While this small victory is somewhat nice, it is quite too early to celebrate. It's a simple algorithm: take the number of emails produced by a spam-king, multiply by the number of possible suckers (gross profit), subtract the $500 per infraction of those willing to take the time and effort (net profit), and the result is well a very, very large pot minus a few pennies.
I would suggest taking a drug that fixes the infection rather than the symptoms. But I could be wrong.
It's unfortunate how naive you techies are: such sweet innocence. Good riddance to bad legislation, huh? Well here's the slashdot word of the day: rider. Can you say rider boys and girls?
Rider - An amendment, usually not germane, that it's sponsor hopes to get through more easily by including it in other legislation. Riders become laws if the bills they are attached to are enacted. The House, unlike the Senate, has strict germaneness rules, so riders are usually Senate devices to get legislation enacted quickly or to bypass possible opposition.
Legislation is usually mostly good with some bad, this was simply bad on it's own.
There's always a front-door
on
Storage Security
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
I've had this similar thinking before, because the information in and of itself is not important, from a technical perspective, it's the mechanism to access that needs to be secure. Hence, a SAN with a fibre-channel fabric would seem secure (a client needs an HBA card), but hook it up to a MS File server, SQL Server, or Oracle, and suddenly all the same exploits apply.
I would suggest it's not the type of nails used, it's the design of the front door. I could be wrong.
Peace, Out!
~Airrage;)
But does it work in Europe?
on
10 Techno-Cool Cars
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Frankly, all this concept from an industry severely lacking it in, seems, well contrived. Yet, I am drawn to a couple of the designs, and the fuel mileage on some is outstanding.
The problem is the pump (or the adapter) if you will. What we need to do is insure that any pump can supply and type of fuel seamlessly.
Reminds me of the Universal Adapter ad from IBM. Where the engineer is spouting all the things that can be integrated, and yet when asked 'Does it work in Europe?', he replies, 'You need an adapter for that'.
We typically accept this type of stuff in new technology -- serial was good for a long time -- but USB was good too. It allowed for one cord for many devices. It was hub in nature. We need to get the same thinking into the universal fuel pump so that these cars have a chance.
The car alone is risky, the infrastructure is even more so, I mean how much dark fiber is buried around the US?
Actually, Open Office, cannot do all the things office can do. The problem comes in where you define as what is Office? First, most think of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Access (Professional) as the standard office suite. But now, with the 2000 versions, include Project/Project Server, Visio, MapPoint, Frontpage, Publisher, and the list goes on and on.
Secondly, I think you mean to say that it can do everything MS can do considering the basic functionality I use. This is probably true with any productivity suite out there, since they all essentially do the same basic things.
However, if you take Excel for example, and have seen the myriad ways in which it is used, sometimes other packages have similar functionality, and often times it is completely unique to MS Office.
I can wear gloves and shorts like Mike Tyson and say, 'See I'm a boxer now, I'm sparring and jumping rope, I can do anything Mike can do.' Then Mike connects and you realize the difference.
The only place where things are probably similar is WORD, which boiled down could be replaced by just about anything, really.
You argument is good, except for the problems noted with #4, but otherwise you've made a good argument.
1. Martin Sheen, Barbra Streisand, Sean Penn and many other celebrities have voiced their opposition to a looming war with Iraq. Have their views had an influence on your own views on the war?
97.28% 1357 votes No
2.72% 38 votes Yes 2. Do you believe the celebrity anti-war movement has had an impact on the president or other politicians?
92.98% 1298 votes No
7.02% 98 votes Yes 3. Do you think it is appropriate for celebrities to publicly voice their views on the war?
58.17% 812 votes No
41.83% 584 votes Yes 4. Does a celebrity's decision to speak out against the war make you admire that person less or more or have no impact on how you view that celebrity?
67.41% 941 votes Admire less
22.99% 321 votes No impact
9.6% 134 votes Admire more
Total votes cast: 1396
To Summarize: Celebrities have no influence on me personally, my government in general, shouldn't voice their opinions anyway, and makes me lose what little respect I had for them in the first place.
Hoorah!
Why don't things evolve?
on
The Linux Uprising
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
THIS ARTICLE IS SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED TO BE VIEWED BY ADULTS AND THEREFORE MAY BE UNSUITABLE FOR CHILDREN UNDER 17. THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS ONE OR MORE OF THE FOLLOWING: PROVOKING THOUGHTS (PT), EXPLICIT SARCASM (ES), OR CRUDE INDECENT SPELLING (S).
Why don't things evolve?
I keep thinking about the space shuttle, and open-source, and Microsoft; also of tiny winged dinosaurs recently found in the Mongolian Highlands. All these controversies and discoveries start me thinking -- but mostly the dinosaurs. Why did those little dinosaurs sprout wings? What was the point? Don't they know that was a greater wind resistance drag, making it even harder to escape predators? Why did the space shuttle, built in 80's never upgrade? One could talk of the government and the fact that they never, ever, upgrade unless it's tanks or grenades. But the space shuttle, with it's aging tape-to-tape flight computers, and it's spray on foam insulation, and it's glued on tiles -- why evolve to serve this niche, then never evolve? Was it laziness, stupidity, or some perceived fecundity that we've reached the promised land?
