"The correlation of spice and oil today may seem good, but oil is not a hallucinogen that also allows a greater perception and awareness. Dumbing it down to oil and Iraq does no justice to Frank Herbert."
To the contrary, Herbert was showing great insight. He was pointing out that oil has not only become vital to transportation, but has permeated the rest of our economy and culture in ways we weren't even aware of - we literally breath it in in atmospheric pollution, eat and drink it in the plastic containers we use, and "live it" in the sense that it has allowed a culture of mobility that is historically unprecedented. The Fremen were literally addicted to spice; the Middle east is addicted to oil in that if it ran out their governments and power would collapse. But Herbert was pointing out that the rest of the world is ALSO addicted to oil, but simply don't recognize it. Remember, Dune was published in 1965, well before the oil shocks of the early 70's, the Iranian revolution, and the final collapse of the colonial systems and their vestiges.
I think the only part Herbert missed was the need for the Fremen to have a leader that was from the oppressing outside but going native, who brings outside technologies and ways of thinking and applies them to the lean, tough, religious culture of the Fremen. I think this is where his "white maleness" showed through; in reality, the Middle Eastern people have simply applied Western technology on their own, or used that given by Western powers, along with western organizational techniques. Although perhaps Herbert isn't as chauvinistic as I propose - the fact that a truly unifying Arab/Muslim leader has not emerged might be indicative of an insight that the Islamic world CAN'T unify on it's own. I think we'll see within the next few years how right Herbert really was.
- There is a substance that is absolutely essential to transportation, and has also become vital to many other aspects of the widespread economy. - This substance exists in an incredibly harsh desert environment and can only be extracted in commercial quantities by large technological implementations not native to the environment or culture of the indigenous people. - The aformentioned indigenous people have been toughened by the environment and by the continued exploitation of them by outsiders. They have also become fanatical followers of a particular religion with messianic elements. - The indigenous peoples realize their situation and, using technology and techniques received from those who exploited them, turn on those exploiters and seize control of the geography and production of that substance, thereby throwing the rest of the wider economy into turmoil and stepping onto the wider stage.
And, in later books, wage Jihad against the balance of the world/universe, taking them over and enforcing strict religious tenets on the conquered cultures and people.
1) Vendor convinces end user to buy their product, and gives end user a "sample" spec, written in such a way that only the Vendor can comply. 2) End user scrubs spec of vendor references and submits it to Purchasing as his department's "requirements". 3) Purchasing does what they do. 4) Vendor is the only bidder - no one else can comply with the requirements as written. 5) Profit! (for the vendor)
It matters because it is a long held practice of governments to specify a "standard" product so that they cannot be accused of choosing proprietary products. If OOXML had not become a standard, governments may not have been ALLOWED to use it according to their own internal rules. Of course, this process is often abused - specifications are often written so that only one product or company qualifies, even though they are not named. So now all governments need to is say "File formats shall comply with standard XYZ and - lo and behold - only MS office qualifies.
"In criticizing the arguments for the warrantless surveillance program, the EFF lawyer claims the US is "far from the military theater". Well 9/11 was an attack on US soil, so where does the EFF think the "military theater" is? The warrantless surveillance program was specifically designed to prevent an attack on US soil by non-US citizens."
I'll disagree with this. One attack on US soil does NOT make the entire US a "military theater" in the conventional sense. Part of the problem is language - terms like "theater of operations" were developed to describe a type of warfare that evolved over thousands of years. But what we are dealing with now are insurgencies and terrorism, which operate by different rules and the historic solutions - summary executions of insurgents, etc. - are not available anymore.
Right now our system is set up to deal with violence against our citizenry in 2 ways: 1) Reactive. This is the police, responding to crimes that have already happened. According to the Supreme Court, they are not accountable for preventing crimes. 2) Proactive. This is the military, whose job is to defend/prevent violence against US citizens, and have been restricted to directing that against other nations.
