SO does this mean that all the Environmentalists now have to shut their traps about paper or plastic? (I know.. they now want everyone to bring their own canvas bags to the store).
Seriously though... if there are natural bacteria that decompose both polystyrene and polyethylene... doesn't that just mean that the studies that showed that those materials would last for a really long time in landfills were just plain wrong, and that we should stop feeling guilty about throwing them away - as far as polluting the environment goes?
Recycling is still a good idea of course. If only because it stimulates the economy with all kinds of new 'made from recycled materials' products that consumers seem to love.. even if they are cheaper and more disposable than the higher grade material versions.
Except that forcing people to enter their *Admin* password to escalate their privileges also forces them to stop and think "hmmm does this program REALLY need that type of access?"
Additionally if the person is not an admin for that machine, they won't be able to install the software without someone's help, ideally an individual who took the time to NOT give them an admin account for just this reason... so they wouldn't install malware by mistake.
SUDO doesn't work if it is turned into an obligatory prompt dialogue that people just click through mindlessly.
Regarding imagination, we are creatures of history, our culture, our environment and our biology.
One point to make about Sci-fi... when you leave behind the "Science" ie DNA, physics, known biology, etc. you've entered the realm of Fantasy. So there are some limits to what we can rightly call Sci-fi.
There is lots of great alternate reality fiction which mixes science and 'magic' or which takes science to a level where it is indistinguishable from magic.... or explores timelines of humanity where we chose steam power over ICEngines, clockwork over transistors, etc. In the future this type of fiction could be called Sci-Fi, who knows... Verne's tale was pure fantasy for those of his time....
I don't think you've looked around at what people are writing about. Maybe just break away from traditional people in space doing things that people do today but in a different environment fiction....
Regarding 'near future gloom', I'll save that for a different thread....
They could just be setting up the ultimate census network.... who needs to do sample sets when you can just count the unique faces...
Personally I don't mind the accumulation of data. I don't even mind that there is some organization watching my every move.
This type of surveillance isn't about individuals however. It's about population analysis... cultural trends, etc. It's certainly not about policing... there is ample evidence that widespread surveillance doesn't work against criminals who are aware of it.
Had problems on OS X until I cleared my prefs...
on
Firefox 3 RC1 Out Now
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I'm not sure exactly what was wrong... something was corrupted for sure but a variety of javascript was simply not being processed. Flash wasn't loading, possibly due to lack of javascript as so many flash embeds are done that way now....
In any case if you have any problems on OSX you might want to try moving all your prefs and addons/extensions/etc anything mozilla or firefox and starting up FF3 RC1 as a brand new install.
I only use FF to test websites (love safari) and occasionally to do some rigorous script debugging with firebug. So I don't have any bookmarks or other settings I care about. You may want to find out how to save those things for re-import later if you use it daily.
Standardizing on the packages isn't really the answer. You're forcing technology to solve a policy problem.
What you really want is a common HCI without the GUI bit.
As in, you want common Use Cases for accessing functionality. You want to be able to navigate and manage software the same way no matter what it looks like or who developed it.
Think screens for this... first comes a menu screen, then a settings screen, then a confirmation dialogue. Settings labels should be consistent, settings options should be presented in the same type of control... this would apply whether it's in a 2D GUI, 3D GUI or on CLI.
As an example there would be a common installer methodology... so that whether it is presented in a GUI or on the CLI it provides the same feedback and presents the same options...
1) Tell them what they are installing 2) Show them the options and a multi-select to choose their preferences 3) Provide a confirmation of their choices and an install location input (GUIs can use a file browser to help select the location) 4) Show the license agreement and opt-in choice 5) Begin install and show progress 6) Show confirmation of installation and a link to the Readme text or MAN/Help pages 7) Show an exit button
However the Distro wants to present this in their Install utility is fine... as long as they include these 7 steps.
Same is true of install scripts... include these steps and you meet the standard.
Any system wide process can be standardized in this way. The look of it doesn't matter, only the process.
That is how you get a standardized User Experience that can be learned and used across multiple platforms, WMs UIs and GUIs.
That is how you can create one set of instructions which can be used for any software that has a common configuration process, settings edit mode, etc.
Sci-fi has plenty of room to play... What will the lifestyle be like on other planets... on orbital space stations... new offshoot cultures.
It's less about discovering new science now and more about how we will live when we actually get to use the science that we already have or get to first hand explore the places we have discovered.
