Yet all this backward compatibility is NOT hurting, Chrome, Opera, Firefox and yes, even Safari.
How come ALL these can support older windows versions without problems but MS somehow runs into issues supporting its own OS that they are STILL selling?
Yes, I want to get rid of old Windows as well but mostly because of IE. If MS actually released some decent upgrades to its old crap they could help people who can't afford to upgrade their PC constantly. If IE9/10 was available XP (as other browsers more capable browsers are) then IE6 would be dead and buried. Clearly MS doesn't want IE6 gone badly enough, or are their browser developers not as capable as EVERY other browser make out there?
As an industry insider I can tell you that this new domain is NOT going over terribly well. The only ones in favour are ICM (the ones taking the money for the new domains) and advertising agencies. The adult industry? Not so much.
At it most basic, it is seen as a money grab. This is clear from how they are going to handle trademark disputes. For a fee, you can remove your trademark from EVER being registered as a.xxx domain. So Disney need not be worried about disney.xxx. As long they pay the fee. How much? They ain't saying (really, I asked at a live forum and the guys in charge refused to answer). But Disney will pay it because it won't be a lot of money (to them) and there are plenty of others who will also pay the fee to keep their name blacklisted (forever for now but of course it is only going to be a matter of time before that comes a yearly fee). That means ICM coffers will get a HUGE boost straight from the start AND they will want to keep that money flowing because money is a drug. The more you get, the more you need.
But there are other issues at work:
As a.xxx domain owner you agree to have your site monitored... for what? Well, child porn is trotted out predictably BUT you have to remember that this is ICM policing the site owners, NOT the police as on ALL other domains. But HOW are they going to monitor?
At one point, Liley flatly denied that ICM plans to “spider”.xxx domains to enforce compliance with IFFOR policies, such as the prohibition on meta tags that suggest the presence of child pornography.
Minutes later, a.xxx opponent read aloud from the IFFOR policy (pdf) that says all registrants must consent to “automated monitoring”.
Vaughn refused to answer many questions and weasled his way around others. The porn industry is CLEARLY not in favor of this.
One thing unanswered is how they are going to monitor CLOSED sites. Remember, most porn sites are membership sites and there content is NOT meant to be available to just anyone out there. Is every.xxx site owner going to have to provide ICM with a username and password that allows full access to the site? Who is going to be responsible for breaches where these accounts are lost? Does any other site have to give full access to a private company by default to be allowed on the net?
But should I care
A lot of people, even on slashdot don't like porn and want it to be hidden. Fair enough? No. Not really. If you like freedom of speech and believe me, many do not, then the.XXX domain is the registration of jews.
Godwin? Maybe but its parallels must be found in method rather then is shock effect. How did the nazi's know where to find Jews? Contrary to nazi propoganda they ain't all that easy to spot. It is not like they had it as easy as the US and its prosecuted minorities like blacks and asians. You can just tell a black person just by looking at him/her. Jew? Not so much, unless you believe nazi propoganda.
What allowed the mass murder to happen is the "harmless" registration of religion done long before the true horror of the nazi's became clear.
Yeah yeah, you know. So how does it apply to porn?
Obscenity
What is obscene? The US courts can't tell you AND this has been VERY important in ensuring free speech survives DESPITE being against the law. As long as the courts can't agree on what is obscene, the law cannot be used to ban your material. This is what allowed the porn mags such as Playboy, Penthouse and Hustler to survive countless court battles. Is obscenity forbidden? Yes. Are the mags obscene? Not proven, case dismissed. Why do you think these mags have higher grade journalism then many rags that can be bought from any store? Because it stopped them from being simply labelled as obsene AND banned.
Porn is that whichever is clearly obscene. What is obscene has always been hard to get established in an American court. That is why porn often can't be blocked in public places.
BUT now there is a porn domain. Use it and you just labelled yourself as obsene. Making you very easy to block.
Already US senators have discussed, LONG before.xxx was created, laws to force sites to use it AND then laws to enforce blocks. Blocks on everything publicly accesible. Possible because the obscenity would be proven.
There is a reason there are articles in Playboy, Penthouse AND even Hustler. Articles that are often of significantly higher journalistic standards then found in other non-adult magazines. It gave them the defence they were not just porn mags and could therefor not be blocked from distribution.
Most of the people in the know are extremely wary about this. Hopefully it will fizzle out like.mobi and all the other domains but this time, there are puritans in the wings waiting to launch yet another attack on freedom of speech.
Because if you think those that want to censor the web are going to stop at nude people, you are very much mistaken.
You got to find your niche as a distro. You can go boring and stable, or exciting and cutting edge... of course there are those who think stable is exciting but we don't talk about BSD people here... they smell funny.
Ubuntu wants to provide a great DESKTOP user experience. This means they got to follow the edge of Linux development because Linux by itself is not all that user friendly. Just try to do a CentOS install, text mode only, at the end you select the base packages, make a wrong choice, you can do it all over again as it hangs. That is in 2011. Compared to Ubuntu, the other distro's are still stuck in 2000. Suse and Mandriva tried to be more userfriendly but failed to do it as well as Ubuntu does because they still cared about stability more then pushing out the latest.
And even Ubuntu ain't all that cutting edge.
If you don't like it? Don't use it. But that means wresting with the other distro's far less friendly install and package choices.
Was Pulse Audio to soon? Yes but on the other hand, other distro's still think OSS is cutting edge And now that Pulse Audio does work, Ubuntu is ahead of the rest. Why do you think Ubuntu is so fucking popular? All the whiners complain about Pulse Audio and STILL use Ubuntu because the rest just ain't competing. Not for the desktop.
As for long term support. Just fucking upgrade already. What are you, a windows user who still needs windows 3.1 because he is to cheap to buy new software or have it retro-fitted? No wonder the economy is grinding to a halt. Wanna bet the chinese aren't worried about keeping decade old software running? Companies replace trucks every three years because it makes no sense to keep an old truck running when a new one will save you fuel, but lets keep decade old software that is full of bugs and performs like it was written by Bill Gates himself running at all costs and never upgrade.
Ubuntu pushes the edge. Not everyone can stand that. Go back to Red Hat and enjoy software so old SCO is still sueing it.
Americans have been having it WAY to easy for local travel. Days used to be you could just walk on the aircraft and just show your boarding pass. Carry on anything you want, even flammable stuff (still can or what do you think (duty-free) Vodka is?) and guns.