How do we deal with violence that isn't propagated by other nations per se, that has a substantial component on US soil, and is large enough that simply reacting to it after it has happened isn't enough? I'm not really sure, but I can say that the way we are doing it now is failing.
It USED to be that this was taken care of on an individual basis, with persons responsible for defending themselves and their families, and armed to do so. But that has largely gone away. For instance, here in Maryland a 12 year old boy killed a man who was attacking his mother in their own house. A neighbor had come in and had her down on the floor, choking her. The kid yelled at him, but he didn't get off, so the kid grabbed a knife and took a wild swing and got luck and got the attacker's jugular. Worthy of a medal, right? Nope - the district attorney is deciding whether to prosecute the kid based on the fact that it wasn't self defense - the kid wasn't in danger, only his mother.
The government has succeeded in convincing us that our safety lies in police that have no responsibility to defend the citizenry and a military that isn't organized, equipped, or trained to protect the US against threats from non-governmental actors. And guess what, folks - electing Democrats in fall isn't going to help ONE DAMNED BIT!
You miss my point - until now, the possibility of using the US military in the US was precluded by posse comitatus. The US military is not trained for, and does not WANT to conduct, military operations on US soil against US citizens. But those piss poor excuses for men (and I include the women) in Congress decided that, if they get another scary thrown at them, that they would place the US military between them and danger. Which is a miserable idea - Congress rants at how poor the Military is at "policing" in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Balkans, etc., but somehow thinks they will turn into Cub Scouts on US soil?
Yes, the Constitution applies to the military as well as the police, but for over 100 years that has been accomplished by keeping military operations OUT of the US proper.
"And here are Senator Leahy's remarks on the Senate floor about this Act, which has since been passed and signed into law. The first paragraph is all you really need to read:
"Sep 30, 2006: After passing both the Senate and House, a conference committee is created to work out differences between the Senate and House versions of the bill. A conference report resolving those differences passed in the Senate, paving the way for enactment of the bill, by Unanimous Consent. A record of each representative's position was not kept."
So he thought that part of the bill was awful, but not awful enough for him to do anything about besides make speeches? Real moral bravery there.
given the breathless nature of the summary, I actually read the RTFA. Some points.
1) It's a speculative footnote - the memo authors were speculating that the 4th amendment may not apply during military operations in the US proper. The summary takes that and runs with it to its own speculation.
2) The basis of the footnote was the fact that Congress authorized military operations in the US, and typically the 4th amendment doesn't apply to military operations - if a soldier is going to search a house, his warrant is permanent and engraved into the sole of the bot he uses to kick down the door. Why in the HELL Congress decided to chuck posse comitatus overboard I'll never understand, except ibn light of tehm being a bunch of cowardly pussies who were so afraid of a jetliner crashing into the Capitiol and killing them all that they would do ANYTHING to protect their pampered asses.
"Great idea in theory, poor idea in practice. IP & MAC address anonymity won't help you when you leave a trail elsewhere. I work for a college in New England and we regularly receive RIAA notices -- all the MAC address and IP address shenanigans in the world don't help when Joe Student logged into BlackBoard and Webmail from the same MAC & IP address as he allegedly downloaded pirated material. And, no, the "Oh dude, I totally gave my username & password to someone else" excuse doesn't get very far in that case."
I think you miss the point - black operations under false identity, white operations in the clear. You ONLY use the live cd and USB drive to do "questionable" operations, and use your standard logins, etc., for everyday stuff.
Think of it another way - who here DOESN"T have a different username for boards on which you'd rather not be identified: throwaway email, fake profile info. It wouldn't fool a determined criminal investigation, but it helps avoid those embarrassing "Hey, aren't you RealCoolGuy123 over on SexWithSmallAnimalsForum.com? Never thought I'd see you here at the WhiteGuysForJesus boards!"
