Firstly, the Metric system sucks. That's why the US doesn't use it. Imperial measurements are based around two things: commonly used amounts/distances and binary division. You can take a half, a third, or a quarter of something and not get some goofy decimal. Metric is great for chemistry, good for physics and engineering, (ironicly, Metric would be excellent for physics and engineering if everything else in the US was metric) but it stinks for around the house.
This gets us to point number two: Windows is and will be surperior over the long run. That's because Microsoft has virtually unlimited resources. They can pay people to do the work a lot of F/OSS developers aren't interested in doing. Like documentation and ease of use. Frankly, Windows Server 2003 the nicest system I've ever worked with. I'll take.NET over Java any day of the week.
I'm 6 feet tall, weigh 200 pounds, enjoy a good pint and I use Windows. Let the flames begin.
While I get tons of spam on my personal email account, my work account sees far less junk. Part of this is that I've had my work account for a shorter period of time. My work account is also publicized less. Finally, I get dozens of work related email in the course of a day. Contrast that with my personal account which receives so much junk that I don't even hide my address on slashdot anymore. That account has been in existence for about 6 years now and I only receive a few pieces of personal mail a week.
So, in short, I'd tend to believe the 32% figure. Most of my users don't have their email address published anywhere but their business card and send a lot of work related email in the course of a day.
There is. But the President has a number of unspecified wartime powers. Or at least he wants us to believe he does. For example, constitutonal or not, Lincoln suspended the right of Habeus Corpus during the Civil War. Similar moves were made during WWI and WWII. The President simply declares "a State of Emergency". Hopefully in the Hamdi and Padilla cases, the Supreme Court will put the smack down on these sorts of practices.
On the other hand, if the Feds did try something asinine like this, every little backwater militia will literally be up in arms. And that is why we have the second amendment.
Reminds me of an idea I had for a cable channel: Let the shows/producers/whatever bid for the time slot they want, and then they keep all the ad revenue that comes in for that slot. I'm sort've supprised DirecTV, Comcast, DishNetwork, et al haven't tried that yet. But not really. Wouldn't want to piss off the established networks.
Actually, about 10% of the spam I receive is marked with ADV:. This indicates to me that about 10% of spammers make an effort to stay just this side of the law. And I thank them; may SPAM filters have never failed to pick up any that are tagged as such.
But you are right about a few things. The feds need to start going after the spammers (and those that advertise with them - conspiracy charges?) that they can get. Also, state AGs need to start targeting offenders for violating state and lcoal obscenity laws. If you can't put it on a billboard on mainstreet, it shouldn't be in unsolicited email. Doubly so if the account is held by a kid.
And finally, obviously, we all need to move to an email system that isn't so fundamentally flawed.
Yeah, but my programs are more free than his. I program for the public domain. On the other hand, most of my programs are pretty much useless. But the point is, if you aren't free to keep your changes private, you're still chained down. The GPL ultimately hampers innovation and condems itself to a uniform mediocrity. If you took Linux and turned it over to the public domain, Microsoft's ship would be sunk. The FOSS developers would still continue to contribute to it, and commercial developers would actually start to invest significant resources in it.
Oh, heck, I'll bite too. Firstly, it's not a derivative work. It's instructions for making a derivative work. It's a fine, but important distinction. The derivative work is made in realtime, by the end user who can specify various thresholds for language, nudity, violnece, etc. Secondly, copyright holders have no control over derivative works, other than to block their distribution. The information held in the DVD player is merely of the following sort: From 23:14 to 23:16 there is partial nudity. From 29:22 to 29:23 there is profane laguage. That isn't a derivative work, just notation of significant features. Frankly, I'm not aware of anything in the DMCA that would prohibit this sort of behavior.
Read the article and decision. The ruling allows (not requires) states to prohibit local governments (who derive their authority from a grant by the state) from becomming a telcom utility provider. This is a victory for state's rights. Frankly, governments have no business running a phone company. Or a garbage company. Or really any other company.
So, if you want a small local phone company, organize your friends and neighbors and start a co-op. Furthermore, your argument that "this law is plainly unconstitutional" is fully without merrit in that this is a Supreme Court decision, and they are the final arbitrators over the US Constitution. If they say something is constitutional, you've only got 2 options: amend the constitution, or get them to reconsidder their decision.
Likewise. I used to shop at Kroger until they added those obnoxious cards.
I never use my real name when applying for "loyalty" cards. However, I do use my actual address so I can see who, if anyone, they're whoring my shopping habits out to. Interstingly enough, I still haven't gotten any mail addressed to David St. Hubbins, Tyler Durden, or Dr. Sam Beckett yet. Of course, I've moved since I applied for them, and neither David, Tyler or Sam gave a change of address form to the post office.
