What you do in your spare time really can reflect on your desirability as an employee. I have dealt with extremely productive people who did beautiful quality work but were utterly unreliable, difficult to work with and generally not people you want to have to deal with on a daily basis. In these cases either drugs or possibly psychological issues were often at heart and ultimately made it impossible for them to function over the long term.
Any mature person can tell you that you really don't want naked bong party pictures floating around. Unfortunately young people are by definition not mature.
A silly online nick really would not be an issue for me as an employer provided you DON'T get the goatse guy. It't the content that counts.
The older I get, the more *I* am interviewing *them*. If you have a sense of humor and indulge in some silliness on your offtime you really shouldn't be embarassed. OTOH googling your name produces the goatse picture, you really ought to consider a name change.
All well said! The real reason I like to contrast pharma vs music is this: Both patents and copyrights were conceived to, on one hand, encourage people to innovate by allowing them to profit and, on the other hand, to benefit society as a whole WHEN THEY EXPIRE. Although I think both systems have been amazingly successful at harnessing greed for the benefit of all, both systems are also being abused. As you say, good for Simmons. I say: good for Glaxo, too. And good for us when both of their products go to the public domain. NOBODY benefits if the system gets abused.
I wouldn't blame a college kid for downloading "Beth", neither do I blame people for getting cheaper grey market drugs if they need them. I wouldn't blame a hungry guy for stealing a loaf of bread, either. Prosecuting any of the above places the blame on the wrong part of the system.
This is the most accurate comment regarding Simmons. The people with interests vested in the current system naturally don't support change. Frankly, Nancy Pelosi makes me sick by being a media industry puppet with the whole finanical aid thing. Look at big pharma - sure, they're bastards but at least they make something beneficial. Pharma spends billions on research then gets a few years to profit IF it passes FDA approval. Conversely, any idiot can pen a stupid ditty which costs nothing then get approximately forever to profit from it. How much did humanity benefit from, say, the song "Beth" versus Lipitor?
Meh. Congress could do something if they had any balls. Or ethics. Blaming Bush only addresses half of the problem. Electing a democrat won't bring any real change. Just a different flavor of scum.
"Vested interests" include our current two party system and their corporate masters. The republicrats do not serve the interests of the citizenry.
We don't even hear about candidates from our two main political parties. Why shouldn't they be given time during the debates. It's shameful how the message we hear is controlled, sanitized and spun. The US is so far in debt we will never get out. The dollar is crashing and our financial preeminence has passed to the chinese. All congress does is spend more and more yet nobody talks about the consequences.
What I mean is ideology is useless if it doesnt serve the interests of the people. When the economy finally implodes and everyone is out on the street, we MIGHT see real change if the american people havent been so thoroughly sheepified that they realize a revolution is the only real solution.
You must be young because this kind of crap has been going on for ages. The worst part is that while the people are saying the bush presidency has been a catastrophe, congress is really the one to blame.
The only difference between the crap going on now and in previous eras is that all the easy ways of cheating have been used up, so congress has to push the envelope in order to serve their corporate masters.
Nobody in congress is serving the interests of the people. Even Ron Paul is more interested in ideology. I'm tired of visionaries; I want someone practical.
Agreed. Municipal WiFi is a stupid idea. How does giving earthlink a guaranteed monopoly with guaranteed profits be a good thing? What ever happened to free market efficiencies? The only thing that can possibly happen is costs will climb, climb and climb some more. Lack of competition guarantees it.
Amen, brother. I grew up collecting vinyl and hated every second of it. Trying to keep the surface dust free, clicks, pops, hiss and rumble no matter what you did, ruined media if the turntable gets bumped, skipping, no portability. CD's are great compared to that. Sound compression is a choice made by the producers. Some bands are starting to choose not to do it in favor of better dynamic range. No matter what media format you choose, there will be problems.
Sure, vinyl sounds different, richer to some people's ear. Right now some folks are rediscovering the sound. Soon, most of them will get sick of the problems - it has niche market written all over it.
No way in hell vinyl will "replace" CD's. Something else might, but not vinyl.
I wonder how much the xandros distro adds to the cost? So long as there isn't any weird hardware any distro ought to be ok with a bit of tweaking.
You can't really blame Asus for picking a commercial distro. All Asus has to do is hand them a unit and some money and say "make it work". I don't know what kind of deal they have, but if end users get OS support through Xandros, then it makes even more sense for Asus do go that way since they are expecting non-linux savvy consumers to buy the unit.
Could be that once this thing starts rolling they'll offer a slightly cheaper naked version.
