This a nearly perfectly incorrect assessment of the geopolitical reality surrounding Iraq, and is a fine example of how the mass-market US media completely fails to educate people.
The real story is fascinating, man. Take some time to educate yourself. Start with this question: what was the United States' chief concern in the Gulf in 1989-1990? What were they worried about?
You have obviously not been following the sanctions very closely over the past several years... otherwise you'd note that the majority of the industrial world, and even other Arab states, do not actually agree with or help the US stance. They did at first, but that support eroded away years ago.
In fact, if you do the research - and it's not difficult, as there isn't anything secret about it - you may be surprised to learn exactly what has been in the US interest, and how US interest has been managed, and how the US media reports it.
And by the way, Saddam hasn't been removed from power in one way or another not because of any laws (it didn't stop us from removing Noriega, if you recall)... Saddam hasn't been removed from power because we have no reason to WANT Saddam removed from power. In fact, Saddam is doing a damn fine job just where he is. If Saddam does leave power and is replaced with someone more overtly friendly to the US, here's a clue: start worrying.
The purpose of the sanctions is not to prevent Saddam from projecting power. If that were the case, things would be quite different. The purpose of the sanctions is to try to remove Saddam from power, and that is, indeed, what most people who swallow the propaganda believe as well.
Of course, either way, the sanctions' effects on Saddam are beside the point, as that isn't where their true value lies. However, you're thinking on the right track!
I don't have any links handy, but I'm sure if you do a little digging you'll find some wire service articles from the few weeks leading up to the invasion of Kuwait. These are very interesting reading. In order to put them into context and understand the story, it'll be necessary to have a basic understanding of the major geopolitical events in the region for the past 50 years - nothing too in-depth, a simple timeline will probably be enough... although it'll be good to know something about general US policies in the region as well, like what happened with the Shah in Iran (or, as a CIA employee put it to me in 1988, y'ever wonder WHY those people are so mad at us?). Put it all together, check out the articles, and ask yourself why the US might tacitly encourage Iraq to invade Kuwait...
The effect of the embargo on Saddam Hussein has been to INCREASE his power. If you stop and think about it, you'll realize why... Saddam already has the wealth, power and contacts necessary to procure basically whatever he wants on the black market. The effect is, if you're an Iraqi and you want access to imported goods - i.e., the Good Life - you will be beholden to Saddam Hussein. If you are part of the middle-class group that Saddam provides for, then what's good for Saddam is good for you.
If there were no embargo, the Good Life incentive to keep Saddam in power would be at least diluted.
At the very, very least, it should be quite clear that if you want to get rid of Saddam, then the sanctions method is, uh, not exactly producing sparkling results yet. In fact, the sanctions only make the ruling class stronger while punishing everyone else.
So ask yourself this... the US is not ignorant of these facts. Why do they work so hard to keep the embargo in place?
There is a reason... but if you think it's all the propaganda you rattled off in your post, you're not using your head. The answer is in plain sight.
While an armed populace would be little threat to today's army, it still is a deterrent.
So... even though a modern army has little to fear from ragtag partisans armed only with small arms, they're still acting as a deterrent?
Any of you gun nuts seen the articles on the upcoming replacement for the M16? The one with exploding shells with timed fuses linked to a laser rangefinder, so you can easily be killed even behind cover or around corners?
Do you realize your varmint rifles aren't protecting you from jack shit, and the government will do what it wants with you whether you have a gun or not? In fact, it looks to me like if the government has a beef with you, and you've got guns, they'll probably use many more and much bigger guns against you, and you will lose. I would say the days when it was practical to fight the government with weapons are long gone, and all the hot air that gets blown about how guns safeguard our freedom and blah blah blah is a fat load of horseshit. Unless someone's got some evidence to the contrary, I just don't see it.
What I do see is: most people who own guns are either paranoid or they just like to shoot or both. I like to shoot guns quite a lot, actually, but I don't delude myself into thinking I'm somehow safer or more free in any way because I own a gun. That's a convenient sentiment, but it just doesn't wash. I mean, who is it exactly you think you're going to have to kill to keep yourself free? What kind of delusional Turner-Diary-Red-Dawn scenario is going through your head that makes you think killing people would ever possibly be a swell idea? Seriously... I don't get it. I want to hear a realistic hypothetical scenario where your United States gun saves you from the United States government.
