Forget electronic devices of all kinds.
I saw a translucent _office chair_ in this week's Office Depot flyer. Available in five fruit colours. (I don't remember which ones though)
Well, they'd probably structure it more along the lines of extra fees _if_ you enjoy the music. So you'll pay the regular fee for the tracks that you hit fast forward on after a second to realise what song it is, and extra for the ones that you actually like enough to listen to.
Not neccessary. (Besides, there's all sorts of politicians who seem to think that rather than have government programs to help the poor and elderly, people should just buy shares with money that'll mysteriously appear if the rich don't pay taxes anymore, but I digress...) All you need is to remove laws that allow shareholders to sue a company that doesn't do whatever stupid thing it takes to keep share prices & dividends up. Almost certainly won't make a difference in practice, but at least the evil fucks who make the decisions to screw the masses and rape the planet for an extra 1/2% profit will have one less excuse...
I wasn't overly impressed with 3 kings. Not only did I not like the "heroes" (the only reason they bothered to help is because they felt kind of guilty ignoring them while they -stole the gold-), I felt like the producer (director?) didn't know what sort of movie this was supposed to be. It seems to be a bad war movie parody that occassionaly drifts toward trying to be a serious commentary - which it does very badly, melodramtically pounding the viewer over the head with the insanely fucking obvious. Sadaam & his army are evil. Sadaam's a madman that his men are terrified of. Bush only started the war for PR and secure oil. Bush calling for the Iraqi people to rise up, making himself look heroic and determined. CNN reporters being concerned only with career advancement and awards. None of this stuff should have been anything remotely new to any viewer who ever bothered to think about anything during the gulf 'war'.
American Beauty at least had good directing and acting. (I don't care what his pay implies, Clooney can't act. Wahlburg's not a lot better) Not exactly controversial subject matter though, unless your a member of the christian coalition. The neighbor kid was rather original, but the other character's certainly weren't, and they don't deviate at all from what many people believe to be typical american suburbanites. The movie basically amounted to getting the audience to hate the wife. (I don't know how well it worked for women, but all the males I know really, really hated her. so did I, but I also felt like I was being led) The neighbor kid was creative, and the nazi plate thing was rather creepy, but for the most part it was a very well made piece of art reflecting exactly what the audience already believes.
Fight Club had some of that too, with the anti-capitalist/consumerist messages, but that wasn't what the movie was about. (although I agree with those messages myself) It was about society and expectations of how others will act. We do not expect to have someone provoke a fight with us in the street, the police commishinor does not expect to be assaulted and threatened with castration, the boss does not expect to have an employee beat the shit out of himself. Such actions are so completely counter to how we expect things to happen that we cannot form a response to them. Many people in our society behave as little more than automatons, generating appropriate responses to a given set of inputs. (Think about the Seinfeld discussions of what's the appropriate response to actions that are _slightly_ outside normal paramaters) One guy goes insane, starts a cult that goes out of its way to do totally non-standard things, and winds up just replacing one set of inputs and responses with another set that are, if anything, even more inflexible.
I'm quite sure I remember the american's successfully testing an anti-sat laser last year. They blasted a decommisioned comsat with this big ground based laser, which fried, then melted the satellite. They of course made it clear that they didn't have any intentions of using it on other people's birds...
More on the SAT thing; as I understand it, the SAT is a standardized test that american high school students take. I'm not sure how the scoring works, but I do know that I scored in 95th or better percentile in all parts of the standardized tests I took. Nothing wrong with my grasp of the english language. (although my spelling has deteriorated since I started typing to the exclusion of any other method of writing.)
I suppose fuel::electricity is valid, but then what do you propose for x::software? I doubt that Office 2000 would run on a 386. By the time it managed to finish swapping in and out of disc for however many hours it would take just to load, (never mind the hour or better it would take just to bloody scroll the screen) something would crash or lock. (not that you'd notice the lock as being any different). Trying to run Office 2000 on a 386 would be like deciding to 'drive' your half-ton truck by pushing it up a hill; it _might_ be possible, but it'd be faster to leave the (effectively) useless tool behind.
