The reason the Virgin Islands, Gibraltar and the Antilles are so high is that they are three of the most popular ship registration countries, so for every 10 people, there's a supertanker or cruise ship. It has nothing to do with actual individual consumption.
As for Iceland, almost all of their energy is geothermal, so there's practically zero environmental impact. Aslo, they've committed to go petrol-free by 2012--and they'll probably succeed at that goal. Hell with the distances they have, they could well run their vehicles on compressed air, although they're planning on using that geothermal energy to split hydrogen from seawater and become the Kuwait of clean energy.
Everyone keeps responding as if I'm saying "No one needs Oracle, therefore everyone can get by with MySQL." No, what I'm saying is that many people could get by just as well on, say, a $1M Sybase or MS-SQL install as the $5M Oracle equivalent.
Tax reform in general is not limited to that particular tax reform idea in particular.
Opposition to that particular tax reform idea does not equal a lack of understanding of either.
Boredom with the endless drone from people who see no other alternative but that particular "solution" is an indication of neither. It's just after the billionth reading of the talking points, one simply doesn't need to hear it again...and again...and again.
Take it as a given that "most" people ARE for tax reform, ARE interested in it and ARE open to the discussion. But, don't expect them to sign on to ONE idea just because it has a nifty name and a website,
It's the FT folks that are being stubborn. They have THE solution and aren't interested in hearing anyone else's ideas or criticisms. Politics is about compromise and that platform is uncompromising, ergo, it will fail.
I will accept that someone would need something like Oracle Financials and that would be contingent upon using the Oracle database, but structurally speaking, why is it necessary for anything in particular? I mean, cripes, GOOGLE uses MySql. If THEY don't need Oracle, who the hell does?
I've run into this before trying to sell a TINY Division on using MySQL or PostgreSQL--every single !#!#%ing engineer said the same thing: we don't need _anything_ beyond MySQL, hell PostgreSQL is even overkill, so let's use it. Absolutely not, was management's response no matter how many high-profile case studies we threw at them. It was as if the #1 requirement was "Must cost at least $57,000, but list for $75k, so the purchasing manager can get a nice fat bonus for 'saving' money."
Seriously, I'd like someone to explain what precisely about Oracle could ever be considered absolutely necessary that cannot be found anywhere else aside from organizational bias and insipid politics.
On a smartphone, I have SSH. I use Mutt, which automagically scales to my screen and gives me access to 10GB of email, which I can jump around _much_ faster than over the Web, whereas any kind of WebMail on a smartphone is still !@$#%ing AWFUL. Then, when I sit down at a coffeehouse, I also do the thumbdrive routine and have the same interface.
The point I was making was that regardless of how you collect the tax, it will take the same _amount_ of tax and that the increase in the proportion of income tax can be directly related to the drop in revenue by other means (primarily, customs receiverships). That doesn't attack "FairTax" at all. It's a fact, rather than merely "truthy" like your.01% reference. I prefer facts to truthiness, thanks.
I've had the F.T. argument too many times. It has nothing whatever to do with my previous comment and, frankly, it bores me. Suffice it to say, while what we have now is overly complex, consumption taxes alone are overly simplistic as taxation is not merely about revenue collection. It is also about encouraging certain economic activity while discouraging others. Make your case there, not with hyperbole and "because it's, like, simple and stuff."
They are not in any way shape or form controlling what you put in your mind other than what they are selling. If anything, the likes of Saatchi & Saatchi have more to do with this so-called mind control than than all the IP lawyers on the planet. Oddly enough, most of the stuff people are griping about is stuff that they have been conditioned to buy. It would be interesting to look at the psychology of being so warped into the desire for such a useless product while simultaneously having a visceral reaction to the idea of actually paying for it. In that respect, I'm far more concerned about the situation than even the most vocal fanboys of P2P etc. Yeah, the mind control is disturbing, but the problem isn't in the DRM or the DCMA--it's the product itself and the marketing that makes you want it in the first place.
It was not citizens refusing to pay the alcohol producers for their product at the prices and conditions they were selling them at that got the law either enacted OR repealed, it was consumers INSISTING on paying the alcohol producers for their product that caused BOTH. The alcohol-producers certainly did not champion that law nor did the consumers think they were being unreasonable even when the deliveries came with a tommy-gun escort.
