But I'm dealing with TODAY. I agree, not every German is a Nazi and we shouldn't hold that over their heads especially since a majority of them weren't even alive at the time. But if this were 1942 my outlook on Germans as a whole would be much different.
So you're saying that in 1942 you would have believed that all Germans were Nazi's, but that over 60 years later you realise with hindsight that you would have been wrong. You see that not all Germans of that time were Nazi sympathisers.
Are you perhaps making the same mistake this time? Will you look back in 60 odd years and realise that you were wrong? That all Muslims aren't extremists that want to destroy the West?
Ok, seeing as though you took the time to reply again, I'll assume that you really did miss my point.
You are equating the entire Muslim world with the stoning of unfaithful women. I responded by equating all Americans with supporting the execution of mentally ill prisoners.
Both statements were so broad as to be virtually meaningless.
I'm not saying that some Muslims don't support stoning women, perhaps (probably?) even a majority of Muslims do in some areas. But until people realise that not all Muslims feel this way, the same as not all Christians support Intelligent Design or execution for heresy, there's no hope for reconciliation between Muslims and non-Muslims.
What we are fighting against, Muslims and non-Muslims alike, is extremism and intolerance. Broad statements that "Muslims believe this..." or "Christians believe that..." aren't helpful. There are many different interpretations of Islam the same as there are many differt interpretations of Christianity.
It's easy to point fingers at the Muslim woman wearing a burqa and scream "her rights are being trampled by Islam", but how long ago was it that western women going to a beach, or even just going outside, had to be covered from ankle to wrist? And was it really that long ago (given the history of the Earth) that women were burned at the stake for being witches?
You rightly look at the stoning of unfaithful women as barbaric but demonise all Muslims over it. I look at the execution of mentally ill prisoners in the US as barbaric, but I recognise that there are many differing views on the subject in the US. Every Country/Religion has got some history that they're not (or at least shouldn't be) proud of.
When's the last time Christians stoned a woman for infidelity? The Muslims probably did it today... and that's not considered an extreme to these people, it's the norm.
That's a pretty wide brush you're using there to tar all Muslims with.
When was the last time the US executed a mentally ill prisoner? The US probably did it this year, and they don't consider it to be morally wrong to execute someone without the mental capacity to understand what it was that they did wrong.
Doesn't sound like we are raping the innocent, hooking people's nuts to wall outlets or anything in Saddam's league. The worst there is not stopping somebody from trying to bash his own brains out.
Well that's a relief. Glad to see the US isn't as bad as Sadam. The US only uses dogs to scare shackled prisoners, smears shit all over them and takes photo's, deprives them of sleep, places prisoners in "stress positions" for great lengths of time, parades them naked in front of others, sodomises prisoners with torches and other implements, makes them stand hooded on boxes with electrodes connected to them, generally bashes them, and occasionally "accidently" kills prisoners. And that's just some of the stuff we know about and have seen pictures of.
But as long as what Sadam did was worse, who can complain? Right? I mean the US are still the good guys right?
Bzzzt. Wrong!!! Torture is torture Fucktard! There is no defence at all for torture. The information gained is unreliable and you are no more morally superior to Sadam or anyone else who practices torture.
Seroiusly, most of the Internet usage in my building, and dare I say probably most offices, is from personal browsing.
We get spikes in the morning to news sites from 8am right up to about 10am. Huge usage again over the lunch breaks to various sites, but that doesn't taper off until about 3.30pm or so. Friday lunch time isn't too bad but still noticeably high, lots of people are at the pub. But from about 3pm on Fridays until about 4.30 we see high usage again. Lots go home early.
Random Office Drone: "Playing solitaire is so 90's now, don't you know? Everyone's checking out the Internet now. It's amazing what's out there. And the work connection is so much faster than at home."
To compare time wasting properly you would have to include the time that people spend talking, going to the toilet, on personal phone calls, or just not thinking about the job. You would also have to credit them for the extra hours worked, the lunches skipped, and all the times you were called at home at 3am because a security guard saw a "flashing light, that was red" or something else innocuous and decides to call you even though you're not on call!
All that should really matter is that you are doing all the work that's required of you on time and in a professional manner.*
*Not considering staffing shortages, dickhead managers or other issues out of your control.
ISP's want you to pay for Internet access, they just don't want you to use it.
