Here is Judge Victor Marreo's Opinion/Order. Interesting read. It seems there needs to be some additional clarification added to the Patriot Act limiting its reach to matters of national security.
"Absent the secrecy provisions of the 2709(c), however, there is no vehicle in the statute to preserve a more norrowly-tailored degree of secrecy necessary to effectuate the important purposes of the statute consistent with First Amendment values."
It is important to note that they judge stayed his order for 90 days to give time for an appeal - seems this one is just going to be quickly passed along to the Supreme Court.
I am conservative when it comes to economic and defense issues, and liberal with regards to social issues. A conservative libertain? I dont know... Anyways, that being said, Ashcroft makes me very uncomfortable. Everyone, whether they realize/admit it or not, has philosophical presuppositions from which they derive their ideas (ideology) concering morality, law, etc. I guess one could view the Constitution as our government's philisophical presupposition. I find myself having little confidence that Ashcroft sees/respects the division between his own ideology and that of the Constitution. Accurate or not, I for some reason I get the feeling that he wants to punish all the 'sinners', and have the rest praying on rice. There is no real evidence I can find to support this, but still, its just not the kind of 'vibes' I like to get from the Attorney General.
"Only so many competent people have the stomach for the pathetic politicking required to rise through the ranks in government service."
Ya, because in the corporate world promotions are not won by "politicking" but rather given to people who deserve them - based solely on one's performace and devotion.
I was home-schooled for 3rd thru 7th grade - skipped 8th - and went to "unaccredited" private school for 9th thru 12th. The summer before I left for college I took two courses at the local university. Half way thru my summer courses one of my profs told me that I needed to go to the administration building and meet with 'Maria' because I had been dropped from his class. Maria told me that I was going to have to get my GED in order to continue my coursework. I tried to reason with her, pointing out that I had already been admitted, and was just there for the summer. She would not budge and said "this is what happens when you do not get an accredited diploma - your diploma means nothing". This really pissed me off. In so many words I told her that she could kiss my ass, that I made a 1440 on my SAT which puts me in the top 1 percentile of applicants to her school, and I was not going to get my GED which would only prove that I can do basic arthmitic and am not illiterate. Anyways, I met with the president of the university, and ended up not having to get my GED.
To get into the other university I had to take the SAT II (English, Math), and from what I understand you do not have to do anymore. Now they just take your SAT/ACT and derive a phantom 'class rank'.
What astonishes me is that they do not teach LOGIC in public school. This is why the overwhelming majority of people feel right at home with informal logical fallacies. I would estimate that about 80 percent of all arguments I hear (friends, print, tv, etc.) contain at least a one informal logical fallacy. It drives me insane. Call me cynical, but if given a choice between a judge or jury trial, I would choose the judge every time. People always whine about how messed up our legal system is, but it is not the system, rather it is the jury's lack of basic reasoning skills.
So, this book somewhat makes sense. It is easy to control people who cannot reason themselves out of a cardbord box.
I think is it quite obvious that there was water on Mars at one time; but how does one jump from water to life? The probability of getting from simple molecules, to complex organic molecules to nucleic acids, to self replicating single cellular organisms (DNA), is so astronomical I see no reason to believe that it happens everywhere there is water. Earth was lucky, very lucky.
Lamest Slashdot article in a long time...
on
Is Math A Sport?
·
· Score: 4, Informative
Math is interesting, math is fun, math is usefull, but math is not a sport.
From WordNet (r) 2.0: sport
n 1: an active diversion requiring physical exertion and
competition [syn: athletics]
Ya, might work if everyone started at the same time... Which I am afraid will not happen, and the first few who try will have the peacefull and benevolent Chinese goverment go Tianamin on their asses.
Shortly before dawn on Aug. 28, an M1A1 Abrams tank on routine patrol in Baghdad "was hit by something" that crippled the 69-ton behemoth.
Army officials still are puzzling over what that "something" was.
According to an unclassified Army report, the mystery projectile punched through the vehicle's skirt and drilled a pencil-sized hole through the hull. The hole was so small that "my little finger will not go into it," the report's author noted.
The "something" continued into the crew compartment, where it passed through the gunner's seatback, grazed the kidney area of the gunner's flak jacket and finally came to rest after boring a hole 1½ to 2 inches deep in the hull on the far side of the tank.
As it passed through the interior, it hit enough critical components to knock the tank out of action. That made the tank one of only two Abrams disabled by enemy fire during the Iraq war and one of only a handful of "mobility kills" since they first rumbled onto the scene 20 years ago. The other Abrams knocked out this year in Iraq was hit by an RPG-7, a rocket-propelled grenade.
