I think our analysis is dead on, but I'm not sure his life has been wrecked. Disrupted? Unquestionably. Was it his fault? Damn straight. Is he getting way too much time in the penalty box? Yep. Is his life ruined? Hmm, that depends on what he learns from this and how he deals with it.
He obviously has no ninja skills -- giving it away to friends and professors and posting a facebook page was retarded. If he creates a similar situation for himself down the road, he'll modify his approach if he has any sense and took anything away from this experience.
Sucks he might lose his scholarship. Too bad he put all his eggs in the ROTC basket. But there are other ways to finance an education at least.
If it comes up in a job interview, he comes clean about it and has behaved himself since then, the only people he'll have to worry about are idiot bureaucrats who hire other idiot bureaucrats. He's maybe closed a few doors for himself, but they are probably doors that are better to have closed in the first place.
A lot of people do stupid things in their teens and twenties. If it doesn't become a pattern, and he's honest about it (assuming it even comes up -- TFA said no laws were broken) it may not matter a whole lot in few years.
Forget about society doing anything constructive to prevent bullying. That just gets more ridiculous laws passed that result in ridiculous litigation.
What this guy did is unforgivable and we'll never understand exactly what went wrong with him. But the thing that keeps getting said over and over again that I just can't feature is how he went his entire life without one single friend. Not one person that seemed to really give a damn about him. Not one other being he could relate to in a sea of people the size of a state university.
When I was in college, there was (coincidentally) an asian guy in our department from a very traditional immigrant family who was unquestionably odd: had a very thick accent, literally ran everywhere he went -- often barefoot, avoided contact with others, didn't bathe regularly, had nervous ticks, totally socially inept. Frat boys picked on him. Sorority girls shunned him.
He was a mathematical prodigy. Some of my friends and I just started including him in conversations, odd as he was, and damn if he didn't respond positively. He was still odd as holy hell, still engaged in some of the same behaviours, but eventually was comfortable enough with us that he would tell jokes and we'd laugh or he'd do some of his usual odd things and we'd gently tease him about but it was okay.
He put on a dress for a Halloween costume party one year and never took it off. I've heard he's gone through with the operation to go with the dress since the last time I saw him. Good on him, if it makes him happy.
I wonder what might have become of him if a few of us didn't go out of our way to befriend him? I don't think he would have gone so far as to kill anyone else, but maybe he would have. Maybe he would have killed himself. Who knows. Maybe our friendship with him didn't have a significant effect on him. But then again, it may have made all the difference.
My school was small and maybe just more of a personal place than a larger school is. Maybe that was the difference. Maybe Cho was so broken by the time he got to university that nothing and nobody could help him.
Anyway, this was a very roundabout way of saying that I think making a personal effort will likely be more effective than anything society at large might try to do to solve problems like Mr. Cho.
In this country handguns were banned about 10 years ago and, whilst the (mostly sporting) fraternity fought tooth-and-nail against it they did on the whole comply with the law when it came in. I used to target shoot.22's, and was quite good at it, and it's a pity that the handgun guys can't do it any more, but we've seen the results of imperfect control.
Are you referring to the Dunblaine school massacre? I was studying in the UK when that happened. That and Mad Cow was pretty much all you heard about on the news.
IIRC, that guy had all of his guns legally. Did they change the laws with respect to handguns as a result of that incident? Do you think it's had any impact beyond simply removing guns from target shooter? I'm not being a smartass, just interested.
There is a handgun ban in the District of Columbia, not that that's stopped DC from being awash with illegal handguns.
Rules are made to be broken, except these. You just make them a habit through careful repetition. If you can't handle that, you can't handle the responsibility of owning a firearm.
1) For starters, get a trigger lock and a locking case for it and don't store the ammo with it.
2) Always keep the safety on until you're ready to shoot. Practice shooting enough and you get used to turning it off before you fire.
3) Always know what you're shooting at (is it a deer or a human? if you have to ask, it's a human) and what's beyond your target.
