There are people on the sex offender list merely "caught" peeing in bushes and then charged with exposing themselves. And how about teens texting nude pics of themselves and charged with child porn? It has become a district attorney's game where they can claim putting X number of sex offenders away. Lots of good people's lives ruined for political bullshit. And the list itself becomes nearly worthless in telling good people from bad.
Animal abusers shouldn't be put on lists. It's disgusting what they did, they should be punished and that's it. But where is the line? If I step on some insects walking or accidently drive into an squirrel crushing it (but not killing it), will a DA who has it out for me (or is merely looking to get reelected) charge me on a high crime betting that I will plea bargain a deal that includes putting me on this list?
America has an obsession with punishing people one way or another for life (I think after people are released from prison for a felony, they can't get a passport which means they can never travel abroad again) for things that don't even approach murder/rape but with like tax evasion. We don't need to become an ever more punitive society for lesser and lesser offenses.
As a gamer this saddens me. As a parent I applaud the effort.
As a parent, you seem to be a reactionary retard that applauds "For the Children" campaigns mindlessly w/o considering the true motives of the people behind it nor the true societal burden/value of your perceived ideeal solution.
I would venture on the whole of society, violent games have a cathartic effect rather than a columbine one. Humans don't like rainbows and everyone being happy, they are attracted to violence and strife. If the games don't give it to them, they'll turn elsewhere.
No matter how noble or righteous you might think ripping up your lawn and replacing it with wood chips is, it is still violating the ordinance.
Let me introduce you to the concept of "Limited Government". There are hundreds of thousands of Federal laws - not just statutes, but via treaties, bureaucracies creating their own laws, what have you. You are in violation of at least several right now, I guarantee it. Everyone is. Just because it's on the books doesn't mean it itself is legal or can be enforced.
A city's government doesn't own your property. They should have very limited rights to tell you what to do with it, especially if it costs money, and one consideration is safety. Beyond that, I look down at most laws. Especially "property" value. What is property worth when you can't do anything with it anymore except conforming to everyone else?
Soldiers that come home shell shocked, traumatized for the rest of their lives but on the other side some becoming writers or what not and sharing the horrors of war with the general public.
Or soldiers largely untouched, but treating their experience like it was a video they watched on digg or a video game, completely detached from the inhumanity of it all - heck, during their lunch break, they may go to Walmart to get a game that will be more exciting to play after work. Even a current fighter pilot faces death, if somewhat distanced to what his weapons do on the ground.
I, for one, will never buy another OCZ product again. I bought a "Solid Series" a little over a year ago when newegg reviews (about a dozen at the time) only had good things to say about them. They were pretty fast in the beginning.
About half-a-year later, the thing started stuttering for seconds on end, much worse than any non-broken spinning disk I encountered. It was a little over half full, that's it. Turns out that they put in crappy controllers, I guess. Not fully sure. Now the company says they're not good at stand-a-lone performance, suddenly they called it a "value series", and that you should "upgrade" to a premium series for that, but they're still good for arrays and the like.
They certainly didn't assert or say that anywhere at the time of sale, it's just a belated excuse for shipping a crap product to people that paid good money.
The Mosques in Germany were infamous for getting a building permit for, say, 2 stories and then building a multistory monstrosity and ignoring any local goverment - either eating the fines or ignoring them relying on the Politically correct to shut up any opposition while they go ahead and dominate their neighbors sunlight and skyline.
Can't imagine it was much different in neighboring Switzerland.
Ah, but you're making a mistake. It may be cruel and unusual, but it is not punishment. Therefore, the eighth amendment does not apply.;)
Scalia made a similar argument against the unconstitutionality of torture. It was brilliant! And someone should probably reword the eighth amendment...
It doesn't need to be reworded. People who interpret things stop need to be twisting around. The 10 bill of Rights all block the government from taking certain actions. It's in effect when the government is in effect.
Some people may point out these are civil trial, but who enforces the findings of the court? Government. Otherwise the judgements would be voluntary and not binding. Therefore, these punishments are unconstitutional.
