Given CA's *generally* pleasant climate, I wonder what the savings might be for parking the trucks *outside* all the time. Even under a fabric canopy to stop sun damage.
Also Given the general frequency of significant quakes and the increasing likeliness of a 'big' quake, perhaps parking trucks outside might be a plausible idea?
I don't have a pathological hatred of Bush. Or Cheney. Or Palin. I do tend to have an aversion to malice and stupidity though.
Did I condem Bush or anyone else? No I called out the actions taken by him and his cohorts.
Their actions speak volumes that cannot be explained away or justified in any way shape or form.
The Patriot Act is an abomination, we agree on that. Obama is continuing it and supporting it much like most presidents would be in his place I suspect.
To say that is 'worse' than originally proposing it is quite a stretch though.
Obama has the high distinction of carrying on many of the policies GWB implemented. He should get plenty of criticism for that. And does.
But starting A WAR under false pretenses stands out pretty damned far ahead of *anything* Obama has or has not done.
Analogies are rarely perfect, that's why they are 'analogous'. How about someone buys an apple, eats it and throws the core on the ground next to the cart? Fast forward a few years and presto chango there's an apple tree next to the cart. No effort no work by anyone other than the environment in which it exists.
Except you can't create an apple tree out of thin air like that. You have to grow it from seed, water it, look after it for years until it produces fruit. There is a natural, physical constraint in that case.
And there used to be the same natural, physical constraint when it came to producing copies of music. Vinyl, 8-track, cassette, CD, DVD, etc. It used to be the *only* way you could get a copy of music. There was a physical component that required materials, input and money.
Now with the internet and digital music, those copies can be made at just about zero cost. Sure you could say there is electrical costs and wear and tear on hard drives and such, but those costs are so minute as to be effectively zero. And infinite copies can be made with zero physical input; i.e. no cost.
So yes the apples example exactly describes what has happened to the business of making copies of music. Do 'apples' physically match this example? of course not, but it's meant to show how a different existing situation would work in a simple example.
If you enable people to make illegal copies of their copyright material, and to find more people to make illegal copies from, and you make money from it, how is that not stealing?
You cannot 'steal' a digital bit. It simply exists and is copied or erased. But you cannot 'take' or 'steal' it in any way.
Napster is a bad example but for a different reason. Napster was busted for violating the copyrights of the music they were allowing to be traded.
How about Guitar Hero being killed because the copyright holders of the songs demanded ridiculous amounts when the game amounts to free advertising for them? They are certainly in the rights to do so, but it doesn't mean that 'innovation' isn't being stifled by it.
Patents are the bigger problem. Specifically software patents, but patents in general too. That Tivo can be sued because someone patented a completely vague idea without actually building their idea hurts everybody. Vonage also got sued over really technical things that Verizon (I think) purchased patents for and then sued Vonage. Worse, 'Patent Trolls' - companies that literally don't make anything purchase lots of patents solely for the purpose of suing companies who actually create things - *that* stifles innovation significantly.
I'm not advocating illegal sharing of copyrighted works. I am advocating that the current mindset of today's 'media' companies is very short sighted and backwards. Digital copies, instead of being a 'product' like a CD, are now the 'advertising' they should be using to drive people to buy things that aren't available in infinite supply. (This is not saying that because it's illegally available they should just give up).
Digital copies can be made in infinite numbers at just about zero cost. Say I'm selling apples and one day, someone comes and, without taking any apples, creates an apple tree next to my apple stand. Now apples are available for free right next to me. The value of my apples is lowered. I have not lost anything, nor been deprived of anything. There are simply more apples on the market and that causes value to go down. An infinite supply of apples puts the 'value' of any one apple at zero. I can complain that free apples exist - this is what 'media' is doing today. Or I can shift to having people come to my cart to by my 'worm free' apples. Instead of selling apples, I'm now providing a service of quality apples. I can certainly take apples from the tree too, I just spend time verifying they are worm free; that's the 'value' I am providing.
For the music industry, the 'value' is in live performances and merchandising. You simply can't produce a live performance infinitely, it can only be done at the concert with those musicians for a finite set of people.
But unfortunately we have billions of dollars fighting this basic fact of the digital world. Best description I've heard "Trying to make digital bits not copyable is like trying to make water not wet".
