I'm not sure why anybody's "embarrassed". What the hell do you expect when you're selling this country down the river to China in every other respect, from jobs to manufacturing to real estate to massive loans to the USA federal government (in large portion to fund Dickhead's war that nobody else wants)-- while China, on its own, is going around buying practically every resource (particularly energy and steel-related) on the planet. Meanwhile our Doofus-in-Chief continues to ignore China, and the other Doofuses in congress continue to give China "Most-Favored Nation" status year-after-year while simultaneously ignoring civil and human rights abuses while America _drowns_ in pathetic, shoddily-manufactured cheaply made goods-- in some cases downright deadly goods-- from China. We let China sh*t all over us and STILL we continue to bend over and take it....
And we're _SURPRISED_ AND _EMBARRASSED_ ???
Puh-leeeeze -- the corrupt leaders in this country make me sick.
I think that's a great idea. Then the viruses and malware can simply concentrate on using the clipboard as the attack vector and not worry about those other, more difficult techniques.
Hey, just try OUT-SOURCING all of that to some down-and-out country-- like maybe the U.S.A.-- I'll bet there's all sorts of semi-qualified people here who would be willing to work phone-service banks for you-- after some dialect training of course. I know how hard it is to understand all those foreigners working for next-to-nothing. Now that everyone else in the world has our jobs, I'm sure you could find some folks here who would be willing to work cheap. Hey, probably even some A+'ers who could even FIX that stuff for you at a cut-rate. You would probably want to use your own CEOs there though. The ones we have here are rather temperamental, not very cost-effective, and frankly don't work very well.
FROM: Mr. Ben Ahore Central Bank of America New York, NY 212-555-1212
TO: Honorable Nigerian Linux User Address
Dear Sir:
I have been requested by the American National MacroSoft Company to contact you for assistance in resolving a matter. The American National MacroSoft Company has recently concluded a large number of contracts for softwares exploration in the sub-Western region. The contracts have immediately produced moneys equaling over US$40,000,000. American National MacroSoft Company is desirous of softwares exploration in other parts of the world, however, because of certain regulations of the American Government, it is unable to move these funds to another region.
You assistance is requested as a non-American citizen to assist the American National MacroSoft Company, and also the Central Bank of America, in moving these funds out of America. If the funds can be transferred to your name, in your Nigerian National account, then you can forward the funds as directed by the American National MacroSoft Company. In exchange for your accommodating services, the American National MacroSoft Company would agree to allow you to retain 10%, or US$4 million of this amount.
However, to be a legitimate transferee of these moneys according to American law, you must presently be a depositor of at least US$100,000 in an American bank which is regulated by the Central Bank of America.
If it will be possible for you to assist us, we would be most grateful. We suggest that you meet with us in person in New York, and that during your visit I introduce you to the top representative of the American National MacroSoft Company, Mr. Gill Bates, as well as with the top official of the Central Bank of America, Mr. Tinus Lorvalds.
Please call me at your earliest convenience at 212-555-1212. Time is of the essence in this matter; very quickly the American Government will realize that the Central Bank is maintaining this amount on deposit, and attempt to levy certain depository taxes on it.
Two-sheets?? Hmmm... colorful toilet paper. Who's your favorite dirtbag this week??? Download an image to your e-toilet paper roll and... um... you get the idea.
BTW-- whoever invents this stuff-- you owe me 10% of the profits!:)
No, I'm not a retard and its kind of silly to resort to name-calling just because you have a different opinion. I happen to like the physical process of "reading" a book. I can carry it around with me as I like. I can curl up in bed with it. I can sit on the John with it. I can leave it open on my desk under a pile of other similarly-treated books while I'm working. If its small enough, I can roll it up and stick it in my back pocket and take it with me. If you can make that "disposable", fine. I'm not sure why that makes me a retard. If they're not as cheap as you suggest then there will be a good market for book "chassis" and a lot of entities will be working to trade-out paper books with e-paper book chassis and stocking up on whatever storage doo-dad has the info. And as for "missing the win"-- I think what I just described is winning pretty big. I would rather have reusable books than disposable books because then I would be adding a lot of nasty stuff back into the environment and contributing to the pollution epidemic. And if I did as YOU suggest, THAT would be pretty retarded.
