In the Air Force, bad readiness inspection results usually get action. What they don't usually get is publicity.
This was a leak. I don't want to be too cynical about my military alma mater, but expect a serious leak-hunt along with all of the anticipated corrective actions, remedial training, and legal action.
I don't think it was the same military units involved in both incidents. The 2007 incident was the 5th Bomb Wing, and this incident is the 91st Missile Wing. Technically, the 5th Bomb Wing is the host unit and the 91st is an independent tenant unit, since most of its weapons are off base.
But it's awkward and somewhat telling that both incidents, as well as some serious inspection failures in 2008 are on the same base. Or maybe that's just the base that's had the most serious scrutiny so far because it's established a reputation of needing scrutiny.
Yes. And to use the diamonds example, DeBeers has levers in both value and scarcity: artificial scarcity by monopolistically controlling supplies and market inventory, and value by pervasive marketing to create and sustain the mindshare diamonds as rare and singularly valuable gemstones of the the jewelry-buying public. (True, a well-cut diamond is truly beautiful, and even a mediocre diamond can be "fixed up" to be quite striking, so not all the consumer value calculus is artificial, but I'm sure that's not all of it. There are many stones that are as striking as diamonds (certain opals, for instance), but only diamonds have that peculiar cultural status in the places that the diamond marketing machine has been operating for decades.
TL;DR summary: a particularly well-placed entity can create both artificial scarcity and enhanced perceived value.
Kobayashi Maru scenario, and this time the people running the scenario know exactly how the cadets cheated the system, so expect the lossage to be epic and memorable.
Meh. That argument was lost ages ago, and not just in technology fields.
It's the difference between a degree in economics and a degree in accounting.
And engineering has always leaned in the direction of vocation. Otherwise, engineering specializations like electrical engineering and civil engineering makes a lot less sense. And believe me. In no way am I trusting an electrical engineer to repair the levees a few miles from here.
I don't think it's necessarily easier. After all, the tester has to put up with smug douchebag developers that think that testing is easier than developing.
I'm sensing a lot of PHB thinking here: "Anything I don't understand is easy."
I wouldn't be surprised if those poor college students get their Adobe suite indoctrination as part of their tuition and fees. Maybe at an educational discount, but nowadays, who knows and why would it matter? Just add another $5k to your undergrad student loan debt!
As to jobs... again, if a workplace needs CS, they'll pay the monthly license (per-seat, probably) as part of their operating cost. It's going to work out a lot like leasing computer hardware instead of buying it and then disposing of it when it needs to be upgraded.
As much as I really prefer the model of "one up-front payment, perpetual license" (as close to "buying" as you can get with proprietary software), the idea of software lease MUST be irresistable to SW vendors. Steady cashflow, inherent anti-piracy (if a cloud-based online-heavy implementation), separation of feature developent and marketing plans...well, maybe not so much that one. Time will tell.
And since the other distinguishing characteristic is the name (and the soundtrack), ripped directly from a copyrighted Japanese pop song, I think the creator of Nyan Cat owns significantly less than 25% of the thing.
Although I would never wish legal trouble on anyone, even a copyright troll, it would certainly tickle my sense of poetic justice for Christopher Torres to be served with papers from Kellogg's and whoever "daniwell" on Nico Nico Douga is.
Or maybe we just acknowledge that pop culture is a rich fertile humus best cared for by tilling and turning, rather than by boxing up and labeling.
Yes. It's cultural compost. People are arguing about who owns manure. Makes me proud to live in the 21st Century.
You could hear the discomfort and almost see the cringing as the author of TFS carefully tiptoed around the IP minefield.
Seriously. Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot. We are becoming afraid to speak, create, express ourselves... not because of Big Brother or the New World Order (or even the Illuminati), but because of the Intellectual Property criminal syndicate.
They own the words. They own the pictures. They own the ideas, FFS. What are we left with? "Shut up and consume your media, Consumer! And then BUY MORE."
