Like most people (here at least!) I'm not happy about the way the big media companies are rail-roading governments around the world to shore up their failing businesses - and even more unhappy at how the Governments are cow-towing to the media moguls and allowing themselves to be manoeuvred into generating more legislation (and don't get me started about ministers feathering their nests before the next election!)... but copyright isn't all bad! If you create something it isn't unfair to expect people to pay for it!
Except that there are non-BBC channels and you have to pay the tax even if you never watch a BBC channel.
To use a car analogy, this would be like having to pay a monthly fee to Ford for "car services" regardless of what brand your car is.
There are many arguments around this one, but my favourite is that because the BBC (usually!) sets such high standards it makes the other terrestrial TV companies (ITV, Chan4/5) and the UK cable companies strive to raise their game also. Hence the benefit for any UK TV watcher regardless of which channel.
It is more like the UK's road fund licence (AKA Car Tax): everyone pays if they own a car because it (is supposed to!) make ALL the roads better!
That said, IMHO I'd say the TV License has had its day and it should be scrapped and an equal amount just taken from income tax instead. This would save money 'cos there'd be no need for all the TV License infrastructure, etc.
.... the domain does not comply with the.com.au regs and should have never been approved registration in the first place....
In which case surely the powers that be should be chasing those who are supposed to enforce the rules rather than the people who got past them! It's not their fault the rule enforcers would rather have the money than enforce the rules!
I'm not a scientist and I realize that wherever it hits could cause a chain of reactions that affect the entire earth, but isn't the idea to reduce civilian casualties?
Actually, that whole "reduce civilian casualties" malarky would likely be the main problem. The damn politicians would likely be counting up civilians (and in the case of an asteroid strike everyone is a civilian!) rather than working out the most suitable place to do the least damage to the planet! That most suitable place may well be uninhabited - but Antarctica is most certainly isn't (sea level changes).
Even assuming we'd be able to chose a landing target, an empty place that throws large amounts of debris into the atmosphere could end up being worse than landing it somewhere more populated, but with a more suitable geology! In cases like these you have to stop thinking about individuals and think of the health of the planet as a single organism - and let me tell you, that isn't going to happen any time soon!
That's why the Climate Conference is getting nowhere! If the Scientists know the planet is warming then the Scientists should tell the Politicians what the solution is, and the Politicians should tell the World! - it's like going to a Doctor who says you've got cancer, then asking your accountant for the best treatment and he suggests (as all accountants always do!) that cutting all the pencils in half ought to do it!
The Doctor says you've got cancer you ask the Doctor what treatment. You ask another Doctor too... hell, you ask ALL the Doctors!
The trouble we've got with the AGW problem is the Scientists say there's a problem, but the people are asking the damn homoeopaths and crystal therapists for a solution, and a dilute one at that!
... A generation ship, however, could solve this problem (kids could very conceivably be raised on a giant ship with lakes and forests and a whole functioning mini-society), but as you said, this would require some incredible engineering. Lifting that much material into orbit really needs a space elevator, for starters. And this still doesn't address the gravity problem; those lakes and forests aren't going to work without artificial gravity. And I personally believe the invention of artificial gravity is going to go hand-in-hand with the invention of FTL drive, as I believe the fundamental nature of gravity and the speed of light are intertwined.
How about we pick a suitable asteroid and hollow the mother out enough to fit inside what we need to live, leaving the rest as "mass" to be ejected as propellant. How's about we set the thing rotating about a suitable axis to provide sufficient 1G habitable floors?
The problem with such an endeavour is that it will be costly. Very costly. There are those who think that the window of opportunity for humans to do something like this is finite. At some point it will become political suicide to suggest we allow some people to starve/freeze/drown/fry/etc to use the money to build this Generation Ship. That point may not be too far in the future... a couple of hundred years maybe? Maybe considerably sooner!
So, if we don't start Now we may never be able to get off this rock!
... if that means the people on board only experience 5-25 years, how much time will pass on Earth before we found out what this exploration team discovers there? (Remember, once they get there after however many years (hundreds? thousands?), they'd have to send their data by radio at light-speed, which would take yet another 28 years.)...