In the rest of the world, were air travel is likely to cross borders, checks have always been more strict. And with good reason. Hijacks were once common. Aircraft made good targets. It was tried with both ships and trains but they lack a sense of urgency, are to big, to open. So, something had to be done.
Something has to be done does NOT mean you are going to solve the problem 100%. I travelled very recently and as I left Holland, a dog sniffed me. Probably trying to make sure I don't bring drugs (legal in Holland) into countries that had personal freedom (the US). Do US citizens think I should not have been checked? Oddly enough, it is NOT the US who does this check, it is the dutch custom officers.
That is one part of airport security most people miss. The guy petting you is NOT just working for his own government but for the country you are flying to as well, as well as the airliner. There are three checks. Not breaking local laws, not breaking airliner rules, not breaking destination laws.
With the TSA, the US has caught up with the rest of the world AND went a little further. Because they want to stop another 9/11? Partly but also to stop the most easy flow of drugs and money. Just recently in Europe a child was caught with a small fortune in cash. Money mule? All those who cried about the pat down of a child, well, here is proof. Kids are used to commit crimes (transporting large amounts of cash is illegal).
People break the law, in general most normal people (A lot of slashdot does not apply) want the law to be enforced and so airports are now enforcing the laws.
Does it work? Lots of people claim that ZERO attacks have been stopped. But you can turn that bit right around. ZERO successful attacks SINCE the TSA. Shoe-bomber? Detroit flight? NOT successful. Because the attackers used stupid primitive tech that didn't stand a chance in hell?
Yes... and WHY? Because airport security stopped them from simply carrying on proven bomb technology.
Air port security is like a cheapo fire alarm and a 10 yr old fire estinguisher you don't know how to operate. It is not perfect but it beats having nothing at all AND shows you at least put some thought into it and probably are NOT storing jerrycans of petrol over your oven. That is the point about security that a lot of people don't get either. It is not just the security things you do do. But also the things you DON'T do anymore.
Like allowing guns aboard aircraft. Once normal in the US. Anyone think allowing them back is a good idea? How about smoking? High pressure canisters in the cargo? How about ANY of the security do's and don'ts that have been learned over the years and are now daily practice?
Some airports now no longer rely on the nearby cities fire service but have an engine ALWAYS crewed with engine running beside the runway. Most of these fire engines never ever attended a single crash. Skip them?
Airport security doesn't fix everything but I don't think it would be smart to go back to the early days of commercial flight and just open the whole place up. That was tried. It didn't work.
Security theather? Well, if you believe so strongly your government is so corrupt and out to get you, rise up and overthrow your oppressors. No, the ones who talk like that are almost always the armchair type. Talk loudly about the police state, then call the cops because the neighbours dog dared to fart to loudly.
PLEASE, lets seperate flights. One flight for all the people who think all their luggage should be carry on and who want to store bottles of fuel (called whiskey) in a confined space and who think anything and everything should be carried on board including every piece of electronics ever made broadcasting on god knows what frequencies.
And one flight for me and others who hate flying but simply put up with it as an award but handy form of transport to get to different places around the world fast and prefer to do it with high safety standards and as little fuz as possible.
Mind you, you also need two runways because I think the first groups airplanes will be crashing a LOT.
No I don't think all of the security really works. The problem is that if you do nothing... well then shit does happen, just look at the past. Hijacks happened at the drop of a hat. And it has been proven that carry on alcohol has caused extra deaths in accidents because of it becomes just more fuel to burn when the bottles break. Safety experts have been trying to get that stuff banned for ages but the airports want the sales from duty free.
Just remember, 9/11 did NOT happen on an El-Al flight.
Revolutions happen when the masses realize they got nothing left to lose.
Revolutions are needed when stagnation is getting out of control.
The US has stagnated.
The masses do not yet realize they got nothing to lose.
Therefor: This same decline has been in process for a long time. Like when Japan took over as power economy from the USA. China is just Japan squared.
Is the US doomed? Hardly but it don't matter how slow a ship is sinking. If you don't bail, the sinking will happen. A ship taking on water isn't doomed but a ship that takes on a drop of water a day will eventually sinkif nothing is done.
So, in one paragraph you deny people have a natural right to food but also claim the same people have a natural right to own property... my my, how handy for a rich white boy. Your rights are natural, those of the poor and hungry are not. You might want to talk to Maria Antoinette.
Sir, we got a volunteer. Private Turbidostato has volunteered to not just take a large high power electric device into salt water but to strap it, unarmed and naked (we are the navy after all) to our specially grown giant sized sharks whose increase in size thanks to their constant submergance in radiated water is only outmatched by their increase in ferocity.
Might I suggest sir, that you put in the request for his medal (posthumous), now? It would save time.
QUICK, someone call the navy! They MUST know this! A random dweed on slashdot has pointed out a fatal flaw in their decade long research! Save the nation, we can prevent a second Pearl Harbor if only we can this information to the right people!
Either this or, thank you for point out the bloody obvious and that a close range defensive weapon designed to take out small attacking ships does not need over the horizon capabilities. Layers of defence, read up on it.
It is before my time but I seem to recall being told that the big wake-up call was sputnik. The first men in space was big as well but easily diminished because it was essentially a ballistic shot not a real space trip. Sputnik was up there a long time, beeping all the way, undeniable.
Anyway, the Americans were to focussed on giving nazi war criminals a cozy ride and failing miserably to realize that there was a reason the german lost the war, their tech sucked. Still American history teaches that german tech led to space conquest, forgetting that it was a shift away from this that finally allowed the americans to catch up. But hey, if you chance history perhaps you might want to go after those that allowed killers of american POW's to get of scot free.
What if America had been first?
It wasn't. Examine WHY this was the case before you go into fantasy land. WHY was a 3rd world nation that had suffered a decimating war ahead of a country that was swimming in money and the only effect of war had been fewer unemployed? Once you can answer that, you have learned a lot about the true nature of the US and might even be able to use to help explain the current mess it is in.
Don't treat the USSR beating the US as some kind of freak accident, EXAMINE your history as it is, so you can learn from it. Or do you want to soon ask the question "what if the US had beat China to a space colony?"
