Simple solution: f you are a free coder, don't go anywhere near MS code or NDAs. On the other hand, if you are already immersed in a MS-only world, and are working on MS-only applications, and systems, perhaps this is a good thing for you. I think there is a sufficient differientiation between MS-immersed people and free software coders...there probably isn't all that much overlap there.
"And one other thing, even with the comical insanity, it wasn't a bad place to work. The reason I left was because the company was seized by the IRS for failure to pay payroll taxes."
IRS to Scientology: No, you don't understand. You owe us a million dollars!!
"The REAL interesting part is how Hubbard, as a crappy sci-fi author, wrote an interesting backstory for his religion. Turns out, the reason you feel bad sometimes (mentally, although bad thoughts lead to bad physical condition) is because... well..I never get this part right, because its just dumb. Something about a Galactic Civil War, and all these alien people being imprisioned in a volcano on Earth (when it was just forming) and then having atom bombs (not thermonuclear weapons, mind you - we're talking Fat Man and Little Boy here, and these were aliens which could do FTL and lord knows what else) dropped on them. Their spirits came to become Man, or something like that, and the auditing process is supposed to release them."
Wow, you mean the bone-crushing vacuousness and resulting existential angst of modern life is really due to evil aliens. Hell, I feel a lot better now. Where's the salvation jar?
"angry teens used to be so much better than they make them today"
Yeah...the establishment figured out it could win by co-opting instead of fighting. And now we are being sold back bell-bottoms and VW bugs. Beatle songs sell us flat screen TVs and cellular service. Gap commercials pump back at us the very same rebellious songs that MTV played in the 80s, over homogenous shiny faced groups dancing in 50s-esque conformity. And now MTV itself sniffs out upcoming trends, neuters them (*cough* rage rock *cough*) and sells them back to kids.
Gentle reader, your rebelliousness IS the product, your generation has already been sold out. YHL. HAND. (Now go to school and shoot up some people)
"What I suspect happened is that he did something stupid as root."
One could argue systems should be designed so that random "stupid" actions can't totally munge a system. Perhaps capabilities will mitigate the power of root...
"But you had backups made that you could restore from, right?"
Normal Windows users I know hardly ever make a full backup of their machine, yet I haven't ever seen any "total filesystem corruption" caused by shutting down. The point is that perhaps it *shouldn't* be demanded of users that they treat their systems like a volatile mixture of chemicals in a fragile container.
Who said hacktivism is legal? I think it's akin to civil disobediance. That's not legal...but it's a political statement. At least "hacktivists" are taking their angst and frustration out for "noble" causes (yeah yeah moral relativism)...at least it's better than just defrauding the neighborhood bank.
"There's a big difference between staging a sit-in and defacing someone's property."
And there is also a difference between defacing "property" and defacing a website. If no data is lost, what exactly is the damage done? The damage is some denial of service, and clean up aftwards. Not unlike sit-ins.
Wow, did you catch Frontline's "The Merchants of Cool"? Basically every generation, every revolution, is co-opted, and sold back to the public at large, totally annihilating the original movement. After which a search for the next "big thing" is undertaken, and the vicious cycle continues.
"It is censorship no matter how you look at it, and the difference from this and childproof lids is that medicine can kill a stupid child, a video game wont."
Both medicine and video games can "harm" kids. It is up to the parent deciding what "harm" is. For instance, I'm sure parents don't want their children playing games with pornographic content. Sure it may not physically harm them. But it's also not something a parent wants.
And why do you think RIAA would intentionally want to deprive young customers from seeing their content? Do you really think they are such good souls that they reject a kid on some moral grounds? Maybe that's what they'd have you believe. But these are the guys that *market* to underaged kids. They *want* kids to see their movies and buy their stuff. Congress *stuffs* ratings down their throat (either that or intimidates them into regulating themselves). That some guy stops kids from seeing an R rated movie without a parent, is not some underhanded MPAA scheme to deprive themselves of customers. They have to do it because the society thinks it's a Good Thing. That said, censorship at the governmental level of *creation* of content is vile and evil. Anybody should create anything they want (except things that exploit other people illegally, like kiddie porn) without the government stepping in. It is when that content is distributed can we set up some regulations (please put the porn on a stand behind the counter, and not in public view; please card kids trying to get into skin flicks; please conform to a video game rating system; etc.)
