Well, a few years ago I came across a park with a big outdoor party going on, full of Chinese engineers and engineering students. They seemed to be having a good time, and I thought about walking over to see what it was all about. Then I noticed the big sign saying "Chinese Only!"
The truth is that the thousands of Chinese students are here for one reason, and one reason only: to pick our brains, and suck all the oxygen out of higher education in the United States (every U.S. student that can't find a spot because a Chinese student took it is to China's advantage.) They have no interest in having anything whatsoever to do with American culture... well, any that do are probably too afraid to try. So don't expect too much.
I dunno about WoW, but I do know that Valve's Steam Content Distribution System uses a Torrent-like swarming protocol... mainly because they hired Bram Cohen to write it for them.
These assholes (just like the RIAA) aren't out for redress of grievance... they want deterrence. That means you have to royally fuck over company after company, and hope that the word gets out and scares other people into "compliance" (whatever that actually means.) The only difference in methodology is that the RIAA targets individuals, and the BSA targets organizations. In either case, it's virtually indistinguishable from more traditional forms of racketeering.
When it comes to patent trolls, the music and movie industry, and software producers it just seems like they are able to get away with treating their customers like dirt more than anywhere else.
No shit. Around 1990 or so I was doing video games for trade shows, and I was carrying the backup computer system into McCormick place on setup day. I got challenged by some union drone, of course, but fortunately I had my customer with me. As it happened, he was the CEO of a multi-billion-corporation. After a very brief exchange between the drone and the executive, I continued on to our booth equipment in hand. Oddly enough, after that we didn't have any problems carrying the rest of our stuff in.
All in all, a very pleasant experience from my perspective.
whatever entity ends up collecting those fees will have no incentive to actually distribute them, and will probably do its level best to hang on to them. That's the problem with all such schemes. Furthermore, how do you determine who is a artist deserving of compensation? Hell, for that matter how do you determine who is an artist in the first place? If it's just a simple matter of registering oneself with the government as a musician, hell, sign me up right now. I wouldn't mind some free money.
You mean that Americans (who happened to be black) invented them. I don't mean anything derogatory by that, but making such distinctions only serves to demean those individuals and their works. The implication is that there's something so noteworthy about a black person achieving anything of substance that their race must be mentioned. Of course black people have made significant contributions to our society, our culture and our technology. So have French, Greeks, Germans, Italians, Russians, Czechs and millions of others of all nationalities. Why does their ethnic background matter so much to some people? They were all citizens of this great nation, all helped to make it what it is today. That should be enough.
My girlfriend is a true African-American... she came to the U.S. about twenty-five years ago from that continent, earned her citizenship, and has the right to call herself an African-American. But she doesn't. She calls herself an American and she's proud of that. This is her country now. As for me, I was born here, but I don't go around brandishing my ethnic roots. That would be complicated, since I'd be something like a "Greek-Irish-German-with-some-other-stuff-mixed-in-American". Not so easy on the ears.
She told me flatly that she could cure all of them of their desire to be called "African Americans" by the simple expedient of sending them to her home country for a few months. Most of them would come back here and would count themselves lucky to be Americans. Bad as things can be for many people in the United States, there are places that are worse. Much worse.
That was a problem at work for me some time ago. Now, I know that a tolerance for interruptions depends upon one's personality and job. However, as a software developer, I liken it to someone building a house of cards, and then having some well-meaning idiot knock it down every half hour or so. Incredibly frustrating and annoying.
Well, yes and no. There are some that are powered by thermionic emission (ala the SNAP generators of old), but I believe we've only orbited one or two that actually had a fission reactor on board. The Russians also launched some that were powered that way as well (one had a serious malfunction, as I remember.)
The Illinois Tollway Authority is a bureaucracy of the worst stripe.
My presumption was, from the very beginning, that they were keeping such records. That's why I refused to get an I-Pass, because I don't like being tracked, just as a matter of general principle. I wasn't surprised to find out that I was right.
As a matter of fact, adoption rates for I-Pass transponders were not what they were hoping to get (maybe a lot of other people felt the same way I do, I don't know) so about a year ago they just decided to double the rates for people using the manual lanes. You know, to "encourage" them to buy an I-Pass. Basically a hearty "fuck you" to everyone on the toll roads: do what we want or we'll just stick it to you.
This happened not long before it came out that the Tollway had accumulated nearly a billion dollar surplus.
there's not many countries with the tech to launch something that big.
