OK, so buy them turbans, put 'em on their heads and THEN throw them directly in jail...
Re:Hey, wasn't Microsoft in trouble for this too?
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WorldCom Fraud Doubles
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· Score: 2
Sweet. (and no surprise at all).
They use whatever's left of that 'cookie jar' they're reputed to have, to illegally smooth out earnings reports, they were being taken to court over it, they dipped into the cookie jar and bought off the prosecution, and sealed the records of the court case that will now never happen.
How cute.
They are SO next, in all of this. What else have they been doing?
It isn't possible to intelligently hate Microsoft in your world?
The trouble with what you propose is this: in the event that Microsoft is genuinely worthy of hatred and resistance, you are tuning out everyone who understands the truth, and refusing to listen to them simply because they are not taking a moderate position.
Truth includes extreme positions. Microsoft excels at creating extreme positions. The only historically justifiable approach to dealing with Microsoft IS an extreme position, and this is why you are seeing so many people taking an extreme position on Microsoft.
You do them a grave disservice by lumping them all into the category of 'blindly hate Microsoft', because you refuse to acknowledge the possibility that these people know better than you, and have reason to hate Microsoft.
The part you're missing is this: endorsements of supermodels, actors etc. are VERY INEFFECTIVE. They aren't persuasive. It's possible to test that sort of thing by running split campaigns, Ogilvy (again) is on record as having done just that, and celebrity endorsements are miserable at actually translating into sales.
But with celebrity endorsements, the advertising manager gets to talk to Supermodel/Actor/Etc, various people in the agency get to meet them on the set, spending the client's money- do you see why it's a popular technique even though it is not effective?
You can convince me to be ashamed of myself for knowing too damn much about how advertising works. I feel unclean:D but don't argue that your distaste for ineffective advertising forms gives you the grounds to prove the customer is an idiot. Like Ogilvy said, she's your wife. He is the neighboring Slashdot poster in the next thread along. (argh! the customer is a GEEK!)
You're arguing for a sort of peasant, luser life form that describes everybody but 'us' slashdot posters. Maybe a lot of the people out there don't know from computers, but a lot of them will have other skills. Everybody's a luser at SOMETHING. Everybody's a BOFH at SOMETHING. I guess I'm both- on the one hand, knowing a fair amount about the way advertising works and what you can reasonably conclude about the American public from it, and on the other, trying to convince an advertising luser who thinks that celebrity endorsements move products that their conclusions about the American public are unjustified.
"The customer is not a moron. She is your wife." -David Ogilvy
The advertising industry used to talk about 'The Great Unwashed' and talk about 'getting on all fours to look at the problem from the customer's point of view'. They were just as wrong as you are, and smarter agencies came along and ate their lunch.
The population contains idiots. That doesn't mean all of the population can't think, nor does it mean that all of the population that can, won't. The real question to ask yourself is- if the population did think, how, exactly, would you know? Quick, name 20 non-RIAA music labels. Name ten places to go and buy music without going through RIAA-controlled channels... even if the population does think, how are they going to know where to go if the information is kept from them?
And if you get the CDs you can rip whatever you want off them in any format you want and even dupe the whole CD- the words 'please copy this CD for your friends' are literally written on every CD.
I mean it. I do this stuff to be listened to, and I can afford not to sell it- I subsist other ways. Play me. I can't pay you to do so, but neither will I sue your ass:D
Re:What's with the quotes?
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The Last Place
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· Score: 2
The Simpsons is too self-referential as far as culture. It's one big mockery OF Western Culture, but it's fixating on the symptoms.
I don't like it, but I would say Seinfeld was one of the high points of unmistakably American culture- particularly the famous last episode which illustrates exactly what Seinfeld was about all along. Seinfeld is vicious, mean, cheap, self-absorbed, pitiless, joyless... the few times I saw it I just did NOT 'get' it, I couldn't see what the hell was supposed to be so funny about this hugely popular show. When I read about that final episode, that notorious final episode, then I got it, and I respected the nerve of it. Seinfeld was observational humor on a grand scale, and what was being observed was the practical result of Western culture and values- a fantastic integration of what you might call Western Corporate Capitalism into the characters' very psyches. They were pitiful, utterly isolated- the only interaction they could do with anything was the crudest sort of tearing-down. There were no connections, no social context for them, no home or support- the ultimate nihilism- and the show's observational humor was built on that void, which resonated with the American viewing audience.
That is why I think 'Seinfeld' is the ultimate expression of American Culture.
That is also why I think 'American Culture' as it stands today is poisonous and unworthy of being exported. It's like, you could have a form of cancer that infected really well, and spread really fast, making it by far the most efficient organism around- it just kills its host, woopsy. Is that a reason to infect people with it? "Look, it expands really fast! That must mean it's good for you!"
Re:Spread of US "culture"
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The Last Place
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· Score: 2
For that matter, there was a time when there weren't old beer cans and cigarette butts strewn by the side of the road- in Sweden.