...that's highly inaccurate, but at the time(s) the income tax was nearly that limited, we didn't even have interstate highways. We were also paying for wars as a relatively new experience--and we've for all intents basically been engaging in new wars, with new veterans needing to be supported and pensioned off, well, ever since the Revolutionary War so this "golly, but that was raised to pay for 'the' war" line is pretty silly. Aren't we fighting one right now? How about five years ago (Afghanistan)? 15 (Gulf I)? 30 (Vietnam)? 60 (WWI)? 90 (WWI)? 105 (Spanish-American, Philippines)? 120 (Indian)? 140(ish) (Civil War)? 150 (Mexican-American)? 190 (War of 1812)? See a pattern? There were many more in there, but the big ones happen like clockwork and the money to fight them has gotta come from somewhere.
So, through the late 1800's to the end of WWII a huge amount of the federal government's revenue to pay for these things was gleaned from customs receiverships, which have long since been disbanded as a part of decolonization under the Trusteeship Council of the United Nations. Tariffs continuted, but under GATT and later the WTO, those have been dropping off into oblivion. If you think that the IRS is abusive (disregarding the fact that every developed nation has something nearly identical), what we used to have was outright criminal. It isn't surprising that the income tax would grow in the context of getting rid of the long-standing practice of international extortion.
I have almost NEVER worked in any organization where users were given latitude to just install whatever the hell they want. IT staff, maybe, but rank and file? Never. It's not even a virus issue, it's a licensing and business process and continuity issue. You want your "tools" to be chosen such that in the event of disaster, you can repalce them as quickly as possible with no impediments. Arbitrary configurations are a sure-fire way to guarantee that will not happen.
I don't understand the problem. If you think they're evil, don't consume their products. Why the hell do people treat CDs like friggen crack? You DON'T NEED IT. Paid, free, physical media or downloaded, just stop. The artists are part of the beast as well, why respect them if they're willing participants as well? Don't even listen to it on the radio.
You can't simultaneously support something you find evil and retain a shred of credibility, so just stop. If you can't stop and are willing to break the law for your fix, I humbly suggest that you quite literally have a substance abuse problem and should seek professional help or a twelve-step program or something.
Hell, spend your CD money on booze and then join AA so you can sit around and blame the RIAA for your alcoholism.
It just doesn't instill much confidence in a project if it is so horribly mismanaged financially that they must scream that they will die unless someone just hands them a wheelbarrow full of cash when others make piles of it through creative deals. If all the energy spent flailing around begging for money had been used to figure out a similarly sustainable revenue stream, they'd no doubt end up receiving more donations out of respect for showing a shred of moxie instead of getting a pittance out of pity.
At a large come huge company I used to work for, every Friday night all of the workstations enterprise-wide were reimaged whether they needed it or not. In a case like this, they'd just schedule an immediate reimage and bounce everyone all at once. Useless for a few hours, but problem solved. Once you get people on standardized desktops and saving only to network drives, this ceases to much of an issue.
They are neither contingent nor corollary. Many verysmartpeople would argue that they are often mutually exclusive...not least in so far as your freedom ends at my fist.
For christ's sake, they've an animated banner on the front page of/. and we get a top story that is nothing but a fricken press release from the same company....well, at least they're paying for one of the ads.
The idea of being shocked--SHOCKED, I say--that a recent graduate would have to own up to not having business skills is absolutely stunningly stupid. Of COURSE you don't. It's your first job, damn it. It would be laughable that recent grads think they are qualified to do jack shiat coming out of school if it wasn't for the fact that hiring managers seem to be on the same page, both expecting experience from the inexperienced and disregarding experience in absence of a stupid B.S.
With that many links to different stories, I couldn't tell which one actually WAS the story. Besides, by the time I got to the end of that deluge of dreck, I couldn't care less.
Slashdot Mirror
The reason the Virgin Islands, Gibraltar and the Antilles are so high is that they are three of the most popular ship registration countries, so for every 10 people, there's a supertanker or cruise ship. It has nothing to do with actual individual consumption.
As for Iceland, almost all of their energy is geothermal, so there's practically zero environmental impact. Aslo, they've committed to go petrol-free by 2012--and they'll probably succeed at that goal. Hell with the distances they have, they could well run their vehicles on compressed air, although they're planning on using that geothermal energy to split hydrogen from seawater and become the Kuwait of clean energy.