4) Never point a gun at anything you don't intend to kill.
5) ALWAYS handle a gun as though the safety is off and it is loaded.
Those are basically the rules I was taught when I learned to shoot as a child.
I would add...
6) Pass on what you learned to your own children once they are old enough to understand the rules if you have guns in the house.
7) No "toy" guns. Guns are not toys, plain and simple.
Imagine yourself spouting your nonsense to someone who contracted HIV because:
1) They were raped
2) They got a bad blood transfusion
3) They were born with it
4) They were treating someone who has it and inadvertently infected themselves
5) They're a cop who caught a needle arresting a dope-fiend (one I'm certain a law-and-order guy such as yourself can appreciate).
6) Or imagine saying that to your son or daughter, whether they were being irresponsible or not when they contracted it
Now peep doing that face-to-face, rather than from behind a computer screen.
Personal responsibility can't solve the problem by itself.
You're shortsighted, and just plain mean, and I feel sorry for you, friend.
Abstain versus imminent risk of death. Self preservation is a far stronger motivator than sex in humans. I guess you thought you had a good point but didn't. Nice try though.
Apparently not, since more and more people seem to be catching it in spite of it being a known risk and the reams of information available on how to avoid becoming infected. I guess you thought you had some guts and a snappy rebuttal, but apparently you didn't. Nice try though, AC.
What makes you so sure his friends spread it, or that the people that gave it to them knew they had it. The incubation period for HIV can last for years with no noticeable symptoms.
AIDS is a terrible disease but unless it is dealt with as a health crisis and not a badge of honor or rebellion, it isn't going to get much better. And the idea that it is somehow a right to spread the disease uncontrollably is not helping.
It is a terrible disease but everything you said right after that is absolutely asinine. Find someone who has it and ask them if they feel like a rebel or if they feel honored to have joined the ranks of the terminally ill. WTF??!?
If we treated this disease like the measles were treated in the 1800's AIDS would be gone in 10 years, never to be heard from again.
Measles incubation prior to apparent symptoms being displayed is all of 7 to 14 days. The possibility of going for years with the infection, not knowing you have it, and spreading it to others is just not the case with that. Criss-crossing the globe in a day wasn't possible in the nineteenth century. Not mention, measles hasn't exactly been eradicated yet.
How is that a straw man, exactly? Asking people to abstain is asking people to forego one of the most fundamental of human behaviors. Condoms break, my friend. Been there, done that.
Riddle me this, since we're comparing HIV to the common cold: what if HIV mutated and became transmittable by the same means as the common cold virus or an influenza, but unlike the common cold, you're stuck with it for the rest of your life because someone sneezed on you. Would that change your mind?
Then don't proceed to be. It doesn't excuse the insensitive, judgemental comments that follow.
Sure, some people weren't as careful as they should have been and got infected, but guess what... They live in the same world with the rest of us and can subsequently spread their illness. This is a public health issue. Morality judgements of people infected with STDs don't bring about cures for them any faster. Nor does the attempted imposition of the same morality on the rest of the, as yet, uninfected population seem to be having much effect in slowing down the spread either, let alone stopping it.
How 'bout instead of taking research money away from HIV and giving it some more morally worthy disease, we just resolve to spend more research money on all of them and stop making questionable moral assessments of sick people.
Prior art and non-obviousness should take care of that and its consideration in the application process is provided for in the draft bill (PDF, with apologies). It seems to me that anything already residing in the public domain or a copyrighted work would be prior art.
In the case of public domain materials I can't see how someone could possibly patent, copyright or otherwise stake a claim on them. By definition, they are no longer owned by anyone, save the "the public." A business process that employs the use of them is a separate matter entirely.
They protect two different things and one does not trump the other. Copyright the code. Patent the process.
If they were wandering through my neighborhood, I'd log into them with the default admin password and do them them kind favor of putting them all on separate channels so they don't step on each others' signals. SOP, right?