A bit of Westernization later, and there were- and I've never heard of any country going back and regaining its original character once it goes down this path. Something about Western Culture (tm) seems to teach people, 'consume, charge ahead towards whatever goal you claim to have, stomp anything that's in the way and chuck your trash out the window because you can't be bothered to waste time taking care of somebody ELSE'S roadside'.
On the subject of soft drinks, anyone noticed how "Red Bull" is made in Austria? Anyone noticed how American companies are now fighting for shelf space with their own imitations, anyone get the feeling that Coke and Pepsi are just not OK with you being able to buy soft drinks from some not-Coke company in Austria? Disneyfication is an awfully cheery word for global control. It will be interesting to see whether 'Copsi' choose to kill 'Red Bull' with price cutting and subsidizing their alternatives with the sales of their regular soft drinks, or whether they choose to kill it by demanding stores not carry it and threatening to pull the regular soft drinks off the shelves. The advantage of the latter is that once Red Bull is killed they get to still sell their 25 cent ripoff sugar water at 2$ a tiny can...
"it is literally impossible for a capitalist culture to force itself on another culture."
Ye gods. Nice oversimplification of psychology! Nice resolute ignoring of history and current freaking events, guy. You're playing logical games- go learn about 'game theory' and get it through your head that there is such a thing as non-optimal outcomes. You're insisting on a religious faith in stuff that is not backed up by reality, and every bit of it is to defend your little axiom, that cannot be questioned, that capitalists cannot possibly influence or direct a market other than to offer goods and services.
Post-Enron that sounds freaking insane- and that's just one side of things. People have been studying the psychological manipulation of 'consumers' (the word alone is a bias) for DECADES, how is it that you know nothing of this?
Damn randite. "no no, there is no such thing as force unless you point a gun at somebody!" You just keep on quote "applauding global corporations" unquote and let's hope enough people notice that and recognize you for what you are. You are not the apex of enlightenment, and your opinions are not the height of wisdom. They are brainwashed foolishness.
Re:Life without TV is good
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The Last Place
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I do, and I'm an American. I haven't had broadcast TV in my place for over eight years, and when you have 10 times the number of books as you do videos, the videos kinda sit unplayed.
Of course, I'm one of those freaks supporting Bhutan's desire to not be Westernized, so maybe you shouldn't listen to me. Or maybe it's worth asking 'why does living that small amount more like Shangri-La lead one to understand and sympathise with them more?'
Re:negative connotation to consolidation
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The Last Place
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· Score: 2
Whoa. On what planet are Buddhist monks the stagnant warmongering old guard, and "Terminator" and the world wrestling federation a 'peaceful world'?
We in America are a cancerous growth- sort of. We're a hell of a lot like, say, Microsoft- everything will be great if we don't ask any questions, don't stop to think, don't slow down! This masks some fundamental problems with our values.
There are a lot of places in the world where trying to imitate us in the USA has led to a world of hurt. Attempts to do high-yield agriculture, attempts to use 'free trade' by setting up sweatshops and such things- if our value is just 'MORE' well, that's a problem.
There was a time when we had much more specific values- 1776. If you read things like the Federalist Papers you'll see the words of people with far more depth to them than you commonly see these days. I have! Everybody here is fond of Jefferson for his thoughts on IP being like a flame that is spread, not diminished, but I'm also a fan of Madison and Federalist #10, and that guy would have understood this situation perfectly. He was the one loudly demanding that the majority be prevented from automatically trampling smaller factions (cultures) just by its own weight. Instead of proposing that Shangri-La be trampled by the weight of Western 'culture' (exactly how do you consider 'Seinfeld' culture? Answer carefully- it's a trick question, and a deeper question than you think), how about devoting some thought to how this 'living meme', Shangri-La, which has echoed throughout culture and literature like some earthly Heaven, can be allowed to retain its own identity? Because IT WANTS TO. It's just that you don't saddle a damned butterfly and expect it to be the same.
Can't help but be reminded of Douglas Adams' little parable about Fuolornis Fire Dragons...
Boy, you seem to get a HUGE charge out of the things you are saying, little one. Waving tiny swords and blowing tiny trumpets *squeeeeeak* you line up to declare victory and gleefully yip, "Ahahahaha, MS wins! MS won the trial! Microsoft owns yuo!"
Now that you have that out of your system, and same for your astroturfing buds who rejoiced to see your claims and promptly modded 'em to the roof, all of you take a deep breath... and listen to common sense for a change.
Microsoft are a bunch of pushy criminals (according to the laws of the USA as they stand). They are not even interested in THINKING about how they're criminal, any more than you are- they only want to manipulate the situation for their benefit, just as they do for their criminal activities (meaning, activities that are against the law). They have no interest whatsoever in justice or law, only in what they can get for themselves, and they have ingrained habits that have been routine for years which have them pushing the limits harder than anyone else is willing to do (except maybe Oracle, or Enron or something, and maybe not even them).
