Really would have appreciated a NSFW tag there. I hadn't heard of that particular company (? - no idea what they are, as I closed the window as quickly as I could), and was not expecting nudity.
That's because it's always a different Link, as well as a different Zelda and a different Ganon(dorf). The series is effectively rebooted with each iteration. (Even bigger nerds, feel free to correct me on this.)
Funny, I was just searching today for "steam sucks" because I wanted to see if my recent experiences with it were common.
I'm enough of a sheep to buy Painkiller after it was recommended in a Zero Punctuation review, but the downloading was far inferior to what I've experienced on less-than-legit channels. The Steam client is slow as hell on what I consider to be an older, but not terrible computer - 1.8ghz, 1.5GB ram, etc - it takes a couple minutes to open, and anything it needs to do (switch tabs, get properties on something) makes it think for at least another minute. The worst part? It's a big enough game and my connection is slow enough (peak at about 150KB/sec) that it took me several evenings to download. To my great surprise and frustration just starting up the Steam client doesn't cause active downloads to resume - that requires a manual request. I was in a hurry one evening and only waited long enough to start my pc and Steam, thinking that when I came back a few hours later the game would be done and I could play it for a bit - no. Steam hadn't downloaded anything even though it was sitting idle and working just fine.
When the game finally did get downloaded, I was annoyed to find that I need to have Steam run every time I launch it, and it sits in the background serving up ads to the client software unless I alt-tab out of the game to close it. Not a huge deal, but given that it takes a few minutes to start up and update Steam *every time* I want to play, it adds up. I don't have a lot of time to game, so having some of that eaten up waiting for a service I have no intent of using each time annoys the hell out of me.
I don't mind paying for games, but when pirating them would result in a superior experience and less hassle I'm not exactly encouraged.
I have a frankenstein mix of a rev A, rev C, and a rev D daughtercard. It's a bondi rev C case / monitor, rev A guts, voodoo2 card on the mezzanine slot, 80gb hd, and a 333mhz processor via the rev D daughtercard. Works quite nicely as a backup server running Tiger.
Incidentally, the rev C really is bondi blue - that was only supposed to be used on rev A and B (C was the introduction of the 5 'fruit' colored models, and the blue was a deeper color than A or B). I guess they had leftover bondi cases and built a handful of them (in the US, per case markings) with rev C guts. I was really confused when I opened it up expecting to see a mezzanine slot I could slap my voodoo2 card onto.
If the Dems really wanted it to pass, all they would have had to do was to get a few more of their party to actually cast a vote.
Nope. The summary (and most press articles on this and many other Senate votes, actually) is a bit misleading - this wasn't a vote on the actual amendment, it was a vote on *cloture*. This type of vote fails if there are 40 "nays," otherwise it will pass and move on to an actual vote on the bill at hand, which would be a simple majority vote. So when 43 Republican senators vote "nay" on cloture the bill / amendment never goes on to a real vote - this is also known as a filibuster. Doesn't really matter if 1 or all 50 Dems vote "yea" when 42 Republicans (plus Lieberman) vote against it. In this case every single Dem did vote, and they voted "yea."
Unfortunately the Dems aren't really holding the Republicans to what a "nay" on cloture should cause, which is additional debate leading to another cloture vote. If the Dems wanted to really force the issue, they could continue to debate on this and nothing else until enough Republicans either abstained or voted "yea" on cloture to allow for a real vote. As it is, the Dems have essentially consented to all Senate votes requiring the support of 60 senators to pass by not forcing a filibuster to actually mean endless discussion. Personally, I find this infuriating, though I understand that indefinitely shutting down the Senate over a single vote could be politically damaging, or at least appear to be.
There are so many things wrong with your post that I don't even know where to start.
Unfortunately, thieves aren't actually *buying* the goods, but rather, just walking out with them...
Er, but the practice in question is checking the *receipt* for customers who just walked out of the *checkout* area. This has nothing to do with someone shoving a cd in their pants and walking out. This check does absolutely nothing to combat traditional grab 'n go shoplifting. What the grandparent post was discussing was a way to remove the receipt check and still have a way to go back and nail people later - if they don't provide ID, no service. If they do provide ID and are later found (via surveillance video review) to have shoplifted then they can be charged. Not a bad idea really, other than the grandparent-noted likelihood of reduced customer retention.
...the problem is that if merchants actually had to obey these limitations, and everyone knew exactly what these limitations were...
By "these limitations" do you mean our rights? Because they aren't "limitations," they're our rights which the founders fought hard to give us. Everyone should know what these rights are, but unfortunately such is not the current state of things, or no one would consent to these ridiculous post-checkout inspections.
...damned if you detain someone without perfect evidence...