Bleah... if that's what it means to own a gun, you can keep it. Seems pretty obvious to me that a far more effective deterrent against the government is a good attorney. Bitch all you want, but in my lifetime the ACLU has done a hell of a lot more to protect me from the government than any gun.
I've got a RedHat box that I actually use very rarely. It serves files, and it's been up for well over a year now, and besides updating Samba for Win2K compatibility and a few tweaks here and there, I have very little reason to touch the thing.
Now, I'm a decent enough geek - not the best, but I've seen worse - but I still just don't use Linux enough to A) really get in and learn it well and B) retain what I do learn. But I've got enough of a basic grasp of what's going on that I could do a LOT better with it if there were a place I could go that would JUST GIVE ME THE SYNTAX of what I want to do! I spend more time reading semi-useful man pages and pecking at the keys trying to guess my way around... all I want is a webpage that lists, short and sweet, common examples of syntax. How would I do XYZ? What would that look like? Yes, I know what XYZ *does*, just show me how it looks, dammit! I don't want to wade through a 15-pound book just to find the one line of syntax I need help with.
So that's what I find annoying about trying to move from Windows to Linux. I'm always delighted with how simple Linux is - once I spend three hours to figure out, oh, I had to put a space there, or put that in quotes, or it's "route add default gw", not "route add gw", or you just edit this line in foo.conf, or whatever. There's all kinds of conceptual information out there, and lots of man pages, but not much in the way of a quick and practical reference guide... that I've found, anyway. Suggestions, anyone?
And third is the backup/RAID issue, which will be "resolved in the marketplace"... meaning, I assume, that not all drives will come with this "feature", or there will be some provision for totally disabling it. I wouldn't be surprised if, if this thing goes through at all, we end up with two grades of hard drives, just like the two grades of CD-Rs (data and audio) - consumer and server class, one with the copy control and one without.
Even if they manage to implement this on all hard drives, I doubt most of us here will be hit too hard... like the loopback system, there'll be at least several different ways around this stuff, and I bet even before the first drives are released we'll see effective countermeasures spread across the net. I've seen guys crack the most ridiculous, obscure, obsolete stuff just for the sake of doing it... but these drives would be the Holy Grail for crackers. It'd be a jihad, man. I give these drives approximately a 0% chance of success, even in the short term. It'd make CSS look good in comparison. Maybe I'm overconfident, but history's pretty clear on the success rate of copy control schemes - particularly if the copy control scheme royally fucks legitimate users.
When I first heard about DivX, I said, sweet Jebus, that is one dumbass technology... it was clear from the beginning DivX would go nowhere fast (some people were scared, as I recall, and with legitimate concern, just like now... but... c'mon). I predict this scheme will go nowhere even faster. Maybe it'll actually go into production, and maybe it'll last, and maybe it'll keep Joe Consumer from bootlegging N'Sync and everyone will be happy... but I bet not.
I find that a high-quality monitor and a Matrox card work for me. Crank up the refresh rate, tune the controls just so, set up the lighting around your workstation so it's comfortable, and you should be all set. Never mind with the rest of that stuff. Sunglasses seem like a good idea if your eyes do start to go screwy, though.
I swear by Matrox cards, though. No, you won't get the highest possible FPS out of a Matrox card, if you care about that sort of thing, but put one side-by-side with some other cards and I think you'll see a difference. My office has two workstations with (surprisingly) decent Compaq monitors, one with a Matrox G400 and one with a TNT2, and the difference is pronounced. I couldn't work on the TNT2 machine like I can on the G400. YMMV, natch.
Yup, 10 minutes of the most casual research can unearth mountains of material that debunk this would-be debunker.
First off, your basic premise is flawed. The pros and cons of streetcars has nothing to do with whether or not GM systematically aided their destruction. Streetcars may or may not have been on the way out regardless of GM's actions -- but it's irrelevant to the question of whether or not GM did some nasty business.
