I will just let you know that land rises a bit faster than you think.... To be specific there are sites where it has risen 300 or more feet in less than 100 years (In Alaska this has been seen). The bouyancy effect are not nearly as slow as you think. You must come from the class of Geologist who were amaized by Mt St Helens like it was a super eruption. (It was only 1/2 or less of 3 others since 1820 and only 1/500th of Mt Pinatubo) I have seen both by the way in person.
Melt Rates are not as fast as days anyway. Greenland or South Pole Ice would take centuries and bluntly the land would compensate quite rapidly. You also are not considering the effect of additional water on the ocean bottom. Your problem is that you have not learnd about that famous Greek Archemedes and his principal. It works every time we have tried it!
Land movements are much faster than you are supposing. Oil Drilling has cause Oak Hills Ca to drop some 40+ feet in less than 70 years. Oil drilling has lowered a lot of east texas similar (- 10 feet or more)
It appears you have not heard about the deep ocean currents either (Warming Echo)
The issue of what will happen when land covered by ice sees a melting is curious. Most people assume that water/ice sitting on land will raise ocean levels when it runs into the ocean. This is not so. The reason has to do with the exact same reason for which the land sticks above the ocean. Frankly it is floating just as the ICE in the water. When the ice or water on land runs off into the ocean, the land it was on rises in a process called isostatic rebound. This makes more room for the water in the ocean and as such makes the net effect zero.
The reasons for which large land masses rise or fall below the ocean has to do with effects in the Crust and Mantle of the earth. Clearly these effects are beyond any human control. The Isostatic rebound is pretty profound. In areas where glaciers have recently melted off, land masses have risen as much as 200 or 300 feet. These have been observed in the past 100 years.
The complete melting of Ice off of Greenland for example would reveal a land mass which at this time is below sea level most of it. The land would rise serveral thousand feet by best estimates revealing mountains as high possibly as the Smoky Mountains or higher in places.
The science we have regards this is revealed in sattelite orbits. This mapping measures the density as by deviations in orbits. It reveals that this particular set of data is fact. It would be best to assume that land like Ice is floating and subject to all the same rules of displacement. Undersea land is sunk for the same reasons.
The melting of the polar regions is driven by cycles way too long to have been affected by any human intervention. The heat to melt the polar ice is part of a ocean current cycle that has over 20,000 years of lead time on our current events. The salt water currents cycle is massive and is global. It is controlled by an inventory of water that is estimated to take over 20,000 years to cycle through. If and it appears so that the Polar Caps are melting, The heat that is driving this melt fell to earth some 20,000 years ago.
For those of us who live in the eastern USA our mountains have massive cliffs cut by deep rivers of ice. These glaciers had north America looking like the south polar regions do today. The warming that took out those glaciers is probably echoing back on us right now.
Also one other factor is driving events. In the early part of the 1900's the sun got about 1.5% brighter than it was over the previous 5,000 years. It has remained so since. It does appear in the past 5 to 7 years that this trend has reversed. I sincerely doubt that we humans have any influence on the brightness of the sun.
The whole "Global Warming" argument is actually a political argument by Europeans and Asians to hobble the Americna Economy. Their economic beliefs generally assume the success of one person is the result of him having advantage over his competition. This is why we see such dangers to the world economy at this time. Such ideas do not allow adaptation. They rely on conquest.
The Irony of this is that while the these Asian and Europeans are using massively higher amounts of coal, much of which is mined in the USA, they are telling Americans not to burn it! While US Coal consumption has dropped steadily since the early 1900's Hampton Roads, Virginia and Mobile, Alabama have become the worlds largest energy exporting ports. No it is not oil. It is COAL. The total tonnage is about 1 Billion Tons of coal from these two ports a year. The energy value of this is more than equal to 300 billion barrels of oil/year. This means that the USA exports the equal to the entire Saudi Oil Inventory in the ground about every 10 years. Total world production of oil is about 65 Billion Barrels of oil a year.
While everyone was not watching China raised their consumption of coal to a total of about 2 Billion Tons a year. India did about 1.5 Billion tons a year increase as well. This means that the total US Consumption and Export of Coal of about
The Microsoft gang getting a dose of their own medicine is ironic indeed! But as to Patients/Copyrights we have a problem. Software clearly needs effective processes where the inventor of something gets paid. The problem here is that the programmers who write the stuff rarely get the control here.
Also there is a problem with software technology patients/copyrights blocking progress. Clearly without them no progress would get far, but with them the laws we have are not really suited to them. First they run for too long to be relevant in the industry. This is particularly true of copyrights. Patient renewal in softare is an abserd proposition.
There is another "Process" problem here. The concept that you can patient a process when there are many ways of doing it subverts the whole innovation and invention process.
We are dealing with a set of laws which do not make any sense regards to software anyway.
It probably will all be academic shortly. Regardless of any Domestic US Lawsuits, Linux is going gangbusters world wide and will take out Microsoft anyway. The Domestic US Market will either adapt to the new ways or it will collapse in the market. Americans have a choice of going the GPL etc or losing all the market. The EU will not defend Microsoft in this.
I suspect that the Microsoft guys already know this and are just bailing out. The other software guys are just grabbing a piece as they go out anyway. If you are a developer this leaves you exactly one way to make a living. SERVICE.
No! Every good thing suggested about this project denies the facts behind our current problems. (IE that the school administrations don't want to deal with the real world.) Schools were publically created to teach common civil morals and bluntly that is a job they refuse to do and no camera can see them doing!
There cannot be any security once access is granted to parents. It will be recorded, diverted and etc. What is more the same blind eyes that only see when a desperate kid finally hits back will still only see that. The other incidents will be dismissed as accidents or accidentally disposed of.
This is the sucking hole for the concept of personal freedom. We think we can enforce it when the reality is that we must teach it! Freedom enforced always becomes a higher tyranny than the original offense. This is why we were warned by our founding fathers about not trading freedom for security
The absolutely best example of this was the events of 911. There were camera tapes showing the guys on the very mission. There they were buying box cutters. There they were boarding planes. Then the planes were seen crashing into the buildings. Let me assure you that all we will get out of this experiment is less freedom, more irresponsible officials and selective enforcement. Remember that if they find someone that they don't like they can watch them like a hawk and save every second. With cut/paste and a bit of editing that person can forever become a Political Non-Person and well the morons advocating this will join in the cyber lynching.
Remember that there were at least 40 incidents all reported in at the time in which the 911 guys could have been dealt with. This is also true in schools. The bad kids are not dealt with and it is not for lack of video recording. It is not for lack of reporting. One team of Hijackers actually stayed at the House of a professional FBI Informant! This whole technology solution to the issue of human behavior and morals is an attempt to deny that the problem is HUMAN INTENT and not a specific act.
In the USA we have spent about $200,000,000,000 on "Homeland Security." We still cannot catch "Illegal Aliens." (Or will not catch them -- the reality) The Government makes a party about taking our money for purpose But does not do the work. This will be the case in Schools. We will spend a lot and the schools still will not work. It is a shake down racket where if they actually solved the problem they would be out of a job. It is a mafia style protection scheme.
We should note that from 1993 to 2001 Al Qaeda worked tirelessly to do the 911 events and were caught repeatedly and ignored. It took them nearly 8 years to get it right. We have not suffered their attack since 911 because they are not yet able. This is not related to any action of ours. When they become able we will know it. In the mean time we will probably have shelled out 100 times the cost of their terrorist attack even if they destroy a whole city. Our own government in its pernicious greed will have an excellent record of what happened but will not have stopped it again. In our schools we have the same thing going on. Parents ever more scared of the failings of the system seek devices to make this work. The Administration sucks up the money because it allows them to have more and more "Phony baloney jobs" that don't actually deal with students. It protects their budgets. In the end we get more and more terror and more and more afraid.
Sorry but this idea is driven by the triumph of fear over intelligence. Cameras could help if the people were on the job. They will not get them on the job and we will suffer even worse because our money will be gone and we will seek ever deeper into this counterproductive set of ideas.
Doubt me? England ran this idea up on crime control. Almost a million cameras later, their traffic is not as safe, their crime rate is up and the citizens are afraid of the authorities. Do we have to act stupid just to learn that it is wrong?
I was flying over the midwest with the trade rep. from Taiwan. I told him plainly to look down and to his amaizement he saw the endless farms etc. I told him that when he got to Wash. DC the people there would try to impress him with our arms and etc as being the source of our strength. I told him that down below was the source of our strength.
