--just a dumb question (to anyone), but aren't there any add-on cooling systems that use an inert gas for the refrigerant/heat transfer medium rather than liquid water? I really don't know never did any overclocking stuff. Most I've done is attach small fans to the top of passive heat sinks. A gas would solve any leaking problems that could case electrical failure and hardware damage, combined with a thermostat "whoops getting too dang hot boss!" emergency shut down device.
NOPE a real patriot is both intelligent and a student of history, past and reasonably current. A real patriot is able to recognize patterns of deceit and apply them to current events. A real patriot learns from his own and other country's past actions and learns to not keep making the same mistakes over and over and over again. A real patriot can look at a scam, see it for a scam, recognize scams from the past, see where the junta has used scams in the past, and is brave and smart enough to say NO, NEVER AGAIN! A real patriot isn't hungup on political parties and rhetoric, a real patriot is not a member of some fanboy cult over some "leader" or "political party" and stays blind to their misdeeds in the past, a real patriot LOOKS at what individuals do as compared to what they say, and is able to figure out reality rather than have it dictated to them. A real patriot doesn't use the "nuhremberg defense" to excuse illegal actions. A real patriot has the courage to NOT follow illegal orders and to speak out when they see criminality in their ranks and in their superiors actions in the government.
The world has tried the lock step goose stepping methods, it doesn't work, it's heinous and criminal. Real patriots have the courage to actually follow their oaths, and not just BLINDLY follow orders. A real patriot will do these things, false patriots full of bravado and lacking intelligence will follow the old ways that lead to "sieg heil" actions.
Learn from history or be destined to repeat it, you have a binary choice there.
--I agree, that's why I mentioned in the post notifying the police. It just depends on the circumstances how anyone might want to go about it. You can theoretically push the matter as a bunco crime-fraud- and as you suggest let the local prosecutor decide, or try for civil penalties in small claims court, perhaps you lost time from work to return the item, whether or not the money was easily and cheerfully refunded, etc. It could even start as a class action suit, even on a small local size. Variety of ways. Usually you can/should/be advised to always start from a default position that if you as joe little guy have a beef with an entrenched larger and richer org of any kind that any wheels of "justice" are slow and rusted up, but ya never know until you try, who knows you might get a hip local DA who's gotten burnt at home with a crippled CD and has a fume going on about it. If plan A don't work, goto plan B. My position is try plan A or B, because plan C-complaining about stuff as the only option, hardly ever "works" to solve a problem.
--I have, twice, both times against government people seriously abusing their positions, won both times. And you? What have you done?
To me, drm and music cd's are a grade c low interest, I am way more concerned with what I feel are much more important issues, nothing big, just the growing power of this junta that's seized control of the US and is hell bent on inmposing a two class master/serf society based on fear, surveillance, command and control. I "work" on those issues more. I just like commenting "in general" and offerring advice that anyone by themselves *can* make a difference IF they actually follow through and try, IF they think they've been screwed and have some evidence. Anything from organizing a boycott, to a lawsuit to whatever, what DON'T work is just complaining about it. I've looked at this "cd that ain't a cd" issue in the stores, it's obvious as all get out, they are clearly mixed in with "normal" cds and are being sold "the same as".Miniscule fine print in jargon that is meaningless to most people, they are sold and displayed as 'cds" and they aren't. It's a pure scam. It certainly looks like consumer fraud and buncoism to me. So I wrote *IF* this was a concern of mine and I had become a victim, I would calmly go and sue them-whomever was in charge of receiving my money for the counterfeit- in local court. Not enough people do that, they fail to follow through on various things, they just take it where the sun don't shine over and over again. I don't know WHY but I can make some guesses at it, which I outlined above.
This is a commentary forum, I commented,I've seen this same topic of bogus counterfeit non-cd look a likes come up here it seems a hundred times already, yet to hear of anyone actually using "the law" right back at them. Now sometimes-a lot of times-lawsuits are trivial and unwarranted, other times they are necessary and it's always a judgement call. Basic history and research shows that large concerns will continually try to skate the law or alter reality in their favor, BUT, there's differing ways to 'fight back", I encourage those actions and mindset, for people to stop being professiobnal "victims". So ya, it sounds strong, and I'm emotional about it, so what? Better than just hoping someone else does it. Myself, I don't buy cd's except for very occassional older used ones, sometimes entire years go by I purchase zero, I don't download mp3 music whatsoever,I own none of that, zero, and don't own any "illegal" software, but say if I DID purchase pre recorded new retail music and it was a major enjoyment and interest of mine I certainly might sue over these crippled disks. Just encouraging the others here who feel strongly about it-or any other *thing* they feel strongly about- to take the next logical step, and take the moral and legal high ground as well.
--sue. Sue them, and here's how to do it. Take the LOCAL store manager to court, charge "fraud". Simple fraud is a crime. It's *illegal* to sell something that ain't that something. They offer to sell you a "cd" when it's not-it LOOKS like a cd but it isn't. It's fraud. Buncoism, it's against the law, just so widely done now it appears "lawful". You stick a crippled disk in front of 12 people on a jury and ask them what it is they'll say it's a cd, and cd's should play in cd players PERIOD. It's that simple a concept. Don't try changing the big guys all by yourself it ain't happening, don't try suing sony or walmart, take whomever took YOUR money and sold you something that wasn't as advertised to local small claims court or other appropriate venue for your situation and locality. Use this technique as a force multiplier. Don't even let them skate with a refund or a return, KEEP the crippled disk, that's your evidence of fraud, get some people who are "just following orders" to realise there ARE consequences for their actions. This is a basic problem our society has, "just following orders", it's never anyone's fault, nothing "bad" ever has any named human being attached to it just some vague "corporation" that's a bear to deal with, which is nuts, this goes for politics to economics, people just TAKE IT all the time when you don't have to. Don't let them plead ignorance or pass the buck or just rip off the next guy and the next guy and the next guy. If "anyone you" think this is an important enough issue, prove it! Once you get some judgements against these people, it will force THEM to bump it up, because THEY will in turn sue their bosses for being ordered to perpetuate and expand this scam congame. Work exactly at the level the crime occurred, you and your wallet and someone taking your money at a your local store.
If you went into the store to buy shampoo and dumped it on your head and it was shoe polish, would you take it or sue the ^&^*(tards? If they kept selling shoe polish labeled as shampoo? Over and over and over again? If you went into the store and bought a can of corn and opened it up and it had rat parts in it instead of corn, would you sue, or just take YOUR time and go back and get a 'real' can of corn, knowing that half the cans on the shelf labeled corn that looked like cans of corn were in reality canned rat?
The deal is these stores, and their corporate/cartel/monopolist bosses, want cowed sheepish brainwashed consumers, they want you to only grumble, maybe a few people exchange the defective products, they don't want to make the hard decisions that follow ethics, they want to skate the cheapest way they can. Suing some humongous corporation is HARD, suing a place local and a named individual for an exact specific crime is a lot easier and cheaper, and if thousands of people did it this crap would stop tomorrow.
Sam with spammers, in the states where spam is now illegal-WHY aren't there thousands of lawsuits? I'll tell ya why, it's because 99% of people are sheep, easily cowed, don't want to "rock the boat", scared, think their single efforts won't matter, just content to bitch about things but nothing else-whatever, all excuses really for not taking personal indignation and getting shafted right back to the shafter and getting your day in court. If your cause is righteous, you at least have a chance, never even trying means you'll keep getting shafted, which just further emboldens the badguys to keep ripping people off and pulling more and more scams.
