Really: when it comes to deciding what to do with 3% of your income, don't you want YOU making that decision, instead of total strangers you don't know and who know you less and who are operating on non-sequitor ulterior motives?
I won't get to make those decisions, you probably won't either, and the same goes for the vast majority of people here on/. And in the current business model, if an investment doesn't pay off in 2 to 5 years, it's not worth investing in. Which means that pure research, the stuff that needs to get done for truly innovative technologies to become practical, or even possible, won't get done. Now go read all the other posts that mention all the cool things government research has led to.
Universal healthcare is a boon for capitalism. Calling it socialist is incredibly short sighted by unimaginative people looking for political gain.
This dovetails nicely with my overall opinion on the matter. A healthy society is a benefit for everyone. Once people get above a certain level of health, they start worrying about less important things, like making piles of cash, expressing their creative urges, trying new things. And these are the things that make society worthwhile. Of course, in most of the world except the US, calling it socialist (which it is) isn't enough to get it ridiculed out of hand.
The difference is, some things can be adequately described without QM. What they're saying is, photosynthesis can't. I can explain plenty of things in Newtonian physics, some more in General Relativity. It's kind of like when they discovered how flies fly a few years back. Sure, we knew they could fly, we even knew a great deal about the mechanics involved. But to really figure it out, they had to do some serious testing. What they learned is that flies use 3 different techniques to generate lift, in every flap of their wings. That's what was new in that particular study. Greater understanding comes one step at a time. Given what we know now, perhaps we can build better devices to harness light energy. Or perhaps it will take us in a brand new direction. We'll see.
Would I be worried? Sure. Would I automatically assume 9/11, Part II? No. Would I immediately tune into my local news radio/TV? You bet. Rational response to the unknown, rather than the panicked assumption of the unlikely.
And this is where you have to decide if you're going to pull up your pants and do something or cower in fear. The reason 9/11 happened isn't because of the bravery of skill or cleverness of the hijackers, it's because of the institutionalized cowardice we've mandated in most 'civilized' countries in response to this. "Just do what they say, keep your head down, and let the professionals take care of it." The only thing that really changed after 9/11 was that we saw that perhaps the authorities won't get there in time, and maybe, just maybe, you can't trust hostage-takers for your welfare. This institutionalized cowardice shows itself in other ways. People who refuse to fly after 9/11, even though it's arguably safer than before. Not because of the new 'security' measures, but because people know that if the hijackers succeed there's a good chance they'll all die, and so they'll do whatever it takes to keep that from happening. And of course the terrorists know that, and plane hijackings just aren't in vogue anymore. Another way this institutionalized cowardice shows is people who just don't have the balls to say to themselves and their neighbours, their fellow hostages, "There's only one of him, only 9 (or 15 or 30) bullets in that gun, and if we storm him he won't be able to reload. Sure, one or more of us could die, but we aren't going to sit back and let fear and the threat of violence rule our lives." Of course, bravery and stupidity can be easily mistaken. No sense rushing a squad of guys carrying automatics, but a single guy with a semi-auto pistol? That's not an unreasonable goal for 5 or 10 determined individuals. A few guys with box cutters? Why would you even wait?
Why build robots when you can just convert people into them? Plenty of companies would be quite happy for their drones to just be entirely focused and not too creative. After all, a lot of jobs don't require much creativity at all. There was a story about this, about an implant or somesuch that allowed people to go on autopilot during boring parts of their lives. The implant would make them do the task at hand in a very consistent manner while the person would have the experience of dreaming. Of course, they threw in some negative side-effects, and the whole idea was scrapped. The interesting part was, while most people would go on auto-pilot at work, the main character would be alert at work and go on autopilot at home. And of course, Lewis Carroll was speculated to be taking drugs when he wrote Alice in Wonderland. I wouldn't be surprised. I guess what I'm getting at is, some jobs require creativity, a lot don't, and taking drugs to enhance your work capabilities is going to look pretty attractive to some people, especially if they wear off for the evening/weekend. It's not a game I'm interested in playing, but I'm sure there are many out there who would, and have.
As a software developer, I agree. If you can't make your millions on a given piece of software in about 5 years, you probably never will. I'm currently thinking of writing my own software (not the work for hire I get paid for), and releasing old versions under BSD or GPL after the 5-year mark. I've currently not written anything of significance that isn't work for hire, so it's a moot point for me right now.
Yes, but if it's just life, then there is the very real incentive to simply kill the author. In my opinion, a set number of years after registration is better (with the default going to the public commons with an attribution and a date instead).