I love the CDC cuts. Did we learn nothing from the 'volcano research' disaster that was Louisiana Gov Bobby Jindal? Criticize something only to have that very thing's usefulness be brought front and center just weeks later.
Can't wait till we find out the next bird flu *is* a pandemic and we're screwed because we stopped that wasteful Center for Disease Control and Prevention
Memorizing it and regurgitating the same answers is essentially wasting your time and money on a course that's clearly doing nothing for you
Which is basically my entire point. My english classes were a complete waste of my time and money.
You are correct it is a slippery slope and one that needs monitoring. A better improvement is not just pushing people through 'stock' type courses, but having courses that fit the outcome desired.
Most developing countries are skipping the wired land line entirely. It's much cheaper to set up cell towers and have mobile phones than to lay all the infrastructure required to give adequate coverage via land lines.
My point was not about things that 'count', but about the addons that invariably get, well, added on.
Look, I'm not much of an athlete. I'm certainly not going to set any sort of records for running the mile. Nor should I be allowed to drive the mile and have that count -- that would be cheating, and I shouldn't get a medal for it.
If your a plumber whose job it was to fix the leaky faucet at the job site a mile away, you'd be fired for not driving there and getting the work done as fast as possible.
If you really don't think the task is useful, the way to avoid it is to go to a more technical school, and then see how people feel about hiring you.
Lehigh is pretty damned technical thank you very much. Engineering since 1865.
Incidentally, I certainly wouldn't hire you at this point, knowing you're the sort of person who would cheat to get out of some work. If you're that easy to buy off, what happens when actual money is involved? How could I trust you with any corporate secrets, knowing you'd sell them to make a buck?
Damn that's a fast strawman neck jerk! Where in the hell do you come up with that? I have stated that for tasks unrelated to the job at hand, using existing resources is reasonable. I work in code; if need some code to do something specific, I sometimes google to see if it's already been done. Why spend the time doing it again if code already exists right? Of course I *do* check licensing because that *is* about money. I don't misappropriate. If its open source or a reasonable amount, I pay for it.
if you're the kind of person who can solve calc problems, you're probably the kind of person who can solve programming or engineering problems.
There are plenty of programming problems to solve, calc isn't required to be able to do them. I can see your point that calc might provide a good working knowledge of problem solving, but I'd suggest a good many topics do that as well.
I'd much rather have my professors work on helping students who don't get it, or on their other responsibilities besides teaching -- like actually doing new research -- than creating dozens of sample problems to cover the exact same material.
First, these types of classes invariable have teaching assistants whose very job is to help out those who don't understand the concepts. Secondly, one of the prime complaints about tenured professors is that they aren't doing teaching but research. I would love for them to do either one, but not at the same time. Teaching requires effort not just reading a script so you can get back to your research.
What's more, I don't see how it's the professor's responsibility to set any sort of example to you, especially if you don't intend to become a professor.
Wait, teachers aren't supposed to be role models?
Erm, note that if you don't cheat, those same exams do make you think. Note also that if you do cheat, there's really no amount of added "thinking" you can put into an exam -- certainly the kind of exam you're going to give to hundreds of students -- which is going to make cheating any harder.
A test that is new can't be cheated on in the sense of bringing in the answers from last year. They wouldn't do you any good. THAT is my entire point.
What you're demanding is that a professor come up with brand-new material every semester that also makes students really think.
yes I am. Or at *least* make a friggin effort. Simply reusing the same test for 10 years is ridiculous. And yes I've seen the ten years of tests to prove that statement. Fraternity/Sorority files are quite detailed.
it doesn't mean the prof isn't trying,
That's exactly what it means. It means, "I did it once and now I'm just going to coast on what I did before". If they can
I didn't imply the grade I got either way;-) My point was the lesson that was 'taught' was that, why study when they won't even change the test from last year? This was the mantra at the entire school for the most part. Tests were closely guarded and you can't keep the questions at the end of the test. Of course fraternities/sororities simply had everybody memorize a single question and over time they build up a pretty good copy of the actual test.
I generally tell students to bring a page of notes, I don't care what's on it. The very act of figuring out what they should put on their page is a good way to study.