Er... hang on... so you reckon it might take 5 to 25 years (from their perspective) to get there, but hundreds of years as far as those left behind see it?
Assuming 25 years to get there + the 28 years to send a Light Speed message back - hey, we'd get a message from them before they arrive!
I don't get it! Surely their perspective of the time to get there must be longer than it would take light to get there if they are travelling at Sub Light speeds? Our perspective may well see it as even longer, but they can't get there in less time than light if they travel slower than light?
Or maybe I need to pick up a Relativity Made Easy book...
Yep! It never ceases to amaze me how the upper echelons of management can be so utterly clueless about how their companies work! Time after time I've worked in places where stupid decisions such as these are made - such as changing from different office space for the Sales/Marketing type folks and the Programmers/Developers to lumping them all in the same open plan office so we can all be "one big team"! 'Cos that's just what I like when I'm trying to code - sales and marketing buffoons talking too damn loud on the 'phone etc! Other 'funny' decisions is stuff like insisting that Programmers/Developers must all wear suits and ties because if you look smart you will work smart. Programmers often have their little foibles and management will ALWAYS be trying to shoe-horn them (us!) into their view of how Programmers should be! It's laughable really - I thought this sort of thing would stop happening once the IT people started to rise up through management and get to the top, but it still seems to be mostly the accountant types who get the top jobs (and they still cut pencils in half to save money!).
Being in The Zone is such a great feeling too, then some numbnuts manager will come over and ask for a progress report and blow it all away!
It seems more and more reasonable to give kids their own version of the internet completely. That way we wont get crazy someone think of the children laws.
Surely the only logical solution is to have a Paedophiles only Internet...
You know, this post just sums up the problem for me. People who randomly talk about sex with strangers are the problem. I can't think of a situation where I would randomly talk about sex with anyone I don't know.
I'm not a prude or anything, I just think that this is just a sign of how meaningless sex has become, and now people are acting like dogs in heat, trying to mate with anything that moves.
If you RT*A (bleeped one word because I don't know how old you are!) you will see that talking about sex is not a requirement of the conversation to potentially put you outside the (Canadian) law. This is about luring (what is usually known as grooming in the UK) and just being nice to someone, asking about and/or listening too their problems, being a sympathetic ear, offering any advice (useful or not!), being funny, even just being vaguely humerous, saying it's raining where you are and it's about 5pm. ANYTHING that could even vaguely be seen as trying to befriend could, can, WILL be seen as luring/grooming.
Who was it said something about Governments liking laws that basically mean everyone has done something wrong 'cos it's a great way to control the population!
Of course, parents also have to give their kids a bit of freedom and not always be peeking over their shoulder.
Hmmmm. Almost! I'll fix it for ya:-
Parents also have to give their kids a bit of freedom and not be caught peeking over their shoulder!
My sister let her kids walk to school on their own and they were totally unaware that she followed them the first 'n' times, until she was happy they were being sensible, etc. The kids got their freedom and Sis kept her peace of mind!
I did that when I was a kid (learned how to make explosives on the internet). However, I also learned how to build a computer, program, cook, fix my car, argue, etc. on the Internet. In fact, I would say I am where I am today (full-time developer and grad student) because of the information available on the Internet. You gotta take the bad with the good sometimes and deal with the consequences.
Aha... a school boy error there, as you appear to have decided that learning to make explosives must always be bad? Why?
The knowledge of how to make explosives isn't bad, it's just knowledge, but the thought processes that attribute "badness" to certain knowledge is at the root of all censorship and is actually the problem! Therefore we should censor censorship!
So why not just have a bunch of ex-servicemen - hell! Rent out some of our actual servicemen - on board and have them get off the boat with all their kit before the boat tries to dock - they could even just transfer to some other boat going the other way!
I could imagine a lot of service personnel volunteering for such a cruise - all the ammo you can eat and pirates to shoot at! A four man stick should do nicely!
There is the danger that it just raised the violence on both sides... if you fight back and lose it would be V. nasty!
