Hitting your kid or yelling at them that they are a fat sack of shit no one could ever love are despicable shortcuts to 'good' behavior
Wow. Way to take that argument from 'middle of the road' to the extreme.
The thing you are forgetting is that parents are the authority of their children. If my kid is misbehaving and decides to bust out a few car windows, guess who is responsible. Me. I'm the one who will have to pay.
A parent must be responsible for his or her children. You must teach them right from wrong, and teach them good behavior.
If they refuse to listen to you, they disobey, and they continue at it, you must put a stop to it. If that requires time-out, grounding, or paddling their behind, so be it.
And here's the best part. It's up to the parent to decide what is the best action for their child--not your decision, or the government's.
When I was young and stole a pack of gum from the store, my mom made my tell the store owner what I did and apologize to him in front of the check-out lines full of people. Never stole again.
A few years later, I was cussing my mom out. I called her a bitch and told her I didn't have to listen to her. My step-dad whipped his belt off and beat my ass. He told me to never talk to my mother that way again, and if I did there would be similar consequences. Getting your ass beat with a belt sucks--so guess what? I never talked to my mom that way again.
If the replacement rate for a desktop computer is 3 years, and everyone buys for $250 and Windows for $130 - that's less than $400 over 3 years... or just over $10 monthly.
You're totally missing the figures.
You buy a computer, you buy Windows XP Pro (which is specifically designed for a Microsoft network)...then you buy CALs even though you already bought a product specifically designed to talk with windows server. Then just after a year, the motherboard fails on the machine and you have to replace it....and because Microsoft is so forgiving with their license practices, technically you have to buy Windows XP again and throw away the old copy. Then a few weeks after installing WGA freaks out and says you don't have a legit copy. For some reason your license key won't work to reactivate Windows, and you're left with having to plead to some indian guy to reactivate your box or just buy another copy of Windows XP. The same goes for Office. Sharepoint too--and if you use them together, buy another CAL or two. Maybe standard or advanced, etc...it never ends.
I guess what I'm saying is that even if the web service cost you $100/mo for one computer or user, it'd still be worth it.
Exactly. Vote for Linux support with your money. The problem is, there aren't nearly enough Linux users to make a dent they will notice. If it makes you feel any better, I bought a (crappy) Foxconn board once and won't be buying one again.
I wonder how many people bought the Linksys WRT54G* series of wireless routers because they could load Linux. I have 5 myself, add family, friends, and clients and that number jumps up to around 50. That should be well over $2k for Linksys just from my purchasing decisions alone.
Everytime a new framework or web development system gets hyped I can't but wonder why people get so excited about having reinvented the wheel, and a wonky one at that.
Everything you mentioned in your post has been solved for many, many years already. Just use Perl and the Template Toolkit.
That's like saying that 'toilets' were solved years ago. Just go out to the outhouse and take a load off.
Although the problem was 'solved', someone came along and did the whole indoor plumbing and a porcelain toilet thing.
Same thing with web frameworks. Both perl and python work well. Python just works better.
I'm sure whatever comes after Django in a few years will be even better.
You lose 3 ways even from a self-interest perspective - not even counting the human cost and our responsibility to help those in need.
It's not the job of the government to legislate morality. My *personal* beliefs say that I should help widows and orphans. If I do so, it's an altruistic act--but not if the government is forcing me to do it.
The government has a very specific set of duties outlined in our founding documents--unfortunately they aren't following them, and no one is standing up to stop them.
Would it be better to have them rob you instead, which costs you, then they go to jail, which is paid for by taxes, which costs you,
There's another great option: rope
Hang a few of 'em and everyone else will fall in line. If they don't, there's always more rope.
It's ok to call me a nut-job at this point--but how did we break away from England. England was forcing the Catholic religion on everyone. We broke away and said that each individual is allowed to do what they want as long as they are denying other individuals the same freedoms (life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, bill of rights, etc...)
The scenario where this falls apart is literally a text book example (I have the textbook).
Yeah--but that's not the scenario that gpgauth is trying to cover. It's designed to make sure your first connection attempt (where you initially enter a username/password, etc...) is the same service as all your additional connection attempts.
If you're really worried about someone intercepting, go pay $400/yr for a cert from verisign. I really only care that when I go to slashdot, it's the same slashdot I was viewing when I signed up years ago.
Perhaps when getting a job became nearly impossible!
Oh--that's right. Since you can't get a job, it's my problem. I forgot about that section of the declaration of independence where it said that I have to pay taxes to support the people that can't get a job because they have no marketable skills and Burger King isn't hiring anymore burger flippers.
(I'm not trying to say you personally flip burgers and have no marketable skills, but rather that there are some people that fit that description, and they are on welfare, and I am having to pay for their bad choices.)
Encryption like that is practically useless without verification of some sort. Man in the middle attacks will allow an attacker to read the traffic without some means of forcing the person at the other end to identify themselves.
Maybe I'm missing something, but gpgauth is setup to make sure you are talking to the same key every time--and not that some company has verified that xyz.com is who they say they are.
Use slashdot as an example. I don't care if they've been verified by Verisign. Seriously--what do they know about me. UID, username, email, website, and a few other BS details.
The scenario is this: Surf to slashdot for the first time ever. Read it, love it, decide to sign up. You click 'sign up', enter your username and your public key. The server now 'knows' you. It encrypts some random data to your public key and sends it to you along with it's public key. You decrypt the data with your key, re-encrypt it to the servers key, and then send it back. You're authenticated.
Now the next time you go back, you enter your username and encrypt some random data to the servers key. If the server is a man in the middle, it won't be able to decrypt your random data. If it's legit, it can decrypt it and re-encrypt it to you. You've just verified the server. Then it sends you some random data, and you decrypt/reencrypt to it. You've just verified both ways.
You're right that there's nothing there to validate that Slashdot is really at 123 whatever st. in Springfield, but you have verified that the server is the same one you signed up with in the beginning--and really, that's all that matters with a lot of sites.
42,642 people died in 2006 in the USA from vehicle crashes. If requiring a GPS in every vehicle would help reduce this number, and also protect citizens from the occasional police harassment, why not? And for those not fond of the government knowing so much about them, do like I do - ride a bicycle to work! Of course, maybe GPSing bicycles is the future too...
Great idea. Why don't you just hand all our money over to the government--because they know what's best for us. We'll have GPS things in our cars, wear orange vests if we get within 1/4 mile of the highway, we all get helmets and padded walls and tables in our houses so we don't get hurt--and maybe if there's enough left over in all the money you're forking over, the government can buy us all those firstalert pendents you wear around your neck that call 911 for you at the push of a button when you fall down. That would be awesome. Let's mandate everything right now so no one ever gets hurt or has to be responsible for anything.
