Yes, this is news! The weakness he found was that Internet Security is turned off through the install process for the entire session. This is a big problem and open to exploit. What is also news is that he could abuse IE7 so much and still reset it to a nearly pristine state. That was pretty cool.
I'm sorry. That's bunk or FUD or over exaggerated, take your pick. DRM on the iPod only comes into play when I purchase songs from the iTS. I have thousands of songs ripped from my cassette collection. I have my LP collection waiting in the wings. None of them have or will have embedded DRM. I purchased several months worth of tracks from eMusic.com: No DRM. So the DRM conundrum only comes into play if I want to transport my iTS collection to, for example, a Zune. Then I'm "forced" to burn all my FairPlayed tracks onto CDs and re-rip them as DRM free MP3s. Audiophiles will wail and moan about a loss in audio quality, but most muggles won't care. They'll be more concerned about the time it will take to burn and rip the music. But then can still do it.
The iTS is a perk for iPod users, but it isn't the reason Apple maintains "it's crushing market share". People buy an iPod for many reasons like design, ease of use, and even chic, but not the iTS DRM. iTunes the program, on the other hand, is a large factor in the iPod's popularity, as well.
Actually, Fairplay is the loosest of all the DRM schemes out there and is virtually undetected by common usage, unlike the MSFT alternatives. This, too, contributes to the iPod's popularity. Apple got a lot right here. That's why they dominate the market.
I'm not surprised this Engadget piece was picked up by Digg in the usual OMG!!!!@#!!!!111!!! fashion, but here on slashdot? C'mon, guys.
Apple doesn't do any of the encoding. They provide a software kit for the vendors to do that. This is obviously a case where vendors have cheaped out. And are we surprised? Oh no! The same people who support the RIAA have unethically upsampled low quality vids to make believe they are high quality! They're ripping off their customers! Like this is news?
Have any of these people who repurchased upsampled music been given the brush off by Apple? Now THAT would be news. But in this day of fly off the handle news reporting I shouldn't be surprised this made front page on Digg.com. I am disappointed slashdot editors didn't show any savvy before posting the very same news story. This is debunked in digg.com AND Engadget comments. If common sense didn't prevail a moment of research would have shown this to be simple link baiting by Engadget. Again.
Don't complain to me. I didn't make the "See-Through Faggotry" comment. He's obviously referring to the old iMacs, but this being slashdot, perhaps he's referring to open source homosexuality?
I don't know what is more worrying. That the parent equates translucent plastic with homosexuality or that he thought Steve Jobs personally designed all of Apple's computers.
So many people have suggested this, but you are assuming the neighbor is capable of being reasonable. Some people are just jerks. Honest.
The best suggestions here involve getting younger policemen to come out to witness the aural attack. Don't call dispatch. The submitter needs to drive over to the precinct and talk to the person in charge - whomever is on duty. Explain the technology to them, show them news printouts from NPR, CNN, BBC, etc. Bring a sample sound clip of the "mosquito" on his laptop or iPod. He'll have to convince them in person or they'll just dismiss him as a punk kid/crackpot.
If I didn't have a house filled with kids and teenagers I might like to use this "warfare" myself on an annoying neighbor myself. My next door neighbor can't seem to experience any music without a sub woofer. In fact, I swear he has a stereo with sub woofer in every room of his house. Of course, he mounts his stereos on the inside walls. Every few months I have to go over there and remind him to keep it down after 10pm. Then I have to knock on his door at 1am, 2am, 3am... He doesn't get it until I've made such a pain of myself I win for a few months. If I asked this guy earnestly why he feels the need to be so loud so late at night he'd tell me to do anatomically awkward things to myself. No. I'm better off just kindly but sternly asking him to lower the music again. He glares at me but he turns the music down.
Now he's parking his car across two spaces so nobody else can use Guest parking. I don't think he's clueless. I think he just enjoys pissing his neighbors off. It's a power trip. Talking nicely to him only makes him crankier.
I had no idea that Richard Biggs had passed away. He was so young. 44 years old. What a tragedy. I can't imagine the show without his grace and dignity. Yes, Dr. Franklin was just a character, but the Richard Biggs, like Andreas Katsulas, brought him to life. I have a lot of respect for anybody who can do that. Judging by most TV, it's not a very common skill.
This list is even more insipid than I first thought. They didn't just put together an iPod article for page load whoring, they put it together hastily. I found the "Tunebuckle" (page 7) over at the featured website AND at the price point or $19.95. Oh, sure, you can spend $60 if you want a Tunebuckle, but why do that when you can buy THIS beauty for only $19.95?
One wonders if they spent any time at all putting the list together. Certainly there are odder iPod Accessories than leather wallets and functional gloves. That knitted iPod hat is sounding better and better...
Egads! That is scary stuff. Next they'll be making them for interfacing with Japanese love sims. Lister's groin attachment suddenly doesn't seem so much science fiction.
I wonder if that judge would have gotten in so much trouble if he had used one of these things instead of his pump? Nevermind. I don't want to think about it.