For the same reason you can patent ancient chestnuts by suffixing the claims with "...in a mobile device." All bets are off and no claim is too outrageous.
The powers assume you don't have civil rights until some court says you do. Even the words on a 200-year-old scrap of parchment are re-parsed with each new technological advance (printing press, telegraphy, telephones, etc.) because there are people in power for whom your clearly stated rights are an obstacle to their goals... so your rights are not applicable in this particular case until someone slaps them on the wrist and tells them that the right does, in fact, still apply.
This is the ugly truth behind the often-quoted maxim "the law doesn't keep up with technology." The people behind the law have a vested interest in making sure the established protections of the rule of law can't be applied in as many circumstances as possible, and work hard to redefine each new technological plateau as a new frontier of surveillance, seizure, and self-incrimination.
The men behind the Bill of Rights understood this. This is why we even have a Bill of Rights: because the government needs a standing restraint order against stalking their citizens.
If such videos existed, they'd probably be hosted on Vimeo and blog-posted on FailBlog. And since little kids would probably get hurt in the process, probably not even that. (I think they've got an unspoken rule about kids getting hurt, kind of like how Bethesda games like Fallout 3 or Skyrim make child NPCs invulnerable.)
Teenagers? Fair game, especially if self-inflicted. The entire genre of skateboarding fails is pretty much built on variations of "skater-boy racking his nuts on the handrail he's trying to grind".
Wrong. The goofy glasses will include the bluetooth earpiece. Or just an earpiece, if the goofy glasses integrate the phone directly. Then it'll be like All Tomorrow's Parties.
Cool story, but what does this have to do with Barnes & Noble? Or was that a template rant? If so, you loaded the wrong (or at least, off-topic) value for $HATED_EBOOK_VENDOR.
..."They've also provided data dumps of the Bitcoin addresses involved" mean?
I'm not up on bitcoin minutia. If these d-bags were running miners, that means that they own the coins... their wallet. So, what addresses do they mean? Specific coin IDs?
I think that's just BBC mis-interpreting "Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI" as a copyright claim, in clear ignorance of 17 U.S.C. Section 105 (Copyright Act):
Generally, United States government works (works prepared by officers and employees of the U.S. Government as part of their official duties) are not protected by copyright in the U.S. (17 U.S.C. [Section] 105) and may be used without obtaining permission from NASA.
(*Yeah, Slashdot doesn't accept the ampersand entity code or the unicode character for the "section" mark. The 20th Century called. They wish to thank Slashdot for their continued support of last millennium's encoding standards.)
Anyway, I have this funny feeling BBC assumes copyright everywhere. (Suddenly, copyrights! Thousands of them!) I suspect they'd give themselves a hyperventilating panic attack if someone submitted some Public Domain material for them to display... "OMG, whose copyright is this!??!"
Here's irony: the difference between the $20 dongle you bought and threw away and the $20 dongle you replaced it with (and the next $20 dongle you buy to obsolete the second one) may just be in firmware. Firmware that, if you'd paid the money up-front, you could have flashed from open-source repositories and had the exact same features... for $0 extra.
BTW, the entire premise that you have to constantly, obsessively, upgrade hardware is foolish. Just thought you should know.
Because we don't have enough slavering mindless patent attacks in the courts right now?
You're trying to raise the bar on keeping patents, I'm sure. A noble goal. But the people who want to keep their patents will happily crank out their litigation tempo if that's what it takes.
Your proposal is full of blowback. The solution is worse than the problem.
Slashdot Mirror
In the Air Force, bad readiness inspection results usually get action. What they don't usually get is publicity.
This was a leak. I don't want to be too cynical about my military alma mater, but expect a serious leak-hunt along with all of the anticipated corrective actions, remedial training, and legal action.
Barksdale AFB, Louisiana, not Mississippi.