I would like to be able to purchase some book-length (ie. 200-300+ page) e-paper "blanks" that I could then have some e-book thingies (USB sticks, whatever, I don't care) that I could energize them with at any time so that I could invest in 6-10 book "chassis" and then plug in the set of reading materials I'm currently working with. I like the idea of saving trees, but I'm old-fashioned in that I much prefer working with a "book" style object to read, flip through, bookmark and come back to, etc. My fear is that the people who make this stuff and go to market it are going to take the idiot route and price it very high in hopes of getting a lot of money per sheet, rather than to price it very low and make an astounding pile of money when the whole world starts converting books to this new format. Think libraries, schools, businesses, book publishers, etc-- all will have a serious need for book-length "blanks" to stock their shelves with. And you could get Newspaper and Magazine length blanks too. So your subscription could come electronically and then just be loaded into the blank. You could go back however many issues you like and have it as clear and crisp as the day you first saw it. And think of all the microfiche that's out there with archival information-- that could be transferred to e-book (newspaper) format as well to make it more easily disseminated and used. Lots and lots and lots of possibilities exist for this new e-paper. I am *totally* stoked and waiting for this stuff to hit the consumer market for real. And I've got my fingers totally crossed hoping they price it cheap instead of expensive (even though I know that's complete wishful thinking)
And anybody who says that has never been a civilian, scared stiff and cowering in the corner while soldiers dressed in garb you don't recognize, faces shielded and heads helmeted, speaking languages you don't understand, brandishing guns and other weapons at you, your wife or husband, your kids, your parents, maybe firing shots through the room to make sure everyone "gets the message". Or maybe they just burst in and don't bother to be as civil as that even-- they just spray the room indiscriminately-- or stand there and say "give me six" and then shoot you where you stand. Or rape your sister, wife or mother-- kill your brother, father, uncle or cousin. And you don't know who they are, why they came or what you did to bring any of it on.
Adding machines will only make it worse. It will make it easier. And it will abstract the "doers" from the "doees", they'll just be images on a video screen, like a bad movie-- cause in real life you don't usually get the pithy lines or memorial death scenes. People just get shot and fall down and die. Or worse, they fall down and lie there in agony for a really long time and then they die. Machines will be the ultimate emotionless killers. And war will change from a n ugly human experience to being just another day at the office for the orkin man.
War is a horrible thing. But it makes certain people rich and/or powerful. That's why nobody can make it go away. As long as those people stand to gain wealth and power, war will continue to be a fact of life. When you want to stop the war, follow the money, look for the power-- take out those elements and the rest will grind to a halt on its own. Most people are inately good and decent and don't want to fight. They just want to live their lives, raise their children, go to their jobs, and be left alone.
The world doesn't need a new way to make war. Plenty of ways to do that exist already. The world needs better ways to get along and to get rid of the rich and powerful motherfuckers who want to screw it up for everyone else. There's nothing wrong with being rich and powerful. Its only when a line is crossed and that power turns into incessant greed and megalomania. And that's when the wars begin.
Given that cops have itchy trigger fingers and tend to shoot first and say "oops" later-- that prank could have had tragic results. Whoever did it ought to get a serious whacking-- or at the very least, someone should call the SWAT Team in on him unawares.
The solution is so simple and yet the muckity-mucks at AOL will never get it. Stop putting out a service that sucks, while simultaneously pissing off all your users and pretty much everybody else you ever come into contact with. Sometimes the problem isn't THEM its YOU.
One sure bet though-- those doing the firing will have nothing to lose-- their golden parachutes are in the bag-- while those getting fired won't get squat.
Wouldn't it be fun-- just one time-- for a company to decide to lay people off and start with the CEO, CFO, CIO, and board of directors and all the executive management and higher-up middle management... "We're keeping the workers-- they actually get shit done. The rest of you just sit around on your big hairy asses and collect 6-figure welfare checks. We've discovered we can pay for executives in India who will be just as ineffective from overseas. We're going to take the money we save and throw a big party for the people that actually matter. Oh, and we want our Ferarri back and we'll have someone send you the bill for the stock options and all those trips on the corporate jet."
