Maybe it was a lame example, but it fits neatly enough.
"Words hold meaning."
You are confusing the words with the things they represent. Words are groupings of sounds. They are attributed meaning, they don't actually have any intrinsic meaning of their own. For example, the words 'shit', 'crap', and 'excrement' all have the same meaning. All three words convey the same thing, none is any more 'proper' or 'descriptive' as you put it a couple posts ago. Yet I listed them in the order of perceived offensiveness. Are you really going to continue to claim that there is actually some form of logic that would INNATELY chose one of those groupings of sound over another?
Even that misses the real problem so we need to adjust it a bit. Farberware (ibm) put in lots of R&D to develop a new pasta maker, the maker is faster and easier and takes the world by storm. Kraft (microsoft) made a deal with farberware to include a couple years worth of supplies for the pasta maker (dos) free with purchase. Of course those who want a pasta maker use the free supplies.
Soon other companies figure out the principle behind the design and produce their own interoperable versions (pc clones). The obvious choice is for these clone makers to also go with free Kraft supplies, assuring the public that it is just as good as the other. This way they can replicate the look and feel of the other system.
Farberware Pasta maker and all the clone products have taken the world by storm and become a household name. The success of these products has catapulted Kraft to a monopoly position in the market, for while there lots of pasta maker manufacturers, Kraft provides the supplies for all of them.
But there is a twist, Kraft (microsoft) includes a poison (proprietary document formats) in every batch of supplies. Once you use Kraft products you will die in 30 days unless you use the products again within that time. This doesn't affect most users who eat pasta within that time frame and continue using Kraft since that is what they started with. Others discovered the problem when they wanted to try something new and found a warning when searching for other options. Kraft is confident that the free market will defend its right to protect its market position and believes its customer lock-in strategy is just good business.
Of course it doesn't stop there. The pasta maker design is such that the supplies must yield a certain consistency that can only be produced by a secret ingredient in the Kraft supplies. So those who own Farberware pasta makers (which is everyone) are unable to use any other sort of supplies than Kraft. Making it impossible to purchase one and never use the Kraft supplies and therefore avoid the poison. Although, sooner or later you are bound to eat a meal at a restaurant or friends home where the Kraft supplies are used anyway.
Despite Kraft's consistency lock, some independent groups have figured out how to make supplies that will inter-operate with the pasta machines well enough for many people. Recognizing Kraft's powerful position some of the pasta machine clone makers consider offering units with other types of supply than Kraft. Kraft quickly used its market position to force vendors to only provide Kraft with machines and further to include a bottle of Kraft sauce (Internet explorer) along with the supplies. This way Ragu has no hope of competing the market. Kraft even adjusts their pasta to absorb all the liquid in Ragu sauce and other sauces while performing perfectly with Kraft sauce.
And there you have it, the story of Microsoft piggy backing on the success of the IBM PC and PC CLONE to gain and monopoly, using proprietary products and formats to prevent customers from having the option of choosing a competing product once they put data in a Microsoft format. And of course, the method by which they use their pasta supply... err... operating system monopoly to gain additional monopolies in somewhat related areas like web browsers.
"The most noble purpose of the government is to ensure the free market, something that cannot exist without government intervention."
You seem to be confusing free market with fair market. When refering to a free market one needs to define 'free' on a case by case basis. Typically the term 'free market' is used to refer to a market that is free of government interference and regulation, where the only restriction on how business is conducted is economics. If a product is unsafe then a free market would remove it by economic force (people would not purchase that product). Most of those who claim they want a market free of government interference only want government interaction that reduces profits stopped and want corporate/business protecting legislation to remain.
The first step in breaking a free market is to introduce corporations, lending, and capital investment and afford them government security and legal recognition. These instruments allow a consolidation of wealth and assure that those who have means are able to utilize it to exploit those with lesser means to increase their wealth rather than each man earning for himself.
The second is collaboration between competitors, in order for a free market to remain free the term 'government' needs to include private sector bureaucracy as well as state/city/national.
Preventing this breakage is impossible without protective legislation and that would itself be a violation of the free market. Free markets are no more realistic and workable in practice than communism. One fails due to the human tendency toward laziness, the other fails due to the human tendency toward greed. No system will ever succeed unless it abandons all romantic notions and recognizes at its core that most people are lazy, greedy, self-centered, vicious, inconsiderate, stupid, and irresponsible.
Seriously, any 'higher intelligence' that has been herded for thousands of years by stories of magic men in the skies who want them to behave or suffer eternally after death must be thought of as they cattle that they are first and foremost.
"Extra verbs/adjectives for those that don't want to learn a proper variety of more useful and descriptive ones?"