Not trying to be a wiseass (well, yeah, maybe I am), but why is this important. I never really understood the whole "V2 VS V3" thing, and a succinct explanation would be appreciated.
"There will still be gatekeepers, but the new gatekeepers will be bloggers and other online communities that promote music they've heard and appreciate."
Oh, well, that's a relief - for a minute there I thought the gatekeepers were going to be self important blowhards with little taste and no style.
"The recording industry are just a bunch of puffed out suits beating their own chests in response to the threat of something surpassing them. They'll get bored eventually."
No, they won't. Their livelihood is threatened, and no one gets "bored" in the face of rapid loss of income. It's definitely going to get worse before it gets better.
While State College may be liberal (big surprise - that's where the faculty and administration lives), and the administration at UP may lean liberal (they'd be laughed at when they go to conventions), keep in mind that most of the STUDENTS are from "10 miles in any direction". And I'd hazard a guess that the Philadelphia and Pittsburgh student, who might tend liberal, are underrepresented - they have a lot of college options closer to home. So the student body tends more conservative. And those students typically lay low - activism isn't their thing. Depending on which side of the political spectrum you're on, they either don't have time between classes and homework for things like protests, or they aren't interested in anything they can't drink, fuck, or drive - probably both.
I went to Lehigh, which had much the demographic and setting writ small.The student newspaper always railed about student "apathy" - why weren't we protesting the war (Gulf I), etc. The Arts & Science majors would make a showing, and be pretty much ignored by the Engineering and Business majors on their way to classes/pub night.
Hell, my brother had an ARSENAL in his dorm room at State College - handguns, deer rifles, compound bows, knives, blowguns, slingshots - and no one batted an eye.
That's because you go to a school in PA where the first day of deer season is a de facto state holiday.
It's teh state where, every year, one MEELION men armed with weapons that can penetrate body armor leave home to perform both stationary and mobile operations, each the intent on inflicting severe bodily injury - all well within the confines of the law. And most years, NOT A SINGLE PERSON gets shot.
Yes, it is possible to keep and bear arms without turning into a slavering murderers. I think that's what Sarah Brady and her controllers are afraid of - people being armed, having power, and having the potential to use that power, even though they won't unless necessary. Intentionally restricting the POTENTIAL power of the individual is classis, racist, elitist, and every other -ist i can think of. It is saying to another "I am afraid of you, and therefore I am going to try to remove that fear by removing your power to make me afraid." It is the ultimate in moral cowardice.
"Or decides to tackle the 'weapon wielder'. Or raises a vigilante posse to go after the 'weapon wielder'. "
Given the (lack of) action by the students at VT, the other school shootings, and the mall shootings to defend themselves, I'd say those last two aren't worries at all. Which is exactly how the school administration and government administration want it - sheep waiting for the shepherd to save them when the wolves come, instead of free, responsible adults in charge of their own safety.
Sorry, any comments about politics or economics from anyone labeling themselves as European are automatically discounted as naive and pretentious. Western Europe has been living in a bubble for 60 years as the US subsidized their defense, freeing up government funds for social programs. Likewise, they were forced into political alignment with each other by the need to stick together against the threat, real or perceived, from the USSR.
Have fun now that the USSR is a competitor and not an enemy (how's that natural gas bill?) The US will shortly be retrenching on the world stage. You'll still be allowed to complain about American isolation and protectionism, except now it will be economic and not political - BMW is already talking about moving German jobs to the US. And NATO is probably going to become hobbled after Afghanistan. What will happen when the Europeans cannot cry "This cannot be tolerated - the US, err, I mean, NATO must stop this!"?
And for those that say that Europe is now one big happy family, there's 2000 years of history that says otherwise - Europe has been "peaceful" for 2.5% of that time. So the odds are 40:1 that Europe will again be involved in armed conflict within its own borders. But, hey, the EU will solve all your problems, right?