This is a *brilliant* idea. I love it as a tool that makes students 'want' to study.
the experience you gain applying programming to hard science problem solving is I think very valuable
I agree this would be quite valuable. Unfortunately this is just about never the case. Physics is physics and programming is programming. They generally don't show you the real world in college, it's the concepts of physics. Which if you're going to be a physicist are rather important. As a programmer, not so much.
True to a point. It can depend highly on the circumstances and tasks assigned. As a techie, I know my 'writing' skills generally are below par. And if I could have gotten pre-written papers in college I certainly would have. 15 years of tech jobs and what I want to do does not require such skills. Am I limiting what I could possibly do in the future? sure. I accept that. I only wrote 10 papers during my 4 year engineering degree. Hardly enough work to build any sort of 'skill' in the concept. That's all that was required. If the task is that menial, why not find an easier way?
Ditto for other things like physics, chemistry and calc. I'm a programmer, if I need to know those equations, I'll look them up. My employer certainly wants me to do that rather than remember my education from 15 years ago.
My favorite example was freshman physics. A hall mate got a copy of the previous years test through his fraternity. We studied every concept on that test. When we got into the test, it was *literally* the same test. Maybe a few numbers different but the exact same test.
If professors aren't going to work to create tests for their students, it doesn't exactly set a good example for the students. Have exams and tests that make you think rather than just regurgitate and you'll find cheating a *lot* harder. But most profs aren't interested in doing that much work.
Illegal for Joe Public to block signals in public areas perhaps. But not for the Feds to block them in restricted areas.
Prisons don't tend to be very near private residences so there wouldn't be much issue of blocked area bleeding outside the walls of the prison. And the FCC can issue a waiver for certain cases.
There isn't any reason they can't do this in a *prison*.
My GPS (Navigon) gives a high level display of the route too. The problem is it's a trip of 100 miles on a 4 inch screen. Not exactly helpful. If desired I can drill to the turn by turn route list, but that's still just a list of streets and distances.
Slashdot Mirror
Given CA's *generally* pleasant climate, I wonder what the savings might be for parking the trucks *outside* all the time. Even under a fabric canopy to stop sun damage.
Also Given the general frequency of significant quakes and the increasing likeliness of a 'big' quake, perhaps parking trucks outside might be a plausible idea?
the reasons for going into Iraq in 2003 weren't false? do tell...
I don't have a pathological hatred of Bush. Or Cheney. Or Palin. I do tend to have an aversion to malice and stupidity though.
Did I condem Bush or anyone else? No I called out the actions taken by him and his cohorts.
Their actions speak volumes that cannot be explained away or justified in any way shape or form.
The Patriot Act is an abomination, we agree on that. Obama is continuing it and supporting it much like most presidents would be in his place I suspect.
To say that is 'worse' than originally proposing it is quite a stretch though.
(this new formatting is uuuuggggllllyyy!)
glad you agree with my assertion that it was false pretenses.
did you mention anything else that even matters?
Obama has the high distinction of carrying on many of the policies GWB implemented. He should get plenty of criticism for that. And does.
But starting A WAR under false pretenses stands out pretty damned far ahead of *anything* Obama has or has not done.
did you miss 2000-2008? truth was pretty well damned to the circular file...
Except you can't create an apple tree out of thin air like that. You have to grow it from seed, water it, look after it for years until it produces fruit. There is a natural, physical constraint in that case.
And there used to be the same natural, physical constraint when it came to producing copies of music. Vinyl, 8-track, cassette, CD, DVD, etc. It used to be the *only* way you could get a copy of music. There was a physical component that required materials, input and money.
Now with the internet and digital music, those copies can be made at just about zero cost. Sure you could say there is electrical costs and wear and tear on hard drives and such, but those costs are so minute as to be effectively zero. And infinite copies can be made with zero physical input; i.e. no cost.
So yes the apples example exactly describes what has happened to the business of making copies of music. Do 'apples' physically match this example? of course not, but it's meant to show how a different existing situation would work in a simple example.
If you enable people to make illegal copies of their copyright material, and to find more people to make illegal copies from, and you make money from it, how is that not stealing?
You cannot 'steal' a digital bit. It simply exists and is copied or erased. But you cannot 'take' or 'steal' it in any way.
Napster is a bad example but for a different reason. Napster was busted for violating the copyrights of the music they were allowing to be traded.