Note to self. A random individual on Slashdot nick'd as somersault is the ultimate authority on the English language and utility of the words contained therein. All must refer to his vast wisdom before using a verb or adjective to determine if that word is of the proper variety and worthwhile utility.
"then of course the words themselves can generate emotions. It's not illogical."
If someone routinely slams bedroom door in face then the door may be a trigger that stirs your emotion and offense. That hardly makes being angry with the door logical or valid. You should be angry with the person slamming the door in your face, not the door itself.
I am going to ignore the name-calling you wielded in that same statement. Who says there has to be a point to swearing? In fact, last I checked this is supposed to be a new millennium staffed with new and improved intelligent human beings. An intelligent human will immediately dismiss the entire concept of 'swear' words, 'bad' words, and 'profanity' as illogical nonsense. Words can no more be profane or bad than guns can kill people. Words, Guns, Knives, Hammers, Racks, Hack Saws, Poisons, and Medicines are all inanimate objects incapable of motive. The tool bears no responsibility for the actions of the higher life form who wields it.
If you find yourself offended by the words of another I recommend you consider why. Is it the message being conveyed by the other you find offensive or the words themselves? Either way you need to evaluate whether those feelings are logically consistent and correct yourself if needed. Of course, if it is the words that offend you then logic will always lead to the conclusion that you need to correct yourself and dismiss the ignorant and merit-less moral notions passed down from the 50's.
"stupid argument"
Certainly, unlike your own educated and firmly supported arguments. You have proven that a declaration of the stupidity of another's argument is obviously a self-evident point requiring no support whatsoever. Clearly, arguments like these are of high caliber and should be credited with greater merit than those to which you were responding.
Microsoft has a handful of patents could apply to open source. They'll give you a patent for putting the OK button on the bottom right of the diagbox because the eye scans it first. There have to be some.
As big a gun as Microsoft is, it needs a few things in place in order to be able to leverage its IP. First, there are a couple big companies with massive patent portfolios that could be leveraged to counter-attack Microsoft software (since there are enough ridiculous patents that nobody with much software could avoid violating something). Second, they need to be sure they have a defense against anti-trust action (we weren't trying to eliminate competition your honor, you see, we even made an agreement to protect users of that system who were willing to join in a mutual respect of our rights as innovators: we didn't attack our competitor, only a group of vendors stealing our IP).
In one action they have made Novell a pawn. Novell may or may not see the fallout and simply have sold out. Perhaps Novell jumping at the opportunity to become the only Linux show in town and eliminate their biggest competitor. Perhaps they were only considering the additional clause an added bonus. Whether Novell was witting or simply misdirected the effect is the same, Microsoft has their glowing halo in case of anti-trust and one of the two big guns has been disarmed should Microsoft attack.
Apparently, Robert Cresanti, Under Secretary of Commerce for Technology; is a bought and paid for whore giving blow jobs to Microsoft and other tech corps. You mean a politician is corrupt and using his position to make recommendations based upon the bribes of corporate interest rather than doing 'the right thing'(TM)? Oh my, I am so astonished that such a thing could happen in our great nation.
Didn't anyone tell him we have the only shiny and clean political system and are the greatest most honest dudley do right nation in the world? Didn't he get the memo telling him that we don't brainwash our children with altered more patriotic versions of history to brainwash them? Or the part where in the land of the free our government doesn't perform thousands of warrant less wiretaps on the private domestic communication of citizens not even suspected of crimes. Certainly no corrupt politicians elected with rigged voting machines.
I just hope that this nation hasn't gone so far that people actually are lulled into a false sense of security because of a few wins for the other corrupt party in the two rigged party system. Those who rig elections in this country pay the ones with (D) in the title just as surely as the ones with (R).
"Solar is renewable but is not capable of supplying enough energy to supply the worlds energy needs. This sentence means, it is not... right? With current solar technology a fairly large chunk of the Earths surface would have to be covered with panels. While this sentence emans: it is capable, yes? So what exactly is your point?"
Let me clarify. Yes, of course the sun burns enough juice to light up our world. In theory we can even harvest enough of that juice with enough panel surface. In practice, covering 60% of the surface of the earth with the most efficient solar panels we can produce is not possible.
"Even if you can only enable your bot 3 hours at a time, that's still 3 hours or more that you go out and get a drink, while some other poor SOB is grinding away for mats/rep/items."
