Was it just me or was that article fud (pro-google propaganda without really covering the issues). My greatest concern, and I'm sure its one I share with at least one other person, is that I think I may feel quite uncomfortable about targetted advertising. I don't want to get a new girlfriend (lucky I'm reading slashdot:-) and find ads aimed at buying her gifts, nor do I want to write about my ichy balls and have ichy ball remedies on the sidebar. The article did not cover this at all. It will depend on google's implementation, so far we have some reason to trust them but this is a dicey new area.
And the article did not even mention google's IPO. Google is discussed in this article and by some of/.'s readbase as 'the people's company'. Of course, after it floats, it will be the shareholders company. And it will (IANAL) become illegal for them to act not in the interests of those shareholders. Which could mean illegal for them to do some of the 'good' things they have been doing - because they will be spending other people's money/investment.
Finally... how is google going to stop this service being used for W@r3z? I forsee a situation where an unscrupulous individual logs in, uploads a new game or movie, then writes a perl script that can send it to whoever they want. Google can shut down the account but the game/movie could easily have been sent to hundreds or thousands of people at considerable bandwidth cost. Surely they have thought of this I wonder how they will stop it? Will they tolerate this sort of thing on the small scale - I mean they will have to won't they?
There doesn't seem to be anything big about this. I understand the origins of the robots.txt file were about keeping robots out of infinite loops and unimportant large file trees, but everyone knows they are also used to prevent google from indexing stuff people would rather keep (semi) private.
If this was some crazy government conspiracy and they were trying to hide the information, why would they put it on their website? Could be any number of reasons they have done this perhaps they were getting loads of hits from google about iraq related things but if anyone really wants the information surely they can just visit it.
The whole idea of product placement is that it is not "seen". Advertisers don't want characters who have a coke addiction because a cluey audience will realise that marketers are screwing around with their entertainment and they will not like that. Also, people want characters who they can relate to but who are similar to them in some way, it would be difficult to convince an audience that someone was cool because they were addicted to coke (because it is better to show characters who are powerful, in control then people will idolise them).
What the best advertisers have done is to make it so their product is what makes the characters cool or what makes the movie exciting. Think tom cruises sunglasses in mission impossible or bonds watch or car in the latest bond.
What is scary is that advertising is going to get mroe transperant but it also going to become even more integrated into the programs. It is perhaps the greatest sign of our apathy that the only thing we have left, our entertainment and culture, is becoming commercialised - its value lost on future generations except as a sign of how fucked up previous generations were.
Yes but this is a story about telstra's main SMTP servers being blocked. I purposely do not send mail through my own server because I assume coming from Bigpond cable there is a chance the IP block will be blacklisted.
Then again who would want to email anyone on AOL anyway?
I hope this has some affect but I don't see how it can. If spammers can be sued in Michigan, or even in all of America, what stops the spammers using nations do not recognise US law? Instead of Sears now shutting down it's spam operations (which I assume are incredibly popular) won't it just contract it out overseas through some shady company? Surely it must be proved that they were indeed the originators of the spam?
Suppose I have an unlisted number, then it's unlikely that a charity will be able to get my number (unless someone sells it to them). But if I register with the do-not-call list then I've basically published my phone number for every nonprofit and political party to add to their call list.
In Australia the company I worked for used residential area codes and randomly generated the last four digits. Some of the people we called had unlisted numbers for 20 years.
The idea that there are people out there who think only their pet projects deserve assistance is not my idea of a real uplifting message right before Christmas.
I can't speak for the original poster but when I read "charities that help the less fortunate" I was thinking of things other than people's pet projects. That is the whole point, that there are organisations trying to reverse social evils like homelessness and drug addiction, and perhaps projects like Gnome do not deserve the same tax previlidges because generally speaking, even after the release of Gnome 2.0 the homeless are still, largely, without homes (although having a great free GUI is extremely generous - and we can only hope that as soon as they get homes they will take advantage of this).
At my highschool we used Novell computers, and they were as locked down as the poor computer studies teacher could make them. You couldn't use the floppy drive. You could only execute the 8 or so programs assigned to you. The internet was so protected that I was unable to look stuff about Homer's Odyssey (luckily I was protected from the word virgin I presume).
Now at uni things are so much more free yet the systems so much more secure. We can use the floppy drives, have our own email addresses and websites, and even the/sbin/ is a+x (I don't know how bright this is on there part). All is well...
Unless you go into one of the windows labs in which case you are assaulted with kazaa, icq, msn straight after logging on. You will find the harddrive to be full of crap. Also many people do 'confirm' their password after logging on thus I assume there are password files on those computers with hundreds of students passwords, all with measily encryption.