If it was me with this particular issue, I'd tell that store manager (get their full name and job title) ONE TIME to stop selling crippled "counterfeit cd look-a-likes" that aren't "cds", that unless they are removed or labeled and displayed and stocked completely separately from REAL cd's PROMINENTLY six ways to sunday with BIG SIGNS that they AREN'T cd's and WON'T play in most normal cd players that you intend to sue HIM in local court personally,that you will file an official police report, then follow through if they keep ripping people off. Getting ripped off the first time is his fault, twice is "your" fault because "anyone you" puts up with it, generally and non specifically speaking.
--get a plug in engine water jacket heater, they work great for your vehicle. Instant nice warm starts, instant heat. I don't live in the frozen north anymore but when I did that was the low tech and still reliable "fix" for cold weather and cold vehicles.
--very interesting idea and having it be like a normal dead trees book in "form" is a great use of human ergonomics. Like how many books do we use that fold up besides playboy centerfolds? I know there's some, but basically this "looks good". Remains to be seen if it performs and how it compares price wise. It would also be nice to have an option of a "no loaded OS" version so that people can choose what they want. I Don't understand the detractors on the thread a lot, this is a niche product same as hundreds of other gadgets out there. To me "more choices" is a good thing.
--no, not sputnik, it was just the realization that they had gotten "up there" first, and 'space nukes" might be soon forthcoming. Was a serious blow to national prestige and thoughts of "invincibility" I guess. Like I said I was just a grade school kid then but it was a BIG DEAL in conversations I overheard. As kids we just looked at pictures and 'artists impressions' drawings, etc. We all went out tried to see it as the newspapers had a track, but I never saw it. I DID see "echo", our satellite, with some binoculars, that was cool.
Neat young geekatroid story. Had one of the first "transistor radios", was also one of the school sliderule and busted briefcase nerds. During one of the earlier geminis, I got to monitor the "news" out on the playground with the radio,where the reception actually "received" -heh- then come in and get on the school PA system and give "updates" every 15 minutes. Nice assignment. Manned launches were always constant tv and radio coverage back then, pre-empted most all other programming. cool beans and stuff.
--I was a gradeschool kid then and I remember that night it was announced. It scared the crap out of the adults. That's really the biggest thing I remember about it, got a sense they were all going "ohh 5|-|!7" and wondering when atomic ww3 was gonna start, because the russians were "so much ahead". I don't recall a lot of "cool-science" talk, nope, it was a lot more along the lines of "dang, russkies got the high ground, this sucks". The awarness of airpower and having the high ground was still pretty much in adults consciousness then, all of them remembered the tremendous advantage the allies had after establishing air superiority in ww2 and to a lesser extent korea, because before that, the outcome of the war was in MAJOR serious doubt.
My pet peeve was the government abandoning the x-series projects, going to the dumb capsule idea. I think if we had just kept developing the "space plane" concept then, we'd be 20 years further down the road to space travel being even more normal than it is now, and a lot cheaper. I also think that yaeger was technically the first guy in "space", certainly close enough.
--there's an obvious two main reasons linux isn't used "more"by windows users. One, windows comes on their machine, it's installed. Two, windows is too hard for them already, they are intimidated by it and as such the thought of something brand new and different is even more intimidating. There's not even an awareness of what an "operating system" is, to most people windows="computer and the intarweb". I know windows users who even after years still cannot do simple easy tasks, have no idea on security, are reluctant to use even what came installed, never even bother to explore all the menu options, etc. I call it "never getting out of first gear", they are content to drive in first gear forever, until they buy another new computer because the old one "doesn't work anymore". rinse lather repeat. And they don't *see* linux, it's NOT on the shelf locally, at least anyplace they go and look. People say "it's at walmart" well, maybe online it is, my local walmart gives you the choice of XP or XP and that's IT. And if you tried to explain there is no "linux company"and the concept of rolling your own or buying a canned distro they would be totally lost, it's an alien idea, it can't exist or it's some program runs on windows they don't know what it does and don't need. I've asked them to stock linux at the local chinamart, they say "naw, that's decided at corporate". Radio Shack, same deal, that's the only two places around here that sell software. Granted this is a rural area but it's where I live and the reason I see around here why linux isn't used or tried. At best people might buy a game, or a very specific application such as a money managing app, but that's it. Once it's in the schools and the kids come home and change their parents home PC's for them, maybe, until then not happening in a big way.
--no cheap labor doesn't make it right, IMO. I am COMPLETELY aganst all this western money and expertise going to china. We were sold a bill of goods that china would "embrace democracy" and "buy our stuff" if we encouraged US and europaen manufacturing to move there. The result has been, well yes, china built up a huge manufacturing base in a short time, and all they buy from us is advanced technology in order to do it even better. They buy advanced machine tooling, the tools used to make more tools to make-everything. And with this chip start, their own complete domestic computers. Lot of giuys been laughing it's "only" a 200, well all I can say is give them a year or two, see how fast they advance. You can do a LOT with not top of the line but still functional computers of these sizes. And with a population of a billion and a half, and with a further market (with cash to spend) in the exploding islamic/oil world of another billion, in a short time they won't need to sell gadgets to the west. they won't need us anymore. We buy walmart trinkets from them, that's it. Next year you are going to see larger home appliances like washing machines coming from them. thgis is a one step at a time deal for them but they are stepping FAST now. They are building their own advanced aircraft, building rockets, and everything possible electronic. I think it's been the biggest economic and political blunder that the US could have made, and there has been zero "quid pro quo", they haven't done one thing about becoming "more free", all they've done is add to their totalitarian population command and control infrastructure, and are building the worlds largest military. At some point they will surpass the US and europe, then they will decide they own the oil. Their demographics and world proven supplies dictate that they need all the oil, and I am convinced they mean to get it. It's coming, and short term profits mentality, combined with western societal indifference, is going to bite us and hard. They turn out engineers by the millions, we turn out team sports players and video game players, generally speaking. They pump out technicians, we create rap stars and people who know how to detail their rides. We are destroying our economy as they are building their's. Something's gonna pop. I am quite doomy and cynical over this situation.
--OK, fair enough. Take the menus, they are a way to navigate around the computer. and to use an e-vile analogy you might not like, take it to giving someone directions, you might say turn at such and such an intersection and street, but usually you'll addlike "there's a chinamart on the corner on the left and a kentucky fried across the street, turn left there' or something like that.
So how to make this concept better, so it's more intuitive and easy? I don't have an answer for that, for me, I find it easier to remember "geographically" (go from bottom>up> over> down across> there, etc) where my menu entry is. I prefer the menu entries themselves once I get there to be text though,not icons, so I guess I like half and half cli/gui. Well sorta, at least I like a word there that names the app and has a short explanation with it. I'm also coming from a mac classic background as opposed to a windows/dos background, so maybe that's part of it. My biggest problem with cli is not only syntax which is hard enough but trying to remember the exact file names with version numbers and where they live to even get to them. It'sa like you can't get there from here unless you already know exactly where "there" is, and if ya did, you wouldn't need to search. It's a catch 22 in a way.