They'll advertise the benifits of high speed ADSL access with unlimited downloads, but then (at least in Australia) the fine print will show a download/upload speed of 512/128 with a download limit of 10Gb per month (you might get a bit extra in off peak periods). Even the new ADSL2 available in some places is 1500/256, still with a download limit of 10Gb per month and a cost of over $100 Aus per month.
Those Australians stupid enough to sign up with Telstra (majority government owned telco that owns most of the telecommunications infrastructure in Aus, including the copper last mile) then find out that uploads actually count towards their download limit. Go over your download limit for the month and your connection speed is throttled to 56K or you're charged at a rediculous rate per Mb over your limit.
Now they're going after the likes of Skype and other Internet VoIP providers.
ISP's would be happy if all you did was check email and read a few news sites while paying top dollar for a 1500/256 ADSL2 service. "receive your emails lighting fast" was one of the recent ads.
Bah, ISP's shit me here in Aus. And don't even get me started on telcos.
If you're going to pay thousands of dollars to go to Uni, you want to know that you'll get value for money in the form of a degree. Knowledge doesn't necessarily get you a high paying job, or keep your wealthy and/or sucessful parents happy, a degree can.
In Australia, up until a few years ago, High School leavers applying for Uni had to have a certain HSC mark to get into Uni courses. This minimum entry score was set for each course by each Uni based on number of applicants to a course and the HSC scores of those applicants (and other factors). Students paid a fee to the Uni for each course with the Federal Government subsidising Uni's on a per student basis.
A few years ago the Federal Government allowed what was named "full fee paying students". These students were able to get into Uni courses with a HSC score lower than the mark set by the Uni's. To do this they paid full fees, i.e. no Government subsidy to the Uni for that student plus a bit more. Since then the Government have been reducing the amount they pay in student subsidies and are pushing Uni's to operate as a profit making business, forcing Uni's to push for more full fee paying students who are worth more in dollar terms than non-full fee paying students.
Since this change there have been a number of stories of "soft marking" coming out of the Uni's. Basically full fee paying students were being soft-marked, with the justification that they were full fee paying, and so deserved value for money. By getting an easy ride at Uni, they would recommend that uni to other full fee paying students, making more money for the Uni's.
If you were a full fee paying student, would you go for a Uni that would soft mark you, or one that treated you no differently to other students?
I am saying it is utter and complete bullshit for the judge to make it illegal to teach a widely held belief if the teachers and school board feel it should be part of the fucking curriculum.
Why am I not surprised that you find this so hard to understand?
Schools can teach ID all they want in theology or religious studies. What they can't do is re-label science to be whatever they want it to be and teach non-scientific material in science class.
This is the same reason why you don't do book reports in maths class, learn sports in english class, or learn about evolution in religious studies.
Rollup 2 allows MCE HDTV support as well as digital radio. Not to mention increased stability and many other fixes to bugs that were extremely annoying pre rollup 2.
I am most definately not a Microsoft fanboy, but I must say that Windows MCE is a better all round product than all the other HTPC software on the market. The major factor for me in settling on MCE was that my wife found it very easy to use. Sure, there are problems now and again, and Microsoft have a long way to go with this product, but my wife and I are very happy with it.
On another note, I've always found this whole HTPC noise issue a bit over rated. I've seen people spend a fortune on silent this and fanless that, but in the end they were living in an open plan unit where their fridge made more noise than their PC.
For me I just replaced my primary home tower PC with a new one, installed two digital HD tuner cards in the old tower, bought MCE, the MCE remote, and the MCE keyboard, installed MCE, reinstalled MCE, reinstalled MCE again, investigated my MCE problems for about 2 weeks on the net, upgraded motherboard, reinstalled MCE, downgraded drivers, upgraded drivers, upgraded BIOS, reinstalled MCE, installed rollup 2, rolled back to previous motherboard, reinstalled MCE, reinstalled rollup 2, and that was it. I now have a stable system. Easy as that.:)
MCE takes a lot of work to get it set up properly and stable. Stable being the primary aim, it's no good using MCE as your primary meda centre if the system locks up and doesn't record Arrested Development (for me) or Neighbours (for my wife) when it's supposed to.
Not to mention that my wife is happy to ok any tech purchase now as long as it will help the HTPC.:)
How to we come up with a better way to make decisions without losing our freedoms completely?