Which does absolutely nothing to stop scaring visitors of your website
The problem is that most people seem to only need encryption, while others need some sort of trust that the person you are connecting to is legit.
For those that need the trust, you'll have to pony up to verisign. They spend time and money to verify who you are and make sure you can be tracked down if there are problems. (for the most part).
For people who just need some sort of encryption, it shouldn't require the whole trust model as well--just the ability to verify you are sending your username/password to the same server you were using the last time you went to my.whatever.com.
So someone spur on the bastards at gpgauth.com. It seems like a good idea.
First of all, don't call me insane. I thought we were having a fucking conversation.
Sorry--I think the idea is insane, not you.
Secondly you are reading into what I am saying.
I'm not 'reading in' anything. I am attempting to put into my own words what I understand you as saying. If I understand wrong, please correct me. I just don't want to prefix every sentence with "I understand you are saying X, if I am correct in that understanding, here is my rebuttal".
Good private education (especially one on one) is too expensive. Church education isn't bad because it teaches religion - I didn't say that. The close-minded attitude it teaches is the problem. It's a false dichotomy to say that one can't learn about religion and about the sociology of homosexuality (if you read the course description you will see that it is not a class about "how to be gay" despite the title of the class).
Yes, good private education is expensive. Paying for *any* quality service costs more money. And wouldn't you have more money if you weren't being taxed and forced to use a service that doesn't let you chose how your child is taught. Personally, I think homosexuality is wrong, so should my child be taught that it's ok against my wishes? You may be thinking that I am wrong, and yes my child should be taught homosexuality is ok--that he should be more 'enlightened'. Well--what about that school district where a law or something was just passed that schools had to teach creationism as well as evolution? Do you want teachers telling your kids the world was created by God--if that's not what you believe? It's a double-edged sword. I believe people should be free to teach their children what they want without the government interfering.
So having underpaid teachers with classrooms of 30+ kids
I thought we didn't need more funding!
I thought that's the point you were trying to make--that the teachers were under-funded.
some people will be successful, and others will not.
That doesn't give them the right to throw all morals out the window. Just because something is legal doesn't make it OK.
Morality is not in the government's domain. Morality is a religious issue. My morals say "don't be a homosexual, don't steal, don't murder, etc...", where as other cultures and other people believe being a homosexual is ok...and killing for speaking out against the government is punishable by murder. Even further still, some cultures believe being a homosexual is punishable by death. That's seriously f*cked up.
The government is here to enforce a very basic set of laws (life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness more or less). Which can be broken down into don't kill someone unless they are trying to kill you, you have the freedom to come and go as you please unless you trample on other people's rights, and you can pursue happiness weather it's finishing, computers, being a priest, or sitting on your butt--just don't expect anyone to bail you out of the consequences of your decision. It is the job of religion--should you believe in one--to tell you how to live your life as a good person. My religion says I should help the fatherless and the widows. And when I do, it's an altruistic and selfless act. But if the government now taxes me and forces me to pay for a welfare system where males sit on their ass all day drinking beer because they don't want to work, and they have 5 kids with all different mothers, I have no choice in supporting them or not. I'm forced to. And while the kids receive some benefit of my enforced money, so do the worthless males. (I'm specifically not calling them 'men' for a reason.) It's not altruistic and selfless when you are forced to do it.
LOL. Those course aren't ridiculous. I have never seen a problem with studying our own culture intellectually. It's not like anyone is forced to take such classes, either.
So those courses are all about our culture and make us more intelligent, yet in your next argument you rail on our culture and say it makes us stupid. You can't tell me that studying a liberal class like learning how to be gay is going to enlighten my kid and make him or her more intelligent, yet being taught by his mother, father, and tutors, and/or a private school, and/or a religious school will make him an idiot.
When did you liberals suddenly get to decide that learning about sticking your manhood in the place where another man evacuates his bowels is enlightenment and intelligent, yet being taught about the religious beliefs of different cultures is idiotic and stupid.
Anyway, in reality your ideas would lead to a nation of idiots. It's really that simple. Either everyone receives a sub-par home education or church education, or they are subjected to a massively impersonal international indocrinational "education business." Sounds great.
So having underpaid teachers with classrooms of 30+ kids will make my child smart, yet one-on-one education with his/her parents, tutors, and/or private schooling will make him/her an idiot.
What have rich people ever done to me? They've brought their filth Wal*Marts to my town and driven out the smaller businesses that were less expensive
Aah--here's where the liberal insanity begins. So if you start a small business selling widgets, and you are able to do so at an extremely good price, and people start purchasing from you--you should be punished?
No really--people love the widgets so much and you sell so many, that you decide to expand--and you setup a few shops throughout the US, and after a few years, suddenly you're everywhere. Well--screw you. You're too successful. You just need to close your doors and die because the liberals think it's unfair that EVERYONE doesn't have a business as successful as you.
That's not a very enlightened position. In this world you have to realize that some people will be successful, and others will not. That's their choice, determined by how much hard work they want to put in, how intelligent they are, and how society values their contribution. Not everyone gets to be a multimillionaire, otherwise the system breaks down.
I'm not sure where you get that WalMart was more EXPENSIVE than the smaller businesses in your town.
The logic doesn't add up. If WalMart is more expensive than the small businesses--why would people purchase from them. And if people aren't purchasing from them, why are they still in business. Maybe they are cheaper and you're fudging the facts. Maybe they are more expensive, buy provide more value--such as a small business possibly not taking Visa, where WalMart does? All in all, if people didn't want or didn't like WalMart, it would go away--but people love WalMart, and they constantly buy stuff from WalMart because it's sooo cheap.
they've turned my historic downtown into a posh strip mall for bitches and boners.
Oh yeah--So your idea is to educate the crap out of ourselves because we need to be 'progressive' all the while putting a freeze on any real progress in your town because you like the look of the pretty buildings.
If you like 'em so much, buy them. Then you can say what happens to them. Unfortunately 'pretty' buildings don't make any money. So you better have a business plan. And if that business plan is 'sell' it to someone else and make money, they might want to buy it and put a WalMart in it's place.
They've gone out of their way to accommodate vapid yuppies and bring them to my town.
