That's what is wrong with the support industry. Lazy asses who don't take pride in their work and have little or no patience. Way back in 94 when I was a Windows n00b, I used to call support and was appalled at how bad it was. Adaptec, S3, Microsoft... they all sucked. Within a year of using Windows (originally a Mac and Atari/Amiga guy here) I became my own support because I knew more than any of the jackasses on the other end of the phone. What really used to irk me was when I would call and have to walk through all the crap solutions that they were reading from a database even though I'd already done all of that. I'd tell them I already knew the outcome but they wanted me to do it anyway. Then in the end they would say "fdisk, format and re-install". Of course I wouldn't do that. I would dig up the info online or form other users and eventually solve the problem. That's when I realized that the fools that work support are just plain lazy, but your comment cinches it.
I deal with stupid users every day where I work, but I still help them even if it's the upteenth millionth time. I don't expect them to understand or to know what to do. Face it. Computers are STILL to hard to use for the average user because they are very complex machines. The only people that have a prayer of being able to use a computer to it's full capabilities are people who are very good at deductive logic and can understand abstractions easily. This is NOT the average human being. It's probably only about 10% of the population. About 75% would be the people who learn by wrote. They just know what buttons to puch when, but don't know why. So people and computers are meeting halfway, but when something doesn't work, it all falls apart. Face it... computers STILL suck for the majority of the population. (Note that the other 15% I didn't mention are comprised of both the guys with the bulbous heads who can do advanced physics calculations at 245 MIPS in their wetware and the other end of the spectrum with the small cranium that has trouble turning on a light and votes for George W. Bush because that's what TV told them everyone else is doing.)
Anyway... I guess a big part of the "American way" (these days read that as the way capitlist countries act) is to be lazy. Make millions while you sleep, yadda yadda...
...I don't really think this will affect Linux much at all considering how little Linux actually makes use of the BIOS. In my recent attempts to build a nice desktop system based on RedHat 9 for my mom for Christmas, I kept running into plenty of evidence that Linux pretty much ignores a lot of what BIOS is supposed to do for an OS. The P II 266, I was trying to get going for my mom was having a little performance issue, so I had to delve into the black art of BIOS tuning and found that after a while, I wound up turning off a lot of the "optimization" in the BIOS that Windows depends on. After said tuning and custom compiling kernel 2.4.22 with the preemptable kernel patch, the P II was humming along in step with my P 4 runningn Windows XP. So... I wouldn't be surprised if you see Linux on these new BIOS-less platforms.
I subscribe to DirecTV so I can bitch about it jackass. If I didn't, you'd be here saying I have no right to bitch about it simply because you are a contrarian.
...I have to ask people; What ever happened to the idea of advertiser paid radio? Or television? As it is right now, I have DirecTV but it REALLY irks me that I pay almost $50 a month and STILL have to endure commercials. For that amount of money, everything I get should be commercial free. And now they want people to pay for radio while still hitting you with adverts? Things are going to hell in a handbasket for the common man and he doesn't even realize it. The only reason I have DirecTV is for the few decent programs that are on and the fact that it's cheaper than the shitty digital cable in my area. And don't even bring up the subject of the fact that there is a near monopoly in the satellite TV biz... The only choices you have as a "Joe Average" are DirecTV and The Dish Network. DirecTV is owned by Fox (blech!) and The Dish Network used to (not sure now) be owned by some ridiculous christian asses that wanted to make sure that the programming was "wholesome". Sorry, but I'm not happy with the ida that IFC was not carried on the Dish Network in the past.
One of the reasons I was very happy with all the stuff that WAS happening with internet radio back in the 90s was that it gave me choice and I didn't have to pay for it. No one did. I paid for my ISP and that entitled me to access anything on the net I wanted that was legit. (I'm not a pirate which is why I use Linux and rip all my own Ogg Vorbis files from CDs I buy) Now, there's only a handful of internet radio worth listening to. And much of it has also gone the pay route, so I've had to abandon some.