I don't think the machine's badly designed, it's just not working all that well right now. Some (too many?) parts of the whole aren't functioning as they should and it's just throwing the whole thing out of whack.
It doesn't help that certain elements are pushing for abstenance only teaching, instead of also pushing the condom message.
At the same time, these abstenanace only proponents are also teaching waiting for marriage and monogomy. But what about those who don't follow the marriage and/or monogomy line? And they're a significant number. I would have thought that when fighting a disease of this magnitude you would use all the resources at your disposal.
All the abstenance teaching in the world won't help you if you step on an infected needle on a beach, or receive infected blood during a transfusion, or any of the other socially acceptable ways of contracting AIDS.
I've decided that if there is this push to "teach the controversy" surrounding ID vs Evolution in Science classes, why aren't people pushing to "teach the controversy" between the Bible and Science in Theology or Religious classes?
I can see it now...
"And then Moses parted the sea. At this point I must mention that there is very little scientific proof that Moses, indeed any man, has the ability to part a sea. In fact it is almost universally accepted that it is not possible for any man, now or ever, to have been able to part any sea without some form of construction works. If you would like any further information on this you can read almost any science book ever written."
We should also push for stickers to be placed on the cover of every bible that reads "There is controversy over the content of this book. For further information see...."
After all, if we don't teach kids the controversy, we are doing them a disservice and failing them in their education.
God: Dang, missed again. Can't 841457 (because they use Slashdot userID's in Heaven) just stand still for a while? Angel: Sir, you've got to hold the L1 button to auto-aim. God: Oh, I've been holding R1. Angel: No, that's your special attack button. God: What's my special attack then? Angel: Hurricanes! God: Oh. Oops, my bad.
If you have a good employer, you are one of the lucky ones. Obviously you don't need the protection of a union when your employer looks after you well.
Unions are needed where the employer is a complete bastard. And they are out there. My wife nearly got the sack because her boss forgot to tell her that she was out of sick days after she had an operation.
You might be happy with your employer right now, but what happens if they get bought out and the new management team don't wish to continue with the previous managements practices?
How does it go? You don't know what you've got 'till it's gone. Once the unions are gone, it will be a good century or so before the come back. Well, my belief anyway.
So how are your pay and conditions right now? Happy with your pay rise this year? Getting paid for that overtime that you do? I guess you don't have any complaints about your current employment. If you do, you could always speak to your boss. After all, the company you work for couldn't possibly do without you personally, and it must be so hard for them to find a replacement in the current skills shortage.
Here's a hint. You are disposable. You aren't worth shit to your employer. Think you have a lot of in house knowledge or specialised skills that you've built up over many years? Doesn't mean shit. Management will crap all over you given half the chance and replace you with two workers each being paid half your wage. And then they'll get paid a bonus for doing it.
Unions are the only way for the workers to stand up against management. It levels the playing field given all the money, lawyers and resources employers have that individual workers don't.
It's up to you to decide whether to join a union or not. Just don't be surprised when salary negotiations don't go as you hoped, or you are laid off because it's cheaper to have the work done overseas and there's nothing you can do about it.
Not all unions are militant. My current union successfully negotiates inflation salary increases every year for us plus performance payments. This year management didn't want to pay an inflation increase. My union fought hard for us and managed to get the inflation increase (3.8%). Two weeks later our board announced they had given themselves a 25% pay rise.
I'd say that the problem is the complexity of the software... 23,000 function points? 1800 different transactions? A system of this complexity cannot reasonably be created in such a short time frame (2 years).
Customs Management: "But the tenderer said they could meet the deadline under budget. Sure, they were the lowest bidder and all the other tenderers said it couldn't be done for twice the money in twice the time, but I have no reason not to believe the successful tenderer. I forsee no problems with this project."
How many times have we all seen this happen? I've stopped signing off on projects where the lowest bidder is automatically selected. If the bean counters want to choose the lowest bidder by default, I make them write a note accepting personal responsibility for selecting the lowest bidder. After a few fuck-ups, delayed projects, and the near demotion of a bean counter, the culture is slowly starting to change.
I want to know how anyone can justify spending $250 million on any IT project. I'm writing a spec for our new Disaster Recovery building. We are talking duplication of our entire server and mainframe infrastructure, new Comms active equipment, new PABX, new servers, massive high speed links, cabling infrastructure... and this isn't even coming in at $5 million.