I can feel there is a tipping-point here, some wisdom I'm about to understand, and yet it eludes me. Back to Microsoft. Why couldn't Novell evolve? Did they think that a different password for everything was better than one password to rule them all? Why continue to chew the prehistoric cud whilst the meteor streaks across the sky - moocow!. Now it's Microsoft, you might argue, that is starting to run a little slower, a little more gamely, who sees the big game cats bearing down in their proverbial rear view mirrors. Will they evolve? Can they evolve? What will they become?
And so open-source sits too at the precipice, but its penultimate creative spark blew apart at its evolution, splitting into various organisms wading the primordial ooze. Fascinating stuff: evolve now or later, but why not right at the beginning? Evolve on the starting line! It's a pretty awesome strain of thinking. Keep trying to get it right on the starting line -- holding back some DNA -- shooting off ideas that might work. Hyper, hyper-parasitosis. I believe it's the way of informational beings. Even WOPR decided that there might be a better way.
So why can't Microsoft evolve? I believe they can, but it must happen while, and before, the energy required to evolve is still greater than the remaining energy it has to sustain life. Can they evolve a hybrid, become open-source (you heard it here first!), jump from the abyss, sprout wings, and fly?
This was supposed to be an homage to becoming a moderator, and yet in hindsight, giving that it's a first post, and there is some thinly-veiled sexual references, I can honestly see how this was not well received.
"I was in the show once, best 21 days of my life. You know you don't carry your bags in the show? You hit white balls for batting practice, the stadiums are like cathedrals, and the women all have long legs and brains."
Recently, I was in the show. It wasn't a goal of mine to get to the show, it just happened, through luck or talent or both. It's not like you have a progress-bar to the show, to show how close or far you are. But one day, I showed up to read about ol' Ike, and there it was: 'you've been granted access to the show'.
Now, I'm not going to say I was Mr. Cool about it. It was a nice little surprise, so I read the link on how to act in the show and quickly went out and got stinking drunk, had sex, and woke up with an 85 year old woman. Yes, like that first grope in the back seat of Dad's Buick 88, I was spent before the bra was off. And so I sat, staring at my new wife -- with a tattoo I don't remember getting -- smoking a Kool Menthol asking, "Was it good for you too?" Naturally, my first experience in the show was a bust.
But that's the problem with the show, you know what to do technically, but you don't know the art of it. I endeavored to do a better job next time. But a better job at what? What exactly am I supposed to do? And that's what all the veterans know and all the rooks don't: the key is to influence the show.
Now I figured after such a spectacular flameout, I'd never get back to the show...
But then it happened again. And this time it was going to be different. I kept up with the flow, trying to route the conversation, looking for wicked turn-of-phrase, or a pun, or deep insight, and then I found it. Like Cap' Ahab, I said 'harpoon that som' bitch thar!' So I threw +1, and waited. And waited. And waited. And as the thundering herd came towards me I realized that the show would not turn for me, and I had a made a critical error. I was stampeded by pre-pubescent pimpled youngsters in Star Trek T-Shirts. I pulled myself from the muck to watch the thundering herd move farther and farther out of sight. I tried this again and again, to the same results. Needless to say, I ended up in the same seedy motel, waking and rolling to the same sight. I relit a used Kool and took a deep drag. My ass hurt and I had a sinking suspicion that my other buttocks said 'boat' which would have delighted the tattoo artist no end to finish his partially completed 'love'. I dared not look.
I had become the Gary Coleman of the show. I was starting to learn Spanish or French or whatever language is appropriate to disappear to the fringes of civilization. And disappear I did.
Arthur C. Clarke said all things come in threes, it's the way of the universe, ultimate karma, triple redundancy I think. And as the old man predicted, the random seed generator came up with my social, and beyond belief, it was time for a comeback to the show.
This time would be different, really. This time I would commit. The third base coach is telling me take a pitch, but I'm digging in for a big cut. That's what I didn't realize before: you have to commit. You have to go all in. You have to be willing to risk all in one swing in the show; you have to bend steel with your mind. The next Shakespeare or Dickens or Simmons is out there, and I'm going to find them, so I set the filter to -1 Uncut and Raw and step into the light...
Right on the money. I'm sorry, but if you don't shower and wear Pokemon t-shirts, you are going to be intimate with the inner workings of public toiletry.
To all you high-schoolers reading this: use basic grooming standards! (do not use your friends as a standard).
I don't care who your girlfriend is, getting her a mouse pad for Valentine's Day, or any other affectionate-laden holiday is a bad, bad, idea. And when I mean bad, I mean real wrath of God type stuff: fire and brimstone coming down from the skies, rivers and sea's boiling, 40 years of darkness, earthquakes, volcanoes, the dead rising from the grave, human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria!
In texas, to successfully protect your privacy, you need to register with the texas do-not-call (dnc) list costing about five dollars per year. Next, on the national level, you need to opt-out (for life) from all credit-card offers, mass solicitations, etc, by registering with the four credit bureaus. There is a 1-800 number for this somewhere. Next, you need to send a similar form letter to the National Advertisers Organization opting out as well (more information can be found through research).
It's so good to see this coming through. But it's also about technology and where we draw the line on privacy. The Euros, for all their failings, got this right, they're system is starts with the customer in opt-out mode, whereas we are all opt-in, thus the thousand letters from Visa.
The marketers, from the article, and other things I've read, talk about cost. This is, well bullshit. Yes, it will cost them more, on a relative basis, because their samples are based on a two-percent acceptance rate BY SENDING EVERY US CITIZEN A FLYER! But what if you could identify those people who really did want information, then there is no wasted paper, or time, or energy. That's less money! I'm sure someone, somewhere needs a free carpet-cleaning estimate and ten dollars off their next pizza, but it ain't me.
