" When I teased my girl about it, she countered with "only the ones who were too stupid to be caught, the real ones are still over in England."." "I am beaten, unable to use that argument again."
Being neither English, nor Australian (neither American or Canadian for that matter) I am deeply impressed by the frankness and authenticity of both arguments:-).
Now I know that those who were sent to Australia were "stupid criminals" while those remaining in England (I presume not Irish, Scotts and Welsh) were/are the "clever criminals".
I am delighted to use both arguments in conjunction.
jackdoodle (644479) said: "...than a patent on the human genome, which has been done more than once. (Note, for instance the patent on the genetic material of a member of the Hagahai tribe of Papua New Guinea - patent number 5,397,696.)
"5,397,696 -- Richard Yanagihara; Vivek R. Nerurkar, both of Frederick, Md.; Carol Jenkins, Garoka, Papua New Guinea; Mark Miller, Fort Lee, N.J.; Ralph M. Garruto, Boyds, Md. PAPUA NEW GUINEA HUMAN T-LYMPHOTROPIC VIRUS. Patent dated March 14, 1995.
Disclaimer and Dedication filed October 24, 1996, by the Department of Health and Human Services. Hereby disclaims and dedicates to the public the entire term of said patent."
"just makes me doubly motivated to go out and download all the music I want"
and ths makes me triply motivated to rip and put up my CDs for download. until now I used to allow only 1 user at a time to download from me, but now I will make it 10. look for kazaa user oggfan.
The TCA story was a calculated research article supposedly aimed at accurately finding out the percentage of geeks understanding humour, while in actuality it was a veiled (burqa clad) method to bring some geeks nearer to the aims and objects of TIA, while sorting out the rest in several groups: terrorists, provocateurs, anti-something lunatics, etc.
The method is said to be based on monitoring who laughs, for how long and on which sentences.
The feedback technology used to compile the results is said to be working on SELinux.
burqa=http://labs.google.com/glossary?q=burqa&bt nG =Google+Glossary+Search
CashCarSTARwrote: "What happens when within 5 minutes I can gain most any knowledge I desire? Well..it kinda breaks down the walls, that is what it does."
I find it hard to believe. In 5 minutes you can find a huge number of hits on google, but to make it knowledge you will need prior knowledge to sift through and remove the so called "white noise". Google and internet search engines do help a lot, but they create new limitations and "tunnel visions" leading to an unjustified and wrong perception like "what is not on the internet doesn't exist".
Information pollution and information fatigue are other known consequences of googling.
"The problem with such limitless resources, is not a problem with the resource itself, it's a cultural problem."
I agree with you that the problem is a cultural one, but with a note that there is no such thing as a limitless source, since the limits of this source become obvious to you only when the next source comes about.
"Love of knowledge is the most important thing that can be gained at such a young age. We should not throw this away just so we can have good little Christian worker bees."
I fully agree with you on this one. Pekka Himanens book The Hacker Ethic, co-written with Linus Torvalds and Manuel Castells is a very good dissection of worker bees and protestant ethic.
"So far, the results are not tremendously clear or, at least not tremendously impressive." I would think the words "not tremendously impressive" is a diplomatic way of saying "doesn't work".
Faeton wrote: "So, I don't think this is a big revelation to anyone here. Computers are just tools, MS is dumbing everybody down, blah blah blah."
Though I would agree with you, but would like to suggest that marketing lies can not possibly be limited to MS only. You have Macs, Educational Software vendors and even Hardware vendors (Intel, AMD) etc. contributing to hype and marketing tricks all pushing computers as the ultimate solution. Apart from companies, you will also find people in academic circles and researchers who believe the same.
Mentioned Economist.com article "Pass the chalk", found here: http://ron.unique.cc/economist/economist1.htm, names three possible reasons for negative relationship between computer use and test scores.
