Just because the BBC, Al Jazeera and a few (out of power) people in governments don't agree with our foreign policy, doesn't make it "95% of the world's population that doesn't live in the US." The people who don't agree are just the loudest, often.
I kind of figured it was something like that. (Every once in a while a moderation just completely irks the shit out of me, and this one was one of those times, considering the other posts that definitely ARE flamebait in this thread that aren't getting the moderation. Being brainless and saying the same thing 50 people before have said is NOT insightful, mods. Nor is it interesting the 50th time through.)
You apparently don't live around poor people. While it's true that some people are working two jobs just to have the Soccer-Mom lifestyle, many are also doing it because neither can manage to get a good enough job. Some are even doing it to pay for college for their children, or help pay for it.
I grew up pretty close to "poor." I say close to because even with one income we had an air conditioner/heat/groceries, but not many extras. (My dad busted his ass to save up to get us a computer when I was eight.) My mom never worked, but many people I know had two parents working, and weren't doing much better than we were. Generally they didn't have college educations. Some just didn't have a chance to get one -- my dad is the third of eight children. They were perpetually broke. (Why my grandparents had that many children, I will never know.) Some just weren't smart enough.
I agree with that about the government not being a parent, though. Most people in government are eternal spoiled brats.
Back on the main topic... I've been playing violent games since... well, Wolfenstein 3D. Then Doom. Mortal Kombat 1 and 2... I couldn't take the ridiculousness of them after that. Sort of grew out of it. I played GTA: Vice City through four times, and I am the anti-violent person in real life. My best friend growing up? Just played Doom, and was one of the most freaking violent people as he got older.
It has nothing to do with access to violent games... it's all the individual personality. Parents should be responsible for that, no matter what. The government doesn't have a clue, or the resources to individually decide when people are mature enough for games.
Um, it loads fine for me with Firefox 0.9. I've been using Mozilla since before the 1.0 milestone release, and I've never really had problems with it crashing(though some releases since then have been nearly unusable). Yes, it's crashed -- even in the last week -- but so has Internet Explorer.
And of course it isn't perfect yet; it's not even at 1.0. But what's Internet Explorer's excuse? It's been around for years and Microsoft has almost unlimited resources.
The US Media doesn't jump at a chance to cover computer related issues. With the news items of the last few days*, this isn't really a huge issue for the US media. If it were a virus or something that was "big news" to the average person, then we'd hear about it. But most people don't understand what spyware and malware are.
*American beheaded, terrorist killed, the 9/11 commission saying on thing, Cheney saying another, Putin saying he said this and that about Iraq... plus the Peterson trial. lot of things the media is going to go crazy covering. To the point where everyone but addicts get tired of it.
But they want the US to apply the law to sites hosted in the US. If the EU asks the US to violate some ignorant Klansman's right to free speech, it's still _the US_ doing it, and still the US violating the constitution.
Personally, I think the people making racist webpages are a waste of bandwidth; fuck 'em, the end. But any time a government is given a new law allowing it to do X or restrict Y, it keeps going. And going, and going.
What's to stop them from next enacting a "no hate speech against elected officials on the 'net" type rule? You know _every_ elected official would love that.
Yeah, except: Linus is like one of the only hardcore geeks to get laid. If the opportunity presented itself more often, who's to say there wouldn't be more of us with kids.
Yeah, man. God knows you can't swear in the United States. I mean, fuck, you'd be hanged. Wait, I just said fuck.
The FCC is dealing with public airwaves. Right or wrong, that's what they deal with. Example? HBO. Have you ever seen the Sopranos? They fucking say fuck a lot!
One of the things Howard Stern was in hot water for was a racist remark made on air by a caller(I believe it was a caller; I doubt it was Stern himself, but it may have been a guest). In some countries, racist speech is not protected. So you can take your "yay I can swear" thing and stick it.
The FCC doesn't control just every single area of "speech" in this country. Another example? Playboy. I've got a whole damn stack of them.