The current near future gloom is only a blip on the radar... we'll get past it. Imagine if all the past writers couldn't see past the cold war?
You must already be old if you can't imagine anything else...
If not it's a rather useless exploit other than as a prank to pull on your secretary... "Hey Sandra... can you print out a table of links for this website?"
Which is good cause otherwise he wouldn't represent the vast majority of Catholics on the planet whom all do accept evolution and other scientific theories as perfectly valid ideas which don't contradict a belief in God in any way.
- speaking as a converted Catholic... I saw which way the rest of Christianity was headed and didn't want to be affiliated...
Why not use this or some other method directly at the ballast intakes?
Rather than microwaving the entire ballast tank continuously... just put in place a bottleneck area where the water is "treated". First with a forced water filter through a mesh to grab the majority of the unwanted critters (which could be ejected back into the ocean) then with the microwaves to kill off any microbes or other very small critters, including eggs, etc. that could develop into critters on the passage itself.
Seems to me that it would much cheaper and much more humane to do this one time per fill up.
Even better.... why not have a treatment plant onshore that cleans water and makes it available for the ships at the same time they are taking on cargo and fuel?
Absolutely... cause it's different now how? Anonymity is only good until it's lost. It could happen at any time... a random client whom doesn't realize your beliefs finds out and tells someone who happens to be a religious nut in secret (well secret to most)... suddenly your anonymity is lost. Now what do you do?
It's don't ask don't tell policy. AKA an excuse for prejudice to happen while everyone ignores it so they too won't be singled out for attention.
Much better to enact strong legislation that does not allow descrimination and has stiff penalties for those who continue to practice it. We have hate crime laws for a reason.
There will always be people who choose not to do business with you for one reason or another. If you live somewhere that your business can't survive without the patronage of people who won't use your service because of a difference in beliefs, maybe you should think about moving somewhere else.
Yeah, my company just did a big web redesign for a major brand... budget was 100k though, very low for what was needed.
We did a full flash site with deep linking (back-button support, bookmarking in the flash, etc.), click tracking, 3 level loading mechanism.. main loader, pages, content... and a whole host of cool features (photo upload, morph and email to a friend), custom eCards, games, video ending voting system (pick the ending of the video and we'll shoot the next one based on your feedback). The swfs all check for screen readers and redirect to text only version.
We also did a full html version of the site (minus the flash only apps), with WAI- AA support, links to all videos as flvs for use in a flv standalone player... and deep links into all the content for those with screen readers who want to try out the flash tools and don't mind a challenge (or their disability isn't holding them back as much as some).
We also did a mobile site for XHTML/WAP with streaming video support and some flash lite content where possible.
We also did a mobile WAP/WML site with straight text content and 3GP downloadable video where possible.
This project ended up being a 450k man hour project. The flash version of the site would have come in close to the budget... if we had ignored the deep linking ability, the accessibility options for flash (captioning, tab indexes, etc) and hadn't bothered to tie it to the CMS we used to keep all the content synchronized.... yes the flash site pulls it's content from the CMS as well.
We did all this extra as an investment in the relationship with the parent company of the brand...
So it was 4.5 times as expensive to include support for all devices that might access the site. Even then we didn't optimize for all devices, only 2, Flash supporting browsers and XHTML Mobile phones.
Honestly it's the difference between a 50k website and a 150k website.
The 50k website is designed once for one target, one audience... the 150k website is designed for all targets and all audiences.
A typical business would rather save the 100k difference and ignore the fact that 20% of visitors may have a bad experience.
It's like accessibility... it adds a 30% overhead to building a website. Lots of extra QA, extra dev, extra creative effort, etc.
There are a lot of competing interests when it comes to spending money on a website... not everyone can afford to spend it all on being a good member of the community. They have to get ROI first, then maybe if there's budget next year they'll add in good faith gestures.
The Dragonlance Saga, the original 4 books, mind you, was one of the best Fantasy epics of my childhood, though it is an homage and certainly a derivative work.
After that, certainly The Forgotten Realms series was a great world to dig in to and was by and large extended in a very entertaining way.
I did love Dune as well and a variety of other series but the above 2 were my favorite formative Fantasy epics.
Who says you can't play games AND make sweet love? A good game could be like foreplay... get the tension just right then BAM! sweet sweet lovin'
The last thing you want in this scenario is to actually care about the game... so no RPGs or MMORG or even Team games... just good old fashion PVP action.