I can tell TV and HDTV, but (ignoring aspect ratio) they would need to be side by side or have a picture where either there is an amount of small text or the detail jumps out at you like a detailed landscape. People in suits on talk shows with bland backgrounds will be harder, although the face/hair gives it away.
I would assume, you too, could tell TV vs HD, just use get your monitor to think it's projecting to your normal resolution and somehow downgrade the signal along the way to 640x480 somehow (idk if this is possible, not talking about setting the resolution to 640x480). Or even easier, go to an HDTV and connect the computer to it via an S-Video connector - I old G4 macbook had this option, you'll see the entire picture but it's downgraded to 480i, painful.
People like to draw the comparison with civil engineering, where an engineer may be liable (even criminally) if, say, a bridge collapsed. But this isn't really the same thing. We're not talking about software that simply fails and causes damage. We're talking about software that fails when people deliberately attack it. This would be like holding a civil engineer responsible when a terrorist blows up a bridge -- he should have planned for a bomb being placed in just such-and-such location and made the bridge more resistant to attack.
Not only that, but civil/mechanical/other engineers usually know exactly what they are dealing with - a Civil engineer may specify the type of concrete used, car engineer may specify the alloy of steel.
Most of the time, software engineers don't have that luxury. Video Game consoles (and still are, mostly) used to be nice that way and it was the reason they had fewer problems than PCs.
Tell a bridge engineer that he has no absolutely control over the hardware he has to work with and that it may have a billion variations, and see if he signs his name to it.
Agreed 100%. I also was more dismissive when I first saw the iPad, to the point where I wondered why it didn't have an add-on keyboard like always innovating's netbook (which this IBM slate seems to have copied in a way), but now I went through Apple's presentation days ago - I have to say this product might have a chance.
Yeah, you can do a "million more" things on a netbook/notebook/desktop - but why would Apple try to have a new product compete with their own line-up, let alone all that is already out there. Looking at the iPad, I would say it's not in competition with notebooks, not even small ones. It's in competition with the Amazon Kindle and other e-readers. I owned a Kindle for about 3 weeks -- while I appreciate the battery life e-ink gives, it was bad contrast, slow rendering, and gives a horrible web experience. And that is what the iPad is aiming at -- much like how the iPod came into a marketplace that already had years of mp3 players.
Idk if it will be successful, but I think the geeks dismissing it for the wrong reasons - the limited view of their own demographic, wants and needs.
While I won't get one for myself, I'm thinking of getting one for my father. He wants to email and surf basically - but he never extensively used a computer in his life beyond an ATM or digital watch - and he still stumbles with the most basic laptops. He's not a stupid man, but doesn't have the benefit of our generation. Even many people in their 30s and 40s are like that - I tried teaching my uncle to use a computer - he just got a laptop. But its frustrating for us both --- when you use computers all the time, you just don't consciously realize anymore how many quirks and rules you put up with to use the thing. He wants to email pictures he took with a digital camera - damn, teaching concept of file systems, file size, possible resizing, etcetera. Not an easy task for a newbie.
I think that's what the iPad is aimed at - making the computing experience as appliance like as possible. Push a button, the thing turns on. I thought the lack of keyboard would hurt it - but guess what - traditional tablets have been tried and none were successful yet. The first and second IBM video is extremely counter to this - just way too many active gadgets on the screen at once and touching that circle thing and dragging it is way too cumbersome (windows-like paradigm) instead of clicking something once and it doing what you want. The screen also seems way too big as a tablet, although the way it pops out is extremely cool.
If Apple succeeds here, it's because they're going into an untapped market - not because they're doing what everybody else is doing (hint: tablets have been long made -- nearly nobody wants). It could flop tremendously as well, but I think the halls of Slashdot, populated by people to whom computers are second nature, are the wrong opinions to go by.
Here's what should *not* determine when to end support: "I'm a programmer and working with this old API is soooo painful and my compiles take a few seconds longer! Whine!"