Wake up PEOPLE!!! You are being led down the path to ownership. Not YOU owning something, but someone else owning you! It's no surprise to me that I've become more and more of a hermit along with my wife. We isolate ourselves from America's fucked up society and it's "culture" more and more every day. That's why I do nearly everything myself. I can't accept paying people ridiculous amounts of money for goods and services that just aren't worth it. About the only things I can really justify are my water, gas, electric and ISP bills. I wouldn't have a cell phone, but since my company pays for it, I do. In general they just aren't worth it. I can't really justify the $50 a month to DirecTV though. BBC America, with it's few interesting programs (where's the Doctor Who?) isn't worth $50 a month. Neither is VH1 Classic, IFC, Sundance or Turner Classic Movies. But all of those channels are about all I watch. Cartoon Network sucks heavily now. So does SciFi, and the "new" AMC bites choad so hard it's astounding. I mean WHO are they doing marketing research with to determine that we want nothing but crap? TechTV? JESUS! That's about the worst example of info for armchair techies of "technology-lite". They've got nothing on/. and I've even been having my own issue with/. for the past few years.
Ahhh well... another post that will probably get modded down. At this point, who cares? There are more important problems to attend to... like getting George W. Bush out of office.
I'm right there with ya brother! I used OS/2 before I made the move to Linux, largely because I was sick and tired of Win 3.1 and Windows 95's instability. OS/2 was AWESOME for the day. I could run Windows and DOS apps with more stability and performance than native Windows on the same box (a 486 DX2 66 at the time with 16 Megs of RAM!). I also LOVED the flexibility and beauty of the Presentation Manager. I was able to make my desktop look any way I wanted it to (ie. more usable to me instead of your average moron) and had long file names for a good number of years before Windows.
Microsoft NEVER innovates. Unless you consider the definition of innovation to buy or "borrow" technology from other companies and rebrand it with a warm and fuzzy name. I have yet to see Microsoft come up with one original idea or product. AND I still have yet to see them truly innovate. The real definition of innovation is to take something that exists and use it in a NEW way. Not to use it in the SAME way it's already been used and change the name. Microsoft is a lot like those stupid kids in school who would copy someone else's paper and then change a few words here or there. That's MS "innovation".
I am certain that Microsoft won't really die, but they will evolve into something else. Much like the tobacco industry today is playing at being open about the effects of smoking. You know those folks would still rather be raking in the bucks, but how long before Philip Morris becomes a pharmeceutical company with a "cure" for smoking addiction? Microsoft will be touting the value of open source eventually, but they'll have a different name for it and claim they came up with it on their own. (Shared source is close, but not quite there yet. They are beginning to realize that OSes are approaching the point where they no longer have any real value.) I look for Microsoft to move more deeply into hardware, firmware and more Apple-like marriage of their software to hardware. Sadly, I don't see them dying. Maybe becoming less relevant like some older technology companies, but never dying. Look at it this way... at one time the biggest name in gaming was Atari. It could be said that they had a monopoly at one point. Now, all that's left is the name. It gets pulled out of the casket from time to time and slapped onto a game to try and get sales, but that's it. If it could happen to them. It could happen to ANYONE.
...I didn't read the fucking article. But, I have to say that if the MPAA actually means something by what was said on the front page, this COUDL be potentially good news. *IF* they realize that small markets are important. Possibly more important than the big markets.
I tend to be very interested in films that almost never make it to video even though they should. A great example is the Cremaster Cycle by Matthew Barney. (He even goatse's the completely unsuspectin audience at one point in this art film!:) ) There was some talk of releasing it on DVD, but that hasn't happened. Instead they released a section of the film (about 20 minutes of it) on DVD, possibly as a test. Granted it's from Palm pictures which is not a major distributor. But, if the MPAA realizes that NO WE DON'T WANT yet another copy of some crap Disney film, or the latest teen squeeze on DVD and we DO want intriguing foreign films and art films and collector's series... AND they realize that they can make larger profits with smaller markets (I would easily pay $250 for a five disc set of Matthew Barney's Cremaster Cycle), they will make more money than they ever have. The people who really BUY films are enthusiasts like me. Not Joe and Jane Average. Chances are, that to Joe and Jane average, it's better to rent or watch it on a pay-per-view service. Instead, they should make thier killings on box office sales by putting out movies that people WANT to see. Sure, some people want to watch crap and that's fine (all the people who thought Jerry MacGuire was a good film can apply here). But, Americans could stand for a good dose of exposure to more enlightened cinema from Europe. Back in the 80s, there was more of a trend in this direction and this resulted in a wide array of movies that were accesible at mainstream cinemas. Right now, if your name isn't Kutcher or Witherspoon or Suvari, the movie industry doesn't care. But there are great actors, actresses, and directors that AREN'T teens or "hip and young" who could really bring something to the screen. Richard E. Grant (loved him in Withnail and I and How to Get Ahead in Advertising), Derek Martini, and Guy Maddin for example. Look them up on IMDB and you will see what cinema COULD be if the MPAA just put down their desire for the almighty dollar and did what they are supposed to do! Make movies for art's sake for crying out loud!!
