"Baudrillard's vision reminded me of another dystopian prophecy from the beginning of the twentieth century, E. M. Forster's chilling [1909] tale "The Machine Stops." The story is about a future world of billions of people, each of whom lives in a comfortable multimedia chamber that delivers necessities automatically, dispenses of wastes, and links everyone in the world into marvelously stimulating web of conversations. The only problem is that people long ago forgot that they were living in a machine."
Excerpted from "The Virtual Community",
Howard Rheingold, 1993.
ISBN 0-06-097641-1
How timely. I repeatedly tried to install this on the latest Firebird release as an extension yesterday and it never worked. Does the "zilla" part refer to its ability to stomp around and destroy previous installs of the flaming chicken?
is pronounced according to French rules - "bom-BAR-dee-AY
Actually, it properly sounds like, "bom-bard-YAY" (emphasis on the last syllable, no "dee" if you do it right).
A great TV ad I once saw was some interviewee repeatedly calling the interviewer (pronounced) "Mr. Dumbass". The name was Mr. Dumas.
Very funny.
Re:Biggest PC annoyance...
on
PC Annoyances
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· Score: 1
Get your grubby fingers off my screen
Some years ago I convinced local VP-level management in a medium-sized multinational to purchase a high-end 21" Hitachi monitor (1600x1200@85Hz) for CAD use. At the time, the price was about CAN$3K.
At that time the company was on an ISO 2001 compliance bender and they had adopted one of those "control-all-purchases-down-to-the-paperclip-level " programs.
Needless to say, the clueless were ported to work on the consultant's "task force" for the implementation of this latest, greatest business development.
To make a long story short, I was having some trouble deciphering the intricacies of the software, and the designated support guy shows up. With his ball-point pen. And proceeds to point out dialog boxes, in blue ink, on the screen.
I am but a lowly Windows 2000 user and know not of the intricacies of the magic of programs, so please forgive me. What is index.dat and why can't it be deleted without buying some software that claims to do so?
Spam eats up bandwidth just being delivered, even if it gets filtered at the end anyway
Yeah, but just think of all the extra bandwidth we'll have once UCE, viruses and scammail are finally banished by the Spamish Inquisition (nobody expects the Spamish Inquisition)!
...it gives each marketer in the United States one free shot at each consumer's e-mail inbox
Can a subcontracted person be defined as a 'marketer'? I.E., Joe Spammer pays 'John Smith' $50 to one-time spam 3,000,000 addresses from his email account. 'John Smith' uses a valid return address but abandons account after the dirty deed is done. Technically within the law?
Reader creates temp files which it is supposed to clean up after itself. it has a bug and sometimes creates 64000 temp files and then can't open since it has run out of numbers to assign to new tmp files.
It's not worth it when you can get a high resolution CRT for about 20% of that.
Go for a good dual 85Hz+@1024x768 (or even triple!) CRT setup instead of one LCD for now and spend the rest on an extra PCI video card or a dual-head card. Once you go multiple you'll never go back.
Just try to get through to customer care for any reason whatsovever. I'd like to make some changes to my service...
Really. I can make remote changes to my webhosting options through the ISP's web interface and replace my previously chosen digital TV cable channels (eg., change Bravo for SpikeTV almost immediately) via the internet. Why can't this be done for other services?
Answer? Take out the "middle man" from most digital-enabled transactions and, boom!, automatic unemployment for millions of people.
C++:
You accidently create a dozen instances of yourself and shoot them all in the foot. Providing emergency medical assistance is impossible since you can't tell which are bitwise copies and which are just pointing at others and saying "That's me, over there."
FORTRAN:
You shoot yourself in each toe, iteratively, until you run out of toes, then you read in the next foot and repeat. If you run out of bullets, you continue anyway because you have no exception-handling facility.
Modula-2:
After realizing that you can't actually accomplish anything in this language, you shoot yourself in the head.
COBOL:
USEing a COLT 45 HANDGUN, AIM gun at LEG.FOOT, THEN place ARM.HAND.FINGER on HANDGUN.TRIGGER and SQUEEZE. THEN return HANDGUN to HOLSTER. CHECK whether shoelace needs to be retied.