While non-lethal deterrents are obviously much better than lethal ones, when you don't intend to actually kill, I wonder what this would do to nonviolent resistance. Nonviolent resistence is basically a call on the human conscience - not too many people can stand for armed units gunning down and smashing in the skulls of defenseless civilians. However, if you replace those units with "friendly" foam and MASER shooters, will anybody really care? For instance, would the anti-WTO protests in Seattle have gotten that much attention if the protesters were peacefully dispersed with non-lethal weapons? Would the Vietnam war have lasted even longer if non-lethal weaponry effectively silenced and taken the upper hand from the protest movement?
(Yes I know it sounds hypocritical, but the whole point of non-violent resistence is that others won't stand to let people attack and kill peaceful protesters - non-lethal weapons provide the same effect without casting a nasty shadow on the forces in power)
Well, I can't find the quotes now, but there are two quotes (the second by founding fathers I'm pretty sure): one says that capitalism inherently tends to destroy itself by devolving into monopolies...it is just simply the most efficient; the other says basically that corporations will always be driving for profit at the expense of the worker and consumer.
The free market isn't some magical panacea. And yes, it is the government's business to mess around in the marketplace.
As insane as it is mutually assured destruction has "kept" us from nuclear war thus far. A theater missile defense 1) won't work 2) will just cause enemies to build up and throw more at us at once. There is no way that a missile defense will catch each and every one of an overwhelming barrage. Now, this "combat missile defense" or whatever they call it, intended to be used in battlefield situations may make sense...or it just make be a code word for "we have our foot in the door now and we're going to really build a theater missile defense anyway, you suckers".
The best way to avoid nuclear holocaust is to just learn to be nice and be liked by people. Unfortunately the US is adamant in being an asshole in many cases. And the chickens come home to roost...
I think that people have already tackled your question with: Most artists get most of their money from performances anyway. Giving the music away is just a way to drive people to performances. Currently, AFAIK, "reverse engineering" songs is illegal...only the record companies get to produce books of tablature, etc. Does this sound *right* to you? Should RIAA be able to bust down my door because I'm singing one of their songs and somebody might overhear? These are all artificial restrictions...not birthrights. The test is to draw the line at the appropriate place. I believe this line is currently drawn to overwhelmingly favor the record industry (not artists), and large mega-software companies...and not consumers of either product.
Yeah, that sucks. Perhaps we should be coming up with different, better solutions?
"We're a community, damnit! We're not your ad-clicking sheep! If you can't sell ads then that's your problem! One day this web site will be free of your commercial opportunist tryannical business, all the trolls will leave, this site will be cool again, and then food will taste better!"
Amen;) Ok, maybe I'm just still pumped from last night's Frontline ("The Merchants of Cool"), but I'm really fed up with vicious circle of "demand generation". Instead of just trying to increase the speed of the process (let's find better ways to make ads to catch more people who will have to find better ways to avoid ads so that we have to find better ways to make ads to...), I think we should be trying to find ways out of this advertising nightmare. Ok, so perhaps micropayments aren't the silver bullet. I'd still like to be able to click a button and give some change as a tip after reading a good article, than be surrounded by advertising everywhere I go. Maybe that's not enough, but shit, "tough". Perhaps sites will revert back to smaller, more intense communities, who are more willing to shell out for real content...instead of site after banal site of regurgitated, non-differentiated content supporting itself by banners...how dreary. (ok, perhaps I'm smoking on the nostalgia pipe).
I'd seriously plunk down a micropayment, for, e.g., some of the interviews Slashdot has done, or reviews of technology, etc. Same for the in-depth reviews on Ars-Technica, Tom's Hardware, and some of the good articles on Wired. Not only would I not have to deal with ads, but I'd get the warm fuzzy feeling of doing the "right thing" while at the same time building up a loyalty to the site because I know that I'm probably one of the exclusive in-club that actually *does* tip.
Let's stop trying to get the addict to help us design better drugs, and instead try to get the addict OFF the drugs.
Re:This is part of our destiny.
on
Solar Sails
·
· Score: 2
"Ok, so Western thought involves a rampant urge to make order from disorder by taking an active role in discovery and learning, this is what you mean right?"
Your reply illuminates the presumption that anything unconquered is by definition "disorder". This is exactly what I'm talking about. "Discovery and learning" does not necessarily equal conquering and vice versa.
western
2 capitalized : of, relating to, or characteristic of a region conventionally designated West: as a : steeped in or stemming from the Greco-Roman traditions b : of or relating to the noncommunist countries of Europe and America c : of or relating to the American West
Generally the mindest of "Western civilization".
