That's all I know about L.A. cell service. In finding out which provider to switch to from AT&T, I ran into this ePinions page. Unlike this awful and non-informative article, the ePinions page divides ratings by territory or metro area. Use something like this when choosing a cell service provider, as providers DO vary in service depending on the location.
And as soon as you go into business for yourself, you will learn that failure is an integral and unavoidable part of success. If you think that big companies get absolutely everything right, you are very very wrong.
Now, why would failures "be swept under the rug"? Failures are abandoned projects, never-finished products, non-sellers, etc... They are simply left behind, not hidden.
There's a famous cliche that says "If you never fail, you are not taking enough risks." As a business person and someone who has failed several times before getting it right, I can tell you the saying is true. If you dislike failure, then go into business.
Do you have problems with people exchanging cash anonymously? If not, please explain how putting this transaction over a wire should make a difference.
Simple: Exchanging cash requires a physical presence. If you need to send your sales cash to your colombian drug suppliers you have to physically go there (and go through both countries' customs, immigration, and other legal checks on your way), or you can go down to a money wire service and potentially bypass all those checks both countries have. Which would you choose?
The law is that if you transfer $10,000 or more to a financial institution it needs to be reported to the feds
It's not even that simple, nor is the threshold that high. There are several levels of reporting requirements and the lowest explicit thresholds are at about $3000 for most states.
Additionally, funds transfers companies are burdened with detecting "suspicious" transactions, and you have to report those no matter what the amounts are.
I am not going to spell out how to do this, just suffice it to say that the methods are very sophisticated.
This guy ain't implementing his invention in the USA (and the non-triangle of terror countries) until he gets some heavy-duty legal compliance checking stuff into his system. The age of anonymous funds transfers is over.
This sounds fine in principle, but the state banking authorities all over the USA are clamping down on "anonymous" funds transfers rather ferociously, specially after Sept 11.
This is not hearsay or speculation, I work in the financial services industry, and I can tell you that the financial laws are going the other way - less anonymity and higher identification requirements for money wires.
In other words, this guy will have to keep transactions down a ridiculously low upper limit to avoid ID requirements.
I have seen people wiring money for very fraudulent puposes, so I don't really share people's feelings that wiring money should be anonymous.
As for this guy's plans to use the technolgy abroad, he should take into consideration that the USA is requiring other countries to follow USA-like laws and he might have the same issue abroad.
Again, this is from first-hand experience, not hearsay.
All our development is in.NET now, and it's a blast! We have never had this high productivity with any other language or platform. It also runs rock-solid.
.NET is here to stay..NET is the shape of things to come on Windows for a long, long time.
It's not about convenience, it's ALL about protectionism. If they price inexpensive/free solutions "out of the market" then you will continue to use the otherwise more expensive solution. In this case, I'm betting the government wants to protect its own ISP, or pehaps a "rich friend's" ISP/method/etc...
Whoever said regulations and taxes have anything to do with convenience?
If the worst problem your kid is going to face is some pr0n on the web
This misses the point. Sure, there are many problems to be faced by families these days, but any attempt to minimize these is welcomed.
Also, I'd rather be the one to teach my children about sex, not a porn web site. At the very least, web content filtering for children gives the choice back to the parent as to when that exposure to sex begins. Is that not how it should be?
[...]difference is that an adult can make a written request (per session) for unfiltered access.
That's good enough for me. If I go to a library and want to surf the web unencumbered, it seems perfectly reasonable to me that: 1) Content is filtered by default, and 2) I can remove the filter for the session by filling out a form. What's wrong with that?
I agree in the spirit of the law (protect children), mainly because I am close to being a father myself, and what I can handle on the web a child certainly cannot. I think unrestricted access to the internet can be a dangerous thing for children, specially if unsupervised.
My main objection is with the companies producing the stupid-assed filters and closed/encrypted blocked sites lists. Is it feasible to think that there could be an open source blocking software? Who would maintain the list of blocked sites? Whose moral standards would such a list enforce? How would categorization be done such that, for example, you could allow non-explicit sexual content (ie, educational and health sites), and not explicit content?