Lisp:
You shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the appendage which holds...
BASIC:
Shoot yourself in the foot with a water pistol. On big systems, continue until entire lower body is waterlogged.
Forth:
Foot yourself in the shoot.
APL:
You shoot yourself in the foot; then spend all day figuring out how to do it in fewer characters.
Pascal:
The compiler won't let you shoot yourself in the foot.
Snobol:
If you succeed, shoot yourself in the left foot. If you fail, shoot yourself in the right foot.
HyperTalk:
Put the first bullet of the gun into foot left of leg of you. Answer the result.
Prolog:
You tell your program you want to be shot in the foot. The program figures out how to do it, but the syntax doesn't allow it to explain.
370 JCL:
You send your foot down to MIS with a 4000-page document explaining how you want it to be shot. Three years later, your foot comes back deep-fried.
Packaged in solid gold attache case...
on
Stealth Inflation
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· Score: 1
Since when does "handling" in the shipping and handling for a two pound item justify an extra $10 expense?
Dan's Data has a recent short write-up on this (albeit for international shipping), excerpt below:
[quote] The strange phenomenon of Amazingly High International Shipping Rates is something that people who buy gadgets from overseas often encounter.
There are two reasons why dealers may do it.
One: They don't really want overseas orders, but they're tired of getting mail from people who may or may not be credit card scammers, in unlikely nations, asking about shipping fees. So they list some outrageous gold-plated international priority rate, which chases away such people.
Two: They used to offer air mail shipping, but parcels kept disappearing. [/quote]
Slashdot Mirror
If you have a really, really cold fridge and you open the fridge door really, really fast, you too can witness frozen light.
...Imagine going out to a club and getting a frozen "light cube" in your drink
Ice cube lights. Not quite the same thing, though.
The 'Matrix' story stolen from Sophia Stewart?
"Baudrillard's vision reminded me of another dystopian prophecy from the beginning of the twentieth century, E. M. Forster's chilling [1909] tale "The Machine Stops." The story is about a future world of billions of people, each of whom lives in a comfortable multimedia chamber that delivers necessities automatically, dispenses of wastes, and links everyone in the world into marvelously stimulating web of conversations. The only problem is that people long ago forgot that they were living in a machine."
Excerpted from "The Virtual Community", Howard Rheingold, 1993. ISBN 0-06-097641-1
Try adding Avantbrowser to IE, if only for experiment's sake.
How timely. I repeatedly tried to install this on the latest Firebird release as an extension yesterday and it never worked. Does the "zilla" part refer to its ability to stomp around and destroy previous installs of the flaming chicken?
is pronounced according to French rules - "bom-BAR-dee-AY
Actually, it properly sounds like, "bom-bard-YAY" (emphasis on the last syllable, no "dee" if you do it right).
A great TV ad I once saw was some interviewee repeatedly calling the interviewer (pronounced) "Mr. Dumbass". The name was Mr. Dumas.
Very funny.
Get your grubby fingers off my screen
l " programs.
Some years ago I convinced local VP-level management in a medium-sized multinational to purchase a high-end 21" Hitachi monitor (1600x1200@85Hz) for CAD use. At the time, the price was about CAN$3K.
At that time the company was on an ISO 2001 compliance bender and they had adopted one of those "control-all-purchases-down-to-the-paperclip-leve
Needless to say, the clueless were ported to work on the consultant's "task force" for the implementation of this latest, greatest business development.
To make a long story short, I was having some trouble deciphering the intricacies of the software, and the designated support guy shows up. With his ball-point pen. And proceeds to point out dialog boxes, in blue ink, on the screen.
Glurge
I am but a lowly Windows 2000 user and know not of the intricacies of the magic of programs, so please forgive me. What is index.dat and why can't it be deleted without buying some software that claims to do so?
Maybe some rocket science company could use a self-motivated backyard tinkerer.
Spam eats up bandwidth just being delivered, even if it gets filtered at the end anyway
Yeah, but just think of all the extra bandwidth we'll have once UCE, viruses and scammail are finally banished by the Spamish Inquisition (nobody expects the Spamish Inquisition)!
