ALERT - someone on this (Taco sponsored!) thread has presented a point of view that Steve Jobs is wearing *no clothes*. All moderators mobilise immediately to mod "flamebait".
Crikey. Panic aborted. It says flamebait - it is flamebait. The Apple iPhone is really worth $599, and a two year tie in, thank Jobs.
Are you talking this Bjorn? Because he is not a scientist. He is not even a statistician who can validate what others have. He is simply a politician. In fact, he has been accused of scientific dishonesty. If he were a real scientist, his career would have ended immediately. He has been accused of scientific dishonesty by his own government's agency - the Danish Committees on Scientific Dishonesty. They were subsequently investigated by the government who found they had made "procedural errors". One of these was "The DCSD did not provide specific statements on actual errors." Petitions were raised against the DCSD by everyone, the government rejected their findings as "invalid", but as you demonstrate, mud sticks.
Sadly, it takes a number of years before the BSE really shows up in populations You mean fortunately of course. The thing is, according to the BSE scientists, we (brits) were all exposed to massive doses 30 years ago. Since the total number of cases is 200 and the rate of people catching vCJD (human form) is non-increasing, the length of time it takes to infect a human looks like being more than 125 years. Either that, or it was BS. Either way, hundreds of thousands of cattle were incinerated, the British cattle industry was screwed over, and Europeans were scared for no reason.
CWD in deer - it seems rather odd that BSE should spread to deer since the mechanism of transfer to cows was supposed to be eating offal. Either you have serious carnivore deer - or it's a naturally occurring problem which has been labeled an environmental issue. Now can you understand why I don't trust the environmental lobby?
As to the hurricanes, Dr. Grey and his center noted after the downgrading that they did not know about the on-going el nino. So does that mean that he was right, or he was wrong?
I'm asking because there have been a lot of environmental scares (Genetic modification, Bovine Spongiform Encephalitis, damaged fragile food chains causing crops to fail, the build up of toxic chemicals leading to mass sterility) that were not true and have wasted a lot of time and money. There are several claims that much of the data suggesting global warming has been massaged (e.g. a climate scientist trying to remove evidence of a Medieval Warm Period when temperatures were as high as today - paragraph ten).
I don't personally doubt that there is a small global warming effect caused by CO2- about 1 degree per century judging by the last 30 years. What I am uncomfortable with is that scientists who oppose the consensus seem to get a lot of flak (ever heard of Bjorn Lomborg - all he did was write a book - that's supposed to be a good thing).
I don't want to upset anyone here - but I think the emphasis now is on the consumer gadgets not the computers - the iPod is now far more important to Apple than the Mac. I think this is backed up by the dropping of "computer" from the name, and that virtually no mention was made of the Mac, plus OSX was only mentioned as a feature of the Apple phone. I think that for Apple to keep reaching a bigger audience it's good for them to be considered a "cool thing" company, and not a computer company. Maybe this is bad news for geeks, but it looks like great news for Apple shareholders.
Especially since, from TFA:
The Times found, it has invested $423 million in Eni, Royal Dutch Shell, Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp. and Total of France This list contains several of the largest energy companies in the world. If you choose not to invest in them (the foundation invests $434m/$40bn = 1.1%), you are not investing in a balanced portfolio - which the managers of the foundation are obliged to do.
If there is a problem with flaring natural gas, write a letter to the Nigerian government and ask them to legislate. If you want to find someone else to blame - best look at your parents, grandparents, and yourself. If you hold assets in a US or European large cap index fund (e.g. your pension) then you hold shares in these corporations. Best always to check your own (and your parents') hands for blood before you lay blame. If you study at a university - you can bet your school's endowment holds shares in them too. If you want to do something about this, get the shareholders (who own the company) to write to the companies.
It would be interesting to know where the Tribune Company Employee Pension Plan is invested. I'd be surprised to learn that they did not own shares in the same companies The LA Times (owned by Tribune Company) is so concerned by.
The main purpose is to vaccinate Microsoft against bad press. The Buffett docation announcement was made on a stadium draped in Microsoft logos.
And so cheap! only 40 billion dollars. What kind of an advertising campaign could you have organised for only 150 dollars for every man, woman and child in the US. And how in character for Buffet to donate his personal fortune for Microsoft's PR department's benefit. Thankyou for sharing your wisdom EmbeddedJanitor.