Professionally, I've mostly used MS SQL, DB2/Universe and Sybase. I've NEVER used MySQL professionally, so I can HARDLY be considered a "fanboy."
...directly referencing Oracle Financials.
Everyone keeps responding as if I'm saying "No one needs Oracle, therefore everyone can get by with MySQL." No, what I'm saying is that many people could get by just as well on, say, a $1M Sybase or MS-SQL install as the $5M Oracle equivalent.
Tax reform in general is not limited to that particular tax reform idea in particular.
Opposition to that particular tax reform idea does not equal a lack of understanding of either.
Boredom with the endless drone from people who see no other alternative but that particular "solution" is an indication of neither. It's just after the billionth reading of the talking points, one simply doesn't need to hear it again...and again...and again.
Take it as a given that "most" people ARE for tax reform, ARE interested in it and ARE open to the discussion. But, don't expect them to sign on to ONE idea just because it has a nifty name and a website,
It's the FT folks that are being stubborn. They have THE solution and aren't interested in hearing anyone else's ideas or criticisms. Politics is about compromise and that platform is uncompromising, ergo, it will fail.
...that ANYONE /needs/ Oracle.
I will accept that someone would need something like Oracle Financials and that would be contingent upon using the Oracle database, but structurally speaking, why is it necessary for anything in particular? I mean, cripes, GOOGLE uses MySql. If THEY don't need Oracle, who the hell does?
I've run into this before trying to sell a TINY Division on using MySQL or PostgreSQL--every single !#!#%ing engineer said the same thing: we don't need _anything_ beyond MySQL, hell PostgreSQL is even overkill, so let's use it. Absolutely not, was management's response no matter how many high-profile case studies we threw at them. It was as if the #1 requirement was "Must cost at least $57,000, but list for $75k, so the purchasing manager can get a nice fat bonus for 'saving' money."
Seriously, I'd like someone to explain what precisely about Oracle could ever be considered absolutely necessary that cannot be found anywhere else aside from organizational bias and insipid politics.
...is "Republican."
On a smartphone, I have SSH. I use Mutt, which automagically scales to my screen and gives me access to 10GB of email, which I can jump around _much_ faster than over the Web, whereas any kind of WebMail on a smartphone is still !@$#%ing AWFUL. Then, when I sit down at a coffeehouse, I also do the thumbdrive routine and have the same interface.
The point I was making was that regardless of how you collect the tax, it will take the same _amount_ of tax and that the increase in the proportion of income tax can be directly related to the drop in revenue by other means (primarily, customs receiverships). That doesn't attack "FairTax" at all. It's a fact, rather than merely "truthy" like your .01% reference. I prefer facts to truthiness, thanks.
I've had the F.T. argument too many times. It has nothing whatever to do with my previous comment and, frankly, it bores me. Suffice it to say, while what we have now is overly complex, consumption taxes alone are overly simplistic as taxation is not merely about revenue collection. It is also about encouraging certain economic activity while discouraging others. Make your case there, not with hyperbole and "because it's, like, simple and stuff."
They are not in any way shape or form controlling what you put in your mind other than what they are selling. If anything, the likes of Saatchi & Saatchi have more to do with this so-called mind control than than all the IP lawyers on the planet. Oddly enough, most of the stuff people are griping about is stuff that they have been conditioned to buy. It would be interesting to look at the psychology of being so warped into the desire for such a useless product while simultaneously having a visceral reaction to the idea of actually paying for it. In that respect, I'm far more concerned about the situation than even the most vocal fanboys of P2P etc. Yeah, the mind control is disturbing, but the problem isn't in the DRM or the DCMA--it's the product itself and the marketing that makes you want it in the first place.
It was not citizens refusing to pay the alcohol producers for their product at the prices and conditions they were selling them at that got the law either enacted OR repealed, it was consumers INSISTING on paying the alcohol producers for their product that caused BOTH. The alcohol-producers certainly did not champion that law nor did the consumers think they were being unreasonable even when the deliveries came with a tommy-gun escort.
