The idea is a question that is stupid simple for a person who has existed in this world, but impossible for a computer that lacks the proper context.
Like this: Show a picture of a tree. The user fills in the blank. T-R-E-E. Any dipshit would get that right. Hell, even give them the T. I don't think a computer would get it in three tries - after that, do a 1 hour IP lockout. That should also prevent "guessing."
If you had a bunch of such problems, it would make it pretty tough. Would some of them be solveable some of the time? Maybe. But staying ahead of computers in the Turing test has ALWAYS been very easy.
But I know what you mean about daytime talk shows.;)
Brings up a good point...how does continually evolving software get treated? I imagine that each new version is considered to be "fresh" when it is released, but does that mean you can keep re-releasing it to re-up it? Will people get to pick and choose and try to figure out what bits were written when?
Of course, if anyone is still using the current kernel in 200 years, that's sad. But then that kind of thinking led to the Y2K industry.
So far, I was under the impression no one had won the Turing contest yet. You are beating their trivial problems, but they're finally waking up and shifting the "online human test" to things that people haven't figured out how to code. I'd link to the article if I could remember where I saw it...
Hell, the simplest would be an easy reading comprehension or logic test with a short-answer blank - the computer would never get it, and all humans would.
My guess is that soon, people who REALLY want you out will keep you out.
The easier it is for one of us to put up a proof of concept system, the more likely it is that Solaris x86 will trickle into corps and bring expensive Sun boxes along for a ride.
It's as if you were asleep for the last 10 years of Linux market penetration.
I didn't say it might not be a good idea for sun - obviously, as you mention, the reason they give away Solaris x86 is for sysadmins to play with. And no, I haven't been asleep. In fact, linux is used at my workplace for the same reasons you mention - a few of us were playing around with it, and then...
But while it might be a good idea for them to give away Solaris x86, that isn't to say that all these Stallman Jr.'s on here have any grounds to claim that Sun is EVIL for not giving away everything they own for free, all the time, to any jackass that wants it. For a lot of people on here, it's not about Sun's business practice, OSS has become their freaking religion.
In fact, I doubt very much that Sun gives a rat's ass about the $20/download they will make - I doubt they could fund an office picnic with it. It's likely to separate people into two camps - those who want to dl it because they saw it on/., and those, like sysadmins, who actually are serious about it. Kind of like country club fees in that way - keep out the riffraff.
Quite frankly, you should be glad - that nominal fee will keep your download faster by keeping their bandwidth clear.
Damned good point tho. We really have some self-righteous SOB's on here who feel entitled to all software, without writing a single decent piece of software themselves. $20 for a mature OS with no license limit, and people BITCH. Ingrates.
A check is neutral. Where did you get this bad information? Negative scores only come from late payments, large open debts, and extended dillenquencies.
I got this "bad information" here
among other places. Here's a link to a shorter explanation from the Fair&Isaac website, the people who make the credit score and provide them to Transunion, Equifax, etc.
Sorry, but 10% of your credit score is how many credit checks you've had in the last year. It's not at ALL neutral, unless you're the one checking. If someone told you that, they were misinformed. Here's an excerpt from the site I linked to...
# 35% of the score is based on your payment history. This makes sense since one of the primary reasons a lender wants to see the score is to find out if (and how timely) you pay your bills. The score is affected by how many bills have been paid late, how many were sent out for collection, any bankruptcies, etc. When these things happened also comes into play. The more recent, the worse it will be for your overall score.
# 30% of the score is based on outstanding debt. How much do you owe on car or home loans? How many credit cards do you have that are at their credit limits? The more cards you have at their limits, the lower your score will be. The rule of thumb is to keep your card balances at 30% or less of their limits.
# 15% of the score is based on the length of time you've had credit. The longer you've had established credit, the better it is for your overall credit score. Why? Because more information about your past payment history gives a more accurate prediction of your future actions.
#10% of the score is based on the number of inquiries on your report. If you've applied for a lot of credit cards or loans, you will have a lot of inquiries on your credit report. These are bad for your score because they indicate that you may be in some kind of financial trouble or may be taking on a lot of debt (even if you haven't used the cards or gotten the loans). The more recent these inquiries are, the worse for your credit score. FICO scores only count inquiries from the past year.
# 10% of the score is based on the types of credit you currently have. The number of loans and available credit from credit cards you have makes a difference. There is no magic number or combination of types of accounts that you shouldn't have. These actually come more into play if there isn't as much other information on your credit report on which to base the score.