Okay, couple of things going on here. First: The myth busters episode "proofing" you can't be sucked out of aircraft. This was the movie myth that a small hole wouldn't not cause everything inside to be sucked out. HOWEVER, we are not talking about that here, we are talking about a major hole. In the hawaii incident, there was a gigantic hole, the flight attendant was not sucked out movie style but (probably) swept up by the massive wind force that occurs partly simply because aircraft move so fucking fast. Nobody knows how she met her dead. It might be comforting to think she died instantly and without pain... if that helps you sleep at night.
Another incident involved a pilot being SUCKED out through the window in front of him (showing just how wrong the DISCOVERY mythbuster program is in its logic and research). He was SUCKED out and exposed to the cold and lack of oxygen for a long time AND survived.
Another incident involves an aircraft breaking up in mid air, all died but the family got record damages because experts had shown that they most likely survived the break up and were alive and aware the entire way down. Families were from one of the south american countries, maybe chili if you want to google it (to lazy myself).
The simple fact is that Myth Busters is a great example of bad science where they ignore recorded evidence and then twist the experiment until it doesn't resemble to claim at all. The clearest example was the "myth" of Jaws being able to hit a boat. So they tested the myth of a super sized shark hitting a boat, by using a smaller shark because Jaws was an unrealistic size... well? That is the myth, the myth is NOT real shark doing something real shark don't do.
Same with the being sucked out. There is more then one way, and pressure difference isn't the only one. Air rushing past a hole tends to create a sucking force itself (see how your engine sucks fuel up into the air) and a massive hole would create all kind of secondary forces. According to mythbusters, large buildings don't cause winds to rise to such level that they blow people of their feet because the pressure difference ain't big enough. Well, shucks.
So basically, discovery claims things contradicted by their own programs. Guess that answers who takes discovery serious, ABSOLUTELY NOBODY.
Jeordi is not african, he is a westerner with black skin. Big difference. Perhaps as I said a sign of moving on, that being black no longer means you have to pretend to be straight from darkest africa and discover your roots... but the fact remains, TOS had the first black/white kiss. TNG had none of that.
And Jeordi on developed later on. Watch the first season again if you can stand it.
You wish you could work for Picard... indeed. You would serve under Kirk, that is because he is a captain, not a manager.
But as said, different fans, different tastes. I know a girl who likes Picard too. One sick puppy. Everyone knows Kirk gets all the girls.
I know this concept will be hard to swallow but imagine this: A politician who really need his salary because it is the only income he has and if the salary for being a politician is lowered, he has no choice but to seek another job and no longer be able to be elected by the people he is trying to represent.
Or in other words, lowering the salary of politicians is a very effective way to keep the poor out of government.
Is that what you want, republican?
Silly question, of course it is.
And that you didn't even consider this simple thing, goes to show just how morally corrupt you are. Only rich people who don't need the pay can be politicians in your mind. A politician who simply needs the salary to pay for housing and food doesn't exist in your mind. Only fat cats can be leaders.
Pity how the current state of affairs has ruined peoples mind. Nobody can even run for office unless he is rolling in cash... democracy of the rich, for the rich. This is how it came to be.
Belgium has been without a NEW government following elections. Its old government is still in place even if reduced in this kind of decisions it can make. And its public services are completly uneffected. There is NO shutdown of the Belgium public service.
In contrast, the US has got a government AND has leaders in charge, who just aren't doing their job of running the fucking country and are threathing to break down basic services in order to get their pork projects signed off.
Big difference. The bullshit is the same (In Belgium nobody wants to face facts that the two-state nation is at the end of its life and in the US the two party system needs to change) but the results are very different.
To put simply: Belgium is proof that if you shoot the politicians, nobody would notice. The US is proof that politicians should be shot.
You are right, partially. The system of check and balances is protection against an INDIVIDUAL human influences of greed, laziness, pride etc etc. It does NOT protect against the masses. It stops Bill Gates from simply buying the president, it doesn't stop the voters from making bad choices in election after election.
What economy of scale? Your dim little mind is aware that Apple is currently one of the largest if not the largest PC maker in the world right? They have even beaten Dell once (haven't checked if Dell or HP has taken the lead again).
So what economy of scale? Someone going to sell Mac clones so successfully they outperform the largest makers by such a magnitude they can demand even sharper prices then Apple already can?
TOS is a series that was originally meant to be more like the Twilight Zone, different characters each episode. It still keeps the characters from having a ongoing story. There is no story arc spanning episodes although the book versions do tie the episodes together. The stories themselves are close to Sci-Fi in that they explore the now by just slightly changing the now to make us re-examine the facts. Simple example: Rather then examine black vs white race issues, the race issue is shown by two people who are both black and white, just different sides. To "us" there is no difference to them there is. This shows just how silly race differences are.
TNG most hated change was the kid. For some reason TV must have a kid in it and people hate kids and Wheaton was the most hated of them all. Wonder what ever happened to him. The characters also become more like the crew of the Love Boat, in that they had from the beginning long established relationships, parent-child, ex-lovers. The difference is clear in that TOS never had an episode aimed purely at introducing the cast. TNG did it and needed two episodes.
It also did something else, the most powerful most capable characters, were white humans. Spock from TOS was gone, replaced why a white android and various white male humans. It lacked the edge. Maybe that was a good thing, maybe a token black woman on the bridge was no longer needed to show a society that had moved beyond racism. Maybe.
Finally, the approaches of the crew were stellar opposites. TNG was all about endless meetings. Crisis, Enterprise about to be blown up in ten seconds, MEETING time! Kirk would bust some balls, Picard would listen to suggestions. It seemed all a bit eighties to me.
DS9 was a radical departure, first off, the kid again, two this time... don't they learn? They ditched the enterprise and sayed a big Hello to story arcs... it was a soap in space. And where as Kirk always tried to do the right thing, DS9 firmly brought in politics especially US politics of screwing your allies any time you can. They didn't think anything of betraying their allies if it suited them at that moment only to suck up to them next time. This wasn't the brave new world, it wasn't Kirk either kicking ass OR accepting that humans didn't always get it right BUT willing to learn. This was Senate Hill in space.
Voyager went back into space but dumped all sense of ethics at the spaceport. Kirk would never have stood for it. Janeway did anything to get home, including mass genocide. Star Trek, how far can you fall.
Enterprise... well that answered that question didn't it. The opening trailer showed only US spacecraft. TOS had russians, blacks, aliens in the same crew. Enterprise, USA all the way.