...the same company who has been claiming that security is their top issue while getting exploited MORE times in 2003 than ever before to stop spam? I think they will likely do what they've always done and fix one problem only to create five more...;P
rkz is NOT a troll. He's someone who is concerned about the demise of Slashdot in much the same way that I am. You dorks can go roll your holes.
And, I know I have to say this again for the benefit of the slower amongst you, I am NOT a troll despite my user ID. If you read my older journal entries, you will see that my user ID is just a way of pointing out the neocon lies that the vocal minority of/. likes to astroturf. neocons are Trolling for Dollars. They are doing it here on/., in the White House, in the capitols of our states and in in every boardroom across America. I am not a troll, I am merely someone who is pointing out the lies of the neocons.
I got some Liz Claiborne body lotion for men. Me!? I don't wear any kind of cologne or aftershave, so WHY would I want body lotion? Oh well... I didn't say anything other than thank you since it came from my mom. But that HAS to be THE weirdest gift I've ever gotten. If I WAS going to wear any kind of cologne it would be something much more fashionable anyway... like Calvin Klein's Eternity for men. That, has a more pleasing, less "manly" fragrance. (I ain't gay, but Brut would be totally out of place on me)
Family, friends, myself, co-workers, anything I see that happens to be remotely interesting on my lunch break in the city... There's a lot to take pictures of. What's really nice is that I wanted to take a lot of pictures in the past, but traditional photographyis so expensive, it's really prohibitive. With my Sony and a few packs of CD-RWs, I can take hundresd of thousands of pictures of anything and everything and then re-use the discs after I've culled what I really want to keep. After all, you have to take into account that you can't just walk up to something and take one picture and get it right the first time. You need to try different exposure and aperature settings, different ISOs, etc... Then you need to experiment with lighting, time of day, angles. So in the end, an amateur like me might take 10-30 pictures of one subject, just to get that one really cool image. So, 300-400 per day is pretty realistic for a non-pro. Pros, take far more. For example, just to get the right image for a porno movie cover, Asia Carerra once said they literally take about 1000 photographs and wittle it down to the one image that's just right. That's the only way to take pictures. If you just walk up to something and take one picture, you are risking having zero usable images. I came back from my trip to Australia last year with about 45,000 images. Many of them very similar, but only one out of a grouping would actually make the cut for posting on a web page or printing. I'm very particular about the lighting, composition and color. I'm sure not everyone can relate to me on this, but I'm willing to be I'm in the majority compared to most users of digital cameras. After all, one's life should be well documented in images for posterity. Look at all the pictures of James Dean that were taken of him just in daily activity. How else would Morissey have been able to have James Dean as a part of his life, if those images didn't exist.
I've often wondered about the ability to to eavesdrop with modern cell phones. Since they have voice recording capabilities and many of them are just audio terminals with an always on connection, there's got to be a way to snoop with them. Imagine having your cell phone in your bedroom with all those new really neat features. Completely unaware that someone can remotely activate the audio on the phone and listen to your sex life or intimate conversation. If you ask me, cell phones are destined to be just as big of a security hole as computers have been within the first part of the 21st century. Keep in mind that these "digital wonders" have little in common with their analog, wired ancestors. You can't really cut off the audio with a switch...
Let's put it another way. Let's say that there was a rarely known word: "GeorgeWBushIsAnAss". This word has no connection to George W. Bush himself. It's an old word that just happens to bear a striking resemblence to a meme that is percolating through the collective minds of Americans today. In reality this word just means, untrustworthy.