In other words, is there a way to make this work somewhat well, now that the law passed the Supreme Court test?
What's so hard to understand about actually enforcing a law that calls for legitimate and accurate headers on all e-mail? We don;t need taxes to deter spammers! Lawsuits and jail time are deterrent enough. Why add one more new tax? How will the e-mails be regulated? They wil have to come up with a new mail protocol, unless they require everyone running a mail server to file a yearly tax form! That would be worse than the spam!
But you DO have to worry, as the RIAA brands anyone using P2P file-swapping as "music pirates."
Do YOU trust the RIAA to be do their duty and actually be able to prove that a P2P user did indeed violate copyrights? What's the recourse for someone falsely accused? With such low settlements, the answer is that it's easier to settle than to spend $20,000 to avoid a $15,000 settlement.
Anyway, it's all hypothetical since widespread lawsuits have not yet started.
This is scary... If the RIAA is going to sue everyone using file swapping with an aim to settle this will happen:
1) There will be tons of lawsuits filed.
2) Million-dollar lawsuits are unpayable for the "common people," but $15,000 is well within reach. That means those sued will _have_ to pay it, and no judge will dismiss the settlement. It's feasible and doable to pay $15,000 over five years. Chump change to the RIAA, yes -- but most importantly: This will be a self-supporting business. Settlement money will fund new lawsuits. The RIAA is not after the money, they're out to threaten and terrorize anyone who uses file-swapping, and literally, the lawsuits will "pay for themselves."
This stinks... If you thought the Microsoft tax was bad, get ready for the RIAA tax!
1) Don't the latest WTO accords force menmbers to recognize and respect each other's patents? The US had to slightly change their patent laws, the rest of the world had to change their own laws as well (More so than the US did). We already have this "global patent system."
2) Why should getting patents be cheap? Yes, patents should be expensive, and if anything, much more well-researched before being granted.
I'm much more afraid of patents being too cheap than too expensive.
Even if it was feasible I still would be adamantly against it. The reason is that the US Government would immediately seize the opportunity and embed eavesdropping on high-level protocols under the guise of "national security." Stupid people in high places would support it (as they support all the other dumb things going on right now, anyone saying "save the children" can get the most iditiotic laws passed too. Smart people in high places are afraid to oppose it because it would "harm children." This is why Clinton signed the COPA, by the way).
Of course, copyright proponents would love to inspect the contents of Internet traffic as well, and they would put huge money into getting these provisions into the specs.
Unfortunately the things I mention are not the stuff of crappy science fiction, but rather what has been going on so far wherever certain interests can have an influence. Thanks but no thanks. I'd rather keep hitting the delete key more than a hundred times a day and keep my spam and my privacy wherever I can.
$50/year for XBox Live is a great deal (IMHO) if they deliver what they promise. So far so good. I'm willing to pay (and have already maid my first year) for it. To me it seems honest, and I have more fun in the end.
Free (to the gamer) multiplayer gaming's been around for along time on the PC world. Why can;t these people stop being babies about it and make better games?
To me this is a load o' <bleeep!> coming from the gaming companies.
Grow up and keep making the $0 you were directly making off multiplayer in PC games! You'll still make more money because we'll buy more of your games because multiplayer is much more fun that single player!
Just look at return to castle wolfenstein, 1942, or any good MP game... They will not die, and only because of the multi-player! (And the MP gaming is free as well)
If anything, MS paying for the whole MP infrastructure would make it easier to product MP games.
Have you grandfather prepare to give a really good and smart answer to the following question:
"How will the university provide a professionally-relevant education when you will teach students without using the de-facto stanadard tools of the trade in use by a great majority of employers?"
and (along the same lines):
"What will your answer be to a prospective employer of our students when he asks you why our accounting students have not mastered basic accounting tools such as Microsoft Excel?"
