given the increasing cynicism we (and not just the/. crew) feel towards out elected representatives, i would like to know how much a congressman costs? how about a senator? for instance if i stand to gain $100M from a piece of legislation, how much is the expected "donation" and to who? from the point of view of shunning the money grubbing status quo, who are the public officials who deserve most respect? (i.e. who can't be bought?)
i would play this up.
coders are, essentially engineeers, and what we work on are essentially engineering problems. our job is to come up with the solution to those problems. as we all know, any given problem (e.g. connect two sides of a river) has numerous possible solutions. (build a suspension bridge, build a tunnel, build two docks and buy a fast ferry). a factor in the solution is how asthetically pleasing the solution is for the inhabiatants of the area (the bridge is really pretty) and how pleasing it is to your engineering peers (o.m.g. you distributed the load to the 2 central columns using a mesh that looks just decorative).
similarly with solving a problem in code. you can brute force a solution and that will get the job done, but no-one who ever looks at it your code will be impressed. each extra level of ingenuity you work into your code, each clever way of solving a problem, or each really elegent piece of your design speaks to another programmer.
in the end the programmer cannot describe his work (his art) in english. he cannot say "oh how clever am i, i used design pattern X here and that gives me a 30% performance improvement".
instead he publishes his code, his peers see it. and they know.
problem is that the wholesale price is too high. large record stores (or online retailers) should be able to get volume discounts. if a corner record store sells 35 copies of a CD and virgin sells 50,000 copies of the same CD, shouldn't virgin get a volume discount?
well yes in any other industry, but the record companies have refused to budge on the issue. it's not hard to see why - with no competition to their monopoly on distribution, they have no need to. they'll get the $550,000 out of virgin anyway.
IMHO this is a Good Thing(TM) not just becuse record companies are evil (even though they are) and not just because it's gonna cost them money (even though it will - wait until the class action lawsuits start), but also because it's just one more small step in the irreversable decline of their power. less power for Them (TM) is more power for Us.
which would be a very valid point except that if you take away trade, you think these people are going to suddenly start respecting civil rights, stop using natural resources and set to work undoing the damage they have already done to the enviromnment. and aren't we doing a fabulous job here on civil rights, resource conservation and a clean environment.
have a close look at all the people who are opposed to the WTO, be they electrohippies, buchananites, traditional tree hugging hippies, pampered over-paid owners in protected industries. what they are really against is change. the change that the net and the communications revolution has brought, is scaring the shit out of them, because they don't understand it. but rather than try to make sense of the world as it is becoming, they are dreamily looking back at a happier time when we could all live together in harmony. and so the wto is evil and is destroying "our way of life". well bull shit. my taxes are paying to keep farmers in the mid west on the land just so i can pay more for what they produce than if i bought stuff grown in south america. the motto of the old order is "what we have, we hold". the motto that was presented to me as part of my tekkie training is "adapt or die". free trade (and the wto) is good because it favours the dynamic, adaptive, free. you give me all the choices and all the information, then i'll decide if i want to pay more for something manifactured right here, and how much more. how would you feel if you were only allowed buy computers assembled in oregon and chips made in san diego. fine you'd think, except you'd still be paying $5000 for a 386.
all deep links should be allowed. data online is data online, even if universal (or whoever) bury it under 17 layers of advertising for the "die hard IV:how much more money can we make outa this crap".
they want the ad revenues, let them get clever enough to store their content behind a front end that people might want to browse to/thru. it's effectively advertising advertising advertising anyway.
Slashdot Mirror
couldn't they just have published the 'nosmoke' download on their website and let people fix it themselves ?
i could explain these charges to you (i work for a phone company - not a bell tho) but you woudn't believe me and it would make your head hurt.
sorri,
-dec
but your beer sucks.
given the increasing cynicism we (and not just the /. crew) feel towards out elected representatives, i would like to know how much a congressman costs? how about a senator? for instance if i stand to gain $100M from a piece of legislation, how much is the expected "donation" and to who? from the point of view of shunning the money grubbing status quo, who are the public officials who deserve most respect? (i.e. who can't be bought?)
i would play this up.
coders are, essentially engineeers, and what we work on are essentially engineering problems. our job is to come up with the solution to those problems. as we all know, any given problem (e.g. connect two sides of a river) has numerous possible solutions. (build a suspension bridge, build a tunnel, build two docks and buy a fast ferry). a factor in the solution is how asthetically pleasing the solution is for the inhabiatants of the area (the bridge is really pretty) and how pleasing it is to your engineering peers (o.m.g. you distributed the load to the 2 central columns using a mesh that looks just decorative).
similarly with solving a problem in code. you can brute force a solution and that will get the job done, but no-one who ever looks at it your code will be impressed. each extra level of ingenuity you work into your code, each clever way of solving a problem, or each really elegent piece of your design speaks to another programmer.
in the end the programmer cannot describe his work (his art) in english. he cannot say "oh how clever am i, i used design pattern X here and that gives me a 30% performance improvement".
instead he publishes his code, his peers see it. and they know.
get a grip. the best minds flock to the US because they earn more money here.
problem is that the wholesale price is too high. large record stores (or online retailers) should be able to get volume discounts. if a corner record store sells 35 copies of a CD and virgin sells 50,000 copies of the same CD, shouldn't virgin get a volume discount?
well yes in any other industry, but the record companies have refused to budge on the issue. it's not hard to see why - with no competition to their monopoly on distribution, they have no need to. they'll get the $550,000 out of virgin anyway.
IMHO this is a Good Thing(TM) not just becuse record companies are evil (even though they are) and not just because it's gonna cost them money (even though it will - wait until the class action lawsuits start), but also because it's just one more small step in the irreversable decline of their power. less power for Them (TM) is more power for Us.
i'm sending everyone i know who shops online a link to this story and asking them not to shop @ etoys.
oh, wait, can they sue me for writing those 5 letters in that order without acknowledging their trademark?
which would be a very valid point except that if you take away trade, you think these people are going to suddenly start respecting civil rights, stop using natural resources and set to work undoing the damage they have already done to the enviromnment. and aren't we doing a fabulous job here on civil rights, resource conservation and a clean environment.
have a close look at all the people who are opposed to the WTO, be they electrohippies,
buchananites, traditional tree hugging hippies, pampered over-paid owners in
protected industries. what they are really against is change. the change that
the net and the communications revolution has brought, is scaring the shit out
of them, because they don't understand it. but rather than try to make sense of
the world as it is becoming, they are dreamily looking back at a happier time when
we could all live together in harmony. and so the wto is evil and is destroying
"our way of life". well bull shit. my taxes are paying to keep farmers in the mid
west on the land just so i can pay more for what they produce than if i bought
stuff grown in south america. the motto of the old order is "what we have, we hold".
the motto that was presented to me as part of my tekkie training is "adapt or die".
free trade (and the wto) is good because it favours the dynamic, adaptive, free.
you give me all the choices and all the information, then i'll decide if i want to
pay more for something manifactured right here, and how much more. how would you
feel if you were only allowed buy computers assembled in oregon and chips made
in san diego. fine you'd think, except you'd still be paying $5000 for a 386.
all deep links should be allowed. data online is data online, even if universal (or whoever) bury it under 17 layers of advertising for the "die hard IV:how much more money can we make outa this crap".
they want the ad revenues, let them get clever enough to store their content behind a front end that people might want to browse to/thru. it's effectively advertising advertising advertising anyway.
btw, how do i filter out firstposters.