The unique thing is these three things in one package: price, size and linux. My luggable-not-portable inspiron 1200 filled the "cheap" niche but loses on size and was only available with xp.
This thing just might be wildly popular if it turns out to be as great as it looks. If it is, the overall price of pc's and laptops in particular ought to be dragged down. Linux gets a free boost since non-linux users attracted to the package will give it a try and undoubtedly like it. The ultraportability makes it obvious that you CAN'T expect it to run heavy duty apps - it's a web surfing/email box.
Out of the box, it will do what it was obviously designed to do and please almost everyone. I sincerely doubt many current non-linux users will really care about the lack of Windows once they see how well it works.
I also hope is ships soon as it's really annoying to have to keep emptying this drool bucket.
Yup, it's a gradient. If bromine has "dangerous" properties, you can account for them. If it's the best substance to accomplish a given task AND the consequences of it's properties can be handled there is no reason not to use it. Note that the term "best" includes an analysis of it's ability to meet a specific manufacturing requirement AND it's "safety".
I love the "dangerous" characterization of bromine. Bromine is no more dangerous than hydrogen. If you rapidly combine hydrogen with oxygen you get a big boom! Dangerous!! Ban hydrogen and hydrogen compounds forever!!!
People never seem to have a clue about how the things in their everyday life are produced. Generally they seem to expect that the only byproduct of production should be butterflys and rose water. Unfortunately these people are also allowed to vote.
I love how you completely ignore the fact that PATENTS EXPIRE and that companies compete to patent similar things - look at the plethora of statin drugs on the market. There is still competition! You are simply making stupid assertions without providing explainations.
I can only assume you are an idiot or a troll. Judging from the AC post it's troll, but that doesn't rule out your being an idiot as well. Sophomore in college? Know the definition of that word?
I recently built a mini itx system based around a via 1.5 ghz processor to do the same basic tasks the fit-pc is designed to handle. The fit isnt a bad box, it's just that it isn't really anythything new or innovative. Looks to me like they took a pico-itx board, slapped on a laptop hard disk and called it a system. The price is good for the size, but you can build a system with a way better processor, more ram and add a CF to IDE adapter so you can go without moving parts.
The pirate party's position is backed up by a bunch of nonsense. Government is the most expensive and inefficient method of accomplishing anything. Where is the pressure to cut costs? Certainly not from the market. For nonprofitable things like malaria it might make sense but certainly not for the bulk of research.
Look at the cost of generic drugs; They typically cost a small fraction of brand name drugs. Eventually, every drug will become generic and the free market will set the price. In the meantime you have these private companies competing with each other to produce new medications.
Government is no different than a monopoly - costs continually rise with no real incentive for efficiency. Why kill private reseach? Capitalism harnesses greed. Patent expirations mean that eventually everyone benefits.
I am not trying to claim that the current system is great, just that there needs to be incentive for individuals or corporations to spend money on r & d. As I pointed out earlier, if nothing can be patented then the only advantage a brand can have in the market is price. Since Indian and Chinese labor is paid a small fraction of workers in the US or Europe, the advantage automatically goes to them. Pharma research is so ridiculously expensive AND rigidly controlled that nobody would do it if they weren't able to recoup costs. God forbid anyone should make a profit.
Certainly nobody wants ugly pink jumpers. People want boner pills and stuff to make heart attacks go away so they can be fat and lazy. Besides, once it goes OFF patent, anyone in the world has FREE access to the information. Where's the problem?
Example A: A company dumps $300 million into developing a new, unique molocule that cures a fatal disease for which there is currently no treatment. People are no longer dying and when the patent expires, the minimum cost of production and distribution sets the price due to that magical thing called "free market competition". All of humanity benefits forever more. The company uses profits to develop new drugs. Repeat Example A.
Example B: A company dumps $300 million into developing a new, unique molocule that cures a fatal disease for which there is currently no treatment. Once this is released, Chinese and Indian companies with no R&D budget flood the market with ultra cheap copies. All of humanity benefits forever more. The company that developed the drug goes belly up and the unique nexus of research talent is forever lost. Humanity suffers from the lack of future research since no company in their right minds will do R&D since there is no profit in it. End of cycle.
I read Marx; it was the biggest load of horseshit I ever laid eyes upon. Anyone who has ever run a business or raised a child (I've done both) would immediately recognize the stupidity of Marx's ideas. Go ahead and link a few more academic theories: perhaps some day you will graduate and learn how the real world operates - NOTHING is free.
This is one of the dumbest comments I've ever seen. I'm guessing you are still in college, cuddling up to Marx at night.