I always hear the "bozo" argument used against windows... WHO CARES? Don't you have incompetents in the other platforms too? Who cares if incompetents get certified? Why is it an argument against Windows?
It is a natural thing that the smaller the field, the higher the ratio of specialized people you'll have running things... The fact that there are users and administrators of Windows that have "less than desireable" capabilities does NOT speak badly of Windows. Maybe it speaks well: "even an idiot can manage it!"
Obviously this is not a technically-oriented company
What does this mean? Technically-oriented companies are businesses too, and so they exist to make a profit. If a company chooses exchange because it is more useful and easier to use and manage than anything else out there, why is that bad? Anyway, I don't think you are saying that Windows should be used by all non-technical companies are you? It could easily be construed that way.
Would you rather pay one sys admin that spends half this day playing, or two very busy admins? If you are running a business the decision is a no-brainer.
Given that junk mail in the regular mail is more acceptable (and I will mention that my wife (specially) does like to know when there's a sale on), and given that e-mail is the next big thing, what do you see as an acceptable solution/accord to spam?
I certainly am tired of deleting the penis elargement and Nigerian bank deposit e-mails, but where is the balance and how do we attain it, if ever?
Slashdot Mirror
That's all I know about L.A. cell service. In finding out which provider to switch to from AT&T, I ran into this ePinions page. Unlike this awful and non-informative article, the ePinions page divides ratings by territory or metro area. Use something like this when choosing a cell service provider, as providers DO vary in service depending on the location.
Now, why would failures "be swept under the rug"? Failures are abandoned projects, never-finished products, non-sellers, etc... They are simply left behind, not hidden.
There's a famous cliche that says "If you never fail, you are not taking enough risks." As a business person and someone who has failed several times before getting it right, I can tell you the saying is true. If you dislike failure, then go into business.
In other words, what the hell is your point?
Simple: Exchanging cash requires a physical presence. If you need to send your sales cash to your colombian drug suppliers you have to physically go there (and go through both countries' customs, immigration, and other legal checks on your way), or you can go down to a money wire service and potentially bypass all those checks both countries have. Which would you choose?
It's not even that simple, nor is the threshold that high. There are several levels of reporting requirements and the lowest explicit thresholds are at about $3000 for most states.
Additionally, funds transfers companies are burdened with detecting "suspicious" transactions, and you have to report those no matter what the amounts are.
I am not going to spell out how to do this, just suffice it to say that the methods are very sophisticated.
This guy ain't implementing his invention in the USA (and the non-triangle of terror countries) until he gets some heavy-duty legal compliance checking stuff into his system. The age of anonymous funds transfers is over.
This is not hearsay or speculation, I work in the financial services industry, and I can tell you that the financial laws are going the other way - less anonymity and higher identification requirements for money wires.
In other words, this guy will have to keep transactions down a ridiculously low upper limit to avoid ID requirements.
I have seen people wiring money for very fraudulent puposes, so I don't really share people's feelings that wiring money should be anonymous.
As for this guy's plans to use the technolgy abroad, he should take into consideration that the USA is requiring other countries to follow USA-like laws and he might have the same issue abroad.
Again, this is from first-hand experience, not hearsay.
Yes people: Even beautiful girls play Wolfenstein!
.NET is here to stay. .NET is the shape of things to come on Windows for a long, long time.
Whoever said regulations and taxes have anything to do with convenience?
This misses the point. Sure, there are many problems to be faced by families these days, but any attempt to minimize these is welcomed.
Also, I'd rather be the one to teach my children about sex, not a porn web site. At the very least, web content filtering for children gives the choice back to the parent as to when that exposure to sex begins. Is that not how it should be?
That's good enough for me. If I go to a library and want to surf the web unencumbered, it seems perfectly reasonable to me that: 1) Content is filtered by default, and 2) I can remove the filter for the session by filling out a form. What's wrong with that?
My main objection is with the companies producing the stupid-assed filters and closed/encrypted blocked sites lists. Is it feasible to think that there could be an open source blocking software? Who would maintain the list of blocked sites? Whose moral standards would such a list enforce? How would categorization be done such that, for example, you could allow non-explicit sexual content (ie, educational and health sites), and not explicit content?