...that's highly inaccurate, but at the time(s) the income tax was nearly that limited, we didn't even have interstate highways. We were also paying for wars as a relatively new experience--and we've for all intents basically been engaging in new wars, with new veterans needing to be supported and pensioned off, well, ever since the Revolutionary War so this "golly, but that was raised to pay for 'the' war" line is pretty silly. Aren't we fighting one right now? How about five years ago (Afghanistan)? 15 (Gulf I)? 30 (Vietnam)? 60 (WWI)? 90 (WWI)? 105 (Spanish-American, Philippines)? 120 (Indian)? 140(ish) (Civil War)? 150 (Mexican-American)? 190 (War of 1812)? See a pattern? There were many more in there, but the big ones happen like clockwork and the money to fight them has gotta come from somewhere.
So, through the late 1800's to the end of WWII a huge amount of the federal government's revenue to pay for these things was gleaned from customs receiverships, which have long since been disbanded as a part of decolonization under the Trusteeship Council of the United Nations. Tariffs continuted, but under GATT and later the WTO, those have been dropping off into oblivion. If you think that the IRS is abusive (disregarding the fact that every developed nation has something nearly identical), what we used to have was outright criminal. It isn't surprising that the income tax would grow in the context of getting rid of the long-standing practice of international extortion.
...everyone else concerned with the topic means by it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AJAX
I have almost NEVER worked in any organization where users were given latitude to just install whatever the hell they want. IT staff, maybe, but rank and file? Never. It's not even a virus issue, it's a licensing and business process and continuity issue. You want your "tools" to be chosen such that in the event of disaster, you can repalce them as quickly as possible with no impediments. Arbitrary configurations are a sure-fire way to guarantee that will not happen.
I don't understand the problem. If you think they're evil, don't consume their products. Why the hell do people treat CDs like friggen crack? You DON'T NEED IT. Paid, free, physical media or downloaded, just stop. The artists are part of the beast as well, why respect them if they're willing participants as well? Don't even listen to it on the radio.
You can't simultaneously support something you find evil and retain a shred of credibility, so just stop. If you can't stop and are willing to break the law for your fix, I humbly suggest that you quite literally have a substance abuse problem and should seek professional help or a twelve-step program or something.
Hell, spend your CD money on booze and then join AA so you can sit around and blame the RIAA for your alcoholism.
It just doesn't instill much confidence in a project if it is so horribly mismanaged financially that they must scream that they will die unless someone just hands them a wheelbarrow full of cash when others make piles of it through creative deals. If all the energy spent flailing around begging for money had been used to figure out a similarly sustainable revenue stream, they'd no doubt end up receiving more donations out of respect for showing a shred of moxie instead of getting a pittance out of pity.
At a large come huge company I used to work for, every Friday night all of the workstations enterprise-wide were reimaged whether they needed it or not. In a case like this, they'd just schedule an immediate reimage and bounce everyone all at once. Useless for a few hours, but problem solved. Once you get people on standardized desktops and saving only to network drives, this ceases to much of an issue.
I _can_ kill a person.
I think you are confusing Freedom with impunity.
They are neither contingent nor corollary. Many very smart people would argue that they are often mutually exclusive...not least in so far as your freedom ends at my fist.
#5-8 have no relation whatever to either DRM or OSS. Just replace "DRM" with "RFID" to see what I mean.
For christ's sake, they've an animated banner on the front page of /. and we get a top story that is nothing but a fricken press release from the same company. ...well, at least they're paying for one of the ads.
...begins with requiring the use of Flash in the first place.
The idea of being shocked--SHOCKED, I say--that a recent graduate would have to own up to not having business skills is absolutely stunningly stupid. Of COURSE you don't. It's your first job, damn it. It would be laughable that recent grads think they are qualified to do jack shiat coming out of school if it wasn't for the fact that hiring managers seem to be on the same page, both expecting experience from the inexperienced and disregarding experience in absence of a stupid B.S.
With that many links to different stories, I couldn't tell which one actually WAS the story. Besides, by the time I got to the end of that deluge of dreck, I couldn't care less.
Hyperbolic much?
A vibrator activated by boredom. Wonderful.
Now hordes of autistics are going to be running around DELIBERATELY boring people to tears.
Someone alert Rockstar. There's a highly offensive FPS in here, I'm sure of it.