Not "without perfect evidence," but rather WITH NO evidence. Those people / businesses are, essentially, "damned." If I buy something from you, have not behaved in any way which suggests that I've been anything other than a normal, honest customer, and you still try to detain me for any reason when I try to leave, you're infringing on my rights. Period. "Meaningfully demand a receipt"? They're in no position to "demand" anything other than that I stay if they have a reasonable suspicion that I've shoplifted. That's it. Unwillingness to consent to a voluntary search does not constitute behavior suspicious enough to warrant detention.
I don't really mean to flame / pick on you specifically, but every time a situation like this comes up I'm sickened by the number of people who will adamantly insist that standing up for your rights is anything less than honorable. If I didn't break any laws, and you didn't see me doing anything to indicate that I may have broken laws, you have no justification to detain me. I'm a free person, and can move about as I please except under the very specific set of circumstances for which our laws have been carefully crafted to cover. Don't tread on me.
As much fault as I tend to find in the current executive branch, I have to agree with the parent on this one. Reading through the actual order I see no mention of seizing anything, merely blocking the transfer of property (which, presumably, includes assets both physical and monetary).
I wouldn't be surprised if this were to be used to go after more than just terrorists, but the summary does appear to be inaccurate at least insofar as the seizing of assets / breaking the 5th amendment goes.
Check out this story at TPMmuckraker - according to a report from CREW there were actually more like FIVE MILLION emails deleted. The scale of this is just stunning.
I'm one of those lucky former TW customers for whom Comcast is looking to jack the rate. My wife and I don't watch tv (haven't for over 2 years now - internet + netflix is all we need), but get this: previously paying $42.95 for 4mbit/sec cable internet only rate increasing to $59.95 for 6mbit/sec cable internet only, plus $3 / month modem rental (never had to pay this before) rate for 6mbit/sec + base cable = $57.95 / month plus $3 / month modem rental
So yeah, we get a faster connection that we don't need (4mbit was more than enough) and pay $20 more per month, unless we opt to add on basic cable tv - then we only pay $18 per month more than we used to. WTF? Why is it *cheaper* to add tv service? Do they make that much off of the local advertisers?
Because of this, I called threatening to cancel and go to DSL, to see if the sales people would haggle. They offered me $10 off per month for 6 months, then $5 off for another 6 months, but after that the rate would be back to normal - no thanks. I called again a week or so later and a different sales rep mentioned that they have an "economy" connection for only $39.95 plus $3 / month modem rental - perfect! I agreed to that, they stated it was a 3mbit / second connection, which is a bit slower than we had before but still more than enough. I double-checked on the speed, specifically asking how much the kbyte / second would be as I didn't have a calculator handy - the rep stated 384kbyte / sec, both up and down. Wait, what? Since when is cable synchronous? I asked about this and the rep was adamant that it'll be 384 up and down. Fine, I'll take it.
Turns out, the rep was an idiot, as were the next two I spoke with a couple weeks later when I called to complain about slow speeds. "Economy" class is 384 kBIT / sec, not kBYTE. Gah. Eventually I was transferred to a highly apologetic rep who verified that I was given bad information, and to make up for this he offered me the 6mbit / sec connection for $20 / month for 4 months. I took it.
I'll be switching to DSL come July, unless comcast has an actual plan by then which is less than $60 / month and greater than 1.5mbit / sec (at minimum).
The notion that the increased sophistication and "media center" uses of new consoles are driving factors in larger numbers of adults owning them is silly. The reason more adults own consoles is the inevitability of aging - I loved playing console games as a kid, and now I'm an adult. I didn't suddenly start buying them because they got to the point of being fancy enough, I kept buying them as I got older.
It's like saying in the mid-fifties that most rock and roll listeners are kids / teens, and then acting surprised when 10 years later the audience for rock and roll is "suddenly" composed of more adults, many of whom even have kids! Shocking!
I personally don't understand the logic behind viewing the blu-ray part of the PS3 as a selling point. Who really cares? Is the subtle (in most cases) graphical advantage really going to make my gaming experience sufficiently more fun to justify the extra cost? I really doubt it.
I know the goal isn't to emulate any other browsers, but I can't stand how Opera 9 handles tabs. When I open a new tab the default behavior is to focus on that tab immediately. Yes, I know you can middle-click to open in background, but on my mac laptop that really isn't an option. I can use command-shift-click, but that's a bit unwieldy - would a preference setting of "open tabs in background by default" be too much to ask?
The other issue I've found with tabs (and for which there doesn't seem to be a work-around - correct me if I'm wrong here) is that after closing a tab, focus then shifts to the last tab viewed. This is incredibly irritating for me personally, as I frequently will open a bunch of links in background tabs from a main page (say, the slashdot front page), then read each tab in order. Using Opera 9 I can still open a bunch of links in the background (using the afore-mentioned 3-button combo), but reading through them is an irritating series of going back to the start tab over and over. Again, a simple preference setting of "When closing tabs: [open previously viewed tab | open tab to right | open tab to left]" would be all I need.
