OK. Let me clarify. STUPID people need protection from themselves. Given that I think most people (no make that Americans) are stupid, I just left that word out in order to be somewhat polite. My apologies to those who are offended that I've been forced to add it in.
Next, "personal responsibility" is a crock of shit. The people (mostly libs) who go on about it the most usually haven't lifted a finger to get where they are in life. They've usually relied on mommy and daddy's money and haven't set foot outside of the gated community. The reason that all this "personal responsibility" rhetoric is complete twaddle is that there are a limited number of things you can take personal responsibility for. Sure you can prevent yourself from sticking your finger in a light socket. Great. You aren't a complete idiot. You can also go a little farther and educate yourself in various skills to provide for yourself. (Carpentry, electical work, auto repair, computers, gardening, etc...) This is also a good thing. It should that you are smart enough to be able to take some things into your own hands and be responsible for them. But that's about as far as it goes.
The bullshit that people sling around here like, "well the homeless person can go to evening classes if they really wanted to and then get a job and work their way up the ladder" doesn't fly in the real world. Or the idea that someone is responsible for their own addiction to a substance. Personally, I think that argument ends when you are talking about drugs that really prevent people from being able to think in any logical way and say, "oh this substance is making my life suck, I should stop now". Expecting an addict to just decide to quit using is equivalent to wishing that santa will come by and drop a few presents down your chimney on December 25th. Libs really don't operate with a full deck and overlook a lot of what reality throws in their faces.
Every one of you who replied to my previous post is a complete idiot. Yes, I do believe in what I stated above. I also believe that if you don't understand what I said, then you are in definite need of protection from your own incompetence to handle your own life. That is all.
You don't get it do you? People need protection from themselves. No one has the right to put their life at risk when an addiction is involved. Your father and grandfather didn't make a choice. They were hooked. It was intentional. They were given a substance that made them crave more. of that substance A substance that was designed to make people crave more. That substance was designed to make money for the people who own cigarette companies. A few million dead people don't matter when you're making a lot of money at their expense. Right? They were forced to smoke due to the addictive nature of nicotine. If I gave someone who was curious a few free rocks of crack (a Slashdot moderator for example) and they got hooked. Then I charged them for all future crack rocks. I'd be making a pretty nice income. You can't say that those people had a choice. Using an addictive substance ceases to be a choice one it enters your body.
Yes. I'm sure you feel safe for months at a stretch when the men in white coats come to take you to the "citadel of data security" after such events.;P
In addition to this astounding conclusion, the Pew Internet and American Life Project's survey of 2,200 adults (only 1,399 of which are actual internet users, mind you) also indicates that 92% of web searchers feel they are confident in their own searching abilities.
I would hazard a guess that "actual internet users" means people who have an internet connection at home. Which would imply that the people outside of the 1,399 aer probably people who access the internet in a public area (cafe, library, town hall, etc..) or at their relative's home. So... no, I wouldn't guess that there is something wrong with the results. Simply something wrong with the way the report was written.
You want Rhythmbox. Personally I don't like players that do that. But if that's what you want, you want Rhythmbox. I use XMMS and Xine. And I think I'm eventually just going to use Xine alone. I tend to think that all the organizing of music should be left up to the ripping program. You do rip music from CD as opposed to downloading it from the net, right?
Too fucking bad they're laughing all the way to the bank.
And? How does that have any bearing on anything? Some of us aren't into computers to make money or "win" anything. We're into computers because we like what they can do for us and the free/open software world allows us to use them to fuller advantage. Sure it takes more work to do it than it would with Windows. But it also takes more effort to build a nice piece of furniture than it does to go to Ikea and buy some. Which would you rather have? The custom built piece or the prefab piece that rolled off a conveyor belt? I'd rather have the custom built piece myself. But that's just me. I hope you found this educational.:P
Bzzzzt! Oh so sorry! Try again. the_mad_poster is one of the few sane people left in this craptastic country full of assholes. I would say that 51% of this country are fucked up thinking dudes and dudettes who need some sort of proessional help. And Dionne Warwick's Psychic Friend's network or any of the myriad televangelists those crackers subscribe to don't count. Thanks for playing though.
