You misunderstand the implications of the 80-20 rule. In this case it's not 80% of the people will only ever need what's in, for example, Star Office. Rather it's 80% of the time they'll only need that.
Which leaves a rather traumatic week waiting to happen for the poor IS guys when their CFO or other office sends out a document to the entire company using that niche feature that StarOffice doesn't support. I.S. can't afford to take that risk, 'cuz they'll be blamed, not the Officer for ignoring the limitations of the lower-cost product.
That's what makes Windows the default and not Linux. I would love for Linux to be something we could standardize on, but telling the marketing department, "No, you can't use that software, try this other one" when the employees had used the former at their previous companies won't work. And each department will have that happen.
Families will have the same problems. My folks run Windows. I've given them PrintMaster, PaintShop Pro, etc., knowing full well they could pop in the CD and be running the tutorial shortly. I don't have to worry about which version glib they may have, or even if they're running a certain OS - they're running Windows. But is "Blues Clues" available for Linux? Is PrintMaster?
If something works 80% of the time and frustrates me 20%, I dump it. So does almost everyone else. Even 5% is too much. That's the problem with your application of the 80-20 rule.
Don't get me wrong; I love Opera. I've been a paid user of it for years, even paid for two different versions (including the current), but there are some real problems with it.
The two biggies are that it craps out completely frequently, at least on my systems, and it has rendering and JavaScript parsing errors. I brought the JavaScript errors to their attention over a year ago and they still aren't fixed. Rob Malda and I discussed some of the rendering errors several years ago, before I was able to prove that they were on Opera, not Slashdot, and they've improved but it still has trouble on lots of pages. JavaScript works better on Netscape and perfectly on I.E., which is ironic considering I wrote it precisely to Netscape's standard.
You could make the claim that the crashes and rendering errors are due to standards being violated, but that doesn't help when the problems are with sites like CNN and AltaVista. Opera makes sacrifices I can't live with daily.
The interesting thing about the article to me is not the question, "Is English the dominant language and will it continue to be?", but rather these statements...
The Internet is capable of helping immigrants everywhere to remain proficient in their first language
. People could use their computers that way (in English)But why would we want to do that?
Ah yes, another Ivory Tower Artist worshipping diversity above all. Her viewpoint is essentially that people want to stay in their own language if they can, and that they inherently value their culture.
I think she over-subscribes to her theory. If it was accurate, Baywatch and other American cultural icons would not have the impact they do. If she were right, the vast majority of immigrants would form enclaves and insist on speaking their native tongue, rather than attempting to assimilate quickly. (Granted, there are enclaves, but they are very much the minority.) Lastly, if they saw it her way, there would be no cross-cultural fertilization or information flow; instead, the whole world would be balkanized.
When people hop on the web, it is for information, entertainment, or interaction. All of these are available (on the web) in greater quantity in English right now than in other languages. This is likely to be a self-supporting fact, as the creators of information and entertainment aim for the largest audience, which then becomes larger due to the material, etc. Very much like Windows vs. the Mac.
The survey is believable, but the pablum they pass for "reasons" aren't.
For example, this line: "A lot of our socialization has steered girls away from technology", according to Scherr (her mother), about her 10-year old. Gee, she's 10! If she's screwed up, it's her mother's fault! Any bets on whether she accepts the blame?
If young girls aren't getting involved, perhaps the better solution is to take away their telephones. Build a language that lets them model societies (or introduce them to programming through SimCity.) But don't blame the system, and fer cryin' out loud, don't screw up the boys to equalize the stats.
That's where I disagree with both you and the premise of the book/article. Neither Korea nor Vietnam were any more legitimate than Iraq; in many ways they were less so, since Iraq was busy decimating Kuwait. We rode to the rescue with smart bombs, better radar, etc.
What's the difference? It cost us fewer lives than Korea or Vietnam, and was more successful. And you claim that makes it wrong? Or that we entered too easily?
Lastly, allow me to point out that the U.S. has been reluctant to enter/support many of the recent U.N. policing activities. We seem to still be war-averse, not because of the risk but because we've learned that we should go in without a clear exit goal.