So someone posts something here on/. using "GeorgeWBushIsAnAss" and get's lambasted by the vocal minority of Bush backers even though he meant no offense. Even though I would find the situation humorous, I would have to say that such a word probably has no place in modern discourse since it is likely to do nothing more than fan flames. If there are other more suitable terms, then the word should be abandoned. ESPECIALLY considering that only a small group of people would have any idea what the word actually means. The world does not cater to those with arcane knowledge no matter how much we may wish it did. It's all about the lowest common denominator.
I agree with you. Even though the word has no connections to the similar sounding racial slur, this word has no place in the English vocabulary today. The first time I'd ever heard this word was when there was a big news story about some idiot politician who used the word and got people pissed off because... THEY DIDN'T KNOW WHAT IT WAS. I didn't either, and I am a very well educated man. The only people who know this word now are people who heard the story back in the 90s about that political flap and English scholars.
I think you would have a very hard time convincing a group of average (insert any race here) that this word is useful at all in today's modern vocabulary. Given that there are many other useful synonyms, I don't see the point in ever using that word other than to rouse tempers and upset people who DON'T know what it means. And in today's world, that would be 90% of the population.
...that there are always questions about who did what first. But keep in mind that the originator of an idea RARELY recieves any credit or praise for it. It's usually the business/politics/religion friendly zealot that gets the biggest accolades. For example, Galileo knew that the earth rotated around the sun by his calculations. Yet because he wasn't supported by the religious/political fops of the day, he died penisless and discredited, only to be proven correct later. Then there is the whole Marconi vs. Tesla thing. Most intelligent observers realize that it is truly Tesla who invented the use of RF and not Marconi. In fact, Marconi specifically used some very shady business practices to invalidate Tesla's patents on induction coils. Marconi was just another Bill Gates. NOt a real inventor but just a busoness man. The two are typically mutually exclusive. So, on this day, consider the possiblity that the Wright brothers may have just been using the typical American method of pulling the wool over people's eyes to gain some notoriety.
Please do not reply to eggtroll, that is MY task. It only "eggs" him on further if anyone but me replies. eggtroll is my current interest. I will follow him as he posts and post this exact response every time. HAND
Please do not reply to eggtroll, that is MY task. It only "eggs" him on further if anyone but me replies. eggtroll is my current interest. I will follow him as he posts and post this exact response every time. HAND
...as the "let the market decide" mantra of the capitlists. Letting the market decide has been an abyssmal failure as I am certain this federal anti-spam bill is likely to be. Both of these failed approaches rely on businesses being "good citizens" which they have proven over and over again that they are not. If there is some way for a business to bypass a law or rule in order to make more money, they will do it. But, the current administration doesn't have a problem with this. As long as they are in power, we are going to see more of our freedoms taken away (like the right to the pursiot of happiness which in my case is a commercial free life) and more of the corporate "rights" bolstered.
Keep this in mind when you're at the polls in 2004: "Businesses are not inherently good".
What have they done to Wilbur!? Oh the humanity! He doesn't have pupils anymore. Oh woe is me!!!;P
Why is this on /. ?
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What does this have to do with things that "geeks" would be interested in? It's purely business crap. If I was interested in this kind of thing, I'd read the trade journals and their related online presence for the ad industry. This has absolutely no interest to the average/. reader. Period. Is this just playing to the suits? I don't get it.
OK OK... You got me. I was merely trying to get down in the depths of what the original poster was doing. He was excoriating the musicians that put their stuff on MP3.com simply because he didn't like what he heard. Yeah, I know that that some of the bands that I listed do have talent (I exclude Eminem and his ilk) and I will grudgingly admit that Soundgarden and STP have way more talent than anyone on radio today (even though I absolutely hate the sound). But, I wasn't really meaning to say that they don't have any talent. I was trying to mirror the original poster's attitude.
As far as my own tastes go, they were shaped in the 80s by electronic bands from Europe and the UK and in general I tend to seek out artists that have little exposure because *I* don't like the bland pap that the music biz tried to push.