True, and shortly the United States won't be one of them, when the last Shuttle is decommissioned. I dunno though... can any of our current launch vehicles handle something like this satellite? I presume the Russians could still handle it (I'm too lazy to Google right now.)
I agree, that's why I said, "with improved algorithms". Ten years, fifty... eventually it will get done unless we find a better way of communicating with computers. Direct neural interface, perhaps. Something like that would be indistinguishable from telepathy, and a darned sight more useful.
And there are reasons to believe that the increase in rate of change is, itself, speeding up.
That's been evident for a long time. If the pace of progress were even remotely linear, people would have a much easier time predicting it. But it's not, and they fail pretty much every time, and have been failing for over a century.
Who knows... maybe we'll live to see Vernor Vinge's Singularity.
Forget voice recognition/synthesis and all that crude claptrap... I want a brain implant capable of accessing symbolic thought patterns directly. Just think about something and the machine will figure out what it is that you want to know, and feed the information back into your head as if you'd just remembered it naturally. You wouldn't even have to know the difference between a "real" recollection and one that was put there on-the-fly. You would just know stuff. Need to perform some integral calculus? No need to boot up your desktop PC... let the implant do the work! So long as it's connected to the global network it could find out anything that's been published, access any service it would need to do what you want. How cool would that be? Imagine you're a scientific researcher and you're thinking about what to do for your next study: you'd instantly know what's already been done in the field. Want to control your home? Just think it! {"She's getting into the mood, better start dimming the lights and fading up the music."}
I mean, LSD was supposed to "expand the mind", but this kind of technology could actually do it.
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Well, a few years ago I came across a park with a big outdoor party going on, full of Chinese engineers and engineering students. They seemed to be having a good time, and I thought about walking over to see what it was all about. Then I noticed the big sign saying "Chinese Only!"
... well, any that do are probably too afraid to try. So don't expect too much.
The truth is that the thousands of Chinese students are here for one reason, and one reason only: to pick our brains, and suck all the oxygen out of higher education in the United States (every U.S. student that can't find a spot because a Chinese student took it is to China's advantage.) They have no interest in having anything whatsoever to do with American culture
I dunno about WoW, but I do know that Valve's Steam Content Distribution System uses a Torrent-like swarming protocol ... mainly because they hired Bram Cohen to write it for them.
ALso, if you say thisn isn't a good time, can you come back in a week? they go get marshals.
Sure, because they don't want to give you time to clean house.
These assholes (just like the RIAA) aren't out for redress of grievance ... they want deterrence. That means you have to royally fuck over company after company, and hope that the word gets out and scares other people into "compliance" (whatever that actually means.) The only difference in methodology is that the RIAA targets individuals, and the BSA targets organizations. In either case, it's virtually indistinguishable from more traditional forms of racketeering.
It sucks you cant ignore them either because they supposedly act with some kind of government authority.
They have the same "authority" as the RIAA. They lie to the courts and law enforcement and get the cops to do their dirty work.
When it comes to patent trolls, the music and movie industry, and software producers it just seems like they are able to get away with treating their customers like dirt more than anywhere else.
... have you driven a GM car lately?
I dunno
Fuck the BSA.
I wouldn't, if I were you. You don't know where they've been.
No shit. Around 1990 or so I was doing video games for trade shows, and I was carrying the backup computer system into McCormick place on setup day. I got challenged by some union drone, of course, but fortunately I had my customer with me. As it happened, he was the CEO of a multi-billion-corporation. After a very brief exchange between the drone and the executive, I continued on to our booth equipment in hand. Oddly enough, after that we didn't have any problems carrying the rest of our stuff in.
All in all, a very pleasant experience from my perspective.
Why is it that arrogant, self-aggrandizing ignorant fuckwits like this get any media time at all?
On the other hand, they let the President open his mouth on occasion too.
whatever entity ends up collecting those fees will have no incentive to actually distribute them, and will probably do its level best to hang on to them. That's the problem with all such schemes. Furthermore, how do you determine who is a artist deserving of compensation? Hell, for that matter how do you determine who is an artist in the first place? If it's just a simple matter of registering oneself with the government as a musician, hell, sign me up right now. I wouldn't mind some free money.
You mean that Americans (who happened to be black) invented them. I don't mean anything derogatory by that, but making such distinctions only serves to demean those individuals and their works. The implication is that there's something so noteworthy about a black person achieving anything of substance that their race must be mentioned. Of course black people have made significant contributions to our society, our culture and our technology. So have French, Greeks, Germans, Italians, Russians, Czechs and millions of others of all nationalities. Why does their ethnic background matter so much to some people? They were all citizens of this great nation, all helped to make it what it is today. That should be enough.