But for definite the international powers that be should make it illegal to pay the ransoms - see Israel and the aeroplane hijacking back in the 70s was it? One or two were stormed and the hijackers realised it wasn't going to work again and stopped!
True, and yet a cardiac surgeon is also a surgeon is also (at least in layman's parlance) a doctor. Do surgeons dislike being known referred to as "doctors" - HELL YES.
I work in IT. I'm an IT Professional. Do I know anything about fixing windoze? HELL NO! Do people assume I know about PCs and wireless routers and (sheeze!) printers? Yep... all the time!
To the untrained eye IT is IT is IT. It's like wine tasting vs beer tasting. Until you expose yourself to the knowledge you just think they all taste the same, but it's not the fault of the ignorant (and I do mean "ignorant" and not necessarily "stupid"). It is an opportunity to enlighten them that IT covers such a wide range of knowledge and skills now (and the range of knowledge and skills is growing rather too fast for this old programmer!) that at some point there may well be a divergence, though where the split(s) may appear I don't know!
Case in point: A couple of friends had a company that bought and sold second hand office furniture since before computers appeared on the scene. Not long after computers became de-rigeur in offices the company split because it recognised that "computers" were no longer just "office furniture" - one half taking JUST computers and the other half taking everything else...
IT will split into different factions just as "office furniture" did when it makes sense for it to do so.
So, what would be a good way to split it up then? Development vs Maintenance? Software (you write stuff to run on H/W) vs Hardware (you build things to run the S/W) vs Repairer (you know how things work and so can configure/fix things & you can talk to real people and so act as an interface between the annoying Users and the equally annoying S/W and H/W people)...
LOL - I sometimes have to work away from home and luckily the route passes close enough to my parents that I can call in and stay overnight.
My (female) boss called home to talk about something or other and the wife picked up. She wasn't sure if it was OK that I stopped off at my folks so she said I was away on business but that she wasn't sure where I was which led my boss to believe that I was playing away.
The conversation the ensued had both women covering for me and was, by both accounts, both anxious and hilarious!
Unfortunately they've re-used existing Kiwi tech, so rather than a capsule to hold the pilot they just attach him to the bottom of the rocket with a bungee cord.
The rocket should get about half-way before the cord is tight enough to lift the pilot which has an added benefit, safety-wise, as any problems during the launch and they can just cut the cord!
We already have clean, safe fusion energy in the form of solar panels.
Hmmm. Try selling the "clean" part of that to the various parts of the world where they strip-mine for the rare elements that are required for solar(electric) panels!
That said, I'd stand up an applaud your clearly a matter of technology comment. There's a chance that humans simply will never be able to harness fusion but I wouldn't bet on it because we're nothing if not tenacious.
My 5c: Let's all throw everything we've got at fusion tech until we either get it working or discover some fundamental reason why it will never work on Earth!
This is, however, one more piece of evidence to support evolution and one more bit of knowledge that we can use to understand where we came from.
That's one more piece of evidence in a long line of pieces of evidence to support evolution...
Now, let's look at the list of (new?) evidence for Creationism. Hmmmm. Do you all have your lists? Then I shall begin...
In the beginning was the void, and the void was our knowledge, and some power hungry people saw that void and thought that it was good...
Formation of separate parts does not imply that those separate parts will "come together" and actually form RNA, does it? That would be an impressive assumption to make.
LOL: So when we have learned how it was possible that all the parts required could be made naturally and that there's a sufficiently common mechanism that can occur that brings them together and forms RNA what will you rail against next? Do you honestly think we won't work it out?
Throughout the scientific history of Man we have been pushing the religophiles further and further into a corner of their own making to their increasingly desperate chant of "God Did It - God Did It". Railing against scientific evidence is futile and just makes you look like ignorant cavemen and the only religions that will survive will be those who totally accept that if there was any divine hand at work that it was ONLY at work before the first roll of the dice and it hasn't interfered since, because then there will be no way science can EVER disprove it!
Slashdot Mirror
Like most people (here at least!) I'm not happy about the way the big media companies are rail-roading governments around the world to shore up their failing businesses - and even more unhappy at how the Governments are cow-towing to the media moguls and allowing themselves to be manoeuvred into generating more legislation (and don't get me started about ministers feathering their nests before the next election!) ... but copyright isn't all bad! If you create something it isn't unfair to expect people to pay for it!