I'm sure some bright spot will be able to explain it away. How now they have a new technology that can do it faster, cheaper and better than ever before-- and yet somehow, in the end, it will translate to more cost to the consumer.
If they were really sincere, they'd allow the customers to vote regularly on how they like/dislike the service Verizon Wireless is giving (drops, charges & excessive fees, etc) and include that data as well.
Because this mod-up/down thing gives people a lever. People, in general, don't have much power much less the ability to actually wield it. So its very much like giving a crack-whore a $1,000 rock and telling her to hand it out in small doses to all the other crack-whores...
Well, you get the picture. It ain't pretty.
But if you ask that same crack-whore what she thinks about the new Verizon Wireless policy she'd probably tell you she traded her cellphone for some rocks. Because in her world, she needs those crack-rocks a lot more thann she needs Verizon Wireless.
Come to think of it, that might be true in our world too.
But it is also true that Verizon Wireless is very much like that crack-whore. Under all that garish make-up and $10 dollar pumps, they're the same. Except, of course, that the crack-whore has a shot at redemption and Verizon Wireless doesn't. Because unlike Verizon Wireless, the crack-whore never forgets that her real mission is to please her customers. Imagine the uproar if she started selling your personal information... I think it would be about the same.
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I'm not sure why anybody's "embarrassed". What the hell do you expect when you're selling this country down the river to China in every other respect, from jobs to manufacturing to real estate to massive loans to the USA federal government (in large portion to fund Dickhead's war that nobody else wants)-- while China, on its own, is going around buying practically every resource (particularly energy and steel-related) on the planet. Meanwhile our Doofus-in-Chief continues to ignore China, and the other Doofuses in congress continue to give China "Most-Favored Nation" status year-after-year while simultaneously ignoring civil and human rights abuses while America _drowns_ in pathetic, shoddily-manufactured cheaply made goods-- in some cases downright deadly goods-- from China. We let China sh*t all over us and STILL we continue to bend over and take it....
And we're _SURPRISED_ AND _EMBARRASSED_ ???
Puh-leeeeze -- the corrupt leaders in this country make me sick.
In fact, it would probably be much better that way :)
I think that's a great idea. Then the viruses and malware can simply concentrate on using the clipboard as the attack vector and not worry about those other, more difficult techniques.
Hey, just try OUT-SOURCING all of that to some down-and-out country-- like maybe the U.S.A.-- I'll bet there's all sorts of semi-qualified people here who would be willing to work phone-service banks for you-- after some dialect training of course. I know how hard it is to understand all those foreigners working for next-to-nothing. Now that everyone else in the world has our jobs, I'm sure you could find some folks here who would be willing to work cheap. Hey, probably even some A+'ers who could even FIX that stuff for you at a cut-rate. You would probably want to use your own CEOs there though. The ones we have here are rather temperamental, not very cost-effective, and frankly don't work very well.
If you buy _anything_ at Best Buy-- nay, strike that-- if you even WALK INTO a Best Buy-- you're a fricken moron.
I fondly remember adding an additional 2K to my Altair (for a whopping 4K total !!)
Turns out this guy had a poster of Linus Torvalds taped to the inside of his locker.
So make one
Someone didn't eat their wheaties this morning.
October 30 2007
FROM: Mr. Ben Ahore
Central Bank of America
New York, NY
212-555-1212
TO: Honorable Nigerian Linux User
Address
Dear Sir:
I have been requested by the American National MacroSoft Company to contact you for assistance in resolving a matter. The American National MacroSoft Company has recently concluded a large number of contracts for softwares exploration in the sub-Western region. The contracts have immediately produced moneys equaling over US$40,000,000. American National MacroSoft Company is desirous of softwares exploration in other parts of the world, however, because of certain regulations of the American Government, it is unable to move these funds to another region.