I dunno 'bout that... I saw a documentary a year or so ago called "Pripyat", and they spent a lot of time interviewing the workers there.
IIRC, these guys weren't actually being paid! They were promised a good salary, but at the time of filming, at least, they hadn't actually received much of anything.
The safety engineer that the film crew spent the most time with was mainly thankful for the job because they gave him a free hot lunch, and the food was actually pretty decent. It was probably the only real meal of the day for most of the employees. The film crew was incredulous about not being paid, especially considering the enormous responsibility on the shoulders of a Chernobyl safety engineer... but the guy just shrugged. Just the way it goes.
So what is the worst-case failure scenario for a CANDU? Earthquake, terrorist bombing? Is there any conceivable pathway for a significant amount of radiation to spread over an area?
Localroger has stated the case quite clearly and effectively, and it looks like the best the resident Slashdot nuclear apologists can do is ignore him and the blatantly obvious issues he brings up. I wonder how many of these clowns own property in Pripyat.
Hey, I'm a geek, too, and I can see where some of these newer theoretical designs sound pretty damn good, especially considering the alternatives. But given two theoretical futures, I'll take the one with solar shingles, flywheels, LEDs, and ever-increasing efficiency over the one with the Not Quite So Likely to Kill Us All nuke plant. As long as we're talking theoretical here.
HP charging for drivers ain't so crazy. The first one's free, of course, but updates might cost you. They did this with their scanners a while ago - if you wanted to make your scanner work with a fresh install of Win98, you had to pay.
Seemed outrageous to me. I figured it was time to upgrade anyway and bought a $100 Microtek. But on the other hand, it costs them money to keep updating drivers for newer OSs... and once you have a humongous product line, where older equipment doesn't necessarily get obsolete, I can see where you might be looking at some serious manpower to update drivers for all your products for each new OS release. Kinda makes sense to charge a nominal fee at some point. Yeah, it sucks, but there it is.
If electricity were freely available to the masses, that would impose the semiotics of a posttextual paradigm, which would lead to the destruction of our society.
OK, first of all, why does this make sense to anyone? Is it me? Am I just dumb, or is this a little pile of stinking pseudointellectual mumbo-jumbo bullshit? I'm not seeing one coherent thought in that paragraph. Maybe I need more context or something, but I suspect the rest of Hankopf's writing amounts to little more than a reading comprehension test for undergrads. Use enough big words, make the barrier to entry just high enough, and you too can make the most thoroughly stupid idea worthy of serious undergraduate consideration.
What are the semiotics of a posttextual paradigm, and why are they sad?
I can't speak for my fellow pod people, but I can assure you that I reached this particular conclusion independent of the/. or carpetbagger or liberal or republican or whatever hivemind. It's very clear that you are aggressively ignorant. You have opportunities to correct this behavior and learn about the world. It would be in your best interest to take them; unless, of course, you like being where you are, surrounded by people who are truly and irredeemably stupid.
Yeah, yeah, I know, but in the future, I think all states should have this provision in place. It just makes sense.
Cripes, even after the fact, though... if someone had the authority and both sides could agree to it, I think we'd be way better off as a nation. I think there are people out there with the gentlemanly good grace to go along with something like that, but neither of these jerkoffs are it.
I always thought you get what you pay for, but these are the most paid-for candidates in history and so far we're getting nothing but trouble. Go figure.
OK, I see your point, but in the big picture I think this guy did the right thing. This girl was being an asshole. Had the manager of the theatre thrown her out (the mature thing to do about the situation), I'd guess that she probably would've just said, wow, that manager was a dick.
But when other people in the audience are throwing things at your head to try to get you to shut up, I have to think that that makes some kind of impression. Instead of the manager being a dick, perhaps it's, wow, people get pissed if you talk in a theatre.
I think, in general, people are too polite in these situations. I think more people should feel free to chuck small hard objects at people who talk in theatres - as long as they have solid aim.
