Anything that's music-related...instruments, amps, etc...is extremely pricey. A decent brand-name USA-made professional-quality electric guitar will set you back $2,000-$3,000, and the same with an amp (thinking of an example of a new Gibson Les Paul and a 50 watt Marshall half-stack). That's the best part of $10,000 for just *ONE* guitar players' personal rig in an average good-quality bar/club cover band!!
Correction: they CAN be extremely pricey. My first electric bass cost $50. The amp was expensive, about $250.
A lot of people believe that they can buy talent. It hasn't happened yet, but that doesn't stop people from buying (and selling) $4,000 guitars. Which is not to say that a $4,000 guitar isn't better than a $50 one. But the $50 one will make noise, and in a crowded, noisy basement bar with lousy acoustics that's good enough.
The Scientific groups are very active too and they are in fact thanking the lack of mainstream (clueless idiots). Mainstream is busy with their "Web 2.0" sites and censoring every single opinion they don't like.
That would have been a lot more poignant if it hadn't been posted to Slashdot.
I like how you help Mac newbies on USENET. I particularly like it because it presumes Mac newbies will go to USENET to get answers for their newbie questions.
Google didn't pay $500M to Deja for "porn" you know. They bought the real Usenet which consists of ASCII characters.
I have no idea why Google paid $500M for DejaNews, and I bet you don't either. Hell, I bet Google doesn't know, outside of "it's data, and we want to put our ads on it".
And Comcasts' internet is so pitiful in terms of what it promises and what it delivers that the fact they sell it at all is practically a breach of contract, regardless of fine print.
I have Comcast Internet. I am utterly satisfied with it. Of course, I don't download hundreds of gigs of pirated movies either. I have a Netflix subscription for that. When I need to download a CD image of some Linux distro, I just use FTP and I get 400-500 Kbps. I almost never use torrents because, if I'm not looking for the Most Popular Thing On The Internet Right Now, there are no seeders. It took two days to download a few MP3s of Grieg playing Grieg. Why? Because it wasn't a ripped copy of [i]Bloodrayne[/i].
The idea that Comcast should provide enough bandwidth to every customer to do whatever they want was such an outlandish and ridiculous claim it didn't really need to be rebutted.
Oh, you mean on the Comcast lines that were partially funded by U.S. taxpayer dollars that were given to Comcast (and others) to get the Internet infrastructure to reach as many people as possible?
So... what? They didn't accomplish that?
How about instead Comcast actually do what they were supposed to do and build capable infrastructure that has enough bandwidth for everyone to do anything?
Ahh, I see, they didn't give you EVERYTHING for FREE. With a PONY. And SPRINKLES.
Teenage Marxists are the most annoying species on Earth.
If he's actually thinking, then great. Unfortunately it's a lot more likely that he's trying to come up with a way to straddle the fence.
Somebody who is well versed in all arguments against a position can produce a counter-argument instantly. That doesn't make him right or wrong, but it doesn't make him worse than the guy who has to invent a position in an instant.
Oh, piffle. Just because I'm not infatuated by Obama doesn't make me a right-wing fanboy.
Would it help if I said that I find all three (D, R, and L) candidates giant shit-sacks? Probably not.
I've done the Outraged Partisan bit. I've tried the Fervent Ideologue schtick for a while, too. It's all junk. "If I vote for this guy, we'll have 14 hours of sunshine and unicorn farts for everybody! If the other guy wins, the tides will reverse, the Sun will dim, and my fridge will cease to store dairy and poultry at a safe temperature." Believing that there is a significant difference between one party and the other is an appeal to magic. It sure does feel good, though, right?
I suspect it shows that pretty much anybody, subjected to enough scrutiny, will fall afoul of the law.
How come Anonymous isn't trying to crack into Obama's accounts? I mean, other than the fact that he's never held a position important enough to be held to such exacting standards.
Again, I think you have an expectation problem, rather than that Intel has a design problem. I use a first-edition Macbook all day, every day. I heap amazing abuse on it. Granted I don't play any games on it other than the (very) occasional Flash game. But the graphics are exquisitely adequate for my needs. And as WoW shows, a game can certainly fit inside the graphics chip's bailiwick. The problem lies elsewhere and is not inherent to integrated graphics.
When a vast number of scientists say it's true, "I don't think it's right" is not a valid answer unless you've got a PhD.
