Honestly, there's an argument to be made both ways. While miniaturization is great, for the most part, at a certain point things get to be "too" small, or, putting it another way, too easy to lose. Especially with something like a game system that is used mainly by kids who, let's face it, aren't always the best at keeping track of things.
OK, my post was a bit tongue in cheek, but here's a more serious version.
Addiction is when continuing to do something will have negative consequences, but you are unable to stop.
I know the negative effects of my smoking, both physically and financially, yet I continue to do it because the discomfort caused by quitting is too much. That's addiction.
By the same token, if someone is spending so much time playing a video game that their wife is about to leave them, yet they can't find it in themselves to step away from the computer, I think it's fair to call that an addiction as well.
Now, if somebody simply has a lot of free time, and decides to fill that free time with a video game, that's not an addiction, it's just a hobby. Even if they're actually putting more time into it than the guy who's wife if packing her things.
Same with your history books. It's just something you enjoy. No problem.
But if it ever did get to the point where you were missing work because you just couldn't walk away until you finished the next chapter, or were skipping social events with friends and family in order to read, then it might be time to sit down and analyze whether or not it's a healthy behavior.
I want to be an addict too, goddammit, same as everyone else.
That's easy. Just start reading history books to the point where it negatively effects the rest of your life.
Tomorrow morning when it's time for work, call in sick and stay home and read. Do it again the next day. The day after that, go to work, but sit at your desk and read instead of getting anything done. Then back to calling in sick for a few days.
One you get fired over it, congratulations, you're now a history addict.
It did virtually nothing of merit in its entire lifespan.
That is entirely untrue. It functioned quite well as, shall we say, an "SUV" (Space Utility Vehicle). It carried satellites and other payloads into space, it carried astronauts to perform repair work on, perhaps most notably, the Hubble and the ISS. It hosted a variety of scientific experiments.
To say that the shuttle accomplished nothing is absurd. The problem with the shuttle is that it was too expensive for what it did. The reusable nature didn't reduce costs in the way it was hoped when it was designed.
The shuttle accomplished a great deal. The problem is that most of those things could have been accomplished for less money.
Agreed. I live in Iowa, and the only time I really notice a uniformity is in the winter when the weather is harsh. Then they tend to stand with their backs to the wind. I would hypothesize that this is to keep the blowing snow out of their eyes.
On a side note: So browsing through Google Earth now qualifies as being a scientist? Cool! Time to update my resume!
Sure, the 400+ tables is probably not an indicator of great design. That's not the part that really concerns me, though.
What makes it even more obvious that the design is shoddy is that they're looking up people by their freakin' name!
A better design would be to use a unique identifier. SS number, DL number, etc... This would solve a lot of the problems with misidentified people, especially Americans (who common sense would tell you are the ones doing the majority of flying within the US).
Perhaps for some people from other countries it might be hard to come up with such a unique identifier, but in cases where it's possible they should just search on SS#. That way poor ol' Bob Smith #3 doesn't get harassed just because Bob Smith #784 is a bad guy.
-If you have the same name, initials or hair color as a felon, you're on the list.
-If you've ever lived withing a 5 mile radius of a felon, you're on the list.
................
Any thoughts?
It takes more than just being a felon.
I have a felony conviction (non-violent). I've flown 3 times since being discharged from parole and haven't run into any difficulties at the airports.
There are many different types of felonies. Many felons are, indeed, very very bad people. However, I personally know several convicted felons who I would trust to babysit my children, or loan money to. Most of the people I know in that category got their felony convictions as a result of substance abuse issues and have since cleaned up their act.
Just wanted to point out that having a felony conviction doesn't necessarily mean somebody is an evil person.
The only problem with that is that by intentinoally contaminating Titan (or any other celestial body) we are permanently and forever closing the door on the chance to find out if it ever supported its own life.
Knowing that I show up at the office every day tells you nothing about this.
Exactly. I've been in this job, at a small company, for just over 10 years. By this point I have written programs and scripts to automate about 90% of my responsibilities. The rest I can complete in about 3 hours a week.
The owner of the company, however, is old-school. He has no problem paying me for sitting in my office surfing the web, playing WoW, or even sleeping for those other 37 hours a week. But on the rare occasion when I've taken work home over the weekend, he doesn't feel he should have to pay me for the 20 hours I put in out of what was supposed to be my free time (and saved his company in the process) because I wasn't "at work".