Perhaps it is important to remember that each series reflected its time. TOS was a by product of the hippy era and Gene Roddenberry had created a story where the future was bright. Racism, hunger, war. These things had been overcome and now we could get on with the fun stuff. Exploring new worlds.
The other series were as much a product of their time. The "management is everything" culture of the eighties. The "US is right and we don't need the rest of the world" of later years.
Each series stand on its own and frankly I don't think any true fan of one can possibly like all the others. Personally, my favorite is still TOS (although to be honest, more the books then the TV show) I can stomach some TNG (the ones without wesley) and the rest. Just no thanks. Didn't bother with the reboot. It might be good, it might not be but I think it is not... the ones I heard whosaid they liked it also seem to like the later tv-shows. Fine for them but then it ain't aimed at me.
One franchise, so many different audiences. Kind of amazing if you think about it.
All we need now is for the Sun to do an article on the bad journalism of Slashdot and we don't have to wait for 2012 for the world to be sucked into a black hole created the LHC.
Part of showing higher intelligence and empathy is being able to empathize with that which has no life.
That the southpark makers cannot do this, is telling.
:)
What is the emotional state of the above? Of two symbols? How many immediately thought "happy face"? How can you think two symbols next to each other are happy?
A lower animal seeing another animal will feel next to nothing, it will register it is as either food, a mate, or a hunter. It does not have "emotions" about it. Higher animals do have some capacity for emotion. How far this goes is not a debate I want to get into today but there is some proof that some animals can become attached to other animals (including us) and regonize feelings, state of emotion, in that other.
We humans are so good at it, that we can even do it in object that really have no emotion one way or another. Cartoons are one of them. CGI characters in a game are another.
In the game Mafia, if you shoot somebody, they don't die instantly, instead they might get wounded and try to crawl away, begging for mercy. It is a very easy to believe animation. It ain't all that hard to act as if they are real. So you walk up to them, and still kill them for little to no motivation in game... why?
Because it is just a game? It ain't real?
That is what the various evil people out there claimed about their victims. Blacks are not real people so enslaving them is okay. Jews are only sub-humans so killing them is okay. Children are not real, so raping them is okay.
No vicious criminals has ever been found to have a high sense of empathy. Find yourself a killer in jail and you find yourself someone who pulled the wings of flies or set cats on fire and STILL cannot see what is wrong with it.
Empathy is what we human beings need to avoid being reptiles who happily eat their own young. It allows us to live in large groups because hurting someone else on purpose makes us feel bad so we don't.
What is kinda amusing is to see those who lack empathic skills is to defend their lack by attacking those who have empathy as being to soft. "Oh how could you cry when Bambi's mother was shot, it is only a cartoon". Yes, it is, and I am only human and humans do that. You don't, what does this make you then?
That this field of study generates such hatred among some gamers is proof enough in itself. It is well known that what the parent said is true, an animal that does not socialize is not socialized. The most obvious and common examples are cats. If a kitten does not get used to human interaction early on, it becomes a wild cat. Socialize, and it will not only live happily in a pack with humans but even with other cats. A social animal becomes social from interaction with others.
Do violent video games change this more then other ways of non-socializing? Consider this, a cat raised in a barn with barely any human interaction will still be less hostile to humans then an animal constently mistreated by humans. A barn cat will simply see humans as other animals that are to big to eat, don't hunt it and don't want to be mated with. Ignore and move on. A mistreated cat will see a hunter and seek to avoid.
Young children are NOT automatically nice responsible social creatures. Their interactions with the world around them, shapes them. This includes everything from the time spend with their parents, to advertizing, to video games.
Some kids play video games, and this shapes them. Some kids play ONLY violent video games and go out of their way to make them more violent. This shapes them. There are ways to play violent video games that makes any observer chill to the bone. When a player goes out of his way to be violent, take PLEASURE in killing that which has no life, then you got a disturbed mind.
BECAUSE IF A VIDEO GAME CHARACTER IS NOT REAL, WHY DO YOU DELIGHT IN HURTING IT?
It is here that the "violent video games have no effect" crowd often fails. If it doesn't make you feel anything, why do it?
Upset people hate your guts for ruining the world economy with your greed and stupidity?
And exactly what has goldman sachs financed recently except themselves? VC funding has nothing to do with the likes of you. You are a leech not a true banker.
What you and so many others forget is that their are countless startups and only a few successful ones. What seperates the two? The latter keep costs from exploding before their is an income.
Let me put it another way. If you say you want an 800 dollar chair at your interview for a startup, should they hire you? Surely expensive chairs are part of the whole startup, vc-backed, bubble economy? Yes, the failed ones. The successful ones run linux of commodity hardware coded on cheapo chair picked up at a 2nd hand sale with the office cleaned by one of the girlfriends... oh okay... sisters.
Adapt? There is no time. Startups don't have the resources to train or re-educate people. You got to hit the ground running on bare feet with nobody sweeping the floor.
I have seen the.NET aprroach tried and they wasted several salaries on a server park complete with licenses and someone to keep track of them before they had even a proof of concept up and running. Solaris was the.NET of the last bubble. Sure, 100.000 on a couple of servers and 50.000 on an Oracle license when you haven't had a single penny of revenue. Why not and 1000 dollar chairs for everyone!
Most startup's have a fixed capital and no income until the product launches. This means ANY costs, no matter how trivial is reducing the time you have to produce a working product. And we all know software products rarely are finished on time. Even 400 bucks can be the difference between a developer having no choice but to work elsewhere or having just enough money to pay the rent to buy the startup a month to finish. I seen attempts fail simply because they no longer had the budget to ship goods to customers at a webshop launch.
What the.NET defenders just don't get is that he is not questioning their coding skills or the usefullness of the development environement but their attitude towards cost vs benefits. He is even polite enough to ask the.NET developers why they think the cost of.NET is worth the benefits.
So far not a single.NET developer has answered his question.
Slashdot Mirror
Yet all this backward compatibility is NOT hurting, Chrome, Opera, Firefox and yes, even Safari.
How come ALL these can support older windows versions without problems but MS somehow runs into issues supporting its own OS that they are STILL selling?
