Slashdot Mirror


User: prgrmr

prgrmr's activity in the archive.

Stories
0
Comments
643
First seen
Last seen
Profile
(view on slashdot.org)

Comments · 643

  1. Re:It begins.... on Canada To Stop Making Pennies · · Score: 2

    The Federal Reserve bank in the US measures the money supply using two formulas, neither of which include your "money from nothing" premise about lending: http://www.ny.frb.org/aboutthefed/fedpoint/fed49.html As banks lend money, particularly the so-called "signature loans" (credit cards and other unsecured loans), they have to increase their cash-on-hand under minimum capitalization regulations by a corresponding percentage as well, and that only comes from operating capital, not thin air.

    As far as inflation goes, a gold standard would certainly help, but would not address every motive in capitalistic economy that drives inflation, i.e., the rise in cost to the consumer for goods and services. The fact is there is no single solution that does that. The US economy was on a gold standard until 1972, and the reasons it was suspended had more to do with competing with other countries than with the domestic economy, and being on the gold standard did not result in "economic collapse".

    Your assumptions about the UK banking system being applicable elsewhere are not entirely true either. While there are international standards on minimum capitalization, the US has additional standards in place, and while these standards appear shockingly low to the average person (6% and 10% respectively), they are sufficient to monetize an bank in a way that encourages it to operate in a risk-averse manner in both the short- and long-term. And the US Fed works differently than the Bank of England, as the US Fed is a private corporation, not an arm of the federal government.

  2. HTC is headquartered in Taiwan, not mainland China. Does anyone know if they manufacture their phones in Taiwan or in China?

  3. Re:equal protection? on German Law To Make Google Pay For Snippets · · Score: 1

    I was thinking an equivalent to the US Constitution's 14th amendment: No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

    In the US, this applies to corporations, because corporation are associations of people, and specifically, the court case Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company recognized corporations as having 14th amendment rights. So in the US, a law to apply this regulation to search engines and exempt others likely would be challenged as an infringement on Google's 14th amendment rights.

  4. equal protection? on German Law To Make Google Pay For Snippets · · Score: 1

    So the German constitution has no "equal protection" equivalent?

  5. The rich are not without the need for morals on Are Rich People Less Moral? · · Score: 5, Informative

    "Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.”
    Napoleon Bonaparte

  6. think of the children! on Chinese Court Orders Ban On Apple's iPad · · Score: 1

    Especially the ones assembling the ipads.

  7. timothy is obvoously having a slow day on Ask Slashdot: Where Are the Open Source Jobs? · · Score: 3, Insightful

    There are a lot of "open source" jobs out there, whether you mean working with open source products like Linux or PHP or Android OS, or working for a company that is an open source provider like Red Hat or Google, and the article is nothing but a troll. Mr. stry_cat completely neglected to give so much as a hint about his technical skill set, let alone enumerate anything specific. There are programming, admin, project management, and management positions in all parts of the country, across almost every industry imaginable, and the only constraints for any given individual are personal preferences as to where to live, and current responsibilities for where they are currently located.

    Every time a slashdot editor allows a completely worthless article like this to hit the front page, they are devaluing slashdot as a brand. Given how often timothy does this, I am amazed he is still permitted the opportunity to do so.

  8. salary as a factor? hell no! on Three Unexpected Data Points Describe Elementary School Quality · · Score: 1

    In a public school, salaries are so overly-influenced (if not outright controlled) by the teachers union that they are meaningless as a metric. For a private school, good luck getting them to divulge the salary levels, let alone what level any particularly teacher is currently at.

  9. desired outcome on Jailbreaking the Internet For Freedom's Sake · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I would go further and suggest that this is a desired outcome by both governments and content holders: to drive the subversives, the perceived anarchists, and in short, all of the non-mainstream consumer users of the Internet off of it into their own "underground". This keeps the nominal Internet "market" sanitized from both subversive content and disruptive behavior, as well as segregates the undesirables into their own sandbox where keeping an eye on them may not be easier, but lowers the degree of urgency for doing so.

  10. obligatory on IBM Tracks Pork Chops From Pig To Plate · · Score: 1

    Time to meet the meat!