Will it cost jobs? Yes, telemarketer jobs. But the reason those jobs are so prevalent is because you have to call EVERY CITIZEN IN THE UNITED STATES. Yes, those jobs will right-size, but you are assured that those person are talking to people who are interested. Does it all make sense now? I hate when people make stupid arguments that defy common sense and macroeconomics.
You are preaching to the choir. We need to have a beer and figure out what to do. I quit once (and I'm not a irrational person) and spent two months traveling in New Zealand, best damn time of my life. I think about that often. I would add the following to your list:
+ Sick fantasy of your wife dying (but not because I want here harmed or dead) so that you get the life insurance. Pay off the house, travel. + Thinking about doing something besides computer shit, like a hobby or something, but end up playing games on the computer, email on the computer, etc. + Realized that college was a lot more fun than I realized at the time, you got to learn new things, sex, drink beer, and somehow 2 hours of sleep was enough!
THIS ARTICLE IS SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED TO BE VIEWED BY ADULTS AND THEREFORE MAY BE UNSUITABLE FOR CHILDREN UNDER 17. THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS ONE OR MORE OF THE FOLLOWING: PROVOKING THOUGHTS (PT), EXPLICIT SARCASM (ES), OR CRUDE INDECENT SPELLING (S).
Why don't things evolve?
I keep thinking about the space shuttle, and open-source, and Microsoft; also of tiny winged dinosaurs recently found in the Mongolian Highlands. All these controversies and discoveries start me thinking -- but mostly the dinosaurs. Why did those little dinosaurs sprout wings? What was the point? Don't they know that was a greater wind resistance drag, making it even harder to escape predators? Why did the space shuttle, built in 80's never upgrade? One could talk of the government and the fact that they never, ever, upgrade unless it's tanks or grenades. But the space shuttle, with it's aging tape-to-tape flight computers, and it's spray on foam insulation, and it's glued on tiles -- why evolve to serve this niche, then never evolve? Was it laziness, stupidity, or some perceived fecundity that we've reached the promised land?
I can feel there is a tipping-point here, some wisdom I'm about to understand, and yet it eludes me. Back to Microsoft. Why couldn't Novell evolve? Did they think that a different password for everything was better than one password to rule them all? Why continue to chew the prehistoric cud whilst the meteor streaks across the sky - moocow!. Now it's Microsoft, you might argue, that is starting to run a little slower, a little more gamely, who sees the big game cats bearing down in their proverbial rear view mirrors. Will they evolve? Can they evolve? What will they become?
And so open-source sits too at the precipice, but its penultimate creative spark blew apart at its evolution, splitting into various organisms wading the primordial ooze. Fascinating stuff: evolve now or later, but why not right at the beginning? Evolve on the starting line! It's a pretty awesome strain of thinking. Keep trying to get it right on the starting line -- holding back some DNA -- shooting off ideas that might work. Hyper, hyper-parasitosis. I believe it's the way of informational beings. Even WOPR decided that there might be a better way.
So why can't Microsoft evolve? I believe they can, but it must happen while, and before, the energy required to evolve is still greater than the remaining energy it has to sustain life. Can they evolve a hybrid, become open-source (you heard it here first!), jump from the abyss, sprout wings, and fly?
"Confusingly enough, this software is produced by a company called (Veridis), and doesn't say PGP on the box, because legally it can't. Network Associates, which acquired PGP Inc. in 1997, still holds the rights to that name..."
I'm sure PGP is important, but I can't remember what the acronym stands for --don't drift, don't drift off, focus buddy you can hang in there...
"...when NAI spun off PGP to PGP Corporation in 2002, they held onto the command-line version. OpenPGP, for whom Zimmermann serves as a technical advisor (as well as a reseller),..."
Almost five, it's about time to pack up and leave here, I wonder what's on TV tonight, probably nothing, Friday night blows. Need to get Road to Rome, but the flunky at Best Buy, who doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground, said they're getting another shipment today, so probably need to go by there after work...maybe pick up mgs2 for xbox while I'm at it. mmmm xbox....
"...is contractually unable to sell a command-line version. (He is on the board of Veridis as well.) But why introduce a text-only version of utility software, anyway, when the GUI-fied desktop version has been maturing for years and costs less?
"actually, if I send Bill Lumberg my tps reports now.. maybe I can sneak out past Milton...
Monopolies are always a bad idea? Hmmmm, that get's me to thinking:
a) Do you have a monopoly on your wife? b) What if the South had won the Civil War? We'd have an oligopoly of 50, instead of a monopoly of one. c) The government has a monopoly on money, you can't create your own, and yet you continue to spend it, without cause or care.
Monopolies have a place, history has shown, as government took over industries to provide the basic infrastructure until such time as they could be privatized. I'm sure others could think of more examples you live with everyday that constitutes to your high standard of living...
But at least one expert -- Richard Doherty, a consulting engineer who did research for a member of the commission that investigated the Challenger explosion -- questioned whether the computers onboard the Columbia had all the information they needed. After tiles were damaged on takeoff, Mr. Doherty said, NASA could have sent up a few changes in the software guidance program to adjust for increased drag on the left side of the craft.