The problem here, beyond the obvious privacy issues, is that people can be adversely affected by credit checks. I mean, where does this stop? Currently, the more credit checks you have, the worse your credit score becomes. So, if this becomes the norm, and companies start doing this even for potential hires (as they very well may), then there are going to be some people seeing their credit rating downgraded simply because they were looking for a job. It won't make an enormous difference, maybe, but even a small difference can make a difference over the life of, say, a mortgage.
This wouldn't be so bad if getting a house didn't routinely follow getting a job...
...this won't kill all online merchants. Remember, sales tax isn't the only advantage for online merchants - frequently, they have a LOT less overhead (no store, only a warehouse; fewer employees, etc). So I don't think it's quite doomsday.
That said, if they think it won't hurt at all, they're insane, I agree. Who hasn't made sure a vendor for something online wasn't in their home state? I live in CA, and it's hard shopping for computer equipment, but given our 8.25% sales tax, is frequently worth it.
Also, doesn't it seem as if all the companies they mentioned are "clicks and mortar" stores? Since these companies have physical locations everywhere, won't this just about kill their online sites?
...And you could have fixed it!!!
on
Baked Apple
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· Score: 1
You couldn't have fried any of the chips - it would have been absolutely dead. Your troubles sound like what a lot of crappy-MOBO owners have been experiencing lately - a blown (probably electrolytic ) capacitor. These things are generally used for rectifying the power source into the MOBO - a task they would probably have fatally failed in after the lightning strike.;) Symptoms of this are random crashes and such, as you describe. But, with a few $ and a soldering iron, it would have been good as new.
And think, you would have had the COOLEST computer ever. Get a clear case to show off the crispy MOBO, and act all smug when you tell interested onlookers, "Aw, it was just a lightning strike. It works fine..."
That has to be among the absolute worst (I will agree with your clip show analysis, however). Used to, they would totally parody any guest stars, roast them. This one was horrible because N'Sync showed up as themselves, no parody, and they let those retards sing. Used to, celebrities begged to get on the simpsons, and played by their rules. IN this episode, things got reversed. Ever since then, I've cringed every Sunday when the new episodes come out.
Granted, nothing could be as good as the three year stretch from 92-94, but the last three years have been HORRIBLE. Please, get some decent writers again, or let the Simpsons die as graceful a death as it can still manage.
Granted, it probably won't for the reasons you elaborate. But finding a good CFC scavenger (other than ozone, obviously) would still be useful. First, while the industrialized world doesn't use them anymore, most of the world isn't industrialized! Second, the lifetimes of CFC's mean that they'll still be around for a while. So it would still be good to clean them up.
...but not here. By that I mean, that there are a lot of movie genres with in they can get away with releasing cookie-cutter crap - such as kung-fu and teen thriller types, as well as lame-ass Adam Sandler-style comedy. Low budget, decent sales from morons, profit.
However, with Star Trek, you have a generally more educated, somewhat more intelligent, and MUCH more demanding (read: geeky) fan base that doesn't want their star trek to be the same steaming pile of horse crap that the studios typically release.
What was actually in the movie? Did it advance the story at all? No. Character development? No. They need to learn that trek fans expect different things from their movies than the typical moviegoer.
Bottom line is they tried to appeal to a mass audience, probably assuming that 1) star trek fans alone wouldn't support the movie, and 2) star trek fans will come anyway. Well, I would disagree with 1) based on history, and 2) was obviously just disproved by the moviegoing public.
So, what does the studio conclude? Can't possibly be anything wrong with their movie, of course...so they figure if this one didn't succeed, no trek movie will. Disney thought the same thing with their non-CG animated movies - their standard animated movies were tanking, while pixar was doing great. Conclusion? Standard animation is dead. Except then they released Lilo and Stitch, which did extremely well. Now standard animation isn't dead. Of course, it wasn't the crappy movies they released before L&S, no.... And Paramount is making the same mistake.
I agree completely - for some people, "fulfillment" = "not starving." I propose a new acronym for these other crybaby bastards: QYFW. Quit Your F*cking Whining.
I'm sure Marcino picked some obscure Scottish town he'd never heard of, and picked a Scottish journal. Since he hated recognition and all. Oh, and he was born in 1874 - which was just a BIT late.
First off, I tend to agree - mainly on the aspect of owning an expensive car is retarded. My wife and I share an 8 yr old Ford Contour, so that should give away my position on the matter...