Justice in America is based on a thing we have called 'the judiciary', or the 'justice system'. Under this system, the values considered important are different than what Microsoft is used to. It is not certain that an 'I'm bigger than you' argument will prevail- you have to think more strategically and consider how Microsoft's actions fit into the context of American Justice in general, and the post-WorldCom political situation in particular, since it's impossible to completely separate Justice from Legislature.
If the days of dot-coms continued forever like the projection laughingly called 'The Long Boom', then you could be right- in that situation, maybe Microsoft could not lose.
That was then, this is now. Microsoft seem unable to adapt to the new situation- my suspicion is that they cannot, because they are bluffing and have committed irregularities as bad or worse than WorldCom. That's as may be- the bottom line is, Microsoft are only very _tentatively_ bigger than the government in influence. Only on their best day, which is long past. Political reality is bigger than Microsoft and currently the reality is that Microsoft's old tricks are very dangerous to it in the new, unfriendly waters.
If you don't think Enron and WorldCom changed the game of buying political influence, wait for the next shoe to drop. I would put it at maybe 60% odds, that next shoe is in fact Microsoft- and the justice of the antitrust trials may be quite irrelevant in a situation where it becomes known that Microsoft has drastically mis-stated its financial position and is vulnerable to, not government action, but collapse of their valuation.
Sweet dreams, and may flocks of Ballmers bellow you to their rest.:)
Yeah, bold but dumb. Kollar-Kotelly has shown on a number of occasions that she is not about to commit any such blunders. What do they expect to do, provoke her into an attack of testosterone? Wrong gender!
It looks to me like she not only is aware not to commit any blunders, but is even aware that Microsoft will make legal arguments claiming she showed massive bias whether she did or not. There is no way she can avoid this, the question is simply whether the charge will stick.
The way she's handled herself, the charge won't stick. My only question is whether she is going to try a weak middle course, or whether she is absolutely going to hand them their head. And for that, I'm going to have to wait and see.
Absolutely. The concept works and it works great. The Aereon people got a real, physical test plane up off the ground and flying controllably with absolutely zero lifting-gas assist. Scaling up the design naturally increases the Reynolds number insanely- drag is enormous, you wouldn't believe how much, and top speeds become very very slow- but as the scale increases it becomes easier and easier to find space for gas cells, and the potential payload increases enormously. At no point does the craft have to be a 'tethered balloon', it's just a really huge lifting body with the ability to offset most or all of its own weight by lifting gases.
Normal zeppelins and blimps are already more able than you'd think to deal with weather conditions, winds etc- the giant lifting body is still more so, because it's producing outrageous lift from the insanely fat 'airfoil'.
This isn't hypothetical to me- since reading The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed as a kid I've been bitten by the lifting-body bug myself, and I've used the blade-element-modelling flightsim X-Plane to design my own takes on the concept, competing with that computer in the book that balanced out all the varying factors and tried to come up with a suitable shape. I think I can beat a computer for certain types of aero design, plus this is the 21st century and I have tools like the flightsim to try out ideas, and airfoil analysis tools that I can put in shapes and get lift/drag/moment charts that I can plug back into X-Plane to more accurately model a lifting body.
From my own (virtual) experiments I can totally confirm that this is the way to go for heavy cargo transport. One thing, however, is very clear: it's slow. Really slow. Like, slower than trucks going 55 miles an hour slow. Big lift, BIG drag. However, the ability to fly straight lines instead of follow roads has to help...
It is most amusing to see an anonymous, cowardly libertarian... sorry, I should say Randite, because I've heard the occasional libertarian who wasn't a loony... trying to claim credit for all of Linux and open source.
Gee, if you're claiming credit for an essentially social-anarchist endeavor (in which it is just easy enough, and just beneficial enough, for people to give to the commons without being too concerned about bankrupting themselves), doesn't that make you a human parasite, with your philosophy living off others' hard work, talent, energy, and altruism?:D
What really made Linux happen was this: software licenses that encouraged the giving of software work you were doing anyway, to a commons, where it could possibly benefit others at very little or no additional cost. It's the 'scratch your own itch' idea. People who've tried to start open source projects hoping for other people to do the work haven't gotten anywhere- it's been the cases where people did work that THEY needed, and then took advantage of the fact that, having done the work, it was possible to give it away without being themselves deprived of it.
There is no argument for doing this but that of benefitting society, and the licenses that made it possible (by blocking predation on this commons) tend to emphasise the further benefit of society rather than the opportunity for individuals to come in and enrich themselves selfishly.
The common factor is that people needed to write software themselves to solve various problems- and having done so, had the opportunity to contribute this work to society without being the slightest bit poorer for it practically. They had to give up the hypothetical possibility of being all proprietary in hopes of profit, in favor of the idea of benefiting society by doing something very easy- open sourcing the program that THEY had already written, that THEY were already able to use. In that context, they lost nothing, because they were still able to use the software they'd written. It was a very cheap way to do something that feels good and might help others- if the deal had been that the author had to give up rights to use their own program, things might have turned out very different. Even if the author had to give up say 3K of RAM, or 2% of the lines of actual code (and do them over), things might have been different, but the interesting thing about software is the way it can be used to build a collective wealth without impoverishing contributors in any way.