Firefox is a free browser... if the API gets too painful, and maintainability becomes a nightmare -- why shouldn't a company decide its limited resources are served better elsewhere?
I am interested in your experience using the Smartpen. Do you have time to go back and review your notes or listen to the audio? Do you transfer the notes to PDF and file the documents in your normal folders on your computer? Seems like a good product. In grad school we took notes in class and then re-wrote them into another notebook. We consulted with classmates in case our notes were vague or missing. We then used our condensed notes to study for the qualifying exams. But that took a great deal of time and had very high value, so we put in the time. At work I might not have too much "review time" but it would be nice to have my notes somewhere in one place that I can search upon. Currently handwritten notes go into folders, but you have to remember which folder you might have stored the note. If I write clearly enough it sounds like you can search entire notebooks.
I have one, but my experience isn't intensive. When you go to charge the pen, it uploads the files on to your computer and then you can make PDF or other pages.
Conversely, I don't really look at that in my classes - my notes are sparse -- I can make a keyword here are there, or just a doodle -- and when reviewing my notebook, I just hit anything I wrote, and the audio goes directly to that part of the lecture.
There are videos showing it. Neat bit of technology.
Seems to work better in small rooms vs huge lecture halls.
Nobody trusts Paypal, but there is no viable alternative. Not yet, anyway, but that can't take long in light of these shenenigans.
They've been saying that about the shenanigans since the beginning of the 2000s.
The fact is that Paypal acts like a bank but without any of the regulations. A bank can't freeze your assets and the like just because they don't like you or what you do -- only the government can do that. Something's got to give here: the last crisis showed banks can't regulate themselves on a trustworthy level.
There are alternatives: google checkout and a myriad of others. Since ebay doesn't allow competition to their paypal - it makes it harder though...
Judging from my own experiences as someone who has suffered from depression for roughly half of my life (and someone who has attempted to end it), I would have to say that depression is the cause, and heavy internet use is the symptom. It's an escape mechanism. Instead of constantly thinking of death, you can get on the Web and try to distract yourself.
Couldn't internet addiction, be part of a feedback cycle keeping you depressed? Less sun, less contact with people firsthand, less social life, and if it's addiction, less sense of accomplishment (because you get less accomplished), declining hygiene standards, etcetera.
The internet is one good way of connecting with people but still being secluded and feeling empty. I mean, being "friended" on facebook, a number tons of people promote, ends up being a good illustration on the tons of superficial relationships typical of online life -- making depression even worse. (To be sure, there are sites that facilitate sociality like meetup groups and dating sites...)
I seen friends go through that and also feel that way just working on a computer most of the day at times, without the addiction part (which is why I ride a bike to work now...)
Maybe it's because many of us hate school growing up, you watch the clock all the time. Because it's boring, anxiety due to bullies, puberty, an oral presentation coming up, you don't have your homework done, etcetera.
I know school was the worst period in my life. Kids want to have fun, and school is a factory-like drill, and by the time you're an adult, it's ingrained to you, so you don't notice it as much.
Idk, but as soon as I got out of high school and the rigid drill, time just seems to be going faster -- and I don't think it's because an internal switch been flicked when I was 17 -- more likely I just enjoyed what I was doing more. Even college was faster, maybe the flexible classes or that almost 80% was what you chose, not what was foisted upon you.
It might also explain why time after school, weekends, and vacations went by so fast for me as a kid.
It's usually underwhelming to geeks... which doesn't always mean much.
Maybe the iPad will be a success. Maybe it won't. But geeks are a small demographic, some of who have an extremely myopic view of the importance of some features.
For the life of me, I cannot get tenses correct in a lengthy piece of writing. Even when the mistakes are pointed out, I don't recognize them.
But there are things in English that make it hard to learn as well. In languages like German, except for some imported words, pronunciation and spelling went hand in hand and are extremely consistent.