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That's what is wrong with the support industry. Lazy asses who don't take pride in their work and have little or no patience. Way back in 94 when I was a Windows n00b, I used to call support and was appalled at how bad it was. Adaptec, S3, Microsoft... they all sucked. Within a year of using Windows (originally a Mac and Atari/Amiga guy here) I became my own support because I knew more than any of the jackasses on the other end of the phone. What really used to irk me was when I would call and have to walk through all the crap solutions that they were reading from a database even though I'd already done all of that. I'd tell them I already knew the outcome but they wanted me to do it anyway. Then in the end they would say "fdisk, format and re-install". Of course I wouldn't do that. I would dig up the info online or form other users and eventually solve the problem. That's when I realized that the fools that work support are just plain lazy, but your comment cinches it.
I deal with stupid users every day where I work, but I still help them even if it's the upteenth millionth time. I don't expect them to understand or to know what to do. Face it. Computers are STILL to hard to use for the average user because they are very complex machines. The only people that have a prayer of being able to use a computer to it's full capabilities are people who are very good at deductive logic and can understand abstractions easily. This is NOT the average human being. It's probably only about 10% of the population. About 75% would be the people who learn by wrote. They just know what buttons to puch when, but don't know why. So people and computers are meeting halfway, but when something doesn't work, it all falls apart. Face it... computers STILL suck for the majority of the population. (Note that the other 15% I didn't mention are comprised of both the guys with the bulbous heads who can do advanced physics calculations at 245 MIPS in their wetware and the other end of the spectrum with the small cranium that has trouble turning on a light and votes for George W. Bush because that's what TV told them everyone else is doing.)
Anyway... I guess a big part of the "American way" (these days read that as the way capitlist countries act) is to be lazy. Make millions while you sleep, yadda yadda...
...I don't really think this will affect Linux much at all considering how little Linux actually makes use of the BIOS. In my recent attempts to build a nice desktop system based on RedHat 9 for my mom for Christmas, I kept running into plenty of evidence that Linux pretty much ignores a lot of what BIOS is supposed to do for an OS. The P II 266, I was trying to get going for my mom was having a little performance issue, so I had to delve into the black art of BIOS tuning and found that after a while, I wound up turning off a lot of the "optimization" in the BIOS that Windows depends on. After said tuning and custom compiling kernel 2.4.22 with the preemptable kernel patch, the P II was humming along in step with my P 4 runningn Windows XP. So... I wouldn't be surprised if you see Linux on these new BIOS-less platforms.
...the UK's first post attempt on Mars was a FAILURE? Just kidding folks. ;P
I subscribe to DirecTV so I can bitch about it jackass. If I didn't, you'd be here saying I have no right to bitch about it simply because you are a contrarian.
From my perspective, I don't know if there's really much difference between blow-blow and blow-suck. (Gawd I love out of context quotes!) ;P
...I have to ask people; What ever happened to the idea of advertiser paid radio? Or television? As it is right now, I have DirecTV but it REALLY irks me that I pay almost $50 a month and STILL have to endure commercials. For that amount of money, everything I get should be commercial free. And now they want people to pay for radio while still hitting you with adverts? Things are going to hell in a handbasket for the common man and he doesn't even realize it. The only reason I have DirecTV is for the few decent programs that are on and the fact that it's cheaper than the shitty digital cable in my area. And don't even bring up the subject of the fact that there is a near monopoly in the satellite TV biz... The only choices you have as a "Joe Average" are DirecTV and The Dish Network. DirecTV is owned by Fox (blech!) and The Dish Network used to (not sure now) be owned by some ridiculous christian asses that wanted to make sure that the programming was "wholesome". Sorry, but I'm not happy with the ida that IFC was not carried on the Dish Network in the past.
/. and I've even been having my own issue with /. for the past few years.
One of the reasons I was very happy with all the stuff that WAS happening with internet radio back in the 90s was that it gave me choice and I didn't have to pay for it. No one did. I paid for my ISP and that entitled me to access anything on the net I wanted that was legit. (I'm not a pirate which is why I use Linux and rip all my own Ogg Vorbis files from CDs I buy) Now, there's only a handful of internet radio worth listening to. And much of it has also gone the pay route, so I've had to abandon some.