I had to look up 'vapid' 1) because of my piss-poor public education and 2) because it appears to be a useless word usually used to describe coffee. Hey--I don't hear you bitching abou
Home schooling can be a lot cheaper than private education, sure. On the other hand good education isn't cheap - a 20 student class is less expensive to teach per capita than a 1 student class. Throw in the cost of personal tutors for the more specialized subjects like math, The Sciences, and The Arts, and it's nothing but a losing deal.
I would rather pay more money to make sure my children are educated correctly, than pay more taxes to make sure everyone's kids get a negligable improvement. Seriously--an additional $200/mo would do wonders if it was going solely to my kid or kids, But if I tossed $200 towards public schools, it would do next to nothing.
Plus--why should someone else work to pay for my kid if he ends up being an idiot?
The year I graduated from high school there was something like a 10% failure rate. The following year it was over 50%.
No thanks--I'll take the personal responsibility to make sure my child is educated.
With that in mind, and with an immense aversion to an America where through negligence a child's parents have the option to deny their child education, where truancy is legal, and where the rich have the tools to deny us even more of our freedoms, I can only conclude that education should be where it is - firmly in the hands of the people. (Corporate controlled education - HELL NO!)
I would like to know what freedoms rich people have denied you.
Nowhere in this statement does it say you have the right to an education:
"We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness."
You have the right to life. You have the right to liberty. You have the right to pursue happiness.
Beyond that, it's up to you. If I want to learn a foreign language, I have the liberty to do so if I find someone who can teach me, and who will work within my financial means. If not, I'm out of luck.
I have the right to teach my child what I wish. If I choose to teach him to read, write, understand math, and science--that's my choice. If I choose not to teach him about some of the (in my opinion) billsh*t school topics--that is my right too. (A HREF="http://www.academia.org/campus_reports/2000/september_2000_2.html">America's Ridiculous Courses - Yeah, I'm aware these are college level, but there are quite a few grade school level courses I wouldn't want my kids exposed to also.)
I don't know when everyone in this country got the idea that they are entitled to a bunch of services instead of working hard for them.
I'm calling BS on that. If you are paying $400 a month in taxes, it seems reasonable that you don't have the money to send your child to a decent private school or tutor anyway. (By all means send them off to be indoctrinated at your local church school, though. See how that works out for them.)
I went to public school. 8 of my friends were home schooled. They all had their GEDs before I finished my freshman year. It works out well for them.
We are spending so much more on defense than education. Get your facts straight (assuming you live in the US).
Yes we are. And we the government is supposed to be spending money on defense. They are not supposed to be spending it on schools.
Get it through your head. Pretty much the only job of the Federal government is defense and protection of the border. The rest is unconstitutional.
The last budget figures I looked at (a few years ago) had 'defense' taking up about 40% of the budget.
You're sitting there thinking "See--defense spending is huge!"
I'm sitting here thinking "Wow--if they stopped stealing that other 60%, could you imagine how much more money would be in my wallet?"
Not this fallacy again:( It sure doesn't help that we are taking away funding from the worst schools, either.
Your argument doesn't address the point. Who gives a crap about public schools. If I can avoid paying education taxes and instead put that money towards the school of my choosing, everyone wins. People will choose to send their kids to the best schools they can afford. In public schools, they are 'guaranteed' the money because the government is taking my taxes no matter what (having kids or not), and they don't care about competing for people's money.
Put yourself in the same position. If the government selected you as the official chef for everyone on your block, and then told you you'd be getting $100 person per month to make food, would you be making the best tasting steaks, or would you go to McDonalds and order a few burgers for everyone? It wouldn't matter what you served up--you're guaranteed the money.
On the flip-side, if you had to compete to be the best chef on your block, you're probably not going to go to McDonalds when your competition can produce an awesome steak.
Same with education. The teachers don't have to strive to be the best because they aren't competing for your education dollars. But what they are motivated by are stupid metrics like the "No Child Left Behind" act.
You hate it? That certainly speaks well for both of you and your ideas about education.
Right--because I hate math, that tells you everything about my ideas on education.
I hate beets too--does that give you some awesome insight to the eating habits of my family too? Because I said I hate beets, are you conjuring up images of my family eating french fries for every meal?
That's a dumb conclusion to jump to.
I hate math because I have never had a need for it in my choice of career. The only time I had to deal with anything other than the four basic operands was in high school. Being forced to do math for a good grade. Seriously--it's been 10 years since I've had to do anything complex. It would be different if I had chosen a career as a rocket scientist though. So here's my official opinion (just so you're not left in the dark coming up with dumb conclusions): If a child of mine needs education in an area that I have little or no expertise in, I will find someone who has the expertise and get him or her an apprenticeship, or find a tutor and pay money to educate my child.
Yeah. And taking money away from them won't either.
So we agree? Dumping money into them won't help and taking money away won't help either? So the problem is not funding.
Well--what is the problem then? I think I explained it fairly well above.
The problem is choice. You have none. I have none. The kids have none. That sounds suspiciously like the beginnings of communism.
The ISPs claim that P2P software takes up too much bandwidth, but what about all of the spam and other botnet activities?
I worked for an ISP for 5 years. In that time, I've seen many connections get maxed out because someone was downloading torrents.
I've only ever run into one connection that was maxed out because of sending email.
The dude was connecting at 14.4 over bad phone lines.
I highly doubt anyone would max out their connection sending email...
I always get a kick out of the people who hate government first and think later. You can tell they have
* Never been in a war
We're in one now. The government is doing a fine job. Actually, constitutionally, that's what the US government is supposed to do. National Defense.
* Never had their house catch fire
Funny--the town next to mine has some sort of 'co-op' fire department. Individuals can choose to be in the fire protection program for something like $1k per year. If your house catches on fire, you're covered. If you're not in the program, you are billed something like $1k per incident plus $800/hr to cover equipment use, etc...
The program has worked this way for the last 30 years, and it works well. They are on par with the fire department in my town.
* Never been in a riot
Nope--never. But if I was, I'd get the f*ck out. If anyone tried to harm me, I'd shoot 'em.
If the riot were happening around my home, I'd lock the doors and close the windows. Anyone coming into my house is a threat to my family. Once again--shoot.
If there are 1,000 people rioting, how the hell are the police going to protect me? My has (I'm guessing) 60,000 people and a police force of 20. How are 20 officers going to protect me from 1,000 rioters? That's easy--20 officers encircle my house and have their guns drawn.
Now how do they protect your house? Um...
You have a responsibility to protect yourself and your family if you have one. No one else has that responsibility.
* Never experienced an epidemic
Nope--but hey, that's what insurance and hospitals are for. ...and most hospitals were founded by religious organizations--not the government.