You assistance is requested as a non-American citizen to assist the American National MacroSoft Company, and also the Central Bank of America, in moving these funds out of America. If the funds can be transferred to your name, in your Nigerian National account, then you can forward the funds as directed by the American National MacroSoft Company. In exchange for your accommodating services, the American National MacroSoft Company would agree to allow you to retain 10%, or US$4 million of this amount.
However, to be a legitimate transferee of these moneys according to American law, you must presently be a depositor of at least US$100,000 in an American bank which is regulated by the Central Bank of America.
If it will be possible for you to assist us, we would be most grateful. We suggest that you meet with us in person in New York, and that during your visit I introduce you to the top representative of the American National MacroSoft Company, Mr. Gill Bates, as well as with the top official of the Central Bank of America, Mr. Tinus Lorvalds.
Please call me at your earliest convenience at 212-555-1212. Time is of the essence in this matter; very quickly the American Government will realize that the Central Bank is maintaining this amount on deposit, and attempt to levy certain depository taxes on it.
Yours truly, etc.
Ben Ahore
Two-sheets?? Hmmm... colorful toilet paper. Who's your favorite dirtbag this week??? Download an image to your e-toilet paper roll and... um... you get the idea.
BTW-- whoever invents this stuff-- you owe me 10% of the profits!
Yes, that's what I figure. That's the short-sighted marketing angle that is likely to dominate. But it never hurts to hope for more eh?
No, I'm not a retard and its kind of silly to resort to name-calling just because you have a different opinion. I happen to like the physical process of "reading" a book. I can carry it around with me as I like. I can curl up in bed with it. I can sit on the John with it. I can leave it open on my desk under a pile of other similarly-treated books while I'm working. If its small enough, I can roll it up and stick it in my back pocket and take it with me. If you can make that "disposable", fine. I'm not sure why that makes me a retard. If they're not as cheap as you suggest then there will be a good market for book "chassis" and a lot of entities will be working to trade-out paper books with e-paper book chassis and stocking up on whatever storage doo-dad has the info. And as for "missing the win"-- I think what I just described is winning pretty big. I would rather have reusable books than disposable books because then I would be adding a lot of nasty stuff back into the environment and contributing to the pollution epidemic. And if I did as YOU suggest, THAT would be pretty retarded.
I would like to be able to purchase some book-length (ie. 200-300+ page) e-paper "blanks" that I could then have some e-book thingies (USB sticks, whatever, I don't care) that I could energize them with at any time so that I could invest in 6-10 book "chassis" and then plug in the set of reading materials I'm currently working with. I like the idea of saving trees, but I'm old-fashioned in that I much prefer working with a "book" style object to read, flip through, bookmark and come back to, etc. My fear is that the people who make this stuff and go to market it are going to take the idiot route and price it very high in hopes of getting a lot of money per sheet, rather than to price it very low and make an astounding pile of money when the whole world starts converting books to this new format. Think libraries, schools, businesses, book publishers, etc-- all will have a serious need for book-length "blanks" to stock their shelves with. And you could get Newspaper and Magazine length blanks too. So your subscription could come electronically and then just be loaded into the blank. You could go back however many issues you like and have it as clear and crisp as the day you first saw it. And think of all the microfiche that's out there with archival information-- that could be transferred to e-book (newspaper) format as well to make it more easily disseminated and used. Lots and lots and lots of possibilities exist for this new e-paper. I am *totally* stoked and waiting for this stuff to hit the consumer market for real. And I've got my fingers totally crossed hoping they price it cheap instead of expensive (even though I know that's complete wishful thinking)
And anybody who says that has never been a civilian, scared stiff and cowering in the corner while soldiers dressed in garb you don't recognize, faces shielded and heads helmeted, speaking languages you don't understand, brandishing guns and other weapons at you, your wife or husband, your kids, your parents, maybe firing shots through the room to make sure everyone "gets the message". Or maybe they just burst in and don't bother to be as civil as that even-- they just spray the room indiscriminately-- or stand there and say "give me six" and then shoot you where you stand. Or rape your sister, wife or mother-- kill your brother, father, uncle or cousin. And you don't know who they are, why they came or what you did to bring any of it on.