...that there aren't more "geeks" who got into computers by way of artistic endeavors. I mean, what the hell man? I got into computers in order to do electronic music, so I knew exactly what the subject line meant. This is why I no longer consider myself a "geek". Sure, I do a lot of stuff that ould be considered geek-like. I love to compile all my software from source and hate RPMs. I try to automate as much as possible at home using Linux. My desktop systems are all Linux based. I run my own web, mail, and DNS servers. But I really only got into computers less than ten years ago. Before that I just used them to make music. First it was the Atari ST (excellent MIDI capabilities and software that blew everything else away at the time) that I used to really compose music in the traditional sense and then sequence it. I wasn't into the MOD scene because I don't work that way. I actually sit down at a MIDI keyboard and really play. Then in college I moved onto the Macs they had on campus (I still used the ST in my apartment). When I graduated in late 1994, I couldn't afford a Mac so I moved to Windows 3.1 which sucked massive ass at the time regarding MIDI and audio. Even Windows 95 and NT 4.0 sucked majorly where real music prodution was concerned. But I still couldn't afford a Mac. Finally in 1997 I got a job involving computers and started getting seriously interested. That's also when I moved to Linux full time. So yeah... I do geeky things, but I do them because they still support my music habit. I would have to say I'm primarily an artist who considers computers one of my instruments for creative outlet. Using the Planet CCRMA software and the ALSA driver for my Layla 20 digital audio interface, I've been able to do some more work in Linux now. It's always a shock to me that there aren't more people like me since almost everyone I knew who was an electronic musician in the 80s and 90s became a "computer guy" in the late 90s and early 2000s.
Heheheh. Yeah. Gotta love thos business e-mail correspondences from MrGolf99@hotmail.com. But that's exactly who I think they are targetting. They are trying to get the small and mid sized business people who don't have an IT infrastructure. There are plenty of sales folks who have hotmail.com accounts and use them frequently. And most of their customers don't seem to bristle at this the way we would. My Hotmail account was used for subscribing to sites/mailing lists that required passport. However, since Passport died an ugly death and some people got wise, those lists are now unfettered. I'm not a business person, so I care about my "techno" image.;P
...if people used the legal system to resolve actual problems instead of as an obstacle course? The SCO suit seems to be calculated to try and smear Linux rather than solve any real issues. The fact that SCO won't reveal what they claim to have as "proof" stands out in my mind as nothing but pure dishonesty.
...the average Hotmail user. They probably want to attract more business users to their service and Outlook is probably the way to do it. For those small and mid sized businesses that don't have and can't afford an Exchange server, this will probably be an answer to their prayers. Now, let's just hope MS doesn't treat them as shabbily as they treat most Hotmail users. I had a Hotmail account for a while until they lost my mail and wouldn't recover it for me. Ever since that experience and an ISP who stole my address and gave it to another customer after seven years of use, I now run my own mail server at home. After all, who can you trust with your e-mail if you can't trust yourself? Now if only it was possible for joe user to run mail and groupware services at home...
PDAs suck. I have yet to find one that doesn't come with useless crap like a day planner/contact list. I don't need that functionality and it's a waste of space for me. What I really want is a device that I can make do pretty much anything. If I want the device to be a thin client to my application server at home, then it should be able to do that. If I want it to be a media player, then it should be able to do that just by loading different software. Anything else just plain sucks.
I don't want resources to be wasted with useless crap that I don't need. I want the machine to be able to be wiped clean of all the boring business apps and instead be loaded up with useful things like X window, Xine, ssh, vncviewer, dasher. But I also would like it to just be dedicated competely to one task. All resources with the pedal to the metal just for kick ass performance on one task. This is not impossible with today's technology.