Wake up PEOPLE!!! You are being led down the path to ownership. Not YOU owning something, but someone else owning you! It's no surprise to me that I've become more and more of a hermit along with my wife. We isolate ourselves from America's fucked up society and it's "culture" more and more every day. That's why I do nearly everything myself. I can't accept paying people ridiculous amounts of money for goods and services that just aren't worth it. About the only things I can really justify are my water, gas, electric and ISP bills. I wouldn't have a cell phone, but since my company pays for it, I do. In general they just aren't worth it. I can't really justify the $50 a month to DirecTV though. BBC America, with it's few interesting programs (where's the Doctor Who?) isn't worth $50 a month. Neither is VH1 Classic, IFC, Sundance or Turner Classic Movies. But all of those channels are about all I watch. Cartoon Network sucks heavily now. So does SciFi, and the "new" AMC bites choad so hard it's astounding. I mean WHO are they doing marketing research with to determine that we want nothing but crap? TechTV? JESUS! That's about the worst example of info for armchair techies of "technology-lite". They've got nothing on
Ahhh well... another post that will probably get modded down. At this point, who cares? There are more important problems to attend to... like getting George W. Bush out of office.
I'm right there with ya brother! I used OS/2 before I made the move to Linux, largely because I was sick and tired of Win 3.1 and Windows 95's instability. OS/2 was AWESOME for the day. I could run Windows and DOS apps with more stability and performance than native Windows on the same box (a 486 DX2 66 at the time with 16 Megs of RAM!). I also LOVED the flexibility and beauty of the Presentation Manager. I was able to make my desktop look any way I wanted it to (ie. more usable to me instead of your average moron) and had long file names for a good number of years before Windows.
Microsoft NEVER innovates. Unless you consider the definition of innovation to buy or "borrow" technology from other companies and rebrand it with a warm and fuzzy name. I have yet to see Microsoft come up with one original idea or product. AND I still have yet to see them truly innovate. The real definition of innovation is to take something that exists and use it in a NEW way. Not to use it in the SAME way it's already been used and change the name. Microsoft is a lot like those stupid kids in school who would copy someone else's paper and then change a few words here or there. That's MS "innovation".
I am certain that Microsoft won't really die, but they will evolve into something else. Much like the tobacco industry today is playing at being open about the effects of smoking. You know those folks would still rather be raking in the bucks, but how long before Philip Morris becomes a pharmeceutical company with a "cure" for smoking addiction? Microsoft will be touting the value of open source eventually, but they'll have a different name for it and claim they came up with it on their own. (Shared source is close, but not quite there yet. They are beginning to realize that OSes are approaching the point where they no longer have any real value.) I look for Microsoft to move more deeply into hardware, firmware and more Apple-like marriage of their software to hardware. Sadly, I don't see them dying. Maybe becoming less relevant like some older technology companies, but never dying. Look at it this way... at one time the biggest name in gaming was Atari. It could be said that they had a monopoly at one point. Now, all that's left is the name. It gets pulled out of the casket from time to time and slapped onto a game to try and get sales, but that's it. If it could happen to them. It could happen to ANYONE.
...I didn't read the fucking article. But, I have to say that if the MPAA actually means something by what was said on the front page, this COUDL be potentially good news. *IF* they realize that small markets are important. Possibly more important than the big markets.
:) ) There was some talk of releasing it on DVD, but that hasn't happened. Instead they released a section of the film (about 20 minutes of it) on DVD, possibly as a test. Granted it's from Palm pictures which is not a major distributor. But, if the MPAA realizes that NO WE DON'T WANT yet another copy of some crap Disney film, or the latest teen squeeze on DVD and we DO want intriguing foreign films and art films and collector's series... AND they realize that they can make larger profits with smaller markets (I would easily pay $250 for a five disc set of Matthew Barney's Cremaster Cycle), they will make more money than they ever have. The people who really BUY films are enthusiasts like me. Not Joe and Jane Average. Chances are, that to Joe and Jane average, it's better to rent or watch it on a pay-per-view service. Instead, they should make thier killings on box office sales by putting out movies that people WANT to see. Sure, some people want to watch crap and that's fine (all the people who thought Jerry MacGuire was a good film can apply here). But, Americans could stand for a good dose of exposure to more enlightened cinema from Europe. Back in the 80s, there was more of a trend in this direction and this resulted in a wide array of movies that were accesible at mainstream cinemas. Right now, if your name isn't Kutcher or Witherspoon or Suvari, the movie industry doesn't care. But there are great actors, actresses, and directors that AREN'T teens or "hip and young" who could really bring something to the screen. Richard E. Grant (loved him in Withnail and I and How to Get Ahead in Advertising), Derek Martini, and Guy Maddin for example. Look them up on IMDB and you will see what cinema COULD be if the MPAA just put down their desire for the almighty dollar and did what they are supposed to do! Make movies for art's sake for crying out loud!!