I don't think it was the same military units involved in both incidents. The 2007 incident was the 5th Bomb Wing, and this incident is the 91st Missile Wing. Technically, the 5th Bomb Wing is the host unit and the 91st is an independent tenant unit, since most of its weapons are off base.
But it's awkward and somewhat telling that both incidents, as well as some serious inspection failures in 2008 are on the same base. Or maybe that's just the base that's had the most serious scrutiny so far because it's established a reputation of needing scrutiny.
Blue-screen. Kernel panics are palpably different.
FWIW, I miss Guru Meditation Errors.
Yes. And to use the diamonds example, DeBeers has levers in both value and scarcity: artificial scarcity by monopolistically controlling supplies and market inventory, and value by pervasive marketing to create and sustain the mindshare diamonds as rare and singularly valuable gemstones of the the jewelry-buying public. (True, a well-cut diamond is truly beautiful, and even a mediocre diamond can be "fixed up" to be quite striking, so not all the consumer value calculus is artificial, but I'm sure that's not all of it. There are many stones that are as striking as diamonds (certain opals, for instance), but only diamonds have that peculiar cultural status in the places that the diamond marketing machine has been operating for decades.
TL;DR summary: a particularly well-placed entity can create both artificial scarcity and enhanced perceived value.
Kobayashi Maru scenario, and this time the people running the scenario know exactly how the cadets cheated the system, so expect the lossage to be epic and memorable.
Meh. That argument was lost ages ago, and not just in technology fields.
It's the difference between a degree in economics and a degree in accounting.
And engineering has always leaned in the direction of vocation. Otherwise, engineering specializations like electrical engineering and civil engineering makes a lot less sense. And believe me. In no way am I trusting an electrical engineer to repair the levees a few miles from here.
I don't think it's necessarily easier. After all, the tester has to put up with smug douchebag developers that think that testing is easier than developing.
I'm sensing a lot of PHB thinking here: "Anything I don't understand is easy."
I wouldn't be surprised if those poor college students get their Adobe suite indoctrination as part of their tuition and fees. Maybe at an educational discount, but nowadays, who knows and why would it matter? Just add another $5k to your undergrad student loan debt!
As to jobs... again, if a workplace needs CS, they'll pay the monthly license (per-seat, probably) as part of their operating cost. It's going to work out a lot like leasing computer hardware instead of buying it and then disposing of it when it needs to be upgraded.
As much as I really prefer the model of "one up-front payment, perpetual license" (as close to "buying" as you can get with proprietary software), the idea of software lease MUST be irresistable to SW vendors. Steady cashflow, inherent anti-piracy (if a cloud-based online-heavy implementation), separation of feature developent and marketing plans...well, maybe not so much that one. Time will tell.
What exactly would this "Premium Content" be?
Cat videos. Funny cat videos. Kitten videos. Lolcat videos.
Other than that, I got nothin'.
And since the other distinguishing characteristic is the name (and the soundtrack), ripped directly from a copyrighted Japanese pop song, I think the creator of Nyan Cat owns significantly less than 25% of the thing.
Although I would never wish legal trouble on anyone, even a copyright troll, it would certainly tickle my sense of poetic justice for Christopher Torres to be served with papers from Kellogg's and whoever "daniwell" on Nico Nico Douga is.
Or maybe we just acknowledge that pop culture is a rich fertile humus best cared for by tilling and turning, rather than by boxing up and labeling.
Yes. It's cultural compost. People are arguing about who owns manure. Makes me proud to live in the 21st Century.
You could hear the discomfort and almost see the cringing as the author of TFS carefully tiptoed around the IP minefield.
Seriously. Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot. We are becoming afraid to speak, create, express ourselves... not because of Big Brother or the New World Order (or even the Illuminati), but because of the Intellectual Property criminal syndicate.
They own the words. They own the pictures. They own the ideas, FFS. What are we left with? "Shut up and consume your media, Consumer! And then BUY MORE."
For the same reason you can patent ancient chestnuts by suffixing the claims with "...in a mobile device." All bets are off and no claim is too outrageous.