"fatalism:
1.The doctrine that all events are predetermined by fate and are therefore unalterable.
2.Acceptance of the belief that all events are predetermined and inevitable."
Yup, things sort of suck when one's whole world-view revolves around the belief that humanity is an imperfect creation, that nothing really worthwhile in this world can be done, except to work hard and resignedly hope for a better afterlife. A subconscious drive for some abstract concept of "progress", coupled with an ultimate resignation, I think leads us to strive very hard without purpose, exploiting for immediate gain. What shall we "conquer" after space?
"I guess what I'm really asking is what do you have against Western thought?"
Besides the dogged persistence to always want to conquer some new thing for the holy grail of some undefined "progress", nothing really. But I'm sure I can always be assured of some knee jerks in the Slashdot crowd. (Sober introspection about our mad rush to develop and conquer? What you say?!)
Re:This is part of our destiny.
on
Solar Sails
·
· Score: 3
"conquer space"
Oops, you have pushed my critique-of-western-thought button! What is it with "conquering" everything? We have to "conquer" the New World. We have to "conquer" nature. We have to "conquer" space.
"Einstein irrefutably proved that travelling faster than the speed of light is utterly impossible"
Well, it was a postulate that has been held up so far, but recent experiments throw inklings of doubt. Beware of absolutes. I don't think much in physics is "irrefutably proved".
"When the singularity comes, as predicted by Vernor Vinge, I shall be among the first to upload."
Yes, drink the kool aid...
It's unfortunate that the west is so fatalistic. I took a look into transhumanism and was at first intrigued, but then got disgusted with its arrogance, fatalism, and irresponsibility. I'm happy being just a plain ol' human. It's this urge to "conquer" to escape and be something else that leads us down all sorts of wrong paths in search of some mythical salvation. bleh
Slashdot Mirror
Simple solution: f you are a free coder, don't go anywhere near MS code or NDAs. On the other hand, if you are already immersed in a MS-only world, and are working on MS-only applications, and systems, perhaps this is a good thing for you. I think there is a sufficient differientiation between MS-immersed people and free software coders...there probably isn't all that much overlap there.
Duh, just glue the paper phone to your shoe.
Bokononism!
"All of the true things I am about to tell you are shameless lies."
(hint: read Cat's Cradle by Vonnegut)
"And one other thing, even with the comical insanity, it wasn't a bad place to work. The reason I left was because the company was seized by the IRS for failure to pay payroll taxes."
IRS to Scientology: No, you don't understand. You owe us a million dollars!!
"The REAL interesting part is how Hubbard, as a crappy sci-fi author, wrote an interesting backstory for his religion. Turns out, the reason you feel bad sometimes (mentally, although bad thoughts lead to bad physical condition) is because... well..I never get this part right, because its just dumb. Something about a Galactic Civil War, and all these alien people being imprisioned in a volcano on Earth (when it was just forming) and then having atom bombs (not thermonuclear weapons, mind you - we're talking Fat Man and Little Boy here, and these were aliens which could do FTL and lord knows what else) dropped on them. Their spirits came to become Man, or something like that, and the auditing process is supposed to release them."
Wow, you mean the bone-crushing vacuousness and resulting existential angst of modern life is really due to evil aliens. Hell, I feel a lot better now. Where's the salvation jar?
Scientology tries to reach out to people and say: "Money is making your pyschic aura filthy. Give it to us. Now."
Before somebody bites my head off...that last bit is from the "angry teen" perspective. It seems nowadays school shootings is the thing to do.
"angry teens used to be so much better than they make them today"
Yeah...the establishment figured out it could win by co-opting instead of fighting. And now we are being sold back bell-bottoms and VW bugs. Beatle songs sell us flat screen TVs and cellular service. Gap commercials pump back at us the very same rebellious songs that MTV played in the 80s, over homogenous shiny faced groups dancing in 50s-esque conformity. And now MTV itself sniffs out upcoming trends, neuters them (*cough* rage rock *cough*) and sells them back to kids.
Gentle reader, your rebelliousness IS the product, your generation has already been sold out. YHL. HAND. (Now go to school and shoot up some people)
"What I suspect happened is that he did something stupid as root."
One could argue systems should be designed so that random "stupid" actions can't totally munge a system. Perhaps capabilities will mitigate the power of root...
"But you had backups made that you could restore from, right?"
