"Is it just me or is slashdot's headlines as of late running parallel to the average idiots way of describing everything as a war?"
In somebody's defense, they probably just picked up the concept and terminology from large telcos. If you go to a large network operations center (say like what AT&T operates in Piscataway, NJ) you will find two or more good-sized conference rooms provisioned with 10-15 workstations each that sit idle 99 percent of the time. Just used in cases of major outages/problems or sometimes for network upgrades. Known as the "war rooms" for as long as I am aware.
I am not job hunting, but I still get emails and notices from recruiting companies. I don't unsubscribe myself from these notices as I find some of them interesting with respect to the types of projects that are going on.
Over the past 6 months, I have gotten a couple of emails about a project manager position and another contract position for a 1000+ desktop rollout planned for 2008 at "the world's largest aircraft company". I think I know who they are referring to. In Redmond's back yard.
"If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free." -- P.J. O'Rourke
You should ask P.J.O'Rourke about infant mortality and longevity stats in places like Sweden and France and what percent of their GDP is expended on health care.
So we got a couple of strategies dealing with this:
I think it would be fair to say that the strategy and intent of Mono has been debated as "good idea" and "bad idea" for a long time and this Silverlight case is just the latest episode. I would say that for a long time I remained ambivalent. As with this calm delineation of "So we got a couple strategies", there always seemed to be some merit to the "face reality: Microsoft technologies will be in play and Linux shouldn't be left out." argument.
But times have changed. At least from a leadership standpoint, Mono has certainly seemed tied to, aligned with, and employed by Novell. A year ago that might not have mattered as much. But with the MSFT-Novell deal, Novell stupidly made itself anathema and in such a way that appears to be irreversible. And this extends to Novell's "family" who did not manage to flee the burning wreck. Mono,? Miguel? Anathema.
So calm, pragmatic assertions of "So we got a couple strategies" no longer matter. When you've been caught on tape drinking the Kool Aid, it won't help to explain to folks how cool and useful it is to piss purple.
Why don't the people who think everyone should have free/subsidized healthcare just shut up and put their money where their mouths are. All you have to do is start a non-profit which will collect donations and use them to pay the premiums (in whole or in part) of the people who would otherwise not have insurance.
Ah the Libertarian utopia, where you can pay cash to have a neighborhood entrepreneur lay down a mile of Interstate as soon as you get the urge to drive somewhere.
Another is refusing to read anything about or by anyone who has anything to do with Ireland, although I make an exception for Nuala O'Faolain, and you should too.
Well! Thank God Patrick O'Brian wasn't really Irish, or I'd be one doomed grass-combing bugger.
Juha-Matti Laurio writes to point out a Washington Times story
Juha-Matti, being from Finland, may have incorrectly formed the impression that the Washington Times is a newspaper. I can see how he might have missed the fact that the WT (along with UPI) is a propaganda outlet operated by Sun Myung Moon.
So *that's* what happened to my 500!! In 1987 I had a rabbit ear antenna fall down behind my desk and it let the magic smoke out of my Amiga. I cried, but I didn't clue in that it was a design flaw (parallel port). Thanks. That makes too much sense. I will sleep more soundly tonight.
"Anyone who has been flying very often for very long knows:"
Anyone. Anyone, he says so assuredly! Well, I have about 750,000 air miles since ~1995 and I am going to guess, from the quality of your breezy analysis, that you don't have quite that many.
While there are a few aspects of your post that merit consideration (on-line booking say), on the whole your analysis is whacked.
"Today, you can book online easily and get your boarding pass from an easy-check-in kiosk."
Easy, that is, until you encounter a glitch and you discover that the people behind the machine taking in bags don't actually work for that airline and can't help you. And you are 10th in line for the one person who seems to actually work for the airline. Easy until your flight cancels due to a mechanical and your beloved e-ticket is worth squat for getting rebooked on that other carrier's flight that leaves in 45 minutes.
Oh, and I am glad that you are actually enjoying reduced seat pitch.
It does not seem like Cringely is an unremitting idiot. I found _Accidental Empires_ to be one of the best books I have ever read on the culture of microcomputer technology and business. His columns in Infoworld (when it was the "real" Cringely) were entertaining and informative. Let's get real, his job is, in great part, to speculate -- give us a little of the "What if?". His speculations and predictions aren't always right. Hardly. But he does a much better, much more well-informed, job than his (seriously blowhard) contemporaries. His clock is right *way* more than twice a day.
Before anybody is tempted to rake him over the coals and/or diss his contributions over the past 15 years, I hope you can say that you've read AE.
"This article is poor (I would say unethical) coverage of a scientific study. [snip...] Also, with this studay, they found out people who had tumors, then asked them if they used cell phones. The subjects probably had no doubt as to why this question was being asked, therefore this was not really a double blind experiment."
I will not argue that the CNet article represents this study very well, but if you are going to complain so casually about coverage of this study -- even calling it unethical -- it would help if some of your supporting arguments and complaints weren't so lousy.
You seem to have no notion of the differences between a retrospective case-contol study (which is what the researchers conducted) and a prospective clinical trial (where you could reasonably employ double-blind methods).
If you look past CNet and find the original article in the International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health you will see that the study included over 2000 control subjects.
It is possible to design lousy studies of any type. There are also reasons to be cautious in interepreting the results of retrospective studies, but particularly in the case of low-incidence disease, they are often the only way to start looking at risk factors -- give policy makers at least something to start working with. So, until you come up with 3 billion dollars and an ethical design for a perfect double-blind cell phone study, I would encourage you to be a bit more forgiving.
I will now retire to consider what a placebo cell phone would look like.
Awwww, bugger. I thought he posted it that way to make a sarcastic point about how unreadable the LinuxWorld web site is.
