there are just under 60 million 4-note combinations playable on a 88 key piano.
It's much worse... because playing high C is the same as middle C, so it's only 12 choices with (maybe) three choices of tempo, which give you only about a million and a half. Most of those sound like crap or are uninteresting (C# C# C# C#... whoo!)
You can set up your strawman all you want, and deride me as a college student all you want (I'll give it a 50/50 chance that I'm probably older than you). I did not argue against tariff... in fact I support a uniform tariff as one of the only just means to support a federal government, as opposed to personal income tax which I view as an invasion of privacy.
What I oppose is protectionism. And it has been my job, my family and my house on the line as a result of this. I've lost a job twice in the last two years, so I do have a bit of experience with this. I also went through the recession of 1991 which, though no fun, was a walk in the park compared to this one, which is now two years old. I'm a software engineer and have been one for quite some time, so I understand the reaction to want to protect my industry. I'm all for curbing H1-B visas. I'm totally against a special tariff directed at a specific industries.
You can poo-poo scarcity all you want, but any economic system that does not account for it will set up a distorted economy that will eventually fall into deep trouble, like this one that papers over the cracks.
You say the demand for ingenuity and artistic vision is very low. I agree, but instead of addressing this problem directly, your reaction appears to run to the very same "corporate/government bereaucrats" you (rightly, IMO) deride. You can't knock the government for its failures and then run to it for help when it's your ox getting gored. I blame a lot of this decline on the same government that runs the "how to be a good little subject" camps that are ostensibly for education, but have progressively dumbed-down a bright, creative and contentious people that live in these United States.
Regarding you advice to me: Since you couldn't get four words into your post without making incredibly wrong assumptions about who I am,
it's quite hard to take it seriously. What's funny is that in reading several of your posts, we probably agree on more things than we disagree on, so in deriding me, you've derided much of yourself.
All protectionist tariffs do is protect a certain segment of the economy (those who make things domestically that are imported and therefore tariffed) at the expense of those who buy them (by making those goods more costly in the market) and those who export goods (scarcity of your currency in foreign markets drives up the value of your currency in relation to other currencies, making export goods less attractive.).
The Mars Odyssey Orbiter will also be used as a lander/rover communications relay. The ESA is setting up their own ground stations to stem the tide, relying on the DSN as backup during critical maneuvers. DSN will be busy, but that's nothing new, really.
This story is unconfirmed, but it can't just be dismissed out of hand, either.
Given that the whole "Kuwaiti babies thrown out of incubators" story was shown to be complete myth, it would do well to be careful to say that Saddam is "known" to do other things.
Don't make the mistake that because a guy wears a black hat, the people opposing him must be in white hats.
Well, as much as I respect Richard Feynman, Sir Isaac Newton didn't see any research come out of the shuttle program either, because he was dead for all of it. Richard Feynman died in 1988, and is therefore not really in a good position to comment on the science done on the shuttle since it resumed operations from the Challenger Disaster.
Arguing from authority is bad debate technique, and using someone reporting on the state of science from a program that has been functioning for 15 years after his death is just a cheap shot. Since an assertion of none can be challenged with a single instance, I direct you here. All of these experiments were made possible by STS and ISS (mostly STS, 'cause the space station isn't doing much science).
So, if you're John Edward or Sylvia Browne channeling Feynman for us, could you pass the word to him?
In my previous life, I worked on information and billing systems for law offices, and I can vouch for that. I converted billing rate tables for big law firms and some of the senior partners billed 600-800 bucks an hour (or more for an actual court appearance). This was also over a decade ago, and somehow I doubt the rates have come down any.
I won't go into how a billing systems were designed from the ground up to cheat clients. I'm not saying all lawyers would do this (far arom it: #include <some_of_my_best_friends_are_lawyers.h>), but there had to be some level of demand for it for the invoicing system to support it from the ground up.
How does this work? Somebody posts something, then someone responds totally misunderstanding the point of the pervious poster, and name-calling in the process ("It's open source, gonad") and this gets +3 INSIGHTFUL?!?
I dig using printf (or its equivalent for other languages) for debugging in general, but I've got to ask you: You get a SEGV from a program you are working on. How do you find that with printfs, short of having a log of:
I've got to say, firing up ddd and doing a backtrace beats putting in 300 printfs in my code only to find that I did something stupid like forget to allocate a chunk of memory for some structure someplace.
Of course, there was the time I was debugging some stuff to use SCSI in the uCLinux kernel, and just putting printk in the kernel code moved the failure point around...:-)
Through 2012, more than 95 percent (by volume in gigabytes) of human-to-computer information input will remain keyboard- and mouse-based (0.6 probability).
