A mashup of "GNU Emacs ('Emacs')" and Netbeans
on
TextMate
·
· Score: 1
Oh dear. It seems someone who obviously likes TextMate and the book has written the worst possible review for the Slashdot crowd. I can't imagine a first sentence less likely generate discussion of interest, and persuades less Slashdot readers to take a look. This is a shame, because TextMate does some interesting things.
A few people have tagged this as BS or Greed. That's ludicrous. $5 x however many Core 2 Duo Macs Apple sold between last November and now (presumably they're enabling it before sale) is pocket change to Apple, and they must know this would generate bad publicity. The idea that they're doing this to help their bottom line is ludicrous.
That said, this is a U.S. law. What about customers outside the U.S. Why should we be charged for this?
It's not a monopoly. There are other media outlets. One of the outlets is better funded than all the others, and this may be unfair, but that doesn't make it a monopoly.
You want me to grab a dictionary?
The Ascent of Man was a BBC TV Series broadcast in the early 70s that. It was Jakob Bronowski's (one of the first serious theoretical physicists to move into quantitative and social biology and take the ideas of physics with them) idiosyncratic take on human culture and technology since, well, the beginning. It's ludicrously ambitious, and often brilliant.
The book reviewed book sounds like a crude quantization of the joy of culture. Not that I've read it, which makes my criticism phillistine at best.
But seriously, if you get a chance to pick up the book of the TV Series (or they rerun the series--I believe it was broadcast on PBS in the states) I highly recommend it.
First, Bush doesn't suck. Granted I'm a right leaning mid-liner, but that isn't a crime unless I'm in Berkely or San Francisco.;-)
Your logic is flawless.
Second, if you believe in global warming, find some real evidence. Yeah there may be an elevated level of CO2 in the air now, but CO2 is a piss poor 'greenhouse gas', methane and water vapor work way better. If there is a global warming trend I'd be inclined to think that it's the sun causing it as there is evidence that Mars is warming, also.
I've got a masters in Atmospheric Physics and Chemistry. I know what I'm talking about. You are appallingly wrong. You may have heard of a book called the Sceptical Environmentalist, which was pounced upon by many groups (with vested interests in a preservation of the status quo) as proof that Global Warming is a liberal lie. It isn't and that isn't what the book says. The case for Kyoto isn't cut-and-dry by any stretch of the imagination, but asserting that global warming is not happening right now is up there with creationism.
Thirdly. What's the best way to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases? Condoms or Abstinence?
OK then. By that logic, what's the best way to prevent gun crime? What's the best way to prevent road traffic accidents? Abstain from guns and cars? We use cars (and the USA inexplicably retains it's paranoid and damaging right to bear arms) because we like and need them. Most people like sex and none of us would be here without it. Persuade teenagers to abstain from sex? You've got to be kidding.
How can there be any such thing as liberal or conservative science? If the new conclusions are consistent with scientific principles, then they are scientific. The end.
The idea that scientific information has no ethical content and is nothing more than a series of context-agnostic truisms has been largely discredited in the literature of the history and philosophy of science. Read The Structure of Scientific Revolutions or Google for Kuhn and those who followed him in the second half of the 20th century. As scientists we can't stick our head in the sands and pretend that what we're doing is apolitical. It always has and always will have huge (and potentially monstrous) ramifications.
Would you rather have your news from independent organizations or from an official government mouthpiece? The BBC is a state-run organization and is controlled and owned by the British government.
It's not state-run in the same way as, say, the Chinese media as you appear to be implying. It's not controlled by the government in terms of day-to-day management. The application of editorial pressure by politicians is, if IIRC, illegal.
Moreover, it's not owned by the government in the sense of a nationalised state utility. It is an independent "corporation" (hence the C in BBC) that manages its own affairs. It is subject to some restriction of its commercial activity, and some protection from the pressures of the commercial world that allow it to produce stuff that's percieved to be "public service". If anyone could be said to own it, it would be the license payer, and in a much more direct way than the taxpayer could be said to own a nationalised utility.
Maybe you knew all this but, taken with the rest of your comment, you seem to be implying that the BBC is little more than a mouthpiece of the "British viewpoint", whatever the fuck that is.
And we all know that moving to Channel 4 was the best thing to happen to English cricket since Ian Botham and 1981;->
If you never watch BBC channels (I don't) then that $150 has been STOLEN from you for a service you never use! (Admittedly, I listen to BBC Radio 1, but you don't pay TV tax to listen to the radio!)
It's not theft. It's taxation. The license fee is to purchase a license to allow you to operate a device capable of recieving colour television pictures. As it happens this money is used to fund the BBC, a service that you claim not to use (although how you could get away from it I don't know). Firstly, the BBC includes BBC Radio (which gets its money from the television license fee, and has done since the radio license fee was abolished). And secondly, since when has not using something been an argument for refusing to pay for worthwhile public services?