  11. the report tells us why on Why the NTSB Is Wrong About Cellphones · · Score: 4, Informative

    from TFA:

    4. The absence of a timely brake application, the cellular provider records indicating frequent texting while driving, the temporal proximity of the last incoming text message to the collision, and the witness statement regarding the driver's actions indicate that the GMC pickup driver was most likely distracted from the driving task by a text messaging conversation at or near the time of the accident.

    9 The GMC pickup driver was fatigued at the time of the accident due to cumulative sleep debt and acute sleep loss, which could have resulted in impaired cognitive processing or other performance decrements.


    And that's why texting while driving is bad, boys and girls. And not getting enough sleep will, apparently, make you stupid enough to do it.

  12. Re:Good advice .. but check your contract on How Do I Get Back a Passion For Programming? · · Score: 1

    Unless he signed a contract that states everything he writes 24x7 belongs to the company, then anything NOT a "work for hire" belongs to him, not his employer. This is predicated on the huge assumption he's not writing things at home via cut-n-paste from work. Many companies will have you sign something giving them title to anything you patent, but copyrights aren't usually included in those, YMMV.

  13. bonuses are not the problem on End Bonuses For Bankers · · Score: 1

    and the profession clearly doesn't understand the current financial industry, where bonuses are really just deferred compensation, not really rewards in the sense that bonuses are in other industries. Both the economy and society would be much better off to not focus on bonuses but instead to actually punish corporations for not managing risk, for ignoring long-term harm in the face of perceived short-term gain.

  14. Re:Shame on you all! on EU Scientists Working On Laser To Rip a Hole In Spacetime · · Score: 1

    As soon as I read the headline, I immediately had to suppress the urge to start whistling.

  15. Re:if they are smart, there are better opportuniti on Ask Slashdot: What To Tell High-Schoolers About Computer Science? · · Score: 1

    I was, using math as a guideline, trying to say that if someone in high school is considering CS, they should really first consider something like physics or chemistry or engineering; and if they cannot handle doing the math for any of those fields, they should reconsider why they are looking at CS.

  16. everything old is new again on Lost Hour-Long Jobs Interview Found · · Score: 1

    step 1: do interview with semi-famous person & conveniently lose it until he becomes famous & dies step 2: ???? step 3: profit!

  17. if they are smart, there are better opportunities on Ask Slashdot: What To Tell High-Schoolers About Computer Science? · · Score: 1

    If they have an aptitude for math, they should look at "harder" sciences than CS, because there's not enough college students studying those right now, so there will be a shortage by the time they are employable. If they cannot do the math then they need to reevaluate why they are looking at CS in the first place.

  18. you don't on How Do You Educate a Prodigy? · · Score: 1

    you put him in charge of it.

  19. Re:Let's face it, on Big Brother Calls 'Shotgun' In Illinois · · Score: 2, Informative

    What's your problem with Kentucky?

  20. Protest is in the news & has a goal on Conflict Between Occupy Wall Street Protestors and NYPD Escalating · · Score: 5, Informative

    You can find links on google's new page, like this one: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-27/wall-street-protesters-joined-by-susan-sarandon.html

    The protesters are actually fairly well organized with planned events, a voting process for making immediate decisions, and a goal of getting Obama to acknowledge the wealth gap and appointing a commission to recommend actions for dealing with it.

    The "traditional" media is indeed ignoring it. There's an on-going debate on twitter about whether or not the twitter admins are actively suppressing the #occupywallstreet hash-tag from trending.

  21. what about Computer Shopper? on Can Newegg Survive the Post-PC Future? · · Score: 1

    Won't someone think of the mail order catalogs!

  22. Meg's first action on Sources Say Meg Whitman To Become HP CEO · · Score: 3, Funny

    will be to announce that HP will accept payments only in the form of major credit cards or PayPal.

  23. the bottom of this particular slipper slope on Mozilla Contemplating Five Week Release Cycle · · Score: 2

    This will continue until they get to a daily release schedule with each new release containing 1 new feature or 1 or 2 bug fixes. And then look for twice daily, etc.

    Mozilla, much more than Google, is pushing me toward using Chrome.

  24. in other news on A Fifth of Telecommuters Work Less Than An Hour Per Day · · Score: 3, Funny

    4 out of 5 respondents to surveys on CareerBuilder lie on surveys.

  25. for the average slashdotter on World Population Expected To Hit 7 Billion In Late October · · Score: 1

    what it really means is that there is now more women than ever before with whom you cannot have sex.