I know this will make a lot of you groan.... but this is a perfect scenario for the use of Flash. It could easily be implemented using one of the open source SWF libraries as well...
What's nice it that there are a few good libraries for speaking flash text as well, so an audio option is possible as well.
1 cheeseburger a week (w/ bacon) 1 chicken burrito 1 serving of Pork chops 1 stir fry w/ steak 1 serving of beef ribs 1 serving of chicken (baked) an order of beef nachos
I also eat a portion of carbs and vegetables with the meat... fish and other seafood add variety.
I'm 30, weigh 170 lbs (6'0")
I'm strong, healthy and fit. I run 5 miles a day (on treadmill). Do yard work and home improvements on the weekend and run after my little girl whenever I'm home (she's 1).
I work in an office with 30 people, only 1 is overweight... too much beer (he's Australian) and everyone is a meat eater. 85% of the people work out in some way or another and are of athletic builds. The rest are fit but of average build (15-18% body fat I estimate), mostly the women.
One thing we don't have is a vending machine with carbonated sugar water in it. We have coffee, tea, hot chocolate and water.
Being vegetarian has nothing to do with being a healthy weight. Eating reasonable portions and getting some exercise will keep you there easily. Avoiding sugar water and condensed sugar snacks every day for a month will stop most weight gain in it's tracks.... basically just stop eating so much damn sugar.
A lot of the controversy about genMod plants has nothing to do with dietary concerns (some of it does). There are issues with the idea that plants are patented, that farmers can not keep seed stock from their crop and must buy it from the 'manufacturer' every year, that it is contributing to lower biodiversity, that the genMods will 'escape' into the wild and pollute wild plants, etc etc.
If open source wants to contribute to the well-being of the world, poor nations specifically and charitable organizations in general it needs to encompass both the software and the hardware.
There are many many things you can do with cheap donated hardware and free software that will help a charitable organization reduce costs and thereby increase the percentage of their funds which make it into the hands of those they intend to help... this is a good thing. BUT when it comes to teaching those people how to care for themselves and how to create their own solutions, it requires both software and hardware.
Open sourcing hardware specs and putting hardware patents into the public domain or under an open source license would dramatically decrease the costs associated with creating their own industry.
Imagine if Intel or AMD were to open source some of their older generation of CPUs, motherboards, etc and allow companies in Africa or Eastern Europe to begin developing their own local hardware platforms. There would still be a market for their more current generation of computers but for general use in business and at home the local devices could prove a huge benefit... not to mention the job creation just in manufacturing the hardware itself. I'm not just talking about PCs either.... I'm talking about embedded devices of all types.
We may even find that these companies will eventually develop new alternative technologies themselves and become major players in the markets at which point Intel or AMD can buy them out or license this new tech that they would not otherwise have access to (as they can't possibly think of everything on their own).
Essentially this is a charitable way to fund startups in 3rd world nations which can provide an end goal for those who choose to educate themselves and want to get out of a subsistence life. One of the hardest challenges 3rd world nations face is that they have no place to employ their citizens who do go into higher education... so those people end up leaving and going to nations where there are opportunities.
When it's done well, extra features do add to the value of a product.
I for one can not imagine using any phone with more features than making calls other than my iPhone.
I've tried out all my coworkers phones, (LG, TREO, PALM, SideKick, Blackberry) and they pale in comparison.... I wouldn't want to use them... keyboards buttons are too small, they require a stylus, touch input is sketchy, screen is too small, sound is poor quality, etc. etc.
That's why I held on to my Sony/Ericsson T610 for ~6 years. It had a bright color display, big keys, easy UI for setting preferences, good input keys/joystick, good sound quality... but I only used it to make and receive phone calls.
The iPhone does all the features right though. Video is awesome, the iTunes implementation just works for music, calendaring kicks the ass of any other phone I've seen, email rocks, web browsing - well you've seen it somewhere.. can't beat it on a mobile device, maps, voicemail, text messaging - all gorgeous and easy to use.
For all the arguments that the world should be transparent and that information should be free.... where are the advocates for it in this scenario?
Innocent until proven guilty. DNA doesn't change that.
Anti-discrimination laws... DNA doesn't change that.
Potential to find out if you are pre-disposed towards certain preventable diseases? DNA does change that.