How about Guitar Hero being killed because the copyright holders of the songs demanded ridiculous amounts when the game amounts to free advertising for them? They are certainly in the rights to do so, but it doesn't mean that 'innovation' isn't being stifled by it.
Patents are the bigger problem. Specifically software patents, but patents in general too. That Tivo can be sued because someone patented a completely vague idea without actually building their idea hurts everybody. Vonage also got sued over really technical things that Verizon (I think) purchased patents for and then sued Vonage. Worse, 'Patent Trolls' - companies that literally don't make anything purchase lots of patents solely for the purpose of suing companies who actually create things - *that* stifles innovation significantly.
I'm not advocating illegal sharing of copyrighted works. I am advocating that the current mindset of today's 'media' companies is very short sighted and backwards. Digital copies, instead of being a 'product' like a CD, are now the 'advertising' they should be using to drive people to buy things that aren't available in infinite supply. (This is not saying that because it's illegally available they should just give up).
Digital copies can be made in infinite numbers at just about zero cost. Say I'm selling apples and one day, someone comes and, without taking any apples, creates an apple tree next to my apple stand. Now apples are available for free right next to me. The value of my apples is lowered. I have not lost anything, nor been deprived of anything. There are simply more apples on the market and that causes value to go down. An infinite supply of apples puts the 'value' of any one apple at zero. I can complain that free apples exist - this is what 'media' is doing today. Or I can shift to having people come to my cart to by my 'worm free' apples. Instead of selling apples, I'm now providing a service of quality apples. I can certainly take apples from the tree too, I just spend time verifying they are worm free; that's the 'value' I am providing.
For the music industry, the 'value' is in live performances and merchandising. You simply can't produce a live performance infinitely, it can only be done at the concert with those musicians for a finite set of people.
But unfortunately we have billions of dollars fighting this basic fact of the digital world. Best description I've heard "Trying to make digital bits not copyable is like trying to make water not wet".
Napster wasn't hit with a patent suit for its method of stealing music. It was busted up because it was stealing music.
If you're going to be anal about terms you should make sure you aren't playing fast and loose with them yourself. Napster didn't *steal* anything.
Patents != Copyright, however IP covers both Patents and Copyright.
gah, meant to post anonymously...don't mod this up
I love the CDC cuts. Did we learn nothing from the 'volcano research' disaster that was Louisiana Gov Bobby Jindal? Criticize something only to have that very thing's usefulness be brought front and center just weeks later.
Can't wait till we find out the next bird flu *is* a pandemic and we're screwed because we stopped that wasteful Center for Disease Control and Prevention
Memorizing it and regurgitating the same answers is essentially wasting your time and money on a course that's clearly doing nothing for you
Which is basically my entire point. My english classes were a complete waste of my time and money.
You are correct it is a slippery slope and one that needs monitoring. A better improvement is not just pushing people through 'stock' type courses, but having courses that fit the outcome desired.
In this context no, we're talking about POTS land lines. i.e. the user would use a dialup modem.
I highly doubt they use land lines at all. They certainly connect into the same system that the land lines do, but that is *not* using land lines.
Most developing countries are skipping the wired land line entirely. It's much cheaper to set up cell towers and have mobile phones than to lay all the infrastructure required to give adequate coverage via land lines.
Look, I'm not much of an athlete. I'm certainly not going to set any sort of records for running the mile. Nor should I be allowed to drive the mile and have that count -- that would be cheating, and I shouldn't get a medal for it.
If your a plumber whose job it was to fix the leaky faucet at the job site a mile away, you'd be fired for not driving there and getting the work done as fast as possible.
If you really don't think the task is useful, the way to avoid it is to go to a more technical school, and then see how people feel about hiring you.
Lehigh is pretty damned technical thank you very much. Engineering since 1865.
Incidentally, I certainly wouldn't hire you at this point, knowing you're the sort of person who would cheat to get out of some work. If you're that easy to buy off, what happens when actual money is involved? How could I trust you with any corporate secrets, knowing you'd sell them to make a buck?
Damn that's a fast strawman neck jerk! Where in the hell do you come up with that? I have stated that for tasks unrelated to the job at hand, using existing resources is reasonable. I work in code; if need some code to do something specific, I sometimes google to see if it's already been done. Why spend the time doing it again if code already exists right? Of course I *do* check licensing because that *is* about money. I don't misappropriate. If its open source or a reasonable amount, I pay for it.
if you're the kind of person who can solve calc problems, you're probably the kind of person who can solve programming or engineering problems.