Minor gripes I suppose - I love Opera's speedy rendering and how well pages scroll (firefox and opera both feel like browsing in slow-motion by comparison), but the tab management is a constant source of frustration.
Is that the official name? I never bothered to learn it, just immediately internalized them as "mercenaries" when I heard about the for-pay soldiers we had. Horrifying.
My older brother had a Lynx and I played the hell out of it - California Games, Blue Lightning, Guantlet (3? 4? You could play as a nerd or a robot, whatever it was), Rampart, Slime World, Shadow of the Beast, Gates of Zendocon, Ninja Gaiden (the arcade version, which I always loved and lost many quarters to), Road Blasters, Stun Runner (another arcade quarter-hog), Viking Child... probably others, but those jump to mind. The thing drained batteries like nobody's business, but we had rechargables and an ac adapter when near an outlet, so it didn't matter too much.
I'd still happily sit and play that for hours, if it worked. I'm can't recall what finally killed it - survived the first iraq war (he was deployed there) just fine, and numerous road trips after that.
To me the only real deterrant to tyranny is that the military is made up of citizens, and is able to communicate with other, non-military people with little restriction (I'd appreciate anyone who's actually served confirming this, but it is the impression I have). It would be more difficult for a government to go to war with its constituents when using family members/friends/neighbors of the same constituents as soldiers.
Naturally, the use of mercenaries in a US military operation scares the crap out of me.
Does anyone know if Ira Hatch of Utah is related to Orrin Hatch of Utah? I tried finding out via google or wikipedia but came up blank. If so I can certainly understand why he would feel that Diebold is the best outfit for the job, given the company's notorious Republican-friendly past statements.
I'll admit to not r'ing tfa and only skimming the comments, but as soon as I read the summary my initial thought was "I'll bet my pants this guy used to have a vested interest in at least one company that would benefit from tiered access." So I wikipedia'd his name, and what was the fourth paragraph?
Martin worked several years for Wiley, Rein, and Fielding, "Rated Top Telecommunications Lobbyists" according to an article on their website. The firm represents the Bells as well as Viacom/CBS, Gannett, Belo, Emmis, Gray Television, and Motorola.
A telecoms lobbyist, what a shock! The cronyism is Bush appointees is pretty much absolute, so this probably shouldn't surprise anyone. Here's a link to his wikipedia entry, for anyone interested.
A barrel of oil is currently running at approximately $63. This is 42 gallons. I'm not sure how refining $1.50 / gallon oil into $0.50 / gallon gasoline works, but I'm guessing the oil companies would be willing to give you millions of dollars for the secret.
(And yes, I realize that portions of the refined oil become other products, but the largest portion does become either diesel or gasoline. Point is, $0.50 / gallon is extremely incorrect.)
Stephen King may or may not actually be healthy, it's an iffy question.
Well, he's unhealthy as far as his eyes go at the very least. And I can't imagine all of those years of drug and alcohol abuse did many of his major organs any good at all.
If he is, I'd imagine he's fairly capable of separating himself from his own stories.
Clearly you haven't read The Dark Tower 5-7. He's one of the main freaking characters.
I was curious about how the electoral vote vs state population numbers really stacked up, and figured it out the other day. I didn't put a ton of time into it and thus made some really bad assumptions (100% turnout etc), but it worked out that in the worst-case scenario a candidate could potentially win with only 22% of the popular vote. Also, a vote in Wyoming is worth the most towards winning an electoral vote, a vote in Texas is worth the least. I made all comparisons in relation to Minnesota (where I live) - a Wyoming vote is worth 3 times as much as a MN one, and Texas is only 77% of a MN vote.
My conclusion? The electoral college has got to go. Why shouldn't we have a popular vote? Because it disadvantages the small states? That's crap - they already have disproportionate numbers in Congress, why should they have an advantage in the presidential election as well?
A popular vote + instant runoff voting would really go a long way towards restoring my confidence in American politics. Even if the elections kept going to the dems or repubs, at least third parties would get enough of a vote as to have a voice. Unless I'm being overly presumptuous - would people still stick to the red vs blue, elephant vs donkey power struggle?
The electoral system is not broken. You're right, it isn't broken - but it does suck. I'm afraid to vote for anyone but one of the major two (this time at least), because I just can't stomache the idea of the wrong one winning. I think a *lot* of people feel the same way. Instant run-off voting (and at least one or two other systems I'm sure) seems to give more of a mandate - the winner is the candidate that is generally preferred over the others, not necessarily the one with the largest number of vocal followers.