There's been a vaccine for TB for 50+ years and still many people die of TB every day.
And there's been a vaccine for Smallpox too - and that still exists in more than twenty laboratories globally. Of course you're right - because something is difficult means it shouldn't be tried, and rich people who donate all of their wealth should have their motives dissected atom by atom - why are they trying to help poor people? What do they hope to gain by "giving something away"? Why don't they stay at home and comment on Slashdot?
Like most philanthropies, the Gates Foundation gives away at least 5% of its worth every year, to avoid paying most taxes. In 2005, it granted nearly $1.4 billion. It awards grants mainly in support of global health initiatives, for efforts to improve public education in the United States, and for social welfare programs in the Pacific Northwest.
And that's the problem. It's run like a business when it's supposed to be losing money. In today's world, it's easy to make money with more money. And certain foundations take advantage of that. I'm sure the Gates' foundation found it lucrative to invest in companies like Eni. After all, the company is avoiding environmental limitations imposed in its home country or the United States. And, in this manner, the foundation stays wealthy. Never losing money but always apparently "helping" people.
This is unmitigated bullshit. The foundation gives away 5% of it's money per year - whether it can find a good cause or not. Why? Because otherwise it has to pay tax on any increase in the size of the fund (including inflation). In other words, in order to prevent giving all of their money to the US government, they must pay out at least 5%. You have seized on this, but it's a well known fact, for any foundation or charitable organisation. Why do they not give it all away in one year? Because it's hard to spend that much money so quickly without wasting it.
When you say "Never losing money" you make it sound like a sin. Most investments have a goal of existing perpetually - i.e. never losing money. That's called sound financial planning - they invest their money in assets that go up rather than go down. Would you prefer that they invested in something that will lose value? Your arguments about building their industry or priming their infrastructure are also wrong. The factory is industry. It produces jobs. How do they export the goods? Via the infrastructure that eni doubtless supports. Bill and Melinda are doing good - whether you like it or not:)
(Neither, by the way, since this is slashdot, will the free market solve the anthropological climate change.) Climate change may be anthropogenic (generated by man), but I'm pretty sure it isn't studying human civilisation:)
11) Intel will rebrand itself and nobody will notice. Intel did, we didn't -- true.
Intel did not rebrand. They launched two new TV ads a few product logos - but they have the same "feel" of the last 15 years of advertising. I wouldn't really call that a "rebranding" effort. So, wrong.
That explains why this is such a crappy article. I'd love to see the huge illicit call centres that would be needed to receive the thousands of calls to "bank". And I'm sure that Wells Fargo would not be even slightly suspicious after receiving 500 calls from young men with Nigerian accents asking to transfer the balance of their savings into the same numbered account.
Yeah - good point. You only need to pay $10-20 more (instead of $100 less), and have a knowledge of which cut down. special offer system to install, and you can get the same functionality you paid for in the first place. Or we could hire you as a consultant (which I'm sure is only $10-20 dollars more? no?) to take care of the support.
Alternatively you could use a real, secure operating system. I think that was the point of the article. Of course, if "cost savings" aren't an "issue" then just hire IBM to put the system in for you. They can hire the consultants, so you don't even need to do that.
found it *impossibly frustrating* to get a Windows server running, while it was quite straight-forward to get a Linux server running.
This is an example of how free software, linux et al gives people real, measurable freedom. That's supposed to be the whole point of living in the West, and no one had to die, go to war, or get obscenely rich for it to happen. God bless Ubuntu.
You really are a cheerless sod. Why don't you try installing Windows on your PC, and then call Microsoft at 50 cents a minute with the same attitude and see how far you get. I don't often insult people on slashdot - but I make sure never to insult people, or their OS, when I'm asking them for help. Isn't it obvious to you why you are being criticised?
Ah... Having read the other posts I now realise you are a troll. Let's keep you talking until the sun rises, so you turn into stone.
Balls... Trans fats have been ignored for 20 years. In the meantime environmental groups have had little campaigns about Genetic Modification (present scientific consensus: no risk), crop monoculture (the horror! the horror!), hundreds of thousands brain dead due to vCJD (what is it now? 50 cases?). The environment is easy to sell to the uneducated public (use pretty dolphins and scare tactics). Real science is hard to sell because people do not have the knowledge, and scientists don't have the marketing or political skills. Greenpeace et al have these in spades, but sadly no scientific expertise or credibility.
