Actually, despite my experience in the past with this kind of sillyness, I have noticed a lot more cashiers taking more care to make sure that the signature really matches.
That can be annoying for people (like me) who can't repeat their own signature. My signature never looks the same as a previous attempt, so how do you check it's really me ?
Personally, I prefer using my PIN-card (over here (netherlands), credit cards are rarely used, mostly PIN, Cash or sometimes Chipknip (chip-wallet) )
Sorry to burst your bubble, but I already have a patent on "the use of earlier implementations of an idea in order to invalidate the legal ownership of aforementioned idea by a third party"
I work for money because we live in a society where we need money. There are lots of things I would like to contribute to, not for pay but because it interests me and maybe to make the world a little bit of a better place, but I have to spend 8 hours a day + travel time in order to make enough money to feed myself and get a roof above my head.
Capitalism truly sucks donkey balls, but it's the best system we've come up with, and untill someone invents a better system, we're stuck with it.
That said, I think certain things need to be free in the interest of the public. e.g. art in all forms should be freely available, and artists should be paid by the government, providing their work entertains a certain minimum amount of people.
Also, I think patents and especially copyright should be held by the original creator and not by companies, nor should it be transferrable. If you didn't invent/create something, you cannot hold the patent/copyright. How can you claim to 'own' an idea/creative work if it didn't spawn from your brain ?
The problem is "why is the interest disappearing when these girls start puberty?".
Maybe they grow up and realize that being a scientist isn't actually as 'cool' as it looks on CSI.
When you're young and you see Angelina Jolie and her cool 'hacker' friends riding along on skateboards and cracking mainframes by randomly bashing on a keyboard while a spiffy 3D interface is spinning at a gazillion FPS on the screen. You want to be that hacker-guy/girl.
Then you grow up and realize that a job in IT requires you sitting at a desk 8 hours a day, and there are surprisingly few skateboard's involved.
I'm a bit disappointed with mobile phone companies regarding the number of bluetooth profiles phones support. For example, GSM's don't support the headset profile, so you cannot use a GSM as a headset for another GSM or as headset for Skype. This is a big miss because the hardware to support this is all there, it's just a software issue. So now I cannot use my GSM with skype while at home.
If you design hardware with bluetooth, please support all profiles your hardware could possibly support, even if it doesn't seems usefull, it might in the future.
if you want science go back to "particle of the week" in trek. They cancelled Star Trek:(
I rather liked Star Trek, even Enterprise. At least it involved inverting the polarity once in a while.
There were great opportunities for techno-babble in BSG, but they missed them all. The whole thing with the captured cylon fighter e.g. was a great excuse to go into cylon technology, but nothing of the sort.
it's going a bit far to say that story lines should be an excuse for space battles.
It was a bit of an overstatement to get my point across.
The main problem I have with BSG is the failed attempt to be 'artistic' and the fact that the story is so sloooooow. Having watched 13 episodes, the story told in those episodes could have been told in perhaps 5 eps. When watching the show I get the feeling the story isn't going anywhere, there's nothing happening, each episode could be summarized in one line, and you wouldn't have to leave out parts of the story!
Well, I disagree. It's not science fiction, it's a drama series which by chance happens to play in a space-setting. If you're in to drama, go watch reruns of As The World Turns.
Sci-Fi shouldn't be about drama, it should be science-fiction. The story lines should only be there as an excuse for more space-battles.
Furthermore, the entire style of the show is annoying, the audience is constantly kept in the dark from what's actually going on. It's way too cinematographic, it looks like it's made by some guy who just graduated from film school and tries to use every trick he learned at school at least once every episode.
Another thing: what's up with the three intro's ? isn't one enough ?
Either that is the most ignorant statement in the world, or you're joking.
EVERYTHING the government does is paid for by tax money. Now who's ignorant ? Why should the US government have control over something paid for with my european tax money ?
So you're stating that all the money we spend every year on preventing/punishing murderes is "out of proportion" to the actual risk? No, I'm not.
Just going by the numbers, it seems so. No it doesn't.
Sure, no terrorist is trying to bomb _you_. So _you_ don't see it as a threat. Actually, the problem is the other way around, lots of people see terrorism as a threat, while their chance of being a victim of terrorism is negligible. You actually have a much higher probability of winning the lottery than being a terrorism victim. US politics is not about doing the right thing, it's about keeping your aproval rating above 50%. So the politicians go with every whim the public has.
So you don't want _your_ tax money spent on prevention. As another poster said, "if someone explodes a nuclear bomb in Chicago that doesn't hurt the US as a whole". It's just selfish thinking. There are millions of people under the poverty line in the US. I propose you raise taxes so the government can provide every single one of them with a decent standard of living. Maybe you don't want your tax money spent on that, because you don't have an income under the poverty line, but that's just selfish thinking.