Imagine a situation where there are 10 parties with candidates for president, and an issue that splits the country 15/85, and that completely polarizes the nation. (This isn't a realistic scenario I realize) Now, if only one of those candidates sides with group A (15% of the population), and the other 9 split, more or less evenly, group B (85%)... in our current system the 15% favored candidate wins. In instant runoff voting someone preferred by group B would probably win. Which seems more fair to you?
Yes, we should have left Saddam in power. I don't like him, in fact I loathe him. He's much closer in metaphorical terms to a demon than a saint. However, Iraq was a *sovereign nation* that we had no legitimate reason to invade. Doing so is imperialism, plain and simple (per m-w.com: Imperialism: 2: the policy, practice, or advocacy of extending the power and dominion of a nation especially by direct territorial acquisitions or by gaining indirect control over the political or economic life of other areas; broadly: the extension or imposition of power, authority, or influence). Explain to me how it isn't. Explain to me how you can justify our invading a country and removing its *legal* ruling power from office when that country was not a direct threat to us.
Thus far our track record in wars that don't directly involve American safety (ie WWII) is pretty poor, particularly in cases where we replaced a sitting, legal government. I can't personally think of any examples where that sort of conflict worked out well for the citizens of the country where the war actually happened (feel free to correct me on this, my knowledge of American military history is far from complete).
I feel sorry for the people of Iraq. They've gone from a brutal dictorship to a brutal power vaccuum, and will most likely end up with another brutal dictatorship within a decade (I'm sorry, but all signs currently point to democracy not working out). They probably would have been better off having a civil war and being done with it - at least that way the new goverment would have some legitimacy.
Ok, I won't "condemn or criticize anyone else" - but I'm certainly going to condemn and criticize a group. Bush himself *might* not be a bad guy, but his administration as a whole is horrific. Let's look at the score: - Unjustified war in Iraq. No WMDs found, no tangible link between Saddam and Al Queda. Was Saddam a tyrant that deserved to be overthrown? Yes. But the United States had no legitimate excuse to do so. We *ARE NOT* the world's police. We have better things to do in our own country with the hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands of lives this war has cost us. War should always, always, *always* be the last option, and only when it is absolutely necessary. I think a certain religious figure the administration claims to believe in would agree. - Extremely shady corporate connections. "Kenny Boy" Lay and Enron. Halliburton, run by Cheney at the time, found guilty of illegal accounting practices. No-bid contracts. - Voting machines. Do I really need to say any more? You read slashdot, right? I just can't in good faith believe that these things would have been pushed as hard if the guys who run the companies didn't favor the incumbent. - Environmental policy. I'm not going to get started on this really, it would take too long. Go ahead and google for "Bush administration environment" if you need convincing that they are *really* frickin' bad on this issue. - Inequal rights. I don't care where you stand on the issue, but do you really agree that a constitutional amendment is the best way to "preserve the sanctity of marriage?" Why is this a federal government issue in the first place? Isn't marriage a (mainly) religious practice that the government only cares about in terms of taxing? I personally think any two people who are actually going to stay with each other in the long run should be legally allowed to make that commitment, but I can see why some would disagree. But a constitutional amendment is very much the wrong answer to this social disagreement. Why not just have churches that don't like gay marriage not recognize such unions? The catholic church doesn't recognize my marriage (as I wasn't married by a priest), and they're welcome not to - but it is not the government's place to make moral judgements. - Dismantling of "inalienable" rights. Why does the government need to be able to review my library records? Is there anything in public libraries I'm not supposed to be reading? Have any terrorists really been caught by spying on the entire populace, ever? Why the hell are people being held in prisons without due process? Are they so dangerous that due process would harm the country?
Ok, so what are the administration's strengths? Really? I can't think of any. Defense? Granted, they're probably more militaristic than a democratic administration would be, but I have yet to be convinced this has helped make us safer. If anything, the Iraq war has lead to a greater percentage of the world hating the US, which just can't be a good thing in the long run.
Fahrenheit 9/11 might not be 100% factually accurate. It might be misleading in some parts. But have you seen it? The movie is a stunning indictment of the general wrong-headedness of the current administration, and even if 50% of it was bunk, it would still piss me off that our leaders are getting away with as much as they are.
In short, I don't like John Kerry, but he's the best bet to get this completely unpalatable administration out. And that's why I'm going to vote for him, and encourage to the best of my ability everyone I know to do likewise.
To tie this all back to the parent post - I'm not projecting self-hatred onto others when I say I hate the Bush administration. I like myself, and honestly believe I'm a good person. I have my faults, but I recognize them and try to either make up for them or work to make them go away. But I hate this administration, and wish nothing but bad things to happen to those involved it it (mmm... life-long prison sentences...). I'm not going to stand up for the administration for the sake of giving myself objectivity - I'm going to stand by my principles and do what I can to get them out of office.