Well I'm sorry someone was unnecessarily harsh - but the comment I was talking about was "The other terrible mind-trap is to fall down the rabbit hole and proclaim the world is ending every time something new happens." I don't see that as flamebait. I do take your point that there might be a lower tech, less stupid solution to this.
But to make this a discussion on "George Orwell was right" is missing the point of Orwell's work and missing the point of what is happening. Perhaps because slashdot is a tech forum a lot of people seem to have read 1984 and saw it as a book warning people that technology can enslave people. But Orwell's preface to Animal Farm and his other writings suggest he was concerned less about how technology was used, and more concerned about freedom of press, freedom of opinion and expression. In this sense, modding even "harsh" statements to be flamebait is a far greater action of big-brotherness than installing a talking camera.
I for one welcome our -1 flamebait moderator overlords. I think everyone should bear in mind this is Slashdot - there is one correct way to think, and that is to think the government is after you. To suggest that a local council installing CCTV to stop fights is a good thing is flamebait and clearly not a genuine argument. Such arguments must be stamped out on Slashdot, so please, let fly with your mod points.
Hey you took all of that from that film "The Corporation". To quote their website: the film puts the corporation on the psychiatrist's couch to ask "What kind of person is it?.
I always found it particularly ironic that the film was made by Big Picture Media Corporation, according to their website - a subsidiary company of British Columbia Film. I think BC's Annual Report speaks volumes:
Economic Impact: Film and television production has emerged as a global industry with a worth of approximately $50 billion annually. Almost every country around the globe now competes for a share of this growing and very lucrative market
I think it's really good to see that an American Corporation has helped meet the niche needs of slashdot users, to give them some nice ideas to put in their posts, while at the same time turning a healthy profit ($4.5m) for the Canadians. Capitalism at it's best.
Can you point to any examples of general-use software (open or closed source) that have successfully implemented a basic/intermediate/advanced toggle switch for its main interface?
Google. Not a toggle switch admittedly - but an advanced interface, and a simple one. The iPod is another example of a simple interface which has been enormously successful.
It's an awful idea... [that] functionality... should be locked away from all but the lords of technology, unavailable to the unwashed masses
That's not what the parent is saying. The parent says why can't interfaces be less cluttered. He is describing his own needs and, for example, his mother's, not claiming to be a "lord of technology". Just because designing a simple interface is hard to do doesn't mean it shouldn't be attempted. It's enormously important, and it's made a lot of money for Apple and Google.
you're wrong. The reason matches go out if you drop them into petrol/gas is that the vapor is so thick that the fuel air ratio is too high for the gas to explode. The flash point of petrol/gas is below normal outdoor temperature - that's why all petrol tankers are earthed to prevent sparks, why running vehicles are not allowed inside oil depots, why there are low walls around petrol stations (to prevent the heavy vapors from rolling down the street to a source of ignition), why you get told off for smoking at petrol stations. Cars work by harnessing the power of exploding gasoline. Hence non-exploding gasoline would be pointless.
We are using water faster then it is replenishing, and as stated before many American Aquifers are in danger This is a very WORTHY point. Thankyou - it would be well suited to an article on potable water. It has NOTHING to do with the usefulness of Hydrogen fuel. The average American uses (i guess) 250 litres of water a day. They need water near them at all times to be comfortable. Hence there is no difficulty in supplying the meager amounts of water required to use hydrogen as fuel - especially since there is no reason that the water cannot be recaptured during use. Sorry to be a bit negative here - but this isn't an article about drinking water. Thankyou.
Granted potable water is hard to find in some places - however the article is discussing the limitations of water electrolysis as a replacement for oil - which is a flammable, sometimes explosive liquid that has to be transported hundreds of miles in order to be used. It is not more difficult to transport water instead, and one can't just stick probes in the ocean and pick up refined gasoline either.
The parent is commenting on the status of the article as a fraud, whilst your point is worthy it doesn't stop the parent being right - the article is clearly BS.
People here talk about "the government" as if it's one organism - some omnipresent hive mind which is, with single minded intent, plotting against the defendant. What they miss is that government is a system of different groups (the courts, the police, the prosecution and defence lawyers) who very often don't particularly like each other. My experience of talking to people in the criminal law system is that they think that other parts of the system misunderstand a) the rules and b) the priorities.
