Well, being that I work in the Sub Capital of the World and hear all about it... If you were to call a sub a ship in front of any member of the Navy, you'd hear all about how subs are NOT ships.:)
What I'm saying is that NOTHING in this country should trump our rights. Our rights against illegal search and seizure, perhaps? They have NO reason to believe that I (or any other person, for that matter) am a terrorist unless they have some kind of probable cause.
So what I AM saying is that yes, they should either search everyone who meets X, Y and Z, or it should be a truly random search.
Now, that all having been said, that doesn't mean that there shouldn't be other means of security. Bag scanning, dogs, et cetera: I don't have a problem with any of that. But the government has no legitimacy in trying to search me when they have no reason to think that I'm a threat. And if it goes for me, then it goes for every other person in this country, too.
Let's add another question to this: Do you feel that it should only be Middle Easterners? As in, people from the Middle East? If so, how exactly do you propose to tell the difference between those people and the people of Middle Eastern descent who are citizens, or even moreso, people who are native to the country and have Middle Eastern descent? And if you don't feel that it should only be Middle Easterners, then how exactly do you claim that there isn't a bias against citizens?
Sorry, but no. While it's true that a Middle Easterner is more likely to be a terrorist than I am (even though with my own mixed-race background, I look somewhat like one), it's still not enough justification to search him without any other reasons. You need to give me more than that.
So either you're going to admit to the public that you're looking for Middle Easterners, and search every one of them (in which case they could easily find people of non-Arab descent who could act on their behalf), and also stop calling their searches random, or you're going to truly make your searches random. At the very least, you can say that you're searching anyone who is acting suspiciously, but if I ask you for a list of reasons why you stopped and searched me, you'd better be able to produce something more than my skin color or facial features.
You know, somehow I completely glazed right over that last paragraph. I gotta stop skimming when I don't mean to.
So yes, the parent was absolutely right that it's a scam; there's just no way it's possible, but I guess the general public is stupid enough to fall for it completely.:)
That is complete and utter bullshit. There is no possible way that they could tell that the disc was copied from. How, exactly, would they be able to do that? To copy a disc, all you'd have to do is, um, read it. You know, with a laser. Just like when you play it.
So they'd be able to tell if somebody scanned it with a laser one time as opposed to others? I don't think so.
I'm intrigued as to how you did this. Can you share what utilities or settings you changed to enable this functionality? I'm interested in applying some of it to my own computer.
I dunno, you're talking a miniscule difference in most areas. I mean, perhaps in areas like Los Angeles, where you spend so much time idling, but for most situations the differential in gas used by traveling at 2pm instead of 8am is negligible.
And it makes a HUGE non-difference if, like me, you're driving 55 miles either way. The amount of gas used up in idling is probably less than a percent.
Are you serious? That is unbelievably ridiculous. Does he even recognize the irony in the situation, that you're still going to use up just as much gas by driving in for a half-day as you are by driving in for a full day?
As I said in my post, I had only HEARD that it wasn't good with screen readers. I wasn't pretending to be any kind of an authority, being that I am not sight-impaired and thus do not use a screen reader; if it seemed like I was implying so, I apologize.
Regardless, however, assuming that the application is developed for general-public use (which I doubt, since it was originally a Citrix application and as such is probably only used by people inside the organization), it's still preventing some people from being able to access it, disabilities or no, because Windows' IE is hardly the only browser used out there. No matter what, there's still a limiting factor there.
The biggest reason I'd use is the lawsuit argument. IE is a horrible browser for disabled persons (screen readers, for example, have a great deal of trouble with IE, I've heard). As a government agency, they're required to give equal access to all people, and by making it IE only, they're limiting access to a government resource. That's just waiting for a lawsuit to happen.
This may be a stupid question, but if it's this toxic, why do they use it? I'm assuming it's perhaps because of the efficiency of the fuel? I guess I don't see why another, less harmful fuel (hydrogen and oxygen, perhaps?) couldn't be used instead... Care to englighten? I don't pretend to be ANY kind of knowledgeable person regarding this, but the question did occur to me when I was listening to the coverage of the landing on the radio.
Yes, but isn't it a part of their job that they need to be able to deal with customers and answer their questions? You say that they're not saying how inept she is at doing other things, but you leave out the important fact that it's not her job to be doing those things. When your job is to help customers, you actually need to be able to help them. Not knowing the difference between a polygon and a megabyte is not going to help anybody, and it just shows that a) you don't care about your job and b) you shouldn't be in that line of work.