In other words, is there a way to make this work somewhat well, now that the law passed the Supreme Court test?
Doesn;t sound all that bad to me now...
What's so hard to understand about actually enforcing a law that calls for legitimate and accurate headers on all e-mail? We don;t need taxes to deter spammers! Lawsuits and jail time are deterrent enough. Why add one more new tax? How will the e-mails be regulated? They wil have to come up with a new mail protocol, unless they require everyone running a mail server to file a yearly tax form! That would be worse than the spam!
Do YOU trust the RIAA to be do their duty and actually be able to prove that a P2P user did indeed violate copyrights? What's the recourse for someone falsely accused? With such low settlements, the answer is that it's easier to settle than to spend $20,000 to avoid a $15,000 settlement.
Anyway, it's all hypothetical since widespread lawsuits have not yet started.
1) There will be tons of lawsuits filed.
2) Million-dollar lawsuits are unpayable for the "common people," but $15,000 is well within reach. That means those sued will _have_ to pay it, and no judge will dismiss the settlement. It's feasible and doable to pay $15,000 over five years. Chump change to the RIAA, yes -- but most importantly: This will be a self-supporting business. Settlement money will fund new lawsuits. The RIAA is not after the money, they're out to threaten and terrorize anyone who uses file-swapping, and literally, the lawsuits will "pay for themselves."
This stinks... If you thought the Microsoft tax was bad, get ready for the RIAA tax!
2) Why should getting patents be cheap? Yes, patents should be expensive, and if anything, much more well-researched before being granted.
I'm much more afraid of patents being too cheap than too expensive.
Of course, copyright proponents would love to inspect the contents of Internet traffic as well, and they would put huge money into getting these provisions into the specs.
Unfortunately the things I mention are not the stuff of crappy science fiction, but rather what has been going on so far wherever certain interests can have an influence. Thanks but no thanks. I'd rather keep hitting the delete key more than a hundred times a day and keep my spam and my privacy wherever I can.
$50/year for XBox Live is a great deal (IMHO) if they deliver what they promise. So far so good. I'm willing to pay (and have already maid my first year) for it. To me it seems honest, and I have more fun in the end.
Who cares about big brother. We're talking sales here.
To me this is a load o' <bleeep!> coming from the gaming companies.
Grow up and keep making the $0 you were directly making off multiplayer in PC games! You'll still make more money because we'll buy more of your games because multiplayer is much more fun that single player!
Just look at return to castle wolfenstein, 1942, or any good MP game... They will not die, and only because of the multi-player! (And the MP gaming is free as well)
If anything, MS paying for the whole MP infrastructure would make it easier to product MP games.
"How will the university provide a professionally-relevant education when you will teach students without using the de-facto stanadard tools of the trade in use by a great majority of employers?"
and (along the same lines):
"What will your answer be to a prospective employer of our students when he asks you why our accounting students have not mastered basic accounting tools such as Microsoft Excel?"
It is a natural thing that the smaller the field, the higher the ratio of specialized people you'll have running things... The fact that there are users and administrators of Windows that have "less than desireable" capabilities does NOT speak badly of Windows. Maybe it speaks well: "even an idiot can manage it!"
Obviously this is not a technically-oriented company
What does this mean? Technically-oriented companies are businesses too, and so they exist to make a profit. If a company chooses exchange because it is more useful and easier to use and manage than anything else out there, why is that bad? Anyway, I don't think you are saying that Windows should be used by all non-technical companies are you? It could easily be construed that way.
Would you rather pay one sys admin that spends half this day playing, or two very busy admins? If you are running a business the decision is a no-brainer.
I certainly am tired of deleting the penis elargement and Nigerian bank deposit e-mails, but where is the balance and how do we attain it, if ever?
If hacking isn't white-collar, then what is?
This pissing match has resulted in a net loss for open source. Open source is limited only by the egos involved.