You pay for plenty for stuff you don't use in this and every other country in the world. I don't get ill very much. I don't begrudge paying for the NHS. Presumably you have your own computer, in which case you're probably not claiming Income Support. The BBC is a public service in the same way. It's not an entertainment channel like NBC, CBS, ABC or even ITV. And it's worth adding that the BBC provides many minority services that would be difficult to fund using adverts such as the World Service, BBC News Online, independent foreign correspondents, etc., etc.
If you think this amounts to theft I don't think you're going to be happy anywhere in the world (except maybe Zimbabwe).
Slashdot Mirror
Oh dear. It seems someone who obviously likes TextMate and the book has written the worst possible review for the Slashdot crowd. I can't imagine a first sentence less likely generate discussion of interest, and persuades less Slashdot readers to take a look. This is a shame, because TextMate does some interesting things.
That said, this is a U.S. law. What about customers outside the U.S. Why should we be charged for this?
It's not a monopoly. There are other media outlets. One of the outlets is better funded than all the others, and this may be unfair, but that doesn't make it a monopoly. You want me to grab a dictionary?
This article hasn't (yet) been accepted for publication. Caveat lector!
What's next? Text messages? Ring tones? The telegraph?
for being unbelievably trite? I think it was.
The book reviewed book sounds like a crude quantization of the joy of culture. Not that I've read it, which makes my criticism phillistine at best.
But seriously, if you get a chance to pick up the book of the TV Series (or they rerun the series--I believe it was broadcast on PBS in the states) I highly recommend it.
from Scunthorpe.
Your logic is flawless.
Second, if you believe in global warming, find some real evidence. Yeah there may be an elevated level of CO2 in the air now, but CO2 is a piss poor 'greenhouse gas', methane and water vapor work way better. If there is a global warming trend I'd be inclined to think that it's the sun causing it as there is evidence that Mars is warming, also.
I've got a masters in Atmospheric Physics and Chemistry. I know what I'm talking about. You are appallingly wrong. You may have heard of a book called the Sceptical Environmentalist, which was pounced upon by many groups (with vested interests in a preservation of the status quo) as proof that Global Warming is a liberal lie. It isn't and that isn't what the book says. The case for Kyoto isn't cut-and-dry by any stretch of the imagination, but asserting that global warming is not happening right now is up there with creationism.
Thirdly. What's the best way to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases? Condoms or Abstinence?
OK then. By that logic, what's the best way to prevent gun crime? What's the best way to prevent road traffic accidents? Abstain from guns and cars? We use cars (and the USA inexplicably retains it's paranoid and damaging right to bear arms) because we like and need them. Most people like sex and none of us would be here without it. Persuade teenagers to abstain from sex? You've got to be kidding.
The idea that scientific information has no ethical content and is nothing more than a series of context-agnostic truisms has been largely discredited in the literature of the history and philosophy of science. Read The Structure of Scientific Revolutions or Google for Kuhn and those who followed him in the second half of the 20th century. As scientists we can't stick our head in the sands and pretend that what we're doing is apolitical. It always has and always will have huge (and potentially monstrous) ramifications.
It's not state-run in the same way as, say, the Chinese media as you appear to be implying. It's not controlled by the government in terms of day-to-day management. The application of editorial pressure by politicians is, if IIRC, illegal. Moreover, it's not owned by the government in the sense of a nationalised state utility. It is an independent "corporation" (hence the C in BBC) that manages its own affairs. It is subject to some restriction of its commercial activity, and some protection from the pressures of the commercial world that allow it to produce stuff that's percieved to be "public service". If anyone could be said to own it, it would be the license payer, and in a much more direct way than the taxpayer could be said to own a nationalised utility.
Maybe you knew all this but, taken with the rest of your comment, you seem to be implying that the BBC is little more than a mouthpiece of the "British viewpoint", whatever the fuck that is.
And we all know that moving to Channel 4 was the best thing to happen to English cricket since Ian Botham and 1981 ;->
It's not theft. It's taxation. The license fee is to purchase a license to allow you to operate a device capable of recieving colour television pictures. As it happens this money is used to fund the BBC, a service that you claim not to use (although how you could get away from it I don't know). Firstly, the BBC includes BBC Radio (which gets its money from the television license fee, and has done since the radio license fee was abolished). And secondly, since when has not using something been an argument for refusing to pay for worthwhile public services?
You pay for plenty for stuff you don't use in this and every other country in the world. I don't get ill very much. I don't begrudge paying for the NHS. Presumably you have your own computer, in which case you're probably not claiming Income Support. The BBC is a public service in the same way. It's not an entertainment channel like NBC, CBS, ABC or even ITV. And it's worth adding that the BBC provides many minority services that would be difficult to fund using adverts such as the World Service, BBC News Online, independent foreign correspondents, etc., etc.
If you think this amounts to theft I don't think you're going to be happy anywhere in the world (except maybe Zimbabwe).
"Instead of next Tuesday (18th June), the Commons debate will now take place on the following Monday (24th June)"