But not by the copyright holders - only by the public in general. The last thing the big copyright holders want to have happen is for this to go into the public domain. And I think most of them would rather go after the copyright holders than the artists, when it comes down to it.
How would you feel if your boss decided to do the same with your paycheck? Or are you trying to tell us that your work deserves compensation while the work of others does not?
My boss only pays me once for the work I do. And I work in a copyright-related field. My creative efforts fall under work for hire.
If you don't think that something is worth paying for then it should not be worth acquiring unless you are some kind of compulsive hoarder.
We prefer to be called 'collectors'. And hey, thanks for the new excuse!
Seriously, if copyright were tied to death + only a short time, JK Rowling would be toast. All the publishing houses would be hiring professional hitmen. And striking it big with the Great American Novel would pretty much be your death knell.
On the other hand, that sound like a good setting for some kind of post-apocalyptic copyright thriller.
I read that and all I heard was "blah blah blah we need to hire hitmen against artists for the sake of our children."
I think we've already answered this a million times. BSD - Do whatever you want, but give attribution. Fork you! GPL - Do just about whatever you want, but you have to distribute source, and a few other conditions. Fork happens. Standard Copyright - Don't even think about forking.
Since it's (or was) GPL, forks are allowed by the copyright. If the current copyright holders don't like it, they shouldn't have bought a GPL licensed product, or kept the community happy. They obviously failed to some degree on the second option, and so we have forks. And so long as the forks follow the requirements of the GPL, all the copyright holders can do is scream and shake their fists. Or straighten things out and hope the forks re-merge or die.
Yep, laws like this are fun. It's like walking through an electrified maze in the dark. You don't know when you've done something wrong until it's far too late. And if you bump into the walls of that maze too many times, what happens then? Jail? Public demonization?
And because of that structure, it does have its place, and value in that place. But there was a reason the BSD-licensed TCP stack ended up in Windows, and that benefited more than just MS and Windows users. Which is a point worth considering.
I don't support RIAA music for the same reason I won't watch The Sopranos. Mafiosi scare me.
I didn't watch The Sopranos because there was too much talking and whining about people's feelings. It's like having an extra wife who doesn't listen to you and won't have sex with you. Oh, wait.
This test is probably pointless in the Windows world. I gave up on load testing in Windows environments when I discovered that a file transfer between computers in an explorer window took approximately twice as long as doing the same thing in a command prompt window. Same file, same source, same destination, 100% performance improvement.
Kinda like how not all people who drink alcohol are alcoholics, but some are and this causes them to drive poorly or become violent.
Alcoholism isn't required to make you drive poorly or become violent - the presence of alcohol can do that without an addictive component. I've met some very nice alcoholics, and people who were fool enough to drive drunk who weren't alcoholics. Don't confuse the issue. Addictions tend to lead to self-destructive behaviour, generally revolving around poor priorities and personal neglect. The non-self-destructive behaviour is more of a secondary effect.
Really? I don't believe in intellectual property... do you?
I do.
-Linux user
I also believe that like most property, it can be made freely available.
Cool. I want to have a party this weekend. Mind if I borrow your place? And can I use your car as a taxi service while I'm at it? I'd be happy to pay the amount you listed above. Or maybe, just maybe, physical property is a little different from intellectual property. That's just one of the reasons I snicker when I hear John Lennon's Imagine.
Perhaps not prostitute, but you've never heard the term political whoring? Corporate whoring? And pilot. Ever hear of a maritime pilot? I bet they were around before those newfangled aircraft pilots hijacked (ooh, another one!) the name. Some words have definitions which are sufficiently flexible to lead to multiple meanings. Pirate has become one of those. Other times, like the hacker vs. cracker issue (or dress vs. robe), it's a lack of knowledge on the part of the user.
Also, while it might not work very well with one, it might work with 10 or 20. This has no bearing on whether we should consider doing it, given our overall lack of knowledge of the various effects of this. What could be an interesting idea is to use this to 'steer' the storm (focus the energy on one side of the storm to make it change course). Keep it from hitting shore as opposed to stopping the storm altogether. But I'm not sure if we could even provide enough power to do that, let alone damp out the storm altogether. At least that would reduce the damage to property without totally messing up the weather.
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Really: when it comes to deciding what to do with 3% of your income, don't you want YOU making that decision, instead of total strangers you don't know and who know you less and who are operating on non-sequitor ulterior motives?
I won't get to make those decisions, you probably won't either, and the same goes for the vast majority of people here on /. And in the current business model, if an investment doesn't pay off in 2 to 5 years, it's not worth investing in. Which means that pure research, the stuff that needs to get done for truly innovative technologies to become practical, or even possible, won't get done. Now go read all the other posts that mention all the cool things government research has led to.