If you don't have some way of rewarding people for innovating, why would anyone bother? The Pharma industry is a great example: each marketable drug costs huge amounts of money - no government could possibly fund the research. MOST drugs fail testing resulting in largely wasted money. You have to have some way of allowing Pharmaceutical companies to recoup their expenditure. If it was legal for anyone to start producing a new drug (or any other innovation), your so called "first mover" advantage evaporates in the face of good old price competition and R&D disappears.
The system we have may not be particularly GOOD (as in benevolent), on the other hand how else can you keep the R&D dollars flowing. At least with the present system the profit motive and greed are harnessed to produce something useful, unlike the copyright system in which anyone can pen an inane ditty in a few minutes, copyright it and then own it for a hundred years.
I really don't know. If you invent some widget that can be utilized to make hard drives better, the patent system should benefit you. I don't see why you should be able to file suit 20 years later, though. If you are smart enough to invent said widget you ought to be smart enough to figure out if it's being used. It doesn't seem fair but how else could you do it?
I am proposing no such thing. Of COURSE big corporations will jack any system to their advantage. However, you have to admit that big corporations make lots of cheap stuff - the processor and hard drive in the computer you are using, for example, so you can't say they are inherently BAD either. Their behavior is quite predictable.
I'm merely suggesting that at some point you need to have some public process by which you can draw a line and say "no, sorry, too late".
I have a feeling you have a basement workshop with a patent for garden bells tacked to the wall.
This kind of smells like a patent mugging to me. If all these companies were using the patent, why did it take so long to file suit? Did all these companies ignore due diligence? Is there some sort of standards that were hashed out while the patent was kept underwater like in the Rambus case?
I really think there needs to be some sort of limit on how and when patent holders can do this sort of thing, coupled with some way standards bodies can file public notice regarding intent to use a particular process or design. First to file is not a bad starting point, but prior art could come into play in the context of such a public notice process, e.g. standards board says we are making stuff like this...public period to comment...patents not claimed by 180 days invalid for this case...NO profit for patent holders!
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What you do in your spare time really can reflect on your desirability as an employee. I have dealt with extremely productive people who did beautiful quality work but were utterly unreliable, difficult to work with and generally not people you want to have to deal with on a daily basis. In these cases either drugs or possibly psychological issues were often at heart and ultimately made it impossible for them to function over the long term.
Any mature person can tell you that you really don't want naked bong party pictures floating around. Unfortunately young people are by definition not mature.
A silly online nick really would not be an issue for me as an employer provided you DON'T get the goatse guy. It't the content that counts.
The older I get, the more *I* am interviewing *them*. If you have a sense of humor and indulge in some silliness on your offtime you really shouldn't be embarassed. OTOH googling your name produces the goatse picture, you really ought to consider a name change.
All well said! The real reason I like to contrast pharma vs music is this: Both patents and copyrights were conceived to, on one hand, encourage people to innovate by allowing them to profit and, on the other hand, to benefit society as a whole WHEN THEY EXPIRE. Although I think both systems have been amazingly successful at harnessing greed for the benefit of all, both systems are also being abused. As you say, good for Simmons. I say: good for Glaxo, too. And good for us when both of their products go to the public domain. NOBODY benefits if the system gets abused.
I wouldn't blame a college kid for downloading "Beth", neither do I blame people for getting cheaper grey market drugs if they need them. I wouldn't blame a hungry guy for stealing a loaf of bread, either. Prosecuting any of the above places the blame on the wrong part of the system.
This is the most accurate comment regarding Simmons. The people with interests vested in the current system naturally don't support change. Frankly, Nancy Pelosi makes me sick by being a media industry puppet with the whole finanical aid thing. Look at big pharma - sure, they're bastards but at least they make something beneficial. Pharma spends billions on research then gets a few years to profit IF it passes FDA approval. Conversely, any idiot can pen a stupid ditty which costs nothing then get approximately forever to profit from it. How much did humanity benefit from, say, the song "Beth" versus Lipitor?
The whole system is screwed up.
Meh. Congress could do something if they had any balls. Or ethics. Blaming Bush only addresses half of the problem. Electing a democrat won't bring any real change. Just a different flavor of scum.
Why do we only have two choices? Think about it...
"Vested interests" include our current two party system and their corporate masters. The republicrats do not serve the interests of the citizenry.
We don't even hear about candidates from our two main political parties. Why shouldn't they be given time during the debates. It's shameful how the message we hear is controlled, sanitized and spun. The US is so far in debt we will never get out. The dollar is crashing and our financial preeminence has passed to the chinese. All congress does is spend more and more yet nobody talks about the consequences.