Yes, I want to get rid of old Windows as well but mostly because of IE. If MS actually released some decent upgrades to its old crap they could help people who can't afford to upgrade their PC constantly. If IE9/10 was available XP (as other browsers more capable browsers are) then IE6 would be dead and buried. Clearly MS doesn't want IE6 gone badly enough, or are their browser developers not as capable as EVERY other browser make out there?
As an industry insider I can tell you that this new domain is NOT going over terribly well. The only ones in favour are ICM (the ones taking the money for the new domains) and advertising agencies. The adult industry? Not so much.
At it most basic, it is seen as a money grab. This is clear from how they are going to handle trademark disputes. For a fee, you can remove your trademark from EVER being registered as a .xxx domain. So Disney need not be worried about disney.xxx. As long they pay the fee. How much? They ain't saying (really, I asked at a live forum and the guys in charge refused to answer). But Disney will pay it because it won't be a lot of money (to them) and there are plenty of others who will also pay the fee to keep their name blacklisted (forever for now but of course it is only going to be a matter of time before that comes a yearly fee). That means ICM coffers will get a HUGE boost straight from the start AND they will want to keep that money flowing because money is a drug. The more you get, the more you need.
But there are other issues at work:
As a .xxx domain owner you agree to have your site monitored... for what? Well, child porn is trotted out predictably BUT you have to remember that this is ICM policing the site owners, NOT the police as on ALL other domains. But HOW are they going to monitor?
http://domainincite.com/icm-faces-porn-anger-over-xxx/
I attended this myself and the following is true:
At one point, Liley flatly denied that ICM plans to “spider” .xxx domains to enforce compliance with IFFOR policies, such as the prohibition on meta tags that suggest the presence of child pornography.
Minutes later, a .xxx opponent read aloud from the IFFOR policy (pdf) that says all registrants must consent to “automated monitoring”.
Vaughn refused to answer many questions and weasled his way around others. The porn industry is CLEARLY not in favor of this.
One thing unanswered is how they are going to monitor CLOSED sites. Remember, most porn sites are membership sites and there content is NOT meant to be available to just anyone out there. Is every .xxx site owner going to have to provide ICM with a username and password that allows full access to the site? Who is going to be responsible for breaches where these accounts are lost? Does any other site have to give full access to a private company by default to be allowed on the net?
But should I care
A lot of people, even on slashdot don't like porn and want it to be hidden. Fair enough? No. Not really. If you like freedom of speech and believe me, many do not, then the .XXX domain is the registration of jews.
Godwin? Maybe but its parallels must be found in method rather then is shock effect. How did the nazi's know where to find Jews? Contrary to nazi propoganda they ain't all that easy to spot. It is not like they had it as easy as the US and its prosecuted minorities like blacks and asians. You can just tell a black person just by looking at him/her. Jew? Not so much, unless you believe nazi propoganda.
What allowed the mass murder to happen is the "harmless" registration of religion done long before the true horror of the nazi's became clear.
Yeah yeah, you know. So how does it apply to porn?
Obscenity
What is obscene? The US courts can't tell you AND this has been VERY important in ensuring free speech survives DESPITE being against the law. As long as the courts can't agree on what is obscene, the law cannot be used to ban your material. This is what allowed the porn mags such as Playboy, Penthouse and Hustler to survive countless court battles. Is obscenity forbidden? Yes. Are the mags obscene? Not proven, case dismissed. Why do you think these mags have higher grade journalism then many rags that can be bought from any store? Because it stopped them from being simply labelled as obsene AND banned.
Porn is that whichever is clearly obscene. What is obscene has always been hard to get established in an American court. That is why porn often can't be blocked in public places.
BUT now there is a porn domain. Use it and you just labelled yourself as obsene. Making you very easy to block.
Already US senators have discussed, LONG before .xxx was created, laws to force sites to use it AND then laws to enforce blocks. Blocks on everything publicly accesible. Possible because the obscenity would be proven.
There is a reason there are articles in Playboy, Penthouse AND even Hustler. Articles that are often of significantly higher journalistic standards then found in other non-adult magazines. It gave them the defence they were not just porn mags and could therefor not be blocked from distribution.
Most of the people in the know are extremely wary about this. Hopefully it will fizzle out like .mobi and all the other domains but this time, there are puritans in the wings waiting to launch yet another attack on freedom of speech.
Because if you think those that want to censor the web are going to stop at nude people, you are very much mistaken.
You got to find your niche as a distro. You can go boring and stable, or exciting and cutting edge... of course there are those who think stable is exciting but we don't talk about BSD people here... they smell funny.
Ubuntu wants to provide a great DESKTOP user experience. This means they got to follow the edge of Linux development because Linux by itself is not all that user friendly. Just try to do a CentOS install, text mode only, at the end you select the base packages, make a wrong choice, you can do it all over again as it hangs. That is in 2011. Compared to Ubuntu, the other distro's are still stuck in 2000. Suse and Mandriva tried to be more userfriendly but failed to do it as well as Ubuntu does because they still cared about stability more then pushing out the latest.
And even Ubuntu ain't all that cutting edge.
If you don't like it? Don't use it. But that means wresting with the other distro's far less friendly install and package choices.
Was Pulse Audio to soon? Yes but on the other hand, other distro's still think OSS is cutting edge And now that Pulse Audio does work, Ubuntu is ahead of the rest. Why do you think Ubuntu is so fucking popular? All the whiners complain about Pulse Audio and STILL use Ubuntu because the rest just ain't competing. Not for the desktop.
As for long term support. Just fucking upgrade already. What are you, a windows user who still needs windows 3.1 because he is to cheap to buy new software or have it retro-fitted? No wonder the economy is grinding to a halt. Wanna bet the chinese aren't worried about keeping decade old software running? Companies replace trucks every three years because it makes no sense to keep an old truck running when a new one will save you fuel, but lets keep decade old software that is full of bugs and performs like it was written by Bill Gates himself running at all costs and never upgrade.
Ubuntu pushes the edge. Not everyone can stand that. Go back to Red Hat and enjoy software so old SCO is still sueing it.
Americans have been having it WAY to easy for local travel. Days used to be you could just walk on the aircraft and just show your boarding pass. Carry on anything you want, even flammable stuff (still can or what do you think (duty-free) Vodka is?) and guns.
In the rest of the world, were air travel is likely to cross borders, checks have always been more strict. And with good reason. Hijacks were once common. Aircraft made good targets. It was tried with both ships and trains but they lack a sense of urgency, are to big, to open. So, something had to be done.