Re:Problem that doesn't exist big time...
on
Passport to Nowhere
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· Score: 1
No, I'm more worried about someone getting onto my machine and stealing all the passwords I've got stored in cookies. If on the other hand, all my cookies got deleted, (HD crash, whatever), pretty much every site out there has a PW recovery/reset proceedure.
This is one of the worst arguments I've ever heard. Virus writers don't target a 2% market share. And Macs did have plenty of problems back when Office macro viruses were the major virus threat and Mac had a much larger market share.
Mac OS X has none of the stability and security that you associate with Windows
Maybe in your world you have stability and security problems with Windows. I don't. My systems are patched and well maintained. They are secure and don't randomly crash. So you can take your little troll and stick it where the Sun(tm) don't shine -- Seattle.
I doubt it. It's not a big effort for an ISP or the Feds to record all packets being sent from a given IP end point. And since computer traffic is a lot easier to encrypt then phone traffic, if you're paranoid, it's easy to hide what you're doing. Use good crypto and what's the government know? that you sent and recieved packets from a select number of hosts.
Au contraire, a Windows machine can be secured as well as a Linux box. The problem I encounter that keeps me from locking down my users' desktops is many of them need to run older poorly written pieces of software that expect local admin privs. If your users wanted to run something on Linux that required they be logged in as root, you'd have the same problem. I realize there are lots of options (sudo, etc.) and Widnows has some equivalents, but training users to use them just isn't worth the effort.
I think it's rather naive to think that the system won't evolve. Cell phones and VoIP are both somewhat in their infancy. Cell phones operators in most areas are supposed to be upgrading their service so that they at least transmit what area of the grid your in to 911. I think it's also quite likely that eventually VoIP and Cell phones both will start to rely on GPS to route emergancy calls.
In the end, the Public Switched Telephone Netowrk will die. Eventually, the Internet (or its successor) will take over. Rather like those commercials that AT&T was running some years back. Your voice, data, CableTV will all come in on one cable. At some point, critical mass will be reached and there will be a massive effort to deliver high speed data networks to every part of the country. Like the rural electrification project. Or the rise of Telephones. Or of cable television. In each case, there was a big push to make sure it was delivered to every house. It's happened several times before; it will happen again. The Telecomms aren't particularly worried about this. They control the existing infrastructure and they'll control the new infrastructure. They're just waiting until it's financially viable, tax subsidized, and federally mandated. I expect the transition to be in about 15 to 20 years.
That brings to mind the biggest problem with playing games online. People are weenies. That's why I've given up on the Internet and gone back to LAN parties.
The govenerment's Weather Contorl Satelites(tm) have had this capability since 1973, as well as the technology to create hail. Please try to keep up with contemporary conspiracy theory.
My only real objection to DirecTV is that they charge $5/month for each additional receiver. This is doubly offensive as you have to buy your own units. Other than that, the signal was generally great. I had the usual problems with severe weather and a neighbor who thought it was funny to obstruct my dish.
The first few months I had satelite, they didn't have local chanels for my area (Richmond, VA). They were added eventually. You should verify that local chanels are available. You can still get them with a conventinal antenna, but it's just more conveniant through your Satelite provider.
I was doing this with my family on bance.net back in 1998, about a year before the patent was filed. Subdomains and email addresses were assigned as: name.bance.net and name@bance.net for persons whose last name was Bance. Truly utterly worthless patent.
they might scapegoat him for all the huge losses of entertainment industry
At the very least, I expect they'll make an example of him which should have a very strong deterrent effect. Lend your screeners to the wrong person, and bam, you're out of the academy and on a lot of informal blacklists.
People need to see free software as a social movement. It gives you a chance to be a better human being by sharing your knowledge with your neighboor.
This is precisely why I do not write GPL software, ever. I recently gave my neighbor a Christmas gift. A rather nice one at that. I did it because he's a good guy and a great neighbor. I also had to spend a little time assuring him that nothing in return was warranted.
Open Source is kind of like that. If you expect something in return, you're not being a very good neighbor, nor should you call it Free Software. That's why when I release code to the public, I make it public domain. Not that I often have occasion to do so. What's important is that RMS can freely add my code to any of his GPL projects. But so can Microsoft. Not that I expect either to happen.
Slashdot Mirror
Firstly, the Metric system sucks. That's why the US doesn't use it. Imperial measurements are based around two things: commonly used amounts/distances and binary division. You can take a half, a third, or a quarter of something and not get some goofy decimal. Metric is great for chemistry, good for physics and engineering, (ironicly, Metric would be excellent for physics and engineering if everything else in the US was metric) but it stinks for around the house.