To me, the most compelling reason to own a mac is "I just like it." If the thing gives you an extra $1000 (or whatever) of enjoyment over the ~3 years you own it, go for it. Hell, compared to a windows machine, there's a good chance that you'd save $1000 in medical bills from your lowered blood pressure, not having to deal with windows.
However, I will defend, to an extent, people who knock macs. It's not necessarily the absolute price - I would almost bet that any sysadmin with a $30k car isn't running a 400MHz eMachine - it's more likely a really fast P4, probably with a chip under a year old. So, at that point, they're basically saying that they get less computer for their $2000, which I believe - it didn't used to be true, but the arguments of getting less done per clock cycle are harder to maintain with the current disparity. However, I suspect that there are other reasons for their rejecting macs - namely that they *like* building things themselves, which is hard with the lack of hardware diversity for the mac platform. And cost isn't necessarily the issue for everyone - but it is for a lot of us.
Note that I'm not saying I hate macs or whatever - I used to, but I'm starting to love them with OS X. I've basically turned ours at work into a unix box, and it rocks. Given a couple more years of unix integration and I might even get one for my next computer. Especially if they get more games for it.
I agree, Duke's likely getting better students than Eastern Nowhere U. So, basically, you contend that students getting a degree from Duke *should* have higher grades - they're better students! That would be fine if they didn't simultaneously claim that their 3.5 GPA from Duke means more than that from somewhere else.
Ultimately, I don't think they can have it both ways. Either "good" schools should have similar grade distributions as "lesser" schools, or their graduates shouldn't get any benefit of the doubt when, say, companies or grad schools compare GPA's. Right now, they do. I do believe grade inflation is worse at liberal arts schools (based both my experiences and from the majority I have read here so far), and that inflated 3.2 counts for a lot more than it should when they go to get a job.
Hopefully, grad schools and employers will wise up to this - there are good students who go to state schools, if for no other reason than they didn't want to go massively into debt, and I would say that a 3.9 from a state school beats a Harvard 3.5 these days.
It's been well documented that the average career of a programmer is about 4 years
Please provide a reference for this "well documented" statistic, because in my personal experience, it's utter rubbish.
Story here about 3 weeks ago. Can't find it now.
People just can't take being a code monkey, with the insane hours, for longer than that
More rubbish. The 3 senior developers I speak about above all had it put in their contracts that they must do some sort of technical work, specifically NOT to go insane.
Then your experience is not representative of the general IT world. This is a typical response - it isn't true for me, so it isn't true. Your sample size of *1* isn't compelling.
There aren't enough management positions for all of them to get promoted within 4 years
You're just making stuff up now. Take a look at most corporate job postings. Most available positions are in management. Better yet, take a look at this [acinet.org] chart. It's the current job openings in the US, organized by job type. Pay particular attention to number one job (Management) and the number 4 job (Software development).
First, job *openings* aren't representative of total *positions*. Coders are typically gotten at college campuses, not through want ads. Also, the position has to remain open to get on the chart (ie, not immediately filled). Low-level positions are filled faster, as a rule. Second, use your damned brain. Have you ever seen a situation where there were more managers than employees? Come on. Third, it shows that they aren't hiring their managers from within (ie, from their base of coders). So the situation is actually worse than I thought.
I have no idea what your grudge against software development or IT careers is, but you should seriously consider researching your facts before you spout out such drivel.
I don't have a grudge against *anyone* - and since I'm not in IT, I have no vested interest against the indistry as a whole. Why you would think that I have some enmity against the IT profession baffles me. A better question would be, if your job is so wonderful, why are you so touchy about anyone who would state otherwise? Adapted from Macbeth, methinks thou doth protest too much.
You sound like you have an anger thing happening. Maybe it's time for you to up the meds. Forget to take your prozac today?
I would say the one thing that prevents a career in IT for most people is that the low-level jobs are extremely draining (psychologically), and there aren't enough management positions for former programmers, etc.
It's been well documented that the average career of a programmer is about 4 years, before they get promoted, move on to something else, or go insane. People just can't take being a code monkey, with the insane hours, for longer than that. There aren't enough management positions for all of them to get promoted within 4 years, so a lot probably quit for something else.
Of course, it begs the question - why does this situation exist in IT? I think the answer is that there is such a flood of programmers (both domestic and "imports") that employers have 0 incentive to make them happy. Programmers are disposable - those that aren't promoted get used up.
I would say there are only a few ways out of this. Either educate kids how shitty an IT job can be, or close off the tech visas for foreigners. But really, neither will happen. So we get to enjoy generation after generation of programmers (and admins) get disillusioned with what they used to do for a hobby.