Yes but if the bot must do it at the same rate as a player and must have resting patterns similar to that of a human (minimum of 8hrs offline in a 48hr period, a several minute period of inactivity every couple of hours, etc) then the bot can not earn more than you could. This makes it impossible for the bot to produce more than a human and therefore can't upset the balance of a game more than a human can. That reduces the problem to techno-idiots being jealous of the guy works smarter and that isn't really a problem at all.
A player using a bot would be producing less with those restrictions than a human with no life. You could run more than one but you would have to have an account and computer dedicated to each one. Hardcore players typically multi-account anyway. The only ones who might abuse this would be gold farmers and they are going to be around even if they have to fall back on slave labor, so bot detection is not a solution to gold farmers. Actually, there are always going to be people who want to be able to play the game casually without being behind the people without a life. Because of that the only solution to the demand for purchased gold is for blizzard to control it themselves.
For instance, if Blizzard monitored the top grinders on a server and rated your gold potential against those players, allowing you to purchase the gold needed to make up the difference but no more. The game economy is then kept in balance because players can't purchase more gold than a player could earn. Blizzard can then keep the profits from the virtual economy at home. Chinese farms would be eliminated or be reduced to the point where they have no impact on the game because 99% of the slack would be taken up by sanctioned gold sales.
"If bio-diesel is not economical, then what is economical within the foreseeable future? A population decline?"
My answer wouldn't be very popular here.
"Which may last orders of magnitude longer than fossil fuel. Insolation is a finite source of power (energy divided by time), but as a source of energy (power times time), it will likely outlast H. sapiens."
Much like the tides, winds, and rotation of the Earth.
"How is gravity sustainable? Once you harness the energy from something falling, you have to use energy to lift it before you let it fall again."
Yes the energy that lifts it is also called gravity. Gravity moves our entire solar system and powers the rotation of the earth, I was not simply referring to the earths gravity. However, on earth it powers winds, tides, rivers, waterfalls, and generates a global magnetic field.
"Solar power is more viable than controlled nuclear fusion for the foreseeable future."
According to whom? First, there is no such thing as more viable. This is black and white, and currently neither source is viable. Solar power is a fairly mature technology that has received a fairly serious amount of research and a great deal of work has been put into it. Anything is possible, but a breakthrough in solar power that would make it viable doesn't really seem likely. Considering the vast amount of effort and funding that has been put into solar already it seems unlikely somebody is going to come up with something new that will dramatically improve solar technology outside of advances in other areas that lend themselves to solar applications. The last I checked solar collection is fairly efficient and powering North America alone would take something like 60% of the Earth's surface being covered in panels.
Fusion on the other hand is fairly young from a research point of view. As it receives more attention and funding it is likely that great advances that aren't even especially brilliant will come simply from having more heads on the concept. Where solar would require an unrealistic amount of real estate to power the earth even with zero loss panels, fusion has the potential to provide a plentiful source of energy that will eliminate our power concerns.
"Wouldn't harnessing the angular momentum of the earth and moon change the length of the day and month? That sounds dangerous for the ecosystem. Can you cite sources otherwise?"
Wouldn't harnessing the heat and light from the sun impact the climate and weather of the Earth? That sounds dangerous for the ecosystem. Can you cite sources otherwise?
There is no such thing as free energy, no matter where you take energy from, you are taking it and that will have an impact on the thing you are taking it from. If you use 'natural' energy sources then you are taking energy that is needed for nature's balance and that will have an impact on nature. With either source the impact would likely be slow, and the ecosystem would of course adapt to the changes. The ecosystem automatically evolves into balance, there is no magic there. If you change the conditions then the ecosystem will adjust into a perfect harmony with those new conditions. It does this by killing off the things that can't survive in those new conditions. The only concern we need have is that we remain one of the things that can survive within the ecosystem.
There is one source of energy that won't have that sort of impact. If stable matter is not providing energy to anything else (hence the stability). If we convert stable matter into unstable energy we can utilize then we aren't robbing nature of the energy that powers it.
"Wind harnesses the movement of air masses that have been heated by the sun. Therefore, it is an indirect form of solar power, not gravity power."
I will be sure to tell the next hurricane that hits us in Florida that the rotation of the Earth has absolutely no impact on wind.
Really, we aren't looking a true energy crisis for at least a century. Solar, Nuclear, and Coal
"After all, if your bot is running 24/7 you'll still outgrind any human quickly enough."
Which would also set off alarms. Humans will be inactive for a minimum of 8hrs in a 48hr period. Humans take at least a 5 minute break every couple hours. It is not just the rate at which humans take actions that can be used to safely distinguish between a human and bot, but also the rate at which they rest.
