User: autophile

Re:Did AP also miss....

On: AP Looks at Piracy, Misses the Point

True, but that's the Broken Window Fallacy.

--Rob

Wiki reference: +1 informative! w00t! :)

Re:I bet God can't take just one!

On: Enron's Kenneth Lay Dies

With apologies to Sarah McLachlan.

Dear Ken,
Hope you got the letter and,
I pray you can make it better there than you did here...
I don't mean a big reduction in the supply of nuclear...
But all the people you employed in your business,
See them starving on their feet,
Cause they don't get enough to eat,
Thanks to Ken
I can't believe you.

Dear Ken,
Sorry to disturb you but,
I felt that you should go to P M I T A,
We all need a big urinal on your grave,
So that the people you employed in your business,
Can piss on your dead feet,
They need a place to excrete,
On Ken...
I can't believe you.

--Rob

Re:Sentencing?

On: Enron's Kenneth Lay Dies

I literally feel robbed, and I had no money in their company.

[humor] No money? I guess you owned Enron stock? [/humor]

--Rob

Re:how does this affect his families liability

On: Enron's Kenneth Lay Dies

Does anyone know how this affects his families liability concerning the Enron fraud?

Yeah... if Congress is allowed to legislate that the family of an author may profit on said author's work for 70 years after they're dead, why not let "Kenny Boy's" family pay for his crimes for 70 years after he died? Kind of like the sins of the fathers.

--Rob

Re:And if you do use P2P....

On: Spain Outlaws P2P File-Sharing

Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!

I wonder what the cost will be to set up the infrastructure required to enforce and prosecute these laws.

One (1) Comfy Chair.

--Rob

Re:I'll address the troll

On: RMS Calls to Liberate Cyberspace

If freedom is a hippie issue, then you are saying that the Founding Fathers of the United States, the Authors of the United States Constitution, and the Soldiers that fought the Revolutionary War to give us a legacy of freedom from the English Crown were also hippies, right?

Perhaps there is some quality that can be abstracted out of various time periods that is the equivalent of the 60's and 70's hippie. In that case, yes, the Founding Fathers were probably some kind of inflation-adjusted hippies.

--Rob

Re:"Don't buy it" is not enough

On: RMS Calls to Liberate Cyberspace

This can be changed by educating buyers and by informing sellers.

And we're certainly not going to educate "The Public" by posting on slashdot. What I want to know is, where are the FSF billboard ads?

--Rob

Re:Huh?

On: Interstate Highway System: 50th Anniversary

55,000 bridges on 46,000 miles of highway? More than 1 bridge per mile? Sounds like we should've done a better job of surveying the route before starting to build freeways.

Those things you go under where you lose GPS, radio, and solar or lunar reception were probably counted as bridges. I'd be mad if I couldn't get across (or under) the highway less than once per highway mile.

--Rob

Re:Slashdotted, of course

On: 1st Heinlein Prize Awarded

Weird, none of the thumbnails load.

--Rob

Re:And this is indeed a serious problem with EBay.

On: How to Win on Ebay: Snipe

There's no unfairness with sniping. Sniping merely takes advantage of people's reluctance to accept the proxy bidding system. If people complain that they were "beat out by a sniper", it means that they're complaining that they bid LESS than the maximum of what they were willing to bid for the item.

The solution is, let people do what they want.

--Rob

Re:In the words of Bill Cosby:

On: Billions Donated to Charity

No, this is an old person who was careful with his money, refused to flaunt his wealth, he never lived in a huge McMansion, despite being the 2nd-richest person in the world, castigates companies who grant free money to their officers, rewards companies that have solid, effective, non-evil management, refuses to give his children a free "get out of life" card, and the best you can say is he's trying to get into heaven?

I think you really need to read up about Buffet. He's not your typical CEO. Heck, he's not even your typical human being.

Or maybe you're just depressed at your own roll of the dice, "killmenow"...

--Rob

Re:you listed a couple

On: 2006 Software War Map between FOSS and Microsoft

These pretty much killed VS as a choice for me:

1. Won't run on my Mac.
2. Isn't free.

--Rob

Re:This is what we're talking about

On: Stem Cells Cure Paralyzed Rats

Surely in order to obtain a university degree you did the obligatory Ethics course.

I have two university degrees, and we never had Ethics. Uh, I mean... Here in the U.S. at least, Ethics isn't required. Uhmmm...

Forget it.

--Rob

Re:What on earth...?

On: Man Arrested for Wireless Piggybacking

I sometimes go to restaurants with my friends for dinner. After dinner, we often sit at the table for a while talking. We have already gotten the check. We have no intention of ordering more. Clearly we're taking up a table that could be used for another customer. So when, exactly, does it become "indecent"? When do we outstay our welcome? One minute? Five minutes? 10? 30? 60?

--Rob

Re:SOX is about accounting

On: Data Theft and Corporate Irresponsibility?

And, it's a great audio processing tool, too!

--Rob

Re:You can place a fraud alert on your credit repo

On: Data Theft and Corporate Irresponsibility?

So why exactly is it up to the schmo to do this? Why not the company?

Because, and this is key if you're to understand exactly how the entire world system works, you're the schmo !

--Rob

Re:I just got "the letter" too

On: Data Theft and Corporate Irresponsibility?

Actually, if you had a 4 GB (+/-) file of just numbers and names, and you gzipped it, I'd be surprised if you couldn't get it down to under 512 MB. It's not binary data; it's just text.

--Rob

Re:Yep...

On: Data Theft and Corporate Irresponsibility?

What was that story someone here told about a hospital that wanted an SSN in order to provide services? The government doesn't require a hospital to collect an SSN. But a hospital is also not required to provide services without one.

It's the Golden Rule in operation. He who has the gold makes the rules.

Not that I'm pro-information-abuse.

--Rob

Re:How can they?

On: Teen Sues MySpace Over Sexual Assault

And if you're too drunk to walk home yourself, which happens a lot in korea, police officers who find you can match your fingerprints up with the police station, according to your finger, and the finger's fingerprint pattern.

This public service announcement brought to you by the Department of Redundancy Department.

--Rob

Re:computers in space

On: Frozen Chip from IBM hits 500 GHz

Since these temperatures only occurs naturally in space, why not build a super, big cluster of these things, hook them up to a satallite and launch it into orbit.

Because then your KVM cables would have to be really, really long.

--Rob

Re:And the way to defeat it is painfully obvious

On: Prototype System Blocks Digital Cameras

It's looking for "the reflectivity and shape of the image sensors", right? Well, just put a couple dozen of them on your hat.

What's more, since this is asinine research, let's call the hat that you put image sensors on an "asshat"!

--Rob

Well, it's confirmed.

On: PayPal Security Flaw Allows Identity Theft

Apparently Netcraft confirmed it.

--Rob

Re:Identity "Theft"?

On: PayPal Security Flaw Allows Identity Theft

So what exactly did you have to do to fix the problem?

--Rob

Strange Californians

On: Amazon Asks Congress to Curb Patent Abusers

From TFA:

California Democrat Howard Berman said he was concerned about the patent holder who "spends not a cent on development...(and) patents every monkey he kisses..."

I knew Californians were strange, but really!

--Rob

Such a wasted opportunity

On: New Worm Starts Munching MSN Users

Fantasma.B is the same, but with a different message:

On the first day, you get embraced. On the second day, you get extended. On the third day, you get extinguished. And on the fourth day, you... oh, wait.

--Rob