... it's a waste of money compared to better causes like... FEEDING or MEDICINE...
When the choice is cast as black-and-white as "Laptop or food/medicine?", I'd bet most people would choose the latter -- it's a no-brainer. The problem is that the problem isn't so simple and casting the problem to be so is somewhat disingenuous.
You have to remember that philanthropy is often done by people with passion.
Nicholas Negroponte
was the co-founder of the MIT Media Laboratory, so naturally he's passionate about computers. One thing about the nature of passion is that one who is passionate wants to instill the same passion in others. Negroponte has passion about computers (and money, which definitely helps), so let him express his philanthropy as he wants.
So perhaps the question shouldn't be, "Why isn't Negroponte giving food and medicine?" but rather "Why isn't there some other rich philanthropist who is passionate about feeding kids and making sure they have decent medical care?" There's no shortage of rich men.
Also, let's face it: giving food and medicine
(a) just isn't sexy to the press and so doesn't garner support easily
and
(b) giving food and medicine is a never-ending job.
Unlike giving a kids a laptop, you have to feed them three times a day every day.
Even the most passionate philanthropist would likely burn out.
Another thing you need to consider is the potential for kids to rise above their situation.
Feeding kids just makes them not hungry;
the results of giving kids access to the internet is unknown buy potentially unbounded.
Consider what was done in
Born into Brothels:
poor children of prostitutes were given cameras.
Could the kids have used more/better food/medicine? Of course.
But what resulted from the cameras was
(a) art
and, for a few children,
(b) a way out of their bleak station in life from their art and notoriety is garnered.
As useful as food and medicine might be, it offers no hope of escaping their bleak lives.
Who knows what kids might accomplish with laptops?
Wouldn't it be interesting to find out?
What?! I'm really not sure what's being said here. I understand the idea behind this, but the wording of the Slashdot piece is difficult to penetrate, even by Slashdot standards.
I hard a hard time reading it as well, but then I saw it (kind of like when you suddenly "see" the picture in a stereogram). Proper punctuation, whitespace, formatting, and font changes help a lot. It should have been:
.. allows any non-privileged user to run his/her program, like so:
cheat 99% program
thereby insuring...
where cheat is the name of the compiled utility that lets you "cheat", 99% is an argument to cheat, and program is the name of some other program that you want to run at 99% of the CPU. I.e., the command line syntax resembles renice.
Yes, I aware of such things and know I can use one. But my point is that I shouldn't have to if they simply put a USB port on the front (just like they did with the Mac towers).
I hope they add (or move) at least one USB port to the front of the computer. It's annoying to have to fumble your way trying to insert a USB flash drive into one of the USB ports on the back that you can't see.
[I]n United States v. Smith, while conceding that nearly half of all American households use cordless telephones, the Fifth Circuit held that "pure radio communications" are not afforded the same Fourth Amendment protection as communications carried by land-based telephone lines because "broadcasting communications into the air by radio waves is more analogous to carrying on an oral communication in a loud [p138] voice or with a megaphone than it is to the privacy afforded by a wire."
... there seems to be a large portion of their online population who are big on censorship. At one point I was a very active member on a Stargate message board, but ther was an Aussie admin who was constantly closing threads...
That's not censorship: it's moderation. Censorship is done by governments. For TFA at hand, it is actually censorship because the Australian school board (presumeably run by the government) is blocking the site and they also want the Federal Government to take down the site (tho it's not clear which Federal Government they're talking about: Australia's or the USA's -- is Australia's national government referred to as "the Federal Government" in Australia?)
Apple/AT&T will only allow signed programs to be installed on the phone. Unless they make that a pretty simple process, which I can't imagine they will - this will severely limit access to developers and software other than Apple sanctioned devices.
Windows Vista already really wants developers to sign their applications (otherwise users get the "Unknown publisher" dialog). Signing an application takes only a hundred or so dollars to buy a code-signing certificate from one of several vendors and adding a line to your build script to sign the application. It's trivial.
What kind of Vista-exclusive software are you gonna run? (Especially under virtualization)
My own. As a developer who writes an application for both Mac OS X and Windows 2000/XP/Vista, it's great to be able to to development and testing on my single MacBook Pro laptop.
I'm not convinced of that. I think it would be easier to relocate a few miles inland than trying to change the world and it's economic structure...
You have to remember that there are lots of weathy people who aren't politicians who have stately homes around Washington DC (e.g., Virginia) who can choose which candidates get their campaign contributions.
However I think the majority is due to the natural cycle of the sun.
Then you're ignoring the tens of thousands of years of data obtained from Antarctic ice cores that show that there hasn't been this dramatic a change over as short of time before. There's no data to support that this is a natural cycle of the sun.
... billions of people face drought and famine, as well as an increase in natural disasters, as a result of climate change. Individuals in the poorest countries face the most danger, due to a lack of infrastructure and geographic location.
It's Nature's way of bitch-slapping us as a species. Unfortunately, she's not slapping the people either causing the change or have the power to do something about it. If Washington DC, Beijing, and a few other capital cities had several inches of standing water from increased sea level, you can bet something would be getting done.