I say DNA should be taken at birth AND by law it should be analyzed and compared against the population. Also by law your DNA should not be allowed as a determining factor in any kind of discrimination. DNA should be taken again at puberty and at age of majority and then again each time you have to renew your ID in person (new picture every 8 years, new DNA sample).
DNA could be used as biometric ID when provided in person in a controlled environment and should be required to sign a long term contract of any sort. However it should be used like a password... blind comparison by the general public. A sample is taken then matched against the database... no details need be disclosed in general use.
No more major identity theft... no more getting a state ID based on a forged Birth Certificate and stolen SS card.
No more cuckolded husbands or boyfriends paying child support for another man's child.
No more bad credit due to ID theft or clerical mistakes.
No more hiring of a person only to find out that they have a history of litigating nuisance law suits fishing for settlement money.
No more mistaken rape charges, murder charges, etc.
As long as the data, DNA in this case is available to you as well as the government... I don't see any problem. Transparent data is neutral.
Privacy laws need to be updated to be about transparency of data rather than protecting the data from the government. Private citizens should have the exact same access to data collected about them that the government has. They need to be updated to have very strict language regarding abuse of access to said information so that low level gov workers who might have access will never use it except in a lawful and on a necessary basis.
The problem with fighting this sort of eventual legislation is that DNA is already being collected and will in the future be collected more and more whether for state purposes or medical purposes or commercial purposes. It (DNA) is way too useful for a variety of reasons to not be collected.... and we have no laws in place to guarantee that this information about you will not be abused.
If your DNA was a part of your medical record THEN it could be protected by existing laws regarding use of that information. If it was collected at birth or as a part of a standard physical then law enforcement would have to get a court order for the information much like finding out your blood type.
All it will take is for a few heavy weights (Apple, Google, Yahoo, eBay, Amazon, Microsoft?) or an aggregation of a lot of little guys...
All they need to do is tell the ISPs to take a hike. See how long the ISPs who want this will be around. A communication network is useless without content. Sure they could negotiate deals with B or C level players but that won't work out and it will cost them tremendously...
Slashdot Mirror
California is doing this now... heard a report on NPR about it a couple weeks ago, with a 10 year timeline to get something like 3000 MW online....
http://gov.ca.gov/index.php?/press-release/3588/
SO does this mean that all the Environmentalists now have to shut their traps about paper or plastic? (I know.. they now want everyone to bring their own canvas bags to the store).
Seriously though... if there are natural bacteria that decompose both polystyrene and polyethylene... doesn't that just mean that the studies that showed that those materials would last for a really long time in landfills were just plain wrong, and that we should stop feeling guilty about throwing them away - as far as polluting the environment goes?
Recycling is still a good idea of course. If only because it stimulates the economy with all kinds of new 'made from recycled materials' products that consumers seem to love.. even if they are cheaper and more disposable than the higher grade material versions.
you obviously don't have kids
Except that forcing people to enter their *Admin* password to escalate their privileges also forces them to stop and think "hmmm does this program REALLY need that type of access?"
Additionally if the person is not an admin for that machine, they won't be able to install the software without someone's help, ideally an individual who took the time to NOT give them an admin account for just this reason... so they wouldn't install malware by mistake.
SUDO doesn't work if it is turned into an obligatory prompt dialogue that people just click through mindlessly.
I agree with each of your points ;-p
Regarding imagination, we are creatures of history, our culture, our environment and our biology.
One point to make about Sci-fi... when you leave behind the "Science" ie DNA, physics, known biology, etc. you've entered the realm of Fantasy. So there are some limits to what we can rightly call Sci-fi.
There is lots of great alternate reality fiction which mixes science and 'magic' or which takes science to a level where it is indistinguishable from magic.... or explores timelines of humanity where we chose steam power over ICEngines, clockwork over transistors, etc. In the future this type of fiction could be called Sci-Fi, who knows... Verne's tale was pure fantasy for those of his time....
I don't think you've looked around at what people are writing about. Maybe just break away from traditional people in space doing things that people do today but in a different environment fiction....
Regarding 'near future gloom', I'll save that for a different thread....
They could just be setting up the ultimate census network.... who needs to do sample sets when you can just count the unique faces...
Personally I don't mind the accumulation of data. I don't even mind that there is some organization watching my every move.
This type of surveillance isn't about individuals however. It's about population analysis... cultural trends, etc. It's certainly not about policing... there is ample evidence that widespread surveillance doesn't work against criminals who are aware of it.