Or the crazy 8MB voodoo2 card that attached (through much labor and sweat) to the underside of the mobo (mezzanine slot). I have one, and even thought it was a puny 233mhz machine it played a mean UT.
Slashdot Mirror
Really would have appreciated a NSFW tag there. I hadn't heard of that particular company (? - no idea what they are, as I closed the window as quickly as I could), and was not expecting nudity.
That's because it's always a different Link, as well as a different Zelda and a different Ganon(dorf). The series is effectively rebooted with each iteration. (Even bigger nerds, feel free to correct me on this.)
Funny, I was just searching today for "steam sucks" because I wanted to see if my recent experiences with it were common.
I'm enough of a sheep to buy Painkiller after it was recommended in a Zero Punctuation review, but the downloading was far inferior to what I've experienced on less-than-legit channels. The Steam client is slow as hell on what I consider to be an older, but not terrible computer - 1.8ghz, 1.5GB ram, etc - it takes a couple minutes to open, and anything it needs to do (switch tabs, get properties on something) makes it think for at least another minute. The worst part? It's a big enough game and my connection is slow enough (peak at about 150KB/sec) that it took me several evenings to download. To my great surprise and frustration just starting up the Steam client doesn't cause active downloads to resume - that requires a manual request. I was in a hurry one evening and only waited long enough to start my pc and Steam, thinking that when I came back a few hours later the game would be done and I could play it for a bit - no. Steam hadn't downloaded anything even though it was sitting idle and working just fine.
When the game finally did get downloaded, I was annoyed to find that I need to have Steam run every time I launch it, and it sits in the background serving up ads to the client software unless I alt-tab out of the game to close it. Not a huge deal, but given that it takes a few minutes to start up and update Steam *every time* I want to play, it adds up. I don't have a lot of time to game, so having some of that eaten up waiting for a service I have no intent of using each time annoys the hell out of me.
I don't mind paying for games, but when pirating them would result in a superior experience and less hassle I'm not exactly encouraged.
I have a frankenstein mix of a rev A, rev C, and a rev D daughtercard. It's a bondi rev C case / monitor, rev A guts, voodoo2 card on the mezzanine slot, 80gb hd, and a 333mhz processor via the rev D daughtercard. Works quite nicely as a backup server running Tiger.
Incidentally, the rev C really is bondi blue - that was only supposed to be used on rev A and B (C was the introduction of the 5 'fruit' colored models, and the blue was a deeper color than A or B). I guess they had leftover bondi cases and built a handful of them (in the US, per case markings) with rev C guts. I was really confused when I opened it up expecting to see a mezzanine slot I could slap my voodoo2 card onto.
Nope. The summary (and most press articles on this and many other Senate votes, actually) is a bit misleading - this wasn't a vote on the actual amendment, it was a vote on *cloture*. This type of vote fails if there are 40 "nays," otherwise it will pass and move on to an actual vote on the bill at hand, which would be a simple majority vote. So when 43 Republican senators vote "nay" on cloture the bill / amendment never goes on to a real vote - this is also known as a filibuster. Doesn't really matter if 1 or all 50 Dems vote "yea" when 42 Republicans (plus Lieberman) vote against it. In this case every single Dem did vote, and they voted "yea."
Unfortunately the Dems aren't really holding the Republicans to what a "nay" on cloture should cause, which is additional debate leading to another cloture vote. If the Dems wanted to really force the issue, they could continue to debate on this and nothing else until enough Republicans either abstained or voted "yea" on cloture to allow for a real vote. As it is, the Dems have essentially consented to all Senate votes requiring the support of 60 senators to pass by not forcing a filibuster to actually mean endless discussion. Personally, I find this infuriating, though I understand that indefinitely shutting down the Senate over a single vote could be politically damaging, or at least appear to be.
Er, but the practice in question is checking the *receipt* for customers who just walked out of the *checkout* area. This has nothing to do with someone shoving a cd in their pants and walking out. This check does absolutely nothing to combat traditional grab 'n go shoplifting. What the grandparent post was discussing was a way to remove the receipt check and still have a way to go back and nail people later - if they don't provide ID, no service. If they do provide ID and are later found (via surveillance video review) to have shoplifted then they can be charged. Not a bad idea really, other than the grandparent-noted likelihood of reduced customer retention.
By "these limitations" do you mean our rights? Because they aren't "limitations," they're our rights which the founders fought hard to give us. Everyone should know what these rights are, but unfortunately such is not the current state of things, or no one would consent to these ridiculous post-checkout inspections.