I tend to be very interested in films that almost never make it to video even though they should. A great example is the Cremaster Cycle by Matthew Barney. (He even goatse's the completely unsuspectin audience at one point in this art film!
...the same company who has been claiming that security is their top issue while getting exploited MORE times in 2003 than ever before to stop spam? I think they will likely do what they've always done and fix one problem only to create five more... ;P
TO: the ACs ripping on rkz, screw off jackasses.
/. likes to astroturf. neocons are Trolling for Dollars. They are doing it here on /., in the White House, in the capitols of our states and in in every boardroom across America. I am not a troll, I am merely someone who is pointing out the lies of the neocons.
rkz is NOT a troll. He's someone who is concerned about the demise of Slashdot in much the same way that I am. You dorks can go roll your holes.
And, I know I have to say this again for the benefit of the slower amongst you, I am NOT a troll despite my user ID. If you read my older journal entries, you will see that my user ID is just a way of pointing out the neocon lies that the vocal minority of
I got some Liz Claiborne body lotion for men. Me!? I don't wear any kind of cologne or aftershave, so WHY would I want body lotion? Oh well... I didn't say anything other than thank you since it came from my mom. But that HAS to be THE weirdest gift I've ever gotten. If I WAS going to wear any kind of cologne it would be something much more fashionable anyway... like Calvin Klein's Eternity for men. That, has a more pleasing, less "manly" fragrance. (I ain't gay, but Brut would be totally out of place on me)
Family, friends, myself, co-workers, anything I see that happens to be remotely interesting on my lunch break in the city... There's a lot to take pictures of. What's really nice is that I wanted to take a lot of pictures in the past, but traditional photographyis so expensive, it's really prohibitive. With my Sony and a few packs of CD-RWs, I can take hundresd of thousands of pictures of anything and everything and then re-use the discs after I've culled what I really want to keep. After all, you have to take into account that you can't just walk up to something and take one picture and get it right the first time. You need to try different exposure and aperature settings, different ISOs, etc... Then you need to experiment with lighting, time of day, angles. So in the end, an amateur like me might take 10-30 pictures of one subject, just to get that one really cool image. So, 300-400 per day is pretty realistic for a non-pro. Pros, take far more. For example, just to get the right image for a porno movie cover, Asia Carerra once said they literally take about 1000 photographs and wittle it down to the one image that's just right. That's the only way to take pictures. If you just walk up to something and take one picture, you are risking having zero usable images. I came back from my trip to Australia last year with about 45,000 images. Many of them very similar, but only one out of a grouping would actually make the cut for posting on a web page or printing. I'm very particular about the lighting, composition and color. I'm sure not everyone can relate to me on this, but I'm willing to be I'm in the majority compared to most users of digital cameras. After all, one's life should be well documented in images for posterity. Look at all the pictures of James Dean that were taken of him just in daily activity. How else would Morissey have been able to have James Dean as a part of his life, if those images didn't exist.
In general I take somewhere between 300-400 pictures a day and I'm not a pro
I've often wondered about the ability to to eavesdrop with modern cell phones. Since they have voice recording capabilities and many of them are just audio terminals with an always on connection, there's got to be a way to snoop with them. Imagine having your cell phone in your bedroom with all those new really neat features. Completely unaware that someone can remotely activate the audio on the phone and listen to your sex life or intimate conversation. If you ask me, cell phones are destined to be just as big of a security hole as computers have been within the first part of the 21st century. Keep in mind that these "digital wonders" have little in common with their analog, wired ancestors. You can't really cut off the audio with a switch...
Let's put it another way. Let's say that there was a rarely known word: "GeorgeWBushIsAnAss". This word has no connection to George W. Bush himself. It's an old word that just happens to bear a striking resemblence to a meme that is percolating through the collective minds of Americans today. In reality this word just means, untrustworthy.