I'm not sure exactly what was wrong... something was corrupted for sure but a variety of javascript was simply not being processed. Flash wasn't loading, possibly due to lack of javascript as so many flash embeds are done that way now....
In any case if you have any problems on OSX you might want to try moving all your prefs and addons/extensions/etc anything mozilla or firefox and starting up FF3 RC1 as a brand new install.
I only use FF to test websites (love safari) and occasionally to do some rigorous script debugging with firebug. So I don't have any bookmarks or other settings I care about. You may want to find out how to save those things for re-import later if you use it daily.
Hmmm I think you're going too far.
Standardizing on the packages isn't really the answer. You're forcing technology to solve a policy problem.
What you really want is a common HCI without the GUI bit.
As in, you want common Use Cases for accessing functionality. You want to be able to navigate and manage software the same way no matter what it looks like or who developed it.
Think screens for this... first comes a menu screen, then a settings screen, then a confirmation dialogue. Settings labels should be consistent, settings options should be presented in the same type of control... this would apply whether it's in a 2D GUI, 3D GUI or on CLI.
As an example there would be a common installer methodology... so that whether it is presented in a GUI or on the CLI it provides the same feedback and presents the same options...
1) Tell them what they are installing
2) Show them the options and a multi-select to choose their preferences
3) Provide a confirmation of their choices and an install location input (GUIs can use a file browser to help select the location)
4) Show the license agreement and opt-in choice
5) Begin install and show progress
6) Show confirmation of installation and a link to the Readme text or MAN/Help pages
7) Show an exit button
However the Distro wants to present this in their Install utility is fine... as long as they include these 7 steps.
Same is true of install scripts... include these steps and you meet the standard.
Any system wide process can be standardized in this way. The look of it doesn't matter, only the process.
That is how you get a standardized User Experience that can be learned and used across multiple platforms, WMs UIs and GUIs.
That is how you can create one set of instructions which can be used for any software that has a common configuration process, settings edit mode, etc.
Sci-fi has plenty of room to play... What will the lifestyle be like on other planets... on orbital space stations... new offshoot cultures.
It's less about discovering new science now and more about how we will live when we actually get to use the science that we already have or get to first hand explore the places we have discovered.
The current near future gloom is only a blip on the radar... we'll get past it. Imagine if all the past writers couldn't see past the cold war?
You must already be old if you can't imagine anything else...
Can you trigger this behavior in an onload event?
If not it's a rather useless exploit other than as a prank to pull on your secretary... "Hey Sandra... can you print out a table of links for this website?"
5 minutes later "What the F***!"
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHA... I totally got you!"
Which is good cause otherwise he wouldn't represent the vast majority of Catholics on the planet whom all do accept evolution and other scientific theories as perfectly valid ideas which don't contradict a belief in God in any way.
- speaking as a converted Catholic... I saw which way the rest of Christianity was headed and didn't want to be affiliated...
Why not use this or some other method directly at the ballast intakes?
Rather than microwaving the entire ballast tank continuously... just put in place a bottleneck area where the water is "treated". First with a forced water filter through a mesh to grab the majority of the unwanted critters (which could be ejected back into the ocean) then with the microwaves to kill off any microbes or other very small critters, including eggs, etc. that could develop into critters on the passage itself.
Seems to me that it would much cheaper and much more humane to do this one time per fill up.
Even better.... why not have a treatment plant onshore that cleans water and makes it available for the ships at the same time they are taking on cargo and fuel?
Absolutely... cause it's different now how? Anonymity is only good until it's lost. It could happen at any time... a random client whom doesn't realize your beliefs finds out and tells someone who happens to be a religious nut in secret (well secret to most)... suddenly your anonymity is lost. Now what do you do?
It's don't ask don't tell policy. AKA an excuse for prejudice to happen while everyone ignores it so they too won't be singled out for attention.
Much better to enact strong legislation that does not allow descrimination and has stiff penalties for those who continue to practice it. We have hate crime laws for a reason.
There will always be people who choose not to do business with you for one reason or another. If you live somewhere that your business can't survive without the patronage of people who won't use your service because of a difference in beliefs, maybe you should think about moving somewhere else.
Yeah, my company just did a big web redesign for a major brand... budget was 100k though, very low for what was needed.
We did a full flash site with deep linking (back-button support, bookmarking in the flash, etc.), click tracking, 3 level loading mechanism.. main loader, pages, content... and a whole host of cool features (photo upload, morph and email to a friend), custom eCards, games, video ending voting system (pick the ending of the video and we'll shoot the next one based on your feedback). The swfs all check for screen readers and redirect to text only version.