Universal healthcare is a boon for capitalism. Calling it socialist is incredibly short sighted by unimaginative people looking for political gain.
This dovetails nicely with my overall opinion on the matter. A healthy society is a benefit for everyone. Once people get above a certain level of health, they start worrying about less important things, like making piles of cash, expressing their creative urges, trying new things. And these are the things that make society worthwhile. Of course, in most of the world except the US, calling it socialist (which it is) isn't enough to get it ridiculed out of hand.
The difference is, some things can be adequately described without QM. What they're saying is, photosynthesis can't. I can explain plenty of things in Newtonian physics, some more in General Relativity.
It's kind of like when they discovered how flies fly a few years back. Sure, we knew they could fly, we even knew a great deal about the mechanics involved. But to really figure it out, they had to do some serious testing. What they learned is that flies use 3 different techniques to generate lift, in every flap of their wings. That's what was new in that particular study.
Greater understanding comes one step at a time. Given what we know now, perhaps we can build better devices to harness light energy. Or perhaps it will take us in a brand new direction. We'll see.
Would I be worried? Sure. Would I automatically assume 9/11, Part II? No. Would I immediately tune into my local news radio/TV? You bet. Rational response to the unknown, rather than the panicked assumption of the unlikely.
And this is where you have to decide if you're going to pull up your pants and do something or cower in fear.
The reason 9/11 happened isn't because of the bravery of skill or cleverness of the hijackers, it's because of the institutionalized cowardice we've mandated in most 'civilized' countries in response to this. "Just do what they say, keep your head down, and let the professionals take care of it." The only thing that really changed after 9/11 was that we saw that perhaps the authorities won't get there in time, and maybe, just maybe, you can't trust hostage-takers for your welfare.
This institutionalized cowardice shows itself in other ways. People who refuse to fly after 9/11, even though it's arguably safer than before. Not because of the new 'security' measures, but because people know that if the hijackers succeed there's a good chance they'll all die, and so they'll do whatever it takes to keep that from happening. And of course the terrorists know that, and plane hijackings just aren't in vogue anymore.
Another way this institutionalized cowardice shows is people who just don't have the balls to say to themselves and their neighbours, their fellow hostages, "There's only one of him, only 9 (or 15 or 30) bullets in that gun, and if we storm him he won't be able to reload. Sure, one or more of us could die, but we aren't going to sit back and let fear and the threat of violence rule our lives."
Of course, bravery and stupidity can be easily mistaken. No sense rushing a squad of guys carrying automatics, but a single guy with a semi-auto pistol? That's not an unreasonable goal for 5 or 10 determined individuals. A few guys with box cutters? Why would you even wait?
Why build robots when you can just convert people into them? Plenty of companies would be quite happy for their drones to just be entirely focused and not too creative. After all, a lot of jobs don't require much creativity at all.
There was a story about this, about an implant or somesuch that allowed people to go on autopilot during boring parts of their lives. The implant would make them do the task at hand in a very consistent manner while the person would have the experience of dreaming. Of course, they threw in some negative side-effects, and the whole idea was scrapped. The interesting part was, while most people would go on auto-pilot at work, the main character would be alert at work and go on autopilot at home.
And of course, Lewis Carroll was speculated to be taking drugs when he wrote Alice in Wonderland. I wouldn't be surprised.
I guess what I'm getting at is, some jobs require creativity, a lot don't, and taking drugs to enhance your work capabilities is going to look pretty attractive to some people, especially if they wear off for the evening/weekend. It's not a game I'm interested in playing, but I'm sure there are many out there who would, and have.
As a software developer, I agree. If you can't make your millions on a given piece of software in about 5 years, you probably never will. I'm currently thinking of writing my own software (not the work for hire I get paid for), and releasing old versions under BSD or GPL after the 5-year mark. I've currently not written anything of significance that isn't work for hire, so it's a moot point for me right now.
Yes, but if it's just life, then there is the very real incentive to simply kill the author. In my opinion, a set number of years after registration is better (with the default going to the public commons with an attribution and a date instead).
But not by the copyright holders - only by the public in general. The last thing the big copyright holders want to have happen is for this to go into the public domain. And I think most of them would rather go after the copyright holders than the artists, when it comes down to it.
How would you feel if your boss decided to do the same with your paycheck? Or are you trying to tell us that your work deserves compensation while the work of others does not?