* Never been through a severe earthquake
I'm not dumb enough to live in an earthquake area. I am however in the shadow of an active volcano. Tell me--how is the government going to stop the volcano?
If I were in an earthquake area, is the government going to pack my 'emergency' kit and be standing by with it seconds after the quake? No. See how well they did with Hurricane Katrina? I don't need any help from them.
* Never been in a flood
Yep--when I was a kid. My parents were smart enough to build their house outside the flood plane. We had enough food and water for about a month if needed. The government didn't give it to us, we stocked it ourselves.
* Never been in a hurricane
Ever heard of a leaving the area, or going into a hurricane shelter under your house?
* Never been in a blizzard - or otherwise had all roads blocked
Winter of 1980. 10 feet of snow, and all the roads were blocked for weeks.
Dad had enough wood to keep the wood stove going, and mom had enough food to keep everyone fed.
(I'm still not seeing where the government helps in any of this)
* Never lived somewhere the roads equate to American wildlife trails
No--but that's something the government is specifically allowed to do.
* Never been in a foreign nation where there are no public schools
Who gives a crap about foreign nations and their schools. I care about here.
If there were no public schools, like I said, *I* would teach my kid. And *I* would pay for other people to teach him math (beause I f*cking hate math)--and this would happen at his or her pace, not at the pace of the dumbest kid in the room. Yes, I can see there being some parents who would do jack for their kids, but that's their problem and their responsibility--not mine. You can't force me to educate my kid under your system because other parents wouldn't educate their kids at all.
* Never lived without food safety inspectors
Yes--I have. For 3 years. Never got sick.
Wash and cook your food well.
In short, they have never lived in the type of third world country that they demand that
There's lots of examples of privatized water and other similar services, generally in the 3rd world.
Can you cite an example of privatizing water or other "natural monopolies" that wasn't an unmitigated disaster for the citizens of that jurisdiction?
I'm not talking about monopolies--just that individuals can do almost *everything* better than a government.
And as far as individuals go, several of my friends own property outside of city limits. They don't need the city government to get water to them--they own wells.
I don't know about the US postal service, but up here in Canada, it's fine.
Our postal service is 'fine' too, but corporations have done a much better job. UPS, FedEx, DHL, etc... can all deliver stuff (at a slightly higher rate) but with better accuracy and speed. The USPS is usually cheaper, but then you have to stand in line for 15 minutes while 1 teller helps 50 people and 5 other tellers are sitting in the back room having their union smoke break while peering out at you. Screw the USPS.
How about schools? you privatize schools, and then only the wealthy go to school. Goodbye even the pretense of social mobility in that case.
About 45% of my taxes go toward paying for public schools (and I don't have a child in school).
If the government abolished public schools and the taxes that go along with them, I would have about $200 more per month that could go towards sending my child to a private school.
Of course I could save even more by teaching my child at home. My wife is great with english, religious history, and the 'home economics' side of things, and I know a lot of geek stuff like programming, and basic electronics, along with political science. Now we couldn't teach this stuff at a college level or anything, but it's more than we learned in K-8 in public schools. And to fill in the gaps on stuff that we don't know as well (we both hate higher-level math and haven't used it since high school), we can get help from a private school or pay a tutor. (Sylvan learning centers is the only one I can think of at the moment--but they are a corporation that employs teachers to tutor students).
Ideally, my child will never go to public school and be faced with a teacher trying to dumb down the coursework for the biggest retard in the class just so he or she can pass and the teacher will look good. It's hard to teach a room full of 30 kids when they are all on different levels.
Dumping more money into our schools won't solve the problem. Letting individuals have a choice in where to receive their education is the solution. Having individuals vote with their pocket book is the correct way. Having taxed forcibly removed from your paycheck to fund a government run school system that leaks money and can't hold bad teachers accountable is the wrong way.
Anyways--a lot of people think the government is the solution, when more often it's the problem.
You are being disingenuous at best. Are your roads in order, is the traffic calm and orderly?
Nope. It's always backed up and the roads have lots of bumps and a few potholes.
Do you have electricity in your home?
Yes, at outrageous rates to California's energy policies.
Are you being raided by armed bandits?
No, but I don't need a police force for that. Just a gun. Except the SF doesn't want you to be able to have a gun.
what about clean water, can you drink the water coming out of your faucet?
I can't really comment on the water in SF--but if the city wasn't providing it, I'm sure the people could figure *something* out. And their solution would probably be cheaper.
What about the mail, is it being delivered?
FedEx, and UPS both courier mail across town and across the country. You can even pay bike messengers to deliver stuff.
You know--it's really amazing just how many solutions there are that don't end with "we need the government to do X"
Or, to paraphrase, "I don't know what the fuck I'm talking about, and I'm too lazy to look it up, but here's my uninformed prejudice". Moron.
It's a logical chain of thought. If you've looked at a billion government programs and they are all taxpayer financed or subsidized, what would the logical pattern be for program billion+1 be?
And yeah, I'm too lazy to look it up. Who the fuck wants to look up information about the post office?
For one thing, it's boring.
And secondly, if I post some uninformed statement here on slash some self-righteous twat like you will eventually post the very link I'm looking for and call me a moron even though I didn't state it as fact. I said "I'd bet". Of course that's what I don't gamble--I would have just lost money.
Anyways--you're not as fast as Google, or as user friendly, but I still get the results I'm looking for when searching via slashdot.
The government just supplies a cheap alternative that people elect to use.
I get the sneaking suspicion that the reason you can mail a letter from one side of the US to the other for 'only' $0.42 is that somehow the USPS doesn't count on stamps as it's only source of income. I'd be willing to bet they get money from the taxpayers just like every other government-run program.
BusyBox v1.00 (2007.01.30-11:42+0000) Built-in shell (ash)
Enter 'help' for a list of built-in commands.
(snip out OpenWRT logo because slashdot thinks I'm using too many junk characters)
root@cortana:~# uptime
18:26:41 up 242 days, 18:26, load average: 0.07, 0.03, 0.00
root@cortana:~#
Slashdot Mirror
Hitting your kid or yelling at them that they are a fat sack of shit no one could ever love are despicable shortcuts to 'good' behavior
Wow. Way to take that argument from 'middle of the road' to the extreme.
The thing you are forgetting is that parents are the authority of their children. If my kid is misbehaving and decides to bust out a few car windows, guess who is responsible. Me. I'm the one who will have to pay.
A parent must be responsible for his or her children. You must teach them right from wrong, and teach them good behavior.
If they refuse to listen to you, they disobey, and they continue at it, you must put a stop to it. If that requires time-out, grounding, or paddling their behind, so be it.