How would you pronounce this:
"Ghoti"
If the "gh" was pronounced like like it was in "tough", the "o" like it was in "women", and the "ti" as in "nation"? And that's just the tip of the iceberg on our arbitrary rules.
"cuz", "u", and other slang are just simplifications.
I'm just glad we have a latin alphabet and don't have to learn kanji and the like. Talk about a long-winded system.
It's no surprise that as car companies come into this country, they go more to the South and a wide swath away from the unions. I believe Mercedes-Benz opened a plant in Alabama in the 1990s for this reason.
Walmart also is anti-union; when a man up in Canada started a union in a store up there, Walmart shut it down rather than deal with the possible spread of unions throughout its workforce and as a warning.
However, Costco is very minimally unions, something like 10-15% of its workforce, and it always has paid well. This comes from the philosophy of its founder (who paid himself 250k a year and it went down from there for Executives, years back).
My friends wanted to do a convention in Philadelphia in 2008. But, because of unions (and not just location), renting the pretty medium hall would have cost 100K. So they held just outside Philly, for the same size hall, it came to 12K. Nearly 10% of the cost.
Even unions find unions overpriced. You mention Germany, one of the biggest unions over there was found to have deplorable working conditions in its offices for its own employees - because they hire a mostly nonunionized workforce. Janitors and the like.
Unions aren't always the way to good wages, I'm sure Google, Microsoft, etcetera, pay it's workers well. When entrenched, they seem to be completely inflexible, and worse, have an artificial monopoly on special powers given by the government.
I almost wish unions were broken in two seperate entities: a workplace safety union that only striked and negotiated about workplace safety and working conditions. One where strikers couldn't be fired. Another union whose concern was pay and benefits, where strikers could be fired. They also wouldn't be allowed the same leadership or be able to strike at the same time as the previous safety union to avoid conflict of interest. The parent company has to operate in the free market, so should they.
I would say even the high cost of living in America is borne by unions. One small example: compared to Europe, there is extremely high rent everyplace I go in America -- except maybe in the boondocks of the boondocks. I would suppose part of this is to offset the property/school taxes everyone (and every business) has to pay directly/indirectly. And schools have unionized teachers. I have relatives as teachers. At least in the richer suburbs, they get paid extremely well, if you add in the benefits and health care plan. Much better than many small businesses can eke out for their employees.
In a lot of places in Europe, people want to be bureacrats of one sort or another. They even polled this in France. Why? Because they know if an f-ing secure job and overall well-to-do job in the long run. I would say it's the same here.
And yes, there is a pay disparity in the America's top corporations. It is entrenched in American culture and is spreading (a decade ago, the CEO of DaimlerBenz made only $2M) outside it. I don't know how to solve that. It is unfortunate and seems to vary company by company, perhaps a symptom of Wall Street.
America won't wake up. They built this industrial power, much of it based on cheap wages (partially as a result of our own unions pushing theirs too high. Look at towns like the suburbs of Detroit and Flint, Michigan -- because unions are led from the top, there isn't an ounce of timely self-preservation when eaten from the bottom). In return, we gave the Chinese our technology, methods of production, and the rest in exchange for cheap junk now -- and are led to dream this will open up a huge market for America, perhaps as huge as the American car market is in Japan.
BTW, where did you move to? Canada, though small in population, seems to be in the upswing, and at least their health care system is sane...
Even Linus readily acknowledges that the world needs more than the Linux model, that the Windows and OS X can all co-exist.
And I hear people talking all the time that OS X is a joy to program for, and not particularly hard.
The iPod/iPhone/iPad is in the form factor that's best suited to appliance. That is, most (90+%) just want them to work. Where even the most polished desktop is too complicated for their tastes and task at hand. Shouldn't their demands be met? BTW, I'm not covering for DRM or the like which only serves the content provider -- just that the appliance view of things is really useful to some people.
Do we complain how the Kindle or past Nokia phones are essentially closed to the average person the same way? Why is this reserved for Apple?