Newspapers have several advantages over other media: they can be read anywhere, without batteries, in bright sun. They can be tossed when done. You can download the information (i.e. buy a paper) with no effort and little money almost anywhere. They are the ultimate portable information source.
Except that they lack information. Newspaper writers tend to be trying to change the world, not merely reporting on it. The articles are very strongly biased, the editorials more so, and the information shallow. Of course the highly-educated well-connected techies won't read them, while they continue to have the same amount of content as a typical usenet group.
If they really want to fix the problem, they would first start screening out all opinion. Then they would add deeper research into the stories and provide more information. Provide URLs at the end of each story where we can go for more information. Let the newspaper be our portal.
Lastly, Jon foolishly attacks newspapers for their lack of graphics. The Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times are doing fine with minimal graphics. So is Slashdot. Heck, see many graphics on this page? Jon, get a clue - most of us can read and don't need pretty pictures for information disemmination. Sometimes they help, but what picture or graphic would, for example, improve the comprehension of this story?
Re:Get non-Wince version, or get a Learning remote
on
The Do-It-All Remote?
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· Score: 1
The Marantz one IS the Pronto. Same company, same body, largely the same software.
I had heard, though, that they do run WinCE. I don't know how to verify this.
Currently, college-educated folk have a much much lower birthrate than non-college educated in the U.S. And I doubt most of those plan their pregnancies. Consequently, we may wind up with a Tolkienesque mix of 90% children born of under-educated families with less money and less stress on education, and the remaining 10% being designer-babies born to highly-educated high-income families.
Eventually, the numbers will shift even further, and we may wind up with either Elves and Trolls or with something out of H.G. Wells "The Time Machine".
Until, of course, some new disease comes along and wipes out half the population, including all of the designer babies, at which point we'll start over.
Yes the company owns the bandwidth, the server, software, but do they actually own a piece of mail? I think if it is sent to the company and not an individual, then yes, otherwise, no.
If the mail is to or from a representative of the company, as indicated by the email address, it is company-business and therefore not private to the employee.
In other words, if the employee sends/receives email from their ISP account at work, that mail is theirs. If the employee works for FiggleDat, any sent/received mail to JoeEmployee@FiggleDat.com is company-relevant.
This is especially important considering the company may be held responsible for abuse from that account... such as inappropriate postings, propagation of child-porn, or even just damage to the company reputation.
I wrote into our Network Use Policy that porn, etc., are forbidden and that using email or the net for them is a firing offense.
However, I also wrote into the policy that we will not investigate or snoop without a formal request from at least one "executive". (Director/V.P. level, of which there are three here.)
Lastly, the policy is also that we do not permanently archive email except for that saved to the "permanent archival" area, and we do not cache URLs. While this does open the door to violators covering their tracks, it does close the door to a large degree on our liability... because there aren't records we should have been checking.
If a user is under suspicion by a manager, proof is not needed immediately anyhow. The appropriate action is for that manager (or H.R.) to have a conference with that user to say: "There have been some complaints. We have not verified their validity, but you may want to be alert and careful."
Unfortunately, many H.R. people (and middle-level managers) are petty enough to prefer to bash people rather than getting on with solving the problems.
I don't think it's a case of retailer mark-up. I've spent a bit of time doing volunteer work in the inner-city. To these kids, shoes and jackets are the primary status symbols, and they DO spend on them.
A big chunk of that difference can probably be explained by the higher prices charged by "inner city" retailers.
I don't see that as the issue at all. Race is linked to culture and culture is the issue. Many blacks have a different culture than economically-similar whites.
For example, a few months ago, Harper's Bazarre had an interesting stat. I don't remember the exact words/numbers, but these are close: Dollars the average American highschooler spends on sneakers in a year: $1100. Dollars the average inner-city African-American highschooler spends on sneakers in a year: $2400
The priorities are different. And we can't fix these from the outside. We can't drag them up-hill. It's finally a clear case where they can't scream and cry "racism".
There is one solution: That community must switch philosophies from that of entitled victim to that of self-empowerment. Just like the rest of us. They finally can't blame anyone else.