"The authors offer three possible explanations of why this might be. First, the introduction of computers into classrooms might have gobbled up cash that would otherwise have paid for other aspects of education. But that is unlikely in this case since the money for the programme came from the national lottery, and the study found no significant change in teaching resources, methods or training in schools that acquired computers through the scheme.
A second possibility is that the transition to using computers in instruction takes time to have an effect. Maybe, say the authors, but the schools surveyed had been using the scheme's computers for a full school year. That was enough for the new computers to have had a large (and apparently malign) influence on fourth-grade maths scores. The third explanation is the simplest: that the use of computers in teaching is no better (and perhaps worse) than other teaching methods."
One might add a possible fourth reason which may explain negative math score: EASE. I think if the pupils use computers to learn and solve mathematical problems they might start relyiong too much on computers and in effect "unlearn" maths.
Another skeptic voice when it comes to possible role of IT in development and education is found here: http://www.himalmag.com/2002/august/essay.h tm
Yet another voice Prashant Sharma from School of Oriental and African Studies University of London http://www.dgroups.org/groups/OKN/docs/dis sertatio n.pdf
And skepticism about IT in production is best represented by "'Solow paradox'-- widespread evidence of computer use, little evidence of (widespread) productivity growth --continues, at least in modified form." found here: http://abcnews.go.com/sections/tech/FredMoo dy/mood y990818.html
While we are on the subject of patents and toilets, here is an interesting article at ZDnet: http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s212 3791,00. html
"IBM eliminates loo patent
08:37 Monday 14th October 2002
Troy Wolverton, CNET News.com
The computing giant decides not to press claims on a system for reserving a place in the toilet queue. The patent probably should not have been granted in the first place, an expert says
IBM has quietly eliminated a patent it received on a method for determining who gets to use the toilet next."
Thanks for the list. It seems to me that the Eldred v. Ashcroft is not so much a challenge to the number of years, but rather to the very right of Congress to make such extensions indefinitely. Lawrence Lessig, says: http://www.redherring.com/insider/2002/10/r oast-pi g-copyright-102202.html
"The Constitution says that copyrights are to be "for limited Times." The framers initially set those "limited Times" to be quite short--14 years, renewable once. After a limited time, copyrighted work was to pass into the public domain--a lawyer-free zone where publishers and creators can draw upon creative work without fear of legal liability. This text, the challengers say, forbids the extension of existing terms."
MacAndrew wrote: "because the life+70/95 terms are not obviously unreasonable, esp. when compared to law in other countries..."
I wonder if you know any other country having a longer term than the US (life+70/95)? To the best of my knowledge all other countries have had lower terms. Those that have changed have done so after US "nudging". Only one country, Australia has publicly stated they will not increase it over 70, India has 60 years limit, and Taiwan has refused to accept US demands to increase it to 95 years.
divec wrote: "The ongoing [aaronsw.com] case against the retroactive extension of copyright duration [eldred.cc] is also very important to many people.."
I agree that eldred.cc [http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/] is a very important case, but it seems that the authors of the article have included only those cases where there is already a court decison.
"And you shouldn't, I was being sarcastic. The exec may or may not be lying."
What I meant was that the exec has a point if it is really true that "people who don't like this form of advertising are in the minority,...". BUT I do not take him on his word, since there is no independent source to confirm it, and no one should believe that type of statement.
After re-reading him through rutledjw "There's an enormous segment of the population that are appreciating these ads.", I can see that he is not at all talking about any majority or minority, but simply using a careful set of words "enormous segment of the population" which can neither be disputed nor asserted.
rutledjw wrote: "From the statement of the advertising exec, people who don't like this form of advertising are in the minority,..." The exec says and you believe it!. I don't believe this. He is simply lying.
"There are other browsers (and products in general) out there that actually are built to protect the user. Yet people won't try anything new. Those who act like sheep shouldn't be suprised when they're lead to slaughter "
I fully agree with this one.
You probably already know it, but Mozilla does not stop all popups even if you block unrequested pop-ups. You will need to add the following entry to user.js in your mozilla profile directory... create it if it doesn't already exist (and it probably won't). It will be merged into prefs.js the next time mozilla is started.