Really. I taught my 45 y/o uncle how to use a computer (Windows 7), his experience to computers limited previously to ATMs. It was painful. There is so much to learn that us geeks take for granted. The computer's behavior is so seemingly arbitrary at times, as are the solutions sometimes. These people don't want a "sense of wonder", they found it in other areas already and they want to have something easy to learn and use - should they be denied entrance into the digital world because they're not geeky enough? Geez, I'm glad when I don't have to fuck around with yet another relatives beige box for once.
I hope that the open PC never goes away. But there should be room for other solutions without the endless complaining. (And yes, the steps Apple does to clamp down their devices from the users themselves, who want to explore and not through misuse, absolutely sucks and should be called on it every step of the way).
Slashdot Mirror
There are people on the sex offender list merely "caught" peeing in bushes and then charged with exposing themselves. And how about teens texting nude pics of themselves and charged with child porn? It has become a district attorney's game where they can claim putting X number of sex offenders away. Lots of good people's lives ruined for political bullshit. And the list itself becomes nearly worthless in telling good people from bad.
Animal abusers shouldn't be put on lists. It's disgusting what they did, they should be punished and that's it. But where is the line? If I step on some insects walking or accidently drive into an squirrel crushing it (but not killing it), will a DA who has it out for me (or is merely looking to get reelected) charge me on a high crime betting that I will plea bargain a deal that includes putting me on this list?
America has an obsession with punishing people one way or another for life (I think after people are released from prison for a felony, they can't get a passport which means they can never travel abroad again) for things that don't even approach murder/rape but with like tax evasion. We don't need to become an ever more punitive society for lesser and lesser offenses.
As a parent, you seem to be a reactionary retard that applauds "For the Children" campaigns mindlessly w/o considering the true motives of the people behind it nor the true societal burden/value of your perceived ideeal solution.
I would venture on the whole of society, violent games have a cathartic effect rather than a columbine one. Humans don't like rainbows and everyone being happy, they are attracted to violence and strife. If the games don't give it to them, they'll turn elsewhere.
Let me introduce you to the concept of "Limited Government". There are hundreds of thousands of Federal laws - not just statutes, but via treaties, bureaucracies creating their own laws, what have you. You are in violation of at least several right now, I guarantee it. Everyone is. Just because it's on the books doesn't mean it itself is legal or can be enforced.
A city's government doesn't own your property. They should have very limited rights to tell you what to do with it, especially if it costs money, and one consideration is safety. Beyond that, I look down at most laws. Especially "property" value. What is property worth when you can't do anything with it anymore except conforming to everyone else?
But what about the microphones? Tape doesn't help so much.
Soldiers that come home shell shocked, traumatized for the rest of their lives but on the other side some becoming writers or what not and sharing the horrors of war with the general public.
Or soldiers largely untouched, but treating their experience like it was a video they watched on digg or a video game, completely detached from the inhumanity of it all - heck, during their lunch break, they may go to Walmart to get a game that will be more exciting to play after work. Even a current fighter pilot faces death, if somewhat distanced to what his weapons do on the ground.
I, for one, will never buy another OCZ product again. I bought a "Solid Series" a little over a year ago when newegg reviews (about a dozen at the time) only had good things to say about them. They were pretty fast in the beginning.
About half-a-year later, the thing started stuttering for seconds on end, much worse than any non-broken spinning disk I encountered. It was a little over half full, that's it. Turns out that they put in crappy controllers, I guess. Not fully sure. Now the company says they're not good at stand-a-lone performance, suddenly they called it a "value series", and that you should "upgrade" to a premium series for that, but they're still good for arrays and the like.
They certainly didn't assert or say that anywhere at the time of sale, it's just a belated excuse for shipping a crap product to people that paid good money.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227373
They even go on the reviews to excuse for this. But of course they don't lift a finger to fix the problem. Stick with Intel or some reputable company.