I honestly don't have any sort of answer to how to make it better short of highly customizable icons that allow people to easily use the icons that make sense for them, if they want to use gui. Here's an example I did, my xmms player came with a gnomes foot taskbar icon by default, seemed silly to me, replaced it with a radio looking thing. I know I can type some stuff to "get there" but really see no reason to when it's one click away. The only thing easier would be/might be to just speak to the computer - say "turn on the radio". I had that effect several years ago on the mac and it more or less worked OK unless a "trigger" word was said in the room or like the TV in the background and the computer mic picked it up then it would do something all on it's own, which was pretty dang funny the first few times it happened. Can't even remember the name of that prog right now but it looked like it had promise. Not quite star trek but it turned apps on and off and did simple stuff like that all from voice command. Maybe someone here who used it before and is reading this might recall, it was pretty neat.
--china is completely versant in the concepts of "wealth re arranging and managing" -the current accepted western short term profitas modal- as opposed to "wealth creation"-which was the past standard in the eventually named "industrial world". They have thouroughly embraced vertical manufacturing as a means towards rapid wealth creation,are suceeding at it, and their balance of trade surplusses with other nations around the world reflect these principles. This move by them is logical and quite predictable, and I would expect them to gain expertise in this technology much faster than most people might assume. whether from a white room effort or reverse engineering, it won't matter as long as they do it. In 30 years they have gone from basically an almost total agricultural and antique-class manufacturing country to the premier world's mass manufacturing nation, and by even conservative analyst predictions will have the worlds largest "true" economy based on tangible wealth creation by around 2015.
In short, laugh now while you still can. Now I don't LIKE it, I think especially in the US we have made a complete blunder in our trade dealings with china, but I can't dismiss out of hand what they have accomplished in such a short time, nor can I dismiss what the pressure of having a billion and a half people and a need for jobs and energy and fresh water will do to a nation that is lead from the top down as hard as china's is. They intend to kick booty and take names, and in the near future, on the business battlefield and maybe on the real warfare battlefield.
Think about it, the most often heard comment of chinas amazing recent successes is "cheap labor". Nope, that ain't it,for example the african continent has cheap labor avaialable by the millions and millions, but manufacturing is going to china because they are actually able to *accomplish complex tasks in a very large way* using "cheap labor". There's a BIG difference.
--yes, this is a serious problem, now think on this. Mercedes and similar electronically enhanced & advanced autos are definetly cool, no argument there of course,-until there's a terrorist event. What are you going to do then? Ever think about it? An exosatmospheric EM pulse, or airdropped graphite fibers, or the available plans on the web EM bomb. Then what? The coolness factor is now reduced to OH S|-|!7! Are you sure that's really the vehicle you want, instead of-just for grins-an older 60s muscle car that's been completely restored, or a solid old pickup? Old fashioned "just works" technology?
This is a SERIOUS consideration anymore, no place in the world is "immune" to terrorist events, and it's only a matter of when-not if- that RF/EM devices start to be used. And to me "who" uses them isn't as important as "they will most likely be used". It's too good of a weapon to think it WON'T be used.
This is my opinion of course, but I think it's something to consider.
--I mean really, how is it possible to have a GUI based system that doesn't look at least similar? function will determine form, look at cars, semi streamlined boxes on wheels. Minor differences but basically "car" shaped.
Reality is, 99% of most people think in "pictures", they DON'T think in terms of lines of text/symbols in a console, ergo, you'll get a windowish looking system as the most functional and easiest to understand and use for the most people. I mean what are the options? You have a choice of a box to type in or various boxes with buttons to mash. Use circles or parabolas or some free form weird drawn "border" to delineate the outside boundaries of the app on the desktop? Have your CLI console be round instead of rectangular?
Sure, pure voice control a la star drek computer would be neat, it's still a way's away for the time being.
--the web is worldwide, yes it is. the us has a huge chunk of the web. We make the US a place where spam is illegal, I mean, they got laws up the wazoo about everything else. One simpleeasy to understand law, no unsolcited commercial email. Email has to be truly opt-in. snail mail has a definete serious cost associated with it, tends to be a lot more self regulating that way, wheras email being so completely cheap and easy to send out billions, that it'slong past become a serious problem. So,with it illegal inside the US, and resulting lawsuits and fines, etc taking care of domestic spammers pretty much, the spammer's servers move offshore to send the spam-easy fix to those nations,do they want access to the humongous part of the WWW that is inside the borders of the US? Easy! No problems! Don't send spam, do what YOU have to do inside your countries. We proceed to block those nations internet connections that allow spam to be sent. awhole nation at a time or large netblock followed by another until they get the "message" that spam won't be tolerated. After a few nations start losing millions a day lost revenue and lost connections to the US cash cow, they'll get the message and hunt down their own spammers. It won't END until SPAM DOESN'T PAY, same as with the ridiculous "war on drugs", drug abuse and the crimes associated with it won't get any better until the huge cash profits are removed from it.
I have thought about this a lot, we don't need an "arms race" of anti spam "filter" programs,that just leads to spammer's counter measures, which will lead to anti-anti counter measures,etc, back and forth ad absurdum,forever and ever, it just needs to be made clear to spammers everywhere that there are other ways to make a living.
--you are correct and palast is a GREAT journalist.
the imf/world bank work exactly like the corporate raiders of the 80's, with a twist. They basically come in,secretly bribe off or blackmail enough of the top politicos in a country to get them to agree to these "loan" terms. The collateral is these nations natural resources usually, along with their currencies. After a billion or so gets deposited in dictator A's secret accounts, they bankrupt these countries and own them. THE IMF KNOWS IN ADVANCE THE LOANS CAN'T BE PAID BACK. It's a tremendous scam, causing slavery and strife. They make the mafia loan shark operations look like charity.
here is a relevant paste from a palast article for anyone not familiar with either palast or the true machinations of the imf, it's good:
http://www.zmag.org/ParEcon/palastimf.htm
IMF'S FOUR STEPS TO DAMNATION
How crises, failures, and suffering finally drove a Presidential adviser to the wrong side of the barricades
By Gregory Palast
It was like a scene out of Le Carré: the brilliant agent comes in from the cold and, in hours of debriefing, empties his memory of horrors committed in the name of an ideology gone rotten.
But this was a far bigger catch than some used-up Cold War spy. The former apparatchik was Joseph Stiglitz, ex-chief economist of the World Bank. The new world economic order was his theory come to life.
He was in Washington for the big confab of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. But instead of chairing meetings of ministers and central bankers, he was outside the police cordons. The World Bank fired Stiglitz two years ago. He was not allowed a quiet retirement: he was excommunicated purely for expressing mild dissent from globalisation World Bank-style.
Here in Washington we conducted exclusive interviews with Stiglitz, for The Observer and Newsnight, about the inside workings of the IMF, the World Bank, and the bank's 51% owner, the US Treasury.
And here, from sources unnamable (not Stiglitz), we obtained a cache of documents marked, 'confidential' and 'restricted'.
Stiglitz helped translate one, a 'country assistance strategy'. There's an assistance strategy for every poorer nation, designed, says the World Bank, after careful in-country investigation.
But according to insider Stiglitz, the Bank's 'investigation' involves little more than close inspection of five-star hotels. It concludes with a meeting with a begging finance minister, who is handed a 'restructuring agreement' pre-drafted for 'voluntary' signature.