...it gives each marketer in the United States one free shot at each consumer's e-mail inbox
Can a subcontracted person be defined as a 'marketer'? I.E., Joe Spammer pays 'John Smith' $50 to one-time spam 3,000,000 addresses from his email account. 'John Smith' uses a valid return address but abandons account after the dirty deed is done. Technically within the law?
He's still going on about innovation?
Adobe Reader error:
Reader creates temp files which it is supposed to clean up after itself. it has a bug and sometimes creates 64000 temp files and then can't open since it has run out of numbers to assign to new tmp files.
That's not the proper way to toilet train a dog. Dogs need positive reinforcement, not negative. Darl, OK. But not a dog.
It's not worth it when you can get a high resolution CRT for about 20% of that.
Go for a good dual 85Hz+@1024x768 (or even triple!) CRT setup instead of one LCD for now and spend the rest on an extra PCI video card or a dual-head card. Once you go multiple you'll never go back.
Just try to get through to customer care for any reason whatsovever. I'd like to make some changes to my service...
Really. I can make remote changes to my webhosting options through the ISP's web interface and replace my previously chosen digital TV cable channels (eg., change Bravo for SpikeTV almost immediately) via the internet. Why can't this be done for other services?
Answer? Take out the "middle man" from most digital-enabled transactions and, boom!, automatic unemployment for millions of people.
Why wait when you have Captain Crunch?
Whatever happened to that proposed interview and submitted questions, anyway? I must have been offline and missed it.
How to Shoot Yourself In the Foot
Developer's Insight, December 1991 (approx version)
C: You shoot yourself in the foot.
C++: You accidently create a dozen instances of yourself and shoot them all in the foot. Providing emergency medical assistance is impossible since you can't tell which are bitwise copies and which are just pointing at others and saying "That's me, over there."
FORTRAN: You shoot yourself in each toe, iteratively, until you run out of toes, then you read in the next foot and repeat. If you run out of bullets, you continue anyway because you have no exception-handling facility.
Modula-2: After realizing that you can't actually accomplish anything in this language, you shoot yourself in the head.
COBOL: USEing a COLT 45 HANDGUN, AIM gun at LEG.FOOT, THEN place ARM.HAND.FINGER on HANDGUN.TRIGGER and SQUEEZE. THEN return HANDGUN to HOLSTER. CHECK whether shoelace needs to be retied.
Lisp: You shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the appendage which holds...
BASIC: Shoot yourself in the foot with a water pistol. On big systems, continue until entire lower body is waterlogged.
Forth: Foot yourself in the shoot.
APL: You shoot yourself in the foot; then spend all day figuring out how to do it in fewer characters.
Pascal: The compiler won't let you shoot yourself in the foot.
Snobol: If you succeed, shoot yourself in the left foot. If you fail, shoot yourself in the right foot.
HyperTalk: Put the first bullet of the gun into foot left of leg of you. Answer the result.
Prolog: You tell your program you want to be shot in the foot. The program figures out how to do it, but the syntax doesn't allow it to explain.
370 JCL: You send your foot down to MIS with a 4000-page document explaining how you want it to be shot. Three years later, your foot comes back deep-fried.
Cat, buttered toast. Combine appropriately and drop from 5 feet. Observe results.
If you're *really* 35-37 years old, your use of the word, "asshat" is inappropriate for your generation.
I haven't yet decided about "to the extreme!".
Did he make his point with a punch list?
See this article for some reasons why some people are fed up with Adobe Acrobat.
I dunno what the sewer charge is for.
Pest control
Since when does "handling" in the shipping and handling for a two pound item justify an extra $10 expense?
Dan's Data has a recent short write-up on this (albeit for international shipping), excerpt below:
[quote] The strange phenomenon of Amazingly High International Shipping Rates is something that people who buy gadgets from overseas often encounter.
There are two reasons why dealers may do it.
One: They don't really want overseas orders, but they're tired of getting mail from people who may or may not be credit card scammers, in unlikely nations, asking about shipping fees. So they list some outrageous gold-plated international priority rate, which chases away such people.
Two: They used to offer air mail shipping, but parcels kept disappearing. [/quote]