In order for telecommuting to really take off, we're just going to have to wait for these old-school types to reach retirement age, and be replaced by people who realize that "being productive" and "being physically present" are NOT the same thing.
Of course, there's are benefits to working for an old-school boss. He doesn't mind if I crack a few beers after around 3 in the afternoon.:-)
Exactly. This is not a criminal court, or even civil court. There's no reason to think the evidence must live up to the "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard.
Simply going with the "most convincing" evidence, and a bit of common sense, should suffice.
Honestly, in the case of China, I definitely find the search engine cache more credible than a state-issued passport. And let's not forget that this cache isn't the only evidence out there.
If we were talking about Great Britain, Sweden, or most other countries, I'd be inclined to accept the validity of the documents as a given. With China, not so much.
And their stance is about as ridiculous as it gets. They've stated that the girls passports are sufficient proof of their age. (Well, there's slightly more to it than that, but that's what it boils down to.)
Great idea, accept documents created by the very people accused of cheating as proof that they didn't cheat.
The IOC is going to lose a LOT of credibility over this (as if they have much left to begin with) if they don't do something about it soon.
I wouldn't even mind if they didn't award the gold to the American women. Let them keep the silver, but it needs to be stripped from the Chinese. This is only proof of one of them being underage, but from what I've been reading, it's starting to seem pretty certain that at least 3 of them are underage.
And if China was willing to cheat this blatantly in this event, it makes you wonder what might have been going on behind closed doors with the rest of their athletes.
Slashdot Mirror
Which was the smarter design choice?
Honestly, there's an argument to be made both ways. While miniaturization is great, for the most part, at a certain point things get to be "too" small, or, putting it another way, too easy to lose. Especially with something like a game system that is used mainly by kids who, let's face it, aren't always the best at keeping track of things.
No, that's the grandma three houses down.
Ahh... Ok. When I read your post he was no longer modded troll, which I guess caused my confusion.
Sorry for the mix up, it seems that you and I are in agreement after all.
In our current society, monogamy makes more sense.
Until you see the hot little redhead that just moved in across the street from me. Then polygamy starts looking pretty damn good again.
Because buying a whole new computer, from any manufacturer, just to run a local web server is a ridiculous suggestion for the submitter's needs.
OK, my post was a bit tongue in cheek, but here's a more serious version.
Addiction is when continuing to do something will have negative consequences, but you are unable to stop.
I know the negative effects of my smoking, both physically and financially, yet I continue to do it because the discomfort caused by quitting is too much. That's addiction.
By the same token, if someone is spending so much time playing a video game that their wife is about to leave them, yet they can't find it in themselves to step away from the computer, I think it's fair to call that an addiction as well.
Now, if somebody simply has a lot of free time, and decides to fill that free time with a video game, that's not an addiction, it's just a hobby. Even if they're actually putting more time into it than the guy who's wife if packing her things.
Same with your history books. It's just something you enjoy. No problem.
But if it ever did get to the point where you were missing work because you just couldn't walk away until you finished the next chapter, or were skipping social events with friends and family in order to read, then it might be time to sit down and analyze whether or not it's a healthy behavior.
Spoken like a true dealer.
"Here, how about a 15 day free trial? It won't hurt you. Everybody's doing it."
I want to be an addict too, goddammit, same as everyone else.
That's easy. Just start reading history books to the point where it negatively effects the rest of your life.
Tomorrow morning when it's time for work, call in sick and stay home and read. Do it again the next day. The day after that, go to work, but sit at your desk and read instead of getting anything done. Then back to calling in sick for a few days.
One you get fired over it, congratulations, you're now a history addict.
Give him a break. Sports Center was about to start, so he was in a rush.
Speaking personally, it makes a great deal of difference to me where they move it to.
I enjoy Vegas. If they stay there, I'll get to visit it again.
Seattle, on the other hand, I would actually pay good money to avoid having to visit, so if they move there, it's as good as gone to me.
While it's certainly a cool exhibit, it doesn't rise to the level of something you can plan an entire vacation around.
It did virtually nothing of merit in its entire lifespan.
That is entirely untrue. It functioned quite well as, shall we say, an "SUV" (Space Utility Vehicle). It carried satellites and other payloads into space, it carried astronauts to perform repair work on, perhaps most notably, the Hubble and the ISS. It hosted a variety of scientific experiments.
To say that the shuttle accomplished nothing is absurd. The problem with the shuttle is that it was too expensive for what it did. The reusable nature didn't reduce costs in the way it was hoped when it was designed.