Except for maybe the outer few miles, it's completely safe. The earth won't warm that much, and the shelf will only melt at the edges (where it's within a degree or so of 0C now). Within, there's about no chance. The ice in that shelf is *incredibly* old - that's why they take ice cores from it to get a picture of the atmosphere tens of thousande of years ago.
So, a market without Nintendo hardware is possible, just as a market without SEGA hardware is now. We still get their great games, but not on their hardware.
I think the difference between Nintendo and Sega comes down to branding and the fraction of games for that system that were ONLY on that system. The examples given were great: Zelda, Mario, etc. Sega tried, and Sonic was a good series, but it just never became synonymous with Sega the way Mario did with Nintendo. Nintendo had better (and more) platform-exclusive games, and it was easier to identify the Nintendo "style." Also, Nintendo never released their games for other systems - which resulted in brand dilution for Sega, and ultimately, their removal from the console market.
To solve both problems, just put on the most bloated, user friendly, eye-candy-licious version of Redhat or whatever they have. This solves the M$ lawyer issues and the newbie issues. Anyone who's used linux for a while is just going to wipe the damned thing and reinstall anyway.
Basically, linux users want two things when they buy a laptop: First, linux drivers for the hardware. Second, saving some cash by not paying for windows. The rest is irrelevant. Sure, throw in a CD of the latest linux version that the buyer wants to save them the download, whatever.
...is that, when these children become teenagers, that she will be bombarded with a steady stream of the shitty music she lobbied for. What's that Hillary? You hate Brittany Spears? Too F*cking bad! You could have had diversity, but YOU didn't want it. HA!
Slashdot Mirror
Like this: Show a picture of a tree. The user fills in the blank. T-R-E-E. Any dipshit would get that right. Hell, even give them the T. I don't think a computer would get it in three tries - after that, do a 1 hour IP lockout. That should also prevent "guessing."
If you had a bunch of such problems, it would make it pretty tough. Would some of them be solveable some of the time? Maybe. But staying ahead of computers in the Turing test has ALWAYS been very easy.
But I know what you mean about daytime talk shows. ;)
Of course, if anyone is still using the current kernel in 200 years, that's sad. But then that kind of thinking led to the Y2K industry.
Stallman...hahaha...
Hell, the simplest would be an easy reading comprehension or logic test with a short-answer blank - the computer would never get it, and all humans would.
My guess is that soon, people who REALLY want you out will keep you out.
The easier it is for one of us to put up a proof of concept system, the more likely it is that Solaris x86 will trickle into corps and bring expensive Sun boxes along for a ride.
It's as if you were asleep for the last 10 years of Linux market penetration.
I didn't say it might not be a good idea for sun - obviously, as you mention, the reason they give away Solaris x86 is for sysadmins to play with. And no, I haven't been asleep. In fact, linux is used at my workplace for the same reasons you mention - a few of us were playing around with it, and then...
But while it might be a good idea for them to give away Solaris x86, that isn't to say that all these Stallman Jr.'s on here have any grounds to claim that Sun is EVIL for not giving away everything they own for free, all the time, to any jackass that wants it. For a lot of people on here, it's not about Sun's business practice, OSS has become their freaking religion.
In fact, I doubt very much that Sun gives a rat's ass about the $20/download they will make - I doubt they could fund an office picnic with it. It's likely to separate people into two camps - those who want to dl it because they saw it on /., and those, like sysadmins, who actually are serious about it. Kind of like country club fees in that way - keep out the riffraff.
Quite frankly, you should be glad - that nominal fee will keep your download faster by keeping their bandwidth clear.
Damned good point tho. We really have some self-righteous SOB's on here who feel entitled to all software, without writing a single decent piece of software themselves. $20 for a mature OS with no license limit, and people BITCH. Ingrates.
...especially the durable ones.
I got this "bad information" here among other places. Here's a link to a shorter explanation from the Fair&Isaac website, the people who make the credit score and provide them to Transunion, Equifax, etc.
Sorry, but 10% of your credit score is how many credit checks you've had in the last year. It's not at ALL neutral, unless you're the one checking. If someone told you that, they were misinformed. Here's an excerpt from the site I linked to...
# 35% of the score is based on your payment history. This makes sense since one of the primary reasons a lender wants to see the score is to find out if (and how timely) you pay your bills. The score is affected by how many bills have been paid late, how many were sent out for collection, any bankruptcies, etc. When these things happened also comes into play. The more recent, the worse it will be for your overall score.