I know you're being a bit hyperbolic, but that isn't terribly different from a priesthood. And honestly, that's the very vibe I get from some of the more vocal scientists--"Sit down, shut up and listen to what I'm saying. I have a Ph.D." I'm not sure we're doing ourselves any favors by swapping one set of gatekeepers for another.
What did we do to our industry? How bad have we fucked it up? Can we change it by unionizing? I'll do anything at this point.
I don't think unionizing is the answer, simply because "IT" is so nebulous. The guy that reboots the Exchange server twice a week works in IT, too.
You touched on the main problem, IMO. "Magic all the time." Everybody has had this conversation: "I've got this idea, we can make a 3-D world and have the users click on tiny representations of our products and have them animate, and they can pick colors and options and then they can buy it. Can you have something in place by next month?" Because it seems that it would be simple to use, it must be simple to program, right? There's a big disconnect between reality and expectations.
Suppose you're a new hire, fresh out of college. You're not really sure of your position, so you say, "yeah, I can do that." Then, somehow, you do it, or something close enough. Expectations have been met, but you've just worked 90 hour weeks and you're burnt out. There's a list of bugs a mile long, it doesn't work on Windows 98 and the CEO wants to be able to edit the products' parameters himself using his Blackberry. "Can you do fix that this week?"
It ups the ante and expectations, and I'm not sure what can be done to rein it in, or if we even want to. This kind of stuff drives innovation in the industry and opens up new jobs.
IMO, the best hedge against this is to carve out a niche and to get really good at it. Then you can consult or hire out your services. The more control over your destiny you have the better your chances of not getting pantsed by somebody else.
A single vote rarely changes much, that's true. But the outcome of the election can change a lot. It's incorrect to draw any conclusions from the proportion of elected officials to other employees: the elected ones give the orders, the rest just carry them out. Even the lobbyists and media have to work within a framework built by elected officials.
That's perhaps the most naive thing I've read in months.
Yes, thanks for reinforcing my point. Elections matter.
You missed the sarcasm, I guess. You're ascribing a lot of weight to this election, but seem to be woefully short on specifics. However your assertion that Gore would have prevented the flooding in New Orleans tells me how unserious you really are.
Slashdot Mirror
Correction: they CAN be extremely pricey. My first electric bass cost $50. The amp was expensive, about $250.
A lot of people believe that they can buy talent. It hasn't happened yet, but that doesn't stop people from buying (and selling) $4,000 guitars. Which is not to say that a $4,000 guitar isn't better than a $50 one. But the $50 one will make noise, and in a crowded, noisy basement bar with lousy acoustics that's good enough.
The Blackberry Curve doesn't. I've missed that feature once or twice, but not too much. Cellphone video is the only thing worse than cellphone photos.
You joke, but John Sidgmore used to yammer on about balloons all the time. It's not necessarily a crazy idea.
That would have been a lot more poignant if it hadn't been posted to Slashdot.
I like how you help Mac newbies on USENET. I particularly like it because it presumes Mac newbies will go to USENET to get answers for their newbie questions.
I have no idea why Google paid $500M for DejaNews, and I bet you don't either. Hell, I bet Google doesn't know, outside of "it's data, and we want to put our ads on it".
E-mail is mainstream. USENET is fringe, and these days nearly useless. Unless you're looking for porn. Which I bet is what you use it for.
I have Comcast Internet. I am utterly satisfied with it. Of course, I don't download hundreds of gigs of pirated movies either. I have a Netflix subscription for that. When I need to download a CD image of some Linux distro, I just use FTP and I get 400-500 Kbps. I almost never use torrents because, if I'm not looking for the Most Popular Thing On The Internet Right Now, there are no seeders. It took two days to download a few MP3s of Grieg playing Grieg. Why? Because it wasn't a ripped copy of [i]Bloodrayne[/i].
The idea that Comcast should provide enough bandwidth to every customer to do whatever they want was such an outlandish and ridiculous claim it didn't really need to be rebutted.
So... what? They didn't accomplish that?
Ahh, I see, they didn't give you EVERYTHING for FREE. With a PONY. And SPRINKLES.
Teenage Marxists are the most annoying species on Earth.
You don't know what "if" means, do you?
Way to not overreact. Let me guess--Obama fan?
If he's actually thinking, then great. Unfortunately it's a lot more likely that he's trying to come up with a way to straddle the fence.