Each nation's economy is analysed, says Stiglitz, then the Bank hands every minister the same four-step programme.
Step One is privatisation. Stiglitz said that rather than objecting to the sell-offs of state industries, some politicians - using the World Bank's demands to silence local critics - happily flogged their electricity and water companies. 'You could see their eyes widen' at the possibility of commissions for shaving a few billion off the sale price.
And the US government knew it, charges Stiglitz, at least in the case of the biggest privatisation of all, the 1995 Russian sell-off. 'The US Treasury view was: "This was great, as we wanted Yeltsin re-elected. We DON'T CARE if it's a corrupt election.." '
Stiglitz cannot simply be dismissed as a conspiracy nutter. The man was inside the game - a member of Bill Clinton's cabinet, chairman of the President's council of economic advisers.
Most sick-making for Stiglitz is that the US-backed oligarchs stripped Russia's industrial assets, with the effect that national output was cut nearly in half.
After privatisation, Step Two is capital market liberalisation. In theory this allows investment capital to flow in and out. Unfortunately, as in Indonesia and Brazil, the money often simply flows out.
Stiglitz calls this the 'hot money' cycle. Cash comes in for speculation in real estate and currency, then flees at the first whiff of trouble. A nation's reserves can drain in days.
And when that happens, to seduce speculators into returning a nation's own capital funds, the IMF demands these nations raise interest rates to 30%, 50% and 80%.
'The result was predictable,' said Stiglitz. Higher interest rates demolish property values, savage industrial production, and drain national treasuries.
At this point, according to Stiglitz, the IMF drags the gasping nation to Step Three: market-based pricing - a fancy term for raising prices on food, water, and cooking gas. This leads, predictably, to Step-Three-and-a-Half: what Stiglitz calls 'the IMF riot'.
The IMF riot is painfully predictable. When a nation is, 'down and out, [the IMF] squeezes the last drop of blood out of them. They turn up the heat until, finally, the whole cauldron blows up,' - as when the IMF eliminated food and fuel subsidies for the poor in Indonesia in 1998. Indonesia exploded into riots.
There are other examples - the Bolivian riots over water prices last year and, this February, the riots in Ecuador over the rise in cooking gas prices imposed by the World Bank. You'd almost believe the riot was expected.
And it is. What Stiglitz did not know is that Newsnight obtained several documents from inside the World Bank. In one, last year's Interim Country Assistance Strategy for Ecuador, the Bank several times suggests - with cold accuracy - that the plans could be expected to spark 'social unrest'.
That's not surprising. The secret report notes that the plan to make the US dollar Ecuador's currency has pushed 51% of the population below the poverty line.
The IMF riots (and by riots I mean peaceful demonstrations dispersed by bullets, tanks and tear gas) cause new flights of capital and government bankruptcies This economic arson has its bright side - for foreigners, who can then pick off remaining assets at fire sale prices.
A pattern emerges. There are lots of losers but the clear winners seem to be the western banks and US Treasury.
Now we arrive at Step Four: free trade. This is free trade by the rules of the World Trade Organisation and the World Bank, which Stiglitz likens to the Opium Wars. 'That too was about "opening markets",' he said. As in the nineteenth century, Europeans and Americans today are kicking down barriers to sales in Asia, Latin America, and Africa while barricading our own markets against the Third World 's agriculture.
In the Opium Wars, the West used military blockades. Today, the World Bank can order a financial blockade, which is just as effective and sometimes just as deadly.
Stiglitz has two concerns about the IMF/World Bank plans. First, he says, because the plans are devised in secrecy and driven by an absolutist ideology, never open for discourse or dissent, they 'undermine democracy'. Second, they don't work. Under the guiding hand of IMF structural 'assistance' Africa's income dropped by 23%.
Did any nation avoid this fate? Yes, said Stiglitz, Botswana. Their trick? 'They told the IMF to go packing.' Stiglitz proposes radical land reform: an attack on the 50% crop rents charged by the propertied oligarchies worldwide.
Why didn't the World Bank and IMF follow his advice?
'If you challenge [land ownership], that would be a change in the power of the elites. That's not high on their agenda.'
Ultimately, what drove him to put his job on the line was the failure of the banks and US Treasury to change course when confronted with the crises, failures, and suffering perpetrated by their four-step monetarist mambo.
'It's a little like the Middle Ages,' says the economist, 'When the patient died they would say well, we stopped the bloodletting too soon, he still had a little blood in him.'
--was reading here last month or so about using lasers for data transfer. Maybe find that thread/company/method, then use strategically placed and aimed mirrors to "force" a line of sight?
--I meant the OS not the model, hahaha! From memory here in various piles of boxes, I still have a 512k, an LC, a quadra 700, two IIsi's, a PB280c and a PB1400, all quite functional. Mostly I only use the 1400 anymore and it only supports 64 megs of ram, which it has, but even with a CPU upgrade it won't even consider running osx so I won't bother. I did try a very early osx beta that was a free download on a 6400 but that box got lightning fried and it never ran well on that from what I recall.
As to lowendmac, been aware and used that site like years and years, it's a great site. I have a bigger pile of x86 boxes as well, hmm, have to check but maybe almost 20 right now, they come and go. I get what I can afford but I have different interests than "just" computers, spend my loot on other things, like small farm/big garden equipment. If I wanted to spend a lot on new computer equipment I'd much rather get some sort of broadband out here in the boonies but waiting for all this wireless/satellite whatnot to shake itself out more and get cheaper. Quite content with my old IBM pentium running linux right now. I *may* get a much newer mac that I could try osx on sometime if I run into one local for sale used and quite *cheap* and feel like it at the time. There's so many used computers now I just don't buy new or even current/used,I'll let the wealthier folks do that and make the payments, content to wait until almost give away price. As to the OS itself, loved it! Never had much trouble with classic OS, always did what I wanted it to do, was always amused at my windows friends and all their crashing and virus etc and reloading the OS all the time stuff, seemed silly to me but to each their own. I remember having some old 286 cobjob and struggling with dos then trying out a similar vintage mac with gui and a mouse at a yardsale, bought it on the spot, that was the 512k. Of course that was years and years ago but still, it was pretty neat at the time. I also bet they'll be a lot more "classic" OS fans keep their old classic boxes running then-say-amigas or whatnot now. Too many good classic apps that still "just work" for it to be totally abandoned, not just yet anyway.
--I happened to go over to netcraft yesterday and just clicked on longest uptimes and most requested. FreeBSD is heavily represented, in fact it almost owned the top 50 uptimes completely. I've never tried it but just those stats say a lot towards the "just works" angle.
Apple and drawin and osx and etc I just don't know. I am still a mac classic user (and now linux on x86), but was disappointed I couldn't run osx on my older mac machines so never tried it. I kept hoping for some sort of "osx lite" version that would run on machines that don't support so much ram as is apparently required, but oh well. Quite frankly I am sorta bewildered by all the various "licenses". The closest thing I've run into on that personally is I designed and had built a much improved version of a niche tool that's used in certain types of construction,as far as I know the first "commercial" iteration. I never even bothered to even attempt to get a patent, just had built and quickly sold a bunch, within a year I saw a few other versions on the market. I made a little money and I know there's thousands of guys get their work done easier with either my version or some others I have seen, that's "good enough" for me.