We also did a full html version of the site (minus the flash only apps), with WAI- AA support, links to all videos as flvs for use in a flv standalone player... and deep links into all the content for those with screen readers who want to try out the flash tools and don't mind a challenge (or their disability isn't holding them back as much as some).
We also did a mobile site for XHTML/WAP with streaming video support and some flash lite content where possible.
We also did a mobile WAP/WML site with straight text content and 3GP downloadable video where possible.
This project ended up being a 450k man hour project. The flash version of the site would have come in close to the budget... if we had ignored the deep linking ability, the accessibility options for flash (captioning, tab indexes, etc) and hadn't bothered to tie it to the CMS we used to keep all the content synchronized.... yes the flash site pulls it's content from the CMS as well.
We did all this extra as an investment in the relationship with the parent company of the brand...
So it was 4.5 times as expensive to include support for all devices that might access the site. Even then we didn't optimize for all devices, only 2, Flash supporting browsers and XHTML Mobile phones.
Good times.
Honestly it's the difference between a 50k website and a 150k website.
The 50k website is designed once for one target, one audience... the 150k website is designed for all targets and all audiences.
A typical business would rather save the 100k difference and ignore the fact that 20% of visitors may have a bad experience.
It's like accessibility... it adds a 30% overhead to building a website. Lots of extra QA, extra dev, extra creative effort, etc.
There are a lot of competing interests when it comes to spending money on a website... not everyone can afford to spend it all on being a good member of the community. They have to get ROI first, then maybe if there's budget next year they'll add in good faith gestures.
The Dragonlance Saga, the original 4 books, mind you, was one of the best Fantasy epics of my childhood, though it is an homage and certainly a derivative work.
After that, certainly The Forgotten Realms series was a great world to dig in to and was by and large extended in a very entertaining way.
I did love Dune as well and a variety of other series but the above 2 were my favorite formative Fantasy epics.
Who says you can't play games AND make sweet love? A good game could be like foreplay... get the tension just right then BAM! sweet sweet lovin'
The last thing you want in this scenario is to actually care about the game... so no RPGs or MMORG or even Team games... just good old fashion PVP action.
I know this will make a lot of you groan.... but this is a perfect scenario for the use of Flash. It could easily be implemented using one of the open source SWF libraries as well...
What's nice it that there are a few good libraries for speaking flash text as well, so an audio option is possible as well.
http://www.dracon.biz/captcha.php
I eat meat on a regular basis.
1 cheeseburger a week (w/ bacon)
1 chicken burrito
1 serving of Pork chops
1 stir fry w/ steak
1 serving of beef ribs
1 serving of chicken (baked)
an order of beef nachos
I also eat a portion of carbs and vegetables with the meat... fish and other seafood add variety.
I'm 30, weigh 170 lbs (6'0")
I'm strong, healthy and fit. I run 5 miles a day (on treadmill). Do yard work and home improvements on the weekend and run after my little girl whenever I'm home (she's 1).
I work in an office with 30 people, only 1 is overweight... too much beer (he's Australian) and everyone is a meat eater. 85% of the people work out in some way or another and are of athletic builds. The rest are fit but of average build (15-18% body fat I estimate), mostly the women.
One thing we don't have is a vending machine with carbonated sugar water in it. We have coffee, tea, hot chocolate and water.
Being vegetarian has nothing to do with being a healthy weight. Eating reasonable portions and getting some exercise will keep you there easily. Avoiding sugar water and condensed sugar snacks every day for a month will stop most weight gain in it's tracks.... basically just stop eating so much damn sugar.
A lot of the controversy about genMod plants has nothing to do with dietary concerns (some of it does). There are issues with the idea that plants are patented, that farmers can not keep seed stock from their crop and must buy it from the 'manufacturer' every year, that it is contributing to lower biodiversity, that the genMods will 'escape' into the wild and pollute wild plants, etc etc.
If open source wants to contribute to the well-being of the world, poor nations specifically and charitable organizations in general it needs to encompass both the software and the hardware.
There are many many things you can do with cheap donated hardware and free software that will help a charitable organization reduce costs and thereby increase the percentage of their funds which make it into the hands of those they intend to help... this is a good thing. BUT when it comes to teaching those people how to care for themselves and how to create their own solutions, it requires both software and hardware.