# 30% of the score is based on outstanding debt. How much do you owe on car or home loans? How many credit cards do you have that are at their credit limits? The more cards you have at their limits, the lower your score will be. The rule of thumb is to keep your card balances at 30% or less of their limits.
# 15% of the score is based on the length of time you've had credit. The longer you've had established credit, the better it is for your overall credit score. Why? Because more information about your past payment history gives a more accurate prediction of your future actions.
#10% of the score is based on the number of inquiries on your report. If you've applied for a lot of credit cards or loans, you will have a lot of inquiries on your credit report. These are bad for your score because they indicate that you may be in some kind of financial trouble or may be taking on a lot of debt (even if you haven't used the cards or gotten the loans). The more recent these inquiries are, the worse for your credit score. FICO scores only count inquiries from the past year.
# 10% of the score is based on the types of credit you currently have. The number of loans and available credit from credit cards you have makes a difference. There is no magic number or combination of types of accounts that you shouldn't have. These actually come more into play if there isn't as much other information on your credit report on which to base the score.
This wouldn't be so bad if getting a house didn't routinely follow getting a job...
That said, if they think it won't hurt at all, they're insane, I agree. Who hasn't made sure a vendor for something online wasn't in their home state? I live in CA, and it's hard shopping for computer equipment, but given our 8.25% sales tax, is frequently worth it.
Also, doesn't it seem as if all the companies they mentioned are "clicks and mortar" stores? Since these companies have physical locations everywhere, won't this just about kill their online sites?
And think, you would have had the COOLEST computer ever. Get a clear case to show off the crispy MOBO, and act all smug when you tell interested onlookers, "Aw, it was just a lightning strike. It works fine..."
Granted, nothing could be as good as the three year stretch from 92-94, but the last three years have been HORRIBLE. Please, get some decent writers again, or let the Simpsons die as graceful a death as it can still manage.
Granted, it probably won't for the reasons you elaborate. But finding a good CFC scavenger (other than ozone, obviously) would still be useful. First, while the industrialized world doesn't use them anymore, most of the world isn't industrialized! Second, the lifetimes of CFC's mean that they'll still be around for a while. So it would still be good to clean them up.
However, with Star Trek, you have a generally more educated, somewhat more intelligent, and MUCH more demanding (read: geeky) fan base that doesn't want their star trek to be the same steaming pile of horse crap that the studios typically release.
What was actually in the movie? Did it advance the story at all? No. Character development? No. They need to learn that trek fans expect different things from their movies than the typical moviegoer.
Bottom line is they tried to appeal to a mass audience, probably assuming that 1) star trek fans alone wouldn't support the movie, and 2) star trek fans will come anyway. Well, I would disagree with 1) based on history, and 2) was obviously just disproved by the moviegoing public.
So, what does the studio conclude? Can't possibly be anything wrong with their movie, of course...so they figure if this one didn't succeed, no trek movie will. Disney thought the same thing with their non-CG animated movies - their standard animated movies were tanking, while pixar was doing great. Conclusion? Standard animation is dead. Except then they released Lilo and Stitch, which did extremely well. Now standard animation isn't dead. Of course, it wasn't the crappy movies they released before L&S, no.... And Paramount is making the same mistake.
Work sucks, that's why they pay you to do it!
I'm sure Marcino picked some obscure Scottish town he'd never heard of, and picked a Scottish journal. Since he hated recognition and all. Oh, and he was born in 1874 - which was just a BIT late.
I drink n' code so much that my blood is too thin to clot. Of course, my code ends up with the strangest variable names...
To me, the most compelling reason to own a mac is "I just like it." If the thing gives you an extra $1000 (or whatever) of enjoyment over the ~3 years you own it, go for it. Hell, compared to a windows machine, there's a good chance that you'd save $1000 in medical bills from your lowered blood pressure, not having to deal with windows.
However, I will defend, to an extent, people who knock macs. It's not necessarily the absolute price - I would almost bet that any sysadmin with a $30k car isn't running a 400MHz eMachine - it's more likely a really fast P4, probably with a chip under a year old. So, at that point, they're basically saying that they get less computer for their $2000, which I believe - it didn't used to be true, but the arguments of getting less done per clock cycle are harder to maintain with the current disparity. However, I suspect that there are other reasons for their rejecting macs - namely that they *like* building things themselves, which is hard with the lack of hardware diversity for the mac platform. And cost isn't necessarily the issue for everyone - but it is for a lot of us.