--that's weird, I've never had any trouble unsubscribing a particular install after logging in to the account. Sure you are accepting the cookie? That's part of it.
--I thought of something. You said "no headers". Well, maybe no problem, create your own headers which consist of the message you are trying to get across to the bozos, like "Yo! I'm trying to report YOU and you don't have any headers in your SPAM " and etc, e-mail looking formatted to taste.
Alternate like someone else suggested, small claims court, which I think if thousands of people did it in the various states that outlaw unsollicited spam and phone calls and text messages and what not would stop this stuff faster than any amount of bayseian math voodoo spam filters. MSN or spamking or whomever, e mail complaining not working, losing THOUSANDS of court cases and being fined just might, even if it's hard to collect from them eventually some press articles would embarass tyhem enough. Or hey, have bill gates served with the bill from your judgement by a claims processor.
With that said I've never had a hotmail account, are they still freebies? Or do they charge now or what? If it's a freebie I guess you get what ya pay for. I've had bad luck with every "free" email service I ever tried, so don't use them any more, FWIW.
Besides that I dunno and maybe none of this would work. I once had my host eat my website when they got sold to earthfink and no amount of phone calls or emails would resove it, I never did anything about it, as the point was moot, they no longer existed as what they were before. Next time though, if something like that were to happen, I will go the local small claims route. And as soon as spam is made illegal in my state I'll start filing as well. No idea why more people don't sue spammers in the states that allow it.
Slashdot Mirror
--just a dumb question (to anyone), but aren't there any add-on cooling systems that use an inert gas for the refrigerant/heat transfer medium rather than liquid water? I really don't know never did any overclocking stuff. Most I've done is attach small fans to the top of passive heat sinks. A gas would solve any leaking problems that could case electrical failure and hardware damage, combined with a thermostat "whoops getting too dang hot boss!" emergency shut down device.
NOPE a real patriot is both intelligent and a student of history, past and reasonably current. A real patriot is able to recognize patterns of deceit and apply them to current events. A real patriot learns from his own and other country's past actions and learns to not keep making the same mistakes over and over and over again. A real patriot can look at a scam, see it for a scam, recognize scams from the past, see where the junta has used scams in the past, and is brave and smart enough to say NO, NEVER AGAIN! A real patriot isn't hungup on political parties and rhetoric, a real patriot is not a member of some fanboy cult over some "leader" or "political party" and stays blind to their misdeeds in the past, a real patriot LOOKS at what individuals do as compared to what they say, and is able to figure out reality rather than have it dictated to them. A real patriot doesn't use the "nuhremberg defense" to excuse illegal actions. A real patriot has the courage to NOT follow illegal orders and to speak out when they see criminality in their ranks and in their superiors actions in the government.
The world has tried the lock step goose stepping methods, it doesn't work, it's heinous and criminal. Real patriots have the courage to actually follow their oaths, and not just BLINDLY follow orders. A real patriot will do these things, false patriots full of bravado and lacking intelligence will follow the old ways that lead to "sieg heil" actions.
Learn from history or be destined to repeat it, you have a binary choice there.
--I agree, that's why I mentioned in the post notifying the police. It just depends on the circumstances how anyone might want to go about it. You can theoretically push the matter as a bunco crime-fraud- and as you suggest let the local prosecutor decide, or try for civil penalties in small claims court, perhaps you lost time from work to return the item, whether or not the money was easily and cheerfully refunded, etc. It could even start as a class action suit, even on a small local size. Variety of ways. Usually you can/should/be advised to always start from a default position that if you as joe little guy have a beef with an entrenched larger and richer org of any kind that any wheels of "justice" are slow and rusted up, but ya never know until you try, who knows you might get a hip local DA who's gotten burnt at home with a crippled CD and has a fume going on about it. If plan A don't work, goto plan B. My position is try plan A or B, because plan C-complaining about stuff as the only option, hardly ever "works" to solve a problem.
--I have, twice, both times against government people seriously abusing their positions, won both times. And you? What have you done?
To me, drm and music cd's are a grade c low interest, I am way more concerned with what I feel are much more important issues, nothing big, just the growing power of this junta that's seized control of the US and is hell bent on inmposing a two class master/serf society based on fear, surveillance, command and control. I "work" on those issues more. I just like commenting "in general" and offerring advice that anyone by themselves *can* make a difference IF they actually follow through and try, IF they think they've been screwed and have some evidence. Anything from organizing a boycott, to a lawsuit to whatever, what DON'T work is just complaining about it. I've looked at this "cd that ain't a cd" issue in the stores, it's obvious as all get out, they are clearly mixed in with "normal" cds and are being sold "the same as".Miniscule fine print in jargon that is meaningless to most people, they are sold and displayed as 'cds" and they aren't. It's a pure scam. It certainly looks like consumer fraud and buncoism to me. So I wrote *IF* this was a concern of mine and I had become a victim, I would calmly go and sue them-whomever was in charge of receiving my money for the counterfeit- in local court. Not enough people do that, they fail to follow through on various things, they just take it where the sun don't shine over and over again. I don't know WHY but I can make some guesses at it, which I outlined above.
This is a commentary forum, I commented,I've seen this same topic of bogus counterfeit non-cd look a likes come up here it seems a hundred times already, yet to hear of anyone actually using "the law" right back at them. Now sometimes-a lot of times-lawsuits are trivial and unwarranted, other times they are necessary and it's always a judgement call. Basic history and research shows that large concerns will continually try to skate the law or alter reality in their favor, BUT, there's differing ways to 'fight back", I encourage those actions and mindset, for people to stop being professiobnal "victims". So ya, it sounds strong, and I'm emotional about it, so what? Better than just hoping someone else does it. Myself, I don't buy cd's except for very occassional older used ones, sometimes entire years go by I purchase zero, I don't download mp3 music whatsoever,I own none of that, zero, and don't own any "illegal" software, but say if I DID purchase pre recorded new retail music and it was a major enjoyment and interest of mine I certainly might sue over these crippled disks. Just encouraging the others here who feel strongly about it-or any other *thing* they feel strongly about- to take the next logical step, and take the moral and legal high ground as well.
If you went into the store to buy shampoo and dumped it on your head and it was shoe polish, would you take it or sue the ^&^*(tards? If they kept selling shoe polish labeled as shampoo? Over and over and over again? If you went into the store and bought a can of corn and opened it up and it had rat parts in it instead of corn, would you sue, or just take YOUR time and go back and get a 'real' can of corn, knowing that half the cans on the shelf labeled corn that looked like cans of corn were in reality canned rat?
The deal is these stores, and their corporate/cartel/monopolist bosses, want cowed sheepish brainwashed consumers, they want you to only grumble, maybe a few people exchange the defective products, they don't want to make the hard decisions that follow ethics, they want to skate the cheapest way they can. Suing some humongous corporation is HARD, suing a place local and a named individual for an exact specific crime is a lot easier and cheaper, and if thousands of people did it this crap would stop tomorrow.
Sam with spammers, in the states where spam is now illegal-WHY aren't there thousands of lawsuits? I'll tell ya why, it's because 99% of people are sheep, easily cowed, don't want to "rock the boat", scared, think their single efforts won't matter, just content to bitch about things but nothing else-whatever, all excuses really for not taking personal indignation and getting shafted right back to the shafter and getting your day in court. If your cause is righteous, you at least have a chance, never even trying means you'll keep getting shafted, which just further emboldens the badguys to keep ripping people off and pulling more and more scams.
