I just love how innovative companies like Google are forced to spend all this money on lobbyists just so Congress doesn't screw them over. Why isn't it all spent on making a better product? Because some people gave the government so much power beyond its strict Constitutional limits, which given enough time would mean lobbyists would be fighting over all that juicy government money and to shackle their competitors. "It's okay though, we can give the government all this power, we just have to, you know, limit the lobbyists!" YOU CAN'T. With that much money at stake, they will steamroll over whatever petty contributions limits and ethics rules you set up.
That's because there are no true small government types in government anymore. People keep voting for politicians who "bring home the bacon" and who pile all sorts of regulations on business. But if a major function of government is to regulate business and find various ways to extract money from them, then it creates an incentive for businesses to lobby government. Getting favorable treatment from the government becomes a competitive advantage, only because we live in a society that insists on micromanaging the economy.
Don't want businesses lobbying government? There's an easy solution: get government out of the business of micromanaging businesses.
A great way to end corruption would be to make government as small (and transparent) as possible.
What opportunity did those who signed up have to negotiate those terms
The terms are negotiated by the market. If the terms are too onerous for individuals, those individuals will not sign up. If too few people sign up to make the business profitable--and if the business is smart enough to figure out that the onerous terms are resulting in poor performance in the market--then those terms will change or the business won't last long.
Your use of logic and your citation of facts are depriving the Slashdot Skript Kiddies of their inalienable right to blame all the world's problems on the United States.
Five years ago, Sony's music labels should have started releasing all albums as mp3 on Memory Sticks
Yeah, that would be a great idea except for the fact that 5 years ago, if they used RAM as the medium, an album would have cost several times more than it would on CD. Nobody in their right minds would have bought music that way...
That's quite a bit different. As an American taxpayer, I am legally required to contribute money to NASA's budget. If I refuse, I go to jail. So it is rather easy for NASA to take money from me to hand out trinkets to other people; it wasn't NASA's money to begin with. At least Apple is sacrificing something of its own (money) to reward people who have sacrificed something of their own (time).
That's called a free market, idiot. How is that a scam?
If you want your car repaired and find that one place charges $100/hour for labor and another charges $90, which one are you going to pick? If you say $90, do I get to yell SCAMMER!!! SCAMMER!!! at you?
You see, an act in and of itself is neither good nor evil. An act is good or evil depending on who does it. By definition, if Microsoft does something, it is evil. If Google does the same thing, it is good.
Similarly, if the U.S. censors something, it is bad. If China does it, it is good. If Bill Clinton starts a war, it is good. If George W. Bush does, it is bad. If the economy has 5% unemployment under a Democratic president, the economy is doing well. If it has 5% unemployment under a Republican president, it is doing poorly.
Granny isn't going to be able to read the icon font for either.
...and she'll probably be insulted that her computer is calling her a "gimp."
Re:Books for web browsers?
on
Firefox Secrets
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· Score: 5, Funny
That reminds me of a story I heard in the mid-1980s. A manufacturer of VCRs shipped each box with a videotape explaining how to use the VCR. The tape included instructions on how to hook up the VCR.
Python predates Java. When I program in Java, it's always a pain to replicate the functionality I get with Python's default libraries. Python comes with "batteries included."
Since the mid-1990s, I have installed and/or configured the following packages on multiple Linux versions/distributions:
MySQL
bind
Apache
lighttpd
PHP
FastCGI
Postfix
sendmail
qmail
Postgresql
...to name a few
Despite the fact that I have been using computers since the early 1980s, have programmed everything from 6502 assembler to C, C++, Java, Pascal, PHP and Ruby, every fucking time I have to install and configure something on Linux, it is a major pain in the ass. There are different package systems for (nearly) each distro, and for software that's not packaged, I have to screw around with make and configure for an hour just to get the thing to compile. Forget the dependency hell and the mismatched shared libraries. Different patches have to be applied for different distros, and in most cases, the documentation from the provider of the software is not quite complete (to be charitable).
Let's face it, even for a relative expert like me, Linux is a ballbuster when you're trying to get the environment exactly the way you want it. Sure, it runs great after that, efficiently and with stability, but it should not take me over a week to get a functioning web server + PHP + mail server + database engine up and running exactly the way I want it. And yes, it can take a week...when you're like me, and you have to deal with several Linux distros at once, it is very difficult to become an expert in each one or even to keep straight which ones have which quirks, which ones store files where, etc. Most of my time is spent digging up relevant info out of mailing list archives that are several years old.
All I know is, if I am ever in the position of specifying hardware, I will get an Apple Xserve running OS X Server. All the flexibility of Linux with the ease-of-use of a Mac. It may not be a "free" OS, but my time isn't free either, even though the Linux community often treats people that way.
Not if you had an Apple II. Woz's drive didn't use the seek hole.
And the notch indicated READ/WRITE, not read-only as another poster suggested. I remember cutting plenty of notches to make single-sided disks double-sided. I wouldn't have needed to do that if the absence of the notch meant read/write.