Patrick_Champion wrote: "This McCollum guy... How do you reason with a guy like this?"
I guess by encouraging Netscape, Sun, and Oracle to sue this guy for defamation, since he is almost calling them terrorists.
Quto from McCollum: "The Linux(TM) cult's newest jihad is to aid in the fight against Microsoft begun by their competitors Netscape, Sun, and Oracle along with over a dozen state attorney generals during their anti-trust litigation. The Linux(TM) cult, not unlike the global confederation of leftist zombies led by a few radicals bent on the destruction of the United States, is a global confederation of leftist zombies led by a few radicals bent on the destruction of Microsoft."
This is hilarious, and I missed it on first read. They do have morons writing press releases. I tried to find an email on their site to write to them but could not find one.
quantaman wrote: "It doesn't exactly apply in Russia, it applies to people selling things in the US that may be illegal under American law. You don't have to like it but if you sell something in a country it's your responsibility to make sure it's legal under their laws."
Does that mean US/European porn sites selling porn in the whole world, can be tried in Saudi Arabia, Iran etc, where it is illegal?
How many of us were indignant at Google trying to comply with French and German laws which forbid hateful material and pro-nazi propaganda.
The laws governing internet and e commerce are in their infancy and pose a very complex set of problems, and we do not have simple answers about whether particular laws apply or not in particular cases.
Slashdot Mirror
...Linus Torvalds next ?
"they claim in it is that by choosing MS Office over OpenOffice.org one is protected from the threat of viruses"
Does anyone know of a single virus affecting OpenOffice?
just curious
" When I teased my girl about it, she countered with "only the ones who were too stupid to be caught, the real ones are still over in England."."
:-).
"I am beaten, unable to use that argument again."
Being neither English, nor Australian (neither American or Canadian for that matter) I am deeply impressed by the frankness and authenticity of both arguments
Now I know that those who were sent to Australia were "stupid criminals" while those remaining in England (I presume not Irish, Scotts and Welsh) were/are the "clever criminals".
I am delighted to use both arguments in conjunction.
Hobbex (41473) wrote:
"In the EU only Portugal and Greece are poorer, and that looks likely to change."
Plain, simple and pure bullshit, just like rest of the post. I live in Sweden, which despite all problems, is still the most decent place to live.
jackdoodle (644479) said:
/ og/1996/w eek50/patdisc.htm
"...than a patent on the human genome, which has been done more than once. (Note, for instance the patent on the genetic material of a member of the Hagahai tribe of Papua New Guinea - patent number 5,397,696.)
from:
http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/com/sol
"5,397,696 -- Richard Yanagihara; Vivek R. Nerurkar, both of Frederick, Md.; Carol Jenkins, Garoka, Papua New Guinea; Mark Miller, Fort Lee, N.J.; Ralph M. Garruto, Boyds, Md. PAPUA NEW GUINEA HUMAN T-LYMPHOTROPIC VIRUS. Patent dated March 14, 1995.
Disclaimer and Dedication filed October 24, 1996, by the Department of Health and Human Services.
Hereby disclaims and dedicates to the public the entire term of said patent."
"just makes me doubly motivated to go out and download all the music I want"
and ths makes me triply motivated to rip and put up my CDs for download. until now I used to allow only 1 user at a time to download from me, but now I will make it 10. look for kazaa user oggfan.
The TCA story was a calculated research article supposedly aimed at accurately finding out the percentage of geeks understanding humour, while in actuality it was a veiled (burqa clad) method to bring some geeks nearer to the aims and objects of TIA, while sorting out the rest in several groups: terrorists, provocateurs, anti-something lunatics, etc.
t nG =Google+Glossary+Search
The method is said to be based on monitoring who laughs, for how long and on which sentences.