Making a bot operate at the speed of a human, including breaks and sleeping will not eliminate all the reasons to have a bot. But it will eliminate the edge bots give over humans and that is all that is required to balance gameplay. You can debate game economy and players not knowing how to play characters but these can occur with a sweatshop full of humans or ebay account sales without any bots at all.
Actually bots would be at a disadvantage since they must grind and grinding is of little value in wow. Real players don't grind in wow because the quest system gives far better points. Since bots can only grind they would be far less effective than real humans. The same with farming, humans are far more versatile if the bots must 'sleep' and take breaks.
Then you are back to not being economical. Even if all waste oils miraculously became free the supply would not be enough to even graze the surface of our consumption needs. Even with free oils the cleaning process and distribution costs, plus the need for people to actually profit along the way would make bio-diesel a non-viable choice economically.
"The sun is the only renewable source of energy that this planet has."
Perhaps I am being anal but the sun is not a source of renewable energy. It is a finite source of energy.
"If the sun cannot supply enough energy for the population, then the planet has passed its carrying capacity."
Do you have any idea how much energy is contained in a pebble? Matter is simply a stabilize form of pure energy. There is a massive supply of energy on earth aside from the sun. It may not be viable at the moment but the sun is hardly the end all be all of energy. The sun is a convenient source of unstable energy, but that can be derived from other sources. Gravity comes immediately to mind. The rotation of the Earth, the tides, wind, all expressions of gravitational energy that can be harnessed.
"Blizzard does not support Linux. It was great that some enterprising people got WoW working, but that doesn't mean you can complain when Blizzard does something that unintentionally breaks it."
That really isn't relevent to the conversation. Blizzard didn't do something that breaks an unsupported configuration. Blizzard accused legitimate users of violating the game terms of service. Further, they simply stole the monthly fees those users paid under false pretenses.
Solar is renewable but is not capable of supplying enough energy to supply the worlds energy needs. With current solar technology a fairly large chunk of the Earths surface would have to be covered with panels.
Solar is a great way to REDUCE dependance on other sources of energy but it is not a solution. Just like biodiesel is not a viable wholesale replacement for petro because it is not economical. Unless you think everyone should be stealing oil vats from in back of their local mcdonalds.
Just doing something repetative wouldn't be checking the gameaction bandwidth. It would be checking the logic, which is precisely what the parent poster said would not work.
It's not that the script would do something different than your wife, it's that your wife is only human and can't press buttons, click, and move as fast as a script. Since a script would be able to take, say 20 actions in the time it would take a determined human to take 5 it should be easy to detect the scripts.
Your text-talk (where did that term come from anyway) needs a little correcting. "CU" should be "c u". Damn phone texters are fucking up perfectly good IM shorthand.
I never really understood texting on mobile phones, it is a pain in the ass and costs per message. Why wouldn't you just call the person?
"So you believe in a Deity that condemns people to eternal suffering because they told one shitty bad taste joke? Fucking hardcore."
Why not? There are plenty of deities that will condemn you to hell for less. There is even one that will have you burn for all eternity if you get laid for a price that is less than half of everything you own.
I think you have that backwards. Linux is already largely used on the server-side. If it couldn't communicate with windows desktops then it would be pulled in a heartbeat. If you put in linux desktops then you wouldn't need to use windows network protocols to communicate with the linux servers.
"Except that the developing world will keep developing non-M$ OS's, just because they (a) won't be able to afford the ever-increasing hardware demands of Micro$hit, (b) don't particularly like the US oftentimes, and (c) want to keep their hardware free of US control."
Except that most of the development isn't done in those places. Most of the development in major projects is done by developers paid by US corporations. For successful suit, just the RISK of such a suit is enough to cut off that development funding.
"I can't think of a single time I've seen one of these ultimate-death-for-open-source scenarios come to pass."
There are still several ultimate-death-for-open-source scares that are very much alive and progressing as feared. For instance, all the hardware DRM and windows trusted computing fears are still very much present and are no less sinister than they ever were. It is just that the change has been slow enough in coming that the guard has been let down.
Bruce, I haven't read the agreement anymore than any of the others here. But is it possible that the agreement covers Novell customers who receive the source and extends to those who have a copy that derives from a Novell copy as well? If Novell derivatives are also covered then Novell would not be encumbering the GPL software they are distributing but still would not be protecting RedHat.
This would also put Novell in a position to force acceptance of any patches or modifications they want into the software but would allow anyone who can fork from a Novell copy to be protected from Microsoft.
Slashdot Mirror
I find that 'shit' is a rather appropriate word.
"Really crap example :)"
Maybe it was a lame example, but it fits neatly enough.
"Words hold meaning."