The Mosques in Germany were infamous for getting a building permit for, say, 2 stories and then building a multistory monstrosity and ignoring any local goverment - either eating the fines or ignoring them relying on the Politically correct to shut up any opposition while they go ahead and dominate their neighbors sunlight and skyline.
Can't imagine it was much different in neighboring Switzerland.
It doesn't need to be reworded. People who interpret things stop need to be twisting around. The 10 bill of Rights all block the government from taking certain actions. It's in effect when the government is in effect.
Some people may point out these are civil trial, but who enforces the findings of the court? Government. Otherwise the judgements would be voluntary and not binding. Therefore, these punishments are unconstitutional.
I can tell TV and HDTV, but (ignoring aspect ratio) they would need to be side by side or have a picture where either there is an amount of small text or the detail jumps out at you like a detailed landscape. People in suits on talk shows with bland backgrounds will be harder, although the face/hair gives it away.
I would assume, you too, could tell TV vs HD, just use get your monitor to think it's projecting to your normal resolution and somehow downgrade the signal along the way to 640x480 somehow (idk if this is possible, not talking about setting the resolution to 640x480). Or even easier, go to an HDTV and connect the computer to it via an S-Video connector - I old G4 macbook had this option, you'll see the entire picture but it's downgraded to 480i, painful.
Not only that, but civil/mechanical/other engineers usually know exactly what they are dealing with - a Civil engineer may specify the type of concrete used, car engineer may specify the alloy of steel.
Most of the time, software engineers don't have that luxury. Video Game consoles (and still are, mostly) used to be nice that way and it was the reason they had fewer problems than PCs.
Tell a bridge engineer that he has no absolutely control over the hardware he has to work with and that it may have a billion variations, and see if he signs his name to it.
Agreed 100%. I also was more dismissive when I first saw the iPad, to the point where I wondered why it didn't have an add-on keyboard like always innovating's netbook (which this IBM slate seems to have copied in a way), but now I went through Apple's presentation days ago - I have to say this product might have a chance.
Yeah, you can do a "million more" things on a netbook/notebook/desktop - but why would Apple try to have a new product compete with their own line-up, let alone all that is already out there. Looking at the iPad, I would say it's not in competition with notebooks, not even small ones. It's in competition with the Amazon Kindle and other e-readers. I owned a Kindle for about 3 weeks -- while I appreciate the battery life e-ink gives, it was bad contrast, slow rendering, and gives a horrible web experience. And that is what the iPad is aiming at -- much like how the iPod came into a marketplace that already had years of mp3 players.
Idk if it will be successful, but I think the geeks dismissing it for the wrong reasons - the limited view of their own demographic, wants and needs.
While I won't get one for myself, I'm thinking of getting one for my father. He wants to email and surf basically - but he never extensively used a computer in his life beyond an ATM or digital watch - and he still stumbles with the most basic laptops. He's not a stupid man, but doesn't have the benefit of our generation. Even many people in their 30s and 40s are like that - I tried teaching my uncle to use a computer - he just got a laptop. But its frustrating for us both --- when you use computers all the time, you just don't consciously realize anymore how many quirks and rules you put up with to use the thing. He wants to email pictures he took with a digital camera - damn, teaching concept of file systems, file size, possible resizing, etcetera. Not an easy task for a newbie.
I think that's what the iPad is aimed at - making the computing experience as appliance like as possible. Push a button, the thing turns on. I thought the lack of keyboard would hurt it - but guess what - traditional tablets have been tried and none were successful yet. The first and second IBM video is extremely counter to this - just way too many active gadgets on the screen at once and touching that circle thing and dragging it is way too cumbersome (windows-like paradigm) instead of clicking something once and it doing what you want. The screen also seems way too big as a tablet, although the way it pops out is extremely cool.
If Apple succeeds here, it's because they're going into an untapped market - not because they're doing what everybody else is doing (hint: tablets have been long made -- nearly nobody wants). It could flop tremendously as well, but I think the halls of Slashdot, populated by people to whom computers are second nature, are the wrong opinions to go by.
Is this a new form of slashvertisement?