Doing things in this way benefits society immensely, and I think it is good for the people.:)
By which I mean to say that society is benefitted by the people easily being able to participate in a 'commons' collectively... *sound of randite troll's head exploding* ah! There. Thought that would do it. Carry on;)
Re:How capitalism can indeed serve social interest
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Reclaiming the Commons
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· Score: 2
"Oh, a mad peasant. I am terrified, I tell you, *yawn* terrified."
What social consequences, exactly? Try carrying your argument into the real world. File it under 'dead peasant insurance', after 'Bhopal' and dipped in the water from that stream in the USA poisoned so bad that fish placed in it dissolved in minutes, their skin fucking falling off.
WHAT social consequences? You're making that part up.
I would suggest you do a simple google search on "dead peasant insurance" before complaining about the admirably informed author's use of the term 'corporate classes'.
In a world where these entities not only act in practice but even use the LANGUAGE of class (hell, the language of feudal aristocracy!) to describe their 'peasants' and the cash value of same, I feel it is wrong not to acknowledge the situation.
We are not talking about suspicions that 'maybe these corporations don't fully embrace the humanity of their lesser employees', or speculations on how they talk behind closed doors (which they must- Enron? WorldCom? There's someone making a lot of judgement calls to hose the 'peasants', in corporation after corporation). We are not even talking about suspicions that corporations will play lotto on the lives of its peasants and ex-peasants, because that is PROVEN and hard fact, again in corporation after corporation. We're talking about the fact that in at least one case the corporation was on record in literally using the words 'dead peasants' to describe this group of people. Not 'dead guys', not 'dead ex-employees' but 'dead peasants'. This, in spite of well reported reluctance to reveal the practice at all, much less the mindset behind it, and it's so widespread that one corporation just came out and said it (in internal reports- I believe specifically it was a memo that came to light requesting a printed-up chart with the dead peasants in a certain column).
Please tell me why 'corporate classes' is not exactly the right way to refer to this situation in which corporations are referring to American citizens as peasants, speculating on their lives for corporate gain, and behaving as if American citizens have no more intrinsic value than livestock, grain, or office supplies (to use a Dilbert reference).
I will settle for that, though there isn't a point you make that I wouldn't dispute. Don't see how spending money on advertising deserves government-granted monopolies, and you have the whole environmental thing backwards- the article is talking about private interests taking property previously held by government, not the other way around! I would say 'fine' to merely nailing down all public lands as protected areas and not bothering to expand this, but all public lands are basically under heavy attack to be privatized and strip-mined^H^H^H^Hdeveloped;)
That's as may be. You do everyone a disservice by complaining about the term 'corporate classes'. What the hell else would you call it?
pesticides cost MONEY. They are part of the problem- what makes them necessary is the pushing of high yield crops on the Third World. Without that, farmers grow low yield, inefficient crops with substantial diversity, subsisting off this behavior.
The West comes and sells them high yield crops. Hell, these companies (like Monsanto etc.) will go in and play villagers videos and stuff, they'll do anything to sell their product. Then, surprise! You need to spray with pesticides as you're now growing a monoculture Western-style. Guess what? You need irrigation! You need to invest in the infrastructure all of a sudden. How? Die. (that may not seem like a logical answer, but third world farmers DO NOT HAVE irrigation or money to buy pesticides and crop dusters. So the crop fails, and they die.
It is wrong of you to view indigenous subsistence farming through such a Westernized set of blinders that you're automatically assuming they have freaking crop dusters. What is up with that? Or are they subhuman because they don't have garden freaking sheds with plant sprayers in them? Is it a case of make them farm like Americans or kill them off? That's the effect.
This is why so much of the world hates my country. We have a tendency to steamroller anything else without even paying attention or noticing. You do realise that people lived by subsistence farming in the Third World thousands of years ago? Oh my, look at that low efficiency of that crop yield. They'll all starve unless we rescue them! And then they better be GRATEFUL! *spit*
Sorry. Not your fault really- you weren't to know- but this is not the first time I have listened to, and understood, the concerns of agricultural interests elsewhere in the world. Read some of the links other Slashdotters have posted. For instance, I knew Western high-yield farming decimated India's agriculture and destroyed farmers, but I wasn't aware until today that we're doing the same thing in Ethiopia- last I heard that name, it was over famine relief efforts (probably caused for political reasons) and by now our actions have gutted Ethiopia's ability to feed itself even in the absence of political treachery.
Re:How to take care of the situation you describe
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Copyright as Cudgel
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· Score: 2
*ROFL*
Ooooo. 'Quite simple really';)
Let me give you a free hint- remove the subsidies FIRST.
Otherwise, you'll remove the controls and regulations and the corporations will immediately use that new freedom to grab much bigger corporate welfare, have legislation passed to make not using their crap punishable by fines and imprisonment, and will top it off by privatizing some government functions like law enforcement and the penal system:)
And on the guard towers will be written, Verbrauchen Macht Frei;)
The idea is that you can trust people you actually meet and talk to, in normal society, to not secretly be actors or actresses behaving like regular people while secretly trying to sell you consumer products.