There are plenty of programming problems to solve, calc isn't required to be able to do them. I can see your point that calc might provide a good working knowledge of problem solving, but I'd suggest a good many topics do that as well.
I'd much rather have my professors work on helping students who don't get it, or on their other responsibilities besides teaching -- like actually doing new research -- than creating dozens of sample problems to cover the exact same material.
First, these types of classes invariable have teaching assistants whose very job is to help out those who don't understand the concepts. Secondly, one of the prime complaints about tenured professors is that they aren't doing teaching but research. I would love for them to do either one, but not at the same time. Teaching requires effort not just reading a script so you can get back to your research.
What's more, I don't see how it's the professor's responsibility to set any sort of example to you, especially if you don't intend to become a professor.
Wait, teachers aren't supposed to be role models?
Erm, note that if you don't cheat, those same exams do make you think. Note also that if you do cheat, there's really no amount of added "thinking" you can put into an exam -- certainly the kind of exam you're going to give to hundreds of students -- which is going to make cheating any harder.
A test that is new can't be cheated on in the sense of bringing in the answers from last year. They wouldn't do you any good. THAT is my entire point.
What you're demanding is that a professor come up with brand-new material every semester that also makes students really think.
yes I am. Or at *least* make a friggin effort. Simply reusing the same test for 10 years is ridiculous. And yes I've seen the ten years of tests to prove that statement. Fraternity/Sorority files are quite detailed.
it doesn't mean the prof isn't trying,
That's exactly what it means. It means, "I did it once and now I'm just going to coast on what I did before". If they can
does this count at "I'm not swearing *at* the computer, I'm swearing near it"?
I generally tell students to bring a page of notes, I don't care what's on it. The very act of figuring out what they should put on their page is a good way to study.
This is a *brilliant* idea. I love it as a tool that makes students 'want' to study.
Perhaps, but the reverse is not true I don't think. Certainly hasn't been in my experience.
the experience you gain applying programming to hard science problem solving is I think very valuable
I agree this would be quite valuable. Unfortunately this is just about never the case. Physics is physics and programming is programming. They generally don't show you the real world in college, it's the concepts of physics. Which if you're going to be a physicist are rather important. As a programmer, not so much.
Sadly, there aren't enough Profs like this guy. Sounds exactly what I didn't get...sigh
People that cheat, don't learn
True to a point. It can depend highly on the circumstances and tasks assigned. As a techie, I know my 'writing' skills generally are below par. And if I could have gotten pre-written papers in college I certainly would have. 15 years of tech jobs and what I want to do does not require such skills. Am I limiting what I could possibly do in the future? sure. I accept that. I only wrote 10 papers during my 4 year engineering degree. Hardly enough work to build any sort of 'skill' in the concept. That's all that was required. If the task is that menial, why not find an easier way?
Ditto for other things like physics, chemistry and calc. I'm a programmer, if I need to know those equations, I'll look them up. My employer certainly wants me to do that rather than remember my education from 15 years ago.
My favorite example was freshman physics. A hall mate got a copy of the previous years test through his fraternity. We studied every concept on that test. When we got into the test, it was *literally* the same test. Maybe a few numbers different but the exact same test.
If professors aren't going to work to create tests for their students, it doesn't exactly set a good example for the students. Have exams and tests that make you think rather than just regurgitate and you'll find cheating a *lot* harder. But most profs aren't interested in doing that much work.
*whooosh*
If these domain owners had been 'sued' that would reasonable. Having your say, court of law and all that.
The domains were simply 'taken' by the US without any due process associated with being 'sued'.
Illegal for Joe Public to block signals in public areas perhaps. But not for the Feds to block them in restricted areas.
Prisons don't tend to be very near private residences so there wouldn't be much issue of blocked area bleeding outside the walls of the prison. And the FCC can issue a waiver for certain cases.
There isn't any reason they can't do this in a *prison*.
My GPS (Navigon) gives a high level display of the route too. The problem is it's a trip of 100 miles on a 4 inch screen. Not exactly helpful. If desired I can drill to the turn by turn route list, but that's still just a list of streets and distances.