Firefox is a free browser... if the API gets too painful, and maintainability becomes a nightmare -- why shouldn't a company decide its limited resources are served better elsewhere?
If you mean by pure marketshare, yes, in America.
I believe Yahoo auctions is more popular in Japan. But that was years ago, maybe it changed.
The reviews here will help you:
http://www.amazon.com/Livescribe-2GB-Pulse-Smartpen-APA-00002/dp/B001AAN4PW
I have one, but my experience isn't intensive. When you go to charge the pen, it uploads the files on to your computer and then you can make PDF or other pages.
Conversely, I don't really look at that in my classes - my notes are sparse -- I can make a keyword here are there, or just a doodle -- and when reviewing my notebook, I just hit anything I wrote, and the audio goes directly to that part of the lecture.
There are videos showing it. Neat bit of technology.
Seems to work better in small rooms vs huge lecture halls.
They've been saying that about the shenanigans since the beginning of the 2000s.
The fact is that Paypal acts like a bank but without any of the regulations. A bank can't freeze your assets and the like just because they don't like you or what you do -- only the government can do that. Something's got to give here: the last crisis showed banks can't regulate themselves on a trustworthy level.
There are alternatives: google checkout and a myriad of others. Since ebay doesn't allow competition to their paypal - it makes it harder though...
Also, how do you define "news organizations"?
Trying to define them seems like an infringement of Freedom of the Press.
Couldn't internet addiction, be part of a feedback cycle keeping you depressed? Less sun, less contact with people firsthand, less social life, and if it's addiction, less sense of accomplishment (because you get less accomplished), declining hygiene standards, etcetera.
The internet is one good way of connecting with people but still being secluded and feeling empty. I mean, being "friended" on facebook, a number tons of people promote, ends up being a good illustration on the tons of superficial relationships typical of online life -- making depression even worse. (To be sure, there are sites that facilitate sociality like meetup groups and dating sites...)
I seen friends go through that and also feel that way just working on a computer most of the day at times, without the addiction part (which is why I ride a bike to work now...)
Maybe it's because many of us hate school growing up, you watch the clock all the time. Because it's boring, anxiety due to bullies, puberty, an oral presentation coming up, you don't have your homework done, etcetera.
I know school was the worst period in my life. Kids want to have fun, and school is a factory-like drill, and by the time you're an adult, it's ingrained to you, so you don't notice it as much.
Idk, but as soon as I got out of high school and the rigid drill, time just seems to be going faster -- and I don't think it's because an internal switch been flicked when I was 17 -- more likely I just enjoyed what I was doing more. Even college was faster, maybe the flexible classes or that almost 80% was what you chose, not what was foisted upon you.
It might also explain why time after school, weekends, and vacations went by so fast for me as a kid.
It's usually underwhelming to geeks... which doesn't always mean much.
Maybe the iPad will be a success. Maybe it won't. But geeks are a small demographic, some of who have an extremely myopic view of the importance of some features.
For the life of me, I cannot get tenses correct in a lengthy piece of writing. Even when the mistakes are pointed out, I don't recognize them.
But there are things in English that make it hard to learn as well. In languages like German, except for some imported words, pronunciation and spelling went hand in hand and are extremely consistent.
How would you pronounce this:
"Ghoti"
If the "gh" was pronounced like like it was in "tough", the "o" like it was in "women", and the "ti" as in "nation"? And that's just the tip of the iceberg on our arbitrary rules.
"cuz", "u", and other slang are just simplifications.
I'm just glad we have a latin alphabet and don't have to learn kanji and the like. Talk about a long-winded system.
It's no surprise that as car companies come into this country, they go more to the South and a wide swath away from the unions. I believe Mercedes-Benz opened a plant in Alabama in the 1990s for this reason.
Walmart also is anti-union; when a man up in Canada started a union in a store up there, Walmart shut it down rather than deal with the possible spread of unions throughout its workforce and as a warning.