It's called 'society'. At one time it was considered rather important.
The real question is, "how many times do you have to seriously consider that the person you just met who's being friendly and talking to you is an actor paid to do so?"
This obnoxious campaign really ought to be nipped in the bud- it's bringing a social dynamic to paranoid reality that should be left as depicted fictionally in 'The Truman Show'.
How much is it worth to you to be able to trust that the person you meet is not literally a trained actor befriending you only to sell a consumer product?
Hey, wouldn't it be interesting if these people could hunt down your personal information online, and then seek you out specifically to leverage such information ("hey, you a Steelers fan?") in order to befriend you and sell you a consumer product?
Yeah, but reducing humanity to a state of 'you can't believe anything you see, anything you're told, or anybody you know' seems like a fucking high price to pay.
I'd call this fraud, but that would imply there was some sort of even hypothetical dividing line between society and commerce. And gee, if human beings have no function other than to consume stuff, who gives a fuck whether they can trust the motives of their pathetic little personal interactions?
Because lying sales weasels infiltrating all of life can only lead to a catastrophic erosion of trust itself, and will cause all humanity to be cloistered in broadband-connected bunkers by 2100, refusing to interact at all with untrustable human beings, and instead sucking down gigabytes of virtual news and information while being able to believe none of it?:D
Jamming isn't a public performance. You're thinking of 'gigging', which is yet another business activity where you charge people to get in- or another form of 'gigging', where you perform publically without getting paid to entertain people in a public setting.
Slashdot Mirror
OK, so buy them turbans, put 'em on their heads and THEN throw them directly in jail...
They use whatever's left of that 'cookie jar' they're reputed to have, to illegally smooth out earnings reports, they were being taken to court over it, they dipped into the cookie jar and bought off the prosecution, and sealed the records of the court case that will now never happen.
How cute.
They are SO next, in all of this. What else have they been doing?
The trouble with what you propose is this: in the event that Microsoft is genuinely worthy of hatred and resistance, you are tuning out everyone who understands the truth, and refusing to listen to them simply because they are not taking a moderate position.
Truth includes extreme positions. Microsoft excels at creating extreme positions. The only historically justifiable approach to dealing with Microsoft IS an extreme position, and this is why you are seeing so many people taking an extreme position on Microsoft.
You do them a grave disservice by lumping them all into the category of 'blindly hate Microsoft', because you refuse to acknowledge the possibility that these people know better than you, and have reason to hate Microsoft.
But with celebrity endorsements, the advertising manager gets to talk to Supermodel/Actor/Etc, various people in the agency get to meet them on the set, spending the client's money- do you see why it's a popular technique even though it is not effective?
You can convince me to be ashamed of myself for knowing too damn much about how advertising works. I feel unclean :D but don't argue that your distaste for ineffective advertising forms gives you the grounds to prove the customer is an idiot. Like Ogilvy said, she's your wife. He is the neighboring Slashdot poster in the next thread along. (argh! the customer is a GEEK!)
You're arguing for a sort of peasant, luser life form that describes everybody but 'us' slashdot posters. Maybe a lot of the people out there don't know from computers, but a lot of them will have other skills. Everybody's a luser at SOMETHING. Everybody's a BOFH at SOMETHING. I guess I'm both- on the one hand, knowing a fair amount about the way advertising works and what you can reasonably conclude about the American public from it, and on the other, trying to convince an advertising luser who thinks that celebrity endorsements move products that their conclusions about the American public are unjustified.
At least the whole argument reeks of geekiness :)
The advertising industry used to talk about 'The Great Unwashed' and talk about 'getting on all fours to look at the problem from the customer's point of view'. They were just as wrong as you are, and smarter agencies came along and ate their lunch.
The population contains idiots. That doesn't mean all of the population can't think, nor does it mean that all of the population that can, won't. The real question to ask yourself is- if the population did think, how, exactly, would you know? Quick, name 20 non-RIAA music labels. Name ten places to go and buy music without going through RIAA-controlled channels... even if the population does think, how are they going to know where to go if the information is kept from them?
ampcast.com/chrisj
And if you get the CDs you can rip whatever you want off them in any format you want and even dupe the whole CD- the words 'please copy this CD for your friends' are literally written on every CD.
I mean it. I do this stuff to be listened to, and I can afford not to sell it- I subsist other ways. Play me. I can't pay you to do so, but neither will I sue your ass :D
I don't like it, but I would say Seinfeld was one of the high points of unmistakably American culture- particularly the famous last episode which illustrates exactly what Seinfeld was about all along. Seinfeld is vicious, mean, cheap, self-absorbed, pitiless, joyless... the few times I saw it I just did NOT 'get' it, I couldn't see what the hell was supposed to be so funny about this hugely popular show. When I read about that final episode, that notorious final episode, then I got it, and I respected the nerve of it. Seinfeld was observational humor on a grand scale, and what was being observed was the practical result of Western culture and values- a fantastic integration of what you might call Western Corporate Capitalism into the characters' very psyches. They were pitiful, utterly isolated- the only interaction they could do with anything was the crudest sort of tearing-down. There were no connections, no social context for them, no home or support- the ultimate nihilism- and the show's observational humor was built on that void, which resonated with the American viewing audience.