Experts believe whatever it is that knocked out the tank in August was not an RPG-7 but most likely something new -- and that worries tank drivers.
Just one more reason for Apple to rethink the whole 'Help Viewer' implementation. I don't know about you, but I despise that sluggish POS (I hate that spinning beachball). I do not even bother using it. It is faster to find 'help' via a google search. It is without question the LAMEST aspect of OS X.
May 9th "It is a rewrite (from scratch) for Evolution 1.5. The binary RPMS are compiled for Fedore Core 2 Test 3 but you should be able to rebuild it under any other distribution (hopefully).
The connector is based on the original sources of the "evolution-data-server" which makes the evolution-ogo connector GPL."
Intersting. I have a question. About a week ago it rained for an extended period of time here, which resulted in the streets being flooded. I barely made it home from work in my explorer (water was about an inch above the bottom of my door). Is there any danger if these hybrids are driven through relativley high water?
REDMOND, WA--In what CEO Bill Gates called an unfortunate but necessary step to protect our intellectual property from theft and exploitation by competitors, the Microsoft Corporation patented the numbers one and zero Monday.
With the patent, Microsofts rivals are prohibited from manufacturing or selling products containing zeroes and ones--the mathematical building blocks of all computer languages and programs--unless a royalty fee of 10 cents per digit used is paid to the software giant.
Microsoft has been using the binary system of ones and zeroes ever since its inception in 1975, Gates told reporters. For years, in the interest of the overall health of the computer industry, we permitted the free and unfettered use of our proprietary numeric systems. However, changing marketplace conditions and the increasingly predatory practices of certain competitors now leave us with no choice but to seek compensation for the use of our numerals.
A number of major Silicon Valley players, including Apple Computer, Netscape and Sun Microsystems, said they will challenge the Microsoft patent as monopolistic and anti-competitive, claiming that the 10-cent-per-digit licensing fee would bankrupt them instantly.
While, technically, Java is a complex system of algorithms used to create a platform-independent programming environment, it is, at its core, just a string of trillions of ones and zeroes, said Sun Microsystems CEO Scott McNealy, whose company created the Java programming environment used in many Internet applications. The licensing fees wed have to pay Microsoft every day would be approximately 327,000 times the total net worth of this company.
If this patent holds up in federal court, Apple will have no choice but to convert to analog, said Apple interim CEO Steve Jobs, and I have serious doubts whether this company would be able to remain competitive selling pedal-operated computers running software off vinyl LPs.
As a result of the Microsoft patent, many other companies have begun radically revising their product lines: Database manufacturer Oracle has embarked on a crash program to develop an abacus for the next millennium. Novell, whose communications and networking systems are also subject to Microsoft licensing fees, is working with top animal trainers on a chimpanzee-based message-transmission system. Hewlett-Packard is developing a revolutionary new steam-powered printer.
Despite the swarm of protest, Gates is standing his ground, maintaining that ones and zeroes are the undisputed property of Microsoft.
We will vigorously enforce our patents of these numbers, as they are legally ours, Gates said. Among Microsofts vast historical archives are Sanskrit cuneiform tablets from 1800 B.C. clearly showing ones and a symbol known as sunya, or nothing. We also own: papyrus scrolls written by Pythagoras himself in which he explains the idea of singular notation, or one; early tracts by Mohammed ibn Musa al Kwarizimi explaining the concept of al-sifr, or the cipher; original mathematical manuscripts by Heisenberg, Einstein and Planck; and a signed first-edition copy of Jean-Paul Sartres Being And Nothingness. Should the need arise, Microsoft will have no difficulty proving to the Justice Department or anyone else that we own the rights to these numbers.
Added Gates: My salary also has lots of zeroes. Im the richest man in the world.
According to experts, the full ramifications of Microsofts patenting of one and zero have yet to be realized.
Because all integers and natural numbers derive from one and zero, Microsoft may, by extension, lay claim to ownership of all mathematics and logic systems, including Euclidean geometry, pulleys and levers, gravity, and the basic Newtonian principles of motion, as well as the concepts of existence and nonexistence, Yale University theoretical mathematics professor J. Edmund Lattimore said. In other words, pretty much everything.
I by no means think the EU represents "absolute right". Truth of the matter is that, for the most part, I dislike the EU, This being said, I do agree with them on this issue. I do believe that Microsoft is guilty of 'antitrust abuses', and should be held accountable.
I do not think that the EU wants to 'punish' Microsoft, and is just looking for a reason ro do so - rather - the reason for their reaction to Microsoft is a resultt of the EU being more socialist (than the US). Think of a two color gradient - blue to red - the blue being 'free market capitalism' and the red being Communism. Modern goverments fall somewhere in between the solid blue and red.