You are confusing the words with the things they represent. Words are groupings of sounds. They are attributed meaning, they don't actually have any intrinsic meaning of their own. For example, the words 'shit', 'crap', and 'excrement' all have the same meaning. All three words convey the same thing, none is any more 'proper' or 'descriptive' as you put it a couple posts ago. Yet I listed them in the order of perceived offensiveness. Are you really going to continue to claim that there is actually some form of logic that would INNATELY chose one of those groupings of sound over another?
Even that misses the real problem so we need to adjust it a bit. Farberware (ibm) put in lots of R&D to develop a new pasta maker, the maker is faster and easier and takes the world by storm. Kraft (microsoft) made a deal with farberware to include a couple years worth of supplies for the pasta maker (dos) free with purchase. Of course those who want a pasta maker use the free supplies.
Soon other companies figure out the principle behind the design and produce their own interoperable versions (pc clones). The obvious choice is for these clone makers to also go with free Kraft supplies, assuring the public that it is just as good as the other. This way they can replicate the look and feel of the other system.
Farberware Pasta maker and all the clone products have taken the world by storm and become a household name. The success of these products has catapulted Kraft to a monopoly position in the market, for while there lots of pasta maker manufacturers, Kraft provides the supplies for all of them.
But there is a twist, Kraft (microsoft) includes a poison (proprietary document formats) in every batch of supplies. Once you use Kraft products you will die in 30 days unless you use the products again within that time. This doesn't affect most users who eat pasta within that time frame and continue using Kraft since that is what they started with. Others discovered the problem when they wanted to try something new and found a warning when searching for other options. Kraft is confident that the free market will defend its right to protect its market position and believes its customer lock-in strategy is just good business.
Of course it doesn't stop there. The pasta maker design is such that the supplies must yield a certain consistency that can only be produced by a secret ingredient in the Kraft supplies. So those who own Farberware pasta makers (which is everyone) are unable to use any other sort of supplies than Kraft. Making it impossible to purchase one and never use the Kraft supplies and therefore avoid the poison. Although, sooner or later you are bound to eat a meal at a restaurant or friends home where the Kraft supplies are used anyway.
Despite Kraft's consistency lock, some independent groups have figured out how to make supplies that will inter-operate with the pasta machines well enough for many people. Recognizing Kraft's powerful position some of the pasta machine clone makers consider offering units with other types of supply than Kraft. Kraft quickly used its market position to force vendors to only provide Kraft with machines and further to include a bottle of Kraft sauce (Internet explorer) along with the supplies. This way Ragu has no hope of competing the market. Kraft even adjusts their pasta to absorb all the liquid in Ragu sauce and other sauces while performing perfectly with Kraft sauce.
And there you have it, the story of Microsoft piggy backing on the success of the IBM PC and PC CLONE to gain and monopoly, using proprietary products and formats to prevent customers from having the option of choosing a competing product once they put data in a Microsoft format. And of course, the method by which they use their pasta supply... err... operating system monopoly to gain additional monopolies in somewhat related areas like web browsers.
"The most noble purpose of the government is to ensure the free market, something that cannot exist without government intervention."
You seem to be confusing free market with fair market. When refering to a free market one needs to define 'free' on a case by case basis. Typically the term 'free market' is used to refer to a market that is free of government interference and regulation, where the only restriction on how business is conducted is economics. If a product is unsafe then a free market would remove it by economic force (people would not purchase that product). Most of those who claim they want a market free of government interference only want government interaction that reduces profits stopped and want corporate/business protecting legislation to remain.
The first step in breaking a free market is to introduce corporations, lending, and capital investment and afford them government security and legal recognition. These instruments allow a consolidation of wealth and assure that those who have means are able to utilize it to exploit those with lesser means to increase their wealth rather than each man earning for himself.
The second is collaboration between competitors, in order for a free market to remain free the term 'government' needs to include private sector bureaucracy as well as state/city/national.
Preventing this breakage is impossible without protective legislation and that would itself be a violation of the free market. Free markets are no more realistic and workable in practice than communism. One fails due to the human tendency toward laziness, the other fails due to the human tendency toward greed. No system will ever succeed unless it abandons all romantic notions and recognizes at its core that most people are lazy, greedy, self-centered, vicious, inconsiderate, stupid, and irresponsible.
Seriously, any 'higher intelligence' that has been herded for thousands of years by stories of magic men in the skies who want them to behave or suffer eternally after death must be thought of as they cattle that they are first and foremost.
"Extra verbs/adjectives for those that don't want to learn a proper variety of more useful and descriptive ones?"