Your $1 dollar today == $.60 in one year applies to cars to some extent too. Dealers often have new cars from a year or two ago, at a considerably lower price than the latest model. Dollars is dollars, depreciation is depreciation. and years are still years.
I'm still trying to figure out what my hair length has to do with _anything_
Who the hell was talking about backward compatability? I was talking about upgradeability, and so was Mooo Cow... (yes, I realize they are related, however I think the distinction is important here)
Anyhow, I think that, following Mooo Cow's analogy of vehicles:: computers, that fuel:: software. I have no _need_ to upgrade my vehicle to use modern fuel, but my computer will not beable to run modern software in another year or two. The fact that hardware is backwards compatable (for the most part) doesn't affect the fact that much of it will not beable to power software after a few years of shelf life. My point was that for Mooo Cow's analogy to be relavant, you'd have to beable to run current versions of word on old hardware (at least ten years, say).
Sarcastic or not, an analagy is an analagy. The use its put to does not change the nature of what it is.
As far as "computer years" vs. "reality years", I'll consider that relevant when I can pay for my computer hardware in "computer dollars" instead of "real dollars"
140 pounds? This is requires "assistance"? Bah. Weak little people with your "no lifting anything over 70 lbs labour laws"! 300 pounds I could see, but 140?
(For the record, I'm 6'8", and have carried 300 pound objects by myself in the past.)
My vehicle's engine is still able to use today's fuel, and it's 16 years old. The same can be said for cars that are 60 years old. My current processor will not beable to power the software of a few years from now.
It may be neccessary to move on and abandon old base technology from time to time, but Intel's really not in a postition to be screwing with the upgrade paths of their loyal customers. (I'm sure that there are some) At the same time, I don't trust a chip that requires reinforced cases to support its mass.
And of course, they won't beable to get a large marketshare in the states because of PayPal's dominance (by then), giving the world wonderful compatibility issues for trading across the US border...
Who knows? Regardless, I'll know fairly quickly when they can deal with Canadians, since I had them add me to a list of people who want to be mailed when its ready.
WTF does Microsoft have to insist on throwing every single bell and whistle that the 1%'ers want into the mix?
Because those 1%ers are the ones who buy the upgrade as soon as its available, and thus start the cycle of forcing others to upgrade to stay compatible with everyone else.
I don't think he was refering to Roman's tho. He should maybe have dropped a millenium, but regardless, there really wasn't much left of the Roman empire 1500 years ago. If he meant to refer to the Romans themselves, he'd have gone back another 500 or 1000 years...
The RIAA will probably love this, since they can embed fingerprints in all their discs, and then just run around sending cease & desists to anyone who distributes a file that contains a fingerprint that says "copyright RIAA member"
And I'm not sure we'd even have much room to complain about it, at least not from a legal standpoint... If they only complained about the distribution (including publicly posting them), then we couldn't yell and scream about "fair use!"
Qwest? I thought they were a telco...
Anyhow, I'm sure there are some areas where there are options for cable service, I just don't think that its very common.
They still want more people to come on despite the hit to quality because that means more people giving them money. The local cable guys are getting to the point where many older customers are switching to one of the ADSL providers, just so they can have a guarenteed bandwidth and more reliable service. In all the time I've had cable, I've never seen a download above 70K/s, and usually I'm around 40. Still faster than a modem, but not as fast as they advertise it as being "capable" of. The fleeing customers have prompted a really cheesy ad campaign that's trying to convince people that just because _every_ subscriber won't be using the service at the same time, it means that only one will.
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Forget electronic devices of all kinds. I saw a translucent _office chair_ in this week's Office Depot flyer. Available in five fruit colours. (I don't remember which ones though)
Well, they'd probably structure it more along the lines of extra fees _if_ you enjoy the music. So you'll pay the regular fee for the tracks that you hit fast forward on after a second to realise what song it is, and extra for the ones that you actually like enough to listen to.
cancel the supply mission?