If it was me with this particular issue, I'd tell that store manager (get their full name and job title) ONE TIME to stop selling crippled "counterfeit cd look-a-likes" that aren't "cds", that unless they are removed or labeled and displayed and stocked completely separately from REAL cd's PROMINENTLY six ways to sunday with BIG SIGNS that they AREN'T cd's and WON'T play in most normal cd players that you intend to sue HIM in local court personally,that you will file an official police report, then follow through if they keep ripping people off. Getting ripped off the first time is his fault, twice is "your" fault because "anyone you" puts up with it, generally and non specifically speaking.
here: Robomower
too slick!
--get a plug in engine water jacket heater, they work great for your vehicle. Instant nice warm starts, instant heat. I don't live in the frozen north anymore but when I did that was the low tech and still reliable "fix" for cold weather and cold vehicles.
--very interesting idea and having it be like a normal dead trees book in "form" is a great use of human ergonomics. Like how many books do we use that fold up besides playboy centerfolds? I know there's some, but basically this "looks good". Remains to be seen if it performs and how it compares price wise. It would also be nice to have an option of a "no loaded OS" version so that people can choose what they want. I Don't understand the detractors on the thread a lot, this is a niche product same as hundreds of other gadgets out there. To me "more choices" is a good thing.
--man that is so sad. sorry. I certainly hope you can find her again. geez. Prayers go with you.
--no, not sputnik, it was just the realization that they had gotten "up there" first, and 'space nukes" might be soon forthcoming. Was a serious blow to national prestige and thoughts of "invincibility" I guess. Like I said I was just a grade school kid then but it was a BIG DEAL in conversations I overheard. As kids we just looked at pictures and 'artists impressions' drawings, etc. We all went out tried to see it as the newspapers had a track, but I never saw it. I DID see "echo", our satellite, with some binoculars, that was cool.
Neat young geekatroid story. Had one of the first "transistor radios", was also one of the school sliderule and busted briefcase nerds. During one of the earlier geminis, I got to monitor the "news" out on the playground with the radio,where the reception actually "received" -heh- then come in and get on the school PA system and give "updates" every 15 minutes. Nice assignment. Manned launches were always constant tv and radio coverage back then, pre-empted most all other programming. cool beans and stuff.
--I was a gradeschool kid then and I remember that night it was announced. It scared the crap out of the adults. That's really the biggest thing I remember about it, got a sense they were all going "ohh 5|-|!7" and wondering when atomic ww3 was gonna start, because the russians were "so much ahead". I don't recall a lot of "cool-science" talk, nope, it was a lot more along the lines of "dang, russkies got the high ground, this sucks". The awarness of airpower and having the high ground was still pretty much in adults consciousness then, all of them remembered the tremendous advantage the allies had after establishing air superiority in ww2 and to a lesser extent korea, because before that, the outcome of the war was in MAJOR serious doubt.
My pet peeve was the government abandoning the x-series projects, going to the dumb capsule idea. I think if we had just kept developing the "space plane" concept then, we'd be 20 years further down the road to space travel being even more normal than it is now, and a lot cheaper. I also think that yaeger was technically the first guy in "space", certainly close enough.
--there's an obvious two main reasons linux isn't used "more"by windows users. One, windows comes on their machine, it's installed. Two, windows is too hard for them already, they are intimidated by it and as such the thought of something brand new and different is even more intimidating. There's not even an awareness of what an "operating system" is, to most people windows="computer and the intarweb". I know windows users who even after years still cannot do simple easy tasks, have no idea on security, are reluctant to use even what came installed, never even bother to explore all the menu options, etc. I call it "never getting out of first gear", they are content to drive in first gear forever, until they buy another new computer because the old one "doesn't work anymore". rinse lather repeat. And they don't *see* linux, it's NOT on the shelf locally, at least anyplace they go and look. People say "it's at walmart" well, maybe online it is, my local walmart gives you the choice of XP or XP and that's IT. And if you tried to explain there is no "linux company"and the concept of rolling your own or buying a canned distro they would be totally lost, it's an alien idea, it can't exist or it's some program runs on windows they don't know what it does and don't need. I've asked them to stock linux at the local chinamart, they say "naw, that's decided at corporate". Radio Shack, same deal, that's the only two places around here that sell software. Granted this is a rural area but it's where I live and the reason I see around here why linux isn't used or tried. At best people might buy a game, or a very specific application such as a money managing app, but that's it. Once it's in the schools and the kids come home and change their parents home PC's for them, maybe, until then not happening in a big way.
--no cheap labor doesn't make it right, IMO. I am COMPLETELY aganst all this western money and expertise going to china. We were sold a bill of goods that china would "embrace democracy" and "buy our stuff" if we encouraged US and europaen manufacturing to move there. The result has been, well yes, china built up a huge manufacturing base in a short time, and all they buy from us is advanced technology in order to do it even better. They buy advanced machine tooling, the tools used to make more tools to make-everything. And with this chip start, their own complete domestic computers. Lot of giuys been laughing it's "only" a 200, well all I can say is give them a year or two, see how fast they advance. You can do a LOT with not top of the line but still functional computers of these sizes. And with a population of a billion and a half, and with a further market (with cash to spend) in the exploding islamic/oil world of another billion, in a short time they won't need to sell gadgets to the west. they won't need us anymore. We buy walmart trinkets from them, that's it. Next year you are going to see larger home appliances like washing machines coming from them. thgis is a one step at a time deal for them but they are stepping FAST now. They are building their own advanced aircraft, building rockets, and everything possible electronic. I think it's been the biggest economic and political blunder that the US could have made, and there has been zero "quid pro quo", they haven't done one thing about becoming "more free", all they've done is add to their totalitarian population command and control infrastructure, and are building the worlds largest military. At some point they will surpass the US and europe, then they will decide they own the oil. Their demographics and world proven supplies dictate that they need all the oil, and I am convinced they mean to get it. It's coming, and short term profits mentality, combined with western societal indifference, is going to bite us and hard. They turn out engineers by the millions, we turn out team sports players and video game players, generally speaking. They pump out technicians, we create rap stars and people who know how to detail their rides. We are destroying our economy as they are building their's. Something's gonna pop. I am quite doomy and cynical over this situation.
--OK, fair enough. Take the menus, they are a way to navigate around the computer. and to use an e-vile analogy you might not like, take it to giving someone directions, you might say turn at such and such an intersection and street, but usually you'll addlike "there's a chinamart on the corner on the left and a kentucky fried across the street, turn left there' or something like that.
So how to make this concept better, so it's more intuitive and easy? I don't have an answer for that, for me, I find it easier to remember "geographically" (go from bottom>up> over> down across> there, etc) where my menu entry is. I prefer the menu entries themselves once I get there to be text though,not icons, so I guess I like half and half cli/gui. Well sorta, at least I like a word there that names the app and has a short explanation with it. I'm also coming from a mac classic background as opposed to a windows/dos background, so maybe that's part of it. My biggest problem with cli is not only syntax which is hard enough but trying to remember the exact file names with version numbers and where they live to even get to them. It'sa like you can't get there from here unless you already know exactly where "there" is, and if ya did, you wouldn't need to search. It's a catch 22 in a way.