Normal Windows users I know hardly ever make a full backup of their machine, yet I haven't ever seen any "total filesystem corruption" caused by shutting down. The point is that perhaps it *shouldn't* be demanded of users that they treat their systems like a volatile mixture of chemicals in a fragile container.
Who said hacktivism is legal? I think it's akin to civil disobediance. That's not legal...but it's a political statement. At least "hacktivists" are taking their angst and frustration out for "noble" causes (yeah yeah moral relativism)...at least it's better than just defrauding the neighborhood bank.
"I'd love to know why all the self-confessed 'geeks' on the programme seemed to have green hair????"
Because having colored hair is "edgy". Didn't you attend Eleet Hacking 101?
"There's a big difference between staging a sit-in and defacing someone's property."
And there is also a difference between defacing "property" and defacing a website. If no data is lost, what exactly is the damage done? The damage is some denial of service, and clean up aftwards. Not unlike sit-ins.
"When was the last time political assassination was called shootivism?"
Some assassinations are called "democratic revolutions". Some assassinations are called "sentences". Everything is not black and white.
Wow, did you catch Frontline's "The Merchants of Cool"? Basically every generation, every revolution, is co-opted, and sold back to the public at large, totally annihilating the original movement. After which a search for the next "big thing" is undertaken, and the vicious cycle continues.
"It is censorship no matter how you look at it, and the difference from this and childproof lids is that medicine can kill a stupid child, a video game wont."
Both medicine and video games can "harm" kids. It is up to the parent deciding what "harm" is. For instance, I'm sure parents don't want their children playing games with pornographic content. Sure it may not physically harm them. But it's also not something a parent wants.
And why do you think RIAA would intentionally want to deprive young customers from seeing their content? Do you really think they are such good souls that they reject a kid on some moral grounds? Maybe that's what they'd have you believe. But these are the guys that *market* to underaged kids. They *want* kids to see their movies and buy their stuff. Congress *stuffs* ratings down their throat (either that or intimidates them into regulating themselves). That some guy stops kids from seeing an R rated movie without a parent, is not some underhanded MPAA scheme to deprive themselves of customers. They have to do it because the society thinks it's a Good Thing. That said, censorship at the governmental level of *creation* of content is vile and evil. Anybody should create anything they want (except things that exploit other people illegally, like kiddie porn) without the government stepping in. It is when that content is distributed can we set up some regulations (please put the porn on a stand behind the counter, and not in public view; please card kids trying to get into skin flicks; please conform to a video game rating system; etc.)
I like XML-RPC which is sort of like "SOAP-Light"...it's very simple and to the point.
While non-lethal deterrents are obviously much better than lethal ones, when you don't intend to actually kill, I wonder what this would do to nonviolent resistance. Nonviolent resistence is basically a call on the human conscience - not too many people can stand for armed units gunning down and smashing in the skulls of defenseless civilians. However, if you replace those units with "friendly" foam and MASER shooters, will anybody really care? For instance, would the anti-WTO protests in Seattle have gotten that much attention if the protesters were peacefully dispersed with non-lethal weapons? Would the Vietnam war have lasted even longer if non-lethal weaponry effectively silenced and taken the upper hand from the protest movement?
(Yes I know it sounds hypocritical, but the whole point of non-violent resistence is that others won't stand to let people attack and kill peaceful protesters - non-lethal weapons provide the same effect without casting a nasty shadow on the forces in power)
Well, I can't find the quotes now, but there are two quotes (the second by founding fathers I'm pretty sure): one says that capitalism inherently tends to destroy itself by devolving into monopolies...it is just simply the most efficient; the other says basically that corporations will always be driving for profit at the expense of the worker and consumer.
The free market isn't some magical panacea. And yes, it is the government's business to mess around in the marketplace.
As insane as it is mutually assured destruction has "kept" us from nuclear war thus far. A theater missile defense 1) won't work 2) will just cause enemies to build up and throw more at us at once. There is no way that a missile defense will catch each and every one of an overwhelming barrage. Now, this "combat missile defense" or whatever they call it, intended to be used in battlefield situations may make sense...or it just make be a code word for "we have our foot in the door now and we're going to really build a theater missile defense anyway, you suckers".
The best way to avoid nuclear holocaust is to just learn to be nice and be liked by people. Unfortunately the US is adamant in being an asshole in many cases. And the chickens come home to roost...