I know we're all used to reading about large numbers, but $250 million is a lot of money.
Seriously, at what point do you look at a project and say "this has gone way over budget and isn't going to be finished any time soon, is it time to count our losses"?
Shitdrummer.
And yet you still don't own it. This isn't a problem unique to the US. Companies don't want to have to pay to upgrade perfectly profitable infrastructure. They prefer that the government (i.e. the people) pay, or at leat contribute considerably. Then the companies proceed to make a shit load of money by gouging the paying public.
I've long believed that governments should own the cable in the ground and lease it to commercial businesses to onsell to the people. That way you won't have the stupid scenario where one company digs up a street to lay a cable, then two weeks later a competing company comes and digs up the same street again to lay the samy type of fibre or whatever down. The cost savings there should be huge. Thus the end cost to comsumers is significantly lowered while the quality (i.e. access speed, line quality, repair times) is significantly higher.
Plus you get the added bonus that politicians would ensure their constituents have high quality services, they wouldn't risk their political hides over a fibre cable. Also the entry level to becoming a service provider is significantly lowered, all you have to do is resell the connection. The government makes a handsome profit out of selling cable access and the people don't have to pay as much tax as a result. Well, that last one's probably a bit iffy.:)
Slashdot Mirror
Not to mention shit like this happening.
Shitdrummer.
But I'm dealing with TODAY. I agree, not every German is a Nazi and we shouldn't hold that over their heads especially since a majority of them weren't even alive at the time. But if this were 1942 my outlook on Germans as a whole would be much different.
So you're saying that in 1942 you would have believed that all Germans were Nazi's, but that over 60 years later you realise with hindsight that you would have been wrong. You see that not all Germans of that time were Nazi sympathisers.
Are you perhaps making the same mistake this time? Will you look back in 60 odd years and realise that you were wrong? That all Muslims aren't extremists that want to destroy the West?
Shitdrummer.
Ok, seeing as though you took the time to reply again, I'll assume that you really did miss my point.
You are equating the entire Muslim world with the stoning of unfaithful women. I responded by equating all Americans with supporting the execution of mentally ill prisoners.
Both statements were so broad as to be virtually meaningless.
I'm not saying that some Muslims don't support stoning women, perhaps (probably?) even a majority of Muslims do in some areas. But until people realise that not all Muslims feel this way, the same as not all Christians support Intelligent Design or execution for heresy, there's no hope for reconciliation between Muslims and non-Muslims.
What we are fighting against, Muslims and non-Muslims alike, is extremism and intolerance. Broad statements that "Muslims believe this..." or "Christians believe that..." aren't helpful. There are many different interpretations of Islam the same as there are many differt interpretations of Christianity.
It's easy to point fingers at the Muslim woman wearing a burqa and scream "her rights are being trampled by Islam", but how long ago was it that western women going to a beach, or even just going outside, had to be covered from ankle to wrist? And was it really that long ago (given the history of the Earth) that women were burned at the stake for being witches?
You rightly look at the stoning of unfaithful women as barbaric but demonise all Muslims over it. I look at the execution of mentally ill prisoners in the US as barbaric, but I recognise that there are many differing views on the subject in the US. Every Country/Religion has got some history that they're not (or at least shouldn't be) proud of.
Shitdrummer.
Why am I not surprised you missed my point entirely? Oh, that's right, because it was nuanced and not black and white.
Shitdrummer.
When's the last time Christians stoned a woman for infidelity? The Muslims probably did it today... and that's not considered an extreme to these people, it's the norm.
That's a pretty wide brush you're using there to tar all Muslims with.
When was the last time the US executed a mentally ill prisoner? The US probably did it this year, and they don't consider it to be morally wrong to execute someone without the mental capacity to understand what it was that they did wrong.
What do they say about glass houses and stones?
Shitdrummer.
Doesn't sound like we are raping the innocent, hooking people's nuts to wall outlets or anything in Saddam's league. The worst there is not stopping somebody from trying to bash his own brains out.