...quickly upgrade all flash ads and video to Flash9 this morning. I was just prompted to upgrade to Flash9 (I don't really keep on top of Flash updates) an hour or so ago.
Although I'd like to see MySpace increase its response time, a week response time is fairly fast for corporations. Apple took two weeks to patch the vulnerabilities discovered last February and they were applauded for having a fast response. The shame is that Microsoft's glacier-like response to security vulnerabilities makes two weeks look speedy, and one week look positively instantaneous.
I realize that it will be popular to bash MySpace around here over this but the real culprits are, in order from least to greatest responsibility, the users who hadn't patched their OS with the latest updates, Microsoft for pushing such crappy code in the first place, and greatest of all, the ad agency that didn't catch this little beauty. They should lose their contract at the least over this, IMO. I use a Mac, Safari, and an adblocker style sheet, but I want to see an end to this. Kids shouldn't be used to propagate malwarez and if I was a band over at MySpace I'd be plenty ticked off about this, too.
I found the Tunebuckle to be an interesting gimmick though it wasn't for sale where they claimed it was and a shop I *did* find selling the item offered the belt for $60. Not really an impulse buy. The gloves were not a bad idea, but with this week's temperatures Winter seems like a forgotten dream. Overall, though, the list seemed like it was simply trying to get linked to digg and slashdot, which it did.
Maybe I should talk my daughter into knitting a goofy hat to hold an iPod. I can see it now. The click wheel would be smack dab suspended over the forehead like a third eye. Post the plans on my blog, submit it to digg and slashdot and bam! My Google adsense might pull in more than 3 that day. It's so Web 2.0! Add pegasus wings on the side and I could even get cuteoverload to link to it.
I wonder if my daughter would do it for me if I promised her a new pony, I mean, iPod...
Sure! Here's one. But most are a parent's nightmare like this or a designer's nightmare like this. Most MySpace user pages are pretty scary, but the band pages, the original reason for being for MySpace, are usually well designed.
So Cory's latest purchase is a Lenovo with Ubuntu instead of a MacBook Pro because he doesn't like iTMS DRM? And Mark's upset at Apple because he doesn't backup his iPhoto or iTunes databases and somehow open source software is going to be impervious to that? It's a free country, so they can do what they want, but I wonder if this is a tempest in a teapot - not a sign of impending doom. Corrupted data is common on all platforms and if one doesn't like iTMS DRM, don't buy music there. Rip CDs instead.
I guess these final straws are non-events for me. And I'm skeptical of their public switching. Seems more like a publicity stunt to me.
Yes, you ARE missing something. We like to party at night in your Grandparent's garage. When the police go and remind them to keep it shut tight it really crimps our style. So keep you hands off our open WiFi Wonderland, pigs! We have a right to download movie torrents from the privacy of somebody else's network!
I have not used their service. However, my experience on the other end of Vonage VOIP calls has been sufficiently unpleasant enough to make me wary. I have to ask the callers to shut off any downloads when their voices begin to skip and chop. There's also digital artifacting that makes the audio incomprehensible from time to time. As much as I like to be a geek, this seems like a service that is too much for the network it is using. In addition, I, too, have concerns about 911. When you consider how much the service costs, the slight savings isn't enough to offset the downsides.
No, my "accusation" was missing a quantifier. It's not intellectually lazy, just grammatically lazy.
It seems you are arguing ideals of academia. I was referring to the proponents of evolution I find in slashdot forums. Many posters are hardly kind to the other side of any issue they stand against, be it religion, politics, etc.
My statement still stands. The parent poster cannot proclaim the virtues of modern knowledge, lump all people of faith into one statement, then chastise them. THAT, my friend, is intellectually lazy.
As for my statement about testy evolutionists, my statement was based on observation. Perhaps that was why it was an easy statement to make. You've done a fair bit of testy overgeneralization in your own reply which makes my point to some degree, though you were more polite than most. You seem to be assuming that the people I was referring to were only testy because they were dealing with ignoramuses. Isn't it possible that not all proponents of evolution are as high minded as you think? Perhaps, just perhaps, some of them abuse the slashdot rating system and participate in mocking debate in the forums? These are the proponents I was referring to. They don't publish in the tomes of academia. They troll the forums of the internet blindly debating the virtues of evolution just as ignorantly with as many falsehoods and gross misrepresentations of science as the fanatics on the other side do.
Ah, a blanket statement of my own I missed before posting. I should have stated "some evolutionists" - especially the kind you find in public forums. However, this slight mistake doesn't mean my statement isn't true, just overgeneralized without the quantifier.