And here's the best part. It's up to the parent to decide what is the best action for their child--not your decision, or the government's.
When I was young and stole a pack of gum from the store, my mom made my tell the store owner what I did and apologize to him in front of the check-out lines full of people. Never stole again.
A few years later, I was cussing my mom out. I called her a bitch and told her I didn't have to listen to her. My step-dad whipped his belt off and beat my ass. He told me to never talk to my mother that way again, and if I did there would be similar consequences. Getting your ass beat with a belt sucks--so guess what? I never talked to my mom that way again.
If the replacement rate for a desktop computer is 3 years, and everyone buys for $250 and Windows for $130 - that's less than $400 over 3 years... or just over $10 monthly.
You're totally missing the figures. ...and because Microsoft is so forgiving with their license practices, technically you have to buy Windows XP again and throw away the old copy. Then a few weeks after installing WGA freaks out and says you don't have a legit copy. For some reason your license key won't work to reactivate Windows, and you're left with having to plead to some indian guy to reactivate your box or just buy another copy of Windows XP. The same goes for Office. Sharepoint too--and if you use them together, buy another CAL or two. Maybe standard or advanced, etc...it never ends.
You buy a computer, you buy Windows XP Pro (which is specifically designed for a Microsoft network)...then you buy CALs even though you already bought a product specifically designed to talk with windows server. Then just after a year, the motherboard fails on the machine and you have to replace it.
I guess what I'm saying is that even if the web service cost you $100/mo for one computer or user, it'd still be worth it.
Exactly. Vote for Linux support with your money. The problem is, there aren't nearly enough Linux users to make a dent they will notice. If it makes you feel any better, I bought a (crappy) Foxconn board once and won't be buying one again.
I wonder how many people bought the Linksys WRT54G* series of wireless routers because they could load Linux. I have 5 myself, add family, friends, and clients and that number jumps up to around 50. That should be well over $2k for Linksys just from my purchasing decisions alone.
Everytime a new framework or web development system gets hyped I can't but wonder why people get so excited about having reinvented the wheel, and a wonky one at that.
Everything you mentioned in your post has been solved for many, many years already. Just use Perl and the Template Toolkit.
That's like saying that 'toilets' were solved years ago. Just go out to the outhouse and take a load off.
Although the problem was 'solved', someone came along and did the whole indoor plumbing and a porcelain toilet thing.
Same thing with web frameworks. Both perl and python work well. Python just works better.
I'm sure whatever comes after Django in a few years will be even better.
considering there is no where else to reliably store it.
Yeah--that's the dumb part about the patent. Databases are designed to store things--just like cars are designed to transport things.
It's as ridiculous as me trying to sue someone for transporting fishtanks in cars.
HEY! Stop that f*cking U-Haul! I patented moving fishtanks around in vehicles, and I just saw him load one up!
You lose 3 ways even from a self-interest perspective - not even counting the human cost and our responsibility to help those in need.
It's not the job of the government to legislate morality. My *personal* beliefs say that I should help widows and orphans. If I do so, it's an altruistic act--but not if the government is forcing me to do it.
The government has a very specific set of duties outlined in our founding documents--unfortunately they aren't following them, and no one is standing up to stop them.
Would it be better to have them rob you instead, which costs you, then they go to jail, which is paid for by taxes, which costs you,
There's another great option: rope
Hang a few of 'em and everyone else will fall in line. If they don't, there's always more rope.
It's ok to call me a nut-job at this point--but how did we break away from England. England was forcing the Catholic religion on everyone. We broke away and said that each individual is allowed to do what they want as long as they are denying other individuals the same freedoms (life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, bill of rights, etc...)
Ummm.... racist much?
Look--an anonymous liberal coward.
Do you know the definition of racist?
Nothing in that comment was racist.
It's not that I don't want Obama to be president because of his skin color--it's that I don't want Obama to be president because he's a marxist.
There are no black men in this country as powerful as George H. W. Bush. Period.
God forbid--if the idiot liberals have their way, you'll be eating those words in a few months when Obama the marxist rises to power.
The scenario where this falls apart is literally a text book example (I have the textbook).
Yeah--but that's not the scenario that gpgauth is trying to cover. It's designed to make sure your first connection attempt (where you initially enter a username/password, etc...) is the same service as all your additional connection attempts.
If you're really worried about someone intercepting, go pay $400/yr for a cert from verisign. I really only care that when I go to slashdot, it's the same slashdot I was viewing when I signed up years ago.
Perhaps when getting a job became nearly impossible!
Oh--that's right. Since you can't get a job, it's my problem. I forgot about that section of the declaration of independence where it said that I have to pay taxes to support the people that can't get a job because they have no marketable skills and Burger King isn't hiring anymore burger flippers.
(I'm not trying to say you personally flip burgers and have no marketable skills, but rather that there are some people that fit that description, and they are on welfare, and I am having to pay for their bad choices.)
Encryption like that is practically useless without verification of some sort. Man in the middle attacks will allow an attacker to read the traffic without some means of forcing the person at the other end to identify themselves.
Maybe I'm missing something, but gpgauth is setup to make sure you are talking to the same key every time--and not that some company has verified that xyz.com is who they say they are.
Use slashdot as an example. I don't care if they've been verified by Verisign. Seriously--what do they know about me. UID, username, email, website, and a few other BS details.
The scenario is this: Surf to slashdot for the first time ever. Read it, love it, decide to sign up. You click 'sign up', enter your username and your public key. The server now 'knows' you. It encrypts some random data to your public key and sends it to you along with it's public key. You decrypt the data with your key, re-encrypt it to the servers key, and then send it back. You're authenticated.
Now the next time you go back, you enter your username and encrypt some random data to the servers key. If the server is a man in the middle, it won't be able to decrypt your random data. If it's legit, it can decrypt it and re-encrypt it to you. You've just verified the server. Then it sends you some random data, and you decrypt/reencrypt to it. You've just verified both ways.
You're right that there's nothing there to validate that Slashdot is really at 123 whatever st. in Springfield, but you have verified that the server is the same one you signed up with in the beginning--and really, that's all that matters with a lot of sites.
42,642 people died in 2006 in the USA from vehicle crashes. If requiring a GPS in every vehicle would help reduce this number, and also protect citizens from the occasional police harassment, why not? And for those not fond of the government knowing so much about them, do like I do - ride a bicycle to work! Of course, maybe GPSing bicycles is the future too...