I went to see "Bringing Out the Dead" one day, and some young loser couple had brought their entire screaming little baby horde with them. That's right, they brought a pack of babies to Bringing Out the Fucking Dead. You know, a Disney flick I can see, but no one has any business bringing their toddlers to a very adult picture like this. And sure enough, the babies would not stay quiet. I quietly stewed for about half an hour. All the other audience members in their entire side of the theatre had already gotten up and moved away from them. It should've been a no-brainer - take your kid outside. In the old days, theatres had "cry rooms" where people with kids could watch a flick and not ruin it for everyone else... it'd be nice if they still had those, but that's what we get for supporting the multiplexes. Anyway... I went and asked for a manager, the mature thing to do, but the manager wasn't in and they weren't sure when he'd return and no one wanted to deal with it. Lovely. So I went back and sat on the back of the seat in front of the couple, staring at them and blocking their view of the screen. There were some very polite and reasonable words exchanged, but their attitude towards the situation was basically, hey, it's a baby, whaddaya gonna do. With no authority to arbitrate, it came down to either them or me leaving, and they weren't budging. So I left. I got a refund, but it was still a drag, and disconcerting to leave a movie half-watched.
What would've been great, though, is if people had gotten up and joined me to confront them. One person you could blow off, but if half the theatre suddenly gathered around and demanded you leave, you'd probably freakin' leave, and you wouldn't make trouble again. But, especially out here in the Northwest, people just don't tend to be confrontational like this.
So anyway... same theory with this. One guy chucking a Starburst might just be a little immature, but half a theatre of people stoning a talker with Starbursts would sure make a proper impression. I'm not saying it'd be the RIGHT thing to do, I'm just suggesting that it might be the most effective thing to do - direct action against public nuisances.
On the other hand, I have been watching "Fight Club" a little too much lately, so maybe I'm just in that kinda mood.
Someone in charge in Florida should just do the obvious...
Statistically, the count in Florida should be considered a tie. Therefore, the electoral votes should be divided.
Simple, to-the-point, fair, non-partisan, and enough with the wanking around. Is there any conceivable reason why this wouldn't be the way to go?
Re:Is Kotkin Living in a Parallel Universe?
on
The New Geography
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· Score: 1
Hey, I can tell you first-hand why someone might flock to states like Washington from places like Flint, Michigan.
It's because Flint, Michigan is a sinkhole of human potential. Apologies to my man Michael Moore, but Flint sucks because Flint sucks. It's possible, I suppose, that Flint sucks so badly that it's gone all the way around and gotten cool again, but not as far as I can tell.
Flint's an interesting study, actually. Years ago, Flint did not suck. Then it did. They tried, desperately, ridiculously, to not let Flint suck. It's easy to say in hindsight they did stupid things, but who knows what you or I might do in their position. Still, all the time, energy and money they invested couldn't prevent Flint from sucking.
I say, screw Kotkin - there are always going to be places that just plain suck (and let's face it, there is no place that doesn't suck in some way, and people have widely varying priorities and opinions). People with the means to do so will always seek to leave the places that suck and find places that don't. So telecommuting makes it slightly easier. So what? It's entirely possible that in the future Flint might not suck. Would Kotkin get his drawers in a bunch if suddenly Flint turned into a Nerdistan? Or if Alabama suddenly became the Silicon Swamp? These things happen. And what of it?
... OK, OK, obligatory concession to Flint - yeah, Angelo's is pretty damn cool, and so is the Kountry Kettle on Dort after the strip bars close. But c'mon... what else ya got?
I'm not ignoring the rising anti-tech sentiment... there IS no rising anti-tech sentiment. WTF? Anyone seen evidence of a rising anti-tech sentiment?
And the WTO protests brought together a pretty wide variety of interests, but I'll be damned if I saw or heard anything resembling any kind of anti-tech sentiment.
The only possible mainstream high-tech backlash I can imagine is the one where everyone realizes, waitaminute, AOL sucks. Aside from that, I'd love to see evidence of this growing anti-tech sentiment.
Slashdot Mirror
This a nearly perfectly incorrect assessment of the geopolitical reality surrounding Iraq, and is a fine example of how the mass-market US media completely fails to educate people.
The real story is fascinating, man. Take some time to educate yourself. Start with this question: what was the United States' chief concern in the Gulf in 1989-1990? What were they worried about?