Oh, and it isn't anyone's hobby -- the FCC people get paid. (And yes, it bugs the shit out of me that they get tax dollars.)
So glad not to live in the "fucking US"? See what would happen to Janet Jackson if her tit-covering was removed in, oh, Iran or Saudi Arabia. Hell, her face covering. Oh wait, she doesn't wear one. Because she's in the "fucking US" where women aren't kept as property.
Do we have a long way to go? Yes, we do. And progress has been made from a time when Buddy Holly wasn't played because he was singing "jungle music." But we're a whole, whole lot better off than a whole fucking lot of people.
The only problem with the UN?: The fact that the world's richest country refuses to pay the money it owes and has treaty obligations to hand-over to fund the UN.
My point was that the UN doesn't just have "one problem." No group that is made up of people has only _one_ problem. (unless the problem is "that it's made up of flawed _people_.")
The UN isn't made up of magical perfect beings who are right all the time and would be perfect to take over for ICANN, and the US not paying the UN isn't the "only problem with the UN." The UN wouldn't be perfect all the sudden if the US threw a shitload more money their way, either.
I was just taking issue with the "the only problem with the UN" statement. I'm not claiming the UN in general is flawed, or that the US is perfect, that soldiers are all great, wonderful people, or that soldiers are all evil assholes, either. No sweeping assumptions or declarations.
Even ESR doesn't claim to have coined the phrase:
"I did not coin the term "open source"; I only popularized it. It was coined by my friend Christine Peterson of the Foresight Institute. While it's true that I more or less ran the brainstorming session and fortunately had enough of a clue to recognize a winner when it popped up, the creative leap was all hers."
What bothers me more than two underage boys having access to shotguns: A 14 and a 16 year old thought that this would be okay.
I remember 14, and I remember 16. They weren't all that long ago. I had access to a pistol, if I wanted to search for it. However, even at my maddest(and I was a pretty grouchy teenager), there is no way I would have thought it was okay to SHOOT AT SOMEONE.
A much bigger problem exists than who has access to guns: There are people growing up with zero empathy for others, and absolutely zero of the "never play with a gun, never point a gun at someone" things that I was taught(even when there wasn't a gun in the house, this was *stressed*.) Guns or not, someone with this lack of sense could replicate violent video games: GTA:VC, for example, has baseball bats, knives, golf clubs, hammers, and screwdrivers for weapons. (And a few other close-range items...)
I mean, what the fuck is wrong with the parents of these kids that they(the kids) think this is okay? Hello, teach the fucker to care about others.
1. The quality that makes something laughable or amusing; funniness: could not see the humor of the situation.
2. That which is intended to induce laughter or amusement: a writer skilled at crafting humor.
3. The ability to perceive, enjoy, or express what is amusing, comical, incongruous, or absurd. See Synonyms at wit1.
4. One of the four fluids of the body, blood, phlegm, choler, and black bile, whose relative proportions were thought in ancient and medieval physiology to determine a person's disposition and general health.
5. Physiology.
1. A body fluid, such as blood, lymph, or bile.
2. Aqueous humor.
3. Vitreous humor.
6. A person's characteristic disposition or temperament: a boy of sullen humor.
7. An often temporary state of mind; a mood: I'm in no humor to argue.
8.
1. A sudden, unanticipated whim. See Synonyms at mood1.
2. Capricious or peculiar behavior.
What if I download a few songs to hear a new artist, not on the radio or television, then buy their album? I may be one of the few, but I *do* tend to buy albums if the music is decent, and I can't listen to radio, because the same songs are played to death here. Technically, even if I buy a CD later, it's still "music piracy."
And let's be honest, 90% of the time/. users fire up their P2P, they're downloading porn, and we all know it!...Wait, it's not just me, right?
He doesn't -- he just feels he's a minority on slashdot and has typical victimitis. "Hmm, got downvoted. Well, must be my sig and those biased/. mods!" (Anyone on/. screaming "BIAS!" is obviously too damn dumb to realize that they're ON SLASHDOT. DUUUH)
Yeah, I'm sure opensource.org pays Google to be the top ranked search for "Open Source." Or hey, what about a search for Red Cross.... or American Civil Liberties Union. Wonder how much they pay Google to be the top ranked for those searches?