/. using "GeorgeWBushIsAnAss" and get's lambasted by the vocal minority of Bush backers even though he meant no offense. Even though I would find the situation humorous, I would have to say that such a word probably has no place in modern discourse since it is likely to do nothing more than fan flames. If there are other more suitable terms, then the word should be abandoned. ESPECIALLY considering that only a small group of people would have any idea what the word actually means. The world does not cater to those with arcane knowledge no matter how much we may wish it did. It's all about the lowest common denominator.
So someone posts something here on
I agree with you. Even though the word has no connections to the similar sounding racial slur, this word has no place in the English vocabulary today. The first time I'd ever heard this word was when there was a big news story about some idiot politician who used the word and got people pissed off because... THEY DIDN'T KNOW WHAT IT WAS. I didn't either, and I am a very well educated man. The only people who know this word now are people who heard the story back in the 90s about that political flap and English scholars.
I think you would have a very hard time convincing a group of average (insert any race here) that this word is useful at all in today's modern vocabulary. Given that there are many other useful synonyms, I don't see the point in ever using that word other than to rouse tempers and upset people who DON'T know what it means. And in today's world, that would be 90% of the population.
...that there are always questions about who did what first. But keep in mind that the originator of an idea RARELY recieves any credit or praise for it. It's usually the business/politics/religion friendly zealot that gets the biggest accolades. For example, Galileo knew that the earth rotated around the sun by his calculations. Yet because he wasn't supported by the religious/political fops of the day, he died penisless and discredited, only to be proven correct later. Then there is the whole Marconi vs. Tesla thing. Most intelligent observers realize that it is truly Tesla who invented the use of RF and not Marconi. In fact, Marconi specifically used some very shady business practices to invalidate Tesla's patents on induction coils. Marconi was just another Bill Gates. NOt a real inventor but just a busoness man. The two are typically mutually exclusive. So, on this day, consider the possiblity that the Wright brothers may have just been using the typical American method of pulling the wool over people's eyes to gain some notoriety.
Please do not reply to eggtroll, that is MY task. It only "eggs" him on further if anyone but me replies. eggtroll is my current interest. I will follow him as he posts and post this exact response every time. HAND
Please do not reply to eggtroll, that is MY task. It only "eggs" him on further if anyone but me replies. eggtroll is my current interest. I will follow him as he posts and post this exact response every time. HAND
He even has a little of that "complaint generator" sound in his writing style.
...that someone with WAY too much time on their hands is going to take this and animate it to do something obscene in Flash or something?
...as the "let the market decide" mantra of the capitlists. Letting the market decide has been an abyssmal failure as I am certain this federal anti-spam bill is likely to be. Both of these failed approaches rely on businesses being "good citizens" which they have proven over and over again that they are not. If there is some way for a business to bypass a law or rule in order to make more money, they will do it. But, the current administration doesn't have a problem with this. As long as they are in power, we are going to see more of our freedoms taken away (like the right to the pursiot of happiness which in my case is a commercial free life) and more of the corporate "rights" bolstered.
Keep this in mind when you're at the polls in 2004: "Businesses are not inherently good".
What have they done to Wilbur!? Oh the humanity! He doesn't have pupils anymore. Oh woe is me!!! ;P
What does this have to do with things that "geeks" would be interested in? It's purely business crap. If I was interested in this kind of thing, I'd read the trade journals and their related online presence for the ad industry. This has absolutely no interest to the average /. reader. Period. Is this just playing to the suits? I don't get it.
OK OK... You got me. I was merely trying to get down in the depths of what the original poster was doing. He was excoriating the musicians that put their stuff on MP3.com simply because he didn't like what he heard. Yeah, I know that that some of the bands that I listed do have talent (I exclude Eminem and his ilk) and I will grudgingly admit that Soundgarden and STP have way more talent than anyone on radio today (even though I absolutely hate the sound). But, I wasn't really meaning to say that they don't have any talent. I was trying to mirror the original poster's attitude.
As far as my own tastes go, they were shaped in the 80s by electronic bands from Europe and the UK and in general I tend to seek out artists that have little exposure because *I* don't like the bland pap that the music biz tried to push.