The computer did compensate for drag on the left side -- but at some point physics catches up with you -- and it simply burns up. The shuttle basically flys the stall all the way down, it's not like they can "pitch for power - throttle for altitude". This person is an idiot.
I've always wondered about the credit checks. I mean they really can't ask you about religion, or your age, or your ethnicity (other than what they can see). But I've always felt a credit check was a way to get around that? Can't they see all the things I've bought and deduce a lifestyle and ergo deduce a profile of me?
Case in point (all transactions on my credit card):
a) monthly auto pay to Church of Latter Day Saints, deduction: probably a very moral person who wouldn't let us get away with our funny accounting. b) two large charges to 'The Gold Cups Gentlemens Club', deduction: probably a sex fiend and we are definitely staving off a sexual harrassment claim. c) several purchases from Last-Stand Guns 'n Ammo a dealer of surplus Army weapons, deduction: guy is a white supremecist looking for a corporation to target. d) monthly auto-pay to 'feed the children', deduction: guy is a sucker and is easily influenced by marketing.
Reminds me of the article with the Tivo making assumptions based on what you watch.
Final point: dude, in this economy with tech folks out of work, there are plenty of folks willing to subject to all sorts of humiliation for your job, so don't stand there and bitch about something so trivial. At least you get to eat tonight.
I've love the simpsons mostly due in part to their use of literary allusions, pop-culture, and stereotypes. But probably the funniest episode was the one where Troy McClure, aka Phil Hartman, explains the food chain, which shows a Shark jumping out of the water and eating a Gorilla hanging from a tree. Nearly peed my pants.
I think all you need to get peroxide is some baking soda, baby shampoo, and some yellow #5. I saw this on the discovery channel. Can't believe JC doesn't have the info on that one.
I cannot keep solving all your problems, people, seriously I've got better things to do. Now, where should it rain tommorrow...;)
THIS ARTICLE IS SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED TO BE VIEWED BY ADULTS AND THEREFORE MAY BE UNSUITABLE FOR CHILDREN UNDER 17. THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS ONE OR MORE OF THE FOLLOWING: PROVOKING THOUGHTS (PT), EXPLICIT SARCASM (ES), OR CRUDE INDECENT SPELLING (S).
Do you make your own clothes?
In response to a recent comment of mine, a reader responded with the following: "as long as it is open source, and I have the code". And for the first time, I really understood what he was saying. I mean I had read this comment in one form or another all through slashdot for years, but had never, ever, really understood the underlying context.
I asked myself, why this fervent clutch on free, open, uncompiled software? I mean do you make your own clothes? Obviously, no matter where you shop, it's much cheaper to make your own clothes (excluding your time, which open source doesn't take into account anyway), so who here makes their own clothes? I certainly don't. Who here built their own car? Cars are definitely closed. It would definitely be cheaper to build your own, because labor is 60% of a car, remove marketing, factory costs, overhead, you could build probably a nice car for a few thousand dollars. Has anyone constructed their own car? We, as a society, accept closed source in 99.999 percent of our lives: drugs (the legal kind), mail, electricity, phone, highways, pornography (bad example).
But the point, my dear brother, is that we keep getting pushed back by the tide of commercialism shoved down our throats. We stand, naked, on the beach in a fierce winter rain, sleeting, and we shake an angry fist. That's the point of open source: "as long as I have the code". Damn right. So we grit our proverbial teeth, and shivering, we slowly take the heel of our foot and draw a line in the sand. We get on all fours, hunkered against the wind, like some Gollum clawing the earth, and make our way forward. Our anger keeps us warm. I'll listen to the music you choose, I'll take your word on what I should view, I'll read only your approved books, I'll pay double, I'll watch all the commercials, I'll carefully listen to all telemarketers, I'll read spam, but I will not, under any circumstances, give up the code which talks to my mouse.
So why stand firm on open source? I don't believe it's because of some great ideal set forth in the constitution. I don't believe because it's any better, really, than closed systems. I do believe, and I hope I get it right here, is that it's because we've had enough and it's the last vine in the jungle. Because maybe, just maybe, a struggle means there is hope. And hope is a good thing. Maybe it's the hope that someday I could design my own car, or house, or remove the need for a phone, or create my own expressions of art, business, passion, and provide some modicum of balance and power, but only "as long as I have the code". Fuckn'a right.
I have read the article, seen the comments, and have decided that releasing this movie around other blockbusters is probably a good thing. To wit, to suggest somehow, that just because a huge movie arrives, somehow that squeezes out another movie is absurb. When I go shopping for a shirt I may buy several: a button-down dress-shirt, a shortsleeved polo, a pack of undershirts, and a pullover. Does the purchase of one shirt preclude the buying of another...common sense says no. So the 'released around the two-towers' argument doesn't hold water.
Secondly, I think deep-winter is a great time to release a movie. People are in the mood to spend some time watching a flick and staying warm. If you want to sell Christmas trees, you'd better sell them near Christmas.
The only argument for this, or any, movie doing poorly is the trailer. (Stand on soap box). I really only have two information points when making a choice on seeing a movie these days: the trailer, which is becoming more and more like reading the first ten chapters of a book, and what other people say. If I'm watching Bond, or two-towers, and I see the Star Trek trailer, it should get me excited. But this one, alas, did not. I'm not a must-go-see Star Trek fan, but if it looks good (rescuing humpback whales), then I go see; plain and simple. When I saw the trailer, you can just tell it's going to suck, and suck hard (the part about running dune-buggies over the desert made me laugh -- why are they still using rubber wheels in the future?). As for what other people say -- well, it's Star Trek, whose opinion can you trust there?