Great idea. Why don't you just hand all our money over to the government--because they know what's best for us. We'll have GPS things in our cars, wear orange vests if we get within 1/4 mile of the highway, we all get helmets and padded walls and tables in our houses so we don't get hurt--and maybe if there's enough left over in all the money you're forking over, the government can buy us all those firstalert pendents you wear around your neck that call 911 for you at the push of a button when you fall down. That would be awesome. Let's mandate everything right now so no one ever gets hurt or has to be responsible for anything.
Which does absolutely nothing to stop scaring visitors of your website
The problem is that most people seem to only need encryption, while others need some sort of trust that the person you are connecting to is legit.
For those that need the trust, you'll have to pony up to verisign. They spend time and money to verify who you are and make sure you can be tracked down if there are problems. (for the most part).
For people who just need some sort of encryption, it shouldn't require the whole trust model as well--just the ability to verify you are sending your username/password to the same server you were using the last time you went to my.whatever.com.
So someone spur on the bastards at gpgauth.com. It seems like a good idea.
First of all, don't call me insane. I thought we were having a fucking conversation.
Sorry--I think the idea is insane, not you.
Secondly you are reading into what I am saying.
I'm not 'reading in' anything. I am attempting to put into my own words what I understand you as saying. If I understand wrong, please correct me. I just don't want to prefix every sentence with "I understand you are saying X, if I am correct in that understanding, here is my rebuttal".
Good private education (especially one on one) is too expensive. Church education isn't bad because it teaches religion - I didn't say that. The close-minded attitude it teaches is the problem. It's a false dichotomy to say that one can't learn about religion and about the sociology of homosexuality (if you read the course description you will see that it is not a class about "how to be gay" despite the title of the class).
Yes, good private education is expensive. Paying for *any* quality service costs more money. And wouldn't you have more money if you weren't being taxed and forced to use a service that doesn't let you chose how your child is taught. Personally, I think homosexuality is wrong, so should my child be taught that it's ok against my wishes? You may be thinking that I am wrong, and yes my child should be taught homosexuality is ok--that he should be more 'enlightened'. Well--what about that school district where a law or something was just passed that schools had to teach creationism as well as evolution? Do you want teachers telling your kids the world was created by God--if that's not what you believe? It's a double-edged sword. I believe people should be free to teach their children what they want without the government interfering.
So having underpaid teachers with classrooms of 30+ kids
I thought we didn't need more funding!
I thought that's the point you were trying to make--that the teachers were under-funded.
some people will be successful, and others will not.
That doesn't give them the right to throw all morals out the window. Just because something is legal doesn't make it OK.
Morality is not in the government's domain. Morality is a religious issue. My morals say "don't be a homosexual, don't steal, don't murder, etc...", where as other cultures and other people believe being a homosexual is ok...and killing for speaking out against the government is punishable by murder. Even further still, some cultures believe being a homosexual is punishable by death. That's seriously f*cked up.
The government is here to enforce a very basic set of laws (life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness more or less). Which can be broken down into don't kill someone unless they are trying to kill you, you have the freedom to come and go as you please unless you trample on other people's rights, and you can pursue happiness weather it's finishing, computers, being a priest, or sitting on your butt--just don't expect anyone to bail you out of the consequences of your decision. It is the job of religion--should you believe in one--to tell you how to live your life as a good person. My religion says I should help the fatherless and the widows. And when I do, it's an altruistic and selfless act. But if the government now taxes me and forces me to pay for a welfare system where males sit on their ass all day drinking beer because they don't want to work, and they have 5 kids with all different mothers, I have no choice in supporting them or not. I'm forced to. And while the kids receive some benefit of my enforced money, so do the worthless males. (I'm specifically not calling them 'men' for a reason.) It's not altruistic and selfless when you are forced to do it.
Oh, they kept the s
LOL. Those course aren't ridiculous. I have never seen a problem with studying our own culture intellectually. It's not like anyone is forced to take such classes, either.
So those courses are all about our culture and make us more intelligent, yet in your next argument you rail on our culture and say it makes us stupid. You can't tell me that studying a liberal class like learning how to be gay is going to enlighten my kid and make him or her more intelligent, yet being taught by his mother, father, and tutors, and/or a private school, and/or a religious school will make him an idiot.
When did you liberals suddenly get to decide that learning about sticking your manhood in the place where another man evacuates his bowels is enlightenment and intelligent, yet being taught about the religious beliefs of different cultures is idiotic and stupid.
Anyway, in reality your ideas would lead to a nation of idiots. It's really that simple. Either everyone receives a sub-par home education or church education, or they are subjected to a massively impersonal international indocrinational "education business." Sounds great.
So having underpaid teachers with classrooms of 30+ kids will make my child smart, yet one-on-one education with his/her parents, tutors, and/or private schooling will make him/her an idiot.
What have rich people ever done to me? They've brought their filth Wal*Marts to my town and driven out the smaller businesses that were less expensive
Aah--here's where the liberal insanity begins. So if you start a small business selling widgets, and you are able to do so at an extremely good price, and people start purchasing from you--you should be punished?
No really--people love the widgets so much and you sell so many, that you decide to expand--and you setup a few shops throughout the US, and after a few years, suddenly you're everywhere. Well--screw you. You're too successful. You just need to close your doors and die because the liberals think it's unfair that EVERYONE doesn't have a business as successful as you.
That's not a very enlightened position. In this world you have to realize that some people will be successful, and others will not. That's their choice, determined by how much hard work they want to put in, how intelligent they are, and how society values their contribution. Not everyone gets to be a multimillionaire, otherwise the system breaks down.
I'm not sure where you get that WalMart was more EXPENSIVE than the smaller businesses in your town.
The logic doesn't add up. If WalMart is more expensive than the small businesses--why would people purchase from them. And if people aren't purchasing from them, why are they still in business. Maybe they are cheaper and you're fudging the facts. Maybe they are more expensive, buy provide more value--such as a small business possibly not taking Visa, where WalMart does? All in all, if people didn't want or didn't like WalMart, it would go away--but people love WalMart, and they constantly buy stuff from WalMart because it's sooo cheap.
they've turned my historic downtown into a posh strip mall for bitches and boners.
Oh yeah--So your idea is to educate the crap out of ourselves because we need to be 'progressive' all the while putting a freeze on any real progress in your town because you like the look of the pretty buildings.
If you like 'em so much, buy them. Then you can say what happens to them. Unfortunately 'pretty' buildings don't make any money. So you better have a business plan. And if that business plan is 'sell' it to someone else and make money, they might want to buy it and put a WalMart in it's place.
They've gone out of their way to accommodate vapid yuppies and bring them to my town.