Somebody who is well versed in all arguments against a position can produce a counter-argument instantly. That doesn't make him right or wrong, but it doesn't make him worse than the guy who has to invent a position in an instant.
Man, this is all so familiar. It's like reliving the Clintons in the '90s all over again.
Who's making excuses? Hang her high if you want.
I just wonder about the decision to pile on Palin. As Great Satans go she's pretty benign. Why the antipathy?
Oh, piffle. Just because I'm not infatuated by Obama doesn't make me a right-wing fanboy.
Would it help if I said that I find all three (D, R, and L) candidates giant shit-sacks? Probably not.
I've done the Outraged Partisan bit. I've tried the Fervent Ideologue schtick for a while, too. It's all junk. "If I vote for this guy, we'll have 14 hours of sunshine and unicorn farts for everybody! If the other guy wins, the tides will reverse, the Sun will dim, and my fridge will cease to store dairy and poultry at a safe temperature." Believing that there is a significant difference between one party and the other is an appeal to magic. It sure does feel good, though, right?
In your opinion, CEOs are hired based on who they know. No other reason. That's utterly ridiculous, and Feynman couldn't educate you.
Say, how many CEOs do you know?
I suspect it shows that pretty much anybody, subjected to enough scrutiny, will fall afoul of the law.
How come Anonymous isn't trying to crack into Obama's accounts? I mean, other than the fact that he's never held a position important enough to be held to such exacting standards.
You don't know what you're talking about.
If there are no more scientits, I don't want to live on this Earth anymore.
Again, I think you have an expectation problem, rather than that Intel has a design problem. I use a first-edition Macbook all day, every day. I heap amazing abuse on it. Granted I don't play any games on it other than the (very) occasional Flash game. But the graphics are exquisitely adequate for my needs. And as WoW shows, a game can certainly fit inside the graphics chip's bailiwick. The problem lies elsewhere and is not inherent to integrated graphics.
That's funny, I know somebody who plays WoW on a Macbook. Giant raids can get slideshowy, but most of the time it works okay.
I think you're expecting a lot from a $1000 notebook.
It's pretty easy to tell it's something other than a native Mac application. It has that raw look of an X app, which is appropriate I guess.
It's interesting. I'm happy they did it as a proof of concept. Good for them. I'd rather drink paint than use it, though.
Let me guess--you've never run fiber or a water line, right?
Because otherwise it wouldn't happen?
Or maybe you'd like to be out there digging ditches and laying pipe for free. Sounds to me like you're willing. You should start cold-calling mayors.
Uh, the only way this suit could happen is if the municipality granted monopolies via utility easement regulations.
I mean, it sucks, but attempting to link it to your own partisan purposes makes you a dick.
I know you're being a bit hyperbolic, but that isn't terribly different from a priesthood. And honestly, that's the very vibe I get from some of the more vocal scientists--"Sit down, shut up and listen to what I'm saying. I have a Ph.D." I'm not sure we're doing ourselves any favors by swapping one set of gatekeepers for another.
I don't think unionizing is the answer, simply because "IT" is so nebulous. The guy that reboots the Exchange server twice a week works in IT, too.
You touched on the main problem, IMO. "Magic all the time." Everybody has had this conversation: "I've got this idea, we can make a 3-D world and have the users click on tiny representations of our products and have them animate, and they can pick colors and options and then they can buy it. Can you have something in place by next month?" Because it seems that it would be simple to use, it must be simple to program, right? There's a big disconnect between reality and expectations.
Suppose you're a new hire, fresh out of college. You're not really sure of your position, so you say, "yeah, I can do that." Then, somehow, you do it, or something close enough. Expectations have been met, but you've just worked 90 hour weeks and you're burnt out. There's a list of bugs a mile long, it doesn't work on Windows 98 and the CEO wants to be able to edit the products' parameters himself using his Blackberry. "Can you do fix that this week?"
It ups the ante and expectations, and I'm not sure what can be done to rein it in, or if we even want to. This kind of stuff drives innovation in the industry and opens up new jobs.
IMO, the best hedge against this is to carve out a niche and to get really good at it. Then you can consult or hire out your services. The more control over your destiny you have the better your chances of not getting pantsed by somebody else.
That's perhaps the most naive thing I've read in months.
You missed the sarcasm, I guess. You're ascribing a lot of weight to this election, but seem to be woefully short on specifics. However your assertion that Gore would have prevented the flooding in New Orleans tells me how unserious you really are.