I still shake my head in wonder at the people who walk around with a cell phone, a PDA, a digital camera, a laptop or tablet PC, and an MP3 player all strapped to them at once. They look like present day court jesters or something. I don't want to look like that. I care about how I look, and I think wearing a bunch of digital devices looks bad. Having to lug all the around is just as bad as it looks too. I want this stuff to be completely concealed so that I look pretty much like myself, only augmented. That's my goal and we're not there yet. Proprietary software hasn't helped me reach that goal, but open software has helped me get a lot closer. At the moment, I have a tablet PC that I can use as a thin client to my application server at home. I use it with the Twiddler one-handed input device so that I don't have to use the keyboard or the useless virtual keys on the screen. If I could get the tablet to be 1/4th of it's present size and have it display a virtual screen on my glasses, I'd be even closer to what I want.
Good point. The gimp-print drivers for the Epson Photo printers in Linux way outperform the Windows drivers in quality of print. And they do it because that ine of printer is software driven.
The fascination people have with putting Ogg/DOOM/eBooks on random objects amuses the hell out of me. I have a Vorbis player on my iPaq, and an eBook reader on my iPod, and never use either of them. As for porting games...oi. I recommend a GameBoy.
That's the problem. I DON'T want to have to have multiple devices to do the things I want. I want one device that does it all. That's why I don't like PDAs. They are geared towards the business man. What is needed is a portable device that has the flexibility and power of a desktop computer, with many built in input devices (scrolll wheels, mousepad, camera, mic, line in, digital audio in, etc...). Personally, I'm an artist first and a computer guy second. The way I look at it, any portable machine that I use should be able to do anything I want it to based on the software I load. I shouldn't need discrete devices. I don't want to look like some kind of geek Rambo with a belt full of devices. That's just lame. I want to be able to wear my black turtleneck and wireframes with a clean shave while scripting with eye tracking and Dasher, talking to someone with voice over IP, taking pictures, making music and e-mailing all at the same time. (Or individually) But I want it all on one device. it's just not here yet. So we try to beat the existing devices into submission.
...just are not visionary enough. For all this talk of "innovation" from the closed side of the technology world, they sure can't see farther than their own faces. Here are some really good reasons why you would want to reprogram your camera:
1. Turn it into a temporary USB data storage device if it has a USB port on it 2. If it has audio capability, turn it into a digital audio recorder that works kind of like a mini-cassette recorder (ie. shitty quality, but lots of record time) 3. Make it into a "cam" that can be attached to your PC for live web cam stuff 4. Turn it into a video recorder for short clips in a format like MJPEG 5. Make it into an e-book reader that can read PDF or Postscript docs (after all many digital cameras have scroll wheels and multiple menu buttons, etc...) 6. Play some old school video games on them: Space Invaders, Pac Man, maybe even Doom. Doom's been done before... 7. Set it up for motion sensitive mode. It will span a picture only when something in the field of view moves 8. Or similar to above, in motion sensitive mode with USB, it could just dump the image straight to your PC whenever there is motion. Imagine combining this with a laptop to work as a spycam... 9. MP3 or Ogg Vobis player the works from CD or Flash media (again if your camera has audio capability) 10. A USB video monitor. Combine your camera with a Mac Mini and a foldup KB and mouse and you have a pretty compact but powerful system for travelling. (Yes, I don't mind squinting at small screens)
That's just ten ideas to get you started. I'm sure I'm not the only person with any imagination here... Note, I didn't say that these ideas would work for every camera, but they are feasible for at least some models. I'm pretty sure my Sony CD Mavica could do a lot more than it does right now. But I'm also pretty sure they probably have the OS on a ROM...
Mods: What is up above in known as a joke. It indicates that the poster has what is called a sense of humor. Although this sense of humor may be quirky, it does not warrant a negative moderation. Please moderate accordingly. You have been warned.
From what I hear, the performance of the Olivia Newton John (ONJ) was actually pretty high when compared to the early Pentiums. Sure it was a 16-bit processor with limited access to RAM, but for it's day, it had some truly unique innovations. Now... the performance of the Kylie Minogue is another thing entirely. That processor completely kicks the ass of even the lowly Itanium and Opteron processors. I, for one welcome our Aussie Pop Diva overclocked overlords. (That's overladies to you)
Slashdot Mirror
OK. Let me clarify. STUPID people need protection from themselves. Given that I think most people (no make that Americans) are stupid, I just left that word out in order to be somewhat polite. My apologies to those who are offended that I've been forced to add it in.