That is why I think 'Seinfeld' is the ultimate expression of American Culture.
That is also why I think 'American Culture' as it stands today is poisonous and unworthy of being exported. It's like, you could have a form of cancer that infected really well, and spread really fast, making it by far the most efficient organism around- it just kills its host, woopsy. Is that a reason to infect people with it? "Look, it expands really fast! That must mean it's good for you!"
A bit of Westernization later, and there were- and I've never heard of any country going back and regaining its original character once it goes down this path. Something about Western Culture (tm) seems to teach people, 'consume, charge ahead towards whatever goal you claim to have, stomp anything that's in the way and chuck your trash out the window because you can't be bothered to waste time taking care of somebody ELSE'S roadside'.
On the subject of soft drinks, anyone noticed how "Red Bull" is made in Austria? Anyone noticed how American companies are now fighting for shelf space with their own imitations, anyone get the feeling that Coke and Pepsi are just not OK with you being able to buy soft drinks from some not-Coke company in Austria? Disneyfication is an awfully cheery word for global control. It will be interesting to see whether 'Copsi' choose to kill 'Red Bull' with price cutting and subsidizing their alternatives with the sales of their regular soft drinks, or whether they choose to kill it by demanding stores not carry it and threatening to pull the regular soft drinks off the shelves. The advantage of the latter is that once Red Bull is killed they get to still sell their 25 cent ripoff sugar water at 2$ a tiny can...
Ho fucking hum, business as usual...
Ye gods. Nice oversimplification of psychology! Nice resolute ignoring of history and current freaking events, guy. You're playing logical games- go learn about 'game theory' and get it through your head that there is such a thing as non-optimal outcomes. You're insisting on a religious faith in stuff that is not backed up by reality, and every bit of it is to defend your little axiom, that cannot be questioned, that capitalists cannot possibly influence or direct a market other than to offer goods and services.
Post-Enron that sounds freaking insane- and that's just one side of things. People have been studying the psychological manipulation of 'consumers' (the word alone is a bias) for DECADES, how is it that you know nothing of this?
Damn randite. "no no, there is no such thing as force unless you point a gun at somebody!" You just keep on quote "applauding global corporations" unquote and let's hope enough people notice that and recognize you for what you are. You are not the apex of enlightenment, and your opinions are not the height of wisdom. They are brainwashed foolishness.
Of course, I'm one of those freaks supporting Bhutan's desire to not be Westernized, so maybe you shouldn't listen to me. Or maybe it's worth asking 'why does living that small amount more like Shangri-La lead one to understand and sympathise with them more?'
We in America are a cancerous growth- sort of. We're a hell of a lot like, say, Microsoft- everything will be great if we don't ask any questions, don't stop to think, don't slow down! This masks some fundamental problems with our values.
There are a lot of places in the world where trying to imitate us in the USA has led to a world of hurt. Attempts to do high-yield agriculture, attempts to use 'free trade' by setting up sweatshops and such things- if our value is just 'MORE' well, that's a problem.
There was a time when we had much more specific values- 1776. If you read things like the Federalist Papers you'll see the words of people with far more depth to them than you commonly see these days. I have! Everybody here is fond of Jefferson for his thoughts on IP being like a flame that is spread, not diminished, but I'm also a fan of Madison and Federalist #10, and that guy would have understood this situation perfectly. He was the one loudly demanding that the majority be prevented from automatically trampling smaller factions (cultures) just by its own weight. Instead of proposing that Shangri-La be trampled by the weight of Western 'culture' (exactly how do you consider 'Seinfeld' culture? Answer carefully- it's a trick question, and a deeper question than you think), how about devoting some thought to how this 'living meme', Shangri-La, which has echoed throughout culture and literature like some earthly Heaven, can be allowed to retain its own identity? Because IT WANTS TO. It's just that you don't saddle a damned butterfly and expect it to be the same.
Can't help but be reminded of Douglas Adams' little parable about Fuolornis Fire Dragons...
Now that you have that out of your system, and same for your astroturfing buds who rejoiced to see your claims and promptly modded 'em to the roof, all of you take a deep breath... and listen to common sense for a change.
Microsoft are a bunch of pushy criminals (according to the laws of the USA as they stand). They are not even interested in THINKING about how they're criminal, any more than you are- they only want to manipulate the situation for their benefit, just as they do for their criminal activities (meaning, activities that are against the law). They have no interest whatsoever in justice or law, only in what they can get for themselves, and they have ingrained habits that have been routine for years which have them pushing the limits harder than anyone else is willing to do (except maybe Oracle, or Enron or something, and maybe not even them).