!Dozer wrote:
If you make race the issue then it becomes the focal point of the discussion. It seems to me that the issue is really one of economics - people that do not have the income available to them to purchase a computer and internet service. Those people could be white, black, hispanic, tall, short, fat, hairy or blue.
Does MS include Crypto in Win9x? No, partly because they couldn't export it if they did.
Products like this are made for global consumption, they are also made to match the lowest common denominator.
It doesn't work quite like that. Several companies I've been at, including Peter Norton Computing, produced domestic and for-export versions of the same software. The only difference was the inclusion (or, in one case, the number of DES bits of) of encryption.
The bill is stupid, but it's not Microsoft that will suffer; it's smaller companies and perhaps database and ecommerce companies. They can't afford off-shore development and production.
I'm surprised that the DVD is as different from the Criterion Collection Laserdisc. The laserdisc is extremely cool, including (among others)...
Additional sound tracks for commentary from the directors/actors/etc.
Scenes that were deleted from the film (I don't remember the Stay Puft head scene referred to in the article though)
Some great split-screen stuff where you see it before and after adding the special effects
Lots of storyboards (storyboards are basically poster-based presentations used to plan out a movie or play)
Theatrical trailers
Parts of a show "The Making of Ghostbusters"
The screenplay
Comments on how much was scripted vs. not scripted. (Oddly, Bill Murray's part was more scripted and less improvised than the others.)
I have several such Criterion Collection discs (also have Blazing Saddles and Spinal Tap, and probably a few others), but I only watch the supplemental stuff once. It's cool library or party material (for the right party), but not really repeatable entertainment the way the movie itself is.
The DVD's list is pretty different. While there would be a lot of overlap, it sounds like having both would be ideal for the true Ghostbusters Geek. Is there such a thing?
Less Gun Control not More!
on
Why Kids Kill
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· Score: 1
Look at canada. Our crime rate overall is 1/3 of what it is in the us. Our societies are also almost the same. We have gun control, and our country is safer. There are other factors that contribute to this, but gun control is obviously a major one.
OK, look at Mexico. Gun control there is even stricter than in Canada, and yet the gun-crime rate is about eight times higher than in the U.S.
Look at D.C.; it has the strictest gun control in the U.S.... and the highest murder rate.
Another factor to remember: About thirty bombs were found, but only four guns, and of those, one is flat-out banned in the U.S. and the other three are rifles, not hand-guns. Oh yeah, kids can't have guns anyhow.
One of the bombs was made from a 30-pound propane tank. Why aren't you whining for L.P. tank control?
Gun control not only isn't a solution, but in the case, is completely moot. The problem is socialization of fledgeling adults, not guns.
RedHat doesn't appear to have released the new 2.2 on CD-ROM yet. For consistency and recovery purposes, that's my preferred media. Are there any 2.2 distributions on CD-ROM?
Slashdot Mirror
You misunderstand the implications of the 80-20 rule. In this case it's not 80% of the people will only ever need what's in, for example, Star Office. Rather it's 80% of the time they'll only need that.
Which leaves a rather traumatic week waiting to happen for the poor IS guys when their CFO or other office sends out a document to the entire company using that niche feature that StarOffice doesn't support. I.S. can't afford to take that risk, 'cuz they'll be blamed, not the Officer for ignoring the limitations of the lower-cost product.
That's what makes Windows the default and not Linux. I would love for Linux to be something we could standardize on, but telling the marketing department, "No, you can't use that software, try this other one" when the employees had used the former at their previous companies won't work. And each department will have that happen.
Families will have the same problems. My folks run Windows. I've given them PrintMaster, PaintShop Pro, etc., knowing full well they could pop in the CD and be running the tutorial shortly. I don't have to worry about which version glib they may have, or even if they're running a certain OS - they're running Windows. But is "Blues Clues" available for Linux? Is PrintMaster?
If something works 80% of the time and frustrates me 20%, I dump it. So does almost everyone else. Even 5% is too much. That's the problem with your application of the 80-20 rule.