Well that's a relief. Glad to see the US isn't as bad as Sadam. The US only uses dogs to scare shackled prisoners, smears shit all over them and takes photo's, deprives them of sleep, places prisoners in "stress positions" for great lengths of time, parades them naked in front of others, sodomises prisoners with torches and other implements, makes them stand hooded on boxes with electrodes connected to them, generally bashes them, and occasionally "accidently" kills prisoners. And that's just some of the stuff we know about and have seen pictures of.
But as long as what Sadam did was worse, who can complain? Right? I mean the US are still the good guys right?
Bzzzt. Wrong!!! Torture is torture Fucktard! There is no defence at all for torture. The information gained is unreliable and you are no more morally superior to Sadam or anyone else who practices torture.
Shitdrummer.
But costing your boss a lot more in bandwidth.
Seroiusly, most of the Internet usage in my building, and dare I say probably most offices, is from personal browsing.
We get spikes in the morning to news sites from 8am right up to about 10am. Huge usage again over the lunch breaks to various sites, but that doesn't taper off until about 3.30pm or so. Friday lunch time isn't too bad but still noticeably high, lots of people are at the pub. But from about 3pm on Fridays until about 4.30 we see high usage again. Lots go home early.
Random Office Drone: "Playing solitaire is so 90's now, don't you know? Everyone's checking out the Internet now. It's amazing what's out there. And the work connection is so much faster than at home."
Shitdrummer.
To compare time wasting properly you would have to include the time that people spend talking, going to the toilet, on personal phone calls, or just not thinking about the job. You would also have to credit them for the extra hours worked, the lunches skipped, and all the times you were called at home at 3am because a security guard saw a "flashing light, that was red" or something else innocuous and decides to call you even though you're not on call!
All that should really matter is that you are doing all the work that's required of you on time and in a professional manner.*
*Not considering staffing shortages, dickhead managers or other issues out of your control.
Shitdrummer.
*Looks Left*
*Looks Right*
*Looks Behind*
*Speaks in a very hushed tone*
Or you could get married.
*runs and hides*
Shitdrummer.
I bet the stuff about oxygen and metabolism is true as well.
:)
That's why you should never eat the food at the caf.
Oh, and take up smoking... It gets you out of the building for fresh air every hour or so.
Shitdrummer.
ISP's want you to pay for Internet access, they just don't want you to use it.
They'll advertise the benifits of high speed ADSL access with unlimited downloads, but then (at least in Australia) the fine print will show a download/upload speed of 512/128 with a download limit of 10Gb per month (you might get a bit extra in off peak periods). Even the new ADSL2 available in some places is 1500/256, still with a download limit of 10Gb per month and a cost of over $100 Aus per month.
Those Australians stupid enough to sign up with Telstra (majority government owned telco that owns most of the telecommunications infrastructure in Aus, including the copper last mile) then find out that uploads actually count towards their download limit. Go over your download limit for the month and your connection speed is throttled to 56K or you're charged at a rediculous rate per Mb over your limit.
Now they're going after the likes of Skype and other Internet VoIP providers.
ISP's would be happy if all you did was check email and read a few news sites while paying top dollar for a 1500/256 ADSL2 service. "receive your emails lighting fast" was one of the recent ads.
Bah, ISP's shit me here in Aus. And don't even get me started on telcos.
Shitdrummer.
Dick!!!
It's also value for money for the student.
If you're going to pay thousands of dollars to go to Uni, you want to know that you'll get value for money in the form of a degree. Knowledge doesn't necessarily get you a high paying job, or keep your wealthy and/or sucessful parents happy, a degree can.
In Australia, up until a few years ago, High School leavers applying for Uni had to have a certain HSC mark to get into Uni courses. This minimum entry score was set for each course by each Uni based on number of applicants to a course and the HSC scores of those applicants (and other factors). Students paid a fee to the Uni for each course with the Federal Government subsidising Uni's on a per student basis.
A few years ago the Federal Government allowed what was named "full fee paying students". These students were able to get into Uni courses with a HSC score lower than the mark set by the Uni's. To do this they paid full fees, i.e. no Government subsidy to the Uni for that student plus a bit more. Since then the Government have been reducing the amount they pay in student subsidies and are pushing Uni's to operate as a profit making business, forcing Uni's to push for more full fee paying students who are worth more in dollar terms than non-full fee paying students.