Cell phones worked on the plane on 9/11 and didn't mess with the cellular networks.
I never said the phones wouldn't work.
The cellular networks were messed with, but because it was only a handful of people on one flight, it wasn't too disruptive.
Now imagine that multiplied by every flight currently in the air.
The fact that I'm here typing this makes a good case that it doesn't cause the plane to fall out of the sky. As others have said this regulation probably has more to do with protecting the SkyPhone monopoly and passenger comfort than anything else.
The in-flight ban on cell phones has nothing to do with the airlines or the FAA.
(This is such a pervasive myth, it's unbelievable.)
The ban is imposed by the FCC.
Why?
Because cell phones in the air screw up cell towers on the ground.
A cell phone connects to the tower having the strongest signal.
The tower having the strongest signal is usually the closest.
A cell phone in the air is now equidistant from hundreds of towers.
The towers weren't designed for that sort of thing.
If they want to lift the ban in in-flight cell phones,
they need to install what are called pico-cells onboard the planes.
That way the cell phones on the plane connect to the cell "tower" on the plane
and leave the ones on the ground alone.
Code licensed "version 2 or later" can be moved effortlessly into a GPLv3 kernel.
So long as either the files or portions of code that were originally marked as being "under v2 or later" are still so marked, then yes you can include them in code that contains files or portions under v3; but the "v2 or later" parts stay "v2 or later": they don't automatically become v3.
Parts of the kernel are licensed "GPL version 2 or later" (which can roll over automatically)...
The "or later" part is an option for those using the code, not the authors. If it's v2 or later, you, as a user, have the option to use v2 or v3 at your discretion. If it were changed to v3, then you no longer have the option to use v2. Hence, code that's "v2 or later" doesn't automatically become v3 and the authors can't just change it to v3 without every contributors' permission.
I find it disturbing that Monsanto didn't make the list. There's companies that screw their employees (e.g., Walmart), companies that screw their customers (e.g., Best Buy), companies that screw all Americans (e.g., Haliburton), and then there's companies that screw all people on the entire planet. Monsanto falls into the last category.
Photoshop is great photo-editing software - the best.
Photoshop is lousy photo-editing software. It's great for doing graphic-arts-type stuff, but is really lousy at editing photos. Photoshop is a pixel-painting application on steroids. It's 20-year-old (!) software and was made at a time when people just wanted to manipulate digital images. Notice I said "images" and not "photos." Photoshop, despite "Photo" being in the name, wasn't written with photographers in mind.
By "editing photos," I strictly mean making your photos look better. If you want to modify the hell out of a photo (like changing the background, erasing your ex, etc.), Photoshop is definitely the application to use. But if you want to make tonal, contrast, color, etc., adjustments, using things like "Levels" or "Curves" is an exercise in frustration.
For example, you're looking at your photo and the Curves dialog box that contains an X-Y graph and a diagonal line. Somehow, you're supposed to figure out how to manipulate the curve to make your photo look better. You're supposed to know how to correlate, say, a face that's in shadow, to a particular segment of the curve, and then adjust the curve to make it brighter. Good luck. It might be the ideal UI for maniplating images, but it's horrible for editing photos.
Doing selections is also pretty bad. You select and area and want to feather it so as to seemlessly blend your change between the selected and non-selected areas. OK, so you select the Feathering menu item and enter an integer, click OK, and see how it looks. Nope, too little. Undo. Selecting Feathing again, enter another integer, click OK. Nope, too much. Undo. You get the idea. Why now have a vector-based curve with an inner curve that you can simply drag to adjust the feathering and see the result in real time?
And let's not forget that doing any photo editing in gamma-corrected color-space (which Photoshop does) is just wrong. You want to use a linear color-space so as not to introduce weird color-shifts during editing operations.
I could go on. But make no mistake: Photoshop is not the best photo-editing application.
Companies that go overboard on quality either go out of business or get relegated to serving a niche market.
Would you call the video game industry a niche market, then? Ironically, video games (!) have some of the highest quality around for consumer-oriented software products. The hard fact that manufactuers understand is: buggy games are simply not accepted by the market. Period. Nobody would download version 1.0.1 of any game.
I found it ludicrous to not want a vaccination because "it promotes having premarital sex".
Congratulations: you've discovered the wrong-headed thinking done by sufficient Christians to keep recreational drugs and prositution illegal in the USA, not to mention condeming condom use. You can't really blame them, however, since this wrong-headed thinking starts at the top with the Pope and has lasted for centuries. (It wasn't until last year that Pope Benedict finally said it's OK to use condoms to help stem the spread of AIDS in Africa.)
Slashdot Mirror
You have to remember that philanthropy is often done by people with passion. Nicholas Negroponte was the co-founder of the MIT Media Laboratory, so naturally he's passionate about computers. One thing about the nature of passion is that one who is passionate wants to instill the same passion in others. Negroponte has passion about computers (and money, which definitely helps), so let him express his philanthropy as he wants. So perhaps the question shouldn't be, "Why isn't Negroponte giving food and medicine?" but rather "Why isn't there some other rich philanthropist who is passionate about feeding kids and making sure they have decent medical care?" There's no shortage of rich men.