Note that I'm not saying I hate macs or whatever - I used to, but I'm starting to love them with OS X. I've basically turned ours at work into a unix box, and it rocks. Given a couple more years of unix integration and I might even get one for my next computer. Especially if they get more games for it.
Ultimately, I don't think they can have it both ways. Either "good" schools should have similar grade distributions as "lesser" schools, or their graduates shouldn't get any benefit of the doubt when, say, companies or grad schools compare GPA's. Right now, they do. I do believe grade inflation is worse at liberal arts schools (based both my experiences and from the majority I have read here so far), and that inflated 3.2 counts for a lot more than it should when they go to get a job.
Hopefully, grad schools and employers will wise up to this - there are good students who go to state schools, if for no other reason than they didn't want to go massively into debt, and I would say that a 3.9 from a state school beats a Harvard 3.5 these days.
It's been well documented that the average career of a programmer is about 4 years Please provide a reference for this "well documented" statistic, because in my personal experience, it's utter rubbish.
Story here about 3 weeks ago. Can't find it now.
People just can't take being a code monkey, with the insane hours, for longer than that More rubbish. The 3 senior developers I speak about above all had it put in their contracts that they must do some sort of technical work, specifically NOT to go insane.
Then your experience is not representative of the general IT world. This is a typical response - it isn't true for me, so it isn't true. Your sample size of *1* isn't compelling.
There aren't enough management positions for all of them to get promoted within 4 years You're just making stuff up now. Take a look at most corporate job postings. Most available positions are in management. Better yet, take a look at this [acinet.org] chart. It's the current job openings in the US, organized by job type. Pay particular attention to number one job (Management) and the number 4 job (Software development).
First, job *openings* aren't representative of total *positions*. Coders are typically gotten at college campuses, not through want ads. Also, the position has to remain open to get on the chart (ie, not immediately filled). Low-level positions are filled faster, as a rule. Second, use your damned brain. Have you ever seen a situation where there were more managers than employees? Come on. Third, it shows that they aren't hiring their managers from within (ie, from their base of coders). So the situation is actually worse than I thought.
I have no idea what your grudge against software development or IT careers is, but you should seriously consider researching your facts before you spout out such drivel.
I don't have a grudge against *anyone* - and since I'm not in IT, I have no vested interest against the indistry as a whole. Why you would think that I have some enmity against the IT profession baffles me. A better question would be, if your job is so wonderful, why are you so touchy about anyone who would state otherwise? Adapted from Macbeth, methinks thou doth protest too much.
You sound like you have an anger thing happening. Maybe it's time for you to up the meds. Forget to take your prozac today?
It's been well documented that the average career of a programmer is about 4 years, before they get promoted, move on to something else, or go insane. People just can't take being a code monkey, with the insane hours, for longer than that. There aren't enough management positions for all of them to get promoted within 4 years, so a lot probably quit for something else.
Of course, it begs the question - why does this situation exist in IT? I think the answer is that there is such a flood of programmers (both domestic and "imports") that employers have 0 incentive to make them happy. Programmers are disposable - those that aren't promoted get used up.
I would say there are only a few ways out of this. Either educate kids how shitty an IT job can be, or close off the tech visas for foreigners. But really, neither will happen. So we get to enjoy generation after generation of programmers (and admins) get disillusioned with what they used to do for a hobby.
Happy life!
Except for maybe the outer few miles, it's completely safe. The earth won't warm that much, and the shelf will only melt at the edges (where it's within a degree or so of 0C now). Within, there's about no chance. The ice in that shelf is *incredibly* old - that's why they take ice cores from it to get a picture of the atmosphere tens of thousande of years ago.
I think the difference between Nintendo and Sega comes down to branding and the fraction of games for that system that were ONLY on that system. The examples given were great: Zelda, Mario, etc. Sega tried, and Sonic was a good series, but it just never became synonymous with Sega the way Mario did with Nintendo. Nintendo had better (and more) platform-exclusive games, and it was easier to identify the Nintendo "style." Also, Nintendo never released their games for other systems - which resulted in brand dilution for Sega, and ultimately, their removal from the console market.
Basically, linux users want two things when they buy a laptop: First, linux drivers for the hardware. Second, saving some cash by not paying for windows. The rest is irrelevant. Sure, throw in a CD of the latest linux version that the buyer wants to save them the download, whatever.
...is that, when these children become teenagers, that she will be bombarded with a steady stream of the shitty music she lobbied for. What's that Hillary? You hate Brittany Spears? Too F*cking bad! You could have had diversity, but YOU didn't want it. HA!