The powers assume you don't have civil rights until some court says you do. Even the words on a 200-year-old scrap of parchment are re-parsed with each new technological advance (printing press, telegraphy, telephones, etc.) because there are people in power for whom your clearly stated rights are an obstacle to their goals... so your rights are not applicable in this particular case until someone slaps them on the wrist and tells them that the right does, in fact, still apply.
This is the ugly truth behind the often-quoted maxim "the law doesn't keep up with technology." The people behind the law have a vested interest in making sure the established protections of the rule of law can't be applied in as many circumstances as possible, and work hard to redefine each new technological plateau as a new frontier of surveillance, seizure, and self-incrimination.
The men behind the Bill of Rights understood this. This is why we even have a Bill of Rights: because the government needs a standing restraint order against stalking their citizens.
are the submarine patents of culture.
If such videos existed, they'd probably be hosted on Vimeo and blog-posted on FailBlog. And since little kids would probably get hurt in the process, probably not even that. (I think they've got an unspoken rule about kids getting hurt, kind of like how Bethesda games like Fallout 3 or Skyrim make child NPCs invulnerable.)
Teenagers? Fair game, especially if self-inflicted. The entire genre of skateboarding fails is pretty much built on variations of "skater-boy racking his nuts on the handrail he's trying to grind".
Wrong. The goofy glasses will include the bluetooth earpiece. Or just an earpiece, if the goofy glasses integrate the phone directly. Then it'll be like All Tomorrow's Parties.
Cool story, but what does this have to do with Barnes & Noble? Or was that a template rant? If so, you loaded the wrong (or at least, off-topic) value for $HATED_EBOOK_VENDOR.
Nathan Poe is watching this discussion from Heaven above and weeping, gently weeping, to himself.
(Yeah, I know he's not dead, and probably doesn't believe in Heaven anyway. Just go with it.)
..."They've also provided data dumps of the Bitcoin addresses involved" mean?
I'm not up on bitcoin minutia. If these d-bags were running miners, that means that they own the coins... their wallet. So, what addresses do they mean? Specific coin IDs?
I think that's just BBC mis-interpreting "Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI" as a copyright claim, in clear ignorance of 17 U.S.C. Section 105 (Copyright Act):
(*Yeah, Slashdot doesn't accept the ampersand entity code or the unicode character for the "section" mark. The 20th Century called. They wish to thank Slashdot for their continued support of last millennium's encoding standards.)
Anyway, I have this funny feeling BBC assumes copyright everywhere. (Suddenly, copyrights! Thousands of them!) I suspect they'd give themselves a hyperventilating panic attack if someone submitted some Public Domain material for them to display... "OMG, whose copyright is this!??!"
It's North Dakota. You could drive 30 random miles on any highway with no steering wheel and no brake pedal with no negative repercussions.
Northern tier highways are the reason people sometimes confuse "cruise control" with "autopilot".
Here's irony: the difference between the $20 dongle you bought and threw away and the $20 dongle you replaced it with (and the next $20 dongle you buy to obsolete the second one) may just be in firmware. Firmware that, if you'd paid the money up-front, you could have flashed from open-source repositories and had the exact same features... for $0 extra.
BTW, the entire premise that you have to constantly, obsessively, upgrade hardware is foolish. Just thought you should know.
Because we don't have enough slavering mindless patent attacks in the courts right now?
You're trying to raise the bar on keeping patents, I'm sure. A noble goal. But the people who want to keep their patents will happily crank out their litigation tempo if that's what it takes.
Your proposal is full of blowback. The solution is worse than the problem.
Just say it out loud: Abolish software patents.
Negative matter DOES react to tractor beams in reverse, being repelled by the nominally attractive force.
I keep getting questions from people asking me to give them an example of regulatory capture. Now I have one.
The best defense is a strong offense. Objection overruled.
Dr. General Buck Turgidson
Director, NSF Grants Directorate