Microsoft said only that it 'continues to work actively with the European Commission toward an amicable settlement in this case.'
An amicable solution huh? Hahahaha. Oh, the arrogance... It seems that Microsoft just does not 'get it' - this commision could care less about what they (Microsoft) want. Bill and company are still trying to argue their case in spite of the fact that the EU seems to have already made up its mind - MSFT is going to have to do a lot of things it does not want to do - the only question now seems to be whether they are going to have to pay billions in fines as well.
The new iPhoto handles this very well - automatically imports the date the photo was taken. Then you can group the images together in albums similar to the way you create 'smart playlists' in iTunes.
"Kazaa and the Sherman Networks people would be better off moving to somewhere like Yemen, China or Cuba, where even though you don't have some rights, I doubt they go busting down doors over copyright."
Oh ya China, good idea, as long as you they did not facilitate the proliferation of information/material of which challenges the "Party".
"Between 1994 and the present, China's rules and regulations on the Internet became progressively more comprehensive, moving from efforts to regulate Internet business to restrictions on news sites and chat rooms. These regulations give the government wide discretion to arrest and punish any form of expression. For example, "topics that damage the reputation of the State" are banned, but an Internet user has no way of knowing what topics might be considered injurious." More here They already banned google
Too bad they pretty much banned the Internet in Cuba.
"History teaches us that anyone who tries to get in the way of progress either gets a war against them or is bypassed. Or to put it in other terms "nature finds a way"."
You mean like all the wonderful progess we see in China?
The RIAA is dying - just a matter of time.
"The USA was built on some principles of being a new, golden land. It's heading for decline into conservatism and corruption. I think that China and India will be the new superpowers."
Because Netmeeting sucks; anyways I think you are missing the point. iChat and AIM are not designed for business conferencing, rather for one-on-one communication. We have found iChat coupled with Subethaedit very useful here at work(LAN), and iChat works almost as well over the Internet as it does on our LAN - very usable.
I found a interesting app that allows you to store data on miniDV tapes using a DV camera connected to your mac via firewire. You can store 10GB per hour of tape. Perfect if you want to archive/backup large amounts of data. Might want to check it out.
Slashdot Mirror
I am conservative when it comes to economic and defense issues, and liberal with regards to social issues. A conservative libertain? I dont know... Anyways, that being said, Ashcroft makes me very uncomfortable. Everyone, whether they realize/admit it or not, has philosophical presuppositions from which they derive their ideas (ideology) concering morality, law, etc. I guess one could view the Constitution as our government's philisophical presupposition. I find myself having little confidence that Ashcroft sees/respects the division between his own ideology and that of the Constitution. Accurate or not, I for some reason I get the feeling that he wants to punish all the 'sinners', and have the rest praying on rice. There is no real evidence I can find to support this, but still, its just not the kind of 'vibes' I like to get from the Attorney General.
"Only so many competent people have the stomach for the pathetic politicking required to rise through the ranks in government service."
Ya, because in the corporate world promotions are not won by "politicking" but rather given to people who deserve them - based solely on one's performace and devotion.
I was home-schooled for 3rd thru 7th grade - skipped 8th - and went to "unaccredited" private school for 9th thru 12th. The summer before I left for college I took two courses at the local university. Half way thru my summer courses one of my profs told me that I needed to go to the administration building and meet with 'Maria' because I had been dropped from his class. Maria told me that I was going to have to get my GED in order to continue my coursework. I tried to reason with her, pointing out that I had already been admitted, and was just there for the summer. She would not budge and said "this is what happens when you do not get an accredited diploma - your diploma means nothing". This really pissed me off. In so many words I told her that she could kiss my ass, that I made a 1440 on my SAT which puts me in the top 1 percentile of applicants to her school, and I was not going to get my GED which would only prove that I can do basic arthmitic and am not illiterate. Anyways, I met with the president of the university, and ended up not having to get my GED.
To get into the other university I had to take the SAT II (English, Math), and from what I understand you do not have to do anymore. Now they just take your SAT/ACT and derive a phantom 'class rank'.
What astonishes me is that they do not teach LOGIC in public school. This is why the overwhelming majority of people feel right at home with informal logical fallacies. I would estimate that about 80 percent of all arguments I hear (friends, print, tv, etc.) contain at least a one informal logical fallacy. It drives me insane. Call me cynical, but if given a choice between a judge or jury trial, I would choose the judge every time. People always whine about how messed up our legal system is, but it is not the system, rather it is the jury's lack of basic reasoning skills.