In 95-96, the FCC bid out a bunch of frequencies, and there were special Congressional mandates to allow "small businesses" to compete - mainly, very little deposit. Nextwave bought up a whole lot of licenses, and other companies did as well. Then the market took a downturn, and the value of the licenses dropped, and a lot of the participants declared bankruptcy. In Nextwave's case, the FCC "repossessed" the licenses for non-payment, but it was reversed by the court, and Nextwave was given relief. Then the business cycle turned again, and the licenses were worth 3x as much as Nextwave paid for them. The speculation was that they were going to sell them off for an insane profit. The word around the communications industry was they were really just a shell company and never intended to build, just to sell them off later. It looks like they kept the frequencies and are rolling out WiMax on it - *10 YEARS* after the frequencies were auctioned.
The construction provisions are there to make sure that the spectrum actually gets used and not held as an investment. In addition, most S/W/DBE's that get involved in government doings are a fraud: 50.5% of the company is "owned" by a woman, who just happens to be the wife of the CEO and owner of the other 49.5%. Or construction "general contractors" who hire's a "prime subcontractors" - i.e the real general contractor - to do 100% of the scope. Their price to the government? The price that the GC bid plus 1%. So on a $10,000,000 Baltimore City school job, some guy sitting in an office made $100,000, never set foot on site, and never dealt with the city or the other subcontractors.
There is a Nextwave in existence now, but if the WiMax service they are
Slashdot Mirror
"The correlation of spice and oil today may seem good, but oil is not a hallucinogen that also allows a greater perception and awareness. Dumbing it down to oil and Iraq does no justice to Frank Herbert."
To the contrary, Herbert was showing great insight. He was pointing out that oil has not only become vital to transportation, but has permeated the rest of our economy and culture in ways we weren't even aware of - we literally breath it in in atmospheric pollution, eat and drink it in the plastic containers we use, and "live it" in the sense that it has allowed a culture of mobility that is historically unprecedented. The Fremen were literally addicted to spice; the Middle east is addicted to oil in that if it ran out their governments and power would collapse. But Herbert was pointing out that the rest of the world is ALSO addicted to oil, but simply don't recognize it. Remember, Dune was published in 1965, well before the oil shocks of the early 70's, the Iranian revolution, and the final collapse of the colonial systems and their vestiges.
I think the only part Herbert missed was the need for the Fremen to have a leader that was from the oppressing outside but going native, who brings outside technologies and ways of thinking and applies them to the lean, tough, religious culture of the Fremen. I think this is where his "white maleness" showed through; in reality, the Middle Eastern people have simply applied Western technology on their own, or used that given by Western powers, along with western organizational techniques. Although perhaps Herbert isn't as chauvinistic as I propose - the fact that a truly unifying Arab/Muslim leader has not emerged might be indicative of an insight that the Islamic world CAN'T unify on it's own. I think we'll see within the next few years how right Herbert really was.
As for sandworms? They are just fukkin COOL!
Hmmm, lets see.
- There is a substance that is absolutely essential to transportation, and has also become vital to many other aspects of the widespread economy.
- This substance exists in an incredibly harsh desert environment and can only be extracted in commercial quantities by large technological implementations not native to the environment or culture of the indigenous people.
- The aformentioned indigenous people have been toughened by the environment and by the continued exploitation of them by outsiders. They have also become fanatical followers of a particular religion with messianic elements.
- The indigenous peoples realize their situation and, using technology and techniques received from those who exploited them, turn on those exploiters and seize control of the geography and production of that substance, thereby throwing the rest of the wider economy into turmoil and stepping onto the wider stage.
And, in later books, wage Jihad against the balance of the world/universe, taking them over and enforcing strict religious tenets on the conquered cultures and people.
Nope, don't see any insight at all.
Here's the REAL procurement process:
1) Vendor convinces end user to buy their product, and gives end user a "sample" spec, written in such a way that only the Vendor can comply.
2) End user scrubs spec of vendor references and submits it to Purchasing as his department's "requirements".