Meet the new boss...Same as the old boss...
What I mean is ideology is useless if it doesnt serve the interests of the people. When the economy finally implodes and everyone is out on the street, we MIGHT see real change if the american people havent been so thoroughly sheepified that they realize a revolution is the only real solution.
Thomas Jefferson said it first.
You must be young because this kind of crap has been going on for ages. The worst part is that while the people are saying the bush presidency has been a catastrophe, congress is really the one to blame.
The only difference between the crap going on now and in previous eras is that all the easy ways of cheating have been used up, so congress has to push the envelope in order to serve their corporate masters.
Nobody in congress is serving the interests of the people. Even Ron Paul is more interested in ideology. I'm tired of visionaries; I want someone practical.
Agreed. Municipal WiFi is a stupid idea. How does giving earthlink a guaranteed monopoly with guaranteed profits be a good thing? What ever happened to free market efficiencies? The only thing that can possibly happen is costs will climb, climb and climb some more. Lack of competition guarantees it.
Heh. What this boils down to is "boo hoo I don't wanna hafta compete". Another clueless exec who doesn't understand teh intertubes. Bet he sues.
Amen, brother. I grew up collecting vinyl and hated every second of it. Trying to keep the surface dust free, clicks, pops, hiss and rumble no matter what you did, ruined media if the turntable gets bumped, skipping, no portability. CD's are great compared to that. Sound compression is a choice made by the producers. Some bands are starting to choose not to do it in favor of better dynamic range. No matter what media format you choose, there will be problems.
Sure, vinyl sounds different, richer to some people's ear. Right now some folks are rediscovering the sound. Soon, most of them will get sick of the problems - it has niche market written all over it.
No way in hell vinyl will "replace" CD's. Something else might, but not vinyl.
I wonder how much the xandros distro adds to the cost? So long as there isn't any weird hardware any distro ought to be ok with a bit of tweaking.
You can't really blame Asus for picking a commercial distro. All Asus has to do is hand them a unit and some money and say "make it work". I don't know what kind of deal they have, but if end users get OS support through Xandros, then it makes even more sense for Asus do go that way since they are expecting non-linux savvy consumers to buy the unit.
Could be that once this thing starts rolling they'll offer a slightly cheaper naked version.
"And it is enough to start the revolution"
The unique thing is these three things in one package: price, size and linux. My luggable-not-portable inspiron 1200 filled the "cheap" niche but loses on size and was only available with xp.
This thing just might be wildly popular if it turns out to be as great as it looks. If it is, the overall price of pc's and laptops in particular ought to be dragged down. Linux gets a free boost since non-linux users attracted to the package will give it a try and undoubtedly like it. The ultraportability makes it obvious that you CAN'T expect it to run heavy duty apps - it's a web surfing/email box.
Out of the box, it will do what it was obviously designed to do and please almost everyone. I sincerely doubt many current non-linux users will really care about the lack of Windows once they see how well it works.
I also hope is ships soon as it's really annoying to have to keep emptying this drool bucket.
In Soviet Russia linux runs YOU.
There. Happy?
Yup, it's a gradient. If bromine has "dangerous" properties, you can account for them. If it's the best substance to accomplish a given task AND the consequences of it's properties can be handled there is no reason not to use it. Note that the term "best" includes an analysis of it's ability to meet a specific manufacturing requirement AND it's "safety".
I love the "dangerous" characterization of bromine. Bromine is no more dangerous than hydrogen. If you rapidly combine hydrogen with oxygen you get a big boom! Dangerous!!
Ban hydrogen and hydrogen compounds forever!!!
People never seem to have a clue about how the things in their everyday life are produced. Generally they seem to expect that the only byproduct of production should be butterflys and rose water. Unfortunately these people are also allowed to vote.
I love how you completely ignore the fact that PATENTS EXPIRE and that companies compete to patent similar things - look at the plethora of statin drugs on the market. There is still competition! You are simply making stupid assertions without providing explainations.
I can only assume you are an idiot or a troll. Judging from the AC post it's troll, but that doesn't rule out your being an idiot as well. Sophomore in college? Know the definition of that word?
I recently built a mini itx system based around a via 1.5 ghz processor to do the same basic tasks the fit-pc is designed to handle. The fit isnt a bad box, it's just that it isn't really anythything new or innovative. Looks to me like they took a pico-itx board, slapped on a laptop hard disk and called it a system. The price is good for the size, but you can build a system with a way better processor, more ram and add a CF to IDE adapter so you can go without moving parts.
