fooling the router.
What happens when some bit-torrent users figure out how to double their download speeds by setting the QoS bits on their traffic.
They won't actually increase their download speeds by much (a really tiny amount). The point of QoS is to reduce latency on specific connections (which doesn't really matter for large downloads), not to increase bandwidth.
Well, I'll answer your question. But I don't want this post to be interpreted as me whining or asking for pity or trying to justify myself. These are the things that have happened as I see them.
There are two examples that were bothering me when I wrote that post:
1 - in a history class, for an exam, we were supposed to write an essay about this book we read. The exam question asked some very specific questions. I went beyond that, making analogies to connect the topic to day-to-day life. I basically made it understandable to me, given that I never lived in 18th century China. My essay was more intelligent and showed more understanding than the question asked for (and I still stand by that). However, I was given a "D-" because I didn't specifically answer the question. I talked to the professor during office hours -- he was totally cool about it... He said he liked the essay, but, in order to make things fair for all students, I really should follow the rules and answer exactly the question that was asked (and not the more interesting and challenging question that was unasked:-). Okay, cool. I can live with that.
2 - I have this class, Seminar, where each of the students takes turns giving technical talks throughout the semester. The point of the class is to give us practice with public speaking on technical matters. Most people gave talks about "DNA Analysis" or "Fusion" or whatever. I gave a talk about some data analysis software that I had written. The professor was livid. He interrupted me in the middle of my talk and chewed me out right in front of the class. I couldn't figure it out. As near as I could tell, he was pissed that I presented my own work. I checked the syllabus, and it says nothing about presenting your own work or someone else's work. We just have to give talks on technical subjects... It caused me a lot of stress trying to figure out what the hell I did wrong.
Anyway, I eventually talked to him during office hours... he was much more raional and well-
behaved. We basically agreed to disagree. I'll do things his way, that's fine. I can put up with most anything as long as he's civil and well-behaved.
So when I wrote that post, the part that I was bitter about was being punished for doing my own creative work.
David Brooks has an amazingly appropriate editorial in today's New York Times (Mar 30, 2004). I agree with DB whole-heartedly. I've had a number of technical jobs (I'm 28, not just some dude right out of high-school), and I've done very well at most of them. The success skills for school are totally unrelated to the success skills in life or in the workplace.
Right now, I'm going through a cynical phase where I feel like my university is more interested in being a factory for producing white-collar workers, than being a place of education and higher learning.
I'm more than a little surprised (and bitter) this semester at how putting a little bit more work and creativity into my assignments is earning me lower grades and angry lectures from a couple of my professors. Oh well, I'll just follow the rules until I graduate, I guess... my bad, I thought creativity and originality would be rewarded...
I'm much more interested in pursuing something fun and interesting and fulfilling than in making bank or being "successful" by someone else's definition.
A lot of the problem has been that upper management has treated the IT department more like a service department...
IT is a service. We provide a service to all those other guys who actually generate revenue.
...a productive part of the company.
Really. How much revenue-generating product did your IT department produce last year?
I look at it this way: If you own an office building, you need to hire people to maintain it (a building manager and some custodians. Occasionally you'll need to contract some electricians or something.) Likewise, if you own some computers, you need to hire some people to maintain them (a sysadmin, and some techs. Occasionally you'll need to contract some programmers [or purchase some shrink-wrapped software]).
Sure, computers are more complicated than office buildings, and they change a lot more, and they can have a much more dramatic impact on productivity (for those revenue-generating employees... remember them?), but, from a business prospective, there's no fundamental difference.
because *BSD, Solaris, and most Linuxen just piss me off in various ways
I feel exactly the same way (except that I dig Red Hat, and I Looove Fedora). I think that's what it comes down to for a lot of people: your system makes sense to you, and all the others just seem to piss you off.
It's like, you start to come up with a certain system-administration style. And your style has some good, deep-down logic to it, whether you realize it or not. But then, someone else comes along (Windows, or BSD, or Bob's OS) and their fundamental, deep-down philosophy and style is a little bit different than yours. But you don't see that, all you see is the specifics -- the individual choices.
So you see all these specifics that run counter to your sysadmin philosophy without ever fully grasping the sysadmin philosophy of the people who put together that other system, and you get pissed off, thinking, "why the hell did they do it that way?"
I don't think that people are falling all overthemselves for IBM: The slashdot articles concludes with, "the enemy of my enemy is my friend?" and the First Post says "The enemy of my enemy is.. useful."
I just don't see any grand delusions going on here.
In this one instance, IBM's goals happen to be compatible with my (our?) goals of promoting free software. If our goals happen to be compatible (even if for totally different reasons) then, hey... rock on. (for now, anyway...)
A while back, I put an XP machine onto a network and within about 2 minutes, I had caught the slammer worm. That's not even enough time to patch the system..
Screw Windows... there are just so many reasons to not use it at all...
Correlation just means that two things occur together in frequency-space (I'm talking mathematics and statistics here). They might not be "related" as such -- they might both be caused by some deeper, uh, cause.