Except that there are non-BBC channels and you have to pay the tax even if you never watch a BBC channel.
To use a car analogy, this would be like having to pay a monthly fee to Ford for "car services" regardless of what brand your car is.
There are many arguments around this one, but my favourite is that because the BBC (usually!) sets such high standards it makes the other terrestrial TV companies (ITV, Chan4/5) and the UK cable companies strive to raise their game also. Hence the benefit for any UK TV watcher regardless of which channel.
It is more like the UK's road fund licence (AKA Car Tax): everyone pays if they own a car because it (is supposed to!) make ALL the roads better!
That said, IMHO I'd say the TV License has had its day and it should be scrapped and an equal amount just taken from income tax instead. This would save money 'cos there'd be no need for all the TV License infrastructure, etc.
.... the domain does not comply with the .com.au regs and should have never been approved registration in the first place. ...
In which case surely the powers that be should be chasing those who are supposed to enforce the rules rather than the people who got past them! It's not their fault the rule enforcers would rather have the money than enforce the rules!
Of course they are. But the Republicans didn't run on a centrist bipartisan platform, did they?
Yer ... Centrist Bipartisanists! Splitters!
Yeah, a heart attack and President Palin ;)
He's not the president, he's a very naughty boy!
I'm not a scientist and I realize that wherever it hits could cause a chain of reactions that affect the entire earth, but isn't the idea to reduce civilian casualties?
Actually, that whole "reduce civilian casualties" malarky would likely be the main problem. The damn politicians would likely be counting up civilians (and in the case of an asteroid strike everyone is a civilian!) rather than working out the most suitable place to do the least damage to the planet! That most suitable place may well be uninhabited - but Antarctica is most certainly isn't (sea level changes).
Even assuming we'd be able to chose a landing target, an empty place that throws large amounts of debris into the atmosphere could end up being worse than landing it somewhere more populated, but with a more suitable geology! In cases like these you have to stop thinking about individuals and think of the health of the planet as a single organism - and let me tell you, that isn't going to happen any time soon!
That's why the Climate Conference is getting nowhere! If the Scientists know the planet is warming then the Scientists should tell the Politicians what the solution is, and the Politicians should tell the World! - it's like going to a Doctor who says you've got cancer, then asking your accountant for the best treatment and he suggests (as all accountants always do!) that cutting all the pencils in half ought to do it! ... hell, you ask ALL the Doctors!
The Doctor says you've got cancer you ask the Doctor what treatment. You ask another Doctor too
The trouble we've got with the AGW problem is the Scientists say there's a problem, but the people are asking the damn homoeopaths and crystal therapists for a solution, and a dilute one at that!
If you were trapped with the latter you'd likely be in a lift.
... A generation ship, however, could solve this problem (kids could very conceivably be raised on a giant ship with lakes and forests and a whole functioning mini-society), but as you said, this would require some incredible engineering. Lifting that much material into orbit really needs a space elevator, for starters. And this still doesn't address the gravity problem; those lakes and forests aren't going to work without artificial gravity. And I personally believe the invention of artificial gravity is going to go hand-in-hand with the invention of FTL drive, as I believe the fundamental nature of gravity and the speed of light are intertwined.
How about we pick a suitable asteroid and hollow the mother out enough to fit inside what we need to live, leaving the rest as "mass" to be ejected as propellant. How's about we set the thing rotating about a suitable axis to provide sufficient 1G habitable floors?
The problem with such an endeavour is that it will be costly. Very costly. There are those who think that the window of opportunity for humans to do something like this is finite. At some point it will become political suicide to suggest we allow some people to starve/freeze/drown/fry/etc to use the money to build this Generation Ship. That point may not be too far in the future ... a couple of hundred years maybe? Maybe considerably sooner!
So, if we don't start Now we may never be able to get off this rock!