You have obviously not been following the sanctions very closely over the past several years... otherwise you'd note that the majority of the industrial world, and even other Arab states, do not actually agree with or help the US stance. They did at first, but that support eroded away years ago.
In fact, if you do the research - and it's not difficult, as there isn't anything secret about it - you may be surprised to learn exactly what has been in the US interest, and how US interest has been managed, and how the US media reports it.
And by the way, Saddam hasn't been removed from power in one way or another not because of any laws (it didn't stop us from removing Noriega, if you recall)... Saddam hasn't been removed from power because we have no reason to WANT Saddam removed from power. In fact, Saddam is doing a damn fine job just where he is. If Saddam does leave power and is replaced with someone more overtly friendly to the US, here's a clue: start worrying.
OK, Cogent and AC both:
The purpose of the sanctions is not to prevent Saddam from projecting power. If that were the case, things would be quite different. The purpose of the sanctions is to try to remove Saddam from power, and that is, indeed, what most people who swallow the propaganda believe as well.
Of course, either way, the sanctions' effects on Saddam are beside the point, as that isn't where their true value lies. However, you're thinking on the right track!
I don't have any links handy, but I'm sure if you do a little digging you'll find some wire service articles from the few weeks leading up to the invasion of Kuwait. These are very interesting reading. In order to put them into context and understand the story, it'll be necessary to have a basic understanding of the major geopolitical events in the region for the past 50 years - nothing too in-depth, a simple timeline will probably be enough... although it'll be good to know something about general US policies in the region as well, like what happened with the Shah in Iran (or, as a CIA employee put it to me in 1988, y'ever wonder WHY those people are so mad at us?). Put it all together, check out the articles, and ask yourself why the US might tacitly encourage Iraq to invade Kuwait...
Good point. I'm not sure yet if I'm really buying it, but that's a mighty fine explanation.
That'll give me something to think about during the long redeye flight I'm taking tonight...
The effect of the embargo on Saddam Hussein has been to INCREASE his power. If you stop and think about it, you'll realize why... Saddam already has the wealth, power and contacts necessary to procure basically whatever he wants on the black market. The effect is, if you're an Iraqi and you want access to imported goods - i.e., the Good Life - you will be beholden to Saddam Hussein. If you are part of the middle-class group that Saddam provides for, then what's good for Saddam is good for you.
If there were no embargo, the Good Life incentive to keep Saddam in power would be at least diluted.
At the very, very least, it should be quite clear that if you want to get rid of Saddam, then the sanctions method is, uh, not exactly producing sparkling results yet. In fact, the sanctions only make the ruling class stronger while punishing everyone else.
So ask yourself this... the US is not ignorant of these facts. Why do they work so hard to keep the embargo in place?
There is a reason... but if you think it's all the propaganda you rattled off in your post, you're not using your head. The answer is in plain sight.
While an armed populace would be little threat to today's army, it still is a deterrent.
So... even though a modern army has little to fear from ragtag partisans armed only with small arms, they're still acting as a deterrent?
Any of you gun nuts seen the articles on the upcoming replacement for the M16? The one with exploding shells with timed fuses linked to a laser rangefinder, so you can easily be killed even behind cover or around corners?
Do you realize your varmint rifles aren't protecting you from jack shit, and the government will do what it wants with you whether you have a gun or not? In fact, it looks to me like if the government has a beef with you, and you've got guns, they'll probably use many more and much bigger guns against you, and you will lose. I would say the days when it was practical to fight the government with weapons are long gone, and all the hot air that gets blown about how guns safeguard our freedom and blah blah blah is a fat load of horseshit. Unless someone's got some evidence to the contrary, I just don't see it.
What I do see is: most people who own guns are either paranoid or they just like to shoot or both. I like to shoot guns quite a lot, actually, but I don't delude myself into thinking I'm somehow safer or more free in any way because I own a gun. That's a convenient sentiment, but it just doesn't wash. I mean, who is it exactly you think you're going to have to kill to keep yourself free? What kind of delusional Turner-Diary-Red-Dawn scenario is going through your head that makes you think killing people would ever possibly be a swell idea? Seriously... I don't get it. I want to hear a realistic hypothetical scenario where your United States gun saves you from the United States government.