Next, "personal responsibility" is a crock of shit. The people (mostly libs) who go on about it the most usually haven't lifted a finger to get where they are in life. They've usually relied on mommy and daddy's money and haven't set foot outside of the gated community. The reason that all this "personal responsibility" rhetoric is complete twaddle is that there are a limited number of things you can take personal responsibility for. Sure you can prevent yourself from sticking your finger in a light socket. Great. You aren't a complete idiot. You can also go a little farther and educate yourself in various skills to provide for yourself. (Carpentry, electical work, auto repair, computers, gardening, etc...) This is also a good thing. It should that you are smart enough to be able to take some things into your own hands and be responsible for them. But that's about as far as it goes.
The bullshit that people sling around here like, "well the homeless person can go to evening classes if they really wanted to and then get a job and work their way up the ladder" doesn't fly in the real world. Or the idea that someone is responsible for their own addiction to a substance. Personally, I think that argument ends when you are talking about drugs that really prevent people from being able to think in any logical way and say, "oh this substance is making my life suck, I should stop now". Expecting an addict to just decide to quit using is equivalent to wishing that santa will come by and drop a few presents down your chimney on December 25th. Libs really don't operate with a full deck and overlook a lot of what reality throws in their faces.
Every one of you who replied to my previous post is a complete idiot. Yes, I do believe in what I stated above. I also believe that if you don't understand what I said, then you are in definite need of protection from your own incompetence to handle your own life. That is all.
You don't get it do you? People need protection from themselves. No one has the right to put their life at risk when an addiction is involved. Your father and grandfather didn't make a choice. They were hooked. It was intentional. They were given a substance that made them crave more. of that substance A substance that was designed to make people crave more. That substance was designed to make money for the people who own cigarette companies. A few million dead people don't matter when you're making a lot of money at their expense. Right? They were forced to smoke due to the addictive nature of nicotine. If I gave someone who was curious a few free rocks of crack (a Slashdot moderator for example) and they got hooked. Then I charged them for all future crack rocks. I'd be making a pretty nice income. You can't say that those people had a choice. Using an addictive substance ceases to be a choice one it enters your body.
You must be one scared dude if you have to believe that to make yourself feel better.
But I imagine it won't be any more forthcoming from the main source (The Planet) than the details of the SCO vs. IBM trial from SCOs side.
Yes. I'm sure you feel safe for months at a stretch when the men in white coats come to take you to the "citadel of data security" after such events. ;P
I would hazard a guess that "actual internet users" means people who have an internet connection at home. Which would imply that the people outside of the 1,399 aer probably people who access the internet in a public area (cafe, library, town hall, etc..) or at their relative's home. So... no, I wouldn't guess that there is something wrong with the results. Simply something wrong with the way the report was written.
You want Rhythmbox. Personally I don't like players that do that. But if that's what you want, you want Rhythmbox. I use XMMS and Xine. And I think I'm eventually just going to use Xine alone. I tend to think that all the organizing of music should be left up to the ripping program. You do rip music from CD as opposed to downloading it from the net, right?
Ever heard of Xine or MPlayer? They handle streaming media. So your statement is not teh true! ;P
And? How does that have any bearing on anything? Some of us aren't into computers to make money or "win" anything. We're into computers because we like what they can do for us and the free/open software world allows us to use them to fuller advantage. Sure it takes more work to do it than it would with Windows. But it also takes more effort to build a nice piece of furniture than it does to go to Ikea and buy some. Which would you rather have? The custom built piece or the prefab piece that rolled off a conveyor belt? I'd rather have the custom built piece myself. But that's just me. I hope you found this educational. :P
I'd like to tell you where to insert something... ;P
Bzzzzt! Oh so sorry! Try again. the_mad_poster is one of the few sane people left in this craptastic country full of assholes. I would say that 51% of this country are fucked up thinking dudes and dudettes who need some sort of proessional help. And Dionne Warwick's Psychic Friend's network or any of the myriad televangelists those crackers subscribe to don't count. Thanks for playing though.