... if that means the people on board only experience 5-25 years, how much time will pass on Earth before we found out what this exploration team discovers there? (Remember, once they get there after however many years (hundreds? thousands?), they'd have to send their data by radio at light-speed, which would take yet another 28 years.) ...
Er ... hang on ... so you reckon it might take 5 to 25 years (from their perspective) to get there, but hundreds of years as far as those left behind see it?
Assuming 25 years to get there + the 28 years to send a Light Speed message back - hey, we'd get a message from them before they arrive!
I don't get it! Surely their perspective of the time to get there must be longer than it would take light to get there if they are travelling at Sub Light speeds? Our perspective may well see it as even longer, but they can't get there in less time than light if they travel slower than light?
Or maybe I need to pick up a Relativity Made Easy book ...
... it can be necessary when you hit the zone.
Yep! It never ceases to amaze me how the upper echelons of management can be so utterly clueless about how their companies work! Time after time I've worked in places where stupid decisions such as these are made - such as changing from different office space for the Sales/Marketing type folks and the Programmers/Developers to lumping them all in the same open plan office so we can all be "one big team"! 'Cos that's just what I like when I'm trying to code - sales and marketing buffoons talking too damn loud on the 'phone etc! Other 'funny' decisions is stuff like insisting that Programmers/Developers must all wear suits and ties because if you look smart you will work smart. Programmers often have their little foibles and management will ALWAYS be trying to shoe-horn them (us!) into their view of how Programmers should be! It's laughable really - I thought this sort of thing would stop happening once the IT people started to rise up through management and get to the top, but it still seems to be mostly the accountant types who get the top jobs (and they still cut pencils in half to save money!).
Being in The Zone is such a great feeling too, then some numbnuts manager will come over and ask for a progress report and blow it all away!
Still, it's kind of cool that you can make a battery out of sand.
Yep, and to charge it you just turn it over!
It seems more and more reasonable to give kids their own version of the internet completely. That way we wont get crazy someone think of the children laws.
Surely the only logical solution is to have a Paedophiles only Internet ...
You know, this post just sums up the problem for me. People who randomly talk about sex with strangers are the problem. I can't think of a situation where I would randomly talk about sex with anyone I don't know.
I'm not a prude or anything, I just think that this is just a sign of how meaningless sex has become, and now people are acting like dogs in heat, trying to mate with anything that moves.
If you RT*A (bleeped one word because I don't know how old you are!) you will see that talking about sex is not a requirement of the conversation to potentially put you outside the (Canadian) law. This is about luring (what is usually known as grooming in the UK) and just being nice to someone, asking about and/or listening too their problems, being a sympathetic ear, offering any advice (useful or not!), being funny, even just being vaguely humerous, saying it's raining where you are and it's about 5pm. ANYTHING that could even vaguely be seen as trying to befriend could, can, WILL be seen as luring/grooming.
Who was it said something about Governments liking laws that basically mean everyone has done something wrong 'cos it's a great way to control the population!
Of course, parents also have to give their kids a bit of freedom and not always be peeking over their shoulder.
Hmmmm. Almost! I'll fix it for ya:-
Parents also have to give their kids a bit of freedom and not be caught peeking over their shoulder!
My sister let her kids walk to school on their own and they were totally unaware that she followed them the first 'n' times, until she was happy they were being sensible, etc. The kids got their freedom and Sis kept her peace of mind!
I did that when I was a kid (learned how to make explosives on the internet). However, I also learned how to build a computer, program, cook, fix my car, argue, etc. on the Internet. In fact, I would say I am where I am today (full-time developer and grad student) because of the information available on the Internet. You gotta take the bad with the good sometimes and deal with the consequences.
Aha ... a school boy error there, as you appear to have decided that learning to make explosives must always be bad? Why?
The knowledge of how to make explosives isn't bad, it's just knowledge, but the thought processes that attribute "badness" to certain knowledge is at the root of all censorship and is actually the problem! Therefore we should censor censorship!
I could imagine a lot of service personnel volunteering for such a cruise - all the ammo you can eat and pirates to shoot at! A four man stick should do nicely!
There is the danger that it just raised the violence on both sides ... if you fight back and lose it would be V. nasty!