The GP was saying that people in America get away on technicalities too often - I would certainly agree that for anyone who can afford Dershowitz there is a different rule of law. Imagine a plot of the number of trials thrown out on technicality against the wealth of the defendant - which way do you think it would trend?
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Crikey. Panic aborted. It says flamebait - it is flamebait. The Apple iPhone is really worth $599, and a two year tie in, thank Jobs.
CWD in deer - it seems rather odd that BSE should spread to deer since the mechanism of transfer to cows was supposed to be eating offal. Either you have serious carnivore deer - or it's a naturally occurring problem which has been labeled an environmental issue. Now can you understand why I don't trust the environmental lobby?
I'm asking because there have been a lot of environmental scares (Genetic modification, Bovine Spongiform Encephalitis, damaged fragile food chains causing crops to fail, the build up of toxic chemicals leading to mass sterility) that were not true and have wasted a lot of time and money. There are several claims that much of the data suggesting global warming has been massaged (e.g. a climate scientist trying to remove evidence of a Medieval Warm Period when temperatures were as high as today - paragraph ten).
I don't personally doubt that there is a small global warming effect caused by CO2- about 1 degree per century judging by the last 30 years. What I am uncomfortable with is that scientists who oppose the consensus seem to get a lot of flak (ever heard of Bjorn Lomborg - all he did was write a book - that's supposed to be a good thing).
I don't want to upset anyone here - but I think the emphasis now is on the consumer gadgets not the computers - the iPod is now far more important to Apple than the Mac. I think this is backed up by the dropping of "computer" from the name, and that virtually no mention was made of the Mac, plus OSX was only mentioned as a feature of the Apple phone. I think that for Apple to keep reaching a bigger audience it's good for them to be considered a "cool thing" company, and not a computer company. Maybe this is bad news for geeks, but it looks like great news for Apple shareholders.
If there is a problem with flaring natural gas, write a letter to the Nigerian government and ask them to legislate. If you want to find someone else to blame - best look at your parents, grandparents, and yourself. If you hold assets in a US or European large cap index fund (e.g. your pension) then you hold shares in these corporations. Best always to check your own (and your parents') hands for blood before you lay blame. If you study at a university - you can bet your school's endowment holds shares in them too. If you want to do something about this, get the shareholders (who own the company) to write to the companies.
It would be interesting to know where the Tribune Company Employee Pension Plan is invested. I'd be surprised to learn that they did not own shares in the same companies The LA Times (owned by Tribune Company) is so concerned by.
Old? Hah I rememember trolling by morse code back when slashdot was a ham radio channel.
And so cheap! only 40 billion dollars. What kind of an advertising campaign could you have organised for only 150 dollars for every man, woman and child in the US. And how in character for Buffet to donate his personal fortune for Microsoft's PR department's benefit. Thankyou for sharing your wisdom EmbeddedJanitor.
There's been a vaccine for TB for 50+ years and still many people die of TB every day.And there's been a vaccine for Smallpox too - and that still exists in more than twenty laboratories globally. Of course you're right - because something is difficult means it shouldn't be tried, and rich people who donate all of their wealth should have their motives dissected atom by atom - why are they trying to help poor people? What do they hope to gain by "giving something away"? Why don't they stay at home and comment on Slashdot?
This is unmitigated bullshit. The foundation gives away 5% of it's money per year - whether it can find a good cause or not. Why? Because otherwise it has to pay tax on any increase in the size of the fund (including inflation). In other words, in order to prevent giving all of their money to the US government, they must pay out at least 5%. You have seized on this, but it's a well known fact, for any foundation or charitable organisation. Why do they not give it all away in one year? Because it's hard to spend that much money so quickly without wasting it.
When you say "Never losing money" you make it sound like a sin. Most investments have a goal of existing perpetually - i.e. never losing money. That's called sound financial planning - they invest their money in assets that go up rather than go down. Would you prefer that they invested in something that will lose value? Your arguments about building their industry or priming their infrastructure are also wrong. The factory is industry. It produces jobs. How do they export the goods? Via the infrastructure that eni doubtless supports. Bill and Melinda are doing good - whether you like it or not :)
Well this is Slashdot...