Not "without perfect evidence," but rather WITH NO evidence. Those people / businesses are, essentially, "damned." If I buy something from you, have not behaved in any way which suggests that I've been anything other than a normal, honest customer, and you still try to detain me for any reason when I try to leave, you're infringing on my rights. Period. "Meaningfully demand a receipt"? They're in no position to "demand" anything other than that I stay if they have a reasonable suspicion that I've shoplifted. That's it. Unwillingness to consent to a voluntary search does not constitute behavior suspicious enough to warrant detention.
I don't really mean to flame / pick on you specifically, but every time a situation like this comes up I'm sickened by the number of people who will adamantly insist that standing up for your rights is anything less than honorable. If I didn't break any laws, and you didn't see me doing anything to indicate that I may have broken laws, you have no justification to detain me. I'm a free person, and can move about as I please except under the very specific set of circumstances for which our laws have been carefully crafted to cover. Don't tread on me.
As much fault as I tend to find in the current executive branch, I have to agree with the parent on this one. Reading through the actual order I see no mention of seizing anything, merely blocking the transfer of property (which, presumably, includes assets both physical and monetary).
I wouldn't be surprised if this were to be used to go after more than just terrorists, but the summary does appear to be inaccurate at least insofar as the seizing of assets / breaking the 5th amendment goes.
Well, he *is* married to JFK's niece... that may have something to do with it.
Check out this story at TPMmuckraker - according to a report from CREW there were actually more like FIVE MILLION emails deleted. The scale of this is just stunning.
I'm one of those lucky former TW customers for whom Comcast is looking to jack the rate. My wife and I don't watch tv (haven't for over 2 years now - internet + netflix is all we need), but get this:
previously paying $42.95 for 4mbit/sec cable internet only
rate increasing to $59.95 for 6mbit/sec cable internet only, plus $3 / month modem rental (never had to pay this before)
rate for 6mbit/sec + base cable = $57.95 / month plus $3 / month modem rental
So yeah, we get a faster connection that we don't need (4mbit was more than enough) and pay $20 more per month, unless we opt to add on basic cable tv - then we only pay $18 per month more than we used to. WTF? Why is it *cheaper* to add tv service? Do they make that much off of the local advertisers?
Because of this, I called threatening to cancel and go to DSL, to see if the sales people would haggle. They offered me $10 off per month for 6 months, then $5 off for another 6 months, but after that the rate would be back to normal - no thanks. I called again a week or so later and a different sales rep mentioned that they have an "economy" connection for only $39.95 plus $3 / month modem rental - perfect! I agreed to that, they stated it was a 3mbit / second connection, which is a bit slower than we had before but still more than enough. I double-checked on the speed, specifically asking how much the kbyte / second would be as I didn't have a calculator handy - the rep stated 384kbyte / sec, both up and down. Wait, what? Since when is cable synchronous? I asked about this and the rep was adamant that it'll be 384 up and down. Fine, I'll take it.
Turns out, the rep was an idiot, as were the next two I spoke with a couple weeks later when I called to complain about slow speeds. "Economy" class is 384 kBIT / sec, not kBYTE. Gah. Eventually I was transferred to a highly apologetic rep who verified that I was given bad information, and to make up for this he offered me the 6mbit / sec connection for $20 / month for 4 months. I took it.
I'll be switching to DSL come July, unless comcast has an actual plan by then which is less than $60 / month and greater than 1.5mbit / sec (at minimum).
The notion that the increased sophistication and "media center" uses of new consoles are driving factors in larger numbers of adults owning them is silly. The reason more adults own consoles is the inevitability of aging - I loved playing console games as a kid, and now I'm an adult. I didn't suddenly start buying them because they got to the point of being fancy enough, I kept buying them as I got older.
It's like saying in the mid-fifties that most rock and roll listeners are kids / teens, and then acting surprised when 10 years later the audience for rock and roll is "suddenly" composed of more adults, many of whom even have kids! Shocking!
The atari 2600.
I personally don't understand the logic behind viewing the blu-ray part of the PS3 as a selling point. Who really cares? Is the subtle (in most cases) graphical advantage really going to make my gaming experience sufficiently more fun to justify the extra cost? I really doubt it.
I know the goal isn't to emulate any other browsers, but I can't stand how Opera 9 handles tabs. When I open a new tab the default behavior is to focus on that tab immediately. Yes, I know you can middle-click to open in background, but on my mac laptop that really isn't an option. I can use command-shift-click, but that's a bit unwieldy - would a preference setting of "open tabs in background by default" be too much to ask?