Something has to be done does NOT mean you are going to solve the problem 100%. I travelled very recently and as I left Holland, a dog sniffed me. Probably trying to make sure I don't bring drugs (legal in Holland) into countries that had personal freedom (the US). Do US citizens think I should not have been checked? Oddly enough, it is NOT the US who does this check, it is the dutch custom officers.
That is one part of airport security most people miss. The guy petting you is NOT just working for his own government but for the country you are flying to as well, as well as the airliner. There are three checks. Not breaking local laws, not breaking airliner rules, not breaking destination laws.
With the TSA, the US has caught up with the rest of the world AND went a little further. Because they want to stop another 9/11? Partly but also to stop the most easy flow of drugs and money. Just recently in Europe a child was caught with a small fortune in cash. Money mule? All those who cried about the pat down of a child, well, here is proof. Kids are used to commit crimes (transporting large amounts of cash is illegal).
People break the law, in general most normal people (A lot of slashdot does not apply) want the law to be enforced and so airports are now enforcing the laws.
Does it work? Lots of people claim that ZERO attacks have been stopped. But you can turn that bit right around. ZERO successful attacks SINCE the TSA. Shoe-bomber? Detroit flight? NOT successful. Because the attackers used stupid primitive tech that didn't stand a chance in hell?
Yes... and WHY? Because airport security stopped them from simply carrying on proven bomb technology.
Air port security is like a cheapo fire alarm and a 10 yr old fire estinguisher you don't know how to operate. It is not perfect but it beats having nothing at all AND shows you at least put some thought into it and probably are NOT storing jerrycans of petrol over your oven. That is the point about security that a lot of people don't get either. It is not just the security things you do do. But also the things you DON'T do anymore.
Like allowing guns aboard aircraft. Once normal in the US. Anyone think allowing them back is a good idea? How about smoking? High pressure canisters in the cargo? How about ANY of the security do's and don'ts that have been learned over the years and are now daily practice?
Some airports now no longer rely on the nearby cities fire service but have an engine ALWAYS crewed with engine running beside the runway. Most of these fire engines never ever attended a single crash. Skip them?
Airport security doesn't fix everything but I don't think it would be smart to go back to the early days of commercial flight and just open the whole place up. That was tried. It didn't work.
Security theather? Well, if you believe so strongly your government is so corrupt and out to get you, rise up and overthrow your oppressors. No, the ones who talk like that are almost always the armchair type. Talk loudly about the police state, then call the cops because the neighbours dog dared to fart to loudly.
PLEASE, lets seperate flights. One flight for all the people who think all their luggage should be carry on and who want to store bottles of fuel (called whiskey) in a confined space and who think anything and everything should be carried on board including every piece of electronics ever made broadcasting on god knows what frequencies.
And one flight for me and others who hate flying but simply put up with it as an award but handy form of transport to get to different places around the world fast and prefer to do it with high safety standards and as little fuz as possible.
Mind you, you also need two runways because I think the first groups airplanes will be crashing a LOT.
No I don't think all of the security really works. The problem is that if you do nothing... well then shit does happen, just look at the past. Hijacks happened at the drop of a hat. And it has been proven that carry on alcohol has caused extra deaths in accidents because of it becomes just more fuel to burn when the bottles break. Safety experts have been trying to get that stuff banned for ages but the airports want the sales from duty free.
Just remember, 9/11 did NOT happen on an El-Al flight.
Revolutions happen when the masses realize they got nothing left to lose.
Revolutions are needed when stagnation is getting out of control.
The US has stagnated.
The masses do not yet realize they got nothing to lose.
Therefor: This same decline has been in process for a long time. Like when Japan took over as power economy from the USA. China is just Japan squared.
Is the US doomed? Hardly but it don't matter how slow a ship is sinking. If you don't bail, the sinking will happen. A ship taking on water isn't doomed but a ship that takes on a drop of water a day will eventually sinkif nothing is done.
And the US is doing NOTHING.
So, in one paragraph you deny people have a natural right to food but also claim the same people have a natural right to own property... my my, how handy for a rich white boy. Your rights are natural, those of the poor and hungry are not. You might want to talk to Maria Antoinette.
You joke, on slashdot about not ever going outside to avoid the unrealistic rendering effects of the big sky box? On SLASHDOT?
Wanna bet at least half the people go,"yup, me too, it is just so fake!"
Know your audience kid.
Me? I wear 3D goggles ALL the time! The effect is amazing! I feel like I can just reach out and touch!
Sir, we got a volunteer. Private Turbidostato has volunteered to not just take a large high power electric device into salt water but to strap it, unarmed and naked (we are the navy after all) to our specially grown giant sized sharks whose increase in size thanks to their constant submergance in radiated water is only outmatched by their increase in ferocity.
Might I suggest sir, that you put in the request for his medal (posthumous), now? It would save time.
QUICK, someone call the navy! They MUST know this! A random dweed on slashdot has pointed out a fatal flaw in their decade long research! Save the nation, we can prevent a second Pearl Harbor if only we can this information to the right people!
Either this or, thank you for point out the bloody obvious and that a close range defensive weapon designed to take out small attacking ships does not need over the horizon capabilities. Layers of defence, read up on it.
It is before my time but I seem to recall being told that the big wake-up call was sputnik. The first men in space was big as well but easily diminished because it was essentially a ballistic shot not a real space trip. Sputnik was up there a long time, beeping all the way, undeniable.
Anyway, the Americans were to focussed on giving nazi war criminals a cozy ride and failing miserably to realize that there was a reason the german lost the war, their tech sucked. Still American history teaches that german tech led to space conquest, forgetting that it was a shift away from this that finally allowed the americans to catch up. But hey, if you chance history perhaps you might want to go after those that allowed killers of american POW's to get of scot free.
What if America had been first?
It wasn't. Examine WHY this was the case before you go into fantasy land. WHY was a 3rd world nation that had suffered a decimating war ahead of a country that was swimming in money and the only effect of war had been fewer unemployed? Once you can answer that, you have learned a lot about the true nature of the US and might even be able to use to help explain the current mess it is in.
Don't treat the USSR beating the US as some kind of freak accident, EXAMINE your history as it is, so you can learn from it. Or do you want to soon ask the question "what if the US had beat China to a space colony?"