Intel did not rebrand. They launched two new TV ads a few product logos - but they have the same "feel" of the last 15 years of advertising. I wouldn't really call that a "rebranding" effort. So, wrong.
I think you failed to notice this...
That explains why this is such a crappy article. I'd love to see the huge illicit call centres that would be needed to receive the thousands of calls to "bank". And I'm sure that Wells Fargo would not be even slightly suspicious after receiving 500 calls from young men with Nigerian accents asking to transfer the balance of their savings into the same numbered account.
So some socialists oppose freedom of speech. And this is news how, exactly?
Alternatively you could use a real, secure operating system. I think that was the point of the article. Of course, if "cost savings" aren't an "issue" then just hire IBM to put the system in for you. They can hire the consultants, so you don't even need to do that.
This is an example of how free software, linux et al gives people real, measurable freedom. That's supposed to be the whole point of living in the West, and no one had to die, go to war, or get obscenely rich for it to happen. God bless Ubuntu.
Ah... Having read the other posts I now realise you are a troll. Let's keep you talking until the sun rises, so you turn into stone.
Balls... Trans fats have been ignored for 20 years. In the meantime environmental groups have had little campaigns about Genetic Modification (present scientific consensus: no risk), crop monoculture (the horror! the horror!), hundreds of thousands brain dead due to vCJD (what is it now? 50 cases?). The environment is easy to sell to the uneducated public (use pretty dolphins and scare tactics). Real science is hard to sell because people do not have the knowledge, and scientists don't have the marketing or political skills. Greenpeace et al have these in spades, but sadly no scientific expertise or credibility.
But to make this a discussion on "George Orwell was right" is missing the point of Orwell's work and missing the point of what is happening. Perhaps because slashdot is a tech forum a lot of people seem to have read 1984 and saw it as a book warning people that technology can enslave people. But Orwell's preface to Animal Farm and his other writings suggest he was concerned less about how technology was used, and more concerned about freedom of press, freedom of opinion and expression. In this sense, modding even "harsh" statements to be flamebait is a far greater action of big-brotherness than installing a talking camera.
I for one welcome our -1 flamebait moderator overlords. I think everyone should bear in mind this is Slashdot - there is one correct way to think, and that is to think the government is after you. To suggest that a local council installing CCTV to stop fights is a good thing is flamebait and clearly not a genuine argument. Such arguments must be stamped out on Slashdot, so please, let fly with your mod points.
I always found it particularly ironic that the film was made by Big Picture Media Corporation, according to their website - a subsidiary company of British Columbia Film. I think BC's Annual Report speaks volumes:
I think it's really good to see that an American Corporation has helped meet the niche needs of slashdot users, to give them some nice ideas to put in their posts, while at the same time turning a healthy profit ($4.5m) for the Canadians. Capitalism at it's best.What's the hof got to do with this? You'll be bringing kit into it next...
Google. Not a toggle switch admittedly - but an advanced interface, and a simple one. The iPod is another example of a simple interface which has been enormously successful.
It's an awful idea ... [that] functionality ... should be locked away from all but the lords of technology, unavailable to the unwashed masses
That's not what the parent is saying. The parent says why can't interfaces be less cluttered. He is describing his own needs and, for example, his mother's, not claiming to be a "lord of technology". Just because designing a simple interface is hard to do doesn't mean it shouldn't be attempted. It's enormously important, and it's made a lot of money for Apple and Google.
We are using water faster then it is replenishing, and as stated before many American Aquifers are in danger
This is a very WORTHY point. Thankyou - it would be well suited to an article on potable water. It has NOTHING to do with the usefulness of Hydrogen fuel. The average American uses (i guess) 250 litres of water a day. They need water near them at all times to be comfortable. Hence there is no difficulty in supplying the meager amounts of water required to use hydrogen as fuel - especially since there is no reason that the water cannot be recaptured during use. Sorry to be a bit negative here - but this isn't an article about drinking water. Thankyou.
The parent is commenting on the status of the article as a fraud, whilst your point is worthy it doesn't stop the parent being right - the article is clearly BS.
The GP was saying that people in America get away on technicalities too often - I would certainly agree that for anyone who can afford Dershowitz there is a different rule of law. Imagine a plot of the number of trials thrown out on technicality against the wealth of the defendant - which way do you think it would trend?