Oh, I completely agree about the agressive tactics WRT installing Quicktime. I freaked out the first time I downloaded QT to find that there was iTunes built into the install (without even an option to not install it), and went specifically looking for a standalone installer link.
As far as I know,.m4a files have no DRM on them whatsoever. It's the files bought from the iTMS that have DRM encoded on them (.m4p/.m4b files). I've copied.m4a files from my friend's computer with no complaints from iTunes whatsoever.
Also, you most certainly can install Quicktime as a standalone app. You merely have to look for the link on the download page that says "download standalone installer" and *poof* there you go.
For the record, I not only do not have to use iTunes to play my.m4a files (I use Winamp for that), but I can rip to.m4a with other programs (I use Easy CD-DA Extractor) and can even play protected files in Winamp (using a plugin that reads the DRM through iTunes that is installed but not running).
I'm a little confused here. What in my post did you interpret as being bitter? I'm quite happily employed, and I've never been given anything but stellar reviews by ANY employer. It just didn't make sense to me that a prior employer could get sued for saying true things about an employee, is all.
I still don't get this. Why is it illegal to give a bad reference? It makes no sense to me; if the employee had a habit for coming to work late, had had negative performance reviews and sloughed off, why is it illegal to tell another employer that? It's not like you're lying...
While I'm sure this was meant to be a joke (and a rather good one, given that there is no "default position" for your hands on a piano... er... anyway)... It's actually quite easy. For example, a computer keyboard's keys don't sound different when you hit them, while a piano, well, that's its whole point.
Also, finding a specific note on a piano is relatively easy with a blindfold on because of the fact that the black keys help you to find your way. Finding the right octave is easy (and finding the right note is even easier if you have perfect pitch), and then it's just a matter of using your fingers to feel where you are in that octave.
Anyway, now that I've taken a perfectly good joke and ruined it with analysis...
Slashdot Mirror
Well, being that I work in the Sub Capital of the World and hear all about it... If you were to call a sub a ship in front of any member of the Navy, you'd hear all about how subs are NOT ships. :)
Subs are boats, not ships. :)
before we see light sabers.
What I'm saying is that NOTHING in this country should trump our rights. Our rights against illegal search and seizure, perhaps? They have NO reason to believe that I (or any other person, for that matter) am a terrorist unless they have some kind of probable cause.
So what I AM saying is that yes, they should either search everyone who meets X, Y and Z, or it should be a truly random search.
Now, that all having been said, that doesn't mean that there shouldn't be other means of security. Bag scanning, dogs, et cetera: I don't have a problem with any of that. But the government has no legitimacy in trying to search me when they have no reason to think that I'm a threat. And if it goes for me, then it goes for every other person in this country, too.
Let's add another question to this: Do you feel that it should only be Middle Easterners? As in, people from the Middle East? If so, how exactly do you propose to tell the difference between those people and the people of Middle Eastern descent who are citizens, or even moreso, people who are native to the country and have Middle Eastern descent? And if you don't feel that it should only be Middle Easterners, then how exactly do you claim that there isn't a bias against citizens?
Sorry, but no. While it's true that a Middle Easterner is more likely to be a terrorist than I am (even though with my own mixed-race background, I look somewhat like one), it's still not enough justification to search him without any other reasons. You need to give me more than that.
So either you're going to admit to the public that you're looking for Middle Easterners, and search every one of them (in which case they could easily find people of non-Arab descent who could act on their behalf), and also stop calling their searches random, or you're going to truly make your searches random. At the very least, you can say that you're searching anyone who is acting suspiciously, but if I ask you for a list of reasons why you stopped and searched me, you'd better be able to produce something more than my skin color or facial features.
You know, somehow I completely glazed right over that last paragraph. I gotta stop skimming when I don't mean to.
:)
So yes, the parent was absolutely right that it's a scam; there's just no way it's possible, but I guess the general public is stupid enough to fall for it completely.
That is complete and utter bullshit. There is no possible way that they could tell that the disc was copied from. How, exactly, would they be able to do that? To copy a disc, all you'd have to do is, um, read it. You know, with a laser. Just like when you play it.
So they'd be able to tell if somebody scanned it with a laser one time as opposed to others? I don't think so.
Not the band's fault that Sony provides idiotic means of "protection" for their software. :)
:)
After all, what about people who have autorun disabled by default? What do they get charged with? Preemptive circumvention?
They didn't. They provided means of turning off Autorun in Windows.