Perhaps I was unaware of how many "Evolutionary Biologists" participated in slashdot free-for-alls. I've been too busy noticing all the snide comments, mockery, and insults tossed in the direction of anybody who might believe in (snigger, gufaw) a Deity that populate any slashdot discussion involving Evolution or Religion. I was under the impression most discussions here were held by people like us - not necessarily experts but not people bashful about being blowhards regardless.;)
It seems that both sides of the issue have their fanatics who use ad hominem attacks without pausing to support their statements, like the parent poster. As for your statement, "Evolutionary biologists find flaws in existing theories of evolution fairly often, and the theories are adjusted accordingly over time..." I must disagree with you. Perhaps true theorists love the challenge of adjusting the theory of evolution over time, but it's not something that happens without much resistance, and only if the flaws are pointed out by people the theorists respect. If a Creationist, for example, points out a flaw, if he isn't met with outright derision, his flaw is usually dismissed offhandedly whether he has a point or not.
It's like the arguing between political parties. Neither side will concede the other has made a point for fear they'll give their enemy a leg up in the argument. So Democrats will support judges weak on child molestors, for example, and Republicans will support businessmen up to their ears in corruption, for example, instead of admitting there is a problem because the other side is hot on the issue. I see the same mechanism at work in the Evolution/Religion debate.
Perhaps you were referring to academics instead of laymen as I was referring to?
You can't make blanket condemning statements like that then declare you don't want to get into a debate.
I don't think it's a question of lack of faith as you suggest. You have one side of the issue where a faith based person is bombarded with facts, statements, or just assertions that evolution occurred. On the other side you have a faith based person with a personal conviction that there is a God. How does he justify the two? In my observation, there are varied ways they do it. One is to declare evolution is flat out wrong without argument. Another is to point out evolution's flaws (something evolutionists get very testy about, btw. They don't like their faith questioned anymore than religious people do) Still another is to concede some evolution occurred and suggest that God guided evolution. The important thing to realize here is that Creationists are a loud bunch, but they don't speak for all Christians. For example, some suggest the 7 days in question were actually epochs of time of indeterminate length "like unto" 1000 years each.
Frankly, it's not as if Genesis is like Make magazine with a creation How To. It's more like the Cliff Notes version. There's honestly not enough data to say HOW God did anything. Faith based people just believe that he did. They base that faith on their experiences with the Holy Spirit. If you can't relate to this experience then I can't help you. Often in matters concerning evolution and religion, one simply doesn't have much to do with the other and thus the conflict.
Personally, I tend to support the Slartibartfast theory. All those fake fossil layers took a lot of work...they'd need longer than 7 days.
Dang! I remember Deluxe Paint. I used to use Deluxe Paint to upgrade 4 bit game graphics to 8 bit graphics back in the day for a gaming company. I also used Deluxe Paint on my Amiga to make a product called Digital Collage.
I have to agree with both the parent AND your comment. Although it is true that the de-emphasis on drawing by curriculum can be at fault (and the influence still of the "anything goes" style of rendering introduced by abstract expressionism), I began updating my portfolio in a new direction a few months ago and discovered to my horror that I had lost many of my basic skills. Oh, I remembered, but my hand didn't. So I've started from scratch (as part of the flickr community here.) I'm picking up speed to be sure, but all that photoshop work I did over the past several years took me away from the desk and adversely affected my skills.
This isn't rocket science, though. If you don't use it, you lose it. I think bringing awareness to the problem is a good thing, however. If it was such an obvious conclusion as some of the cheekier posters contend, why would so many artists be experiencing this problem? We'll just have to work harder to make time for the pencil and paper (Sorry, but graphic tablets just aren't there yet...too much lag and who can afford a Cintiq?)
I call Bull Puckies. What botnet? Why haven't we heard of it? You think the currently anti-Mac press would pass up a chance to herald OS X botnets as a failure of OS X security? Or even Linux? ZDnet New Zealand would personally wet themselves over this story. I think it's part of their reason for being to blast Apple every chance they can get. And yet we hear nothing.
I took the liberty to scan through www.shadowserver.org's RSS feeds for any news on OS X botnets and all I could find were mentions of the same security vulnerabilities we heard about all through February. Now, I'm not registered with that site so I couldn't use their site search, but I'm fairly certain I won't find anything there. A botnet running on compromised OS X machines would be too juicy for sites like C|Net and ZDnet to pass up.
I don't want to come across as an Apple apologist. Heck, I was so alarmed by the Safari zip file vulnerability that I dedicated a web site to exploring it. But this casual mention of botnets on Linux and Mac OS X just doesn't add up.
You, sir, represent the type of ignorance I have to deal with on a daily basis. So I'm going to address your comment as if you are the head of the local "ADHD is a figment of my government's imagination" chapter, a subchapter of the "ADHD people are just lazy lusers who don't try hard enough" national organization. I realize you haven't personally attacked me, but in the spirit of an open exchange of ideas in our society I hope you realize I'm not personally attacking you either.