I mean, is their webmaster on drugs? Does Sybase pay money to be associated with such madness?
And what the heck did that article say?
Slashdot Mirror
Go back to reading Atlas Shrugged.
My Dad, age 87, who can no longer read his pill bottles, would still kick your punk ass.
Somebody please mod this jerk down.
1-800-4SAURON Very affordable rates. 100% guarantee. J
In somebody's defense, they probably just picked up the concept and terminology from large telcos. If you go to a large network operations center (say like what AT&T operates in Piscataway, NJ) you will find two or more good-sized conference rooms provisioned with 10-15 workstations each that sit idle 99 percent of the time. Just used in cases of major outages/problems or sometimes for network upgrades. Known as the "war rooms" for as long as I am aware.
I am not job hunting, but I still get emails and notices from recruiting companies. I don't unsubscribe myself from these notices as I find some of them interesting with respect to the types of projects that are going on.
Over the past 6 months, I have gotten a couple of emails about a project manager position and another contract position for a 1000+ desktop rollout planned for 2008 at "the world's largest aircraft company". I think I know who they are referring to. In Redmond's back yard.
The email says it is an XP rollout.
You should ask P.J.O'Rourke about infant mortality and longevity stats in places like Sweden and France and what percent of their GDP is expended on health care.
Don't worry. No chance of that happening. You will only lose karma.
I think it would be fair to say that the strategy and intent of Mono has been debated as "good idea" and "bad idea" for a long time and this Silverlight case is just the latest episode. I would say that for a long time I remained ambivalent. As with this calm delineation of "So we got a couple strategies", there always seemed to be some merit to the "face reality: Microsoft technologies will be in play and Linux shouldn't be left out." argument.
But times have changed. At least from a leadership standpoint, Mono has certainly seemed tied to, aligned with, and employed by Novell. A year ago that might not have mattered as much. But with the MSFT-Novell deal, Novell stupidly made itself anathema and in such a way that appears to be irreversible. And this extends to Novell's "family" who did not manage to flee the burning wreck. Mono,? Miguel? Anathema.
So calm, pragmatic assertions of "So we got a couple strategies" no longer matter. When you've been caught on tape drinking the Kool Aid, it won't help to explain to folks how cool and useful it is to piss purple.
Why don't the people who think everyone should have free/subsidized healthcare just shut up and put their money where their mouths are. All you have to do is start a non-profit which will collect donations and use them to pay the premiums (in whole or in part) of the people who would otherwise not have insurance. Ah the Libertarian utopia, where you can pay cash to have a neighborhood entrepreneur lay down a mile of Interstate as soon as you get the urge to drive somewhere.
Well! Thank God Patrick O'Brian wasn't really Irish, or I'd be one doomed grass-combing bugger.
Juha-Matti, being from Finland, may have incorrectly formed the impression that the Washington Times is a newspaper. I can see how he might have missed the fact that the WT (along with UPI) is a propaganda outlet operated by Sun Myung Moon.
So *that's* what happened to my 500!! In 1987 I had a rabbit ear antenna fall down behind my desk and it let the magic smoke out of my Amiga. I cried, but I didn't clue in that it was a design flaw (parallel port). Thanks. That makes too much sense. I will sleep more soundly tonight.
Anyone. Anyone, he says so assuredly! Well, I have about 750,000 air miles since ~1995 and I am going to guess, from the quality of your breezy analysis, that you don't have quite that many.
While there are a few aspects of your post that merit consideration (on-line booking say), on the whole your analysis is whacked.
"Today, you can book online easily and get your boarding pass from an easy-check-in kiosk."
Easy, that is, until you encounter a glitch and you discover that the people behind the machine taking in bags don't actually work for that airline and can't help you. And you are 10th in line for the one person who seems to actually work for the airline. Easy until your flight cancels due to a mechanical and your beloved e-ticket is worth squat for getting rebooked on that other carrier's flight that leaves in 45 minutes.
Oh, and I am glad that you are actually enjoying reduced seat pitch.
Whacked.
It does not seem like Cringely is an unremitting idiot. I found _Accidental Empires_ to be one of the best books I have ever read on the culture of microcomputer technology and business. His columns in Infoworld (when it was the "real" Cringely) were entertaining and informative. Let's get real, his job is, in great part, to speculate -- give us a little of the "What if?". His speculations and predictions aren't always right. Hardly. But he does a much better, much more well-informed, job than his (seriously blowhard) contemporaries. His clock is right *way* more than twice a day.
Before anybody is tempted to rake him over the coals and/or diss his contributions over the past 15 years, I hope you can say that you've read AE.
I will not argue that the CNet article represents this study very well, but if you are going to complain so casually about coverage of this study -- even calling it unethical -- it would help if some of your supporting arguments and complaints weren't so lousy.
You seem to have no notion of the differences between a retrospective case-contol study (which is what the researchers conducted) and a prospective clinical trial (where you could reasonably employ double-blind methods).
If you look past CNet and find the original article in the International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health you will see that the study included over 2000 control subjects.
It is possible to design lousy studies of any type. There are also reasons to be cautious in interepreting the results of retrospective studies, but particularly in the case of low-incidence disease, they are often the only way to start looking at risk factors -- give policy makers at least something to start working with. So, until you come up with 3 billion dollars and an ethical design for a perfect double-blind cell phone study, I would encourage you to be a bit more forgiving.
I will now retire to consider what a placebo cell phone would look like.
Whaaaa? 38 pivot-table posts on /. and nobody has mentioned Lotus Improv yet?
Fixed.
Awwww, bugger. I thought he posted it that way to make a sarcastic point about how unreadable the LinuxWorld web site is. I mean, is their webmaster on drugs? Does Sybase pay money to be associated with such madness? And what the heck did that article say?