The feedback technology used to compile the results is said to be working on SELinux.
burqa=http://labs.google.com/glossary?q=burqa&b
snillfisk's comment is the most informative one on this thread, still it has only one point. will someone please mod this up.
CashCarSTARwrote: "What happens when within 5 minutes I can gain most any knowledge I desire? Well..it kinda breaks down the walls, that is what it does."
I find it hard to believe. In 5 minutes you can find a huge number of hits on google, but to make it knowledge you will need prior knowledge to sift through and remove the so called "white noise". Google and internet search engines do help a lot, but they create new limitations and "tunnel visions" leading to an unjustified and wrong perception like "what is not on the internet doesn't exist".
Information pollution and information fatigue are other known consequences of googling.
"The problem with such limitless resources, is not a problem with the resource itself, it's a cultural problem."
I agree with you that the problem is a cultural one, but with a note that there is no such thing as a limitless source, since the limits of this source become obvious to you only when the next source comes about.
"Love of knowledge is the most important thing that can be gained at such a young age. We should not throw this away just so we can have good little Christian worker bees."
I fully agree with you on this one. Pekka Himanens book The Hacker Ethic, co-written with Linus Torvalds and Manuel Castells is a very good dissection of worker bees and protestant ethic.
"So far, the results are not tremendously clear or, at least not tremendously impressive."
I would think the words "not tremendously impressive" is a diplomatic way of saying "doesn't work".
Faeton wrote: "So, I don't think this is a big revelation to anyone here. Computers are just tools, MS is dumbing everybody down, blah blah blah."
Though I would agree with you, but would like to suggest that marketing lies can not possibly be limited to MS only. You have Macs, Educational Software vendors and even Hardware vendors (Intel, AMD) etc. contributing to hype and marketing tricks all pushing computers as the ultimate solution. Apart from companies, you will also find people in academic circles and researchers who believe the same.
Mentioned Economist.com article "Pass the chalk", found here: http://ron.unique.cc/economist/economist1.htm, names three possible reasons for negative relationship between computer use and test scores.
h tm
s sertatio n.pdf
o dy/mood y990818.html
"The authors offer three possible explanations of why this might be. First, the introduction of computers into classrooms might have gobbled up cash that would otherwise have paid for other aspects of education. But that is unlikely in this case since the money for the programme came from the national lottery, and the study found no significant change in teaching resources, methods or training in schools that acquired computers through the scheme.
A second possibility is that the transition to using computers in instruction takes time to have an effect. Maybe, say the authors, but the schools surveyed had been using the scheme's computers for a full school year. That was enough for the new computers to have had a large (and apparently malign) influence on fourth-grade maths scores. The third explanation is the simplest: that the use of computers in teaching is no better (and perhaps worse) than other teaching methods."
One might add a possible fourth reason which may explain negative math score: EASE. I think if the pupils use computers to learn and solve mathematical problems they might start relyiong too much on computers and in effect "unlearn" maths.
Another skeptic voice when it comes to possible role of IT in development and education is found here:
http://www.himalmag.com/2002/august/essay.
Yet another voice Prashant Sharma from School of Oriental and African Studies University of London
http://www.dgroups.org/groups/OKN/docs/di
And skepticism about IT in production is best represented by "'Solow paradox'-- widespread evidence of computer use, little evidence of (widespread) productivity growth --continues, at least in modified form." found here:
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/tech/FredMo
While we are on the subject of patents and toilets, here is an interesting article at ZDnet:2 3791,00. html
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s21
"IBM eliminates loo patent
08:37 Monday 14th October 2002
Troy Wolverton, CNET News.com
The computing giant decides not to press claims on a system for reserving a place in the toilet queue. The patent probably should not have been granted in the first place, an expert says
IBM has quietly eliminated a patent it received on a method for determining who gets to use the toilet next."
Thanks for the list.r oast-pi g-copyright-102202.html
It seems to me that the Eldred v. Ashcroft is not so much a challenge to the number of years, but rather to the very right of Congress to make such extensions indefinitely.