For example: Working out makes me look better, and it takes time out of my day. So taking time out of my day and looking better have some correlation. But niether of those two effects are really "related" in the more common sense. I can take time out of my day without looking better, and there are ways to look better that don't take (as much) time out of my day.
If a band becomes popular, it seems perfectly reasonable that: A--Their sales will be up and, B--Their illegal copying will be up. Thus, both effects are correlated; however, neither causes the other.
In reference to the article, though, there's not really enough evidence (or controlled studies for that matter) to have much confidence in any correlation anyway. (And for that matter, there's so much bias in the original article, and then bias in Slashdot's reporting of the article that it makes me want to not bother thinking about it without any of the original data anyway...)
Re:Definitely
on
Real Security?
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· Score: 2, Interesting
I do something similar to this: I choose passwords that alternate the left and right hands while typing (typically). That way, I can type the password as quickly as possible. I practice the password over and over for several days until it becomes habit. At which point, I remember them by their feel, not by their content.
The way I see it, Cringely is a very good historian. He's good at sifting throught the facts of what has already happened, and putting things together accurately.
As far I I'm concerned, he's a totally worthless and annoying analyst. He rarely knows what the hell he's talking about.
I don't know what slashdot sees in him either most of the time.
Slashdot Mirror
I agree with the sentiments posted here (leaving the country, violent resistence, etc.)
But I think that, in the long run, perhaps it would be more useful to develop and support technologies that take power away from big governments in the first place -- things like Bittorrent, Wikileaks, solar power...
Uhm. What does that even mean? I hate to nitpick. I've been doing a lot of reading in the cognitive sciences, too. A lot of those numbers ("people only use 10% of their brains", "Einstein only used 10% of his brain") are totally bogus. Where does that number come from?
Interesting. That makes me think: I wonder what the expectation value is for the cost of fixing up a PC that's been infected by Sony, compared to the expectation value of getting sued by RIAA? Meaning: the odds of getting infected by a media company * the cost of repairing the damage, vs the odds of getting sued by a media company * the cost of settling.
At some point it becomes more cost-effective to break the law. Not that I'm suggesting that anyone break the law. Cause, you know, it's illegal and all. (Of course, on the other hand, it was more cost-effective to break the law before RIAA started the lawsuits... that didn't make it right. Or, well, legal, anyway.)
That's the thing. He talks about how cool the Internet is, getting rid of the middle-man, then he starts doing business with a middle-man, Amazon. He's not really participating in the "new" economy: he wants to sell dead trees through a middle-man. (That's fine, if that's what he wants to do.)
But the new economy that he claims to be studying would have him publishing his content directly online, digitally. No dead trees or intermediaries required.
Maybe that's what he wants to do, maybe not. But he's confusing two different things.
I think that how it should work is this:
- The city owns all of the dark fiber (just like they own all of those empty streets with no cars on them).
- A property owner will have a handful of fiber lines coming onto their plot of land. Some of those fiber lines go off to one wiring closet somewhere in some part of town, and some go off to another wiring closet somewhere else (ie, physical redundancy).
- The property owner has visitation rights to the other end of their little strip of fiber-optic cable. Ordinarily, the property owner will sign these rights over to a third-party, an ISP. So the property owner and the ISP enter into a contract to light up the dark fiber.
In this way, anyone can compete. Also, let's say that a private business had two offices, and they wanted to get a 1 Gbps (or even 10 Gbps) point-to-point connection between the offices, they could probably get it done in a day or two. And they could deal with real human beings (local businesses) to get the job done.With Bush, you "largely feel there is more good than bad." You "agree with him on ideological grounds." You vote against things because you "disagree with them on grounds of principle." (emphasis mine)
But nowhere do you mention making your votes based on logic or empirical evidence.
On FC, you can update all packages on your system with one simple command: "up2date -uf". This command upgrades all the available packages on the system.
It has worked flawlessly, out-of-the-box, on any Fedora system I've installed in the past year or so.
Me neither. That's one of the reasons why Fedora is so cool.
maybe it's not a +5 funny or anything, but it's certainly no -1 flamebait...
sheesh (shakes head in dismay...)
My guess is that I would enjoy the culture there (well, the techie-crowd culture), but would they pay me to work on Linux all day? That's really my primary requirement if you want me to do computer work... other than that, there's plenty of other things I'd rather do with my time.
The thing that makes a real-time application seem laggy is that someone else is downloading a big file: your packets have to wait in line for all of those other big chunks of data to get through. With QoS, some packets get to be 'bumped up' in line. The same number of packets get through, the same number of bytes get through, it's just that the ordering is different.
Overall, yes, the QoS'd application would, on average, get slightly more bandwidth. But let's say that your VoIP application is using ~20kbps (that's just a wild-ass example... I dunno the real bandwidth). If the bitTorrent is saturating the rest of the line, getting ~500kbps, then having it on a higher priority isn't going to give it much more bandwidth. (And if the VoIP were using a connection-oriented protocol, like TCP, then all of it's packets would eventually get through anyway, so, in that case, the torrent wouldn't gain anything at all...)