We did not win the cold war by way of weapons and guns. The actual reason we won was our massive farms and industry. Today our officials are exporting our technology, industry and devastating our farms with their economic arrogance. This is a forecast of Doom for the USA if we do not quit this arrogance.
The Whole World is eagerly awaiting our demise and they know it is coming if they just wait. They know we are destroying ourselves. I will plainly state that a "Republican" is one who is for the federal Republic of the United States. Can anyone name any policy of the Bush Administration that is "Republican?"
How in the world did statesmanship come to be the art of destroying ones own nation?
These assumptions regarding the money looping back are historically correct but not now. When a US Senator tried recently to ammend the Defense Appropriations bill to require that 50% of the spending be "Made in the USA" Defense Sec. Rumsfeld shot back saying that he could not run the defense department with this requirement.
Please awaken to the reality that the only participation we as Americans now get in our Tax Dollars is when we pay them. More and more even our Unemployment Compensation is managed "Off Shore" Naturally as long as Americans must mark up their labor 150% to pay the taxes they will have trouble being as "Cheap" as their foreign competition.
When the 4th Mech was delayed into Iraq supposedly from the delay from Turkey, the reality was that the soldiers could not leave their bases in Texas etc because they lacked proper uniforms. The reason the factory in China was busy filling other orders for uniforms. Specifically copycat US Uniforms for Saddam's forces!
Surely on a Computer Geeky forum like this one everybody should love the Idea of the computers running our defense department having all their chips made in China!?! ( A country openly planning to go to war against the USA. ) Or does anyone remember how we shut down Saddams Air defenses by computer tricks in 1991? A feat possible because we built the Computers! How long will our systems work against China when they get around to the war they are arming openly for at this time! Shall I bring up a little history about Japan and the "Made in USA" stuff we got back from them in 1941!
The problem with the Carbon Fiber stuff is also a very dangerous thing. As it more and more becomes possible to make sure exactly who you are killing, it opens the door wider and wider for the acceptance of its use and lowers the restraints on it.
One of the things that few Americans understand is that we have a unique view of our identity as Americans. With few exceptions, such an identity does not exist outside the USA. Most people there see their loyalty more towards their religion, family and possibly local community or town. Understanding these Arabic guys by our view is an error. There is a religious link in these guys and they think it is above any national loyalty. This is why it is so awful how citizenship has recently been doled out to so many persons regardless of any education into citizenship and any check of their real loyalties
The concept that we are all Americans is one we in the USA developed after the US Civil War when it became painfully obvious that if we accepted any other identity, we would all die in an awful war worse than our Civil War.
The claim by President Bush that Islam is Peaceful is ignorant of history. What is more all it does is convince the Islamists that we are liars and makes our people blind to the danger. We have to profile and recognize that people carry "Flags" that tell us who they are. These murdering Islamists do stuff like having their women cover their faces etc. One of their "Flags" is a particular facial hair style.
It is awful but true that every effort we make to try to accomidate what we believe might be "legitimate" palestinian issues, only engenders disrespect of us and danger to us. The failure to recognize this is suicidal and the Palestinians openly taunt us with this fact but in our arrogance we refuse to listen to what they are saying and to react accordingly. We also refuse to understand that the only process likely to achieve our safety is to bring down absolute defeat on them such that like the "Old South" their dreams are "Gone with the wind" giving them the freedom to get on with life without such dangerous behavior.
The politically correct ideas of accepting other identities within the USA threatens to restore the situation that precipitated the US Civil War. It is a condition that bedevils southern Europe. We have a word for it, Balkinization. Don't mistake me for saying something similar to the German "Pure Race" stuff. On the contrary it just means that people who live in the USA as citizens should recognize that they are Americans
Sorry but Microsoft including their recent "Dividend" still fits this category probably better than any other company in history. They have "Made the most money" and paid literally NOTHING until this year in dividends. The largest company in America pays a dividend of 0.25% return on investment. Come on! Wake up this is stock fraud to the limit.
So they make 8 Billion in profit but they don't pay it to their stockholders do they? This is prima facia evidence of what I am talking about but as usual people are not looking closely. They are just ignorantly going about squalking with all the intelligence of three rocks and one large brick.
There is practically no company in America of any size which in any way resembles capitalism. At this time, most big companies are sucking down massive tax exemptions. Their facilities as with MS are paid for and built by the Taxpayers who they intend to defy at every turn. They will refuse any request that they pay this back. Just to set you streight, what I am talking about is called "Jobs" by your Congress critters and is called "Industrial Development" by your city or town or state and is nothing of the sort. It is Faschism or National Socialism Pure and simple. Doubt me? Try financing an operation with real investment money with you at risk. The bank will say NO!
In the Case of MS everyone forgets a company set in business essentially by the US Department of Defense with massive help and "Deep Black" support who now ships all this tech off to our sworn enemy China in return for our generous support and assistance. China is openly planning Nuclear War with the USA and this is not an accusation, it is their word.
No MS is the worst of the lot. They took the most and have paid back such a small amount that it is a bad joke. The fraud at MS is MILES DEEP. But the "Capitalists" at the stock market are all believers who are awaiting even bigger suckers to follow their bad investment with more money.
In the case of MS those who chose "Appreciation" over Dividends will find that the "Profits" of $8 Billion are easy to report but when they have to be shelled out in cash, they will evaporate like Verga. It will never hit the ground. This is why Linux is a threat to MS. The top heavy structure is hollow to the core riddled with mechanisms where the big guys can take it all leaving the stockholders in the shorts. The organization is like a great oak fully hollowed out by termintes. When the wind blows it falls to splinters. It is already happening just watch.
If MS is your idea of capitalism, hold tight it is going to be a bumpy night. (Just a Hint: I am a true capitalist who has run businesses for may years with my own money until they were essentially crushed by these "Tax Advantaged" companies given advantages under Industrial Development Boards)
Yeah what is capitalism? From what I understand a simplified definition of capitalism would be a system where investors put money in and expect a return on investment. Skipping a few details this is about it. Funny how today every Government Hallucination is called Capitalism. NOT LIKELY to be Capitalism just called capitalism.
We see a lot of devices like the SCO team and many others today calling themselves "Capitalism" but bluntly they are thieft by device, the definition of fraud.
I sincerely doubt that the stock holders of SCO or whatever will even participate in the "benefits" if there are any. As such the company should be charged with violation of the "Blue Sky Laws" where they are selling the Blue sky and not any factual thing when they sell stock. They are inducing investors with the intend of never paying them their just return. Does anyone take note that Microsoft might just fit this category too?!
There is another deep issue going on in the world trade situation that is endangering the RIAA. This is probably being ignored and is probably the biggest threat to their money other than the basic marketing changes. It is the function of the "Free Trade" agreements in the American Economy. These deals have undermined much of the income base for the young people. As a result they simply don't have the money to buy because their jobs don't pay that well.
It is essential for any business that makes a profit to have customers who have the money to pay them. The US Economy suffered a 2% loss in gross payrolls in 2002. The result in the young people has been mass slaughter. Georgia Tech reported that some 35% of their Tech Grads did not place in 2001 and almost 40% in 2002! With this rate of belly flopping in new careers among those who routinely normally buy music the most, the RIAA is looking at their market drying up for other reasons than copy problems.
For anyone thinking that this is "off topic" it is about as "off topic" as the issue amount of Social Security Taxes collected is to the solvency of the Social Security. It is at least 1/2 of the whole issue. If people have no money, there are no sales. The RIAA and many other industries in the USA had better wake up to the grand results of the destruction of the wage base in the USA or they too will find themselves cut out of a job. The best thing for business is customers with money!
While it is obvious that P2P transfers do avoid royalties, it is not obvious to many that the purpose for the RIAA is obsolete.
As it was, the RIAA was a tool for an artist to have his production recorded, packaged, stamped and marketed. With the advent of P2P and big hard drives, a customer has little or no reason to every actually have "real media." The marketing value of the RIAA largely hung on the fact that the process was expensive and difficult. Today it is easy and cheap. As such they have no real reason to exist. They may not like it, but it is true.
There are deeper reasons for the RIAA failure though. If we look at the various types of recordings that they pushed on America they frankly are in the business of Social Devolution. This process may be profitable at a short moment, but in time it destroys the very base from which it arises. The RIAA leadership has refused the more positive types of music etc because it wasn't "Artistic" enough for their tastes. The positive types generally outsell the others many times but as a rule don't generate the single "Stars" like the sexpots we get now. The failures of pushing for the sexpot types and gangster types are massive and regular enough to make it a questionable enterprise at any time.