First, to those that think that AD/HD is a fabricated malady providing yet another way for "the Man" to enforce conformity in the youth of America, pull off your tinfoil hat. Attention Deficit Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder are unfortunate names that describe a small percentage of our population that have attention consistency problems. That means that their brain is either unable to focus on something, constantly drifting off even without them realizing it, or their brain is hyperfocusing on something, closing out all external stimuli to their detriment. From personal experience I can tell you that it is quite involuntary and extremely disruptive to learning, though the hyperfocusing aspect has its upsides. All aspects of society are exercises in conformity, and the person who can't pay attention or pays too much attention to the wrong things will miss every relevant cue they need to fit in or be productive. Since I could care less about fitting in, I focus (as best as I can ^_-) on being productive. I think being accomplished is fairly important to a person's self-esteem.
Second, to those that think that helping people fit in and be productive is repugnant, try NOT being productive 24/7 for a decade or two and get back to me. The fitting in part is up to the individual's desires, but being productive is important. Forget "the Man". If one can't focus and follow projects through to the end, then one is at the mercy's of one's own misfiring brain. Last time I checked, that wasn't fun or desirable.
Third, to those that suggest that psychotropic drugs and behavioral treatments judiciously applied are acceptable but video games attempting to train people with AD/HD to focus is wrong, with all due respect I think you folks are a pinheads. What behavioral treatments are you people referring to? Electroshock therapy? Spankings? How is a game that trains one to focus not a behavioral treatment? Or worse, an exercise in conformity?
Fourth and final, I recommend you learn what it's like to have troubles focusing with ADHD. Visit my blog on ADHD. I write about it almost every week. Heck, visit my blog anyway even if you don't want to know. I welcome dissenting viewpoints there, but really I hope you ADHD Doubting folks might learn something. Not only do I attempt to humorously cover the topic of AD/HD (as well as other neurological disorders) with a sense of humor, the comments attached to every column are filled with various viewpoints of people who struggle with AD/HD. IMO, these comments prove that this isn't just a fictional malady invented by psychologists for profit (the Scientologist angle), or schools to have a reason to medicate the masses (the tinfoil hat angle). Just because some psychologists (alright, MOST psychologists) are shameless snakeoil salesmen shilling for the pharmaceutical industry by taking advantage of a mental condition doesn't mean that condition is fabricated. And just because some educators believe conformity is best produced by heavy medication doesn't mean the entire school system wants to medicate all children to be happy members of the new working class.
In the meantime, I would like to see more critical analysis of this technology, not dismissal. Are the changes in the ADHD mind real? Or is this an expensive placebo for rich but gullible people? Assuming the changes are real, are claims of cured ADHD minds overstated? Did the changes last over time? Is there a benefit t
These games have come a very long way from their Pacman days, and even further from their days of moving bar graphs up and down. And as the article reveals, there is now a home version, something I wasn't aware of, that converts any game into a focus training exercise. As the doctor in the article claimed, it is better to go into the office to have the full treatment with the feedback results, but at $50 a session for weeks on end many people cannot take advantage of this technology. Unfortunately, the home kit costs $584, not including medical advisement. 12 sessions (the usual period for neurofeedback) at $50 each costs only $600, including medical advisement. The home kit sounds more like a toy for rich boys or agoraphobics at this point than a viable financial alternative.
Aside from the obligatory "Oooh, shiny" type jokes around here, there has been an awful lot of ignorance concerning this subject. Stating the obvious, people with AD/HD have problems focusing (I cover that in a recent blog entry concerning boredom and the ADHD mind). Utilizing technology to provide a person with attention problems a method to retrain himself is something that should be celebrated, not mocked. Psychotropic drugs, the usual treatment, have dangerous side-effects. I have Chronic Motor Tic Disorder now because I took meds to treat AD/HD. That was 14 years ago, and I'm getting worse, not better. I can assure you I was better off before the meds. Besides, our minds acclimate to the meds so they have limited efficacy before needing dosage boosts. I can't see how learning to train one's mind to think better without medication is a bad thing, especially if it finds positive ways to utilize video games. I'm surprised by the negative comments around here. Perhaps the article should have focused on how this technology boosts GTA stats and fights censorship at the same time?
My only concern about modifying Playstation games to utilize this focusing technology is the problem AD/HD people have with hyperfocusing. AD/HD isn't only about being unable to focus. It's also about hyperfocusing to the exclusion of all other external stimuli, a problem with upsides and downsides. The doctor they interview recommends only 30 minute sessions for adults using this technology, but if one doesn't have will power or a handy mother/wife/girlfriend/buddy to yank the plug, one could simply use the technology as another way to hyperfocus while playing video games. I'm surprised they haven't shipped the controllers with a shell program that launches other games but cuts them off after 30 minutes.
I don't want my AD/HD eliminated. I rather like how quirkily creative I've become because of it. But having the ability to focus my creative energies for my own projects, business, etc. could only be a good thing. Meds are not an option for me anymore, and frankly, are being pushed on people like magic pills. Any tool we can utilize to develop coping strategies to deal with AD/HD and utilize it as an attribute are good tools in my opinion.
Slashdot Mirror
I think it'd be better if you guys just stuck to car analogies.