Adding machines will only make it worse. It will make it easier. And it will abstract the "doers" from the "doees", they'll just be images on a video screen, like a bad movie-- cause in real life you don't usually get the pithy lines or memorial death scenes. People just get shot and fall down and die. Or worse, they fall down and lie there in agony for a really long time and then they die. Machines will be the ultimate emotionless killers. And war will change from a n ugly human experience to being just another day at the office for the orkin man.
War is a horrible thing. But it makes certain people rich and/or powerful. That's why nobody can make it go away. As long as those people stand to gain wealth and power, war will continue to be a fact of life. When you want to stop the war, follow the money, look for the power-- take out those elements and the rest will grind to a halt on its own. Most people are inately good and decent and don't want to fight. They just want to live their lives, raise their children, go to their jobs, and be left alone.
The world doesn't need a new way to make war. Plenty of ways to do that exist already. The world needs better ways to get along and to get rid of the rich and powerful motherfuckers who want to screw it up for everyone else. There's nothing wrong with being rich and powerful. Its only when a line is crossed and that power turns into incessant greed and megalomania. And that's when the wars begin.
Given that cops have itchy trigger fingers and tend to shoot first and say "oops" later-- that prank could have had tragic results. Whoever did it ought to get a serious whacking-- or at the very least, someone should call the SWAT Team in on him unawares.
Let me know when you get that working, I'd like to buy one to start my new brokerage firm with.
Oh, and I'll pay you with the profits I'll make using the machine. You designed it, you know I'm good for it, right???
Well, that's only if you stick it where the sun don't shine...
The tag should be "Giigle", not "Google".
They won't have to work that hard to read mine. It'll be the one going "Linux Rocks, Microsoft Sucks, Linux Rocks, Microsoft Sucks........"
The solution is so simple and yet the muckity-mucks at AOL will never get it. Stop putting out a service that sucks, while simultaneously pissing off all your users and pretty much everybody else you ever come into contact with. Sometimes the problem isn't THEM its YOU.
One sure bet though-- those doing the firing will have nothing to lose-- their golden parachutes are in the bag-- while those getting fired won't get squat.
Wouldn't it be fun-- just one time-- for a company to decide to lay people off and start with the CEO, CFO, CIO, and board of directors and all the executive management and higher-up middle management... "We're keeping the workers-- they actually get shit done. The rest of you just sit around on your big hairy asses and collect 6-figure welfare checks. We've discovered we can pay for executives in India who will be just as ineffective from overseas. We're going to take the money we save and throw a big party for the people that actually matter. Oh, and we want our Ferarri back and we'll have someone send you the bill for the stock options and all those trips on the corporate jet."
I'm sure some bright spot will be able to explain it away. How now they have a new technology that can do it faster, cheaper and better than ever before-- and yet somehow, in the end, it will translate to more cost to the consumer.
Because I'm too busy bitching about Rush Limbaugh and Obama's Flag Lapel Pin on the Hill.
If they were really sincere, they'd allow the customers to vote regularly on how they like/dislike the service Verizon Wireless is giving (drops, charges & excessive fees, etc) and include that data as well.
Because this mod-up/down thing gives people a lever. People, in general, don't have much power much less the ability to actually wield it. So its very much like giving a crack-whore a $1,000 rock and telling her to hand it out in small doses to all the other crack-whores...
Well, you get the picture. It ain't pretty.
But if you ask that same crack-whore what she thinks about the new Verizon Wireless policy she'd probably tell you she traded her cellphone for some rocks. Because in her world, she needs those crack-rocks a lot more thann she needs Verizon Wireless.
Come to think of it, that might be true in our world too.
But it is also true that Verizon Wireless is very much like that crack-whore. Under all that garish make-up and $10 dollar pumps, they're the same. Except, of course, that the crack-whore has a shot at redemption and Verizon Wireless doesn't. Because unlike Verizon Wireless, the crack-whore never forgets that her real mission is to please her customers. Imagine the uproar if she started selling your personal information... I think it would be about the same.