Bleah... if that's what it means to own a gun, you can keep it. Seems pretty obvious to me that a far more effective deterrent against the government is a good attorney. Bitch all you want, but in my lifetime the ACLU has done a hell of a lot more to protect me from the government than any gun.
According to Amazon's Top 100 poll of great books:
Number 19: Left Behind
Number 20: Catch-22
Sweet suffering Jebus on a pogo stick... this is one sick civilization.
I've got a RedHat box that I actually use very rarely. It serves files, and it's been up for well over a year now, and besides updating Samba for Win2K compatibility and a few tweaks here and there, I have very little reason to touch the thing.
Now, I'm a decent enough geek - not the best, but I've seen worse - but I still just don't use Linux enough to A) really get in and learn it well and B) retain what I do learn. But I've got enough of a basic grasp of what's going on that I could do a LOT better with it if there were a place I could go that would JUST GIVE ME THE SYNTAX of what I want to do! I spend more time reading semi-useful man pages and pecking at the keys trying to guess my way around... all I want is a webpage that lists, short and sweet, common examples of syntax. How would I do XYZ? What would that look like? Yes, I know what XYZ *does*, just show me how it looks, dammit! I don't want to wade through a 15-pound book just to find the one line of syntax I need help with.
So that's what I find annoying about trying to move from Windows to Linux. I'm always delighted with how simple Linux is - once I spend three hours to figure out, oh, I had to put a space there, or put that in quotes, or it's "route add default gw", not "route add gw", or you just edit this line in foo.conf, or whatever. There's all kinds of conceptual information out there, and lots of man pages, but not much in the way of a quick and practical reference guide... that I've found, anyway. Suggestions, anyone?
And third is the backup/RAID issue, which will be "resolved in the marketplace"... meaning, I assume, that not all drives will come with this "feature", or there will be some provision for totally disabling it. I wouldn't be surprised if, if this thing goes through at all, we end up with two grades of hard drives, just like the two grades of CD-Rs (data and audio) - consumer and server class, one with the copy control and one without.
Even if they manage to implement this on all hard drives, I doubt most of us here will be hit too hard... like the loopback system, there'll be at least several different ways around this stuff, and I bet even before the first drives are released we'll see effective countermeasures spread across the net. I've seen guys crack the most ridiculous, obscure, obsolete stuff just for the sake of doing it... but these drives would be the Holy Grail for crackers. It'd be a jihad, man. I give these drives approximately a 0% chance of success, even in the short term. It'd make CSS look good in comparison. Maybe I'm overconfident, but history's pretty clear on the success rate of copy control schemes - particularly if the copy control scheme royally fucks legitimate users.
When I first heard about DivX, I said, sweet Jebus, that is one dumbass technology... it was clear from the beginning DivX would go nowhere fast (some people were scared, as I recall, and with legitimate concern, just like now... but... c'mon). I predict this scheme will go nowhere even faster. Maybe it'll actually go into production, and maybe it'll last, and maybe it'll keep Joe Consumer from bootlegging N'Sync and everyone will be happy... but I bet not.
I find that a high-quality monitor and a Matrox card work for me. Crank up the refresh rate, tune the controls just so, set up the lighting around your workstation so it's comfortable, and you should be all set. Never mind with the rest of that stuff. Sunglasses seem like a good idea if your eyes do start to go screwy, though.
I swear by Matrox cards, though. No, you won't get the highest possible FPS out of a Matrox card, if you care about that sort of thing, but put one side-by-side with some other cards and I think you'll see a difference. My office has two workstations with (surprisingly) decent Compaq monitors, one with a Matrox G400 and one with a TNT2, and the difference is pronounced. I couldn't work on the TNT2 machine like I can on the G400. YMMV, natch.
Yup, 10 minutes of the most casual research can unearth mountains of material that debunk this would-be debunker.
First off, your basic premise is flawed. The pros and cons of streetcars has nothing to do with whether or not GM systematically aided their destruction. Streetcars may or may not have been on the way out regardless of GM's actions -- but it's irrelevant to the question of whether or not GM did some nasty business.