With the 911 event there was also a substantial introspection in America and essentialy the "Junk" media found itself on the outs of sales. What had been running well or just hanging on is now dead.
The RIAA people are deep in a hole they created. They made their business with the disreputable of society, (Not to accuse anyone in particular) and now they find that the company of "thieves" they constructed is not profitable. So they think the solution is to attack the copiers. Well to be blunt, they give the stuff away on the Radio.
I have watched this industry for many years. In that time they always get a new copy media and complain bitterly that it is killing their business. In desperation they cut prices, and sales, volume and profits rise. They get prosperous and try to clamp down on copies. Then the price goes way up, sales plummet and in the end they go around again.
Software firms do as do the music people do need assurance of payment for sevices. The best solution here is to charge people for the service you provide. In this case on-line sale with download for a modest price a copy is what is in order. The logic of high prices denies both supply and media issues. Many music people are doing this bypassing RIAA stuff.
The Media types simply fail to grasp one reality that comes up that is best illustrated by CATV. I can only watch one channel at a time. Even with Recording I am only time switching. Charging royalties for each channel on a CATV network and adding channels only gets me mad and makes me seek other options. This is also true in Music. If I listen all the time and have lots of cuts, the value of each cut to me drops as the supply increases due to the amount of time I can devote to each cut dropping. In the end, the RIAA types have to realize that their whole concept or royalties is overloaded, bloated and failing.
With all sympathy to the RIAA the pirates do need cut down a bit. I think some copy protection is in order. But what ever it is, it should not be used to avoid the basic economics here.
(See a few more notes inside:) But first, please get some basic facts about India straight: (Yes India was exploited badly by the British and what is worse it was called "Free Trade" back then too. What is more the Indians laugh out loud at the American Claims to be a free country as do persons from several other countries, who have eyes. Sadly Americans like myself must agree if we look at reality. what passes for liberty here has become a demented lunacy. I would take exception to the view of us being extreme racist. We are the end of many of those things) 1. Despite being exploited and oppressed by the British for more than 200 years, India is not going astray. She has one of the strongest democracies in the world. For example, when the Prime Minister of India declared that he wanted to help US out with troops in Iraq, major public disapproval forced the govt. to act otherwise. In 50 years after independence, India has managed to put up more than a handful of industries. Excess food is exported, and donated to UN. There is a burgeoning middle class, which is now threatening to take jobs away from countries like US. (I would like most respectfully to ask my fellow most arrogant Americans to sit down and listen to the advice a famous opposition leader to Lord North in Parliment gave regards US a few years back [1776]. "... How can we ever hope to subjegate such a might continental power? Let us make peace with them while we can, not when we must." If India only does economically per capita 1/6th of the USA they will be equal to us. If they do the same as us we will be a forgotten backwater in the world. Should they pass us which is a certainty and not long from now, we will be in grave danger should we have been so arrogant regards them. I do not wish to cower to India but neither should they be requested to do so.) I am saying this most respectfully-- most westerners, including those writers sitting in air-conditioned rooms at WSJ, do not know $hit about the third world. (I must concur hartily as a US Citizen with this remark. The WSJ guys don't even know jack $hit about the people who work in the USA either! Otherwise they would understand that the problem with "Outsoursing" that has developed is mostly a product of high domestic US Taxes causing US workers to have to mark their wages up more than 150% in order to live while having to compete against those living in democracies like India who have nothing like this level of taxation. It is no mystery that a man who has to mark his work up this much might have troubles competing with those who don't have to do so.)
I don't think horses have gone obsolete yet! They seem to be very popular as "Recreational Vehicles. Besides does anyone remember the Special Forces in Afghanistan riding horses recently? They might still have value.
Just because Linux isn't photocopy of Windows XXXX etc means exactly nothing. I just installed Slackware 9.0 on my machine and it plays well! The problem is that Windows is assumed to be the standard. If Windows were measured against Linux using it as the standard, I suspect that it might be found seriously lacking as well.
Lacking on Windows:
Serious security like permissions that actually mean something. Actually being able to back up and restore a set of files in a reasonable amount of time.
Windows for example does not have a working backup system where you can make a full disk image of all files including those in use whereby being able to recover easily. But this stems from the Microsoft Purchace Structure. The MS guys don't want you to be able to restore your system without their "Permission." Allowing that might allow "Pirates." Because Linux doesn't care about "Pirates." It works. The objective of Linux is to work, not to pay Microsoft.
Real Security also goes against Microsoft. They think that they own your records and files.
As a Developer I have to be able to strip out and restore an operating system entirely on a regular basis for testing. Only Linux allows this! I boot up Linux and copy all the files I want to be able to restore and then I can at any time restore this image in a few minutes without going through the MS processes of hours to reconstruct an OS.
Yes Linux is under development, unfortunately MS was never under development. MS was a "Pirate" reseller from the beginning. If you developed software, and it was of value, they would contract to sell it initially. If it started to make money, they would pirate it to a parallel development team and then make the product they essentially stole and place it in the market against the original developer. The intent here was extortion to make the original developer have to sell off his product at no profit. As a result Microsoft has essentially stolen all the market for software in the USA. Linux promices to destroy this market process and as such is very valuable to programmers
Linux also has profound value to Companies. Their hardware and software can now work for them without the "Planned Destruction" of a marketing cycle such as Microsoft's newest edition of software. In My company we can still use the old slow computers very well using linux. What is more they can update easily. The developed software does not have to be thrown out regularly.
I have tried to address this from a "neutral" position that is one where I don't try to deal with anything but the issue and thanks for doing the same.
We have a very serious problem developing due to the effects of timing in learning. One may easily set in motion with modern technology events which have consequences years in the future. These same events once set in motion are unlikely to be able to be stopped even when negative unforeseen consequences occur.
Recently we saw this in the "Tech Bubble" I believe that very nearly everyone who knew tech knew that the situation was out of hand by 1997 or 1998. Even the Federal Reserve Chairman discussed this openly. But the events which were driving it were already set when the GATT Agreement was set. Stopping the events which are proceeding from the GATT is not yet beginning even though it clearly is now destroying much of the world economy.
Like this we also see that by setting in motion a technolgy it often takes on a life of its own. For example suppose we get a new "drug" which extends mental ability of people by an order of magnitude. Being quite expensive (Patients etc) to whom do you think it will go first? What would be its effect? Sorry but the prisoners in Jail will get it first. The decision has already been made by federal judges. The effect of this would be profoundly dangerous.
The problem originally discussed of having essentially all work done by machines (IA etc) is no longer one of can we do the work. The issue then becomes under what terms and circumstances do we give the results of this work to people. The goods so produced essentially become "Free" and the system of "ownership" and "Payment" collapse inward having no relavance. This is more or less what I discussed with the Cotton Picking issue in Alabama some decades ago.
What we clearly need is to begin discussing the fact that if the old system continues, there will be a progressive increase in a very few with a mass exclusion of others. This constitutes by fact and effect exactly what the NAZI forces intended to do by force. To discuss it in terms of "Natural Selection" or "Ability" is not relevant since the ownership of such items is property rights which are in no small part the conferred rights granted by the state or by accident of history.
I am not by nature anything but a "Free Enterprise" guy. But what we are approaching is not rationally handled by the old arguments.
I don't think that the issue here is if change will occur but rather what change and how it is managed
There is going to be decided, I think quite by ignorance and not by thinking the following question.
Will we build a world in which the Industrialists machines work for Mankind, or will be build a world in which mankind will work for the Industrialists machines?
Continuing to see this in some egalitarian or historical argument context belies rate. The rate of change now is about equal in 5 years to a century of previous change. The rate is INCREASING by double about every 5 years now. In the words of a song by Sir Elton John (Rocket Man) "Flying close to the speed of sound its easy to get burned."
Just remember that a dog hit and killed by a car, can never learn to avoid cars. You must survive in order to learn. The problem here is that the changes and forces are so profoundly stronger and faster than most believe that they simply do not see the need to adapt until it is all over.
Good shot... (Funny!)
The actual "Cotton Picking Problem" reference is to why doesn't the refered party go back to work and quit bothering with other people's affairs. Still a good funny.
Will the "supply siders" never give up. We now see that we have passed the "Curve" on almost all industries where the number of persons required is dropping. The supposed robot maker jobs here is already automated. The electronics Industry is so automated that the total world supply of CPU's is made by less than a thousand persons and that number drops every day!