Dear Mr. Rotund. How does one "roack"? Is it a sound? An action? Is it a new dance? Please elaborate on this stupidity. kthnx
...that there aren't more "geeks" who got into computers by way of artistic endeavors. I mean, what the hell man? I got into computers in order to do electronic music, so I knew exactly what the subject line meant. This is why I no longer consider myself a "geek". Sure, I do a lot of stuff that ould be considered geek-like. I love to compile all my software from source and hate RPMs. I try to automate as much as possible at home using Linux. My desktop systems are all Linux based. I run my own web, mail, and DNS servers. But I really only got into computers less than ten years ago. Before that I just used them to make music. First it was the Atari ST (excellent MIDI capabilities and software that blew everything else away at the time) that I used to really compose music in the traditional sense and then sequence it. I wasn't into the MOD scene because I don't work that way. I actually sit down at a MIDI keyboard and really play. Then in college I moved onto the Macs they had on campus (I still used the ST in my apartment). When I graduated in late 1994, I couldn't afford a Mac so I moved to Windows 3.1 which sucked massive ass at the time regarding MIDI and audio. Even Windows 95 and NT 4.0 sucked majorly where real music prodution was concerned. But I still couldn't afford a Mac. Finally in 1997 I got a job involving computers and started getting seriously interested. That's also when I moved to Linux full time. So yeah... I do geeky things, but I do them because they still support my music habit. I would have to say I'm primarily an artist who considers computers one of my instruments for creative outlet. Using the Planet CCRMA software and the ALSA driver for my Layla 20 digital audio interface, I've been able to do some more work in Linux now. It's always a shock to me that there aren't more people like me since almost everyone I knew who was an electronic musician in the 80s and 90s became a "computer guy" in the late 90s and early 2000s.
Heheheh. Yeah. Gotta love thos business e-mail correspondences from MrGolf99@hotmail.com. But that's exactly who I think they are targetting. They are trying to get the small and mid sized business people who don't have an IT infrastructure. There are plenty of sales folks who have hotmail.com accounts and use them frequently. And most of their customers don't seem to bristle at this the way we would. My Hotmail account was used for subscribing to sites/mailing lists that required passport. However, since Passport died an ugly death and some people got wise, those lists are now unfettered. I'm not a business person, so I care about my "techno" image. ;P
...if people used the legal system to resolve actual problems instead of as an obstacle course? The SCO suit seems to be calculated to try and smear Linux rather than solve any real issues. The fact that SCO won't reveal what they claim to have as "proof" stands out in my mind as nothing but pure dishonesty.
...the average Hotmail user. They probably want to attract more business users to their service and Outlook is probably the way to do it. For those small and mid sized businesses that don't have and can't afford an Exchange server, this will probably be an answer to their prayers. Now, let's just hope MS doesn't treat them as shabbily as they treat most Hotmail users. I had a Hotmail account for a while until they lost my mail and wouldn't recover it for me. Ever since that experience and an ISP who stole my address and gave it to another customer after seven years of use, I now run my own mail server at home. After all, who can you trust with your e-mail if you can't trust yourself? Now if only it was possible for joe user to run mail and groupware services at home...
Ladies (ostensibly) and gentlemen, meet Slashdot's first self negating story. God it's getting worse around here by the day. ;P
Hehehe. I didn't. At least not until one of my replies.
PDAs suck. I have yet to find one that doesn't come with useless crap like a day planner/contact list. I don't need that functionality and it's a waste of space for me. What I really want is a device that I can make do pretty much anything. If I want the device to be a thin client to my application server at home, then it should be able to do that. If I want it to be a media player, then it should be able to do that just by loading different software. Anything else just plain sucks.
I don't want resources to be wasted with useless crap that I don't need. I want the machine to be able to be wiped clean of all the boring business apps and instead be loaded up with useful things like X window, Xine, ssh, vncviewer, dasher. But I also would like it to just be dedicated competely to one task. All resources with the pedal to the metal just for kick ass performance on one task. This is not impossible with today's technology.