3) Purchasing does what they do.
4) Vendor is the only bidder - no one else can comply with the requirements as written.
5) Profit! (for the vendor)
It matters because it is a long held practice of governments to specify a "standard" product so that they cannot be accused of choosing proprietary products. If OOXML had not become a standard, governments may not have been ALLOWED to use it according to their own internal rules. Of course, this process is often abused - specifications are often written so that only one product or company qualifies, even though they are not named. So now all governments need to is say "File formats shall comply with standard XYZ and - lo and behold - only MS office qualifies.
"In criticizing the arguments for the warrantless surveillance program, the EFF lawyer claims the US is "far from the military theater". Well 9/11 was an attack on US soil, so where does the EFF think the "military theater" is? The warrantless surveillance program was specifically designed to prevent an attack on US soil by non-US citizens."
I'll disagree with this. One attack on US soil does NOT make the entire US a "military theater" in the conventional sense. Part of the problem is language - terms like "theater of operations" were developed to describe a type of warfare that evolved over thousands of years. But what we are dealing with now are insurgencies and terrorism, which operate by different rules and the historic solutions - summary executions of insurgents, etc. - are not available anymore.
Right now our system is set up to deal with violence against our citizenry in 2 ways:
1) Reactive. This is the police, responding to crimes that have already happened. According to the Supreme Court, they are not accountable for preventing crimes.
2) Proactive. This is the military, whose job is to defend/prevent violence against US citizens, and have been restricted to directing that against other nations.
How do we deal with violence that isn't propagated by other nations per se, that has a substantial component on US soil, and is large enough that simply reacting to it after it has happened isn't enough? I'm not really sure, but I can say that the way we are doing it now is failing.
It USED to be that this was taken care of on an individual basis, with persons responsible for defending themselves and their families, and armed to do so. But that has largely gone away. For instance, here in Maryland a 12 year old boy killed a man who was attacking his mother in their own house. A neighbor had come in and had her down on the floor, choking her. The kid yelled at him, but he didn't get off, so the kid grabbed a knife and took a wild swing and got luck and got the attacker's jugular. Worthy of a medal, right? Nope - the district attorney is deciding whether to prosecute the kid based on the fact that it wasn't self defense - the kid wasn't in danger, only his mother.
The government has succeeded in convincing us that our safety lies in police that have no responsibility to defend the citizenry and a military that isn't organized, equipped, or trained to protect the US against threats from non-governmental actors. And guess what, folks - electing Democrats in fall isn't going to help ONE DAMNED BIT!
You miss my point - until now, the possibility of using the US military in the US was precluded by posse comitatus. The US military is not trained for, and does not WANT to conduct, military operations on US soil against US citizens. But those piss poor excuses for men (and I include the women) in Congress decided that, if they get another scary thrown at them, that they would place the US military between them and danger. Which is a miserable idea - Congress rants at how poor the Military is at "policing" in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Balkans, etc., but somehow thinks they will turn into Cub Scouts on US soil?
Yes, the Constitution applies to the military as well as the police, but for over 100 years that has been accomplished by keeping military operations OUT of the US proper.
"And here are Senator Leahy's remarks on the Senate floor about this Act, which has since been passed and signed into law. The first paragraph is all you really need to read:
http://leahy.senate.gov/press/200609/092906b.html"
From http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h109-5122
"Sep 30, 2006: After passing both the Senate and House, a conference committee is created to work out differences between the Senate and House versions of the bill. A conference report resolving those differences passed in the Senate, paving the way for enactment of the bill, by Unanimous Consent. A record of each representative's position was not kept."
So he thought that part of the bill was awful, but not awful enough for him to do anything about besides make speeches? Real moral bravery there.
given the breathless nature of the summary, I actually read the RTFA. Some points.
1) It's a speculative footnote - the memo authors were speculating that the 4th amendment may not apply during military operations in the US proper. The summary takes that and runs with it to its own speculation.