We may or may not reach the points in the time suggested but the real issue is what are we going to do with the people and how are we going to allocate the resources.
I moved to Alabama in 1963. There were over a million jobs in the state picking cotton. With the advent of cotton pickers, this number dropped to an insignificant sum of a two or three thousand. There were a significant number of new jobs which arose that replaced some of the lost jobs but even as early as the 1960's and 1970's this was a real problem.
The failed concept here is that every person is somehow able to adapt "Instantly" to the new reality. People who are young do so fairly well so long as they are pretty bright and industrious. Many others particularly as they grow older have increasing difficulty adapting. Careers which once lasted a lifetime now last but a year or two. The Economic Concepts of the "Free Traders" and such simply do not factore in any concept of time or adaptablity factors.
The solution was to build lots of "Projects" where these people live and their progeny to this day. They fill every town in the state. Their cost is dramatically higher than paying these people to work would be. It is on the order of 4 to 5 times as expensive as a fairly decent job!
We need to quit arguing about the supposed supply of new jobs which about 5 years ago the curve of job loss as a net crossed the curve of new jobs that can be supplied. Now even if we recover economically the jobs don't return.
Those who point to jobs going off shore as a job increase don't notice that world wide there is a massive glut of labor. The issue here is pretty deep because if we continue with the stupid "Supply Side" economic ideals as a religious belief that it is, we will do very great damage before we face reality and fix things as they need to be.
I am not suggesting that there are not many routes to solution here, but the confidence that somehow people will need more and more labor as we automate is the triumph of belief over reality
This is a very good plan! But there is more. Most Colleges and Universities stand to lose a lot of money if Linux suffers. Lots of them use Apache servers and etc. Many of their researchers will be hurt as well. I think they are the appropriate target.
So Encourage Linux at your College or University and discourage SCO Unix and SCO Stock etc.
I think one of the most inciteful statements about the current political situation came from my boss who is on the RNC. He listened to Al Sharpton on C-Span and said, "It is really getting bad when Al Sharpton is beginning to look better than a lot of the other choices." If the Bushies will not stop trying to do proctoscopic examinations by incerting their head up their... they will open the door for the Democrats.
I call the policies of the Bush Administration, "Making the world safe for Democrats." In their race to the bottom the Bushies only have Clinton bashing to hide under. This masks the lack of good reasons to support Bush.
As to Dean, he actually has a pretty good track record and if the Bushies will get off the bashing long enough to look, this guy is the most scary thing they have faced in years. He is a Democrat that doesn't toe the party line. He actually makes some sense. The liberalism he is accused of being looks on closer inspection more like the track record of things that worked. Infant Mortality and Illness dropped with his programs for children being cared for. The cost was less than the "Republican" way of doing nothing.
As a Reagan Republican (My first 3 votes for Prez) I have only good to say about the Democrats giving us some real competition. It hurts the Republican Party to have leaders who spend more effort assassinating the character of good Republicans than supporting good ideas. The Bushies specialize in Character Assassination of the Republicans who make life uncomfortable for them by telling the truth and by bringing up good ideas.
If the Democrats actually reform and come up with good ideas or at least some real ones for a change, the competition will be good in the Republican Party.
For the Record Republicans forget that the Definition of the term Republican is "One who supports the Federal Republic of the USA." The Bushies with their unimited Globalism view American Citizens as merely in their way. They have no policies which are designed as or could in any way be called "Republican." In this light, Mr Dean is much closer to a "Republican." than any Bushie. The Bushies talk about property rights and trample wholesale on the most fundamental property right of all, that of Citizenship. Their policies reduce American Citizens to 3rd Class slaves in their own country being loaded with near 50% taxes and having to compete against untaxed Global Competition even in their own home market.
With this kind of behavior I can only wish Mr Dean well. Maybe he will be able to do what is seemingly impossible within the Republican Party, Shine the Light of truth on these pirates.
Well there are reasons like fraud and the inability to enforce but likely as not the answer is not Fraud in this case. The credit card paranoids in the postings don't know that US Cards and foreign cards walk across borders all the time these days.
There are several reasons which include but are not limited to:
[1] There are particularly on computers Export Limitations from the USA. Silly as this is our profoundly dumb Congress Critters will not allow Americans to sell computers made in China to Hungary. They cite "National Security" and "Encryption" problems. Never mind you can get better encryption there than here.
[2] There are problems with the processing of tariffs and regulations when shipping to the EU. The EU is paranoid about goods coming in from the USA and for example prohibits computers without CPU Chips made in the EU inside. The companies often do not want to mess with the EU tariffs which dispite GATT are horrendous for the USA going to the EU.
[3] There are substantial problems in the calculation on sale point of the freight costs to the EU. These owe to the funky political mess there in the EU and not to anything the Americans want or cause.
I know this is a mess but this is the "Long" and the "Short" of the "Free Trade" crap that exists around the world. The USA would like to sell but the EU is not one bit reciprocal with the USA on the idea of "Free Trade." Since the EU Dominates the WTO they feel no danger of WTO enforcement against them. The USA having only one VOTE is out numbered by a mile!
For the other posting persons out there, I know this because my wife worked at the worlds largest Computer Manufacturing Company and frankly the EU forced them to do many strange things just to be able to trade in the EU. For example all processor chips for many years even those for domestic US Needs were French Made because of the EU Limits and No exports could be to the EU unless All were this.
In addition the EU forced the Assembly at $48/hr labor rate in Holland for machines while the Domestic US Labor got $5.50/hr!
Sorry for those who believe in free trade... You may as well believe in the Easter Bunny! It is just as real as "Free Trade."
If the bankers are such idiots that they cannot see the importance of redundant network paths, they are screwed anyway. It doesn't really matter enough to qualify for National Secret Status anyway.
When the World Trade Center went down (9/11) a very substantial number of corporate data processing centers and Internet linkages were destroyed. (Probably only a nuke blast could do more at one time) The effect for lost data, and lost access and lost communications was essentially none because of what I described about the network redundancy. It was much more than the loss of several trunk lines at the same time that I think my point is made.
There were several banks in the WTC. Also there were numerous brokerage houses.
The point about looking at why the government is "Classifying" such things is also made regards the Department of Homeland Security and the US-DOJ prosecutions. Very few if any "Real Terrorism" cases have been brought related to any such thing as Al Qaeda. On the other hand many cases related to ordinary domestic conditions which already are covered by many laws have been handled as "Terrorism."
The target is (sorry to spell it out) YOU! Al Qaeda et. al. are excuses to scare you into accepting the actions and loss of freedom to what are essentially Nazi's and Faschists in our government who don't want to listen to any domestic dissent.
The Terms Nazi and Faschist are quite precisely used describing the specific stated intent of the parties and their various political and economic policies. These are not terms used lightly. To be very specific the economic policies of the Bush Administration are Faschist and National Socialist Policies (circa 1939-1945) They include the construction of total awareness that even the SS could only have imagined in their dreams. These include the complete subordination of the economy to National Planning and the prevention of parties they do not like from access.
I really think that this security stuff is getting out of hand. Suppose a man with a backhoe just digs by accident. Its a daily occurance. Nobody except the liablity issues for the digger has any fit over it because there are so many redundant channels for data.
This is classic foolishness to classify such a map. The Internet was invented out of US DOD efforts to make communications web linked to make destruction of single or many routes irrelevant.
Terrorists attacking key nodes at the 50 top sites at the same time would probably not even slow stuff down much. Americans really need to be looking at the real reasons for such classification. The reasons probably are more terristic than the terrorists intentions.
There is a bit more to this story. NASA has locked up most of their crash investigation info as "Top Secret" and will not be releasing it with their report.
The reality is that the foam experiment shown was a complete makeup fabrication job to cover up what they have found. Here is why:
The shuttle was going the horrendous speed of less than 400mph when it was struck by the foam. The closure speed of the foam was something in the order of about 50mph and did little or no damage. The Test was done at nearly 600mph impact speed. The kenetic energy loading differential here is about 2500/360000 of the amount used in the test. It was an impressive test but completely irrelevant.
Numerous other poster persons have noted the reasons that the foam was not going so fast
There is a real reason NASA wants the press to buy such crap! NASA has a serious problem in procurement which probably caused the failure.
Without going into too many details and assuming it was the foam as they claim, the factory where the foam is applied has about 85% H-1B Visa Holders as their employees. As a result there is nobody of consequence in that factory would ever dare the ire of management to tell that the work was defective. The reports will always be squeeky clean.