Okay, couple of things going on here. First: The myth busters episode "proofing" you can't be sucked out of aircraft. This was the movie myth that a small hole wouldn't not cause everything inside to be sucked out. HOWEVER, we are not talking about that here, we are talking about a major hole. In the hawaii incident, there was a gigantic hole, the flight attendant was not sucked out movie style but (probably) swept up by the massive wind force that occurs partly simply because aircraft move so fucking fast. Nobody knows how she met her dead. It might be comforting to think she died instantly and without pain... if that helps you sleep at night.
Another incident involved a pilot being SUCKED out through the window in front of him (showing just how wrong the DISCOVERY mythbuster program is in its logic and research). He was SUCKED out and exposed to the cold and lack of oxygen for a long time AND survived.
Another incident involves an aircraft breaking up in mid air, all died but the family got record damages because experts had shown that they most likely survived the break up and were alive and aware the entire way down. Families were from one of the south american countries, maybe chili if you want to google it (to lazy myself).
The simple fact is that Myth Busters is a great example of bad science where they ignore recorded evidence and then twist the experiment until it doesn't resemble to claim at all. The clearest example was the "myth" of Jaws being able to hit a boat. So they tested the myth of a super sized shark hitting a boat, by using a smaller shark because Jaws was an unrealistic size... well? That is the myth, the myth is NOT real shark doing something real shark don't do.
Same with the being sucked out. There is more then one way, and pressure difference isn't the only one. Air rushing past a hole tends to create a sucking force itself (see how your engine sucks fuel up into the air) and a massive hole would create all kind of secondary forces. According to mythbusters, large buildings don't cause winds to rise to such level that they blow people of their feet because the pressure difference ain't big enough. Well, shucks.
So basically, discovery claims things contradicted by their own programs. Guess that answers who takes discovery serious, ABSOLUTELY NOBODY.
Yes, La Forge. Not Uhura.
Jeordi is not african, he is a westerner with black skin. Big difference. Perhaps as I said a sign of moving on, that being black no longer means you have to pretend to be straight from darkest africa and discover your roots... but the fact remains, TOS had the first black/white kiss. TNG had none of that.
And Jeordi on developed later on. Watch the first season again if you can stand it.
You wish you could work for Picard... indeed. You would serve under Kirk, that is because he is a captain, not a manager.
But as said, different fans, different tastes. I know a girl who likes Picard too. One sick puppy. Everyone knows Kirk gets all the girls.
I know this concept will be hard to swallow but imagine this: A politician who really need his salary because it is the only income he has and if the salary for being a politician is lowered, he has no choice but to seek another job and no longer be able to be elected by the people he is trying to represent.
Or in other words, lowering the salary of politicians is a very effective way to keep the poor out of government.
Is that what you want, republican?
Silly question, of course it is.
And that you didn't even consider this simple thing, goes to show just how morally corrupt you are. Only rich people who don't need the pay can be politicians in your mind. A politician who simply needs the salary to pay for housing and food doesn't exist in your mind. Only fat cats can be leaders.
Pity how the current state of affairs has ruined peoples mind. Nobody can even run for office unless he is rolling in cash... democracy of the rich, for the rich. This is how it came to be.
Belgium has been without a NEW government following elections. Its old government is still in place even if reduced in this kind of decisions it can make. And its public services are completly uneffected. There is NO shutdown of the Belgium public service.
In contrast, the US has got a government AND has leaders in charge, who just aren't doing their job of running the fucking country and are threathing to break down basic services in order to get their pork projects signed off.
Big difference. The bullshit is the same (In Belgium nobody wants to face facts that the two-state nation is at the end of its life and in the US the two party system needs to change) but the results are very different.
To put simply: Belgium is proof that if you shoot the politicians, nobody would notice. The US is proof that politicians should be shot.
You are right, partially. The system of check and balances is protection against an INDIVIDUAL human influences of greed, laziness, pride etc etc. It does NOT protect against the masses. It stops Bill Gates from simply buying the president, it doesn't stop the voters from making bad choices in election after election.
What economy of scale? Your dim little mind is aware that Apple is currently one of the largest if not the largest PC maker in the world right? They have even beaten Dell once (haven't checked if Dell or HP has taken the lead again).
So what economy of scale? Someone going to sell Mac clones so successfully they outperform the largest makers by such a magnitude they can demand even sharper prices then Apple already can?
TOS is a series that was originally meant to be more like the Twilight Zone, different characters each episode. It still keeps the characters from having a ongoing story. There is no story arc spanning episodes although the book versions do tie the episodes together. The stories themselves are close to Sci-Fi in that they explore the now by just slightly changing the now to make us re-examine the facts. Simple example: Rather then examine black vs white race issues, the race issue is shown by two people who are both black and white, just different sides. To "us" there is no difference to them there is. This shows just how silly race differences are.
TNG most hated change was the kid. For some reason TV must have a kid in it and people hate kids and Wheaton was the most hated of them all. Wonder what ever happened to him. The characters also become more like the crew of the Love Boat, in that they had from the beginning long established relationships, parent-child, ex-lovers. The difference is clear in that TOS never had an episode aimed purely at introducing the cast. TNG did it and needed two episodes.
It also did something else, the most powerful most capable characters, were white humans. Spock from TOS was gone, replaced why a white android and various white male humans. It lacked the edge. Maybe that was a good thing, maybe a token black woman on the bridge was no longer needed to show a society that had moved beyond racism. Maybe.
Finally, the approaches of the crew were stellar opposites. TNG was all about endless meetings. Crisis, Enterprise about to be blown up in ten seconds, MEETING time! Kirk would bust some balls, Picard would listen to suggestions. It seemed all a bit eighties to me.
DS9 was a radical departure, first off, the kid again, two this time... don't they learn? They ditched the enterprise and sayed a big Hello to story arcs... it was a soap in space. And where as Kirk always tried to do the right thing, DS9 firmly brought in politics especially US politics of screwing your allies any time you can. They didn't think anything of betraying their allies if it suited them at that moment only to suck up to them next time. This wasn't the brave new world, it wasn't Kirk either kicking ass OR accepting that humans didn't always get it right BUT willing to learn. This was Senate Hill in space.
Voyager went back into space but dumped all sense of ethics at the spaceport. Kirk would never have stood for it. Janeway did anything to get home, including mass genocide. Star Trek, how far can you fall.