Slashdot Mirror
Gentlemen,
While this small victory is somewhat nice, it is quite too early to celebrate. It's a simple algorithm: take the number of emails produced by a spam-king, multiply by the number of possible suckers (gross profit), subtract the $500 per infraction of those willing to take the time and effort (net profit), and the result is well a very, very large pot minus a few pennies.
I would suggest taking a drug that fixes the infection rather than the symptoms. But I could be wrong.
Peace out
It's unfortunate how naive you techies are: such sweet innocence. Good riddance to bad legislation, huh? Well here's the slashdot word of the day: rider. Can you say rider boys and girls?
Rider - An amendment, usually not germane, that it's sponsor hopes to get through more easily by including it in other legislation. Riders become laws if the bills they are attached to are enacted. The House, unlike the Senate, has strict germaneness rules, so riders are usually Senate devices to get legislation enacted quickly or to bypass possible opposition.
Legislation is usually mostly good with some bad, this was simply bad on it's own.
I've had this similar thinking before, because the information in and of itself is not important, from a technical perspective, it's the mechanism to access that needs to be secure. Hence, a SAN with a fibre-channel fabric would seem secure (a client needs an HBA card), but hook it up to a MS File server, SQL Server, or Oracle, and suddenly all the same exploits apply.
;)
I would suggest it's not the type of nails used, it's the design of the front door. I could be wrong.
Peace, Out!
~Airrage
Frankly, all this concept from an industry severely lacking it in, seems, well contrived. Yet, I am drawn to a couple of the designs, and the fuel mileage on some is outstanding.
The problem is the pump (or the adapter) if you will. What we need to do is insure that any pump can supply and type of fuel seamlessly.
Reminds me of the Universal Adapter ad from IBM. Where the engineer is spouting all the things that can be integrated, and yet when asked 'Does it work in Europe?', he replies, 'You need an adapter for that'.
We typically accept this type of stuff in new technology -- serial was good for a long time -- but USB was good too. It allowed for one cord for many devices. It was hub in nature. We need to get the same thinking into the universal fuel pump so that these cars have a chance.
The car alone is risky, the infrastructure is even more so, I mean how much dark fiber is buried around the US?
Actually, Open Office, cannot do all the things office can do. The problem comes in where you define as what is Office? First, most think of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Access (Professional) as the standard office suite. But now, with the 2000 versions, include Project/Project Server, Visio, MapPoint, Frontpage, Publisher, and the list goes on and on.
Secondly, I think you mean to say that it can do everything MS can do considering the basic functionality I use. This is probably true with any productivity suite out there, since they all essentially do the same basic things.
However, if you take Excel for example, and have seen the myriad ways in which it is used, sometimes other packages have similar functionality, and often times it is completely unique to MS Office.
I can wear gloves and shorts like Mike Tyson and say, 'See I'm a boxer now, I'm sparring and jumping rope, I can do anything Mike can do.' Then Mike connects and you realize the difference.
The only place where things are probably similar is WORD, which boiled down could be replaced by just about anything, really.
You argument is good, except for the problems noted with #4, but otherwise you've made a good argument.
Survey results
1. Martin Sheen, Barbra Streisand, Sean Penn and many other celebrities have voiced their opposition to a looming war with Iraq. Have their views had an influence on your own views on the war?
97.28% 1357 votes No
2.72% 38 votes Yes
2. Do you believe the celebrity anti-war movement has had an impact on the president or other politicians?
92.98% 1298 votes No
7.02% 98 votes Yes
3. Do you think it is appropriate for celebrities to publicly voice their views on the war?
58.17% 812 votes No
41.83% 584 votes Yes
4. Does a celebrity's decision to speak out against the war make you admire that person less or more or have no impact on how you view that celebrity?
67.41% 941 votes Admire less
22.99% 321 votes No impact
9.6% 134 votes Admire more
Total votes cast: 1396
To Summarize: Celebrities have no influence on me personally, my government in general, shouldn't voice their opinions anyway, and makes me lose what little respect I had for them in the first place.
Hoorah!
THIS ARTICLE IS SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED TO BE VIEWED BY ADULTS AND THEREFORE MAY BE UNSUITABLE FOR CHILDREN UNDER 17. THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS ONE OR MORE OF THE FOLLOWING: PROVOKING THOUGHTS (PT), EXPLICIT SARCASM (ES), OR CRUDE INDECENT SPELLING (S).
Why don't things evolve?
I keep thinking about the space shuttle, and open-source, and Microsoft; also of tiny winged dinosaurs recently found in the Mongolian Highlands. All these controversies and discoveries start me thinking -- but mostly the dinosaurs. Why did those little dinosaurs sprout wings? What was the point? Don't they know that was a greater wind resistance drag, making it even harder to escape predators? Why did the space shuttle, built in 80's never upgrade? One could talk of the government and the fact that they never, ever, upgrade unless it's tanks or grenades. But the space shuttle, with it's aging tape-to-tape flight computers, and it's spray on foam insulation, and it's glued on tiles -- why evolve to serve this niche, then never evolve? Was it laziness, stupidity, or some perceived fecundity that we've reached the promised land?