Just knowing how to use it to its full potential may not be enough. Did you get a look at that helmet in the photo? I've never been in combat, but I'd guess that when the shit hits the fan, I'd want that damn thing out of my face.
Noise canceling headphones?!? Seems to me, often as not, that you'd want to hear some of the ambient sound in combat, particularly in guerrilla warfare.
"More information than they've ever had before" is arguably good for an analyst who has time to process it, but for someone who has to make split-second decisions when their comrades and their own lives hang in the balance... Maybe not so good.
And my accountant and his paper returns are all DRM- & Web 2.0-free. Just because something can be done electronically doesn't necessarily mean it should be done that way.
I took a whole degree in math, but I still pay a preparer and have done so for the past 8 years.
The arithmetic (not math -- oh no, not even close) is not the problem. The problem is keeping abreast of the continual changes in tax law and my ever changing financial status (keeps going UP, thanks! Knock on wood). I'm not an accountant and IANAL. Hence, I've determined for myself that the best thing I can do is vend this task out to someone who is one or the other or both. This is not to say I'm completely clueless with respect to tax, legal and other financial considerations, but I'm hardly as clueful as someone who is neck deep in them everyday.
An even better reason for getting a real live accountant to prepare your return (or a lawyer to draw up your will) is that they have a license on the line when they are performing the service for you. That is strong incentive for them to get it right. And if they don't, there are ways to get that rectified.
In the end, it's not whether you win or lose. It's how place the blame.;^)
For the record, my accountant (a real CPA, not H&R Block) is worth every penny I've spent on him. In addition to preparing tax returns, he's available to advise me on retirement planning, investing, and a whole host of things that software just can't do. I quite literally drop everything that will be required or useful for preparing my tax returns into a shoebox as they come in throughout the year.
1) In January, he sends a letter asking for my pile.
2) I send it once I get all of our W2s, 1099s, etc.
3) He prepares my returns and calls back to discuss them.
4) He mails them back, so I can review and sign them.
5) I stamp and mail them.
The whole process costs me a couple hundred dollars and maybe 45 minutes of my time. Having him do it for me, however, saves hours if not days of my life that I can then put to good use on things I really care about. He knows me and my family and cares about what happens to us, and I like that. He's also a really nice guy. TurboTax is cheaper, but has far less personality.
I doubt it's a lack of social skill so much as a lacking social network compared to the friend pool a typical CEO would have. To get that far up the food chain you at least have to have some political skills, which probably implies social skills as well. This is the director level after all, and not the back office admin level.
Except that most of them eschew cool technology for tried and true, conservative tech. And I wager that much, if not most, of their time is spent dealing with corporate governance bullshit. Especially post-SARBOX and -- to maybe a somewhat lesser extent depending on the business they're engaged in -- as a result of recent changes to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure with respect to electronic documents and how they are to be handled in the event of litigation.
At least that's true of most of the CIOs I've had any dealings with.
It's not your platform, spunkcicle. It's Steve's and Apple's. Just because I mostly don't give a shit about iLife doesn't mean I should have stuck to beige boxes. I have Macs because I like the Unix-like GUI without all the hassle of installing linux and endlessly twiddling with package dependencies and drivers to get it running on whatever laptop I want to use. It's also easier to use with the few linux boxes I still use as well. Since I can also run Windows (because I have to) when I need to, it's a good platform for me. If you must know, yes, I use firefox on all my Macs, Windows PCs, and Linux boxes -- shocking, isn't it, that I might want cross-platform compatibility since I use three or four different operating systems daily.
If you actually read what I wrote, you'd see that I tend to choose gadgets that are the best fit for their intended purpose. Why I'm trying to explain any of this to some dipshit fanboy is beyond my ability to comprehend. You'll buy whatever Steve tells you to whether it makes sense or not.
Now go make an iPhoto book for your Mom, since your obviously so creative and a better steward of your free time.