Note to self. A random individual on Slashdot nick'd as somersault is the ultimate authority on the English language and utility of the words contained therein. All must refer to his vast wisdom before using a verb or adjective to determine if that word is of the proper variety and worthwhile utility.
"then of course the words themselves can generate emotions. It's not illogical."
If someone routinely slams bedroom door in face then the door may be a trigger that stirs your emotion and offense. That hardly makes being angry with the door logical or valid. You should be angry with the person slamming the door in your face, not the door itself.
"pointlessly swearing idiot"
I am going to ignore the name-calling you wielded in that same statement. Who says there has to be a point to swearing? In fact, last I checked this is supposed to be a new millennium staffed with new and improved intelligent human beings. An intelligent human will immediately dismiss the entire concept of 'swear' words, 'bad' words, and 'profanity' as illogical nonsense. Words can no more be profane or bad than guns can kill people. Words, Guns, Knives, Hammers, Racks, Hack Saws, Poisons, and Medicines are all inanimate objects incapable of motive. The tool bears no responsibility for the actions of the higher life form who wields it.
If you find yourself offended by the words of another I recommend you consider why. Is it the message being conveyed by the other you find offensive or the words themselves? Either way you need to evaluate whether those feelings are logically consistent and correct yourself if needed. Of course, if it is the words that offend you then logic will always lead to the conclusion that you need to correct yourself and dismiss the ignorant and merit-less moral notions passed down from the 50's.
"stupid argument"
Certainly, unlike your own educated and firmly supported arguments. You have proven that a declaration of the stupidity of another's argument is obviously a self-evident point requiring no support whatsoever. Clearly, arguments like these are of high caliber and should be credited with greater merit than those to which you were responding.
So you are saying that all that is needed to attain absolute zero is a vacuum?
Microsoft has a handful of patents could apply to open source. They'll give you a patent for putting the OK button on the bottom right of the diagbox because the eye scans it first. There have to be some.
As big a gun as Microsoft is, it needs a few things in place in order to be able to leverage its IP. First, there are a couple big companies with massive patent portfolios that could be leveraged to counter-attack Microsoft software (since there are enough ridiculous patents that nobody with much software could avoid violating something). Second, they need to be sure they have a defense against anti-trust action (we weren't trying to eliminate competition your honor, you see, we even made an agreement to protect users of that system who were willing to join in a mutual respect of our rights as innovators: we didn't attack our competitor, only a group of vendors stealing our IP).
In one action they have made Novell a pawn. Novell may or may not see the fallout and simply have sold out. Perhaps Novell jumping at the opportunity to become the only Linux show in town and eliminate their biggest competitor. Perhaps they were only considering the additional clause an added bonus. Whether Novell was witting or simply misdirected the effect is the same, Microsoft has their glowing halo in case of anti-trust and one of the two big guns has been disarmed should Microsoft attack.
At least IBM is still out there.
Apparently, Robert Cresanti, Under Secretary of Commerce for Technology; is a bought and paid for whore giving blow jobs to Microsoft and other tech corps. You mean a politician is corrupt and using his position to make recommendations based upon the bribes of corporate interest rather than doing 'the right thing'(TM)? Oh my, I am so astonished that such a thing could happen in our great nation.
Didn't anyone tell him we have the only shiny and clean political system and are the greatest most honest dudley do right nation in the world? Didn't he get the memo telling him that we don't brainwash our children with altered more patriotic versions of history to brainwash them? Or the part where in the land of the free our government doesn't perform thousands of warrant less wiretaps on the private domestic communication of citizens not even suspected of crimes. Certainly no corrupt politicians elected with rigged voting machines.
I just hope that this nation hasn't gone so far that people actually are lulled into a false sense of security because of a few wins for the other corrupt party in the two rigged party system. Those who rig elections in this country pay the ones with (D) in the title just as surely as the ones with (R).
"Solar is renewable but is not capable of supplying enough energy to supply the worlds energy needs. This sentence means, it is not ... right?
With current solar technology a fairly large chunk of the Earths surface would have to be covered with panels. While this sentence emans: it is capable, yes? So what exactly is your point?"
Let me clarify. Yes, of course the sun burns enough juice to light up our world. In theory we can even harvest enough of that juice with enough panel surface. In practice, covering 60% of the surface of the earth with the most efficient solar panels we can produce is not possible.
"Even if you can only enable your bot 3 hours at a time, that's still 3 hours or more that you go out and get a drink, while some other poor SOB is grinding away for mats/rep/items."
Yes but if the bot must do it at the same rate as a player and must have resting patterns similar to that of a human (minimum of 8hrs offline in a 48hr period, a several minute period of inactivity every couple of hours, etc) then the bot can not earn more than you could. This makes it impossible for the bot to produce more than a human and therefore can't upset the balance of a game more than a human can. That reduces the problem to techno-idiots being jealous of the guy works smarter and that isn't really a problem at all.