Yes, this is news! The weakness he found was that Internet Security is turned off through the install process for the entire session. This is a big problem and open to exploit. What is also news is that he could abuse IE7 so much and still reset it to a nearly pristine state. That was pretty cool.
I'm sorry. That's bunk or FUD or over exaggerated, take your pick. DRM on the iPod only comes into play when I purchase songs from the iTS. I have thousands of songs ripped from my cassette collection. I have my LP collection waiting in the wings. None of them have or will have embedded DRM. I purchased several months worth of tracks from eMusic.com: No DRM. So the DRM conundrum only comes into play if I want to transport my iTS collection to, for example, a Zune. Then I'm "forced" to burn all my FairPlayed tracks onto CDs and re-rip them as DRM free MP3s. Audiophiles will wail and moan about a loss in audio quality, but most muggles won't care. They'll be more concerned about the time it will take to burn and rip the music. But then can still do it.
The iTS is a perk for iPod users, but it isn't the reason Apple maintains "it's crushing market share". People buy an iPod for many reasons like design, ease of use, and even chic, but not the iTS DRM. iTunes the program, on the other hand, is a large factor in the iPod's popularity, as well.
Actually, Fairplay is the loosest of all the DRM schemes out there and is virtually undetected by common usage, unlike the MSFT alternatives. This, too, contributes to the iPod's popularity. Apple got a lot right here. That's why they dominate the market.
I'm not surprised this Engadget piece was picked up by Digg in the usual OMG!!!!@#!!!!111!!! fashion, but here on slashdot? C'mon, guys.
Apple doesn't do any of the encoding. They provide a software kit for the vendors to do that. This is obviously a case where vendors have cheaped out. And are we surprised? Oh no! The same people who support the RIAA have unethically upsampled low quality vids to make believe they are high quality! They're ripping off their customers! Like this is news?
Have any of these people who repurchased upsampled music been given the brush off by Apple? Now THAT would be news. But in this day of fly off the handle news reporting I shouldn't be surprised this made front page on Digg.com. I am disappointed slashdot editors didn't show any savvy before posting the very same news story. This is debunked in digg.com AND Engadget comments. If common sense didn't prevail a moment of research would have shown this to be simple link baiting by Engadget. Again.
Don't complain to me. I didn't make the "See-Through Faggotry" comment. He's obviously referring to the old iMacs, but this being slashdot, perhaps he's referring to open source homosexuality?
Mod parent up. I haven't laughed so hard in ages!
I don't know what is more worrying. That the parent equates translucent plastic with homosexuality or that he thought Steve Jobs personally designed all of Apple's computers.
So many people have suggested this, but you are assuming the neighbor is capable of being reasonable. Some people are just jerks. Honest.
The best suggestions here involve getting younger policemen to come out to witness the aural attack. Don't call dispatch. The submitter needs to drive over to the precinct and talk to the person in charge - whomever is on duty. Explain the technology to them, show them news printouts from NPR, CNN, BBC, etc. Bring a sample sound clip of the "mosquito" on his laptop or iPod. He'll have to convince them in person or they'll just dismiss him as a punk kid/crackpot.
If I didn't have a house filled with kids and teenagers I might like to use this "warfare" myself on an annoying neighbor myself. My next door neighbor can't seem to experience any music without a sub woofer. In fact, I swear he has a stereo with sub woofer in every room of his house. Of course, he mounts his stereos on the inside walls. Every few months I have to go over there and remind him to keep it down after 10pm. Then I have to knock on his door at 1am, 2am, 3am... He doesn't get it until I've made such a pain of myself I win for a few months. If I asked this guy earnestly why he feels the need to be so loud so late at night he'd tell me to do anatomically awkward things to myself. No. I'm better off just kindly but sternly asking him to lower the music again. He glares at me but he turns the music down.
Now he's parking his car across two spaces so nobody else can use Guest parking. I don't think he's clueless. I think he just enjoys pissing his neighbors off. It's a power trip. Talking nicely to him only makes him crankier.
I had no idea that Richard Biggs had passed away. He was so young. 44 years old. What a tragedy. I can't imagine the show without his grace and dignity. Yes, Dr. Franklin was just a character, but the Richard Biggs, like Andreas Katsulas, brought him to life. I have a lot of respect for anybody who can do that. Judging by most TV, it's not a very common skill.
This list is even more insipid than I first thought. They didn't just put together an iPod article for page load whoring, they put it together hastily. I found the "Tunebuckle" (page 7) over at the featured website AND at the price point or $19.95. Oh, sure, you can spend $60 if you want a Tunebuckle, but why do that when you can buy THIS beauty for only $19.95?
One wonders if they spent any time at all putting the list together. Certainly there are odder iPod Accessories than leather wallets and functional gloves. That knitted iPod hat is sounding better and better...
Egads! That is scary stuff. Next they'll be making them for interfacing with Japanese love sims. Lister's groin attachment suddenly doesn't seem so much science fiction.
I wonder if that judge would have gotten in so much trouble if he had used one of these things instead of his pump? Nevermind. I don't want to think about it.