So what? I didn't say they weren't. Nearly every computing device I own is Apple-branded at this point primarily for that reason.
* Except for the gaming console, which is the only thing I'll continue buying from MS. Apple still hasn't seen fit to care enough about me to make a gaming console.
* I don't like Safari either, now that you mention it. It's not cross-platform compatible, and I can't tinker with it enough to make it suit my needs.
* And that phone everyone just can't stop carrying on about will never handle e-mail as well as my BlackBerry because $teve doesn't really want anyone not under his immediate control to develop software for it. If he'd take a page from Bill G's playbook and buy RIM, I'll be first in line to buy one though.
* Apple thinks I should be more creative, but much of the time I'm confoundingly lazy and unproductive. I spend too much time watching TV, with my Tivo. Another need, unmet by Apple.
Microsoft has offerings in every one of those categories, but most of them suck. Apple makes some things I like, so I buy things from them: iTunes; iPhoto; the best wireless networking around; the most durable notebooks I've ever owned; a filesystem that makes sense to me -- even though they borrowed most of that from *nix; etc. I don't buy their stuff because they're inherently "good" or because they care for me, no am I under the (mistaken) impression that they are or do.
I love Apple in the only way it feels love. With Money. Of course, that will change if something better comes along.
Apple sucks less than Microsoft, but that doesn't mean they're not asswipes too. Does that illustrate my point better?
Heh. I use AppleTalk everyday, actually. I have an old Apple LaserWriter II.g (frankenprinter -- assembled from the parts of about 6 other LaserWriters and HP LaserJet IIIs). Old as that thing is -- and AppleTalk too, for that matter -- it's still supported in OS X quite well.
I turned on the AppleTalk service on my iBook when I got it 5 years ago, installed the printer, and that was about it.
What OS doesn't require that you "reset permissions" on something occasionally?
Oh wait a minute, I forgot about Windows, where you never have to reset permissions because they're already Full Control for everybody, 'cause it's just better that way.
Make that two votes for, "dude has no idea what he's talking about."
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Pictured Rocks, the largest source of fresh water in the world, the most shoreline of any state aside from Alaska. Yeah, what a shithole. We definitely need to ruin that as soon as possible.
He obviously has no ninja skills -- giving it away to friends and professors and posting a facebook page was retarded. If he creates a similar situation for himself down the road, he'll modify his approach if he has any sense and took anything away from this experience.
Sucks he might lose his scholarship. Too bad he put all his eggs in the ROTC basket. But there are other ways to finance an education at least.
If it comes up in a job interview, he comes clean about it and has behaved himself since then, the only people he'll have to worry about are idiot bureaucrats who hire other idiot bureaucrats. He's maybe closed a few doors for himself, but they are probably doors that are better to have closed in the first place.
A lot of people do stupid things in their teens and twenties. If it doesn't become a pattern, and he's honest about it (assuming it even comes up -- TFA said no laws were broken) it may not matter a whole lot in few years.
What this guy did is unforgivable and we'll never understand exactly what went wrong with him. But the thing that keeps getting said over and over again that I just can't feature is how he went his entire life without one single friend. Not one person that seemed to really give a damn about him. Not one other being he could relate to in a sea of people the size of a state university.
When I was in college, there was (coincidentally) an asian guy in our department from a very traditional immigrant family who was unquestionably odd: had a very thick accent, literally ran everywhere he went -- often barefoot, avoided contact with others, didn't bathe regularly, had nervous ticks, totally socially inept. Frat boys picked on him. Sorority girls shunned him.
He was a mathematical prodigy. Some of my friends and I just started including him in conversations, odd as he was, and damn if he didn't respond positively. He was still odd as holy hell, still engaged in some of the same behaviours, but eventually was comfortable enough with us that he would tell jokes and we'd laugh or he'd do some of his usual odd things and we'd gently tease him about but it was okay.
He put on a dress for a Halloween costume party one year and never took it off. I've heard he's gone through with the operation to go with the dress since the last time I saw him. Good on him, if it makes him happy.