Umm... MP3's? Video Recorders? Cameras? -C
I think that the term "human-to-computer information input" would not include these things, since strictly speaking, they're not "human" input. Humans may make your CDs (that's debatable in the case of the RIAA), and your camera images may be *composed* by a human, but strictly speaking, the input is really environmental and not human input.
No, the public will when they realize you're holding ideas hostage in order to profit.
And here's the rub. If you believe that ideas can be owned, then there's nothing wrong with this. If you don't believe ideas can be owned, then there is something wrong with this.
This was the idea that the founders of the American Constitution had to wreslte with: How do you protect the rights of an innvoator to the fruits of his or her labor, but allow the advance of technology and art? That's why the American constitution speaks directly to the concept of "securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;". It is compromise between allowing the innovator to receive the rewards of their innovation, but mandating that after a time those innovations be released to the public domain so that more innovators can build on those ideas.
I have a problem with people who say that everything I do should be free once I've been compensated for the time I've written something. I feel it's my choice how my labor will be disposed with. If I want to make a profit on my labor, well, that's my choice. With that said, I also have a huge problem with our elites trying to extend to effectively infinity the right of patent and (especially) copyright ("Melancholy Elephants", anyone?).
IF you want to distribute computing to the backwaters of the third world and
IF you want to have them have a chance in hell to use it,
then the cheap-o computer or two you are referring to also requires there to be a truckload of copper between it and the nearest electric generation station. Hence, the need for battery power and hand-crank devices.
House of Representatives are supposed to represent the People to the Federal Government. It is the Senators' jobs to represent the States. This distinction has become blurred significantly with the ratification of the 17th(18th) amendment.
Slashdot Mirror
It's much worse... because playing high C is the same as middle C, so it's only 12 choices with (maybe) three choices of tempo, which give you only about a million and a half. Most of those sound like crap or are uninteresting (C# C# C# C#... whoo!)
US GDP in 2002 was about 10 trillion dollars. NASA's budget is about 15 billion dollars. I think you dropped a decimal point there.
You can set up your strawman all you want, and deride me as a college student all you want (I'll give it a 50/50 chance that I'm probably older than you). I did not argue against tariff... in fact I support a uniform tariff as one of the only just means to support a federal government, as opposed to personal income tax which I view as an invasion of privacy.
What I oppose is protectionism. And it has been my job, my family and my house on the line as a result of this. I've lost a job twice in the last two years, so I do have a bit of experience with this. I also went through the recession of 1991 which, though no fun, was a walk in the park compared to this one, which is now two years old. I'm a software engineer and have been one for quite some time, so I understand the reaction to want to protect my industry. I'm all for curbing H1-B visas. I'm totally against a special tariff directed at a specific industries.
You can poo-poo scarcity all you want, but any economic system that does not account for it will set up a distorted economy that will eventually fall into deep trouble, like this one that papers over the cracks.
You say the demand for ingenuity and artistic vision is very low. I agree, but instead of addressing this problem directly, your reaction appears to run to the very same "corporate/government bereaucrats" you (rightly, IMO) deride. You can't knock the government for its failures and then run to it for help when it's your ox getting gored. I blame a lot of this decline on the same government that runs the "how to be a good little subject" camps that are ostensibly for education, but have progressively dumbed-down a bright, creative and contentious people that live in these United States.
Regarding you advice to me: Since you couldn't get four words into your post without making incredibly wrong assumptions about who I am, it's quite hard to take it seriously. What's funny is that in reading several of your posts, we probably agree on more things than we disagree on, so in deriding me, you've derided much of yourself.
All protectionist tariffs do is protect a certain segment of the economy (those who make things domestically that are imported and therefore tariffed) at the expense of those who buy them (by making those goods more costly in the market) and those who export goods (scarcity of your currency in foreign markets drives up the value of your currency in relation to other currencies, making export goods less attractive.).
The Mars Odyssey Orbiter will also be used as a lander/rover communications relay. The ESA is setting up their own ground stations to stem the tide, relying on the DSN as backup during critical maneuvers. DSN will be busy, but that's nothing new, really.
Slashdot has a humor section? Since when?
A ten percent increase in property tax is minor? In that case, you wouldn't mind paying my next ten percent of tax increases for me, would you?
It's an interesting indicator on how creepy things are getting when a comment like this is modded "insightful" rather than "funny". Satire is dying.
Banks and Airlines? Is this a mistake, or did I miss the FCC government takeover story this morning?
Don't blame me. I voted for L. Neil Smith. :-)
This story is unconfirmed, but it can't just be dismissed out of hand, either.