The shuttle accomplished a great deal. The problem is that most of those things could have been accomplished for less money.
Too easy.
And what about the cows at the equator?
They get horribly confused and their heads explode.
Agreed. I live in Iowa, and the only time I really notice a uniformity is in the winter when the weather is harsh. Then they tend to stand with their backs to the wind. I would hypothesize that this is to keep the blowing snow out of their eyes.
On a side note: So browsing through Google Earth now qualifies as being a scientist? Cool! Time to update my resume!
"and worked as a civil servant"
I believe that explains a lot.
Sure, the 400+ tables is probably not an indicator of great design. That's not the part that really concerns me, though.
What makes it even more obvious that the design is shoddy is that they're looking up people by their freakin' name!
A better design would be to use a unique identifier. SS number, DL number, etc... This would solve a lot of the problems with misidentified people, especially Americans (who common sense would tell you are the ones doing the majority of flying within the US).
Perhaps for some people from other countries it might be hard to come up with such a unique identifier, but in cases where it's possible they should just search on SS#. That way poor ol' Bob Smith #3 doesn't get harassed just because Bob Smith #784 is a bad guy.
-If you have the same name, initials or hair color as a felon, you're on the list.
-If you've ever lived withing a 5 mile radius of a felon, you're on the list.
Any thoughts?
It takes more than just being a felon.
I have a felony conviction (non-violent). I've flown 3 times since being discharged from parole and haven't run into any difficulties at the airports.
There are many different types of felonies. Many felons are, indeed, very very bad people. However, I personally know several convicted felons who I would trust to babysit my children, or loan money to. Most of the people I know in that category got their felony convictions as a result of substance abuse issues and have since cleaned up their act.
Just wanted to point out that having a felony conviction doesn't necessarily mean somebody is an evil person.
The only problem with that is that by intentinoally contaminating Titan (or any other celestial body) we are permanently and forever closing the door on the chance to find out if it ever supported its own life.
Methinks somebody confused the phrase "potential home" with "confirmed, known, and verified home".
Knowing that I show up at the office every day tells you nothing about this.
Exactly. I've been in this job, at a small company, for just over 10 years. By this point I have written programs and scripts to automate about 90% of my responsibilities. The rest I can complete in about 3 hours a week.
The owner of the company, however, is old-school. He has no problem paying me for sitting in my office surfing the web, playing WoW, or even sleeping for those other 37 hours a week. But on the rare occasion when I've taken work home over the weekend, he doesn't feel he should have to pay me for the 20 hours I put in out of what was supposed to be my free time (and saved his company in the process) because I wasn't "at work".
In order for telecommuting to really take off, we're just going to have to wait for these old-school types to reach retirement age, and be replaced by people who realize that "being productive" and "being physically present" are NOT the same thing.
Of course, there's are benefits to working for an old-school boss. He doesn't mind if I crack a few beers after around 3 in the afternoon. :-)
Exactly. This is not a criminal court, or even civil court. There's no reason to think the evidence must live up to the "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard.
Simply going with the "most convincing" evidence, and a bit of common sense, should suffice.
Honestly, in the case of China, I definitely find the search engine cache more credible than a state-issued passport. And let's not forget that this cache isn't the only evidence out there.
If we were talking about Great Britain, Sweden, or most other countries, I'd be inclined to accept the validity of the documents as a given. With China, not so much.
And their stance is about as ridiculous as it gets. They've stated that the girls passports are sufficient proof of their age. (Well, there's slightly more to it than that, but that's what it boils down to.)
Great idea, accept documents created by the very people accused of cheating as proof that they didn't cheat.
The IOC is going to lose a LOT of credibility over this (as if they have much left to begin with) if they don't do something about it soon.
I wouldn't even mind if they didn't award the gold to the American women. Let them keep the silver, but it needs to be stripped from the Chinese. This is only proof of one of them being underage, but from what I've been reading, it's starting to seem pretty certain that at least 3 of them are underage.
And if China was willing to cheat this blatantly in this event, it makes you wonder what might have been going on behind closed doors with the rest of their athletes.
I thought it was because nobody actually cares enough to watch.
Could it also have something to do with it being more enjoyable to watch on a 50" plasma than on a 19" computer monitor?
Or that it's more enjoyable to watch sitting on a couch with your family than sitting in a desk chair?
Just sayin.....