I wonder what might have become of him if a few of us didn't go out of our way to befriend him? I don't think he would have gone so far as to kill anyone else, but maybe he would have. Maybe he would have killed himself. Who knows. Maybe our friendship with him didn't have a significant effect on him. But then again, it may have made all the difference.
My school was small and maybe just more of a personal place than a larger school is. Maybe that was the difference. Maybe Cho was so broken by the time he got to university that nothing and nobody could help him.
Anyway, this was a very roundabout way of saying that I think making a personal effort will likely be more effective than anything society at large might try to do to solve problems like Mr. Cho.
IIRC, that guy had all of his guns legally. Did they change the laws with respect to handguns as a result of that incident? Do you think it's had any impact beyond simply removing guns from target shooter? I'm not being a smartass, just interested.
There is a handgun ban in the District of Columbia, not that that's stopped DC from being awash with illegal handguns.
1) For starters, get a trigger lock and a locking case for it and don't store the ammo with it.
2) Always keep the safety on until you're ready to shoot. Practice shooting enough and you get used to turning it off before you fire.
3) Always know what you're shooting at (is it a deer or a human? if you have to ask, it's a human) and what's beyond your target.
4) Never point a gun at anything you don't intend to kill.
5) ALWAYS handle a gun as though the safety is off and it is loaded.
Those are basically the rules I was taught when I learned to shoot as a child.
I would add...
6) Pass on what you learned to your own children once they are old enough to understand the rules if you have guns in the house.
7) No "toy" guns. Guns are not toys, plain and simple.
What, that you don't talk about Fight Club?
1) They were raped
2) They got a bad blood transfusion
3) They were born with it
4) They were treating someone who has it and inadvertently infected themselves
5) They're a cop who caught a needle arresting a dope-fiend (one I'm certain a law-and-order guy such as yourself can appreciate).
6) Or imagine saying that to your son or daughter, whether they were being irresponsible or not when they contracted it
Now peep doing that face-to-face, rather than from behind a computer screen.
Personal responsibility can't solve the problem by itself.
You're shortsighted, and just plain mean, and I feel sorry for you, friend.
Riddle me this, since we're comparing HIV to the common cold: what if HIV mutated and became transmittable by the same means as the common cold virus or an influenza, but unlike the common cold, you're stuck with it for the rest of your life because someone sneezed on you. Would that change your mind?
Sure, some people weren't as careful as they should have been and got infected, but guess what... They live in the same world with the rest of us and can subsequently spread their illness. This is a public health issue. Morality judgements of people infected with STDs don't bring about cures for them any faster. Nor does the attempted imposition of the same morality on the rest of the, as yet, uninfected population seem to be having much effect in slowing down the spread either, let alone stopping it.
How 'bout instead of taking research money away from HIV and giving it some more morally worthy disease, we just resolve to spend more research money on all of them and stop making questionable moral assessments of sick people.
In the case of public domain materials I can't see how someone could possibly patent, copyright or otherwise stake a claim on them. By definition, they are no longer owned by anyone, save the "the public." A business process that employs the use of them is a separate matter entirely.
They protect two different things and one does not trump the other. Copyright the code. Patent the process.
No. OS/PD projects are copyrighted not patented. Whole different animal.
Luke, you've turned off your targeting computer! Is everything okay?
If they were wandering through my neighborhood, I'd log into them with the default admin password and do them them kind favor of putting them all on separate channels so they don't step on each others' signals. SOP, right?
Noise canceling headphones?!? Seems to me, often as not, that you'd want to hear some of the ambient sound in combat, particularly in guerrilla warfare.
"More information than they've ever had before" is arguably good for an analyst who has time to process it, but for someone who has to make split-second decisions when their comrades and their own lives hang in the balance... Maybe not so good.
eVoting, anyone?