More importantly the most likely cause of the loss is easily ignored. The Columbia was running a brand new "Glass Cockpit" with most of the software having been written and tested in India and Pakistan. How do Americans like their national treasures being run by persons who might not like us!? Pretty scary isn't it. Just a minor defect in software could account for the entire set of problems leaving all of the other stories as nonsense.
Those of us who write software are aware of a substantial difference between the American and Asian writers. No disrespect to the quality of the software written by Non-Americans is intended but their style rarely includes the rigorous inventive skills required of Space Flight.
NASA intending to save money and disdaining Americans probably just cooked 7 people and destroyed several billion dollars of national treasure. (Cheap wasn't it?)
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I will just let you know that land rises a bit faster than you think.... To be specific there are sites where it has risen 300 or more feet in less than 100 years (In Alaska this has been seen). The bouyancy effect are not nearly as slow as you think. You must come from the class of Geologist who were amaized by Mt St Helens like it was a super eruption. (It was only 1/2 or less of 3 others since 1820 and only 1/500th of Mt Pinatubo) I have seen both by the way in person.
Melt Rates are not as fast as days anyway. Greenland or South Pole Ice would take centuries and bluntly the land would compensate quite rapidly. You also are not considering the effect of additional water on the ocean bottom. Your problem is that you have not learnd about that famous Greek Archemedes and his principal. It works every time we have tried it!
Land movements are much faster than you are supposing. Oil Drilling has cause Oak Hills Ca to drop some 40+ feet in less than 70 years. Oil drilling has lowered a lot of east texas similar (- 10 feet or more)
It appears you have not heard about the deep ocean currents either (Warming Echo)
The issue of what will happen when land covered by ice sees a melting is curious. Most people assume that water/ice sitting on land will raise ocean levels when it runs into the ocean. This is not so. The reason has to do with the exact same reason for which the land sticks above the ocean. Frankly it is floating just as the ICE in the water. When the ice or water on land runs off into the ocean, the land it was on rises in a process called isostatic rebound. This makes more room for the water in the ocean and as such makes the net effect zero.
The reasons for which large land masses rise or fall below the ocean has to do with effects in the Crust and Mantle of the earth. Clearly these effects are beyond any human control. The Isostatic rebound is pretty profound. In areas where glaciers have recently melted off, land masses have risen as much as 200 or 300 feet. These have been observed in the past 100 years.
The complete melting of Ice off of Greenland for example would reveal a land mass which at this time is below sea level most of it. The land would rise serveral thousand feet by best estimates revealing mountains as high possibly as the Smoky Mountains or higher in places.
The science we have regards this is revealed in sattelite orbits. This mapping measures the density as by deviations in orbits. It reveals that this particular set of data is fact. It would be best to assume that land like Ice is floating and subject to all the same rules of displacement. Undersea land is sunk for the same reasons.
The melting of the polar regions is driven by cycles way too long to have been affected by any human intervention. The heat to melt the polar ice is part of a ocean current cycle that has over 20,000 years of lead time on our current events. The salt water currents cycle is massive and is global. It is controlled by an inventory of water that is estimated to take over 20,000 years to cycle through. If and it appears so that the Polar Caps are melting, The heat that is driving this melt fell to earth some 20,000 years ago.
For those of us who live in the eastern USA our mountains have massive cliffs cut by deep rivers of ice. These glaciers had north America looking like the south polar regions do today. The warming that took out those glaciers is probably echoing back on us right now.
Also one other factor is driving events. In the early part of the 1900's the sun got about 1.5% brighter than it was over the previous 5,000 years. It has remained so since. It does appear in the past 5 to 7 years that this trend has reversed. I sincerely doubt that we humans have any influence on the brightness of the sun.
The whole "Global Warming" argument is actually a political argument by Europeans and Asians to hobble the Americna Economy. Their economic beliefs generally assume the success of one person is the result of him having advantage over his competition. This is why we see such dangers to the world economy at this time. Such ideas do not allow adaptation. They rely on conquest.
The Irony of this is that while the these Asian and Europeans are using massively higher amounts of coal, much of which is mined in the USA, they are telling Americans not to burn it! While US Coal consumption has dropped steadily since the early 1900's Hampton Roads, Virginia and Mobile, Alabama have become the worlds largest energy exporting ports. No it is not oil. It is COAL. The total tonnage is about 1 Billion Tons of coal from these two ports a year. The energy value of this is more than equal to 300 billion barrels of oil/year. This means that the USA exports the equal to the entire Saudi Oil Inventory in the ground about every 10 years. Total world production of oil is about 65 Billion Barrels of oil a year.
While everyone was not watching China raised their consumption of coal to a total of about 2 Billion Tons a year. India did about 1.5 Billion tons a year increase as well. This means that the total US Consumption and Export of Coal of about
The Microsoft gang getting a dose of their own medicine is ironic indeed! But as to Patients/Copyrights we have a problem. Software clearly needs effective processes where the inventor of something gets paid. The problem here is that the programmers who write the stuff rarely get the control here.
Also there is a problem with software technology patients/copyrights blocking progress. Clearly without them no progress would get far, but with them the laws we have are not really suited to them. First they run for too long to be relevant in the industry. This is particularly true of copyrights. Patient renewal in softare is an abserd proposition.
There is another "Process" problem here. The concept that you can patient a process when there are many ways of doing it subverts the whole innovation and invention process.
We are dealing with a set of laws which do not make any sense regards to software anyway.
It probably will all be academic shortly. Regardless of any Domestic US Lawsuits, Linux is going gangbusters world wide and will take out Microsoft anyway. The Domestic US Market will either adapt to the new ways or it will collapse in the market. Americans have a choice of going the GPL etc or losing all the market. The EU will not defend Microsoft in this.
I suspect that the Microsoft guys already know this and are just bailing out. The other software guys are just grabbing a piece as they go out anyway. If you are a developer this leaves you exactly one way to make a living. SERVICE.
Maryland just shut down their DMV operation for the day because of this virus.
... Linux ... Linux ...
Repeat after me....
Linux
No! Every good thing suggested about this project denies the facts behind our current problems. (IE that the school administrations don't want to deal with the real world.) Schools were publically created to teach common civil morals and bluntly that is a job they refuse to do and no camera can see them doing!
There cannot be any security once access is granted to parents. It will be recorded, diverted and etc. What is more the same blind eyes that only see when a desperate kid finally hits back will still only see that. The other incidents will be dismissed as accidents or accidentally disposed of.
This is the sucking hole for the concept of personal freedom. We think we can enforce it when the reality is that we must teach it! Freedom enforced always becomes a higher tyranny than the original offense. This is why we were warned by our founding fathers about not trading freedom for security
The absolutely best example of this was the events of 911. There were camera tapes showing the guys on the very mission. There they were buying box cutters. There they were boarding planes. Then the planes were seen crashing into the buildings. Let me assure you that all we will get out of this experiment is less freedom, more irresponsible officials and selective enforcement. Remember that if they find someone that they don't like they can watch them like a hawk and save every second. With cut/paste and a bit of editing that person can forever become a Political Non-Person and well the morons advocating this will join in the cyber lynching.
Remember that there were at least 40 incidents all reported in at the time in which the 911 guys could have been dealt with. This is also true in schools. The bad kids are not dealt with and it is not for lack of video recording. It is not for lack of reporting. One team of Hijackers actually stayed at the House of a professional FBI Informant! This whole technology solution to the issue of human behavior and morals is an attempt to deny that the problem is HUMAN INTENT and not a specific act.
In the USA we have spent about $200,000,000,000 on "Homeland Security." We still cannot catch "Illegal Aliens." (Or will not catch them -- the reality) The Government makes a party about taking our money for purpose But does not do the work. This will be the case in Schools. We will spend a lot and the schools still will not work. It is a shake down racket where if they actually solved the problem they would be out of a job. It is a mafia style protection scheme.
We should note that from 1993 to 2001 Al Qaeda worked tirelessly to do the 911 events and were caught repeatedly and ignored. It took them nearly 8 years to get it right. We have not suffered their attack since 911 because they are not yet able. This is not related to any action of ours. When they become able we will know it. In the mean time we will probably have shelled out 100 times the cost of their terrorist attack even if they destroy a whole city. Our own government in its pernicious greed will have an excellent record of what happened but will not have stopped it again. In our schools we have the same thing going on. Parents ever more scared of the failings of the system seek devices to make this work. The Administration sucks up the money because it allows them to have more and more "Phony baloney jobs" that don't actually deal with students. It protects their budgets. In the end we get more and more terror and more and more afraid.