At least until XP, or the next windows after that makes into the labs it seems windows will always be a hassle for maintainers.
Should I feel as sorry for someone who goes through mood swings when they stop gambling as someone whose heart stops when they go off heroin? Should I wish the government to devote equally proportional tax dollars to each? Should I spend as much of my time worrying and learning about each?
Addictions in the community are serious issues. They are not serious issues because we need you to feel sorry for the sufferers. A gambling addict may pour all their money into their habit to the point they become bankrupt and loose their house. A drug addict in the community gives a huge proportion of their money to drug dealers who are already operating outside the law and may use the money to further more illegal agendas outside of the communities interest.
Government tax dollars managed appropriately towards these causes should reduce damage to the community and thereby save money. No-one is suggesting you need to treat all addictions with the same brush. They do belong in different categories and need to be treated in different ways. With that in mind however, it is worth remembering that every gambling addict is hurting you - in the pocket and in the lost community member. While gambling addictions may be gaining alot of press at the moment do not let it fool you that there are not real community costs involved.
As for politics and religion, they NEED to be taught in the home! At least if you give a shit about your religion and politics! How else will kids learn about your values? Who you are and what you believe? Is it so awfull that my kids learn from me? I have a vested interest in my childrens upbringing and their belief system. Must they learn from people who have no true interest in their future? Give me a break!
Personally, I don't give a shit about my religion or my politics. They are just opinions I have formed. Given different input variables I would have different output beliefs.
As for my values, my children will spend more time with me and my wife than anyone else, at least while very young. Children naturally imitate belief structures and values without you needing to spell it out to them. I know I'm alot like my father even though I grew up thinking his values were wrong/malformed.
This is not a disagreement with your post, rather an agreement with the original poster's point. I do not have a vested interest in what religious or political paths my kids choose to take. So my situation is different from yours. I do however have a vested interest in keeping open channels of communication between myself and them and I think pushing beliefs is no the best way to do that.
The big difference here is that linking to warez theoretically hurts sales of the software. No sane person could believe that this does.
The issue is that it is taking away from their control over their IP. Id should be able to release their product under the circumstances they see appropriate. This biases consumers in a way that they have no control over.
I never show people half finished versions of anything I work on and Id should have the same right. Slashdot should mention this because it is news but let the links appear in the comments only.
After all, how do you distinguish automatically between a distributed flood of HTTP malicious requests and a Slashdotting?
This is a legitimate question. Why does one need to distinguish between them? Can't the server be set up so when the packets are coming in at X amount per second, where X is the level that will crash the server, block them until it is below the critical level. After all isn't it better to have a few people forced to requested again than to have the server go down completely? Even if it is a Slashdotting isn't the worst thing that is going to happen is a some of them can't get through?
Phase 3. The commercial dns. There are not enough words for every website to have a name unique to it ".com". Regardless of who runs it. The commercialization of DNS registars only makes matters worse. I predict in a few year, if it even takes that long, subdomain will be back in vague. There will not be any choice in the matter. Try finding a unique domain recent less than 8 characters? Tough, huh? Soon the public will learn "search google for keyword slashdot" to find slashdot. Dare I say "AOL Keyword whatever" in ads. Bookmark it if you like it once there, or go through the same process next time.
I imagine that with this will come the sucess of gimicky domain names. The huge success of.tv is a testament to this. Companies don't want to remind their customers that they are a company with the.com. The theme from the book "No Logo" applies here, "Brands Not Products". It's important for companies to separate their brands from their products and their products from the company. Once people link the nike feeling to just a shoe and then link the nike shoe to just a shareprice suddenly the 'feeling' the ad was selling seems quite lame.
As such I think there will be a proliferation of.category domains. Hollywood currently often uses the clunky -movie.com and I think this will be replaced by.movie or something similar. I agree that remembering domain names will become less and less important while making sure your product is the number one hit for keywords will be more and more important but I think people will want a nice sounding domain name once they get there that they have a hope of remembering.
How much money in the form of opportunity cost do you think the city might lose?
Sydney's tourism industry is extremely important. Perhaps the Mayor et al. are thinking that whats lost in two days trading can be gained in the exposure of the city?
Slashdot Mirror
I made a CAPTCHA using flickr images to try and get around this problem: http://www.planetjoel.com/viewarticle/630/Flickr-CAPTCHA+v0.2+using+PHP+and+the+FlickrAPI+for+human+recognition It's similar to Microsofts ASSIRA. I think this approach makes it more fun for the user and is harder for bots.