Oh. Of course. Maybe it was your usage of the "Windows" key, but for some reason I assumed you were using Windows.
/. ;)
How silly of me to think so on
I'm intrigued as to how you did this. Can you share what utilities or settings you changed to enable this functionality? I'm interested in applying some of it to my own computer.
I dunno, you're talking a miniscule difference in most areas. I mean, perhaps in areas like Los Angeles, where you spend so much time idling, but for most situations the differential in gas used by traveling at 2pm instead of 8am is negligible.
And it makes a HUGE non-difference if, like me, you're driving 55 miles either way. The amount of gas used up in idling is probably less than a percent.
Are you serious? That is unbelievably ridiculous. Does he even recognize the irony in the situation, that you're still going to use up just as much gas by driving in for a half-day as you are by driving in for a full day?
How idiotic.
As I said in my post, I had only HEARD that it wasn't good with screen readers. I wasn't pretending to be any kind of an authority, being that I am not sight-impaired and thus do not use a screen reader; if it seemed like I was implying so, I apologize.
Regardless, however, assuming that the application is developed for general-public use (which I doubt, since it was originally a Citrix application and as such is probably only used by people inside the organization), it's still preventing some people from being able to access it, disabilities or no, because Windows' IE is hardly the only browser used out there. No matter what, there's still a limiting factor there.
The biggest reason I'd use is the lawsuit argument. IE is a horrible browser for disabled persons (screen readers, for example, have a great deal of trouble with IE, I've heard). As a government agency, they're required to give equal access to all people, and by making it IE only, they're limiting access to a government resource. That's just waiting for a lawsuit to happen.
Funny, but I always figured that it was the IE users who WERE disabled.
*rimshot*
Thanks much! Unfortunately, my eyes crossed about a third of the way through it. :)
This may be a stupid question, but if it's this toxic, why do they use it? I'm assuming it's perhaps because of the efficiency of the fuel? I guess I don't see why another, less harmful fuel (hydrogen and oxygen, perhaps?) couldn't be used instead... Care to englighten? I don't pretend to be ANY kind of knowledgeable person regarding this, but the question did occur to me when I was listening to the coverage of the landing on the radio.
Yes, but isn't it a part of their job that they need to be able to deal with customers and answer their questions? You say that they're not saying how inept she is at doing other things, but you leave out the important fact that it's not her job to be doing those things. When your job is to help customers, you actually need to be able to help them. Not knowing the difference between a polygon and a megabyte is not going to help anybody, and it just shows that a) you don't care about your job and b) you shouldn't be in that line of work.
Oh, I completely agree about the agressive tactics WRT installing Quicktime. I freaked out the first time I downloaded QT to find that there was iTunes built into the install (without even an option to not install it), and went specifically looking for a standalone installer link.
As far as I know, .m4a files have no DRM on them whatsoever. It's the files bought from the iTMS that have DRM encoded on them (.m4p/.m4b files). I've copied .m4a files from my friend's computer with no complaints from iTunes whatsoever.
.m4a files (I use Winamp for that), but I can rip to .m4a with other programs (I use Easy CD-DA Extractor) and can even play protected files in Winamp (using a plugin that reads the DRM through iTunes that is installed but not running).
Also, you most certainly can install Quicktime as a standalone app. You merely have to look for the link on the download page that says "download standalone installer" and *poof* there you go.
For the record, I not only do not have to use iTunes to play my
I'm a little confused here. What in my post did you interpret as being bitter? I'm quite happily employed, and I've never been given anything but stellar reviews by ANY employer. It just didn't make sense to me that a prior employer could get sued for saying true things about an employee, is all.
I still don't get this. Why is it illegal to give a bad reference? It makes no sense to me; if the employee had a habit for coming to work late, had had negative performance reviews and sloughed off, why is it illegal to tell another employer that? It's not like you're lying...
That MIGHT have been funny, if you hadn't mistakenly thought that it wasn't spelled "Mormon." :)
While I'm sure this was meant to be a joke (and a rather good one, given that there is no "default position" for your hands on a piano... er... anyway)... It's actually quite easy. For example, a computer keyboard's keys don't sound different when you hit them, while a piano, well, that's its whole point.
Also, finding a specific note on a piano is relatively easy with a blindfold on because of the fact that the black keys help you to find your way. Finding the right octave is easy (and finding the right note is even easier if you have perfect pitch), and then it's just a matter of using your fingers to feel where you are in that octave.
Anyway, now that I've taken a perfectly good joke and ruined it with analysis...