To each their own... I still use an HP 200LX precisely for the following reasons:
1. a CLI, allowing me to easily back up and restore data and perform other apps
2. Compatibility with my primary systems; I can run my inventory and other DOS programs on it.
3. I can EASILY write or port applications for it.
4. The keyboard, which is essential when entering long notes.
You use your PDA one way, I use mine a different way. Wince is fine for you, but woefully inadequate for me. The new Sharp is my fantasy-come-true!
Don't get me wrong; I love Opera. I've been a paid user of it for years, even paid for two different versions (including the current), but there are some real problems with it.
The two biggies are that it craps out completely frequently, at least on my systems, and it has rendering and JavaScript parsing errors. I brought the JavaScript errors to their attention over a year ago and they still aren't fixed. Rob Malda and I discussed some of the rendering errors several years ago, before I was able to prove that they were on Opera, not Slashdot, and they've improved but it still has trouble on lots of pages. JavaScript works better on Netscape and perfectly on I.E., which is ironic considering I wrote it precisely to Netscape's standard.
You could make the claim that the crashes and rendering errors are due to standards being violated, but that doesn't help when the problems are with sites like CNN and AltaVista. Opera makes sacrifices I can't live with daily.
The Internet is capable of helping immigrants everywhere to remain proficient in their first language
. People could use their computers that way (in English)But why would we want to do that?
Ah yes, another Ivory Tower Artist worshipping diversity above all. Her viewpoint is essentially that people want to stay in their own language if they can, and that they inherently value their culture.
I think she over-subscribes to her theory. If it was accurate, Baywatch and other American cultural icons would not have the impact they do. If she were right, the vast majority of immigrants would form enclaves and insist on speaking their native tongue, rather than attempting to assimilate quickly. (Granted, there are enclaves, but they are very much the minority.) Lastly, if they saw it her way, there would be no cross-cultural fertilization or information flow; instead, the whole world would be balkanized.
When people hop on the web, it is for information, entertainment, or interaction. All of these are available (on the web) in greater quantity in English right now than in other languages. This is likely to be a self-supporting fact, as the creators of information and entertainment aim for the largest audience, which then becomes larger due to the material, etc. Very much like Windows vs. the Mac.
For example, this line: "A lot of our socialization has steered girls away from technology", according to Scherr (her mother), about her 10-year old. Gee, she's 10! If she's screwed up, it's her mother's fault! Any bets on whether she accepts the blame?
If young girls aren't getting involved, perhaps the better solution is to take away their telephones. Build a language that lets them model societies (or introduce them to programming through SimCity.) But don't blame the system, and fer cryin' out loud, don't screw up the boys to equalize the stats.
That's where I disagree with both you and the premise of the book/article. Neither Korea nor Vietnam were any more legitimate than Iraq; in many ways they were less so, since Iraq was busy decimating Kuwait. We rode to the rescue with smart bombs, better radar, etc.
What's the difference? It cost us fewer lives than Korea or Vietnam, and was more successful. And you claim that makes it wrong? Or that we entered too easily?
Lastly, allow me to point out that the U.S. has been reluctant to enter/support many of the recent U.N. policing activities. We seem to still be war-averse, not because of the risk but because we've learned that we should go in without a clear exit goal.
Newspapers have several advantages over other media: they can be read anywhere, without batteries, in bright sun. They can be tossed when done. You can download the information (i.e. buy a paper) with no effort and little money almost anywhere. They are the ultimate portable information source.
Except that they lack information. Newspaper writers tend to be trying to change the world, not merely reporting on it. The articles are very strongly biased, the editorials more so, and the information shallow. Of course the highly-educated well-connected techies won't read them, while they continue to have the same amount of content as a typical usenet group.
If they really want to fix the problem, they would first start screening out all opinion. Then they would add deeper research into the stories and provide more information. Provide URLs at the end of each story where we can go for more information. Let the newspaper be our portal.
Lastly, Jon foolishly attacks newspapers for their lack of graphics. The Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times are doing fine with minimal graphics. So is Slashdot. Heck, see many graphics on this page? Jon, get a clue - most of us can read and don't need pretty pictures for information disemmination. Sometimes they help, but what picture or graphic would, for example, improve the comprehension of this story?
I had heard, though, that they do run WinCE. I don't know how to verify this.