However, Costco is very minimally unions, something like 10-15% of its workforce, and it always has paid well. This comes from the philosophy of its founder (who paid himself 250k a year and it went down from there for Executives, years back).
My friends wanted to do a convention in Philadelphia in 2008. But, because of unions (and not just location), renting the pretty medium hall would have cost 100K. So they held just outside Philly, for the same size hall, it came to 12K. Nearly 10% of the cost.
Even unions find unions overpriced. You mention Germany, one of the biggest unions over there was found to have deplorable working conditions in its offices for its own employees - because they hire a mostly nonunionized workforce. Janitors and the like.
Unions aren't always the way to good wages, I'm sure Google, Microsoft, etcetera, pay it's workers well. When entrenched, they seem to be completely inflexible, and worse, have an artificial monopoly on special powers given by the government.
I almost wish unions were broken in two seperate entities: a workplace safety union that only striked and negotiated about workplace safety and working conditions. One where strikers couldn't be fired. Another union whose concern was pay and benefits, where strikers could be fired. They also wouldn't be allowed the same leadership or be able to strike at the same time as the previous safety union to avoid conflict of interest. The parent company has to operate in the free market, so should they.
I would say even the high cost of living in America is borne by unions. One small example: compared to Europe, there is extremely high rent everyplace I go in America -- except maybe in the boondocks of the boondocks. I would suppose part of this is to offset the property/school taxes everyone (and every business) has to pay directly/indirectly. And schools have unionized teachers. I have relatives as teachers. At least in the richer suburbs, they get paid extremely well, if you add in the benefits and health care plan. Much better than many small businesses can eke out for their employees.
In a lot of places in Europe, people want to be bureacrats of one sort or another. They even polled this in France. Why? Because they know if an f-ing secure job and overall well-to-do job in the long run. I would say it's the same here.
And yes, there is a pay disparity in the America's top corporations. It is entrenched in American culture and is spreading (a decade ago, the CEO of DaimlerBenz made only $2M) outside it. I don't know how to solve that. It is unfortunate and seems to vary company by company, perhaps a symptom of Wall Street.
America won't wake up. They built this industrial power, much of it based on cheap wages (partially as a result of our own unions pushing theirs too high. Look at towns like the suburbs of Detroit and Flint, Michigan -- because unions are led from the top, there isn't an ounce of timely self-preservation when eaten from the bottom). In return, we gave the Chinese our technology, methods of production, and the rest in exchange for cheap junk now -- and are led to dream this will open up a huge market for America, perhaps as huge as the American car market is in Japan.
BTW, where did you move to? Canada, though small in population, seems to be in the upswing, and at least their health care system is sane...
Even Linus readily acknowledges that the world needs more than the Linux model, that the Windows and OS X can all co-exist.
And I hear people talking all the time that OS X is a joy to program for, and not particularly hard.
The iPod/iPhone/iPad is in the form factor that's best suited to appliance. That is, most (90+%) just want them to work. Where even the most polished desktop is too complicated for their tastes and task at hand. Shouldn't their demands be met? BTW, I'm not covering for DRM or the like which only serves the content provider -- just that the appliance view of things is really useful to some people.
Do we complain how the Kindle or past Nokia phones are essentially closed to the average person the same way? Why is this reserved for Apple?
Really. I taught my 45 y/o uncle how to use a computer (Windows 7), his experience to computers limited previously to ATMs. It was painful. There is so much to learn that us geeks take for granted. The computer's behavior is so seemingly arbitrary at times, as are the solutions sometimes. These people don't want a "sense of wonder", they found it in other areas already and they want to have something easy to learn and use - should they be denied entrance into the digital world because they're not geeky enough? Geez, I'm glad when I don't have to fuck around with yet another relatives beige box for once.
I hope that the open PC never goes away. But there should be room for other solutions without the endless complaining. (And yes, the steps Apple does to clamp down their devices from the users themselves, who want to explore and not through misuse, absolutely sucks and should be called on it every step of the way).
What could possibly go wrong?!