Which they did.
I dunno 'bout that... I saw a documentary a year or so ago called "Pripyat", and they spent a lot of time interviewing the workers there.
IIRC, these guys weren't actually being paid! They were promised a good salary, but at the time of filming, at least, they hadn't actually received much of anything.
The safety engineer that the film crew spent the most time with was mainly thankful for the job because they gave him a free hot lunch, and the food was actually pretty decent. It was probably the only real meal of the day for most of the employees. The film crew was incredulous about not being paid, especially considering the enormous responsibility on the shoulders of a Chernobyl safety engineer... but the guy just shrugged. Just the way it goes.
Excellent post.
So what is the worst-case failure scenario for a CANDU? Earthquake, terrorist bombing? Is there any conceivable pathway for a significant amount of radiation to spread over an area?
Yeah, and boy, was THAT all worth it! Thanks, DoD! Way to protect us!
Localroger has stated the case quite clearly and effectively, and it looks like the best the resident Slashdot nuclear apologists can do is ignore him and the blatantly obvious issues he brings up. I wonder how many of these clowns own property in Pripyat.
Hey, I'm a geek, too, and I can see where some of these newer theoretical designs sound pretty damn good, especially considering the alternatives. But given two theoretical futures, I'll take the one with solar shingles, flywheels, LEDs, and ever-increasing efficiency over the one with the Not Quite So Likely to Kill Us All nuke plant. As long as we're talking theoretical here.
HP charging for drivers ain't so crazy. The first one's free, of course, but updates might cost you. They did this with their scanners a while ago - if you wanted to make your scanner work with a fresh install of Win98, you had to pay.
Seemed outrageous to me. I figured it was time to upgrade anyway and bought a $100 Microtek. But on the other hand, it costs them money to keep updating drivers for newer OSs... and once you have a humongous product line, where older equipment doesn't necessarily get obsolete, I can see where you might be looking at some serious manpower to update drivers for all your products for each new OS release. Kinda makes sense to charge a nominal fee at some point. Yeah, it sucks, but there it is.
Let me just make sure I have this correct:
If electricity were freely available to the masses, that would impose the semiotics of a posttextual paradigm, which would lead to the destruction of our society.
OK, first of all, why does this make sense to anyone? Is it me? Am I just dumb, or is this a little pile of stinking pseudointellectual mumbo-jumbo bullshit? I'm not seeing one coherent thought in that paragraph. Maybe I need more context or something, but I suspect the rest of Hankopf's writing amounts to little more than a reading comprehension test for undergrads. Use enough big words, make the barrier to entry just high enough, and you too can make the most thoroughly stupid idea worthy of serious undergraduate consideration.
What are the semiotics of a posttextual paradigm, and why are they sad?
I can't speak for my fellow pod people, but I can assure you that I reached this particular conclusion independent of the /. or carpetbagger or liberal or republican or whatever hivemind. It's very clear that you are aggressively ignorant. You have opportunities to correct this behavior and learn about the world. It would be in your best interest to take them; unless, of course, you like being where you are, surrounded by people who are truly and irredeemably stupid.
Good luck.
You seem to believe in despotism.
You seem to be an idiot.
Yeah, yeah, I know, but in the future, I think all states should have this provision in place. It just makes sense.
Cripes, even after the fact, though... if someone had the authority and both sides could agree to it, I think we'd be way better off as a nation. I think there are people out there with the gentlemanly good grace to go along with something like that, but neither of these jerkoffs are it.
I always thought you get what you pay for, but these are the most paid-for candidates in history and so far we're getting nothing but trouble. Go figure.
OK, I see your point, but in the big picture I think this guy did the right thing. This girl was being an asshole. Had the manager of the theatre thrown her out (the mature thing to do about the situation), I'd guess that she probably would've just said, wow, that manager was a dick.
But when other people in the audience are throwing things at your head to try to get you to shut up, I have to think that that makes some kind of impression. Instead of the manager being a dick, perhaps it's, wow, people get pissed if you talk in a theatre.