Not neccessary. (Besides, there's all sorts of politicians who seem to think that rather than have government programs to help the poor and elderly, people should just buy shares with money that'll mysteriously appear if the rich don't pay taxes anymore, but I digress...) All you need is to remove laws that allow shareholders to sue a company that doesn't do whatever stupid thing it takes to keep share prices & dividends up. Almost certainly won't make a difference in practice, but at least the evil fucks who make the decisions to screw the masses and rape the planet for an extra 1/2% profit will have one less excuse...
I wasn't overly impressed with 3 kings. Not only did I not like the "heroes" (the only reason they bothered to help is because they felt kind of guilty ignoring them while they -stole the gold-), I felt like the producer (director?) didn't know what sort of movie this was supposed to be. It seems to be a bad war movie parody that occassionaly drifts toward trying to be a serious commentary - which it does very badly, melodramtically pounding the viewer over the head with the insanely fucking obvious. Sadaam & his army are evil. Sadaam's a madman that his men are terrified of. Bush only started the war for PR and secure oil. Bush calling for the Iraqi people to rise up, making himself look heroic and determined. CNN reporters being concerned only with career advancement and awards. None of this stuff should have been anything remotely new to any viewer who ever bothered to think about anything during the gulf 'war'. American Beauty at least had good directing and acting. (I don't care what his pay implies, Clooney can't act. Wahlburg's not a lot better) Not exactly controversial subject matter though, unless your a member of the christian coalition. The neighbor kid was rather original, but the other character's certainly weren't, and they don't deviate at all from what many people believe to be typical american suburbanites. The movie basically amounted to getting the audience to hate the wife. (I don't know how well it worked for women, but all the males I know really, really hated her. so did I, but I also felt like I was being led) The neighbor kid was creative, and the nazi plate thing was rather creepy, but for the most part it was a very well made piece of art reflecting exactly what the audience already believes. Fight Club had some of that too, with the anti-capitalist/consumerist messages, but that wasn't what the movie was about. (although I agree with those messages myself) It was about society and expectations of how others will act. We do not expect to have someone provoke a fight with us in the street, the police commishinor does not expect to be assaulted and threatened with castration, the boss does not expect to have an employee beat the shit out of himself. Such actions are so completely counter to how we expect things to happen that we cannot form a response to them. Many people in our society behave as little more than automatons, generating appropriate responses to a given set of inputs. (Think about the Seinfeld discussions of what's the appropriate response to actions that are _slightly_ outside normal paramaters) One guy goes insane, starts a cult that goes out of its way to do totally non-standard things, and winds up just replacing one set of inputs and responses with another set that are, if anything, even more inflexible.
I'm quite sure I remember the american's successfully testing an anti-sat laser last year. They blasted a decommisioned comsat with this big ground based laser, which fried, then melted the satellite. They of course made it clear that they didn't have any intentions of using it on other people's birds...
More on the SAT thing; as I understand it, the SAT is a standardized test that american high school students take. I'm not sure how the scoring works, but I do know that I scored in 95th or better percentile in all parts of the standardized tests I took. Nothing wrong with my grasp of the english language. (although my spelling has deteriorated since I started typing to the exclusion of any other method of writing.)
Never took a SAT. Not everyone's an american.
I suppose fuel::electricity is valid, but then what do you propose for x::software?
I doubt that Office 2000 would run on a 386. By the time it managed to finish swapping in and out of disc for however many hours it would take just to load, (never mind the hour or better it would take just to bloody scroll the screen) something would crash or lock. (not that you'd notice the lock as being any different). Trying to run Office 2000 on a 386 would be like deciding to 'drive' your half-ton truck by pushing it up a hill; it _might_ be possible, but it'd be faster to leave the (effectively) useless tool behind.
Your $1 dollar today == $.60 in one year applies to cars to some extent too. Dealers often have new cars from a year or two ago, at a considerably lower price than the latest model. Dollars is dollars, depreciation is depreciation. and years are still years.