Slashdot Mirror
I just love how innovative companies like Google are forced to spend all this money on lobbyists just so Congress doesn't screw them over. Why isn't it all spent on making a better product? Because some people gave the government so much power beyond its strict Constitutional limits, which given enough time would mean lobbyists would be fighting over all that juicy government money and to shackle their competitors. "It's okay though, we can give the government all this power, we just have to, you know, limit the lobbyists!" YOU CAN'T. With that much money at stake, they will steamroll over whatever petty contributions limits and ethics rules you set up.
That's because there are no true small government types in government anymore. People keep voting for politicians who "bring home the bacon" and who pile all sorts of regulations on business. But if a major function of government is to regulate business and find various ways to extract money from them, then it creates an incentive for businesses to lobby government. Getting favorable treatment from the government becomes a competitive advantage, only because we live in a society that insists on micromanaging the economy.
Don't want businesses lobbying government? There's an easy solution: get government out of the business of micromanaging businesses.
A great way to end corruption would be to make government as small (and transparent) as possible.
Maybe if you work at Microsoft, not having your code in a shipping product is a reason to be proud.
The terms are negotiated by the market. If the terms are too onerous for individuals, those individuals will not sign up. If too few people sign up to make the business profitable--and if the business is smart enough to figure out that the onerous terms are resulting in poor performance in the market--then those terms will change or the business won't last long.
Maybe he's a Jobs disciple who's still pissed at John Sculley...?
Your use of logic and your citation of facts are depriving the Slashdot Skript Kiddies of their inalienable right to blame all the world's problems on the United States.
That's a sequence of 5 words I never thought I'd see...
Yeah, that would be a great idea except for the fact that 5 years ago, if they used RAM as the medium, an album would have cost several times more than it would on CD. Nobody in their right minds would have bought music that way...
And how exactly do you tell AOL users to switch to another provider if their e-mails are being blocked in the first place?
Someone please mod parent up, +1, Insightful
That's quite a bit different. As an American taxpayer, I am legally required to contribute money to NASA's budget. If I refuse, I go to jail. So it is rather easy for NASA to take money from me to hand out trinkets to other people; it wasn't NASA's money to begin with. At least Apple is sacrificing something of its own (money) to reward people who have sacrificed something of their own (time).
If you want your car repaired and find that one place charges $100/hour for labor and another charges $90, which one are you going to pick? If you say $90, do I get to yell SCAMMER!!! SCAMMER!!! at you?
What is the "-30-" for, anyway?
Similarly, if the U.S. censors something, it is bad. If China does it, it is good. If Bill Clinton starts a war, it is good. If George W. Bush does, it is bad. If the economy has 5% unemployment under a Democratic president, the economy is doing well. If it has 5% unemployment under a Republican president, it is doing poorly.
Are you beginning to understand?
probably burning karma for this, but...
this is one of the most creative sigs i've ever seen
If by "maybe" they mean "no", then, well...yes!
...and she'll probably be insulted that her computer is calling her a "gimp."
That reminds me of a story I heard in the mid-1980s. A manufacturer of VCRs shipped each box with a videotape explaining how to use the VCR. The tape included instructions on how to hook up the VCR.
What the hell does that mean?
Such tolerance from someone who probably claims to despise intolerance...
Where are my +1, Funny mod points when I need them?
In a world with Java and Ruby, who needs Walls and Van Rossums?
Well, I'm a flying goat who hates being rendered and is ambivalent about open source, so there!
Since the mid-1990s, I have installed and/or configured the following packages on multiple Linux versions/distributions:
Despite the fact that I have been using computers since the early 1980s, have programmed everything from 6502 assembler to C, C++, Java, Pascal, PHP and Ruby, every fucking time I have to install and configure something on Linux, it is a major pain in the ass. There are different package systems for (nearly) each distro, and for software that's not packaged, I have to screw around with make and configure for an hour just to get the thing to compile. Forget the dependency hell and the mismatched shared libraries. Different patches have to be applied for different distros, and in most cases, the documentation from the provider of the software is not quite complete (to be charitable).
Let's face it, even for a relative expert like me, Linux is a ballbuster when you're trying to get the environment exactly the way you want it. Sure, it runs great after that, efficiently and with stability, but it should not take me over a week to get a functioning web server + PHP + mail server + database engine up and running exactly the way I want it. And yes, it can take a week...when you're like me, and you have to deal with several Linux distros at once, it is very difficult to become an expert in each one or even to keep straight which ones have which quirks, which ones store files where, etc. Most of my time is spent digging up relevant info out of mailing list archives that are several years old.
All I know is, if I am ever in the position of specifying hardware, I will get an Apple Xserve running OS X Server. All the flexibility of Linux with the ease-of-use of a Mac. It may not be a "free" OS, but my time isn't free either, even though the Linux community often treats people that way.
And the notch indicated READ/WRITE, not read-only as another poster suggested. I remember cutting plenty of notches to make single-sided disks double-sided. I wouldn't have needed to do that if the absence of the notch meant read/write.
Such as hard leftist David Corn, of The Nation? He's one of the founding editors of OSM...certainly "off the reservation" already...