Given that the whole "Kuwaiti babies thrown out of incubators" story was shown to be complete myth, it would do well to be careful to say that Saddam is "known" to do other things.
Don't make the mistake that because a guy wears a black hat, the people opposing him must be in white hats.
5 seconds to type in the IMDB URL. 2 seconds to type "Larry Niven" in cast crew search:
exhibit A
1 second to press "Home" (Google). 5 seconds to enter the query "the slaver weapon" "star trek" "larry niven", and press "I'm feeling lucky":
Exhibit B
Total online research time: 13 seconds. It probably took you more time to post the question to Slashdot than it took for me to answer it.
Furrfu.
Well, as much as I respect Richard Feynman, Sir Isaac Newton didn't see any research come out of the shuttle program either, because he was dead for all of it. Richard Feynman died in 1988, and is therefore not really in a good position to comment on the science done on the shuttle since it resumed operations from the Challenger Disaster.
Arguing from authority is bad debate technique, and using someone reporting on the state of science from a program that has been functioning for 15 years after his death is just a cheap shot. Since an assertion of none can be challenged with a single instance, I direct you here. All of these experiments were made possible by STS and ISS (mostly STS, 'cause the space station isn't doing much science).
So, if you're John Edward or Sylvia Browne channeling Feynman for us, could you pass the word to him?
I knew a Justin Case... He was a pretty cautious fellow, as I recall.
ba-dum-PAH! Thank you, I'll be here all week.
In my previous life, I worked on information and billing systems for law offices, and I can vouch for that. I converted billing rate tables for big law firms and some of the senior partners billed 600-800 bucks an hour (or more for an actual court appearance). This was also over a decade ago, and somehow I doubt the rates have come down any.
I won't go into how a billing systems were designed from the ground up to cheat clients. I'm not saying all lawyers would do this (far arom it: #include <some_of_my_best_friends_are_lawyers.h>), but there had to be some level of demand for it for the invoicing system to support it from the ground up.
How does this work? Somebody posts something, then someone responds totally misunderstanding the point of the pervious poster, and name-calling in the process ("It's open source, gonad") and this gets +3 INSIGHTFUL?!?
Time to read at 4, or maybe not at all.
Fine, then.
So, if you lose your wallet full of cash and I find it, I shouldn't call you since I don't have your written authorization to do so?
Would Guido make me use Python?
What's so hardcore about jazz singers imitating musical instruments with their voices?
Oh, wait, never mind.
I dig using printf (or its equivalent for other languages) for debugging in general, but I've got to ask you: You get a SEGV from a program you are working on. How do you find that with printfs, short of having a log of:
I've got to say, firing up ddd and doing a backtrace beats putting in 300 printfs in my code only to find that I did something stupid like forget to allocate a chunk of memory for some structure someplace.
Of course, there was the time I was debugging some stuff to use SCSI in the uCLinux kernel, and just putting printk in the kernel code moved the failure point around... :-)
is trying to figure out who's bullshitting who.
I think that the term "human-to-computer information input" would not include these things, since strictly speaking, they're not "human" input. Humans may make your CDs (that's debatable in the case of the RIAA), and your camera images may be *composed* by a human, but strictly speaking, the input is really environmental and not human input.
And here's the rub. If you believe that ideas can be owned, then there's nothing wrong with this. If you don't believe ideas can be owned, then there is something wrong with this.
This was the idea that the founders of the American Constitution had to wreslte with: How do you protect the rights of an innvoator to the fruits of his or her labor, but allow the advance of technology and art? That's why the American constitution speaks directly to the concept of "securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;". It is compromise between allowing the innovator to receive the rewards of their innovation, but mandating that after a time those innovations be released to the public domain so that more innovators can build on those ideas.
I have a problem with people who say that everything I do should be free once I've been compensated for the time I've written something. I feel it's my choice how my labor will be disposed with. If I want to make a profit on my labor, well, that's my choice. With that said, I also have a huge problem with our elites trying to extend to effectively infinity the right of patent and (especially) copyright ("Melancholy Elephants", anyone?).
Do consider that:
- IF you want to distribute computing to the backwaters of the third world and
- IF you want to have them have a chance in hell to use it,
then the cheap-o computer or two you are referring to also requires there to be a truckload of copper between it and the nearest electric generation station. Hence, the need for battery power and hand-crank devices.To make the distinction:
House of Representatives are supposed to represent the People to the Federal Government. It is the Senators' jobs to represent the States. This distinction has become blurred significantly with the ratification of the 17th(18th) amendment.