The point is, the government has a limited amount of resources, they have to get the best use out of it, pumping billions of dollars into the 'war on terrorism' is not the best value for money.
You can't solve every problem in the world, you need to have your priorities straight, you need to find out what will give you the most bang for your buck. The current 'war on terrorism' is wasting huge amounts of money with zero or no return.
Just admit it, your statement was flawed (not to mention somewhat off-topic). Finding ways to shut off GPS in the event of terrorist attack or war seems sensible. My comment was on the 'war on terrorism' in general. Besides, you're welcome to shut down the GPS whenever you want, just stay the hell away from galileo, which is paid with my tax money, and for which I see no reason why the US should have control over it.
now what is the direct economic loss to NYC, the US, and even the world. What is at risk and stake? Which is mostly the result of the kneejerk reaction by the government.
They have been preaching Fear ever since the 9/11 attack, that really helped.
Basically, George Bush has been more of a help to Osoma's agenda than any other person in the world could ever have been.
To put your argument into perspective: FBI statistics show that in 1997 around 18,000 people were murdered in the U.S.
That's less than your figure for traffic-related deaths (41,600) last year.
So, by your reasoning, we shouldn't have laws against murder. After all, statistically it's a waste of time, right?
Maybe you should try to read what I have written? I'm not saying you should stop fighting terrorism, nor should we stop preventing and punishing murder. I'm just saying that the cost of the current effort is out of proportion compared to the actual risk.
The EU (other than the UK) has dealt with terrorist attacks by "turning the other cheek" and negotiating. Have the attacks stopped? Nope!!! The US decided to eliminate the den of terrorists and the attacks have stopped! Bullshit, in fact, terrorism has been declining for decades, ages before the US got involved. as for "the attacks have stopped", there has been 1 attack, how can you say the attacks have stopped if there was none before and none so far after, there is no known interval for these attacks.
If e.g. there is a suicide bombing in israel aprox once every month, and then there have been none for a year, you could say they've stopped.
For something to stop, it has to start first, there was 1 attack, that's an incident, not a regular occurence.
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Personally, I prefer using my PIN-card (over here (netherlands), credit cards are rarely used, mostly PIN, Cash or sometimes Chipknip (chip-wallet) )
Sorry to burst your bubble, but I already have a patent on "the use of earlier implementations of an idea in order to invalidate the legal ownership of aforementioned idea by a third party"
"Patent the idea of patenting other peoples ideas"
That's a good idea, I'll file a patent application right away!.
but how can the creator "own" something if he cannot sell it?
In the exact same way record labels / patent owners don't sell the ownership of a piece of IP : license the right to use the IP.
Capitalism truly sucks donkey balls, but it's the best system we've come up with, and untill someone invents a better system, we're stuck with it.
That said, I think certain things need to be free in the interest of the public.
e.g. art in all forms should be freely available, and artists should be paid by the government, providing their work entertains a certain minimum amount of people.
Also, I think patents and especially copyright should be held by the original creator and not by companies, nor should it be transferrable. If you didn't invent/create something, you cannot hold the patent/copyright. How can you claim to 'own' an idea/creative work if it didn't spawn from your brain ?
When you're young and you see Angelina Jolie and her cool 'hacker' friends riding along on skateboards and cracking mainframes by randomly bashing on a keyboard while a spiffy 3D interface is spinning at a gazillion FPS on the screen. You want to be that hacker-guy/girl.
Then you grow up and realize that a job in IT requires you sitting at a desk 8 hours a day, and there are surprisingly few skateboard's involved.
You are not required to have kids, you know.
If you want to compare contents you use the equals() method.
It's the software in the phone that's the problem, as for SonyEricsson opening it's source ... when pigs fly maybe.
I'm a bit disappointed with mobile phone companies regarding the number of bluetooth profiles phones support.
For example, GSM's don't support the headset profile, so you cannot use a GSM as a headset for another GSM or as headset for Skype. This is a big miss because the hardware to support this is all there, it's just a software issue. So now I cannot use my GSM with skype while at home.
If you design hardware with bluetooth, please support all profiles your hardware could possibly support, even if it doesn't seems usefull, it might in the future.
IIRC, the Office EULA specifically prohibits you from running it under anything but a MS Operating System
That may well be, but the EULA is not a legally binding contract, at least not in the country I live in.
You can say anything you like in the EULA, as long as my signature isn't on it, it does not apply.
That means they won't guarantee it to work, but not that they should actively try to prevent it running on another platform.
if you want science go back to "particle of the week" in trek. :(
They cancelled Star Trek
I rather liked Star Trek, even Enterprise. At least it involved inverting the polarity once in a while.
There were great opportunities for techno-babble in BSG, but they missed them all. The whole thing with the captured cylon fighter e.g. was a great excuse to go into cylon technology, but nothing of the sort.