The arithmetic (not math -- oh no, not even close) is not the problem. The problem is keeping abreast of the continual changes in tax law and my ever changing financial status (keeps going UP, thanks! Knock on wood). I'm not an accountant and IANAL. Hence, I've determined for myself that the best thing I can do is vend this task out to someone who is one or the other or both. This is not to say I'm completely clueless with respect to tax, legal and other financial considerations, but I'm hardly as clueful as someone who is neck deep in them everyday.
An even better reason for getting a real live accountant to prepare your return (or a lawyer to draw up your will) is that they have a license on the line when they are performing the service for you. That is strong incentive for them to get it right. And if they don't, there are ways to get that rectified.
In the end, it's not whether you win or lose. It's how place the blame. ;^)
For the record, my accountant (a real CPA, not H&R Block) is worth every penny I've spent on him. In addition to preparing tax returns, he's available to advise me on retirement planning, investing, and a whole host of things that software just can't do. I quite literally drop everything that will be required or useful for preparing my tax returns into a shoebox as they come in throughout the year.
1) In January, he sends a letter asking for my pile.
2) I send it once I get all of our W2s, 1099s, etc.
3) He prepares my returns and calls back to discuss them.
4) He mails them back, so I can review and sign them.
5) I stamp and mail them.
The whole process costs me a couple hundred dollars and maybe 45 minutes of my time. Having him do it for me, however, saves hours if not days of my life that I can then put to good use on things I really care about. He knows me and my family and cares about what happens to us, and I like that. He's also a really nice guy. TurboTax is cheaper, but has far less personality.
You should check out his book, The Eden Express. It details his personal struggles with schizophrenia, among other things. Fascinating reading.
I doubt it's a lack of social skill so much as a lacking social network compared to the friend pool a typical CEO would have. To get that far up the food chain you at least have to have some political skills, which probably implies social skills as well. This is the director level after all, and not the back office admin level.
At least that's true of most of the CIOs I've had any dealings with.
If you actually read what I wrote, you'd see that I tend to choose gadgets that are the best fit for their intended purpose. Why I'm trying to explain any of this to some dipshit fanboy is beyond my ability to comprehend. You'll buy whatever Steve tells you to whether it makes sense or not.
Now go make an iPhoto book for your Mom, since your obviously so creative and a better steward of your free time.
* Except for the gaming console, which is the only thing I'll continue buying from MS. Apple still hasn't seen fit to care enough about me to make a gaming console.
* I don't like Safari either, now that you mention it. It's not cross-platform compatible, and I can't tinker with it enough to make it suit my needs.
* And that phone everyone just can't stop carrying on about will never handle e-mail as well as my BlackBerry because $teve doesn't really want anyone not under his immediate control to develop software for it. If he'd take a page from Bill G's playbook and buy RIM, I'll be first in line to buy one though.
* Apple thinks I should be more creative, but much of the time I'm confoundingly lazy and unproductive. I spend too much time watching TV, with my Tivo. Another need, unmet by Apple.
Microsoft has offerings in every one of those categories, but most of them suck. Apple makes some things I like, so I buy things from them: iTunes; iPhoto; the best wireless networking around; the most durable notebooks I've ever owned; a filesystem that makes sense to me -- even though they borrowed most of that from *nix; etc. I don't buy their stuff because they're inherently "good" or because they care for me, no am I under the (mistaken) impression that they are or do.
I love Apple in the only way it feels love. With Money. Of course, that will change if something better comes along.
Apple sucks less than Microsoft, but that doesn't mean they're not asswipes too. Does that illustrate my point better?
If they ever catch up, you might be in for a big disappointment.
I turned on the AppleTalk service on my iBook when I got it 5 years ago, installed the printer, and that was about it.
What OS doesn't require that you "reset permissions" on something occasionally?
Oh wait a minute, I forgot about Windows, where you never have to reset permissions because they're already Full Control for everybody, 'cause it's just better that way.
Make that two votes for, "dude has no idea what he's talking about."