Justice in America is based on a thing we have called 'the judiciary', or the 'justice system'. Under this system, the values considered important are different than what Microsoft is used to. It is not certain that an 'I'm bigger than you' argument will prevail- you have to think more strategically and consider how Microsoft's actions fit into the context of American Justice in general, and the post-WorldCom political situation in particular, since it's impossible to completely separate Justice from Legislature.
If the days of dot-coms continued forever like the projection laughingly called 'The Long Boom', then you could be right- in that situation, maybe Microsoft could not lose.
That was then, this is now. Microsoft seem unable to adapt to the new situation- my suspicion is that they cannot, because they are bluffing and have committed irregularities as bad or worse than WorldCom. That's as may be- the bottom line is, Microsoft are only very _tentatively_ bigger than the government in influence. Only on their best day, which is long past. Political reality is bigger than Microsoft and currently the reality is that Microsoft's old tricks are very dangerous to it in the new, unfriendly waters.
If you don't think Enron and WorldCom changed the game of buying political influence, wait for the next shoe to drop. I would put it at maybe 60% odds, that next shoe is in fact Microsoft- and the justice of the antitrust trials may be quite irrelevant in a situation where it becomes known that Microsoft has drastically mis-stated its financial position and is vulnerable to, not government action, but collapse of their valuation.
Sweet dreams, and may flocks of Ballmers bellow you to their rest. :)
It looks to me like she not only is aware not to commit any blunders, but is even aware that Microsoft will make legal arguments claiming she showed massive bias whether she did or not. There is no way she can avoid this, the question is simply whether the charge will stick.
The way she's handled herself, the charge won't stick. My only question is whether she is going to try a weak middle course, or whether she is absolutely going to hand them their head. And for that, I'm going to have to wait and see.
Normal zeppelins and blimps are already more able than you'd think to deal with weather conditions, winds etc- the giant lifting body is still more so, because it's producing outrageous lift from the insanely fat 'airfoil'.
This isn't hypothetical to me- since reading The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed as a kid I've been bitten by the lifting-body bug myself, and I've used the blade-element-modelling flightsim X-Plane to design my own takes on the concept, competing with that computer in the book that balanced out all the varying factors and tried to come up with a suitable shape. I think I can beat a computer for certain types of aero design, plus this is the 21st century and I have tools like the flightsim to try out ideas, and airfoil analysis tools that I can put in shapes and get lift/drag/moment charts that I can plug back into X-Plane to more accurately model a lifting body.
From my own (virtual) experiments I can totally confirm that this is the way to go for heavy cargo transport. One thing, however, is very clear: it's slow. Really slow. Like, slower than trucks going 55 miles an hour slow. Big lift, BIG drag. However, the ability to fly straight lines instead of follow roads has to help...
It is most amusing to see an anonymous, cowardly libertarian... sorry, I should say Randite, because I've heard the occasional libertarian who wasn't a loony... trying to claim credit for all of Linux and open source.
Gee, if you're claiming credit for an essentially social-anarchist endeavor (in which it is just easy enough, and just beneficial enough, for people to give to the commons without being too concerned about bankrupting themselves), doesn't that make you a human parasite, with your philosophy living off others' hard work, talent, energy, and altruism? :D
What really made Linux happen was this: software licenses that encouraged the giving of software work you were doing anyway, to a commons, where it could possibly benefit others at very little or no additional cost. It's the 'scratch your own itch' idea. People who've tried to start open source projects hoping for other people to do the work haven't gotten anywhere- it's been the cases where people did work that THEY needed, and then took advantage of the fact that, having done the work, it was possible to give it away without being themselves deprived of it.
There is no argument for doing this but that of benefitting society, and the licenses that made it possible (by blocking predation on this commons) tend to emphasise the further benefit of society rather than the opportunity for individuals to come in and enrich themselves selfishly.
The common factor is that people needed to write software themselves to solve various problems- and having done so, had the opportunity to contribute this work to society without being the slightest bit poorer for it practically. They had to give up the hypothetical possibility of being all proprietary in hopes of profit, in favor of the idea of benefiting society by doing something very easy- open sourcing the program that THEY had already written, that THEY were already able to use. In that context, they lost nothing, because they were still able to use the software they'd written. It was a very cheap way to do something that feels good and might help others- if the deal had been that the author had to give up rights to use their own program, things might have turned out very different. Even if the author had to give up say 3K of RAM, or 2% of the lines of actual code (and do them over), things might have been different, but the interesting thing about software is the way it can be used to build a collective wealth without impoverishing contributors in any way.
Doing things in this way benefits society immensely, and I think it is good for the people. :)
By which I mean to say that society is benefitted by the people easily being able to participate in a 'commons' collectively... *sound of randite troll's head exploding* ah! There. Thought that would do it. Carry on ;)
What social consequences, exactly? Try carrying your argument into the real world. File it under 'dead peasant insurance', after 'Bhopal' and dipped in the water from that stream in the USA poisoned so bad that fish placed in it dissolved in minutes, their skin fucking falling off.