I honestly don't have any sort of answer to how to make it better short of highly customizable icons that allow people to easily use the icons that make sense for them, if they want to use gui. Here's an example I did, my xmms player came with a gnomes foot taskbar icon by default, seemed silly to me, replaced it with a radio looking thing. I know I can type some stuff to "get there" but really see no reason to when it's one click away. The only thing easier would be/might be to just speak to the computer - say "turn on the radio". I had that effect several years ago on the mac and it more or less worked OK unless a "trigger" word was said in the room or like the TV in the background and the computer mic picked it up then it would do something all on it's own, which was pretty dang funny the first few times it happened. Can't even remember the name of that prog right now but it looked like it had promise. Not quite star trek but it turned apps on and off and did simple stuff like that all from voice command. Maybe someone here who used it before and is reading this might recall, it was pretty neat.
HAHAHAHA!
ok that was a coupla good ones!
--china is completely versant in the concepts of "wealth re arranging and managing" -the current accepted western short term profitas modal- as opposed to "wealth creation"-which was the past standard in the eventually named "industrial world". They have thouroughly embraced vertical manufacturing as a means towards rapid wealth creation,are suceeding at it, and their balance of trade surplusses with other nations around the world reflect these principles. This move by them is logical and quite predictable, and I would expect them to gain expertise in this technology much faster than most people might assume. whether from a white room effort or reverse engineering, it won't matter as long as they do it. In 30 years they have gone from basically an almost total agricultural and antique-class manufacturing country to the premier world's mass manufacturing nation, and by even conservative analyst predictions will have the worlds largest "true" economy based on tangible wealth creation by around 2015.
In short, laugh now while you still can. Now I don't LIKE it, I think especially in the US we have made a complete blunder in our trade dealings with china, but I can't dismiss out of hand what they have accomplished in such a short time, nor can I dismiss what the pressure of having a billion and a half people and a need for jobs and energy and fresh water will do to a nation that is lead from the top down as hard as china's is. They intend to kick booty and take names, and in the near future, on the business battlefield and maybe on the real warfare battlefield.
Think about it, the most often heard comment of chinas amazing recent successes is "cheap labor". Nope, that ain't it,for example the african continent has cheap labor avaialable by the millions and millions, but manufacturing is going to china because they are actually able to *accomplish complex tasks in a very large way* using "cheap labor". There's a BIG difference.
This is a SERIOUS consideration anymore, no place in the world is "immune" to terrorist events, and it's only a matter of when-not if- that RF/EM devices start to be used. And to me "who" uses them isn't as important as "they will most likely be used". It's too good of a weapon to think it WON'T be used. This is my opinion of course, but I think it's something to consider.
--I mean really, how is it possible to have a GUI based system that doesn't look at least similar? function will determine form, look at cars, semi streamlined boxes on wheels. Minor differences but basically "car" shaped.
Reality is, 99% of most people think in "pictures", they DON'T think in terms of lines of text/symbols in a console, ergo, you'll get a windowish looking system as the most functional and easiest to understand and use for the most people. I mean what are the options? You have a choice of a box to type in or various boxes with buttons to mash. Use circles or parabolas or some free form weird drawn "border" to delineate the outside boundaries of the app on the desktop? Have your CLI console be round instead of rectangular?
Sure, pure voice control a la star drek computer would be neat, it's still a way's away for the time being.
I have thought about this a lot, we don't need an "arms race" of anti spam "filter" programs,that just leads to spammer's counter measures, which will lead to anti-anti counter measures,etc, back and forth ad absurdum,forever and ever, it just needs to be made clear to spammers everywhere that there are other ways to make a living.
--you are correct and palast is a GREAT journalist.
the imf/world bank work exactly like the corporate raiders of the 80's, with a twist. They basically come in,secretly bribe off or blackmail enough of the top politicos in a country to get them to agree to these "loan" terms. The collateral is these nations natural resources usually, along with their currencies. After a billion or so gets deposited in dictator A's secret accounts, they bankrupt these countries and own them. THE IMF KNOWS IN ADVANCE THE LOANS CAN'T BE PAID BACK. It's a tremendous scam, causing slavery and strife. They make the mafia loan shark operations look like charity.
here is a relevant paste from a palast article for anyone not familiar with either palast or the true machinations of the imf, it's good:
http://www.zmag.org/ParEcon/palastimf.htm
IMF'S FOUR STEPS TO DAMNATION
How crises, failures, and suffering finally drove a Presidential adviser to the wrong side of the barricades
By Gregory Palast
It was like a scene out of Le Carré: the brilliant agent comes in from the cold and, in hours of debriefing, empties his memory of horrors committed in the name of an ideology gone rotten.
But this was a far bigger catch than some used-up Cold War spy. The former apparatchik was Joseph Stiglitz, ex-chief economist of the World Bank. The new world economic order was his theory come to life.
He was in Washington for the big confab of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. But instead of chairing meetings of ministers and central bankers, he was outside the police cordons. The World Bank fired Stiglitz two years ago. He was not allowed a quiet retirement: he was excommunicated purely for expressing mild dissent from globalisation World Bank-style.
Here in Washington we conducted exclusive interviews with Stiglitz, for The Observer and Newsnight, about the inside workings of the IMF, the World Bank, and the bank's 51% owner, the US Treasury.
And here, from sources unnamable (not Stiglitz), we obtained a cache of documents marked, 'confidential' and 'restricted'.
Stiglitz helped translate one, a 'country assistance strategy'. There's an assistance strategy for every poorer nation, designed, says the World Bank, after careful in-country investigation.
But according to insider Stiglitz, the Bank's 'investigation' involves little more than close inspection of five-star hotels. It concludes with a meeting with a begging finance minister, who is handed a 'restructuring agreement' pre-drafted for 'voluntary' signature.
Each nation's economy is analysed, says Stiglitz, then the Bank hands every minister the same four-step programme.
Step One is privatisation. Stiglitz said that rather than objecting to the sell-offs of state industries, some politicians - using the World Bank's demands to silence local critics - happily flogged their electricity and water companies. 'You could see their eyes widen' at the possibility of commissions for shaving a few billion off the sale price.
And the US government knew it, charges Stiglitz, at least in the case of the biggest privatisation of all, the 1995 Russian sell-off. 'The US Treasury view was: "This was great, as we wanted Yeltsin re-elected. We DON'T CARE if it's a corrupt election.." '
Stiglitz cannot simply be dismissed as a conspiracy nutter. The man was inside the game - a member of Bill Clinton's cabinet, chairman of the President's council of economic advisers.
Most sick-making for Stiglitz is that the US-backed oligarchs stripped Russia's industrial assets, with the effect that national output was cut nearly in half.
After privatisation, Step Two is capital market liberalisation. In theory this allows investment capital to flow in and out. Unfortunately, as in Indonesia and Brazil, the money often simply flows out.
Stiglitz calls this the 'hot money' cycle. Cash comes in for speculation in real estate and currency, then flees at the first whiff of trouble. A nation's reserves can drain in days.
And when that happens, to seduce speculators into returning a nation's own capital funds, the IMF demands these nations raise interest rates to 30%, 50% and 80%.
'The result was predictable,' said Stiglitz. Higher interest rates demolish property values, savage industrial production, and drain national treasuries.