2) The basis of the footnote was the fact that Congress authorized military operations in the US, and typically the 4th amendment doesn't apply to military operations - if a soldier is going to search a house, his warrant is permanent and engraved into the sole of the bot he uses to kick down the door. Why in the HELL Congress decided to chuck posse comitatus overboard I'll never understand, except ibn light of tehm being a bunch of cowardly pussies who were so afraid of a jetliner crashing into the Capitiol and killing them all that they would do ANYTHING to protect their pampered asses.
Good, bad..they're the ones with the code.
"gang of naked teenagers invading Prime Minister's question time "
You say that like it's a bad thing.
"Have you ever watched porn close caption?"
Transcribing porn for the hearing impaired.
"Great idea in theory, poor idea in practice. IP & MAC address anonymity won't help you when you leave a trail elsewhere. I work for a college in New England and we regularly receive RIAA notices -- all the MAC address and IP address shenanigans in the world don't help when Joe Student logged into BlackBoard and Webmail from the same MAC & IP address as he allegedly downloaded pirated material. And, no, the "Oh dude, I totally gave my username & password to someone else" excuse doesn't get very far in that case."
I think you miss the point - black operations under false identity, white operations in the clear. You ONLY use the live cd and USB drive to do "questionable" operations, and use your standard logins, etc., for everyday stuff.
Think of it another way - who here DOESN"T have a different username for boards on which you'd rather not be identified: throwaway email, fake profile info. It wouldn't fool a determined criminal investigation, but it helps avoid those embarrassing "Hey, aren't you RealCoolGuy123 over on SexWithSmallAnimalsForum.com? Never thought I'd see you here at the WhiteGuysForJesus boards!"
Not trying to be a wiseass (well, yeah, maybe I am), but why is this important. I never really understood the whole "V2 VS V3" thing, and a succinct explanation would be appreciated.
"There will still be gatekeepers, but the new gatekeepers will be bloggers and other online communities that promote music they've heard and appreciate."
Oh, well, that's a relief - for a minute there I thought the gatekeepers were going to be self important blowhards with little taste and no style.
"The recording industry are just a bunch of puffed out suits beating their own chests in response to the threat of something surpassing them. They'll get bored eventually."
No, they won't. Their livelihood is threatened, and no one gets "bored" in the face of rapid loss of income. It's definitely going to get worse before it gets better.
I cancelled 2 days ago. Went with Dish Network and (gulp) Verizon DSL. Cheaper all around and I won't have Comcast messing with my inetrnet speed.
While State College may be liberal (big surprise - that's where the faculty and administration lives), and the administration at UP may lean liberal (they'd be laughed at when they go to conventions), keep in mind that most of the STUDENTS are from "10 miles in any direction". And I'd hazard a guess that the Philadelphia and Pittsburgh student, who might tend liberal, are underrepresented - they have a lot of college options closer to home. So the student body tends more conservative. And those students typically lay low - activism isn't their thing. Depending on which side of the political spectrum you're on, they either don't have time between classes and homework for things like protests, or they aren't interested in anything they can't drink, fuck, or drive - probably both.
I went to Lehigh, which had much the demographic and setting writ small.The student newspaper always railed about student "apathy" - why weren't we protesting the war (Gulf I), etc. The Arts & Science majors would make a showing, and be pretty much ignored by the Engineering and Business majors on their way to classes/pub night.
Hell, my brother had an ARSENAL in his dorm room at State College - handguns, deer rifles, compound bows, knives, blowguns, slingshots - and no one batted an eye.
That's because you go to a school in PA where the first day of deer season is a de facto state holiday.
It's teh state where, every year, one MEELION men armed with weapons that can penetrate body armor leave home to perform both stationary and mobile operations, each the intent on inflicting severe bodily injury - all well within the confines of the law. And most years, NOT A SINGLE PERSON gets shot.