.NET over Java any day of the week.
This gets us to point number two: Windows is and will be surperior over the long run. That's because Microsoft has virtually unlimited resources. They can pay people to do the work a lot of F/OSS developers aren't interested in doing. Like documentation and ease of use. Frankly, Windows Server 2003 the nicest system I've ever worked with. I'll take
I'm 6 feet tall, weigh 200 pounds, enjoy a good pint and I use Windows. Let the flames begin.
While I get tons of spam on my personal email account, my work account sees far less junk. Part of this is that I've had my work account for a shorter period of time. My work account is also publicized less. Finally, I get dozens of work related email in the course of a day. Contrast that with my personal account which receives so much junk that I don't even hide my address on slashdot anymore. That account has been in existence for about 6 years now and I only receive a few pieces of personal mail a week.
So, in short, I'd tend to believe the 32% figure. Most of my users don't have their email address published anywhere but their business card and send a lot of work related email in the course of a day.
There is. But the President has a number of unspecified wartime powers. Or at least he wants us to believe he does. For example, constitutonal or not, Lincoln suspended the right of Habeus Corpus during the Civil War. Similar moves were made during WWI and WWII. The President simply declares "a State of Emergency". Hopefully in the Hamdi and Padilla cases, the Supreme Court will put the smack down on these sorts of practices.
On the other hand, if the Feds did try something asinine like this, every little backwater militia will literally be up in arms. And that is why we have the second amendment.
Reminds me of an idea I had for a cable channel: Let the shows/producers/whatever bid for the time slot they want, and then they keep all the ad revenue that comes in for that slot. I'm sort've supprised DirecTV, Comcast, DishNetwork, et al haven't tried that yet. But not really. Wouldn't want to piss off the established networks.
Actually, about 10% of the spam I receive is marked with ADV:. This indicates to me that about 10% of spammers make an effort to stay just this side of the law. And I thank them; may SPAM filters have never failed to pick up any that are tagged as such.
But you are right about a few things. The feds need to start going after the spammers (and those that advertise with them - conspiracy charges?) that they can get. Also, state AGs need to start targeting offenders for violating state and lcoal obscenity laws. If you can't put it on a billboard on mainstreet, it shouldn't be in unsolicited email. Doubly so if the account is held by a kid.
And finally, obviously, we all need to move to an email system that isn't so fundamentally flawed.
What a delightful description of the slashdot effect: Bandwith and CPU power are limited, therefore the page you are seeking has presently been lost.
Yeah, but my programs are more free than his. I program for the public domain. On the other hand, most of my programs are pretty much useless. But the point is, if you aren't free to keep your changes private, you're still chained down. The GPL ultimately hampers innovation and condems itself to a uniform mediocrity. If you took Linux and turned it over to the public domain, Microsoft's ship would be sunk. The FOSS developers would still continue to contribute to it, and commercial developers would actually start to invest significant resources in it.
Oh, heck, I'll bite too. Firstly, it's not a derivative work. It's instructions for making a derivative work. It's a fine, but important distinction. The derivative work is made in realtime, by the end user who can specify various thresholds for language, nudity, violnece, etc. Secondly, copyright holders have no control over derivative works, other than to block their distribution. The information held in the DVD player is merely of the following sort: From 23:14 to 23:16 there is partial nudity. From 29:22 to 29:23 there is profane laguage. That isn't a derivative work, just notation of significant features. Frankly, I'm not aware of anything in the DMCA that would prohibit this sort of behavior.
Actually, it won't really be an April Fools joke until CmdrTaco dupes it 3 or 4 times.
Read the article and decision. The ruling allows (not requires) states to prohibit local governments (who derive their authority from a grant by the state) from becomming a telcom utility provider. This is a victory for state's rights. Frankly, governments have no business running a phone company. Or a garbage company. Or really any other company.
So, if you want a small local phone company, organize your friends and neighbors and start a co-op. Furthermore, your argument that "this law is plainly unconstitutional" is fully without merrit in that this is a Supreme Court decision, and they are the final arbitrators over the US Constitution. If they say something is constitutional, you've only got 2 options: amend the constitution, or get them to reconsidder their decision.
Likewise. I used to shop at Kroger until they added those obnoxious cards.
I never use my real name when applying for "loyalty" cards. However, I do use my actual address so I can see who, if anyone, they're whoring my shopping habits out to. Interstingly enough, I still haven't gotten any mail addressed to David St. Hubbins, Tyler Durden, or Dr. Sam Beckett yet. Of course, I've moved since I applied for them, and neither David, Tyler or Sam gave a change of address form to the post office.