Man, don't you read B.C.? ;)
I think that people have already tackled your question with: Most artists get most of their money from performances anyway. Giving the music away is just a way to drive people to performances. Currently, AFAIK, "reverse engineering" songs is illegal...only the record companies get to produce books of tablature, etc. Does this sound *right* to you? Should RIAA be able to bust down my door because I'm singing one of their songs and somebody might overhear? These are all artificial restrictions...not birthrights. The test is to draw the line at the appropriate place. I believe this line is currently drawn to overwhelmingly favor the record industry (not artists), and large mega-software companies...and not consumers of either product.
"the transistor existed in nature as well"
I wonder why it took us so long to discover and put it to use, if it was just sitting there in nature, next to the wheel.
You are totally talking out of your ass. Do you take lessons from Katz?
"Comment forums for each ad banner"
;) Ok, maybe I'm just still pumped from last night's Frontline ("The Merchants of Cool"), but I'm really fed up with vicious circle of "demand generation". Instead of just trying to increase the speed of the process (let's find better ways to make ads to catch more people who will have to find better ways to avoid ads so that we have to find better ways to make ads to...), I think we should be trying to find ways out of this advertising nightmare. Ok, so perhaps micropayments aren't the silver bullet. I'd still like to be able to click a button and give some change as a tip after reading a good article, than be surrounded by advertising everywhere I go. Maybe that's not enough, but shit, "tough". Perhaps sites will revert back to smaller, more intense communities, who are more willing to shell out for real content...instead of site after banal site of regurgitated, non-differentiated content supporting itself by banners...how dreary. (ok, perhaps I'm smoking on the nostalgia pipe).
So we can do your market research for you?
"What about ad system karma?"
So OSDN will devolve into the flashy ads network?
"That's OK. I have my metal bowl on too."
Yeah, that sucks. Perhaps we should be coming up with different, better solutions?
"We're a community, damnit! We're not your ad-clicking sheep! If you can't sell ads then that's your problem! One day this web site will be free of your commercial opportunist tryannical business, all the trolls will leave, this site will be cool again, and then food will taste better!"
Amen
I'd seriously plunk down a micropayment, for, e.g., some of the interviews Slashdot has done, or reviews of technology, etc. Same for the in-depth reviews on Ars-Technica, Tom's Hardware, and some of the good articles on Wired. Not only would I not have to deal with ads, but I'd get the warm fuzzy feeling of doing the "right thing" while at the same time building up a loyalty to the site because I know that I'm probably one of the exclusive in-club that actually *does* tip.
Let's stop trying to get the addict to help us design better drugs, and instead try to get the addict OFF the drugs.
Your reply illuminates the presumption that anything unconquered is by definition "disorder". This is exactly what I'm talking about. "Discovery and learning" does not necessarily equal conquering and vice versa.
Generally the mindest of "Western civilization".
"fatalism:
1.The doctrine that all events are predetermined by fate and are therefore unalterable.
2.Acceptance of the belief that all events are predetermined and inevitable."
Yup, things sort of suck when one's whole world-view revolves around the belief that humanity is an imperfect creation, that nothing really worthwhile in this world can be done, except to work hard and resignedly hope for a better afterlife. A subconscious drive for some abstract concept of "progress", coupled with an ultimate resignation, I think leads us to strive very hard without purpose, exploiting for immediate gain. What shall we "conquer" after space?
"I guess what I'm really asking is what do you have against Western thought?"
Besides the dogged persistence to always want to conquer some new thing for the holy grail of some undefined "progress", nothing really. But I'm sure I can always be assured of some knee jerks in the Slashdot crowd. (Sober introspection about our mad rush to develop and conquer? What you say?!)
"conquer space"
Oops, you have pushed my critique-of-western-thought button! What is it with "conquering" everything? We have to "conquer" the New World. We have to "conquer" nature. We have to "conquer" space.
"Einstein irrefutably proved that travelling faster than the speed of light is utterly impossible"
Well, it was a postulate that has been held up so far, but recent experiments throw inklings of doubt. Beware of absolutes. I don't think much in physics is "irrefutably proved".
"When the singularity comes, as predicted by Vernor Vinge, I shall be among the first to upload."
Yes, drink the kool aid...
It's unfortunate that the west is so fatalistic. I took a look into transhumanism and was at first intrigued, but then got disgusted with its arrogance, fatalism, and irresponsibility. I'm happy being just a plain ol' human. It's this urge to "conquer" to escape and be something else that leads us down all sorts of wrong paths in search of some mythical salvation. bleh