So, this book somewhat makes sense. It is easy to control people who cannot reason themselves out of a cardbord box.
cience can never remove God completely, no matter the discoveries.
And right there is the major problem with religion...
or the frailty of science...
I think is it quite obvious that there was water on Mars at one time; but how does one jump from water to life? The probability of getting from simple molecules, to complex organic molecules to nucleic acids, to self replicating single cellular organisms (DNA), is so astronomical I see no reason to believe that it happens everywhere there is water. Earth was lucky, very lucky.
Math is interesting, math is fun, math is usefull, but math is not a sport.
From WordNet (r) 2.0:
sport
n 1: an active diversion requiring physical exertion and
competition [syn: athletics]
Ya, might work if everyone started at the same time... Which I am afraid will not happen, and the first few who try will have the peacefull and benevolent Chinese goverment go Tianamin on their asses.
Ya, cause I bet it the software does not queue the requests or anything fancy like that...
Ya, I am sure they will not make them the least bit suspicious...
Shortly before dawn on Aug. 28, an M1A1 Abrams tank on routine patrol in Baghdad "was hit by something" that crippled the 69-ton behemoth.
Army officials still are puzzling over what that "something" was.
According to an unclassified Army report, the mystery projectile punched through the vehicle's skirt and drilled a pencil-sized hole through the hull. The hole was so small that "my little finger will not go into it," the report's author noted.
The "something" continued into the crew compartment, where it passed through the gunner's seatback, grazed the kidney area of the gunner's flak jacket and finally came to rest after boring a hole 1½ to 2 inches deep in the hull on the far side of the tank.
As it passed through the interior, it hit enough critical components to knock the tank out of action. That made the tank one of only two Abrams disabled by enemy fire during the Iraq war and one of only a handful of "mobility kills" since they first rumbled onto the scene 20 years ago. The other Abrams knocked out this year in Iraq was hit by an RPG-7, a rocket-propelled grenade.
Experts believe whatever it is that knocked out the tank in August was not an RPG-7 but most likely something new -- and that worries tank drivers.
Here is the full article
Just one more reason for Apple to rethink the whole 'Help Viewer' implementation. I don't know about you, but I despise that sluggish POS (I hate that spinning beachball). I do not even bother using it. It is faster to find 'help' via a google search. It is without question the LAMEST aspect of OS X.
From the OGo-Evolution listserve
May 9th
"It is a rewrite (from scratch) for Evolution 1.5. The binary RPMS are compiled for Fedore Core 2 Test 3 but you should be able to rebuild it under any other distribution (hopefully).
The connector is based on the original sources of the "evolution-data-server" which makes the evolution-ogo connector GPL."
Get it here
Intersting. I have a question. About a week ago it rained for an extended period of time here, which resulted in the streets being flooded. I barely made it home from work in my explorer (water was about an inch above the bottom of my door). Is there any danger if these hybrids are driven through relativley high water?
REDMOND, WA--In what CEO Bill Gates called an unfortunate but necessary step to protect our intellectual property from theft and exploitation by competitors, the Microsoft Corporation patented the numbers one and zero Monday.
With the patent, Microsofts rivals are prohibited from manufacturing or selling products containing zeroes and ones--the mathematical building blocks of all computer languages and programs--unless a royalty fee of 10 cents per digit used is paid to the software giant.
Microsoft has been using the binary system of ones and zeroes ever since its inception in 1975, Gates told reporters. For years, in the interest of the overall health of the computer industry, we permitted the free and unfettered use of our proprietary numeric systems. However, changing marketplace conditions and the increasingly predatory practices of certain competitors now leave us with no choice but to seek compensation for the use of our numerals.
A number of major Silicon Valley players, including Apple Computer, Netscape and Sun Microsystems, said they will challenge the Microsoft patent as monopolistic and anti-competitive, claiming that the 10-cent-per-digit licensing fee would bankrupt them instantly.
While, technically, Java is a complex system of algorithms used to create a platform-independent programming environment, it is, at its core, just a string of trillions of ones and zeroes, said Sun Microsystems CEO Scott McNealy, whose company created the Java programming environment used in many Internet applications. The licensing fees wed have to pay Microsoft every day would be approximately 327,000 times the total net worth of this company.
If this patent holds up in federal court, Apple will have no choice but to convert to analog, said Apple interim CEO Steve Jobs, and I have serious doubts whether this company would be able to remain competitive selling pedal-operated computers running software off vinyl LPs.
As a result of the Microsoft patent, many other companies have begun radically revising their product lines: Database manufacturer Oracle has embarked on a crash program to develop an abacus for the next millennium. Novell, whose communications and networking systems are also subject to Microsoft licensing fees, is working with top animal trainers on a chimpanzee-based message-transmission system. Hewlett-Packard is developing a revolutionary new steam-powered printer.