Open sourcing hardware specs and putting hardware patents into the public domain or under an open source license would dramatically decrease the costs associated with creating their own industry.
Imagine if Intel or AMD were to open source some of their older generation of CPUs, motherboards, etc and allow companies in Africa or Eastern Europe to begin developing their own local hardware platforms. There would still be a market for their more current generation of computers but for general use in business and at home the local devices could prove a huge benefit... not to mention the job creation just in manufacturing the hardware itself. I'm not just talking about PCs either.... I'm talking about embedded devices of all types.
We may even find that these companies will eventually develop new alternative technologies themselves and become major players in the markets at which point Intel or AMD can buy them out or license this new tech that they would not otherwise have access to (as they can't possibly think of everything on their own).
Essentially this is a charitable way to fund startups in 3rd world nations which can provide an end goal for those who choose to educate themselves and want to get out of a subsistence life. One of the hardest challenges 3rd world nations face is that they have no place to employ their citizens who do go into higher education... so those people end up leaving and going to nations where there are opportunities.
When it's done well, extra features do add to the value of a product.
I for one can not imagine using any phone with more features than making calls other than my iPhone.
I've tried out all my coworkers phones, (LG, TREO, PALM, SideKick, Blackberry) and they pale in comparison.... I wouldn't want to use them... keyboards buttons are too small, they require a stylus, touch input is sketchy, screen is too small, sound is poor quality, etc. etc.
That's why I held on to my Sony/Ericsson T610 for ~6 years. It had a bright color display, big keys, easy UI for setting preferences, good input keys/joystick, good sound quality... but I only used it to make and receive phone calls.
The iPhone does all the features right though. Video is awesome, the iTunes implementation just works for music, calendaring kicks the ass of any other phone I've seen, email rocks, web browsing - well you've seen it somewhere.. can't beat it on a mobile device, maps, voicemail, text messaging - all gorgeous and easy to use.
For all the arguments that the world should be transparent and that information should be free.... where are the advocates for it in this scenario?
Innocent until proven guilty. DNA doesn't change that.
Anti-discrimination laws... DNA doesn't change that.
Potential to find out if you are pre-disposed towards certain preventable diseases? DNA does change that.
I say DNA should be taken at birth AND by law it should be analyzed and compared against the population. Also by law your DNA should not be allowed as a determining factor in any kind of discrimination. DNA should be taken again at puberty and at age of majority and then again each time you have to renew your ID in person (new picture every 8 years, new DNA sample).
DNA could be used as biometric ID when provided in person in a controlled environment and should be required to sign a long term contract of any sort. However it should be used like a password... blind comparison by the general public. A sample is taken then matched against the database... no details need be disclosed in general use.
No more major identity theft... no more getting a state ID based on a forged Birth Certificate and stolen SS card.
No more cuckolded husbands or boyfriends paying child support for another man's child.
No more bad credit due to ID theft or clerical mistakes.
No more hiring of a person only to find out that they have a history of litigating nuisance law suits fishing for settlement money.
No more mistaken rape charges, murder charges, etc.
As long as the data, DNA in this case is available to you as well as the government... I don't see any problem. Transparent data is neutral.
Privacy laws need to be updated to be about transparency of data rather than protecting the data from the government. Private citizens should have the exact same access to data collected about them that the government has. They need to be updated to have very strict language regarding abuse of access to said information so that low level gov workers who might have access will never use it except in a lawful and on a necessary basis.
The problem with fighting this sort of eventual legislation is that DNA is already being collected and will in the future be collected more and more whether for state purposes or medical purposes or commercial purposes. It (DNA) is way too useful for a variety of reasons to not be collected.... and we have no laws in place to guarantee that this information about you will not be abused.
If your DNA was a part of your medical record THEN it could be protected by existing laws regarding use of that information. If it was collected at birth or as a part of a standard physical then law enforcement would have to get a court order for the information much like finding out your blood type.
In fact HIPPA already covers this as far as providing evidence to law enforcement after an accident or as part of an investigation.
All it will take is for a few heavy weights (Apple, Google, Yahoo, eBay, Amazon, Microsoft?) or an aggregation of a lot of little guys...
All they need to do is tell the ISPs to take a hike. See how long the ISPs who want this will be around. A communication network is useless without content. Sure they could negotiate deals with B or C level players but that won't work out and it will cost them tremendously...
I'll stand by my statement.