Since this change there have been a number of stories of "soft marking" coming out of the Uni's. Basically full fee paying students were being soft-marked, with the justification that they were full fee paying, and so deserved value for money. By getting an easy ride at Uni, they would recommend that uni to other full fee paying students, making more money for the Uni's.
If you were a full fee paying student, would you go for a Uni that would soft mark you, or one that treated you no differently to other students?
Shitdrummer.
I am saying it is utter and complete bullshit for the judge to make it illegal to teach a widely held belief if the teachers and school board feel it should be part of the fucking curriculum.
Why am I not surprised that you find this so hard to understand?
Schools can teach ID all they want in theology or religious studies. What they can't do is re-label science to be whatever they want it to be and teach non-scientific material in science class.
This is the same reason why you don't do book reports in maths class, learn sports in english class, or learn about evolution in religious studies.
Shitdrummer.
Rollup 2 allows MCE HDTV support as well as digital radio. Not to mention increased stability and many other fixes to bugs that were extremely annoying pre rollup 2.
:)
:)
I am most definately not a Microsoft fanboy, but I must say that Windows MCE is a better all round product than all the other HTPC software on the market. The major factor for me in settling on MCE was that my wife found it very easy to use. Sure, there are problems now and again, and Microsoft have a long way to go with this product, but my wife and I are very happy with it.
On another note, I've always found this whole HTPC noise issue a bit over rated. I've seen people spend a fortune on silent this and fanless that, but in the end they were living in an open plan unit where their fridge made more noise than their PC.
For me I just replaced my primary home tower PC with a new one, installed two digital HD tuner cards in the old tower, bought MCE, the MCE remote, and the MCE keyboard, installed MCE, reinstalled MCE, reinstalled MCE again, investigated my MCE problems for about 2 weeks on the net, upgraded motherboard, reinstalled MCE, downgraded drivers, upgraded drivers, upgraded BIOS, reinstalled MCE, installed rollup 2, rolled back to previous motherboard, reinstalled MCE, reinstalled rollup 2, and that was it. I now have a stable system. Easy as that.
MCE takes a lot of work to get it set up properly and stable. Stable being the primary aim, it's no good using MCE as your primary meda centre if the system locks up and doesn't record Arrested Development (for me) or Neighbours (for my wife) when it's supposed to.
Not to mention that my wife is happy to ok any tech purchase now as long as it will help the HTPC.
Shitdrummer.
How to we come up with a better way to make decisions without losing our freedoms completely?
I don't think the machine's badly designed, it's just not working all that well right now. Some (too many?) parts of the whole aren't functioning as they should and it's just throwing the whole thing out of whack.
Shitdrummer
It doesn't help that certain elements are pushing for abstenance only teaching, instead of also pushing the condom message.
At the same time, these abstenanace only proponents are also teaching waiting for marriage and monogomy. But what about those who don't follow the marriage and/or monogomy line? And they're a significant number. I would have thought that when fighting a disease of this magnitude you would use all the resources at your disposal.
All the abstenance teaching in the world won't help you if you step on an infected needle on a beach, or receive infected blood during a transfusion, or any of the other socially acceptable ways of contracting AIDS.
Shitdrummer.
I've been thinking...
I've decided that if there is this push to "teach the controversy" surrounding ID vs Evolution in Science classes, why aren't people pushing to "teach the controversy" between the Bible and Science in Theology or Religious classes?
I can see it now...
"And then Moses parted the sea. At this point I must mention that there is very little scientific proof that Moses, indeed any man, has the ability to part a sea. In fact it is almost universally accepted that it is not possible for any man, now or ever, to have been able to part any sea without some form of construction works. If you would like any further information on this you can read almost any science book ever written."
We should also push for stickers to be placed on the cover of every bible that reads "There is controversy over the content of this book. For further information see...."
After all, if we don't teach kids the controversy, we are doing them a disservice and failing them in their education.
Shitdrummer
Dude, can't you take a hint... :) Just kidding.
God: Dang, missed again. Can't 841457 (because they use Slashdot userID's in Heaven) just stand still for a while?
Angel: Sir, you've got to hold the L1 button to auto-aim.
God: Oh, I've been holding R1.
Angel: No, that's your special attack button.
God: What's my special attack then?
Angel: Hurricanes!
God: Oh. Oops, my bad.
Shitdrummer
If you have a good employer, you are one of the lucky ones. Obviously you don't need the protection of a union when your employer looks after you well.