It's something to look forward to seeing once in awhile, if it were only 5 weeks long most of us would probably have to download the shows somewhere
They could have just crammed more story into those 13 weeks.
it's going a bit far to say that story lines should be an excuse for space battles.
It was a bit of an overstatement to get my point across.
The main problem I have with BSG is the failed attempt to be 'artistic' and the fact that the story is so sloooooow.
Having watched 13 episodes, the story told in those episodes could have been told in perhaps 5 eps. When watching the show I get the feeling the story isn't going anywhere, there's nothing happening, each episode could be summarized in one line, and you wouldn't have to leave out parts of the story!
Just a good solid Sci-Fi series in my opinion
Well, I disagree. It's not science fiction, it's a drama series which by chance happens to play in a space-setting. If you're in to drama, go watch reruns of As The World Turns.
Sci-Fi shouldn't be about drama, it should be science-fiction. The story lines should only be there as an excuse for more space-battles.
Furthermore, the entire style of the show is annoying, the audience is constantly kept in the dark from what's actually going on. It's way too cinematographic, it looks like it's made by some guy who just graduated from film school and tries to use every trick he learned at school at least once every episode.
Another thing: what's up with the three intro's ? isn't one enough ?
What is considered "left wing" in the US, is considered far right wing in the rest of the world.
I guess this is about legal video-download services with all kinds of nasty DRM stuff. They're trying to close the 'analog loophole'.
Which, offcourse it bullsh*t, there have been 'video signal enhancers' for ages that filter the macrovision protection out of the signal.
Either that is the most ignorant statement in the world, or you're joking.
EVERYTHING the government does is paid for by tax money.
Now who's ignorant ?
Why should the US government have control over something paid for with my european tax money ?
So you're stating that all the money we spend every year on preventing/punishing murderes is "out of proportion" to the actual risk?
No, I'm not.
Just going by the numbers, it seems so.
No it doesn't.
Sure, no terrorist is trying to bomb _you_. So _you_ don't see it as a threat.
Actually, the problem is the other way around, lots of people see terrorism as a threat, while their chance of being a victim of terrorism is negligible. You actually have a much higher probability of winning the lottery than being a terrorism victim.
US politics is not about doing the right thing, it's about keeping your aproval rating above 50%. So the politicians go with every whim the public has.
So you don't want _your_ tax money spent on prevention. As another poster said, "if someone explodes a nuclear bomb in Chicago that doesn't hurt the US as a whole". It's just selfish thinking.
There are millions of people under the poverty line in the US. I propose you raise taxes so the government can provide every single one of them with a decent standard of living.
Maybe you don't want your tax money spent on that, because you don't have an income under the poverty line, but that's just selfish thinking.
The point is, the government has a limited amount of resources, they have to get the best use out of it, pumping billions of dollars into the 'war on terrorism' is not the best value for money.
You can't solve every problem in the world, you need to have your priorities straight, you need to find out what will give you the most bang for your buck. The current 'war on terrorism' is wasting huge amounts of money with zero or no return.
Just admit it, your statement was flawed (not to mention somewhat off-topic). Finding ways to shut off GPS in the event of terrorist attack or war seems sensible.
My comment was on the 'war on terrorism' in general.
Besides, you're welcome to shut down the GPS whenever you want, just stay the hell away from galileo, which is paid with my tax money, and for which I see no reason why the US should have control over it.
now what is the direct economic loss to NYC, the US, and even the world. What is at risk and stake?
Which is mostly the result of the kneejerk reaction by the government.
They have been preaching Fear ever since the 9/11 attack, that really helped.
Basically, George Bush has been more of a help to Osoma's agenda than any other person in the world could ever have been.
To put your argument into perspective: FBI statistics show that in 1997 around 18,000 people were murdered in the U.S.
That's less than your figure for traffic-related deaths (41,600) last year.
So, by your reasoning, we shouldn't have laws against murder. After all, statistically it's a waste of time, right?
Maybe you should try to read what I have written?
I'm not saying you should stop fighting terrorism, nor should we stop preventing and punishing murder. I'm just saying that the cost of the current effort is out of proportion compared to the actual risk.
I was replying to the grandparent post which was referring to the US.
The EU (other than the UK) has dealt with terrorist attacks by "turning the other cheek" and negotiating. Have the attacks stopped? Nope!!! The US decided to eliminate the den of terrorists and the attacks have stopped!
Bullshit, in fact, terrorism has been declining for decades, ages before the US got involved.
as for "the attacks have stopped", there has been 1 attack, how can you say the attacks have stopped if there was none before and none so far after, there is no known interval for these attacks.
If e.g. there is a suicide bombing in israel aprox once every month, and then there have been none for a year, you could say they've stopped.
For something to stop, it has to start first, there was 1 attack, that's an incident, not a regular occurence.