I still shake my head in wonder at the people who walk around with a cell phone, a PDA, a digital camera, a laptop or tablet PC, and an MP3 player all strapped to them at once. They look like present day court jesters or something. I don't want to look like that. I care about how I look, and I think wearing a bunch of digital devices looks bad. Having to lug all the around is just as bad as it looks too. I want this stuff to be completely concealed so that I look pretty much like myself, only augmented. That's my goal and we're not there yet. Proprietary software hasn't helped me reach that goal, but open software has helped me get a lot closer. At the moment, I have a tablet PC that I can use as a thin client to my application server at home. I use it with the Twiddler one-handed input device so that I don't have to use the keyboard or the useless virtual keys on the screen. If I could get the tablet to be 1/4th of it's present size and have it display a virtual screen on my glasses, I'd be even closer to what I want.
Good point. The gimp-print drivers for the Epson Photo printers in Linux way outperform the Windows drivers in quality of print. And they do it because that ine of printer is software driven.
That's the problem. I DON'T want to have to have multiple devices to do the things I want. I want one device that does it all. That's why I don't like PDAs. They are geared towards the business man. What is needed is a portable device that has the flexibility and power of a desktop computer, with many built in input devices (scrolll wheels, mousepad, camera, mic, line in, digital audio in, etc...). Personally, I'm an artist first and a computer guy second. The way I look at it, any portable machine that I use should be able to do anything I want it to based on the software I load. I shouldn't need discrete devices. I don't want to look like some kind of geek Rambo with a belt full of devices. That's just lame. I want to be able to wear my black turtleneck and wireframes with a clean shave while scripting with eye tracking and Dasher, talking to someone with voice over IP, taking pictures, making music and e-mailing all at the same time. (Or individually) But I want it all on one device. it's just not here yet. So we try to beat the existing devices into submission.
...just are not visionary enough. For all this talk of "innovation" from the closed side of the technology world, they sure can't see farther than their own faces. Here are some really good reasons why you would want to reprogram your camera:
1. Turn it into a temporary USB data storage device if it has a USB port on it
2. If it has audio capability, turn it into a digital audio recorder that works kind of like a mini-cassette recorder (ie. shitty quality, but lots of record time)
3. Make it into a "cam" that can be attached to your PC for live web cam stuff
4. Turn it into a video recorder for short clips in a format like MJPEG
5. Make it into an e-book reader that can read PDF or Postscript docs (after all many digital cameras have scroll wheels and multiple menu buttons, etc...)
6. Play some old school video games on them: Space Invaders, Pac Man, maybe even Doom. Doom's been done before...
7. Set it up for motion sensitive mode. It will span a picture only when something in the field of view moves
8. Or similar to above, in motion sensitive mode with USB, it could just dump the image straight to your PC whenever there is motion. Imagine combining this with a laptop to work as a spycam...
9. MP3 or Ogg Vobis player the works from CD or Flash media (again if your camera has audio capability)
10. A USB video monitor. Combine your camera with a Mac Mini and a foldup KB and mouse and you have a pretty compact but powerful system for travelling. (Yes, I don't mind squinting at small screens)
That's just ten ideas to get you started. I'm sure I'm not the only person with any imagination here... Note, I didn't say that these ideas would work for every camera, but they are feasible for at least some models. I'm pretty sure my Sony CD Mavica could do a lot more than it does right now. But I'm also pretty sure they probably have the OS on a ROM...
...but does it run Linux? ;P
Mods: What is up above in known as a joke. It indicates that the poster has what is called a sense of humor. Although this sense of humor may be quirky, it does not warrant a negative moderation. Please moderate accordingly. You have been warned.
From what I hear, the performance of the Olivia Newton John (ONJ) was actually pretty high when compared to the early Pentiums. Sure it was a 16-bit processor with limited access to RAM, but for it's day, it had some truly unique innovations. Now... the performance of the Kylie Minogue is another thing entirely. That processor completely kicks the ass of even the lowly Itanium and Opteron processors. I, for one welcome our Aussie Pop Diva overclocked overlords. (That's overladies to you)