Sorry but this idea is driven by the triumph of fear over intelligence. Cameras could help if the people were on the job. They will not get them on the job and we will suffer even worse because our money will be gone and we will seek ever deeper into this counterproductive set of ideas.
Doubt me? England ran this idea up on crime control. Almost a million cameras later, their traffic is not as safe, their crime rate is up and the citizens are afraid of the authorities. Do we have to act stupid just to learn that it is wrong?
Excellent discussion!
I was flying over the midwest with the trade rep. from Taiwan. I told him plainly to look down and to his amaizement he saw the endless farms etc. I told him that when he got to Wash. DC the people there would try to impress him with our arms and etc as being the source of our strength. I told him that down below was the source of our strength.
We did not win the cold war by way of weapons and guns. The actual reason we won was our massive farms and industry. Today our officials are exporting our technology, industry and devastating our farms with their economic arrogance. This is a forecast of Doom for the USA if we do not quit this arrogance.
The Whole World is eagerly awaiting our demise and they know it is coming if they just wait. They know we are destroying ourselves. I will plainly state that a "Republican" is one who is for the federal Republic of the United States. Can anyone name any policy of the Bush Administration that is "Republican?"
How in the world did statesmanship come to be the art of destroying ones own nation?
These assumptions regarding the money looping back are historically correct but not now. When a US Senator tried recently to ammend the Defense Appropriations bill to require that 50% of the spending be "Made in the USA" Defense Sec. Rumsfeld shot back saying that he could not run the defense department with this requirement.
Please awaken to the reality that the only participation we as Americans now get in our Tax Dollars is when we pay them. More and more even our Unemployment Compensation is managed "Off Shore" Naturally as long as Americans must mark up their labor 150% to pay the taxes they will have trouble being as "Cheap" as their foreign competition.
When the 4th Mech was delayed into Iraq supposedly from the delay from Turkey, the reality was that the soldiers could not leave their bases in Texas etc because they lacked proper uniforms. The reason the factory in China was busy filling other orders for uniforms. Specifically copycat US Uniforms for Saddam's forces!
Surely on a Computer Geeky forum like this one everybody should love the Idea of the computers running our defense department having all their chips made in China!?! ( A country openly planning to go to war against the USA. ) Or does anyone remember how we shut down Saddams Air defenses by computer tricks in 1991? A feat possible because we built the Computers! How long will our systems work against China when they get around to the war they are arming openly for at this time! Shall I bring up a little history about Japan and the "Made in USA" stuff we got back from them in 1941!
The problem with the Carbon Fiber stuff is also a very dangerous thing. As it more and more becomes possible to make sure exactly who you are killing, it opens the door wider and wider for the acceptance of its use and lowers the restraints on it.
One of the things that few Americans understand is that we have a unique view of our identity as Americans. With few exceptions, such an identity does not exist outside the USA. Most people there see their loyalty more towards their religion, family and possibly local community or town. Understanding these Arabic guys by our view is an error. There is a religious link in these guys and they think it is above any national loyalty. This is why it is so awful how citizenship has recently been doled out to so many persons regardless of any education into citizenship and any check of their real loyalties
The concept that we are all Americans is one we in the USA developed after the US Civil War when it became painfully obvious that if we accepted any other identity, we would all die in an awful war worse than our Civil War.
The claim by President Bush that Islam is Peaceful is ignorant of history. What is more all it does is convince the Islamists that we are liars and makes our people blind to the danger. We have to profile and recognize that people carry "Flags" that tell us who they are. These murdering Islamists do stuff like having their women cover their faces etc. One of their "Flags" is a particular facial hair style.
It is awful but true that every effort we make to try to accomidate what we believe might be "legitimate" palestinian issues, only engenders disrespect of us and danger to us. The failure to recognize this is suicidal and the Palestinians openly taunt us with this fact but in our arrogance we refuse to listen to what they are saying and to react accordingly. We also refuse to understand that the only process likely to achieve our safety is to bring down absolute defeat on them such that like the "Old South" their dreams are "Gone with the wind" giving them the freedom to get on with life without such dangerous behavior.
The politically correct ideas of accepting other identities within the USA threatens to restore the situation that precipitated the US Civil War. It is a condition that bedevils southern Europe. We have a word for it, Balkinization. Don't mistake me for saying something similar to the German "Pure Race" stuff. On the contrary it just means that people who live in the USA as citizens should recognize that they are Americans
Sorry but Microsoft including their recent "Dividend" still fits this category probably better than any other company in history. They have "Made the most money" and paid literally NOTHING until this year in dividends. The largest company in America pays a dividend of 0.25% return on investment. Come on! Wake up this is stock fraud to the limit.
So they make 8 Billion in profit but they don't pay it to their stockholders do they? This is prima facia evidence of what I am talking about but as usual people are not looking closely. They are just ignorantly going about squalking with all the intelligence of three rocks and one large brick.
There is practically no company in America of any size which in any way resembles capitalism. At this time, most big companies are sucking down massive tax exemptions. Their facilities as with MS are paid for and built by the Taxpayers who they intend to defy at every turn. They will refuse any request that they pay this back. Just to set you streight, what I am talking about is called "Jobs" by your Congress critters and is called "Industrial Development" by your city or town or state and is nothing of the sort. It is Faschism or National Socialism Pure and simple. Doubt me? Try financing an operation with real investment money with you at risk. The bank will say NO!
In the Case of MS everyone forgets a company set in business essentially by the US Department of Defense with massive help and "Deep Black" support who now ships all this tech off to our sworn enemy China in return for our generous support and assistance. China is openly planning Nuclear War with the USA and this is not an accusation, it is their word.
No MS is the worst of the lot. They took the most and have paid back such a small amount that it is a bad joke. The fraud at MS is MILES DEEP. But the "Capitalists" at the stock market are all believers who are awaiting even bigger suckers to follow their bad investment with more money.
In the case of MS those who chose "Appreciation" over Dividends will find that the "Profits" of $8 Billion are easy to report but when they have to be shelled out in cash, they will evaporate like Verga. It will never hit the ground. This is why Linux is a threat to MS. The top heavy structure is hollow to the core riddled with mechanisms where the big guys can take it all leaving the stockholders in the shorts. The organization is like a great oak fully hollowed out by termintes. When the wind blows it falls to splinters. It is already happening just watch.
If MS is your idea of capitalism, hold tight it is going to be a bumpy night. (Just a Hint: I am a true capitalist who has run businesses for may years with my own money until they were essentially crushed by these "Tax Advantaged" companies given advantages under Industrial Development Boards)
Yeah what is capitalism? From what I understand a simplified definition of capitalism would be a system where investors put money in and expect a return on investment. Skipping a few details this is about it. Funny how today every Government Hallucination is called Capitalism. NOT LIKELY to be Capitalism just called capitalism.
We see a lot of devices like the SCO team and many others today calling themselves "Capitalism" but bluntly they are thieft by device, the definition of fraud.
I sincerely doubt that the stock holders of SCO or whatever will even participate in the "benefits" if there are any. As such the company should be charged with violation of the "Blue Sky Laws" where they are selling the Blue sky and not any factual thing when they sell stock. They are inducing investors with the intend of never paying them their just return. Does anyone take note that Microsoft might just fit this category too?!
There is another deep issue going on in the world trade situation that is endangering the RIAA. This is probably being ignored and is probably the biggest threat to their money other than the basic marketing changes. It is the function of the "Free Trade" agreements in the American Economy. These deals have undermined much of the income base for the young people. As a result they simply don't have the money to buy because their jobs don't pay that well.
It is essential for any business that makes a profit to have customers who have the money to pay them. The US Economy suffered a 2% loss in gross payrolls in 2002. The result in the young people has been mass slaughter. Georgia Tech reported that some 35% of their Tech Grads did not place in 2001 and almost 40% in 2002! With this rate of belly flopping in new careers among those who routinely normally buy music the most, the RIAA is looking at their market drying up for other reasons than copy problems.
For anyone thinking that this is "off topic" it is about as "off topic" as the issue amount of Social Security Taxes collected is to the solvency of the Social Security. It is at least 1/2 of the whole issue. If people have no money, there are no sales. The RIAA and many other industries in the USA had better wake up to the grand results of the destruction of the wage base in the USA or they too will find themselves cut out of a job. The best thing for business is customers with money!