Enterprise... well that answered that question didn't it. The opening trailer showed only US spacecraft. TOS had russians, blacks, aliens in the same crew. Enterprise, USA all the way.
Perhaps it is important to remember that each series reflected its time. TOS was a by product of the hippy era and Gene Roddenberry had created a story where the future was bright. Racism, hunger, war. These things had been overcome and now we could get on with the fun stuff. Exploring new worlds.
The other series were as much a product of their time. The "management is everything" culture of the eighties. The "US is right and we don't need the rest of the world" of later years.
Each series stand on its own and frankly I don't think any true fan of one can possibly like all the others. Personally, my favorite is still TOS (although to be honest, more the books then the TV show) I can stomach some TNG (the ones without wesley) and the rest. Just no thanks. Didn't bother with the reboot. It might be good, it might not be but I think it is not... the ones I heard whosaid they liked it also seem to like the later tv-shows. Fine for them but then it ain't aimed at me.
One franchise, so many different audiences. Kind of amazing if you think about it.
All we need now is for the Sun to do an article on the bad journalism of Slashdot and we don't have to wait for 2012 for the world to be sucked into a black hole created the LHC.
Journalism, its dead has not been exaggerated.
Part of showing higher intelligence and empathy is being able to empathize with that which has no life.
That the southpark makers cannot do this, is telling.
:)
What is the emotional state of the above? Of two symbols? How many immediately thought "happy face"? How can you think two symbols next to each other are happy?
A lower animal seeing another animal will feel next to nothing, it will register it is as either food, a mate, or a hunter. It does not have "emotions" about it. Higher animals do have some capacity for emotion. How far this goes is not a debate I want to get into today but there is some proof that some animals can become attached to other animals (including us) and regonize feelings, state of emotion, in that other.
We humans are so good at it, that we can even do it in object that really have no emotion one way or another. Cartoons are one of them. CGI characters in a game are another.
In the game Mafia, if you shoot somebody, they don't die instantly, instead they might get wounded and try to crawl away, begging for mercy. It is a very easy to believe animation. It ain't all that hard to act as if they are real. So you walk up to them, and still kill them for little to no motivation in game... why?
Because it is just a game? It ain't real?
That is what the various evil people out there claimed about their victims. Blacks are not real people so enslaving them is okay. Jews are only sub-humans so killing them is okay. Children are not real, so raping them is okay.
No vicious criminals has ever been found to have a high sense of empathy. Find yourself a killer in jail and you find yourself someone who pulled the wings of flies or set cats on fire and STILL cannot see what is wrong with it.
Empathy is what we human beings need to avoid being reptiles who happily eat their own young. It allows us to live in large groups because hurting someone else on purpose makes us feel bad so we don't.
What is kinda amusing is to see those who lack empathic skills is to defend their lack by attacking those who have empathy as being to soft. "Oh how could you cry when Bambi's mother was shot, it is only a cartoon". Yes, it is, and I am only human and humans do that. You don't, what does this make you then?
That this field of study generates such hatred among some gamers is proof enough in itself. It is well known that what the parent said is true, an animal that does not socialize is not socialized. The most obvious and common examples are cats. If a kitten does not get used to human interaction early on, it becomes a wild cat. Socialize, and it will not only live happily in a pack with humans but even with other cats. A social animal becomes social from interaction with others.
Do violent video games change this more then other ways of non-socializing? Consider this, a cat raised in a barn with barely any human interaction will still be less hostile to humans then an animal constently mistreated by humans. A barn cat will simply see humans as other animals that are to big to eat, don't hunt it and don't want to be mated with. Ignore and move on. A mistreated cat will see a hunter and seek to avoid.
Young children are NOT automatically nice responsible social creatures. Their interactions with the world around them, shapes them. This includes everything from the time spend with their parents, to advertizing, to video games.
Some kids play video games, and this shapes them. Some kids play ONLY violent video games and go out of their way to make them more violent. This shapes them. There are ways to play violent video games that makes any observer chill to the bone. When a player goes out of his way to be violent, take PLEASURE in killing that which has no life, then you got a disturbed mind.
BECAUSE IF A VIDEO GAME CHARACTER IS NOT REAL, WHY DO YOU DELIGHT IN HURTING IT?
It is here that the "violent video games have no effect" crowd often fails. If it doesn't make you feel anything, why do it?
There are s
To bad suicide bombers, the virgins? It is this guy... mind you, if you examine world history especially in the sunnier parts... they might not mind.
Not all of us have that luxury, you insensitive clod.
Upset people hate your guts for ruining the world economy with your greed and stupidity?
And exactly what has goldman sachs financed recently except themselves? VC funding has nothing to do with the likes of you. You are a leech not a true banker.
What you and so many others forget is that their are countless startups and only a few successful ones. What seperates the two? The latter keep costs from exploding before their is an income.
Let me put it another way. If you say you want an 800 dollar chair at your interview for a startup, should they hire you? Surely expensive chairs are part of the whole startup, vc-backed, bubble economy? Yes, the failed ones. The successful ones run linux of commodity hardware coded on cheapo chair picked up at a 2nd hand sale with the office cleaned by one of the girlfriends... oh okay... sisters.
Adapt? There is no time. Startups don't have the resources to train or re-educate people. You got to hit the ground running on bare feet with nobody sweeping the floor.
I have seen the .NET aprroach tried and they wasted several salaries on a server park complete with licenses and someone to keep track of them before they had even a proof of concept up and running. Solaris was the .NET of the last bubble. Sure, 100.000 on a couple of servers and 50.000 on an Oracle license when you haven't had a single penny of revenue. Why not and 1000 dollar chairs for everyone!
Most startup's have a fixed capital and no income until the product launches. This means ANY costs, no matter how trivial is reducing the time you have to produce a working product. And we all know software products rarely are finished on time. Even 400 bucks can be the difference between a developer having no choice but to work elsewhere or having just enough money to pay the rent to buy the startup a month to finish. I seen attempts fail simply because they no longer had the budget to ship goods to customers at a webshop launch.
What the .NET defenders just don't get is that he is not questioning their coding skills or the usefullness of the development environement but their attitude towards cost vs benefits. He is even polite enough to ask the .NET developers why they think the cost of .NET is worth the benefits.
So far not a single .NET developer has answered his question.
I think that is telling.