My boss only pays me once for the work I do. And I work in a copyright-related field. My creative efforts fall under work for hire.
If you don't think that something is worth paying for then it should not be worth acquiring unless you are some kind of compulsive hoarder.
We prefer to be called 'collectors'. And hey, thanks for the new excuse!
Seriously, if copyright were tied to death + only a short time, JK Rowling would be toast. All the publishing houses would be hiring professional hitmen. And striking it big with the Great American Novel would pretty much be your death knell.
On the other hand, that sound like a good setting for some kind of post-apocalyptic copyright thriller.
I read that and all I heard was "blah blah blah we need to hire hitmen against artists for the sake of our children."
1) My network monitoring setup sends me SMS'es if it detects problems. Silencing these notifications would defeat the purpose of having them.
The settings on a Blackberry allow you to silence email without affecting SMS.
There's no simple solution to issue 2, though.
I think we've already answered this a million times.
BSD - Do whatever you want, but give attribution. Fork you!
GPL - Do just about whatever you want, but you have to distribute source, and a few other conditions. Fork happens.
Standard Copyright - Don't even think about forking.
Since it's (or was) GPL, forks are allowed by the copyright. If the current copyright holders don't like it, they shouldn't have bought a GPL licensed product, or kept the community happy. They obviously failed to some degree on the second option, and so we have forks. And so long as the forks follow the requirements of the GPL, all the copyright holders can do is scream and shake their fists. Or straighten things out and hope the forks re-merge or die.
What do they call that? A flock?
Yep, laws like this are fun. It's like walking through an electrified maze in the dark. You don't know when you've done something wrong until it's far too late. And if you bump into the walls of that maze too many times, what happens then? Jail? Public demonization?
And because of that structure, it does have its place, and value in that place. But there was a reason the BSD-licensed TCP stack ended up in Windows, and that benefited more than just MS and Windows users. Which is a point worth considering.
I don't support RIAA music for the same reason I won't watch The Sopranos. Mafiosi scare me.
I didn't watch The Sopranos because there was too much talking and whining about people's feelings. It's like having an extra wife who doesn't listen to you and won't have sex with you. Oh, wait.
...
What were we talking about again?
This test is probably pointless in the Windows world. I gave up on load testing in Windows environments when I discovered that a file transfer between computers in an explorer window took approximately twice as long as doing the same thing in a command prompt window. Same file, same source, same destination, 100% performance improvement.
Strangest acronym evar.
I think Microsoft's "Client Update Notification Tool" still holds the award for unfortunate acronym.
Kinda like how not all people who drink alcohol are alcoholics, but some are and this causes them to drive poorly or become violent.
Alcoholism isn't required to make you drive poorly or become violent - the presence of alcohol can do that without an addictive component. I've met some very nice alcoholics, and people who were fool enough to drive drunk who weren't alcoholics. Don't confuse the issue.
Addictions tend to lead to self-destructive behaviour, generally revolving around poor priorities and personal neglect. The non-self-destructive behaviour is more of a secondary effect.
Really? I don't believe in intellectual property... do you?
I do.
-Linux user
I also believe that like most property, it can be made freely available.
Cool. I want to have a party this weekend. Mind if I borrow your place? And can I use your car as a taxi service while I'm at it? I'd be happy to pay the amount you listed above.
Or maybe, just maybe, physical property is a little different from intellectual property. That's just one of the reasons I snicker when I hear John Lennon's Imagine.
but for the analysis portion no human need see either the new or the old work.
Suddenly, I don't want to be human anymore. Maybe then I'll have more freedoms. I think I'll be...a walrus. Or a bear.
Perhaps not prostitute, but you've never heard the term political whoring? Corporate whoring?
And pilot. Ever hear of a maritime pilot? I bet they were around before those newfangled aircraft pilots hijacked (ooh, another one!) the name.
Some words have definitions which are sufficiently flexible to lead to multiple meanings. Pirate has become one of those. Other times, like the hacker vs. cracker issue (or dress vs. robe), it's a lack of knowledge on the part of the user.
Yes, but actually working for the government implies quite the opposite.
Hmm, I think they're called 'calluses'.
Also, while it might not work very well with one, it might work with 10 or 20. This has no bearing on whether we should consider doing it, given our overall lack of knowledge of the various effects of this.
What could be an interesting idea is to use this to 'steer' the storm (focus the energy on one side of the storm to make it change course). Keep it from hitting shore as opposed to stopping the storm altogether. But I'm not sure if we could even provide enough power to do that, let alone damp out the storm altogether. At least that would reduce the damage to property without totally messing up the weather.