While it is obvious that P2P transfers do avoid royalties, it is not obvious to many that the purpose for the RIAA is obsolete.
As it was, the RIAA was a tool for an artist to have his production recorded, packaged, stamped and marketed. With the advent of P2P and big hard drives, a customer has little or no reason to every actually have "real media." The marketing value of the RIAA largely hung on the fact that the process was expensive and difficult. Today it is easy and cheap. As such they have no real reason to exist. They may not like it, but it is true.
There are deeper reasons for the RIAA failure though. If we look at the various types of recordings that they pushed on America they frankly are in the business of Social Devolution. This process may be profitable at a short moment, but in time it destroys the very base from which it arises. The RIAA leadership has refused the more positive types of music etc because it wasn't "Artistic" enough for their tastes. The positive types generally outsell the others many times but as a rule don't generate the single "Stars" like the sexpots we get now. The failures of pushing for the sexpot types and gangster types are massive and regular enough to make it a questionable enterprise at any time.
With the 911 event there was also a substantial introspection in America and essentialy the "Junk" media found itself on the outs of sales. What had been running well or just hanging on is now dead.
The RIAA people are deep in a hole they created. They made their business with the disreputable of society, (Not to accuse anyone in particular) and now they find that the company of "thieves" they constructed is not profitable. So they think the solution is to attack the copiers. Well to be blunt, they give the stuff away on the Radio.
I have watched this industry for many years. In that time they always get a new copy media and complain bitterly that it is killing their business. In desperation they cut prices, and sales, volume and profits rise. They get prosperous and try to clamp down on copies. Then the price goes way up, sales plummet and in the end they go around again.
Software firms do as do the music people do need assurance of payment for sevices. The best solution here is to charge people for the service you provide. In this case on-line sale with download for a modest price a copy is what is in order. The logic of high prices denies both supply and media issues. Many music people are doing this bypassing RIAA stuff.
The Media types simply fail to grasp one reality that comes up that is best illustrated by CATV. I can only watch one channel at a time. Even with Recording I am only time switching. Charging royalties for each channel on a CATV network and adding channels only gets me mad and makes me seek other options. This is also true in Music. If I listen all the time and have lots of cuts, the value of each cut to me drops as the supply increases due to the amount of time I can devote to each cut dropping. In the end, the RIAA types have to realize that their whole concept or royalties is overloaded, bloated and failing.
With all sympathy to the RIAA the pirates do need cut down a bit. I think some copy protection is in order. But what ever it is, it should not be used to avoid the basic economics here.
(See a few more notes inside:)
But first, please get some basic facts about India straight:
(Yes India was exploited badly by the British and what is worse it was called "Free Trade" back then too. What is more the Indians laugh out loud at the American Claims to be a free country as do persons from several other countries, who have eyes. Sadly Americans like myself must agree if we look at reality. what passes for liberty here has become a demented lunacy. I would take exception to the view of us being extreme racist. We are the end of many of those things)
1. Despite being exploited and oppressed by the British for more than 200 years, India is not going astray. She has one of the strongest democracies in the world. For example, when the Prime Minister of India declared that he wanted to help US out with troops in Iraq, major public disapproval forced the govt. to act otherwise. In 50 years after independence, India has managed to put up more than a handful of industries. Excess food is exported, and donated to UN. There is a burgeoning middle class, which is now threatening to take jobs away from countries like US.
(I would like most respectfully to ask my fellow most arrogant Americans to sit down and listen to the advice a famous opposition leader to Lord North in Parliment gave regards US a few years back [1776]. "... How can we ever hope to subjegate such a might continental power? Let us make peace with them while we can, not when we must." If India only does economically per capita 1/6th of the USA they will be equal to us. If they do the same as us we will be a forgotten backwater in the world. Should they pass us which is a certainty and not long from now, we will be in grave danger should we have been so arrogant regards them. I do not wish to cower to India but neither should they be requested to do so.)
I am saying this most respectfully-- most westerners, including those writers sitting in air-conditioned rooms at WSJ, do not know $hit about the third world.
(I must concur hartily as a US Citizen with this remark. The WSJ guys don't even know jack $hit about the people who work in the USA either! Otherwise they would understand that the problem with "Outsoursing" that has developed is mostly a product of high domestic US Taxes causing US workers to have to mark their wages up more than 150% in order to live while having to compete against those living in democracies like India who have nothing like this level of taxation. It is no mystery that a man who has to mark his work up this much might have troubles competing with those who don't have to do so.)
Has anyone noticed that the entire .Net project runs on XML and the core driver under it all is the XERCES xml parser? I have...
The Microsoft guys were all ready to use our Linux based developments but... They don't want us to quit paying them for it!
I don't think horses have gone obsolete yet! They seem to be very popular as "Recreational Vehicles. Besides does anyone remember the Special Forces in Afghanistan riding horses recently? They might still have value.
Just because Linux isn't photocopy of Windows XXXX etc means exactly nothing. I just installed Slackware 9.0 on my machine and it plays well! The problem is that Windows is assumed to be the standard. If Windows were measured against Linux using it as the standard, I suspect that it might be found seriously lacking as well.
Lacking on Windows:
Serious security like permissions that actually mean something. Actually being able to back up and restore a set of files in a reasonable amount of time.
Windows for example does not have a working backup system where you can make a full disk image of all files including those in use whereby being able to recover easily. But this stems from the Microsoft Purchace Structure. The MS guys don't want you to be able to restore your system without their "Permission." Allowing that might allow "Pirates." Because Linux doesn't care about "Pirates." It works. The objective of Linux is to work, not to pay Microsoft.
Real Security also goes against Microsoft. They think that they own your records and files.
As a Developer I have to be able to strip out and restore an operating system entirely on a regular basis for testing. Only Linux allows this! I boot up Linux and copy all the files I want to be able to restore and then I can at any time restore this image in a few minutes without going through the MS processes of hours to reconstruct an OS.
Yes Linux is under development, unfortunately MS was never under development. MS was a "Pirate" reseller from the beginning. If you developed software, and it was of value, they would contract to sell it initially. If it started to make money, they would pirate it to a parallel development team and then make the product they essentially stole and place it in the market against the original developer. The intent here was extortion to make the original developer have to sell off his product at no profit. As a result Microsoft has essentially stolen all the market for software in the USA. Linux promices to destroy this market process and as such is very valuable to programmers
Linux also has profound value to Companies. Their hardware and software can now work for them without the "Planned Destruction" of a marketing cycle such as Microsoft's newest edition of software. In My company we can still use the old slow computers very well using linux. What is more they can update easily. The developed software does not have to be thrown out regularly.
I have tried to address this from a "neutral" position that is one where I don't try to deal with anything but the issue and thanks for doing the same.
We have a very serious problem developing due to the effects of timing in learning. One may easily set in motion with modern technology events which have consequences years in the future. These same events once set in motion are unlikely to be able to be stopped even when negative unforeseen consequences occur.
Recently we saw this in the "Tech Bubble" I believe that very nearly everyone who knew tech knew that the situation was out of hand by 1997 or 1998. Even the Federal Reserve Chairman discussed this openly. But the events which were driving it were already set when the GATT Agreement was set. Stopping the events which are proceeding from the GATT is not yet beginning even though it clearly is now destroying much of the world economy.
Like this we also see that by setting in motion a technolgy it often takes on a life of its own. For example suppose we get a new "drug" which extends mental ability of people by an order of magnitude. Being quite expensive (Patients etc) to whom do you think it will go first? What would be its effect? Sorry but the prisoners in Jail will get it first. The decision has already been made by federal judges. The effect of this would be profoundly dangerous.
The problem originally discussed of having essentially all work done by machines (IA etc) is no longer one of can we do the work. The issue then becomes under what terms and circumstances do we give the results of this work to people. The goods so produced essentially become "Free" and the system of "ownership" and "Payment" collapse inward having no relavance. This is more or less what I discussed with the Cotton Picking issue in Alabama some decades ago.What we clearly need is to begin discussing the fact that if the old system continues, there will be a progressive increase in a very few with a mass exclusion of others. This constitutes by fact and effect exactly what the NAZI forces intended to do by force. To discuss it in terms of "Natural Selection" or "Ability" is not relevant since the ownership of such items is property rights which are in no small part the conferred rights granted by the state or by accident of history.
I am not by nature anything but a "Free Enterprise" guy. But what we are approaching is not rationally handled by the old arguments.
I don't think that the issue here is if change will occur but rather what change and how it is managed
There is going to be decided, I think quite by ignorance and not by thinking the following question.