Yes, it is possible to keep and bear arms without turning into a slavering murderers. I think that's what Sarah Brady and her controllers are afraid of - people being armed, having power, and having the potential to use that power, even though they won't unless necessary. Intentionally restricting the POTENTIAL power of the individual is classis, racist, elitist, and every other -ist i can think of. It is saying to another "I am afraid of you, and therefore I am going to try to remove that fear by removing your power to make me afraid." It is the ultimate in moral cowardice.
"Or decides to tackle the 'weapon wielder'. Or raises a vigilante posse to go after the 'weapon wielder'. "
Given the (lack of) action by the students at VT, the other school shootings, and the mall shootings to defend themselves, I'd say those last two aren't worries at all. Which is exactly how the school administration and government administration want it - sheep waiting for the shepherd to save them when the wolves come, instead of free, responsible adults in charge of their own safety.
Don't foget that Chelsea was crawling along with her.
"he initial research which made the connection, was falsified, and the scientist, well, he's not doing research any more."
Suer he's not doing research on the autism/vaccination link?
"You do realize that with SP1, Vista and Server 2008 are the same OS, right?
The differences are tuning and user-space and consumer targeted stuff tacked on the top of the core for Vista."
Isn't that like saying that gorillas and humans are exactly the same except for 1% of their DNA?
"I recommend Nessman-esque masking tape walls and door. Simply enforce pretend knocking and 'lock' it at night. Problem solved."
Never has my sig been more appropriate.
Sorry, any comments about politics or economics from anyone labeling themselves as European are automatically discounted as naive and pretentious. Western Europe has been living in a bubble for 60 years as the US subsidized their defense, freeing up government funds for social programs. Likewise, they were forced into political alignment with each other by the need to stick together against the threat, real or perceived, from the USSR.
Have fun now that the USSR is a competitor and not an enemy (how's that natural gas bill?) The US will shortly be retrenching on the world stage. You'll still be allowed to complain about American isolation and protectionism, except now it will be economic and not political - BMW is already talking about moving German jobs to the US. And NATO is probably going to become hobbled after Afghanistan. What will happen when the Europeans cannot cry "This cannot be tolerated - the US, err, I mean, NATO must stop this!"?
And for those that say that Europe is now one big happy family, there's 2000 years of history that says otherwise - Europe has been "peaceful" for 2.5% of that time. So the odds are 40:1 that Europe will again be involved in armed conflict within its own borders. But, hey, the EU will solve all your problems, right?
Right?
In 95-96, the FCC bid out a bunch of frequencies, and there were special Congressional mandates to allow "small businesses" to compete - mainly, very little deposit. Nextwave bought up a whole lot of licenses, and other companies did as well. Then the market took a downturn, and the value of the licenses dropped, and a lot of the participants declared bankruptcy. In Nextwave's case, the FCC "repossessed" the licenses for non-payment, but it was reversed by the court, and Nextwave was given relief. Then the business cycle turned again, and the licenses were worth 3x as much as Nextwave paid for them. The speculation was that they were going to sell them off for an insane profit. The word around the communications industry was they were really just a shell company and never intended to build, just to sell them off later. It looks like they kept the frequencies and are rolling out WiMax on it - *10 YEARS* after the frequencies were auctioned.
The construction provisions are there to make sure that the spectrum actually gets used and not held as an investment. In addition, most S/W/DBE's that get involved in government doings are a fraud: 50.5% of the company is "owned" by a woman, who just happens to be the wife of the CEO and owner of the other 49.5%. Or construction "general contractors" who hire's a "prime subcontractors" - i.e the real general contractor - to do 100% of the scope. Their price to the government? The price that the GC bid plus 1%. So on a $10,000,000 Baltimore City school job, some guy sitting in an office made $100,000, never set foot on site, and never dealt with the city or the other subcontractors.
There is a Nextwave in existence now, but if the WiMax service they are