Also, let's face it: giving food and medicine (a) just isn't sexy to the press and so doesn't garner support easily and (b) giving food and medicine is a never-ending job. Unlike giving a kids a laptop, you have to feed them three times a day every day. Even the most passionate philanthropist would likely burn out.
Another thing you need to consider is the potential for kids to rise above their situation. Feeding kids just makes them not hungry; the results of giving kids access to the internet is unknown buy potentially unbounded.
Consider what was done in Born into Brothels: poor children of prostitutes were given cameras. Could the kids have used more/better food/medicine? Of course. But what resulted from the cameras was (a) art and, for a few children, (b) a way out of their bleak station in life from their art and notoriety is garnered. As useful as food and medicine might be, it offers no hope of escaping their bleak lives. Who knows what kids might accomplish with laptops? Wouldn't it be interesting to find out?
No, you said, "our probes have sampled the atmosphere, that's about it." No, again, our probes have also landed on the surface.
Yes, I aware of such things and know I can use one. But my point is that I shouldn't have to if they simply put a USB port on the front (just like they did with the Mac towers).
The USB ports inthe keyboard are (still!) USB 1.1 only, not USB 2.0.
I hope they add (or move) at least one USB port to the front of the computer. It's annoying to have to fumble your way trying to insert a USB flash drive into one of the USB ports on the back that you can't see.
If they want to lift the ban in in-flight cell phones, they need to install what are called pico-cells onboard the planes. That way the cell phones on the plane connect to the cell "tower" on the plane and leave the ones on the ground alone.
I can't help you there. Keep re-reading what I wrote until you understand it. I've explained it the best way I know how.
You misunderstand the license. Again, the "or later" part is for the user of the code, not the author. I'm not wrong.
So long as either the files or portions of code that were originally marked as being "under v2 or later" are still so marked, then yes you can include them in code that contains files or portions under v3; but the "v2 or later" parts stay "v2 or later": they don't automatically become v3.
The "or later" part is an option for those using the code, not the authors. If it's v2 or later, you, as a user, have the option to use v2 or v3 at your discretion. If it were changed to v3, then you no longer have the option to use v2. Hence, code that's "v2 or later" doesn't automatically become v3 and the authors can't just change it to v3 without every contributors' permission.
I find it disturbing that Monsanto didn't make the list. There's companies that screw their employees (e.g., Walmart), companies that screw their customers (e.g., Best Buy), companies that screw all Americans (e.g., Haliburton), and then there's companies that screw all people on the entire planet. Monsanto falls into the last category.
Photoshop is lousy photo-editing software. It's great for doing graphic-arts-type stuff, but is really lousy at editing photos. Photoshop is a pixel-painting application on steroids. It's 20-year-old (!) software and was made at a time when people just wanted to manipulate digital images. Notice I said "images" and not "photos." Photoshop, despite "Photo" being in the name, wasn't written with photographers in mind.
By "editing photos," I strictly mean making your photos look better. If you want to modify the hell out of a photo (like changing the background, erasing your ex, etc.), Photoshop is definitely the application to use. But if you want to make tonal, contrast, color, etc., adjustments, using things like "Levels" or "Curves" is an exercise in frustration.
For example, you're looking at your photo and the Curves dialog box that contains an X-Y graph and a diagonal line. Somehow, you're supposed to figure out how to manipulate the curve to make your photo look better. You're supposed to know how to correlate, say, a face that's in shadow, to a particular segment of the curve, and then adjust the curve to make it brighter. Good luck. It might be the ideal UI for maniplating images, but it's horrible for editing photos.
Doing selections is also pretty bad. You select and area and want to feather it so as to seemlessly blend your change between the selected and non-selected areas. OK, so you select the Feathering menu item and enter an integer, click OK, and see how it looks. Nope, too little. Undo. Selecting Feathing again, enter another integer, click OK. Nope, too much. Undo. You get the idea. Why now have a vector-based curve with an inner curve that you can simply drag to adjust the feathering and see the result in real time?
And let's not forget that doing any photo editing in gamma-corrected color-space (which Photoshop does) is just wrong. You want to use a linear color-space so as not to introduce weird color-shifts during editing operations.
I could go on. But make no mistake: Photoshop is not the best photo-editing application.
Would you call the video game industry a niche market, then? Ironically, video games (!) have some of the highest quality around for consumer-oriented software products. The hard fact that manufactuers understand is: buggy games are simply not accepted by the market. Period. Nobody would download version 1.0.1 of any game.
Congratulations: you've discovered the wrong-headed thinking done by sufficient Christians to keep recreational drugs and prositution illegal in the USA, not to mention condeming condom use. You can't really blame them, however, since this wrong-headed thinking starts at the top with the Pope and has lasted for centuries. (It wasn't until last year that Pope Benedict finally said it's OK to use condoms to help stem the spread of AIDS in Africa.)