...quickly upgrade all flash ads and video to Flash9 this morning. I was just prompted to upgrade to Flash9 (I don't really keep on top of Flash updates) an hour or so ago.
Although I'd like to see MySpace increase its response time, a week response time is fairly fast for corporations. Apple took two weeks to patch the vulnerabilities discovered last February and they were applauded for having a fast response. The shame is that Microsoft's glacier-like response to security vulnerabilities makes two weeks look speedy, and one week look positively instantaneous.
I realize that it will be popular to bash MySpace around here over this but the real culprits are, in order from least to greatest responsibility, the users who hadn't patched their OS with the latest updates, Microsoft for pushing such crappy code in the first place, and greatest of all, the ad agency that didn't catch this little beauty. They should lose their contract at the least over this, IMO. I use a Mac, Safari, and an adblocker style sheet, but I want to see an end to this. Kids shouldn't be used to propagate malwarez and if I was a band over at MySpace I'd be plenty ticked off about this, too.
I found the Tunebuckle to be an interesting gimmick though it wasn't for sale where they claimed it was and a shop I *did* find selling the item offered the belt for $60. Not really an impulse buy. The gloves were not a bad idea, but with this week's temperatures Winter seems like a forgotten dream. Overall, though, the list seemed like it was simply trying to get linked to digg and slashdot, which it did.
Maybe I should talk my daughter into knitting a goofy hat to hold an iPod. I can see it now. The click wheel would be smack dab suspended over the forehead like a third eye. Post the plans on my blog, submit it to digg and slashdot and bam! My Google adsense might pull in more than 3 that day. It's so Web 2.0! Add pegasus wings on the side and I could even get cuteoverload to link to it.
I wonder if my daughter would do it for me if I promised her a new pony, I mean, iPod...
Sure! Here's one. But most are a parent's nightmare like this or a designer's nightmare like this. Most MySpace user pages are pretty scary, but the band pages, the original reason for being for MySpace, are usually well designed.
So Cory's latest purchase is a Lenovo with Ubuntu instead of a MacBook Pro because he doesn't like iTMS DRM? And Mark's upset at Apple because he doesn't backup his iPhoto or iTunes databases and somehow open source software is going to be impervious to that? It's a free country, so they can do what they want, but I wonder if this is a tempest in a teapot - not a sign of impending doom. Corrupted data is common on all platforms and if one doesn't like iTMS DRM, don't buy music there. Rip CDs instead.
I guess these final straws are non-events for me. And I'm skeptical of their public switching. Seems more like a publicity stunt to me.
Yes, you ARE missing something. We like to party at night in your Grandparent's garage. When the police go and remind them to keep it shut tight it really crimps our style. So keep you hands off our open WiFi Wonderland, pigs! We have a right to download movie torrents from the privacy of somebody else's network!
I have not used their service. However, my experience on the other end of Vonage VOIP calls has been sufficiently unpleasant enough to make me wary. I have to ask the callers to shut off any downloads when their voices begin to skip and chop. There's also digital artifacting that makes the audio incomprehensible from time to time. As much as I like to be a geek, this seems like a service that is too much for the network it is using. In addition, I, too, have concerns about 911. When you consider how much the service costs, the slight savings isn't enough to offset the downsides.
No, my "accusation" was missing a quantifier. It's not intellectually lazy, just grammatically lazy.
It seems you are arguing ideals of academia. I was referring to the proponents of evolution I find in slashdot forums. Many posters are hardly kind to the other side of any issue they stand against, be it religion, politics, etc.
My statement still stands. The parent poster cannot proclaim the virtues of modern knowledge, lump all people of faith into one statement, then chastise them. THAT, my friend, is intellectually lazy.
As for my statement about testy evolutionists, my statement was based on observation. Perhaps that was why it was an easy statement to make. You've done a fair bit of testy overgeneralization in your own reply which makes my point to some degree, though you were more polite than most. You seem to be assuming that the people I was referring to were only testy because they were dealing with ignoramuses. Isn't it possible that not all proponents of evolution are as high minded as you think? Perhaps, just perhaps, some of them abuse the slashdot rating system and participate in mocking debate in the forums? These are the proponents I was referring to. They don't publish in the tomes of academia. They troll the forums of the internet blindly debating the virtues of evolution just as ignorantly with as many falsehoods and gross misrepresentations of science as the fanatics on the other side do.
Ah, a blanket statement of my own I missed before posting. I should have stated "some evolutionists" - especially the kind you find in public forums. However, this slight mistake doesn't mean my statement isn't true, just overgeneralized without the quantifier.
;)
Perhaps I was unaware of how many "Evolutionary Biologists" participated in slashdot free-for-alls. I've been too busy noticing all the snide comments, mockery, and insults tossed in the direction of anybody who might believe in (snigger, gufaw) a Deity that populate any slashdot discussion involving Evolution or Religion. I was under the impression most discussions here were held by people like us - not necessarily experts but not people bashful about being blowhards regardless.