No, I'm more worried about someone getting onto my machine and stealing all the passwords I've got stored in cookies. If on the other hand, all my cookies got deleted, (HD crash, whatever), pretty much every site out there has a PW recovery/reset proceedure.
Every time another virus runs amok
This is one of the worst arguments I've ever heard. Virus writers don't target a 2% market share. And Macs did have plenty of problems back when Office macro viruses were the major virus threat and Mac had a much larger market share.
Mac OS X has none of the stability and security that you associate with Windows
Maybe in your world you have stability and security problems with Windows. I don't. My systems are patched and well maintained. They are secure and don't randomly crash. So you can take your little troll and stick it where the Sun(tm) don't shine -- Seattle.
I doubt it. It's not a big effort for an ISP or the Feds to record all packets being sent from a given IP end point. And since computer traffic is a lot easier to encrypt then phone traffic, if you're paranoid, it's easy to hide what you're doing. Use good crypto and what's the government know? that you sent and recieved packets from a select number of hosts.
Au contraire, a Windows machine can be secured as well as a Linux box. The problem I encounter that keeps me from locking down my users' desktops is many of them need to run older poorly written pieces of software that expect local admin privs. If your users wanted to run something on Linux that required they be logged in as root, you'd have the same problem. I realize there are lots of options (sudo, etc.) and Widnows has some equivalents, but training users to use them just isn't worth the effort.
I think it's rather naive to think that the system won't evolve. Cell phones and VoIP are both somewhat in their infancy. Cell phones operators in most areas are supposed to be upgrading their service so that they at least transmit what area of the grid your in to 911. I think it's also quite likely that eventually VoIP and Cell phones both will start to rely on GPS to route emergancy calls.
In the end, the Public Switched Telephone Netowrk will die. Eventually, the Internet (or its successor) will take over. Rather like those commercials that AT&T was running some years back. Your voice, data, CableTV will all come in on one cable. At some point, critical mass will be reached and there will be a massive effort to deliver high speed data networks to every part of the country. Like the rural electrification project. Or the rise of Telephones. Or of cable television. In each case, there was a big push to make sure it was delivered to every house. It's happened several times before; it will happen again. The Telecomms aren't particularly worried about this. They control the existing infrastructure and they'll control the new infrastructure. They're just waiting until it's financially viable, tax subsidized, and federally mandated. I expect the transition to be in about 15 to 20 years.
That brings to mind the biggest problem with playing games online. People are weenies. That's why I've given up on the Internet and gone back to LAN parties.
The govenerment's Weather Contorl Satelites(tm) have had this capability since 1973, as well as the technology to create hail. Please try to keep up with contemporary conspiracy theory.
Too late. I baled on DTV for cable to save money on broadband. Stupid Comcast :(
That defeats what for me is the main advantage of backwards compatibilty: not having half a dozen systems cluttering up the space under your TV.
My only real objection to DirecTV is that they charge $5/month for each additional receiver. This is doubly offensive as you have to buy your own units. Other than that, the signal was generally great. I had the usual problems with severe weather and a neighbor who thought it was funny to obstruct my dish.
The first few months I had satelite, they didn't have local chanels for my area (Richmond, VA). They were added eventually. You should verify that local chanels are available. You can still get them with a conventinal antenna, but it's just more conveniant through your Satelite provider.
I was doing this with my family on bance.net back in 1998, about a year before the patent was filed. Subdomains and email addresses were assigned as: name.bance.net and name@bance.net for persons whose last name was Bance. Truly utterly worthless patent.
they might scapegoat him for all the huge losses of entertainment industry
At the very least, I expect they'll make an example of him which should have a very strong deterrent effect. Lend your screeners to the wrong person, and bam, you're out of the academy and on a lot of informal blacklists.
People need to see free software as a social movement. It gives you a chance to be a better human being by sharing your knowledge with your neighboor.
This is precisely why I do not write GPL software, ever. I recently gave my neighbor a Christmas gift. A rather nice one at that. I did it because he's a good guy and a great neighbor. I also had to spend a little time assuring him that nothing in return was warranted.
Open Source is kind of like that. If you expect something in return, you're not being a very good neighbor, nor should you call it Free Software. That's why when I release code to the public, I make it public domain. Not that I often have occasion to do so. What's important is that RMS can freely add my code to any of his GPL projects. But so can Microsoft. Not that I expect either to happen.
er, I think the lesson to be taken away from all of this is:
Get your royalties as a function of per usage rather than flat fee. Also, be very explicit in terms of publication format and media.