But for definite the international powers that be should make it illegal to pay the ransoms - see Israel and the aeroplane hijacking back in the 70s was it? One or two were stormed and the hijackers realised it wasn't going to work again and stopped!
I work in IT. I'm an IT Professional. Do I know anything about fixing windoze? HELL NO! Do people assume I know about PCs and wireless routers and (sheeze!) printers? Yep ... all the time!
To the untrained eye IT is IT is IT. It's like wine tasting vs beer tasting. Until you expose yourself to the knowledge you just think they all taste the same, but it's not the fault of the ignorant (and I do mean "ignorant" and not necessarily "stupid"). It is an opportunity to enlighten them that IT covers such a wide range of knowledge and skills now (and the range of knowledge and skills is growing rather too fast for this old programmer!) that at some point there may well be a divergence, though where the split(s) may appear I don't know!
Case in point: A couple of friends had a company that bought and sold second hand office furniture since before computers appeared on the scene. Not long after computers became de-rigeur in offices the company split because it recognised that "computers" were no longer just "office furniture" - one half taking JUST computers and the other half taking everything else ...
IT will split into different factions just as "office furniture" did when it makes sense for it to do so.
So, what would be a good way to split it up then? Development vs Maintenance? Software (you write stuff to run on H/W) vs Hardware (you build things to run the S/W) vs Repairer (you know how things work and so can configure/fix things & you can talk to real people and so act as an interface between the annoying Users and the equally annoying S/W and H/W people) ...
Look BOTH WAYS EVERY TIME 'cos we do have a few one way streets in Ye Olde Londone
LOL - I sometimes have to work away from home and luckily the route passes close enough to my parents that I can call in and stay overnight.
My (female) boss called home to talk about something or other and the wife picked up. She wasn't sure if it was OK that I stopped off at my folks so she said I was away on business but that she wasn't sure where I was which led my boss to believe that I was playing away.
The conversation the ensued had both women covering for me and was, by both accounts, both anxious and hilarious!
Are taboos on naming female organs really in anyway connected to civilization?
Huh. Huh Huh. Huh. He said female organs. Huh Huh. Huh
Unfortunately they've re-used existing Kiwi tech, so rather than a capsule to hold the pilot they just attach him to the bottom of the rocket with a bungee cord.
The rocket should get about half-way before the cord is tight enough to lift the pilot which has an added benefit, safety-wise, as any problems during the launch and they can just cut the cord!
... All your friends are dead ...
Hey ... this is still slashdot isn't it?
We already have clean, safe fusion energy in the form of solar panels.
Hmmm. Try selling the "clean" part of that to the various parts of the world where they strip-mine for the rare elements that are required for solar(electric) panels!
That said, I'd stand up an applaud your clearly a matter of technology comment. There's a chance that humans simply will never be able to harness fusion but I wouldn't bet on it because we're nothing if not tenacious.
My 5c: Let's all throw everything we've got at fusion tech until we either get it working or discover some fundamental reason why it will never work on Earth!
This is, however, one more piece of evidence to support evolution and one more bit of knowledge that we can use to understand where we came from.
That's one more piece of evidence in a long line of pieces of evidence to support evolution ... ...
Now, let's look at the list of (new?) evidence for Creationism. Hmmmm. Do you all have your lists? Then I shall begin
In the beginning was the void, and the void was our knowledge, and some power hungry people saw that void and thought that it was good ...
Formation of separate parts does not imply that those separate parts will "come together" and actually form RNA, does it? That would be an impressive assumption to make.
LOL: So when we have learned how it was possible that all the parts required could be made naturally and that there's a sufficiently common mechanism that can occur that brings them together and forms RNA what will you rail against next? Do you honestly think we won't work it out?
Throughout the scientific history of Man we have been pushing the religophiles further and further into a corner of their own making to their increasingly desperate chant of "God Did It - God Did It". Railing against scientific evidence is futile and just makes you look like ignorant cavemen and the only religions that will survive will be those who totally accept that if there was any divine hand at work that it was ONLY at work before the first roll of the dice and it hasn't interfered since, because then there will be no way science can EVER disprove it!