The other issue I've found with tabs (and for which there doesn't seem to be a work-around - correct me if I'm wrong here) is that after closing a tab, focus then shifts to the last tab viewed. This is incredibly irritating for me personally, as I frequently will open a bunch of links in background tabs from a main page (say, the slashdot front page), then read each tab in order. Using Opera 9 I can still open a bunch of links in the background (using the afore-mentioned 3-button combo), but reading through them is an irritating series of going back to the start tab over and over. Again, a simple preference setting of "When closing tabs: [open previously viewed tab | open tab to right | open tab to left]" would be all I need.
Minor gripes I suppose - I love Opera's speedy rendering and how well pages scroll (firefox and opera both feel like browsing in slow-motion by comparison), but the tab management is a constant source of frustration.
Is that the official name? I never bothered to learn it, just immediately internalized them as "mercenaries" when I heard about the for-pay soldiers we had. Horrifying.
My older brother had a Lynx and I played the hell out of it - California Games, Blue Lightning, Guantlet (3? 4? You could play as a nerd or a robot, whatever it was), Rampart, Slime World, Shadow of the Beast, Gates of Zendocon, Ninja Gaiden (the arcade version, which I always loved and lost many quarters to), Road Blasters, Stun Runner (another arcade quarter-hog), Viking Child... probably others, but those jump to mind. The thing drained batteries like nobody's business, but we had rechargables and an ac adapter when near an outlet, so it didn't matter too much.
I'd still happily sit and play that for hours, if it worked. I'm can't recall what finally killed it - survived the first iraq war (he was deployed there) just fine, and numerous road trips after that.
To me the only real deterrant to tyranny is that the military is made up of citizens, and is able to communicate with other, non-military people with little restriction (I'd appreciate anyone who's actually served confirming this, but it is the impression I have). It would be more difficult for a government to go to war with its constituents when using family members/friends/neighbors of the same constituents as soldiers.
Naturally, the use of mercenaries in a US military operation scares the crap out of me.
Does anyone know if Ira Hatch of Utah is related to Orrin Hatch of Utah? I tried finding out via google or wikipedia but came up blank. If so I can certainly understand why he would feel that Diebold is the best outfit for the job, given the company's notorious Republican-friendly past statements.
A telecoms lobbyist, what a shock! The cronyism is Bush appointees is pretty much absolute, so this probably shouldn't surprise anyone. Here's a link to his wikipedia entry, for anyone interested.
A barrel of oil is currently running at approximately $63. This is 42 gallons. I'm not sure how refining $1.50 / gallon oil into $0.50 / gallon gasoline works, but I'm guessing the oil companies would be willing to give you millions of dollars for the secret.
(And yes, I realize that portions of the refined oil become other products, but the largest portion does become either diesel or gasoline. Point is, $0.50 / gallon is extremely incorrect.)
Stephen King may or may not actually be healthy, it's an iffy question.
Well, he's unhealthy as far as his eyes go at the very least. And I can't imagine all of those years of drug and alcohol abuse did many of his major organs any good at all.
If he is, I'd imagine he's fairly capable of separating himself from his own stories.
Clearly you haven't read The Dark Tower 5-7. He's one of the main freaking characters.
I was curious about how the electoral vote vs state population numbers really stacked up, and figured it out the other day. I didn't put a ton of time into it and thus made some really bad assumptions (100% turnout etc), but it worked out that in the worst-case scenario a candidate could potentially win with only 22% of the popular vote. Also, a vote in Wyoming is worth the most towards winning an electoral vote, a vote in Texas is worth the least. I made all comparisons in relation to Minnesota (where I live) - a Wyoming vote is worth 3 times as much as a MN one, and Texas is only 77% of a MN vote.
My conclusion? The electoral college has got to go. Why shouldn't we have a popular vote? Because it disadvantages the small states? That's crap - they already have disproportionate numbers in Congress, why should they have an advantage in the presidential election as well?
A popular vote + instant runoff voting would really go a long way towards restoring my confidence in American politics. Even if the elections kept going to the dems or repubs, at least third parties would get enough of a vote as to have a voice. Unless I'm being overly presumptuous - would people still stick to the red vs blue, elephant vs donkey power struggle?
The electoral system is not broken.
You're right, it isn't broken - but it does suck. I'm afraid to vote for anyone but one of the major two (this time at least), because I just can't stomache the idea of the wrong one winning. I think a *lot* of people feel the same way. Instant run-off voting (and at least one or two other systems I'm sure) seems to give more of a mandate - the winner is the candidate that is generally preferred over the others, not necessarily the one with the largest number of vocal followers.
Imagine a situation where there are 10 parties with candidates for president, and an issue that splits the country 15/85, and that completely polarizes the nation. (This isn't a realistic scenario I realize) Now, if only one of those candidates sides with group A (15% of the population), and the other 9 split, more or less evenly, group B (85%)... in our current system the 15% favored candidate wins. In instant runoff voting someone preferred by group B would probably win. Which seems more fair to you?