I'm still trying to figure out what my hair length has to do with _anything_
Who the hell was talking about backward compatability? I was talking about upgradeability, and so was Mooo Cow... (yes, I realize they are related, however I think the distinction is important here) Anyhow, I think that, following Mooo Cow's analogy of vehicles :: computers, that fuel :: software. I have no _need_ to upgrade my vehicle to use modern fuel, but my computer will not beable to run modern software in another year or two. The fact that hardware is backwards compatable (for the most part) doesn't affect the fact that much of it will not beable to power software after a few years of shelf life. My point was that for Mooo Cow's analogy to be relavant, you'd have to beable to run current versions of word on old hardware (at least ten years, say).
Sarcastic or not, an analagy is an analagy. The use its put to does not change the nature of what it is.
As far as "computer years" vs. "reality years", I'll consider that relevant when I can pay for my computer hardware in "computer dollars" instead of "real dollars"
Silly AC, I was pointing out a bad analogy to someone else. YOU think before YOU post. It helps to read the whole thread as well.
140 pounds? This is requires "assistance"? Bah. Weak little people with your "no lifting anything over 70 lbs labour laws"! 300 pounds I could see, but 140?
(For the record, I'm 6'8", and have carried 300 pound objects by myself in the past.)
My vehicle's engine is still able to use today's fuel, and it's 16 years old. The same can be said for cars that are 60 years old.
My current processor will not beable to power the software of a few years from now.
It may be neccessary to move on and abandon old base technology from time to time, but Intel's really not in a postition to be screwing with the upgrade paths of their loyal customers. (I'm sure that there are some) At the same time, I don't trust a chip that requires reinforced cases to support its mass.
And of course, they won't beable to get a large marketshare in the states because of PayPal's dominance (by then), giving the world wonderful compatibility issues for trading across the US border...
Who knows? Regardless, I'll know fairly quickly when they can deal with Canadians, since I had them add me to a list of people who want to be mailed when its ready.
WTF does Microsoft have to insist on throwing every single bell and whistle that the 1%'ers want into the mix?
Because those 1%ers are the ones who buy the upgrade as soon as its available, and thus start the cycle of forcing others to upgrade to stay compatible with everyone else.
They going to include an english to 50,000-years-from-now-speak dictionary too?
I hadn't noticed any correlation... /. readers be _working_ during business hours anyhow?
Really though, shouldn't most
I think that many Americans consider .com .org .net and .gov to be theirs, and country-codes to be good enough for everybody else...
The student's who've already gone through a year or two there have a pretty good incentive to stay don't you think?
I don't think he was refering to Roman's tho. He should maybe have dropped a millenium, but regardless, there really wasn't much left of the Roman empire 1500 years ago. If he meant to refer to the Romans themselves, he'd have gone back another 500 or 1000 years...
The RIAA will probably love this, since they can embed fingerprints in all their discs, and then just run around sending cease & desists to anyone who distributes a file that contains a fingerprint that says "copyright RIAA member"
And I'm not sure we'd even have much room to complain about it, at least not from a legal standpoint...
If they only complained about the distribution (including publicly posting them), then we couldn't yell and scream about "fair use!"
I'm sure I remember reading about this in one of the major science-for-the-masses magazines several months ago.
Still, its an interesting idea. Anyone got any ideas for a really good use for this?
The people who pushed it through support it. That's about it though.
Qwest? I thought they were a telco...
Anyhow, I'm sure there are some areas where there are options for cable service, I just don't think that its very common.
They still want more people to come on despite the hit to quality because that means more people giving them money. The local cable guys are getting to the point where many older customers are switching to one of the ADSL providers, just so they can have a guarenteed bandwidth and more reliable service. In all the time I've had cable, I've never seen a download above 70K/s, and usually I'm around 40. Still faster than a modem, but not as fast as they advertise it as being "capable" of. The fleeing customers have prompted a really cheesy ad campaign that's trying to convince people that just because _every_ subscriber won't be using the service at the same time, it means that only one will.