No, I'm not saying they shouldn't get retirement packages. But they're already well off, generally. Take John Kerry for example.
Clinton was a Governor before he was president. I'm not completely sure, but I'm fairly sure gov's make more than 30K/year. I could care less about Bush being rich, because I don't like him. (Don't like Clinton, either. Didn't bring either up. Didn't mention either's party, either...)
Neither Clinton nor Bush are Senators, either.
I'm not saying they shouldn't be paid, but $158K/year is a *LOT*. Especially since they take way more vacations than anyone else, all their stuff is paid for, they get free transportation. They have personal assistants. Cost of living or not, they're already way ahead of most of the country.
Teachers, police officers and fire fighters aren't paid that much, by the way. A lot of fire fighters in the country are volunteer, too.
I'm not saying Senators aren't important, or that they're all rich(or should be), but generally they're pretty well off, and maybe with the economy the way it is, they should give the pay raise a break for a while. Even if it doesn't make much difference in the economy.
Slashdot Mirror
Um, you mean anyone other than...
Afghanistan, Albania, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Colombia, Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Eritrea, Estonia, Ethiopia, Georgia, Honduras, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Japan, Kuwait, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Mongolia, Netherlands, Nicaragua, Palau, Panama, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Rwanda, Singapore, Slovakia, South Korea, Solomon Islands, Spain, Turkey, Uganda, United Kingdom, Uzbekistan.
Who all were members of the coalition in Iraq?
Just because the BBC, Al Jazeera and a few (out of power) people in governments don't agree with our foreign policy, doesn't make it "95% of the world's population that doesn't live in the US." The people who don't agree are just the loudest, often.
I kind of figured it was something like that. (Every once in a while a moderation just completely irks the shit out of me, and this one was one of those times, considering the other posts that definitely ARE flamebait in this thread that aren't getting the moderation. Being brainless and saying the same thing 50 people before have said is NOT insightful, mods. Nor is it interesting the 50th time through.)
Why the fuck is this flamebait?
The difference is... the guy in this case didn't get 15 years. He took down a webpage. Duh.
Microsoft pisses off people all the time, and they make money.
You apparently don't live around poor people. While it's true that some people are working two jobs just to have the Soccer-Mom lifestyle, many are also doing it because neither can manage to get a good enough job. Some are even doing it to pay for college for their children, or help pay for it.
I grew up pretty close to "poor." I say close to because even with one income we had an air conditioner/heat/groceries, but not many extras. (My dad busted his ass to save up to get us a computer when I was eight.) My mom never worked, but many people I know had two parents working, and weren't doing much better than we were. Generally they didn't have college educations. Some just didn't have a chance to get one -- my dad is the third of eight children. They were perpetually broke. (Why my grandparents had that many children, I will never know.) Some just weren't smart enough.
I agree with that about the government not being a parent, though. Most people in government are eternal spoiled brats.
Back on the main topic... I've been playing violent games since... well, Wolfenstein 3D. Then Doom. Mortal Kombat 1 and 2... I couldn't take the ridiculousness of them after that. Sort of grew out of it. I played GTA: Vice City through four times, and I am the anti-violent person in real life. My best friend growing up? Just played Doom, and was one of the most freaking violent people as he got older.
It has nothing to do with access to violent games... it's all the individual personality. Parents should be responsible for that, no matter what. The government doesn't have a clue, or the resources to individually decide when people are mature enough for games.
Sin, schmin: "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone."
"Judge not, lest ye be judged."
The word "Christian" is based on "Christ."
Um, it loads fine for me with Firefox 0.9. I've been using Mozilla since before the 1.0 milestone release, and I've never really had problems with it crashing(though some releases since then have been nearly unusable). Yes, it's crashed -- even in the last week -- but so has Internet Explorer.