I think that, in most situations, there would be a fairly small benefit to fooling the router.
They won't actually increase their download speeds by much (a really tiny amount). The point of QoS is to reduce latency on specific connections (which doesn't really matter for large downloads), not to increase bandwidth.
"A government is a body of people, usually notably ungoverned"
Now you're quoting the captian...
If you're looking for some quick-n-easy RPMs for doing data analysis and visualization in Python, then check out: http://monkeyrpms.net/
(/me braces for a slashdotting)
There are two examples that were bothering me when I wrote that post: So when I wrote that post, the part that I was bitter about was being punished for doing my own creative work.
David Brooks has an amazingly appropriate editorial in today's New York Times (Mar 30, 2004). I agree with DB whole-heartedly. I've had a number of technical jobs (I'm 28, not just some dude right out of high-school), and I've done very well at most of them. The success skills for school are totally unrelated to the success skills in life or in the workplace.
I wish I could mod you as "+6, Amen, brother!"
Right now, I'm going through a cynical phase where I feel like my university is more interested in being a factory for producing white-collar workers, than being a place of education and higher learning.
I'm more than a little surprised (and bitter) this semester at how putting a little bit more work and creativity into my assignments is earning me lower grades and angry lectures from a couple of my professors. Oh well, I'll just follow the rules until I graduate, I guess... my bad, I thought creativity and originality would be rewarded...
I'm much more interested in pursuing something fun and interesting and fulfilling than in making bank or being "successful" by someone else's definition.
Why on earth is this modded up? The guy created a straw-man argument to attack. He invented his own argument pointless argument...
Really. How much revenue-generating product did your IT department produce last year?
I look at it this way: If you own an office building, you need to hire people to maintain it (a building manager and some custodians. Occasionally you'll need to contract some electricians or something.) Likewise, if you own some computers, you need to hire some people to maintain them (a sysadmin, and some techs. Occasionally you'll need to contract some programmers [or purchase some shrink-wrapped software]).
Sure, computers are more complicated than office buildings, and they change a lot more, and they can have a much more dramatic impact on productivity (for those revenue-generating employees... remember them?), but, from a business prospective, there's no fundamental difference.
because *BSD, Solaris, and most Linuxen just piss me off in various ways
I feel exactly the same way (except that I dig Red Hat, and I Looove Fedora). I think that's what it comes down to for a lot of people: your system makes sense to you, and all the others just seem to piss you off.
It's like, you start to come up with a certain system-administration style. And your style has some good, deep-down logic to it, whether you realize it or not. But then, someone else comes along (Windows, or BSD, or Bob's OS) and their fundamental, deep-down philosophy and style is a little bit different than yours. But you don't see that, all you see is the specifics -- the individual choices.
So you see all these specifics that run counter to your sysadmin philosophy without ever fully grasping the sysadmin philosophy of the people who put together that other system, and you get pissed off, thinking, "why the hell did they do it that way?"
I don't think that people are falling all overthemselves for IBM: The slashdot articles concludes with, "the enemy of my enemy is my friend?" and the First Post says "The enemy of my enemy is.. useful."
I just don't see any grand delusions going on here.
In this one instance, IBM's goals happen to be compatible with my (our?) goals of promoting free software. If our goals happen to be compatible (even if for totally different reasons) then, hey... rock on. (for now, anyway...)
my machine has never been compromised.
A while back, I put an XP machine onto a network and within about 2 minutes, I had caught the slammer worm. That's not even enough time to patch the system..
Screw Windows... there are just so many reasons to not use it at all...
Correlation just means that two things occur together in frequency-space (I'm talking mathematics and statistics here). They might not be "related" as such -- they might both be caused by some deeper, uh, cause.
For example: Working out makes me look better, and it takes time out of my day. So taking time out of my day and looking better have some correlation. But niether of those two effects are really "related" in the more common sense. I can take time out of my day without looking better, and there are ways to look better that don't take (as much) time out of my day.
If a band becomes popular, it seems perfectly reasonable that: A--Their sales will be up and, B--Their illegal copying will be up. Thus, both effects are correlated; however, neither causes the other.
In reference to the article, though, there's not really enough evidence (or controlled studies for that matter) to have much confidence in any correlation anyway. (And for that matter, there's so much bias in the original article, and then bias in Slashdot's reporting of the article that it makes me want to not bother thinking about it without any of the original data anyway...)
I do something similar to this: I choose passwords that alternate the left and right hands while typing (typically). That way, I can type the password as quickly as possible. I practice the password over and over for several days until it becomes habit. At which point, I remember them by their feel, not by their content.
kinda like an analyst...
The way I see it, Cringely is a very good historian. He's good at sifting throught the facts of what has already happened, and putting things together accurately.
As far I I'm concerned, he's a totally worthless and annoying analyst. He rarely knows what the hell he's talking about.
I don't know what slashdot sees in him either most of the time.