Lawrence Lessig, says:
http://www.redherring.com/insider/2002/10/
"The Constitution says that copyrights are to be "for limited Times." The framers initially set those "limited Times" to be quite short--14 years, renewable once. After a limited time, copyrighted work was to pass into the public domain--a lawyer-free zone where publishers and creators can draw upon creative work without fear of legal liability. This text, the challengers say, forbids the extension of existing terms."
MacAndrew wrote: "because the life+70/95 terms are not obviously unreasonable, esp. when compared to law in other countries ..."
I wonder if you know any other country having a longer term than the US (life+70/95)? To the best of my knowledge all other countries have had lower terms. Those that have changed have done so after US "nudging". Only one country, Australia has publicly stated they will not increase it over 70, India has 60 years limit, and Taiwan has refused to accept US demands to increase it to 95 years.
divec wrote: "The ongoing [aaronsw.com] case against the retroactive extension of copyright duration [eldred.cc] is also very important to many people.."
I agree that eldred.cc [http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/] is a very important case, but it seems that the authors of the article have included only those cases where there is already a court decison.
They altered scientific conclusions to satisfy conservatives too.
"JBoss [jboss.org] follows this same idea."
But do they actually stop/restrict you from sharing the contents of documentation with your friends?
"And you shouldn't, I was being sarcastic. The exec may or may not be lying."
What I meant was that the exec has a point if it is really true that "people who don't like this form of advertising are in the minority,...". BUT I do not take him on his word, since there is no independent source to confirm it, and no one should believe that type of statement.
After re-reading him through rutledjw "There's an enormous segment of the population that are appreciating these ads.", I can see that he is not at all talking about any majority or minority, but simply using a careful set of words "enormous segment of the population" which can neither be disputed nor asserted.
rutledjw wrote: ..."
"From the statement of the advertising exec, people who don't like this form of advertising are in the minority,
The exec says and you believe it!. I don't believe this. He is simply lying.
"There are other browsers (and products in general) out there that actually are built to protect the user. Yet people won't try anything new. Those who act like sheep shouldn't be suprised when they're lead to slaughter "
I fully agree with this one.
You probably already know it, but Mozilla does not stop all popups even if you block unrequested pop-ups. You will need to add the following entry to user.js in your mozilla profile directory... create it if it doesn't already exist (and it probably won't). It will be merged into prefs.js the next time mozilla is started.
user_pref("dom.disable_open_click_delay", 1000);
While we are at Freedom and Humour, try thist s.html
http://www.onion.com/onion3847/bill_of_righ
Patrick_Champion wrote: "This McCollum guy ... How do you reason with a guy like this?"
I guess by encouraging Netscape, Sun, and Oracle to sue this guy for defamation, since he is almost calling them terrorists.
Quto from McCollum: "The Linux(TM) cult's newest jihad is to aid in the fight against Microsoft begun by their competitors Netscape, Sun, and Oracle along with over a dozen state attorney generals during their anti-trust litigation. The Linux(TM) cult, not unlike the global confederation of leftist zombies led by a few radicals bent on the destruction of the United States, is a global confederation of leftist zombies led by a few radicals bent on the destruction of Microsoft."
This is hilarious, and I missed it on first read.
They do have morons writing press releases.
I tried to find an email on their site to write to them but could not find one.
Looks like some companies have finally accepeted that GPL is not hostile to property and profit.
quantaman wrote: "It doesn't exactly apply in Russia, it applies to people selling things in the US that may be illegal under American law. You don't have to like it but if you sell something in a country it's your responsibility to make sure it's legal under their laws."
Does that mean US/European porn sites selling porn in the whole world, can be tried in Saudi Arabia, Iran etc, where it is illegal?
How many of us were indignant at Google trying to comply with French and German laws which forbid hateful material and pro-nazi propaganda.
The laws governing internet and e commerce are in their infancy and pose a very complex set of problems, and we do not have simple answers about whether particular laws apply or not in particular cases.