Despite the swarm of protest, Gates is standing his ground, maintaining that ones and zeroes are the undisputed property of Microsoft.
We will vigorously enforce our patents of these numbers, as they are legally ours, Gates said. Among Microsofts vast historical archives are Sanskrit cuneiform tablets from 1800 B.C. clearly showing ones and a symbol known as sunya, or nothing. We also own: papyrus scrolls written by Pythagoras himself in which he explains the idea of singular notation, or one; early tracts by Mohammed ibn Musa al Kwarizimi explaining the concept of al-sifr, or the cipher; original mathematical manuscripts by Heisenberg, Einstein and Planck; and a signed first-edition copy of Jean-Paul Sartres Being And Nothingness. Should the need arise, Microsoft will have no difficulty proving to the Justice Department or anyone else that we own the rights to these numbers.
Added Gates: My salary also has lots of zeroes. Im the richest man in the world.
According to experts, the full ramifications of Microsofts patenting of one and zero have yet to be realized.
Because all integers and natural numbers derive from one and zero, Microsoft may, by extension, lay claim to ownership of all mathematics and logic systems, including Euclidean geometry, pulleys and levers, gravity, and the basic Newtonian principles of motion, as well as the concepts of existence and nonexistence, Yale University theoretical mathematics professor J. Edmund Lattimore said. In other words, pretty much everything.
Lattim
Why not just 'activate' the MS software via telephone?
Jobs hands off? Are we talking about the same person?
Bullshit, eveyone just bring a powerstrip and 'daisy chain' those bad boys....
I by no means think the EU represents "absolute right". Truth of the matter is that, for the most part, I dislike the EU, This being said, I do agree with them on this issue. I do believe that Microsoft is guilty of 'antitrust abuses', and should be held accountable.
I do not think that the EU wants to 'punish' Microsoft, and is just looking for a reason ro do so - rather - the reason for their reaction to Microsoft is a resultt of the EU being more socialist (than the US). Think of a two color gradient - blue to red - the blue being 'free market capitalism' and the red being Communism. Modern goverments fall somewhere in between the solid blue and red.
Microsoft said only that it 'continues to work actively with the European Commission toward an amicable settlement in this case.'
An amicable solution huh? Hahahaha. Oh, the arrogance... It seems that Microsoft just does not 'get it' - this commision could care less about what they (Microsoft) want. Bill and company are still trying to argue their case in spite of the fact that the EU seems to have already made up its mind - MSFT is going to have to do a lot of things it does not want to do - the only question now seems to be whether they are going to have to pay billions in fines as well.
The new iPhoto handles this very well - automatically imports the date the photo was taken. Then you can group the images together in albums similar to the way you create 'smart playlists' in iTunes.
"Kazaa and the Sherman Networks people would be better off moving to somewhere like Yemen, China or Cuba, where even though you don't have some rights, I doubt they go busting down doors over copyright."
Oh ya China, good idea, as long as you they did not facilitate the proliferation of information/material of which challenges the "Party".
"Between 1994 and the present, China's rules and regulations on the Internet became progressively more comprehensive, moving from efforts to regulate Internet business to restrictions on news sites and chat rooms. These regulations give the government wide discretion to arrest and punish any form of expression. For example, "topics that damage the reputation of the State" are banned, but an Internet user has no way of knowing what topics might be considered injurious." More here
They already banned google
Yemen sounds good too right?
Too bad they pretty much banned the Internet in Cuba.
"History teaches us that anyone who tries to get in the way of progress either gets a war against them or is bypassed. Or to put it in other terms "nature finds a way"."
You mean like all the wonderful progess we see in China?
The RIAA is dying - just a matter of time.
"The USA was built on some principles of being a new, golden land. It's heading for decline into conservatism and corruption. I think that China and India will be the new superpowers."
I suggest you read The Declaration of Independence
Because Netmeeting sucks; anyways I think you are missing the point. iChat and AIM are not designed for business conferencing, rather for one-on-one communication. We have found iChat coupled with Subethaedit very useful here at work(LAN), and iChat works almost as well over the Internet as it does on our LAN - very usable.
I go back and forth thru pages and tabs, open and close tabs, using Cocoa Gestures. Check it out.
I found a interesting app that allows you to store data on miniDV tapes using a DV camera connected to your mac via firewire. You can store 10GB per hour of tape. Perfect if you want to archive/backup large amounts of data. Might want to check it out.
Dv Backup
http://www.coolatoola.com/