I can feel there is a tipping-point here, some wisdom I'm about to understand, and yet it eludes me. Back to Microsoft. Why couldn't Novell evolve? Did they think that a different password for everything was better than one password to rule them all? Why continue to chew the prehistoric cud whilst the meteor streaks across the sky - moocow!. Now it's Microsoft, you might argue, that is starting to run a little slower, a little more gamely, who sees the big game cats bearing down in their proverbial rear view mirrors. Will they evolve? Can they evolve? What will they become?
And so open-source sits too at the precipice, but its penultimate creative spark blew apart at its evolution, splitting into various organisms wading the primordial ooze. Fascinating stuff: evolve now or later, but why not right at the beginning? Evolve on the starting line! It's a pretty awesome strain of thinking. Keep trying to get it right on the starting line -- holding back some DNA -- shooting off ideas that might work. Hyper, hyper-parasitosis. I believe it's the way of informational beings. Even WOPR decided that there might be a better way.
So why can't Microsoft evolve? I believe they can, but it must happen while, and before, the energy required to evolve is still greater than the remaining energy it has to sustain life. Can they evolve a hybrid, become open-source (you heard it here first!), jump from the abyss, sprout wings, and fly?
This was supposed to be an homage to becoming a moderator, and yet in hindsight, giving that it's a first post, and there is some thinly-veiled sexual references, I can honestly see how this was not well received.
~Airrage.
"I was in the show once, best 21 days of my life. You know you don't carry your bags in the show? You hit white balls for batting practice, the stadiums are like cathedrals, and the women all have long legs and brains."
Recently, I was in the show. It wasn't a goal of mine to get to the show, it just happened, through luck or talent or both. It's not like you have a progress-bar to the show, to show how close or far you are. But one day, I showed up to read about ol' Ike, and there it was: 'you've been granted access to the show'.
Now, I'm not going to say I was Mr. Cool about it. It was a nice little surprise, so I read the link on how to act in the show and quickly went out and got stinking drunk, had sex, and woke up with an 85 year old woman. Yes, like that first grope in the back seat of Dad's Buick 88, I was spent before the bra was off. And so I sat, staring at my new wife -- with a tattoo I don't remember getting -- smoking a Kool Menthol asking, "Was it good for you too?" Naturally, my first experience in the show was a bust.
But that's the problem with the show, you know what to do technically, but you don't know the art of it. I endeavored to do a better job next time. But a better job at what? What exactly am I supposed to do? And that's what all the veterans know and all the rooks don't: the key is to influence the show.
Now I figured after such a spectacular flameout, I'd never get back to the show...
But then it happened again. And this time it was going to be different. I kept up with the flow, trying to route the conversation, looking for wicked turn-of-phrase, or a pun, or deep insight, and then I found it. Like Cap' Ahab, I said 'harpoon that som' bitch thar!' So I threw +1, and waited. And waited. And waited. And as the thundering herd came towards me I realized that the show would not turn for me, and I had a made a critical error. I was stampeded by pre-pubescent pimpled youngsters in Star Trek T-Shirts. I pulled myself from the muck to watch the thundering herd move farther and farther out of sight. I tried this again and again, to the same results. Needless to say, I ended up in the same seedy motel, waking and rolling to the same sight. I relit a used Kool and took a deep drag. My ass hurt and I had a sinking suspicion that my other buttocks said 'boat' which would have delighted the tattoo artist no end to finish his partially completed 'love'. I dared not look.
I had become the Gary Coleman of the show. I was starting to learn Spanish or French or whatever language is appropriate to disappear to the fringes of civilization. And disappear I did.
Arthur C. Clarke said all things come in threes, it's the way of the universe, ultimate karma, triple redundancy I think. And as the old man predicted, the random seed generator came up with my social, and beyond belief, it was time for a comeback to the show.
This time would be different, really. This time I would commit. The third base coach is telling me take a pitch, but I'm digging in for a big cut. That's what I didn't realize before: you have to commit. You have to go all in. You have to be willing to risk all in one swing in the show; you have to bend steel with your mind. The next Shakespeare or Dickens or Simmons is out there, and I'm going to find them, so I set the filter to -1 Uncut and Raw and step into the light...
Right on the money. I'm sorry, but if you don't shower and wear Pokemon t-shirts, you are going to be intimate with the inner workings of public toiletry.
To all you high-schoolers reading this: use basic grooming standards! (do not use your friends as a standard).
I don't care who your girlfriend is, getting her a mouse pad for Valentine's Day, or any other affectionate-laden holiday is a bad, bad, idea. And when I mean bad, I mean real wrath of God type stuff: fire and brimstone coming down from the skies, rivers and sea's boiling, 40 years of darkness, earthquakes, volcanoes, the dead rising from the grave, human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria!
So gentlemen, buy flowers, keep your balls.
In texas, to successfully protect your privacy, you need to register with the texas do-not-call (dnc) list costing about five dollars per year. Next, on the national level, you need to opt-out (for life) from all credit-card offers, mass solicitations, etc, by registering with the four credit bureaus. There is a 1-800 number for this somewhere. Next, you need to send a similar form letter to the National Advertisers Organization opting out as well (more information can be found through research).
It's so good to see this coming through. But it's also about technology and where we draw the line on privacy. The Euros, for all their failings, got this right, they're system is starts with the customer in opt-out mode, whereas we are all opt-in, thus the thousand letters from Visa.