The pirate party's position is backed up by a bunch of nonsense. Government is the most expensive and inefficient method of accomplishing anything. Where is the pressure to cut costs? Certainly not from the market. For nonprofitable things like malaria it might make sense but certainly not for the bulk of research.
Look at the cost of generic drugs; They typically cost a small fraction of brand name drugs. Eventually, every drug will become generic and the free market will set the price. In the meantime you have these private companies competing with each other to produce new medications.
Government is no different than a monopoly - costs continually rise with no real incentive for efficiency. Why kill private reseach? Capitalism harnesses greed. Patent expirations mean that eventually everyone benefits.
I am not trying to claim that the current system is great, just that there needs to be incentive for individuals or corporations to spend money on r & d. As I pointed out earlier, if nothing can be patented then the only advantage a brand can have in the market is price. Since Indian and Chinese labor is paid a small fraction of workers in the US or Europe, the advantage automatically goes to them. Pharma research is so ridiculously expensive AND rigidly controlled that nobody would do it if they weren't able to recoup costs. God forbid anyone should make a profit.
Certainly nobody wants ugly pink jumpers. People want boner pills and stuff to make heart attacks go away so they can be fat and lazy. Besides, once it goes OFF patent, anyone in the world has FREE access to the information. Where's the problem?
Example A: A company dumps $300 million into developing a new, unique molocule that cures a fatal disease for which there is currently no treatment. People are no longer dying and when the patent expires, the minimum cost of production and distribution sets the price due to that magical thing called "free market competition". All of humanity benefits forever more. The company uses profits to develop new drugs. Repeat Example A.
Example B: A company dumps $300 million into developing a new, unique molocule that cures a fatal disease for which there is currently no treatment. Once this is released, Chinese and Indian companies with no R&D budget flood the market with ultra cheap copies. All of humanity benefits forever more. The company that developed the drug goes belly up and the unique nexus of research talent is forever lost. Humanity suffers from the lack of future research since no company in their right minds will do R&D since there is no profit in it. End of cycle.
I read Marx; it was the biggest load of horseshit I ever laid eyes upon. Anyone who has ever run a business or raised a child (I've done both) would immediately recognize the stupidity of Marx's ideas. Go ahead and link a few more academic theories: perhaps some day you will graduate and learn how the real world operates - NOTHING is free.
This is one of the dumbest comments I've ever seen. I'm guessing you are still in college, cuddling up to Marx at night.
If you don't have some way of rewarding people for innovating, why would anyone bother? The Pharma industry is a great example: each marketable drug costs huge amounts of money - no government could possibly fund the research. MOST drugs fail testing resulting in largely wasted money. You have to have some way of allowing Pharmaceutical companies to recoup their expenditure. If it was legal for anyone to start producing a new drug (or any other innovation), your so called "first mover" advantage evaporates in the face of good old price competition and R&D disappears.
The system we have may not be particularly GOOD (as in benevolent), on the other hand how else can you keep the R&D dollars flowing. At least with the present system the profit motive and greed are harnessed to produce something useful, unlike the copyright system in which anyone can pen an inane ditty in a few minutes, copyright it and then own it for a hundred years.
I really don't know. If you invent some widget that can be utilized to make hard drives better, the patent system should benefit you. I don't see why you should be able to file suit 20 years later, though. If you are smart enough to invent said widget you ought to be smart enough to figure out if it's being used. It doesn't seem fair but how else could you do it?
I am proposing no such thing. Of COURSE big corporations will jack any system to their advantage. However, you have to admit that big corporations make lots of cheap stuff - the processor and hard drive in the computer you are using, for example, so you can't say they are inherently BAD either. Their behavior is quite predictable.
I'm merely suggesting that at some point you need to have some public process by which you can draw a line and say "no, sorry, too late".
I have a feeling you have a basement workshop with a patent for garden bells tacked to the wall.
This kind of smells like a patent mugging to me. If all these companies were using the patent, why did it take so long to file suit? Did all these companies ignore due diligence? Is there some sort of standards that were hashed out while the patent was kept underwater like in the Rambus case?
I really think there needs to be some sort of limit on how and when patent holders can do this sort of thing, coupled with some way standards bodies can file public notice regarding intent to use a particular process or design. First to file is not a bad starting point, but prior art could come into play in the context of such a public notice process, e.g. standards board says we are making stuff like this...public period to comment...patents not claimed by 180 days invalid for this case...NO profit for patent holders!
The muggings gotta stop