It seems that both sides of the issue have their fanatics who use ad hominem attacks without pausing to support their statements, like the parent poster. As for your statement, "Evolutionary biologists find flaws in existing theories of evolution fairly often, and the theories are adjusted accordingly over time..." I must disagree with you. Perhaps true theorists love the challenge of adjusting the theory of evolution over time, but it's not something that happens without much resistance, and only if the flaws are pointed out by people the theorists respect. If a Creationist, for example, points out a flaw, if he isn't met with outright derision, his flaw is usually dismissed offhandedly whether he has a point or not.
It's like the arguing between political parties. Neither side will concede the other has made a point for fear they'll give their enemy a leg up in the argument. So Democrats will support judges weak on child molestors, for example, and Republicans will support businessmen up to their ears in corruption, for example, instead of admitting there is a problem because the other side is hot on the issue. I see the same mechanism at work in the Evolution/Religion debate.
Perhaps you were referring to academics instead of laymen as I was referring to?
You can't make blanket condemning statements like that then declare you don't want to get into a debate.
I don't think it's a question of lack of faith as you suggest. You have one side of the issue where a faith based person is bombarded with facts, statements, or just assertions that evolution occurred. On the other side you have a faith based person with a personal conviction that there is a God. How does he justify the two? In my observation, there are varied ways they do it. One is to declare evolution is flat out wrong without argument. Another is to point out evolution's flaws (something evolutionists get very testy about, btw. They don't like their faith questioned anymore than religious people do) Still another is to concede some evolution occurred and suggest that God guided evolution. The important thing to realize here is that Creationists are a loud bunch, but they don't speak for all Christians. For example, some suggest the 7 days in question were actually epochs of time of indeterminate length "like unto" 1000 years each.
Frankly, it's not as if Genesis is like Make magazine with a creation How To. It's more like the Cliff Notes version. There's honestly not enough data to say HOW God did anything. Faith based people just believe that he did. They base that faith on their experiences with the Holy Spirit. If you can't relate to this experience then I can't help you. Often in matters concerning evolution and religion, one simply doesn't have much to do with the other and thus the conflict.
Personally, I tend to support the Slartibartfast theory. All those fake fossil layers took a lot of work...they'd need longer than 7 days.
Dang! I remember Deluxe Paint. I used to use Deluxe Paint to upgrade 4 bit game graphics to 8 bit graphics back in the day for a gaming company. I also used Deluxe Paint on my Amiga to make a product called Digital Collage.
I have to agree with both the parent AND your comment. Although it is true that the de-emphasis on drawing by curriculum can be at fault (and the influence still of the "anything goes" style of rendering introduced by abstract expressionism), I began updating my portfolio in a new direction a few months ago and discovered to my horror that I had lost many of my basic skills. Oh, I remembered, but my hand didn't. So I've started from scratch (as part of the flickr community here.) I'm picking up speed to be sure, but all that photoshop work I did over the past several years took me away from the desk and adversely affected my skills.
This isn't rocket science, though. If you don't use it, you lose it. I think bringing awareness to the problem is a good thing, however. If it was such an obvious conclusion as some of the cheekier posters contend, why would so many artists be experiencing this problem? We'll just have to work harder to make time for the pencil and paper (Sorry, but graphic tablets just aren't there yet...too much lag and who can afford a Cintiq?)
+4 Interesting!?! Some of you people are on crack. Stop playing WoW and develop a sense of humor already. This post was intended to be a spoof. ::/
I call Bull Puckies. What botnet? Why haven't we heard of it? You think the currently anti-Mac press would pass up a chance to herald OS X botnets as a failure of OS X security? Or even Linux? ZDnet New Zealand would personally wet themselves over this story. I think it's part of their reason for being to blast Apple every chance they can get. And yet we hear nothing.
I took the liberty to scan through www.shadowserver.org's RSS feeds for any news on OS X botnets and all I could find were mentions of the same security vulnerabilities we heard about all through February. Now, I'm not registered with that site so I couldn't use their site search, but I'm fairly certain I won't find anything there. A botnet running on compromised OS X machines would be too juicy for sites like C|Net and ZDnet to pass up.
I don't want to come across as an Apple apologist. Heck, I was so alarmed by the Safari zip file vulnerability that I dedicated a web site to exploring it. But this casual mention of botnets on Linux and Mac OS X just doesn't add up.
You, sir, represent the type of ignorance I have to deal with on a daily basis. So I'm going to address your comment as if you are the head of the local "ADHD is a figment of my government's imagination" chapter, a subchapter of the "ADHD people are just lazy lusers who don't try hard enough" national organization. I realize you haven't personally attacked me, but in the spirit of an open exchange of ideas in our society I hope you realize I'm not personally attacking you either.