The marketers, from the article, and other things I've read, talk about cost. This is, well bullshit. Yes, it will cost them more, on a relative basis, because their samples are based on a two-percent acceptance rate BY SENDING EVERY US CITIZEN A FLYER! But what if you could identify those people who really did want information, then there is no wasted paper, or time, or energy. That's less money! I'm sure someone, somewhere needs a free carpet-cleaning estimate and ten dollars off their next pizza, but it ain't me.
Will it cost jobs? Yes, telemarketer jobs. But the reason those jobs are so prevalent is because you have to call EVERY CITIZEN IN THE UNITED STATES. Yes, those jobs will right-size, but you are assured that those person are talking to people who are interested. Does it all make sense now? I hate when people make stupid arguments that defy common sense and macroeconomics.
"...13.7 billion years old, flat, 4.4% baryons, 22% dark matter and 73% dark energy."
This just sings to me, I think this could be the new "all your base are belong to us." or something of that nature. Quite nice.
You are preaching to the choir. We need to have a beer and figure out what to do. I quit once (and I'm not a irrational person) and spent two months traveling in New Zealand, best damn time of my life. I think about that often.
I would add the following to your list:
+ Sick fantasy of your wife dying (but not because I want here harmed or dead) so that you get the life insurance. Pay off the house, travel.
+ Thinking about doing something besides computer shit, like a hobby or something, but end up playing games on the computer, email on the computer, etc.
+ Realized that college was a lot more fun than I realized at the time, you got to learn new things, sex, drink beer, and somehow 2 hours of sleep was enough!
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Why don't things evolve?
I keep thinking about the space shuttle, and open-source, and Microsoft; also of tiny winged dinosaurs recently found in the Mongolian Highlands. All these controversies and discoveries start me thinking -- but mostly the dinosaurs. Why did those little dinosaurs sprout wings? What was the point? Don't they know that was a greater wind resistance drag, making it even harder to escape predators? Why did the space shuttle, built in 80's never upgrade? One could talk of the government and the fact that they never, ever, upgrade unless it's tanks or grenades. But the space shuttle, with it's aging tape-to-tape flight computers, and it's spray on foam insulation, and it's glued on tiles -- why evolve to serve this niche, then never evolve? Was it laziness, stupidity, or some perceived fecundity that we've reached the promised land?
I can feel there is a tipping-point here, some wisdom I'm about to understand, and yet it eludes me. Back to Microsoft. Why couldn't Novell evolve? Did they think that a different password for everything was better than one password to rule them all? Why continue to chew the prehistoric cud whilst the meteor streaks across the sky - moocow!. Now it's Microsoft, you might argue, that is starting to run a little slower, a little more gamely, who sees the big game cats bearing down in their proverbial rear view mirrors. Will they evolve? Can they evolve? What will they become?
And so open-source sits too at the precipice, but its penultimate creative spark blew apart at its evolution, splitting into various organisms wading the primordial ooze. Fascinating stuff: evolve now or later, but why not right at the beginning? Evolve on the starting line! It's a pretty awesome strain of thinking. Keep trying to get it right on the starting line -- holding back some DNA -- shooting off ideas that might work. Hyper, hyper-parasitosis. I believe it's the way of informational beings. Even WOPR decided that there might be a better way.
So why can't Microsoft evolve? I believe they can, but it must happen while, and before, the energy required to evolve is still greater than the remaining energy it has to sustain life. Can they evolve a hybrid, become open-source (you heard it here first!), jump from the abyss, sprout wings, and fly?
"Confusingly enough, this software is produced by a company called (Veridis), and doesn't say PGP on the box, because legally it can't. Network Associates, which acquired PGP Inc. in 1997, still holds the rights to that name..."
.. maybe I can sneak out past Milton...
I'm sure PGP is important, but I can't remember what the acronym stands for --don't drift, don't drift off, focus buddy you can hang in there...
"...when NAI spun off PGP to PGP Corporation in 2002, they held onto the command-line version. OpenPGP, for whom Zimmermann serves as a technical advisor (as well as a reseller),..."
Almost five, it's about time to pack up and leave here, I wonder what's on TV tonight, probably nothing, Friday night blows. Need to get Road to Rome, but the flunky at Best Buy, who doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground, said they're getting another shipment today, so probably need to go by there after work...maybe pick up mgs2 for xbox while I'm at it. mmmm xbox....
"...is contractually unable to sell a command-line version. (He is on the board of Veridis as well.) But why introduce a text-only version of utility software, anyway, when the GUI-fied desktop version has been maturing for years and costs less?
"actually, if I send Bill Lumberg my tps reports now
Monopolies are always a bad idea? Hmmmm, that get's me to thinking:
a) Do you have a monopoly on your wife?
b) What if the South had won the Civil War? We'd have an oligopoly of 50, instead of a monopoly of one.
c) The government has a monopoly on money, you can't create your own, and yet you continue to spend it, without cause or care.
Monopolies have a place, history has shown, as government took over industries to provide the basic infrastructure until such time as they could be privatized. I'm sure others could think of more examples you live with everyday that constitutes to your high standard of living...
But at least one expert -- Richard Doherty, a consulting engineer who did research for a member of the commission that investigated the Challenger explosion -- questioned whether the computers onboard the Columbia had all the information they needed. After tiles were damaged on takeoff, Mr. Doherty said, NASA could have sent up a few changes in the software guidance program to adjust for increased drag on the left side of the craft.