I had to look up 'vapid' 1) because of my piss-poor public education and 2) because it appears to be a useless word usually used to describe coffee. Hey--I don't hear you bitching abou
Home schooling can be a lot cheaper than private education, sure. On the other hand good education isn't cheap - a 20 student class is less expensive to teach per capita than a 1 student class. Throw in the cost of personal tutors for the more specialized subjects like math, The Sciences, and The Arts, and it's nothing but a losing deal.
I would rather pay more money to make sure my children are educated correctly, than pay more taxes to make sure everyone's kids get a negligable improvement. Seriously--an additional $200/mo would do wonders if it was going solely to my kid or kids, But if I tossed $200 towards public schools, it would do next to nothing.
Plus--why should someone else work to pay for my kid if he ends up being an idiot?
The year I graduated from high school there was something like a 10% failure rate. The following year it was over 50%.
No thanks--I'll take the personal responsibility to make sure my child is educated.
With that in mind, and with an immense aversion to an America where through negligence a child's parents have the option to deny their child education, where truancy is legal, and where the rich have the tools to deny us even more of our freedoms, I can only conclude that education should be where it is - firmly in the hands of the people. (Corporate controlled education - HELL NO!)
I would like to know what freedoms rich people have denied you.
Nowhere in this statement does it say you have the right to an education:
"We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness."
You have the right to life. You have the right to liberty. You have the right to pursue happiness.
Beyond that, it's up to you. If I want to learn a foreign language, I have the liberty to do so if I find someone who can teach me, and who will work within my financial means. If not, I'm out of luck.
I have the right to teach my child what I wish. If I choose to teach him to read, write, understand math, and science--that's my choice. If I choose not to teach him about some of the (in my opinion) billsh*t school topics--that is my right too. (A HREF="http://www.academia.org/campus_reports/2000/september_2000_2.html">America's Ridiculous Courses - Yeah, I'm aware these are college level, but there are quite a few grade school level courses I wouldn't want my kids exposed to also.)
I don't know when everyone in this country got the idea that they are entitled to a bunch of services instead of working hard for them.
I'm calling BS on that. If you are paying $400 a month in taxes, it seems reasonable that you don't have the money to send your child to a decent private school or tutor anyway. (By all means send them off to be indoctrinated at your local church school, though. See how that works out for them.)
:( It sure doesn't help that we are taking away funding from the worst schools, either.
I went to public school. 8 of my friends were home schooled. They all had their GEDs before I finished my freshman year. It works out well for them.
We are spending so much more on defense than education. Get your facts straight (assuming you live in the US).
Yes we are. And we the government is supposed to be spending money on defense. They are not supposed to be spending it on schools.
Get it through your head. Pretty much the only job of the Federal government is defense and protection of the border. The rest is unconstitutional.
The last budget figures I looked at (a few years ago) had 'defense' taking up about 40% of the budget.
You're sitting there thinking "See--defense spending is huge!"
I'm sitting here thinking "Wow--if they stopped stealing that other 60%, could you imagine how much more money would be in my wallet?"
Not this fallacy again
Your argument doesn't address the point. Who gives a crap about public schools. If I can avoid paying education taxes and instead put that money towards the school of my choosing, everyone wins. People will choose to send their kids to the best schools they can afford. In public schools, they are 'guaranteed' the money because the government is taking my taxes no matter what (having kids or not), and they don't care about competing for people's money.
Put yourself in the same position. If the government selected you as the official chef for everyone on your block, and then told you you'd be getting $100 person per month to make food, would you be making the best tasting steaks, or would you go to McDonalds and order a few burgers for everyone? It wouldn't matter what you served up--you're guaranteed the money.
On the flip-side, if you had to compete to be the best chef on your block, you're probably not going to go to McDonalds when your competition can produce an awesome steak.
Same with education. The teachers don't have to strive to be the best because they aren't competing for your education dollars. But what they are motivated by are stupid metrics like the "No Child Left Behind" act.
You hate it? That certainly speaks well for both of you and your ideas about education.
Right--because I hate math, that tells you everything about my ideas on education.
I hate beets too--does that give you some awesome insight to the eating habits of my family too? Because I said I hate beets, are you conjuring up images of my family eating french fries for every meal?
That's a dumb conclusion to jump to.
I hate math because I have never had a need for it in my choice of career. The only time I had to deal with anything other than the four basic operands was in high school. Being forced to do math for a good grade. Seriously--it's been 10 years since I've had to do anything complex. It would be different if I had chosen a career as a rocket scientist though. So here's my official opinion (just so you're not left in the dark coming up with dumb conclusions): If a child of mine needs education in an area that I have little or no expertise in, I will find someone who has the expertise and get him or her an apprenticeship, or find a tutor and pay money to educate my child.
Yeah. And taking money away from them won't either.
So we agree? Dumping money into them won't help and taking money away won't help either? So the problem is not funding.
Well--what is the problem then? I think I explained it fairly well above.
The problem is choice. You have none. I have none. The kids have none. That sounds suspiciously like the beginnings of communism.
The ISPs claim that P2P software takes up too much bandwidth, but what about all of the spam and other botnet activities?
I worked for an ISP for 5 years. In that time, I've seen many connections get maxed out because someone was downloading torrents.
I've only ever run into one connection that was maxed out because of sending email.
The dude was connecting at 14.4 over bad phone lines.
I highly doubt anyone would max out their connection sending email...
I always get a kick out of the people who hate government first and think later. You can tell they have
...and most hospitals were founded by religious organizations--not the government.
* Never been in a war
We're in one now. The government is doing a fine job. Actually, constitutionally, that's what the US government is supposed to do. National Defense.
* Never had their house catch fire
Funny--the town next to mine has some sort of 'co-op' fire department. Individuals can choose to be in the fire protection program for something like $1k per year. If your house catches on fire, you're covered. If you're not in the program, you are billed something like $1k per incident plus $800/hr to cover equipment use, etc...
The program has worked this way for the last 30 years, and it works well. They are on par with the fire department in my town.
* Never been in a riot
Nope--never. But if I was, I'd get the f*ck out. If anyone tried to harm me, I'd shoot 'em.
If the riot were happening around my home, I'd lock the doors and close the windows. Anyone coming into my house is a threat to my family. Once again--shoot.
If there are 1,000 people rioting, how the hell are the police going to protect me? My has (I'm guessing) 60,000 people and a police force of 20. How are 20 officers going to protect me from 1,000 rioters? That's easy--20 officers encircle my house and have their guns drawn.
Now how do they protect your house? Um...