And of course it isn't perfect yet; it's not even at 1.0. But what's Internet Explorer's excuse? It's been around for years and Microsoft has almost unlimited resources.
The US Media doesn't jump at a chance to cover computer related issues. With the news items of the last few days*, this isn't really a huge issue for the US media. If it were a virus or something that was "big news" to the average person, then we'd hear about it. But most people don't understand what spyware and malware are. *American beheaded, terrorist killed, the 9/11 commission saying on thing, Cheney saying another, Putin saying he said this and that about Iraq... plus the Peterson trial. lot of things the media is going to go crazy covering. To the point where everyone but addicts get tired of it.
But they want the US to apply the law to sites hosted in the US. If the EU asks the US to violate some ignorant Klansman's right to free speech, it's still _the US_ doing it, and still the US violating the constitution.
Personally, I think the people making racist webpages are a waste of bandwidth; fuck 'em, the end. But any time a government is given a new law allowing it to do X or restrict Y, it keeps going. And going, and going.
What's to stop them from next enacting a "no hate speech against elected officials on the 'net" type rule? You know _every_ elected official would love that.
Washington, DC bans owning handguns. DC has the highest per capita murder rate in the United States.
Chicago, Il bans owning handguns. Chicago has the highest number of murders in the United States.
Most every gun crime is committed with an illegally purchased or stolen gun.
Yeah, 'cuz everyone knows only people who live in trailers own guns.
Oh wait, Linus likes to shoot. (Third line from the bottom.)
Yeah, except: Linus is like one of the only hardcore geeks to get laid. If the opportunity presented itself more often, who's to say there wouldn't be more of us with kids.
Yeah, man. God knows you can't swear in the United States. I mean, fuck, you'd be hanged. Wait, I just said fuck.
The FCC is dealing with public airwaves. Right or wrong, that's what they deal with. Example? HBO. Have you ever seen the Sopranos? They fucking say fuck a lot!
One of the things Howard Stern was in hot water for was a racist remark made on air by a caller(I believe it was a caller; I doubt it was Stern himself, but it may have been a guest). In some countries, racist speech is not protected. So you can take your "yay I can swear" thing and stick it.
The FCC doesn't control just every single area of "speech" in this country. Another example? Playboy. I've got a whole damn stack of them.
Oh, and it isn't anyone's hobby -- the FCC people get paid. (And yes, it bugs the shit out of me that they get tax dollars.)
So glad not to live in the "fucking US"? See what would happen to Janet Jackson if her tit-covering was removed in, oh, Iran or Saudi Arabia. Hell, her face covering. Oh wait, she doesn't wear one. Because she's in the "fucking US" where women aren't kept as property.
Do we have a long way to go? Yes, we do. And progress has been made from a time when Buddy Holly wasn't played because he was singing "jungle music." But we're a whole, whole lot better off than a whole fucking lot of people.
What I was replying to:
The only problem with the UN?: The fact that the world's richest country refuses to pay the money it owes and has treaty obligations to hand-over to fund the UN.
My point was that the UN doesn't just have "one problem." No group that is made up of people has only _one_ problem. (unless the problem is "that it's made up of flawed _people_.")
The UN isn't made up of magical perfect beings who are right all the time and would be perfect to take over for ICANN, and the US not paying the UN isn't the "only problem with the UN." The UN wouldn't be perfect all the sudden if the US threw a shitload more money their way, either.
I was just taking issue with the "the only problem with the UN" statement. I'm not claiming the UN in general is flawed, or that the US is perfect, that soldiers are all great, wonderful people, or that soldiers are all evil assholes, either. No sweeping assumptions or declarations.
Yeah, there's nothing wrong with the UN. (Linked story: UN troops buy sex from teenage refugees in Congo camp.)
Even ESR doesn't claim to have coined the phrase: "I did not coin the term "open source"; I only popularized it. It was coined by my friend Christine Peterson of the Foresight Institute. While it's true that I more or less ran the brainstorming session and fortunately had enough of a clue to recognize a winner when it popped up, the creative leap was all hers."
It's the November 14th entry.