The computer did compensate for drag on the left side -- but at some point physics catches up with you -- and it simply burns up. The shuttle basically flys the stall all the way down, it's not like they can "pitch for power - throttle for altitude". This person is an idiot.I've always wondered about the credit checks. I mean they really can't ask you about religion, or your age, or your ethnicity (other than what they can see). But I've always felt a credit check was a way to get around that? Can't they see all the things I've bought and deduce a lifestyle and ergo deduce a profile of me?
Case in point (all transactions on my credit card):
a) monthly auto pay to Church of Latter Day Saints, deduction: probably a very moral person who wouldn't let us get away with our funny accounting.
b) two large charges to 'The Gold Cups Gentlemens Club', deduction: probably a sex fiend and we are definitely staving off a sexual harrassment claim.
c) several purchases from Last-Stand Guns 'n Ammo a dealer of surplus Army weapons, deduction: guy is a white supremecist looking for a corporation to target.
d) monthly auto-pay to 'feed the children', deduction: guy is a sucker and is easily influenced by marketing.
Reminds me of the article with the Tivo making assumptions based on what you watch.
Final point: dude, in this economy with tech folks out of work, there are plenty of folks willing to subject to all sorts of humiliation for your job, so don't stand there and bitch about something so trivial. At least you get to eat tonight.
Laters,
Airrage
I've love the simpsons mostly due in part to their use of literary allusions, pop-culture, and stereotypes. But probably the funniest episode was the one where Troy McClure, aka Phil Hartman, explains the food chain, which shows a Shark jumping out of the water and eating a Gorilla hanging from a tree. Nearly peed my pants.
I think all you need to get peroxide is some baking soda, baby shampoo, and some yellow #5. I saw this on the discovery channel. Can't believe JC doesn't have the info on that one.
;)
I cannot keep solving all your problems, people, seriously I've got better things to do. Now, where should it rain tommorrow...
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Do you make your own clothes?
In response to a recent comment of mine, a reader responded with the following: "as long as it is open source, and I have the code". And for the first time, I really understood what he was saying. I mean I had read this comment in one form or another all through slashdot for years, but had never, ever, really understood the underlying context.
I asked myself, why this fervent clutch on free, open, uncompiled software? I mean do you make your own clothes? Obviously, no matter where you shop, it's much cheaper to make your own clothes (excluding your time, which open source doesn't take into account anyway), so who here makes their own clothes? I certainly don't. Who here built their own car? Cars are definitely closed. It would definitely be cheaper to build your own, because labor is 60% of a car, remove marketing, factory costs, overhead, you could build probably a nice car for a few thousand dollars. Has anyone constructed their own car? We, as a society, accept closed source in 99.999 percent of our lives: drugs (the legal kind), mail, electricity, phone, highways, pornography (bad example).
But the point, my dear brother, is that we keep getting pushed back by the tide of commercialism shoved down our throats. We stand, naked, on the beach in a fierce winter rain, sleeting, and we shake an angry fist. That's the point of open source: "as long as I have the code". Damn right. So we grit our proverbial teeth, and shivering, we slowly take the heel of our foot and draw a line in the sand. We get on all fours, hunkered against the wind, like some Gollum clawing the earth, and make our way forward. Our anger keeps us warm. I'll listen to the music you choose, I'll take your word on what I should view, I'll read only your approved books, I'll pay double, I'll watch all the commercials, I'll carefully listen to all telemarketers, I'll read spam, but I will not, under any circumstances, give up the code which talks to my mouse.
So why stand firm on open source? I don't believe it's because of some great ideal set forth in the constitution. I don't believe because it's any better, really, than closed systems. I do believe, and I hope I get it right here, is that it's because we've had enough and it's the last vine in the jungle. Because maybe, just maybe, a struggle means there is hope. And hope is a good thing. Maybe it's the hope that someday I could design my own car, or house, or remove the need for a phone, or create my own expressions of art, business, passion, and provide some modicum of balance and power, but only "as long as I have the code". Fuckn'a right.
I have read the article, seen the comments, and have decided that releasing this movie around other blockbusters is probably a good thing. To wit, to suggest somehow, that just because a huge movie arrives, somehow that squeezes out another movie is absurb. When I go shopping for a shirt I may buy several: a button-down dress-shirt, a shortsleeved polo, a pack of undershirts, and a pullover. Does the purchase of one shirt preclude the buying of another...common sense says no. So the 'released around the two-towers' argument doesn't hold water.
Secondly, I think deep-winter is a great time to release a movie. People are in the mood to spend some time watching a flick and staying warm. If you want to sell Christmas trees, you'd better sell them near Christmas.
The only argument for this, or any, movie doing poorly is the trailer. (Stand on soap box). I really only have two information points when making a choice on seeing a movie these days: the trailer, which is becoming more and more like reading the first ten chapters of a book, and what other people say. If I'm watching Bond, or two-towers, and I see the Star Trek trailer, it should get me excited. But this one, alas, did not. I'm not a must-go-see Star Trek fan, but if it looks good (rescuing humpback whales), then I go see; plain and simple. When I saw the trailer, you can just tell it's going to suck, and suck hard (the part about running dune-buggies over the desert made me laugh -- why are they still using rubber wheels in the future?). As for what other people say -- well, it's Star Trek, whose opinion can you trust there?
Yeah, there's a booth for house-elves who aren't allowed to wear clothes....
Dive, dive, dive...we're being flooded!