Exposure to litigation - it can get you more than loads of cash. It can kill.
I couldn't agree more.
Was it just me or was that article fud (pro-google propaganda without really covering the issues). My greatest concern, and I'm sure its one I share with at least one other person, is that I think I may feel quite uncomfortable about targetted advertising. I don't want to get a new girlfriend (lucky I'm reading slashdot :-) and find ads aimed at buying her gifts, nor do I want to write about my ichy balls and have ichy ball remedies on the sidebar. The article did not cover this at all. It will depend on google's implementation, so far we have some reason to trust them but this is a dicey new area.
/.'s readbase as 'the people's company'. Of course, after it floats, it will be the shareholders company. And it will (IANAL) become illegal for them to act not in the interests of those shareholders. Which could mean illegal for them to do some of the 'good' things they have been doing - because they will be spending other people's money/investment.
And the article did not even mention google's IPO. Google is discussed in this article and by some of
Finally... how is google going to stop this service being used for W@r3z? I forsee a situation where an unscrupulous individual logs in, uploads a new game or movie, then writes a perl script that can send it to whoever they want. Google can shut down the account but the game/movie could easily have been sent to hundreds or thousands of people at considerable bandwidth cost. Surely they have thought of this I wonder how they will stop it? Will they tolerate this sort of thing on the small scale - I mean they will have to won't they?
If this was some crazy government conspiracy and they were trying to hide the information, why would they put it on their website? Could be any number of reasons they have done this perhaps they were getting loads of hits from google about iraq related things but if anyone really wants the information surely they can just visit it.
He looks like one of the nerds off buffy.
Linux is more like crack. Since using it I've sold my t.v. and lost all my friends.
What the best advertisers have done is to make it so their product is what makes the characters cool or what makes the movie exciting. Think tom cruises sunglasses in mission impossible or bonds watch or car in the latest bond.
What is scary is that advertising is going to get mroe transperant but it also going to become even more integrated into the programs. It is perhaps the greatest sign of our apathy that the only thing we have left, our entertainment and culture, is becoming commercialised - its value lost on future generations except as a sign of how fucked up previous generations were.
I thought words were defined by how they are used. It would be ironic if you work for webster.
Then again who would want to email anyone on AOL anyway?
Most you can get on cable is 3gigs a month. Finally my ADSL plan is unlimited, hope its a reasonable speed.
I hope this has some affect but I don't see how it can. If spammers can be sued in Michigan, or even in all of America, what stops the spammers using nations do not recognise US law? Instead of Sears now shutting down it's spam operations (which I assume are incredibly popular) won't it just contract it out overseas through some shady company? Surely it must be proved that they were indeed the originators of the spam?
Now at uni things are so much more free yet the systems so much more secure. We can use the floppy drives, have our own email addresses and websites, and even the /sbin/ is a+x (I don't know how bright this is on there part). All is well...
Unless you go into one of the windows labs in which case you are assaulted with kazaa, icq, msn straight after logging on. You will find the harddrive to be full of crap. Also many people do 'confirm' their password after logging on thus I assume there are password files on those computers with hundreds of students passwords, all with measily encryption.
At least until XP, or the next windows after that makes into the labs it seems windows will always be a hassle for maintainers.
Government tax dollars managed appropriately towards these causes should reduce damage to the community and thereby save money. No-one is suggesting you need to treat all addictions with the same brush. They do belong in different categories and need to be treated in different ways. With that in mind however, it is worth remembering that every gambling addict is hurting you - in the pocket and in the lost community member. While gambling addictions may be gaining alot of press at the moment do not let it fool you that there are not real community costs involved.
As for my values, my children will spend more time with me and my wife than anyone else, at least while very young. Children naturally imitate belief structures and values without you needing to spell it out to them. I know I'm alot like my father even though I grew up thinking his values were wrong/malformed.
This is not a disagreement with your post, rather an agreement with the original poster's point. I do not have a vested interest in what religious or political paths my kids choose to take. So my situation is different from yours. I do however have a vested interest in keeping open channels of communication between myself and them and I think pushing beliefs is no the best way to do that.
I never show people half finished versions of anything I work on and Id should have the same right. Slashdot should mention this because it is news but let the links appear in the comments only.
I imagine that with this will come the sucess of gimicky domain names. The huge success of
As such I think there will be a proliferation of
MechCow
How much money in the form of opportunity cost do you think the city might lose?
Sydney's tourism industry is extremely important. Perhaps the Mayor et al. are thinking that whats lost in two days trading can be gained in the exposure of the city?
MechCow