... she came to the U.S. about twenty-five years ago from that continent, earned her citizenship, and has the right to call herself an African-American. But she doesn't. She calls herself an American and she's proud of that. This is her country now. As for me, I was born here, but I don't go around brandishing my ethnic roots. That would be complicated, since I'd be something like a "Greek-Irish-German-with-some-other-stuff-mixed-in-American". Not so easy on the ears.
My girlfriend is a true African-American
She told me flatly that she could cure all of them of their desire to be called "African Americans" by the simple expedient of sending them to her home country for a few months. Most of them would come back here and would count themselves lucky to be Americans. Bad as things can be for many people in the United States, there are places that are worse. Much worse.
I always thought the doubling was to screw over Wisconsinites.
Well, that was certainly a fringe benefit.
That was a problem at work for me some time ago. Now, I know that a tolerance for interruptions depends upon one's personality and job. However, as a software developer, I liken it to someone building a house of cards, and then having some well-meaning idiot knock it down every half hour or so. Incredibly frustrating and annoying.
Well, yes and no. There are some that are powered by thermionic emission (ala the SNAP generators of old), but I believe we've only orbited one or two that actually had a fission reactor on board. The Russians also launched some that were powered that way as well (one had a serious malfunction, as I remember.)
True ... but I have to pay six tolls a day, to and from work. That's not counting other places I go where I have to use the tollway system. It adds up.
Absolutely ... they were so focused on mating and finding food and stuff that they totally forgot to watch out for asteroids.
The Illinois Tollway Authority is a bureaucracy of the worst stripe.
My presumption was, from the very beginning, that they were keeping such records. That's why I refused to get an I-Pass, because I don't like being tracked, just as a matter of general principle. I wasn't surprised to find out that I was right.
As a matter of fact, adoption rates for I-Pass transponders were not what they were hoping to get (maybe a lot of other people felt the same way I do, I don't know) so about a year ago they just decided to double the rates for people using the manual lanes. You know, to "encourage" them to buy an I-Pass. Basically a hearty "fuck you" to everyone on the toll roads: do what we want or we'll just stick it to you.
This happened not long before it came out that the Tollway had accumulated nearly a billion dollar surplus.
Have you tried this one?
That's a joke, son.
I'm not sure that Stevens qualifies as a nutso, but he certainly gives every appearance of being an ignoramus.
"Good riddance".
...
Now if we can just get him to leave Congress
there's not many countries with the tech to launch something that big.
... can any of our current launch vehicles handle something like this satellite? I presume the Russians could still handle it (I'm too lazy to Google right now.)
True, and shortly the United States won't be one of them, when the last Shuttle is decommissioned. I dunno though
I agree, that's why I said, "with improved algorithms". Ten years, fifty ... eventually it will get done unless we find a better way of communicating with computers. Direct neural interface, perhaps. Something like that would be indistinguishable from telepathy, and a darned sight more useful.
And there are reasons to believe that the increase in rate of change is, itself, speeding up.
... maybe we'll live to see Vernor Vinge's Singularity.
That's been evident for a long time. If the pace of progress were even remotely linear, people would have a much easier time predicting it. But it's not, and they fail pretty much every time, and have been failing for over a century.
Who knows
No more annoyign tpyos!
Yeah, we'll call them "Freudian slips" instead.
And just how are they going to say "LOL"?
Probably by saying "laughing out loud."
Forget voice recognition/synthesis and all that crude claptrap ... I want a brain implant capable of accessing symbolic thought patterns directly. Just think about something and the machine will figure out what it is that you want to know, and feed the information back into your head as if you'd just remembered it naturally. You wouldn't even have to know the difference between a "real" recollection and one that was put there on-the-fly. You would just know stuff. Need to perform some integral calculus? No need to boot up your desktop PC ... let the implant do the work! So long as it's connected to the global network it could find out anything that's been published, access any service it would need to do what you want. How cool would that be? Imagine you're a scientific researcher and you're thinking about what to do for your next study: you'd instantly know what's already been done in the field. Want to control your home? Just think it! {"She's getting into the mood, better start dimming the lights and fading up the music."}
I mean, LSD was supposed to "expand the mind", but this kind of technology could actually do it.