Eventually, the numbers will shift even further, and we may wind up with either Elves and Trolls or with something out of H.G. Wells "The Time Machine".
Until, of course, some new disease comes along and wipes out half the population, including all of the designer babies, at which point we'll start over.
If the mail is to or from a representative of the company, as indicated by the email address, it is company-business and therefore not private to the employee.
In other words, if the employee sends/receives email from their ISP account at work, that mail is theirs. If the employee works for FiggleDat, any sent/received mail to JoeEmployee@FiggleDat.com is company-relevant.
This is especially important considering the company may be held responsible for abuse from that account... such as inappropriate postings, propagation of child-porn, or even just damage to the company reputation.
However, I also wrote into the policy that we will not investigate or snoop without a formal request from at least one "executive". (Director/V.P. level, of which there are three here.)
Lastly, the policy is also that we do not permanently archive email except for that saved to the "permanent archival" area, and we do not cache URLs. While this does open the door to violators covering their tracks, it does close the door to a large degree on our liability... because there aren't records we should have been checking.
If a user is under suspicion by a manager, proof is not needed immediately anyhow. The appropriate action is for that manager (or H.R.) to have a conference with that user to say: "There have been some complaints. We have not verified their validity, but you may want to be alert and careful."
Unfortunately, many H.R. people (and middle-level managers) are petty enough to prefer to bash people rather than getting on with solving the problems.
A big chunk of that difference can probably be explained by the higher prices charged by "inner city" retailers.
For example, a few months ago, Harper's Bazarre had an interesting stat. I don't remember the exact words/numbers, but these are close:
Dollars the average American highschooler spends on sneakers in a year: $1100.
Dollars the average inner-city African-American highschooler spends on sneakers in a year: $2400
The priorities are different. And we can't fix these from the outside. We can't drag them up-hill. It's finally a clear case where they can't scream and cry "racism".
There is one solution: That community must switch philosophies from that of entitled victim to that of self-empowerment. Just like the rest of us. They finally can't blame anyone else.
!Dozer wrote:
Products like this are made for global consumption, they are also made to match the lowest common denominator.
It doesn't work quite like that. Several companies I've been at, including Peter Norton Computing, produced domestic and for-export versions of the same software. The only difference was the inclusion (or, in one case, the number of DES bits of) of encryption.
The bill is stupid, but it's not Microsoft that will suffer; it's smaller companies and perhaps database and ecommerce companies. They can't afford off-shore development and production.
- Additional sound tracks for commentary from the directors/actors/etc.
- Scenes that were deleted from the film (I don't remember the Stay Puft head scene referred to in the article though)
- Some great split-screen stuff where you see it before and after adding the special effects
- Lots of storyboards (storyboards are basically poster-based presentations used to plan out a movie or play)
- Theatrical trailers
- Parts of a show "The Making of Ghostbusters"
- The screenplay
- Comments on how much was scripted vs. not scripted. (Oddly, Bill Murray's part was more scripted and less improvised than the others.)
I have several such Criterion Collection discs (also have Blazing Saddles and Spinal Tap, and probably a few others), but I only watch the supplemental stuff once. It's cool library or party material (for the right party), but not really repeatable entertainment the way the movie itself is.The DVD's list is pretty different. While there would be a lot of overlap, it sounds like having both would be ideal for the true Ghostbusters Geek. Is there such a thing?
OK, look at Mexico. Gun control there is even stricter than in Canada, and yet the gun-crime rate is about eight times higher than in the U.S.
Look at D.C.; it has the strictest gun control in the U.S.... and the highest murder rate.
Another factor to remember: About thirty bombs were found, but only four guns, and of those, one is flat-out banned in the U.S. and the other three are rifles, not hand-guns. Oh yeah, kids can't have guns anyhow.
One of the bombs was made from a 30-pound propane tank. Why aren't you whining for L.P. tank control?
Gun control not only isn't a solution, but in the case, is completely moot. The problem is socialization of fledgeling adults, not guns.
RedHat doesn't appear to have released the new 2.2 on CD-ROM yet. For consistency and recovery purposes, that's my preferred media. Are there any 2.2 distributions on CD-ROM?
Those of us with IBM PC110s have been doing this for years!