I think, in general, people are too polite in these situations. I think more people should feel free to chuck small hard objects at people who talk in theatres - as long as they have solid aim.
I went to see "Bringing Out the Dead" one day, and some young loser couple had brought their entire screaming little baby horde with them. That's right, they brought a pack of babies to Bringing Out the Fucking Dead. You know, a Disney flick I can see, but no one has any business bringing their toddlers to a very adult picture like this. And sure enough, the babies would not stay quiet. I quietly stewed for about half an hour. All the other audience members in their entire side of the theatre had already gotten up and moved away from them. It should've been a no-brainer - take your kid outside. In the old days, theatres had "cry rooms" where people with kids could watch a flick and not ruin it for everyone else... it'd be nice if they still had those, but that's what we get for supporting the multiplexes. Anyway... I went and asked for a manager, the mature thing to do, but the manager wasn't in and they weren't sure when he'd return and no one wanted to deal with it. Lovely. So I went back and sat on the back of the seat in front of the couple, staring at them and blocking their view of the screen. There were some very polite and reasonable words exchanged, but their attitude towards the situation was basically, hey, it's a baby, whaddaya gonna do. With no authority to arbitrate, it came down to either them or me leaving, and they weren't budging. So I left. I got a refund, but it was still a drag, and disconcerting to leave a movie half-watched.
What would've been great, though, is if people had gotten up and joined me to confront them. One person you could blow off, but if half the theatre suddenly gathered around and demanded you leave, you'd probably freakin' leave, and you wouldn't make trouble again. But, especially out here in the Northwest, people just don't tend to be confrontational like this.
So anyway... same theory with this. One guy chucking a Starburst might just be a little immature, but half a theatre of people stoning a talker with Starbursts would sure make a proper impression. I'm not saying it'd be the RIGHT thing to do, I'm just suggesting that it might be the most effective thing to do - direct action against public nuisances.
On the other hand, I have been watching "Fight Club" a little too much lately, so maybe I'm just in that kinda mood.
Someone in charge in Florida should just do the obvious...
Statistically, the count in Florida should be considered a tie. Therefore, the electoral votes should be divided.
Simple, to-the-point, fair, non-partisan, and enough with the wanking around. Is there any conceivable reason why this wouldn't be the way to go?
Hey, I can tell you first-hand why someone might flock to states like Washington from places like Flint, Michigan.
It's because Flint, Michigan is a sinkhole of human potential. Apologies to my man Michael Moore, but Flint sucks because Flint sucks. It's possible, I suppose, that Flint sucks so badly that it's gone all the way around and gotten cool again, but not as far as I can tell.
Flint's an interesting study, actually. Years ago, Flint did not suck. Then it did. They tried, desperately, ridiculously, to not let Flint suck. It's easy to say in hindsight they did stupid things, but who knows what you or I might do in their position. Still, all the time, energy and money they invested couldn't prevent Flint from sucking.
I say, screw Kotkin - there are always going to be places that just plain suck (and let's face it, there is no place that doesn't suck in some way, and people have widely varying priorities and opinions). People with the means to do so will always seek to leave the places that suck and find places that don't. So telecommuting makes it slightly easier. So what? It's entirely possible that in the future Flint might not suck. Would Kotkin get his drawers in a bunch if suddenly Flint turned into a Nerdistan? Or if Alabama suddenly became the Silicon Swamp? These things happen. And what of it?
... OK, OK, obligatory concession to Flint - yeah, Angelo's is pretty damn cool, and so is the Kountry Kettle on Dort after the strip bars close. But c'mon... what else ya got?
I'm not ignoring the rising anti-tech sentiment... there IS no rising anti-tech sentiment. WTF? Anyone seen evidence of a rising anti-tech sentiment?
And the WTO protests brought together a pretty wide variety of interests, but I'll be damned if I saw or heard anything resembling any kind of anti-tech sentiment.
The only possible mainstream high-tech backlash I can imagine is the one where everyone realizes, waitaminute, AOL sucks. Aside from that, I'd love to see evidence of this growing anti-tech sentiment.
Well, OK, that may be true, but man, it hardly fits with the incendiary stereotyping I was shooting for there.