WHAT social consequences? You're making that part up.
In a world where these entities not only act in practice but even use the LANGUAGE of class (hell, the language of feudal aristocracy!) to describe their 'peasants' and the cash value of same, I feel it is wrong not to acknowledge the situation.
We are not talking about suspicions that 'maybe these corporations don't fully embrace the humanity of their lesser employees', or speculations on how they talk behind closed doors (which they must- Enron? WorldCom? There's someone making a lot of judgement calls to hose the 'peasants', in corporation after corporation). We are not even talking about suspicions that corporations will play lotto on the lives of its peasants and ex-peasants, because that is PROVEN and hard fact, again in corporation after corporation. We're talking about the fact that in at least one case the corporation was on record in literally using the words 'dead peasants' to describe this group of people. Not 'dead guys', not 'dead ex-employees' but 'dead peasants'. This, in spite of well reported reluctance to reveal the practice at all, much less the mindset behind it, and it's so widespread that one corporation just came out and said it (in internal reports- I believe specifically it was a memo that came to light requesting a printed-up chart with the dead peasants in a certain column).
Please tell me why 'corporate classes' is not exactly the right way to refer to this situation in which corporations are referring to American citizens as peasants, speculating on their lives for corporate gain, and behaving as if American citizens have no more intrinsic value than livestock, grain, or office supplies (to use a Dilbert reference).
I will settle for that, though there isn't a point you make that I wouldn't dispute. Don't see how spending money on advertising deserves government-granted monopolies, and you have the whole environmental thing backwards- the article is talking about private interests taking property previously held by government, not the other way around! I would say 'fine' to merely nailing down all public lands as protected areas and not bothering to expand this, but all public lands are basically under heavy attack to be privatized and strip-mined^H^H^H^Hdeveloped ;)
That's as may be. You do everyone a disservice by complaining about the term 'corporate classes'. What the hell else would you call it?
pesticides cost MONEY. They are part of the problem- what makes them necessary is the pushing of high yield crops on the Third World. Without that, farmers grow low yield, inefficient crops with substantial diversity, subsisting off this behavior. The West comes and sells them high yield crops. Hell, these companies (like Monsanto etc.) will go in and play villagers videos and stuff, they'll do anything to sell their product. Then, surprise! You need to spray with pesticides as you're now growing a monoculture Western-style. Guess what? You need irrigation! You need to invest in the infrastructure all of a sudden. How? Die. (that may not seem like a logical answer, but third world farmers DO NOT HAVE irrigation or money to buy pesticides and crop dusters. So the crop fails, and they die.
It is wrong of you to view indigenous subsistence farming through such a Westernized set of blinders that you're automatically assuming they have freaking crop dusters. What is up with that? Or are they subhuman because they don't have garden freaking sheds with plant sprayers in them? Is it a case of make them farm like Americans or kill them off? That's the effect.
This is why so much of the world hates my country. We have a tendency to steamroller anything else without even paying attention or noticing. You do realise that people lived by subsistence farming in the Third World thousands of years ago? Oh my, look at that low efficiency of that crop yield. They'll all starve unless we rescue them! And then they better be GRATEFUL! *spit*
Sorry. Not your fault really- you weren't to know- but this is not the first time I have listened to, and understood, the concerns of agricultural interests elsewhere in the world. Read some of the links other Slashdotters have posted. For instance, I knew Western high-yield farming decimated India's agriculture and destroyed farmers, but I wasn't aware until today that we're doing the same thing in Ethiopia- last I heard that name, it was over famine relief efforts (probably caused for political reasons) and by now our actions have gutted Ethiopia's ability to feed itself even in the absence of political treachery.
Ooooo. 'Quite simple really' ;)
Let me give you a free hint- remove the subsidies FIRST.
Otherwise, you'll remove the controls and regulations and the corporations will immediately use that new freedom to grab much bigger corporate welfare, have legislation passed to make not using their crap punishable by fines and imprisonment, and will top it off by privatizing some government functions like law enforcement and the penal system :)
And on the guard towers will be written, Verbrauchen Macht Frei ;)
It's called 'society'. At one time it was considered rather important.
This obnoxious campaign really ought to be nipped in the bud- it's bringing a social dynamic to paranoid reality that should be left as depicted fictionally in 'The Truman Show'.
How much is it worth to you to be able to trust that the person you meet is not literally a trained actor befriending you only to sell a consumer product?
Hey, wouldn't it be interesting if these people could hunt down your personal information online, and then seek you out specifically to leverage such information ("hey, you a Steelers fan?") in order to befriend you and sell you a consumer product?
I'd call this fraud, but that would imply there was some sort of even hypothetical dividing line between society and commerce. And gee, if human beings have no function other than to consume stuff, who gives a fuck whether they can trust the motives of their pathetic little personal interactions?
Everything you know is wrong...
You're still not 'getting' jamming. Nyah ;)
They sure were making a lot of effort to prevent information from ever getting out, if it was harmless information.
o/` Enroooonnnn... o/`