A player using a bot would be producing less with those restrictions than a human with no life. You could run more than one but you would have to have an account and computer dedicated to each one. Hardcore players typically multi-account anyway. The only ones who might abuse this would be gold farmers and they are going to be around even if they have to fall back on slave labor, so bot detection is not a solution to gold farmers. Actually, there are always going to be people who want to be able to play the game casually without being behind the people without a life. Because of that the only solution to the demand for purchased gold is for blizzard to control it themselves.
For instance, if Blizzard monitored the top grinders on a server and rated your gold potential against those players, allowing you to purchase the gold needed to make up the difference but no more. The game economy is then kept in balance because players can't purchase more gold than a player could earn. Blizzard can then keep the profits from the virtual economy at home. Chinese farms would be eliminated or be reduced to the point where they have no impact on the game because 99% of the slack would be taken up by sanctioned gold sales.
Refer to http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=206732&cid=168 80104
"If bio-diesel is not economical, then what is economical within the foreseeable future? A population decline?"
My answer wouldn't be very popular here.
"Which may last orders of magnitude longer than fossil fuel. Insolation is a finite source of power (energy divided by time), but as a source of energy (power times time), it will likely outlast H. sapiens."
Much like the tides, winds, and rotation of the Earth.
"How is gravity sustainable? Once you harness the energy from something falling, you have to use energy to lift it before you let it fall again."
Yes the energy that lifts it is also called gravity. Gravity moves our entire solar system and powers the rotation of the earth, I was not simply referring to the earths gravity. However, on earth it powers winds, tides, rivers, waterfalls, and generates a global magnetic field.
"Solar power is more viable than controlled nuclear fusion for the foreseeable future."
According to whom? First, there is no such thing as more viable. This is black and white, and currently neither source is viable. Solar power is a fairly mature technology that has received a fairly serious amount of research and a great deal of work has been put into it. Anything is possible, but a breakthrough in solar power that would make it viable doesn't really seem likely. Considering the vast amount of effort and funding that has been put into solar already it seems unlikely somebody is going to come up with something new that will dramatically improve solar technology outside of advances in other areas that lend themselves to solar applications. The last I checked solar collection is fairly efficient and powering North America alone would take something like 60% of the Earth's surface being covered in panels.
Fusion on the other hand is fairly young from a research point of view. As it receives more attention and funding it is likely that great advances that aren't even especially brilliant will come simply from having more heads on the concept. Where solar would require an unrealistic amount of real estate to power the earth even with zero loss panels, fusion has the potential to provide a plentiful source of energy that will eliminate our power concerns.
"Wouldn't harnessing the angular momentum of the earth and moon change the length of the day and month? That sounds dangerous for the ecosystem. Can you cite sources otherwise?"
Wouldn't harnessing the heat and light from the sun impact the climate and weather of the Earth? That sounds dangerous for the ecosystem. Can you cite sources otherwise?
There is no such thing as free energy, no matter where you take energy from, you are taking it and that will have an impact on the thing you are taking it from. If you use 'natural' energy sources then you are taking energy that is needed for nature's balance and that will have an impact on nature. With either source the impact would likely be slow, and the ecosystem would of course adapt to the changes. The ecosystem automatically evolves into balance, there is no magic there. If you change the conditions then the ecosystem will adjust into a perfect harmony with those new conditions. It does this by killing off the things that can't survive in those new conditions. The only concern we need have is that we remain one of the things that can survive within the ecosystem.
There is one source of energy that won't have that sort of impact. If stable matter is not providing energy to anything else (hence the stability). If we convert stable matter into unstable energy we can utilize then we aren't robbing nature of the energy that powers it.
"Wind harnesses the movement of air masses that have been heated by the sun. Therefore, it is an indirect form of solar power, not gravity power."
I will be sure to tell the next hurricane that hits us in Florida that the rotation of the Earth has absolutely no impact on wind.
Really, we aren't looking a true energy crisis for at least a century. Solar, Nuclear, and Coal
"After all, if your bot is running 24/7 you'll still outgrind any human quickly enough."
Which would also set off alarms. Humans will be inactive for a minimum of 8hrs in a 48hr period. Humans take at least a 5 minute break every couple hours. It is not just the rate at which humans take actions that can be used to safely distinguish between a human and bot, but also the rate at which they rest.