You have a responsibility to protect yourself and your family if you have one. No one else has that responsibility.
* Never experienced an epidemic
Nope--but hey, that's what insurance and hospitals are for.
* Never been through a severe earthquake
I'm not dumb enough to live in an earthquake area. I am however in the shadow of an active volcano. Tell me--how is the government going to stop the volcano?
If I were in an earthquake area, is the government going to pack my 'emergency' kit and be standing by with it seconds after the quake? No. See how well they did with Hurricane Katrina? I don't need any help from them.
* Never been in a flood
Yep--when I was a kid. My parents were smart enough to build their house outside the flood plane. We had enough food and water for about a month if needed. The government didn't give it to us, we stocked it ourselves.
* Never been in a hurricane
Ever heard of a leaving the area, or going into a hurricane shelter under your house?
* Never been in a blizzard - or otherwise had all roads blocked
Winter of 1980. 10 feet of snow, and all the roads were blocked for weeks.
Dad had enough wood to keep the wood stove going, and mom had enough food to keep everyone fed.
(I'm still not seeing where the government helps in any of this)
* Never lived somewhere the roads equate to American wildlife trails
No--but that's something the government is specifically allowed to do.
* Never been in a foreign nation where there are no public schools
Who gives a crap about foreign nations and their schools. I care about here.
If there were no public schools, like I said, *I* would teach my kid. And *I* would pay for other people to teach him math (beause I f*cking hate math)--and this would happen at his or her pace, not at the pace of the dumbest kid in the room. Yes, I can see there being some parents who would do jack for their kids, but that's their problem and their responsibility--not mine. You can't force me to educate my kid under your system because other parents wouldn't educate their kids at all.
* Never lived without food safety inspectors Yes--I have. For 3 years. Never got sick.
Wash and cook your food well.
In short, they have never lived in the type of third world country that they demand that
There's lots of examples of privatized water and other similar services, generally in the 3rd world.
Can you cite an example of privatizing water or other "natural monopolies" that wasn't an unmitigated disaster for the citizens of that jurisdiction?
I'm not talking about monopolies--just that individuals can do almost *everything* better than a government.
And as far as individuals go, several of my friends own property outside of city limits. They don't need the city government to get water to them--they own wells.
I don't know about the US postal service, but up here in Canada, it's fine.
Our postal service is 'fine' too, but corporations have done a much better job. UPS, FedEx, DHL, etc... can all deliver stuff (at a slightly higher rate) but with better accuracy and speed. The USPS is usually cheaper, but then you have to stand in line for 15 minutes while 1 teller helps 50 people and 5 other tellers are sitting in the back room having their union smoke break while peering out at you. Screw the USPS.
How about schools? you privatize schools, and then only the wealthy go to school. Goodbye even the pretense of social mobility in that case.
About 45% of my taxes go toward paying for public schools (and I don't have a child in school).
If the government abolished public schools and the taxes that go along with them, I would have about $200 more per month that could go towards sending my child to a private school.
Of course I could save even more by teaching my child at home. My wife is great with english, religious history, and the 'home economics' side of things, and I know a lot of geek stuff like programming, and basic electronics, along with political science. Now we couldn't teach this stuff at a college level or anything, but it's more than we learned in K-8 in public schools. And to fill in the gaps on stuff that we don't know as well (we both hate higher-level math and haven't used it since high school), we can get help from a private school or pay a tutor. (Sylvan learning centers is the only one I can think of at the moment--but they are a corporation that employs teachers to tutor students).
Ideally, my child will never go to public school and be faced with a teacher trying to dumb down the coursework for the biggest retard in the class just so he or she can pass and the teacher will look good. It's hard to teach a room full of 30 kids when they are all on different levels.
Dumping more money into our schools won't solve the problem. Letting individuals have a choice in where to receive their education is the solution. Having individuals vote with their pocket book is the correct way. Having taxed forcibly removed from your paycheck to fund a government run school system that leaks money and can't hold bad teachers accountable is the wrong way.
Anyways--a lot of people think the government is the solution, when more often it's the problem.
You are being disingenuous at best. Are your roads in order, is the traffic calm and orderly?
Nope. It's always backed up and the roads have lots of bumps and a few potholes.
Do you have electricity in your home?
Yes, at outrageous rates to California's energy policies.
Are you being raided by armed bandits?
No, but I don't need a police force for that. Just a gun. Except the SF doesn't want you to be able to have a gun.
what about clean water, can you drink the water coming out of your faucet?
I can't really comment on the water in SF--but if the city wasn't providing it, I'm sure the people could figure *something* out. And their solution would probably be cheaper.
What about the mail, is it being delivered?
FedEx, and UPS both courier mail across town and across the country. You can even pay bike messengers to deliver stuff.
You know--it's really amazing just how many solutions there are that don't end with "we need the government to do X"
Or, to paraphrase, "I don't know what the fuck I'm talking about, and I'm too lazy to look it up, but here's my uninformed prejudice". Moron.
It's a logical chain of thought. If you've looked at a billion government programs and they are all taxpayer financed or subsidized, what would the logical pattern be for program billion+1 be?
And yeah, I'm too lazy to look it up. Who the fuck wants to look up information about the post office?
For one thing, it's boring. And secondly, if I post some uninformed statement here on slash some self-righteous twat like you will eventually post the very link I'm looking for and call me a moron even though I didn't state it as fact. I said "I'd bet". Of course that's what I don't gamble--I would have just lost money.
Anyways--you're not as fast as Google, or as user friendly, but I still get the results I'm looking for when searching via slashdot.
The government just supplies a cheap alternative that people elect to use.
I get the sneaking suspicion that the reason you can mail a letter from one side of the US to the other for 'only' $0.42 is that somehow the USPS doesn't count on stamps as it's only source of income. I'd be willing to bet they get money from the taxpayers just like every other government-run program.
Let the fight begin:
darkpixel@hoth:~$ ssh root@cortana.wifi.sq.local
root@cortana.wifi.sq.local's password:
BusyBox v1.00 (2007.01.30-11:42+0000) Built-in shell (ash)
Enter 'help' for a list of built-in commands.
(snip out OpenWRT logo because slashdot thinks I'm using too many junk characters)
root@cortana:~# uptime
18:26:41 up 242 days, 18:26, load average: 0.07, 0.03, 0.00
root@cortana:~#
A MUD hosted by Google...that would be so retro-awesome! I still have a copy of TinyFugue laying around.
Forget that.
I want to see the awesome Google TradeWars Universe.
Could you imagine a billion sectors with hundreds of thousands (maybe even millions) players?