Unions are needed where the employer is a complete bastard. And they are out there. My wife nearly got the sack because her boss forgot to tell her that she was out of sick days after she had an operation.
You might be happy with your employer right now, but what happens if they get bought out and the new management team don't wish to continue with the previous managements practices?
How does it go? You don't know what you've got 'till it's gone. Once the unions are gone, it will be a good century or so before the come back. Well, my belief anyway.
Shitdrummer.
The rich are not responsible because you are poor, you are poor because you haven't taken the steps to be rich
What complete and utter crap.
What about the people working 2 or 3 jobs just to make ends meet?
How is someone born into a poor family supposed to get enough money to pay for the education required to get the high paying jobs to become rich?
Christ you shit me!!!
Shitdrummer
So how are your pay and conditions right now? Happy with your pay rise this year? Getting paid for that overtime that you do? I guess you don't have any complaints about your current employment. If you do, you could always speak to your boss. After all, the company you work for couldn't possibly do without you personally, and it must be so hard for them to find a replacement in the current skills shortage.
Here's a hint. You are disposable. You aren't worth shit to your employer. Think you have a lot of in house knowledge or specialised skills that you've built up over many years? Doesn't mean shit. Management will crap all over you given half the chance and replace you with two workers each being paid half your wage. And then they'll get paid a bonus for doing it.
Unions are the only way for the workers to stand up against management. It levels the playing field given all the money, lawyers and resources employers have that individual workers don't.
It's up to you to decide whether to join a union or not. Just don't be surprised when salary negotiations don't go as you hoped, or you are laid off because it's cheaper to have the work done overseas and there's nothing you can do about it.
Not all unions are militant. My current union successfully negotiates inflation salary increases every year for us plus performance payments. This year management didn't want to pay an inflation increase. My union fought hard for us and managed to get the inflation increase (3.8%). Two weeks later our board announced they had given themselves a 25% pay rise.
Shitdrummer
I'd say that the problem is the complexity of the software... 23,000 function points? 1800 different transactions? A system of this complexity cannot reasonably be created in such a short time frame (2 years).
Customs Management: "But the tenderer said they could meet the deadline under budget. Sure, they were the lowest bidder and all the other tenderers said it couldn't be done for twice the money in twice the time, but I have no reason not to believe the successful tenderer. I forsee no problems with this project."
How many times have we all seen this happen? I've stopped signing off on projects where the lowest bidder is automatically selected. If the bean counters want to choose the lowest bidder by default, I make them write a note accepting personal responsibility for selecting the lowest bidder. After a few fuck-ups, delayed projects, and the near demotion of a bean counter, the culture is slowly starting to change.
Shitdrummer
I want to know how anyone can justify spending $250 million on any IT project. I'm writing a spec for our new Disaster Recovery building. We are talking duplication of our entire server and mainframe infrastructure, new Comms active equipment, new PABX, new servers, massive high speed links, cabling infrastructure... and this isn't even coming in at $5 million. I know we're all used to reading about large numbers, but $250 million is a lot of money. Seriously, at what point do you look at a project and say "this has gone way over budget and isn't going to be finished any time soon, is it time to count our losses"? Shitdrummer.
We, the taxpayers, are the ones who paid for it.
:)
And yet you still don't own it. This isn't a problem unique to the US. Companies don't want to have to pay to upgrade perfectly profitable infrastructure. They prefer that the government (i.e. the people) pay, or at leat contribute considerably. Then the companies proceed to make a shit load of money by gouging the paying public.
I've long believed that governments should own the cable in the ground and lease it to commercial businesses to onsell to the people. That way you won't have the stupid scenario where one company digs up a street to lay a cable, then two weeks later a competing company comes and digs up the same street again to lay the samy type of fibre or whatever down. The cost savings there should be huge. Thus the end cost to comsumers is significantly lowered while the quality (i.e. access speed, line quality, repair times) is significantly higher.
Plus you get the added bonus that politicians would ensure their constituents have high quality services, they wouldn't risk their political hides over a fibre cable. Also the entry level to becoming a service provider is significantly lowered, all you have to do is resell the connection. The government makes a handsome profit out of selling cable access and the people don't have to pay as much tax as a result. Well, that last one's probably a bit iffy.
Shitdrummer