Making a bot operate at the speed of a human, including breaks and sleeping will not eliminate all the reasons to have a bot. But it will eliminate the edge bots give over humans and that is all that is required to balance gameplay. You can debate game economy and players not knowing how to play characters but these can occur with a sweatshop full of humans or ebay account sales without any bots at all.
Actually bots would be at a disadvantage since they must grind and grinding is of little value in wow. Real players don't grind in wow because the quest system gives far better points. Since bots can only grind they would be far less effective than real humans. The same with farming, humans are far more versatile if the bots must 'sleep' and take breaks.
"Stealing? No. Buying? Yes."
Then you are back to not being economical. Even if all waste oils miraculously became free the supply would not be enough to even graze the surface of our consumption needs. Even with free oils the cleaning process and distribution costs, plus the need for people to actually profit along the way would make bio-diesel a non-viable choice economically.
"The sun is the only renewable source of energy that this planet has."
Perhaps I am being anal but the sun is not a source of renewable energy. It is a finite source of energy.
"If the sun cannot supply enough energy for the population, then the planet has passed its carrying capacity."
Do you have any idea how much energy is contained in a pebble? Matter is simply a stabilize form of pure energy. There is a massive supply of energy on earth aside from the sun. It may not be viable at the moment but the sun is hardly the end all be all of energy. The sun is a convenient source of unstable energy, but that can be derived from other sources. Gravity comes immediately to mind. The rotation of the Earth, the tides, wind, all expressions of gravitational energy that can be harnessed.
"So why not vary the timing of a script's actions by a random amount each iteration, and keep that timing within the range of human reaction times?"
Because it would make the bot as slow as a human and eliminate the benefit of botting?
"Blizzard does not support Linux. It was great that some enterprising people got WoW working, but that doesn't mean you can complain when Blizzard does something that unintentionally breaks it."
That really isn't relevent to the conversation. Blizzard didn't do something that breaks an unsupported configuration. Blizzard accused legitimate users of violating the game terms of service. Further, they simply stole the monthly fees those users paid under false pretenses.
Solar is renewable but is not capable of supplying enough energy to supply the worlds energy needs. With current solar technology a fairly large chunk of the Earths surface would have to be covered with panels.
Solar is a great way to REDUCE dependance on other sources of energy but it is not a solution. Just like biodiesel is not a viable wholesale replacement for petro because it is not economical. Unless you think everyone should be stealing oil vats from in back of their local mcdonalds.
Just doing something repetative wouldn't be checking the gameaction bandwidth. It would be checking the logic, which is precisely what the parent poster said would not work.
It's not that the script would do something different than your wife, it's that your wife is only human and can't press buttons, click, and move as fast as a script. Since a script would be able to take, say 20 actions in the time it would take a determined human to take 5 it should be easy to detect the scripts.
Your text-talk (where did that term come from anyway) needs a little correcting. "CU" should be "c u". Damn phone texters are fucking up perfectly good IM shorthand.
I never really understood texting on mobile phones, it is a pain in the ass and costs per message. Why wouldn't you just call the person?
"So you believe in a Deity that condemns people to eternal suffering because they told one shitty bad taste joke? Fucking hardcore."
Why not? There are plenty of deities that will condemn you to hell for less. There is even one that will have you burn for all eternity if you get laid for a price that is less than half of everything you own.
I think you have that backwards. Linux is already largely used on the server-side. If it couldn't communicate with windows desktops then it would be pulled in a heartbeat. If you put in linux desktops then you wouldn't need to use windows network protocols to communicate with the linux servers.
"Except that the developing world will keep developing non-M$ OS's, just because they (a) won't be able to afford the ever-increasing hardware demands of Micro$hit, (b) don't particularly like the US oftentimes, and (c) want to keep their hardware free of US control."
Except that most of the development isn't done in those places. Most of the development in major projects is done by developers paid by US corporations. For successful suit, just the RISK of such a suit is enough to cut off that development funding.
"I can't think of a single time I've seen one of these ultimate-death-for-open-source scenarios come to pass."
There are still several ultimate-death-for-open-source scares that are very much alive and progressing as feared. For instance, all the hardware DRM and windows trusted computing fears are still very much present and are no less sinister than they ever were. It is just that the change has been slow enough in coming that the guard has been let down.
Bruce, I haven't read the agreement anymore than any of the others here. But is it possible that the agreement covers Novell customers who receive the source and extends to those who have a copy that derives from a Novell copy as well? If Novell derivatives are also covered then Novell would not be encumbering the GPL software they are distributing but still would not be protecting RedHat.
This would also put Novell in a position to force acceptance of any patches or modifications they want into the software but would allow anyone who can fork from a Novell copy to be protected from Microsoft.