First, to those that think that AD/HD is a fabricated malady providing yet another way for "the Man" to enforce conformity in the youth of America, pull off your tinfoil hat. Attention Deficit Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder are unfortunate names that describe a small percentage of our population that have attention consistency problems. That means that their brain is either unable to focus on something, constantly drifting off even without them realizing it, or their brain is hyperfocusing on something, closing out all external stimuli to their detriment. From personal experience I can tell you that it is quite involuntary and extremely disruptive to learning, though the hyperfocusing aspect has its upsides. All aspects of society are exercises in conformity, and the person who can't pay attention or pays too much attention to the wrong things will miss every relevant cue they need to fit in or be productive. Since I could care less about fitting in, I focus (as best as I can ^_-) on being productive. I think being accomplished is fairly important to a person's self-esteem.
Second, to those that think that helping people fit in and be productive is repugnant, try NOT being productive 24/7 for a decade or two and get back to me. The fitting in part is up to the individual's desires, but being productive is important. Forget "the Man". If one can't focus and follow projects through to the end, then one is at the mercy's of one's own misfiring brain. Last time I checked, that wasn't fun or desirable.
Third, to those that suggest that psychotropic drugs and behavioral treatments judiciously applied are acceptable but video games attempting to train people with AD/HD to focus is wrong, with all due respect I think you folks are a pinheads. What behavioral treatments are you people referring to? Electroshock therapy? Spankings? How is a game that trains one to focus not a behavioral treatment? Or worse, an exercise in conformity?
Fourth and final, I recommend you learn what it's like to have troubles focusing with ADHD. Visit my blog on ADHD. I write about it almost every week. Heck, visit my blog anyway even if you don't want to know. I welcome dissenting viewpoints there, but really I hope you ADHD Doubting folks might learn something. Not only do I attempt to humorously cover the topic of AD/HD (as well as other neurological disorders) with a sense of humor, the comments attached to every column are filled with various viewpoints of people who struggle with AD/HD. IMO, these comments prove that this isn't just a fictional malady invented by psychologists for profit (the Scientologist angle), or schools to have a reason to medicate the masses (the tinfoil hat angle). Just because some psychologists (alright, MOST psychologists) are shameless snakeoil salesmen shilling for the pharmaceutical industry by taking advantage of a mental condition doesn't mean that condition is fabricated. And just because some educators believe conformity is best produced by heavy medication doesn't mean the entire school system wants to medicate all children to be happy members of the new working class.
In the meantime, I would like to see more critical analysis of this technology, not dismissal. Are the changes in the ADHD mind real? Or is this an expensive placebo for rich but gullible people? Assuming the changes are real, are claims of cured ADHD minds overstated? Did the changes last over time? Is there a benefit t
These games have come a very long way from their Pacman days, and even further from their days of moving bar graphs up and down. And as the article reveals, there is now a home version, something I wasn't aware of, that converts any game into a focus training exercise. As the doctor in the article claimed, it is better to go into the office to have the full treatment with the feedback results, but at $50 a session for weeks on end many people cannot take advantage of this technology. Unfortunately, the home kit costs $584, not including medical advisement. 12 sessions (the usual period for neurofeedback) at $50 each costs only $600, including medical advisement. The home kit sounds more like a toy for rich boys or agoraphobics at this point than a viable financial alternative.
Aside from the obligatory "Oooh, shiny" type jokes around here, there has been an awful lot of ignorance concerning this subject. Stating the obvious, people with AD/HD have problems focusing (I cover that in a recent blog entry concerning boredom and the ADHD mind). Utilizing technology to provide a person with attention problems a method to retrain himself is something that should be celebrated, not mocked. Psychotropic drugs, the usual treatment, have dangerous side-effects. I have Chronic Motor Tic Disorder now because I took meds to treat AD/HD. That was 14 years ago, and I'm getting worse, not better. I can assure you I was better off before the meds. Besides, our minds acclimate to the meds so they have limited efficacy before needing dosage boosts. I can't see how learning to train one's mind to think better without medication is a bad thing, especially if it finds positive ways to utilize video games. I'm surprised by the negative comments around here. Perhaps the article should have focused on how this technology boosts GTA stats and fights censorship at the same time?
My only concern about modifying Playstation games to utilize this focusing technology is the problem AD/HD people have with hyperfocusing. AD/HD isn't only about being unable to focus. It's also about hyperfocusing to the exclusion of all other external stimuli, a problem with upsides and downsides. The doctor they interview recommends only 30 minute sessions for adults using this technology, but if one doesn't have will power or a handy mother/wife/girlfriend/buddy to yank the plug, one could simply use the technology as another way to hyperfocus while playing video games. I'm surprised they haven't shipped the controllers with a shell program that launches other games but cuts them off after 30 minutes.
I don't want my AD/HD eliminated. I rather like how quirkily creative I've become because of it. But having the ability to focus my creative energies for my own projects, business, etc. could only be a good thing. Meds are not an option for me anymore, and frankly, are being pushed on people like magic pills. Any tool we can utilize to develop coping strategies to deal with AD/HD and utilize it as an attribute are good tools in my opinion.