At this point, according to Stiglitz, the IMF drags the gasping nation to Step Three: market-based pricing - a fancy term for raising prices on food, water, and cooking gas. This leads, predictably, to Step-Three-and-a-Half: what Stiglitz calls 'the IMF riot'.
The IMF riot is painfully predictable. When a nation is, 'down and out, [the IMF] squeezes the last drop of blood out of them. They turn up the heat until, finally, the whole cauldron blows up,' - as when the IMF eliminated food and fuel subsidies for the poor in Indonesia in 1998. Indonesia exploded into riots.
There are other examples - the Bolivian riots over water prices last year and, this February, the riots in Ecuador over the rise in cooking gas prices imposed by the World Bank. You'd almost believe the riot was expected.
And it is. What Stiglitz did not know is that Newsnight obtained several documents from inside the World Bank. In one, last year's Interim Country Assistance Strategy for Ecuador, the Bank several times suggests - with cold accuracy - that the plans could be expected to spark 'social unrest'.
That's not surprising. The secret report notes that the plan to make the US dollar Ecuador's currency has pushed 51% of the population below the poverty line.
The IMF riots (and by riots I mean peaceful demonstrations dispersed by bullets, tanks and tear gas) cause new flights of capital and government bankruptcies This economic arson has its bright side - for foreigners, who can then pick off remaining assets at fire sale prices.
A pattern emerges. There are lots of losers but the clear winners seem to be the western banks and US Treasury.
Now we arrive at Step Four: free trade. This is free trade by the rules of the World Trade Organisation and the World Bank, which Stiglitz likens to the Opium Wars. 'That too was about "opening markets",' he said. As in the nineteenth century, Europeans and Americans today are kicking down barriers to sales in Asia, Latin America, and Africa while barricading our own markets against the Third World 's agriculture.
In the Opium Wars, the West used military blockades. Today, the World Bank can order a financial blockade, which is just as effective and sometimes just as deadly.
Stiglitz has two concerns about the IMF/World Bank plans. First, he says, because the plans are devised in secrecy and driven by an absolutist ideology, never open for discourse or dissent, they 'undermine democracy'. Second, they don't work. Under the guiding hand of IMF structural 'assistance' Africa's income dropped by 23%.
Did any nation avoid this fate? Yes, said Stiglitz, Botswana. Their trick? 'They told the IMF to go packing.' Stiglitz proposes radical land reform: an attack on the 50% crop rents charged by the propertied oligarchies worldwide.
Why didn't the World Bank and IMF follow his advice?
'If you challenge [land ownership], that would be a change in the power of the elites. That's not high on their agenda.'
Ultimately, what drove him to put his job on the line was the failure of the banks and US Treasury to change course when confronted with the crises, failures, and suffering perpetrated by their four-step monetarist mambo.
'It's a little like the Middle Ages,' says the economist, 'When the patient died they would say well, we stopped the bloodletting too soon, he still had a little blood in him.'
Maybe it's time to remove the bloodsuckers.
gregory.palast@observer.co.uk
--was reading here last month or so about using lasers for data transfer. Maybe find that thread/company/method, then use strategically placed and aimed mirrors to "force" a line of sight?
--I meant the OS not the model, hahaha! From memory here in various piles of boxes, I still have a 512k, an LC, a quadra 700, two IIsi's, a PB280c and a PB1400, all quite functional. Mostly I only use the 1400 anymore and it only supports 64 megs of ram, which it has, but even with a CPU upgrade it won't even consider running osx so I won't bother. I did try a very early osx beta that was a free download on a 6400 but that box got lightning fried and it never ran well on that from what I recall.
As to lowendmac, been aware and used that site like years and years, it's a great site. I have a bigger pile of x86 boxes as well, hmm, have to check but maybe almost 20 right now, they come and go. I get what I can afford but I have different interests than "just" computers, spend my loot on other things, like small farm/big garden equipment. If I wanted to spend a lot on new computer equipment I'd much rather get some sort of broadband out here in the boonies but waiting for all this wireless/satellite whatnot to shake itself out more and get cheaper. Quite content with my old IBM pentium running linux right now. I *may* get a much newer mac that I could try osx on sometime if I run into one local for sale used and quite *cheap* and feel like it at the time. There's so many used computers now I just don't buy new or even current/used,I'll let the wealthier folks do that and make the payments, content to wait until almost give away price. As to the OS itself, loved it! Never had much trouble with classic OS, always did what I wanted it to do, was always amused at my windows friends and all their crashing and virus etc and reloading the OS all the time stuff, seemed silly to me but to each their own. I remember having some old 286 cobjob and struggling with dos then trying out a similar vintage mac with gui and a mouse at a yardsale, bought it on the spot, that was the 512k. Of course that was years and years ago but still, it was pretty neat at the time. I also bet they'll be a lot more "classic" OS fans keep their old classic boxes running then-say-amigas or whatnot now. Too many good classic apps that still "just work" for it to be totally abandoned, not just yet anyway.
--I happened to go over to netcraft yesterday and just clicked on longest uptimes and most requested. FreeBSD is heavily represented, in fact it almost owned the top 50 uptimes completely. I've never tried it but just those stats say a lot towards the "just works" angle.
Apple and drawin and osx and etc I just don't know. I am still a mac classic user (and now linux on x86), but was disappointed I couldn't run osx on my older mac machines so never tried it. I kept hoping for some sort of "osx lite" version that would run on machines that don't support so much ram as is apparently required, but oh well. Quite frankly I am sorta bewildered by all the various "licenses". The closest thing I've run into on that personally is I designed and had built a much improved version of a niche tool that's used in certain types of construction,as far as I know the first "commercial" iteration. I never even bothered to even attempt to get a patent, just had built and quickly sold a bunch, within a year I saw a few other versions on the market. I made a little money and I know there's thousands of guys get their work done easier with either my version or some others I have seen, that's "good enough" for me.
--that's weird, I've never had any trouble unsubscribing a particular install after logging in to the account. Sure you are accepting the cookie? That's part of it.
--I thought of something. You said "no headers". Well, maybe no problem, create your own headers which consist of the message you are trying to get across to the bozos, like "Yo! I'm trying to report YOU and you don't have any headers in your SPAM " and etc, e-mail looking formatted to taste.
Alternate like someone else suggested, small claims court, which I think if thousands of people did it in the various states that outlaw unsollicited spam and phone calls and text messages and what not would stop this stuff faster than any amount of bayseian math voodoo spam filters. MSN or spamking or whomever, e mail complaining not working, losing THOUSANDS of court cases and being fined just might, even if it's hard to collect from them eventually some press articles would embarass tyhem enough. Or hey, have bill gates served with the bill from your judgement by a claims processor.
With that said I've never had a hotmail account, are they still freebies? Or do they charge now or what? If it's a freebie I guess you get what ya pay for. I've had bad luck with every "free" email service I ever tried, so don't use them any more, FWIW.
Besides that I dunno and maybe none of this would work. I once had my host eat my website when they got sold to earthfink and no amount of phone calls or emails would resove it, I never did anything about it, as the point was moot, they no longer existed as what they were before. Next time though, if something like that were to happen, I will go the local small claims route. And as soon as spam is made illegal in my state I'll start filing as well. No idea why more people don't sue spammers in the states that allow it.