What bothers me more than two underage boys having access to shotguns: A 14 and a 16 year old thought that this would be okay.
I remember 14, and I remember 16. They weren't all that long ago. I had access to a pistol, if I wanted to search for it. However, even at my maddest(and I was a pretty grouchy teenager), there is no way I would have thought it was okay to SHOOT AT SOMEONE.
A much bigger problem exists than who has access to guns: There are people growing up with zero empathy for others, and absolutely zero of the "never play with a gun, never point a gun at someone" things that I was taught(even when there wasn't a gun in the house, this was *stressed*.) Guns or not, someone with this lack of sense could replicate violent video games: GTA:VC, for example, has baseball bats, knives, golf clubs, hammers, and screwdrivers for weapons. (And a few other close-range items...)
I mean, what the fuck is wrong with the parents of these kids that they(the kids) think this is okay? Hello, teach the fucker to care about others.
Humor
1. The quality that makes something laughable or amusing; funniness: could not see the humor of the situation.
2. That which is intended to induce laughter or amusement: a writer skilled at crafting humor.
3. The ability to perceive, enjoy, or express what is amusing, comical, incongruous, or absurd. See Synonyms at wit1.
4. One of the four fluids of the body, blood, phlegm, choler, and black bile, whose relative proportions were thought in ancient and medieval physiology to determine a person's disposition and general health.
5. Physiology.
1. A body fluid, such as blood, lymph, or bile.
2. Aqueous humor.
3. Vitreous humor.
6. A person's characteristic disposition or temperament: a boy of sullen humor.
7. An often temporary state of mind; a mood: I'm in no humor to argue.
8.
1. A sudden, unanticipated whim. See Synonyms at mood1.
2. Capricious or peculiar behavior.
I wasn't suggestiong 90% of /. users, but rather 90% of the time the users on /. who HAD it, it was for porn. Plus, it was a joke.
What if I download a few songs to hear a new artist, not on the radio or television, then buy their album? I may be one of the few, but I *do* tend to buy albums if the music is decent, and I can't listen to radio, because the same songs are played to death here. Technically, even if I buy a CD later, it's still "music piracy." /. users fire up their P2P, they're downloading porn, and we all know it! ...Wait, it's not just me, right?
And let's be honest, 90% of the time
He doesn't -- he just feels he's a minority on slashdot and has typical victimitis. "Hmm, got downvoted. Well, must be my sig and those biased /. mods!" (Anyone on /. screaming "BIAS!" is obviously too damn dumb to realize that they're ON SLASHDOT. DUUUH)
Yeah, I'm sure opensource.org pays Google to be the top ranked search for "Open Source." Or hey, what about a search for Red Cross.... or American Civil Liberties Union. Wonder how much they pay Google to be the top ranked for those searches?
Wow, it was really 35K? I honestly thought it was more. My bad.
And oh yes, I *agree* about the backend deals. Very much. That needs to be stopped and people need to be prosecuted.
I don't think "low" is exactly what I want... but there comes a time when it's over a line. I'd be *very* happy with $150K/year.
No, I'm not saying they shouldn't get retirement packages. But they're already well off, generally. Take John Kerry for example.
Clinton was a Governor before he was president. I'm not completely sure, but I'm fairly sure gov's make more than 30K/year. I could care less about Bush being rich, because I don't like him. (Don't like Clinton, either. Didn't bring either up. Didn't mention either's party, either...)
Neither Clinton nor Bush are Senators, either.
I'm not saying they shouldn't be paid, but $158K/year is a *LOT*. Especially since they take way more vacations than anyone else, all their stuff is paid for, they get free transportation. They have personal assistants. Cost of living or not, they're already way ahead of most of the country.
Teachers, police officers and fire fighters aren't paid that much, by the way. A lot of fire fighters in the country are volunteer, too.
I'm not saying Senators aren't important, or that they're all rich(or should be), but generally they're pretty well off, and maybe with the economy the way it is, they should give the pay raise a break for a while. Even if it doesn't make much difference in the economy.