Yes, we should have left Saddam in power. I don't like him, in fact I loathe him. He's much closer in metaphorical terms to a demon than a saint. However, Iraq was a *sovereign nation* that we had no legitimate reason to invade. Doing so is imperialism, plain and simple (per m-w.com: Imperialism: 2: the policy, practice, or advocacy of extending the power and dominion of a nation especially by direct territorial acquisitions or by gaining indirect control over the political or economic life of other areas; broadly: the extension or imposition of power, authority, or influence). Explain to me how it isn't. Explain to me how you can justify our invading a country and removing its *legal* ruling power from office when that country was not a direct threat to us.
Thus far our track record in wars that don't directly involve American safety (ie WWII) is pretty poor, particularly in cases where we replaced a sitting, legal government. I can't personally think of any examples where that sort of conflict worked out well for the citizens of the country where the war actually happened (feel free to correct me on this, my knowledge of American military history is far from complete).
I feel sorry for the people of Iraq. They've gone from a brutal dictorship to a brutal power vaccuum, and will most likely end up with another brutal dictatorship within a decade (I'm sorry, but all signs currently point to democracy not working out). They probably would have been better off having a civil war and being done with it - at least that way the new goverment would have some legitimacy.
Ok, I won't "condemn or criticize anyone else" - but I'm certainly going to condemn and criticize a group. Bush himself *might* not be a bad guy, but his administration as a whole is horrific. Let's look at the score:
- Unjustified war in Iraq. No WMDs found, no tangible link between Saddam and Al Queda. Was Saddam a tyrant that deserved to be overthrown? Yes. But the United States had no legitimate excuse to do so. We *ARE NOT* the world's police. We have better things to do in our own country with the hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands of lives this war has cost us. War should always, always, *always* be the last option, and only when it is absolutely necessary. I think a certain religious figure the administration claims to believe in would agree.
- Extremely shady corporate connections. "Kenny Boy" Lay and Enron. Halliburton, run by Cheney at the time, found guilty of illegal accounting practices. No-bid contracts.
- Voting machines. Do I really need to say any more? You read slashdot, right? I just can't in good faith believe that these things would have been pushed as hard if the guys who run the companies didn't favor the incumbent.
- Environmental policy. I'm not going to get started on this really, it would take too long. Go ahead and google for "Bush administration environment" if you need convincing that they are *really* frickin' bad on this issue.
- Inequal rights. I don't care where you stand on the issue, but do you really agree that a constitutional amendment is the best way to "preserve the sanctity of marriage?" Why is this a federal government issue in the first place? Isn't marriage a (mainly) religious practice that the government only cares about in terms of taxing? I personally think any two people who are actually going to stay with each other in the long run should be legally allowed to make that commitment, but I can see why some would disagree. But a constitutional amendment is very much the wrong answer to this social disagreement. Why not just have churches that don't like gay marriage not recognize such unions? The catholic church doesn't recognize my marriage (as I wasn't married by a priest), and they're welcome not to - but it is not the government's place to make moral judgements.
- Dismantling of "inalienable" rights. Why does the government need to be able to review my library records? Is there anything in public libraries I'm not supposed to be reading? Have any terrorists really been caught by spying on the entire populace, ever? Why the hell are people being held in prisons without due process? Are they so dangerous that due process would harm the country?
Ok, so what are the administration's strengths? Really? I can't think of any. Defense? Granted, they're probably more militaristic than a democratic administration would be, but I have yet to be convinced this has helped make us safer. If anything, the Iraq war has lead to a greater percentage of the world hating the US, which just can't be a good thing in the long run.
Fahrenheit 9/11 might not be 100% factually accurate. It might be misleading in some parts. But have you seen it? The movie is a stunning indictment of the general wrong-headedness of the current administration, and even if 50% of it was bunk, it would still piss me off that our leaders are getting away with as much as they are.
In short, I don't like John Kerry, but he's the best bet to get this completely unpalatable administration out. And that's why I'm going to vote for him, and encourage to the best of my ability everyone I know to do likewise.
To tie this all back to the parent post - I'm not projecting self-hatred onto others when I say I hate the Bush administration. I like myself, and honestly believe I'm a good person. I have my faults, but I recognize them and try to either make up for them or work to make them go away. But I hate this administration, and wish nothing but bad things to happen to those involved it it (mmm... life-long prison sentences...). I'm not going to stand up for the administration for the sake of giving myself objectivity - I'm going to stand by my principles and do what I can to get them out of office.
Or the crazy 8MB voodoo2 card that attached (through much labor and sweat) to the underside of the mobo (mezzanine slot). I have one, and even thought it was a puny 233mhz machine it played a mean UT.