Will we build a world in which the Industrialists machines work for Mankind, or will be build a world in which mankind will work for the Industrialists machines?
Continuing to see this in some egalitarian or historical argument context belies rate. The rate of change now is about equal in 5 years to a century of previous change. The rate is INCREASING by double about every 5 years now. In the words of a song by Sir Elton John (Rocket Man) "Flying close to the speed of sound its easy to get burned."
Just remember that a dog hit and killed by a car, can never learn to avoid cars. You must survive in order to learn. The problem here is that the changes and forces are so profoundly stronger and faster than most believe that they simply do not see the need to adapt until it is all over.
Good shot... (Funny!) The actual "Cotton Picking Problem" reference is to why doesn't the refered party go back to work and quit bothering with other people's affairs. Still a good funny.
Will the "supply siders" never give up. We now see that we have passed the "Curve" on almost all industries where the number of persons required is dropping. The supposed robot maker jobs here is already automated. The electronics Industry is so automated that the total world supply of CPU's is made by less than a thousand persons and that number drops every day!
We may or may not reach the points in the time suggested but the real issue is what are we going to do with the people and how are we going to allocate the resources.
I moved to Alabama in 1963. There were over a million jobs in the state picking cotton. With the advent of cotton pickers, this number dropped to an insignificant sum of a two or three thousand. There were a significant number of new jobs which arose that replaced some of the lost jobs but even as early as the 1960's and 1970's this was a real problem.
The failed concept here is that every person is somehow able to adapt "Instantly" to the new reality. People who are young do so fairly well so long as they are pretty bright and industrious. Many others particularly as they grow older have increasing difficulty adapting. Careers which once lasted a lifetime now last but a year or two. The Economic Concepts of the "Free Traders" and such simply do not factore in any concept of time or adaptablity factors.
The solution was to build lots of "Projects" where these people live and their progeny to this day. They fill every town in the state. Their cost is dramatically higher than paying these people to work would be. It is on the order of 4 to 5 times as expensive as a fairly decent job!
We need to quit arguing about the supposed supply of new jobs which about 5 years ago the curve of job loss as a net crossed the curve of new jobs that can be supplied. Now even if we recover economically the jobs don't return.
Those who point to jobs going off shore as a job increase don't notice that world wide there is a massive glut of labor. The issue here is pretty deep because if we continue with the stupid "Supply Side" economic ideals as a religious belief that it is, we will do very great damage before we face reality and fix things as they need to be.
I am not suggesting that there are not many routes to solution here, but the confidence that somehow people will need more and more labor as we automate is the triumph of belief over reality
This is a very good plan! But there is more. Most Colleges and Universities stand to lose a lot of money if Linux suffers. Lots of them use Apache servers and etc. Many of their researchers will be hurt as well. I think they are the appropriate target.
So Encourage Linux at your College or University and discourage SCO Unix and SCO Stock etc.
I think one of the most inciteful statements about the current political situation came from my boss who is on the RNC. He listened to Al Sharpton on C-Span and said, "It is really getting bad when Al Sharpton is beginning to look better than a lot of the other choices." If the Bushies will not stop trying to do proctoscopic examinations by incerting their head up their ... they will open the door for the Democrats.
I call the policies of the Bush Administration, "Making the world safe for Democrats." In their race to the bottom the Bushies only have Clinton bashing to hide under. This masks the lack of good reasons to support Bush.
As to Dean, he actually has a pretty good track record and if the Bushies will get off the bashing long enough to look, this guy is the most scary thing they have faced in years. He is a Democrat that doesn't toe the party line. He actually makes some sense. The liberalism he is accused of being looks on closer inspection more like the track record of things that worked. Infant Mortality and Illness dropped with his programs for children being cared for. The cost was less than the "Republican" way of doing nothing.
As a Reagan Republican (My first 3 votes for Prez) I have only good to say about the Democrats giving us some real competition. It hurts the Republican Party to have leaders who spend more effort assassinating the character of good Republicans than supporting good ideas. The Bushies specialize in Character Assassination of the Republicans who make life uncomfortable for them by telling the truth and by bringing up good ideas.
If the Democrats actually reform and come up with good ideas or at least some real ones for a change, the competition will be good in the Republican Party.
For the Record Republicans forget that the Definition of the term Republican is "One who supports the Federal Republic of the USA." The Bushies with their unimited Globalism view American Citizens as merely in their way. They have no policies which are designed as or could in any way be called "Republican." In this light, Mr Dean is much closer to a "Republican." than any Bushie. The Bushies talk about property rights and trample wholesale on the most fundamental property right of all, that of Citizenship. Their policies reduce American Citizens to 3rd Class slaves in their own country being loaded with near 50% taxes and having to compete against untaxed Global Competition even in their own home market.
With this kind of behavior I can only wish Mr Dean well. Maybe he will be able to do what is seemingly impossible within the Republican Party, Shine the Light of truth on these pirates.
Well there are reasons like fraud and the inability to enforce but likely as not the answer is not Fraud in this case. The credit card paranoids in the postings don't know that US Cards and foreign cards walk across borders all the time these days.
There are several reasons which include but are not limited to:
[1] There are particularly on computers Export Limitations from the USA. Silly as this is our profoundly dumb Congress Critters will not allow Americans to sell computers made in China to Hungary. They cite "National Security" and "Encryption" problems. Never mind you can get better encryption there than here.
[2] There are problems with the processing of tariffs and regulations when shipping to the EU. The EU is paranoid about goods coming in from the USA and for example prohibits computers without CPU Chips made in the EU inside. The companies often do not want to mess with the EU tariffs which dispite GATT are horrendous for the USA going to the EU.
[3] There are substantial problems in the calculation on sale point of the freight costs to the EU. These owe to the funky political mess there in the EU and not to anything the Americans want or cause.
I know this is a mess but this is the "Long" and the "Short" of the "Free Trade" crap that exists around the world. The USA would like to sell but the EU is not one bit reciprocal with the USA on the idea of "Free Trade." Since the EU Dominates the WTO they feel no danger of WTO enforcement against them. The USA having only one VOTE is out numbered by a mile!
For the other posting persons out there, I know this because my wife worked at the worlds largest Computer Manufacturing Company and frankly the EU forced them to do many strange things just to be able to trade in the EU. For example all processor chips for many years even those for domestic US Needs were French Made because of the EU Limits and No exports could be to the EU unless All were this.
In addition the EU forced the Assembly at $48/hr labor rate in Holland for machines while the Domestic US Labor got $5.50/hr!
Sorry for those who believe in free trade ... You may as well believe in the Easter Bunny! It is just as real as "Free Trade."
If the bankers are such idiots that they cannot see the importance of redundant network paths, they are screwed anyway. It doesn't really matter enough to qualify for National Secret Status anyway.
When the World Trade Center went down (9/11) a very substantial number of corporate data processing centers and Internet linkages were destroyed. (Probably only a nuke blast could do more at one time) The effect for lost data, and lost access and lost communications was essentially none because of what I described about the network redundancy. It was much more than the loss of several trunk lines at the same time that I think my point is made.
There were several banks in the WTC. Also there were numerous brokerage houses.
The point about looking at why the government is "Classifying" such things is also made regards the Department of Homeland Security and the US-DOJ prosecutions. Very few if any "Real Terrorism" cases have been brought related to any such thing as Al Qaeda. On the other hand many cases related to ordinary domestic conditions which already are covered by many laws have been handled as "Terrorism."
The target is (sorry to spell it out) YOU! Al Qaeda et. al. are excuses to scare you into accepting the actions and loss of freedom to what are essentially Nazi's and Faschists in our government who don't want to listen to any domestic dissent.
The Terms Nazi and Faschist are quite precisely used describing the specific stated intent of the parties and their various political and economic policies. These are not terms used lightly. To be very specific the economic policies of the Bush Administration are Faschist and National Socialist Policies (circa 1939-1945) They include the construction of total awareness that even the SS could only have imagined in their dreams. These include the complete subordination of the economy to National Planning and the prevention of parties they do not like from access.
I really think that this security stuff is getting out of hand. Suppose a man with a backhoe just digs by accident. Its a daily occurance. Nobody except the liablity issues for the digger has any fit over it because there are so many redundant channels for data.
This is classic foolishness to classify such a map. The Internet was invented out of US DOD efforts to make communications web linked to make destruction of single or many routes irrelevant.
Terrorists attacking key nodes at the 50 top sites at the same time would probably not even slow stuff down much. Americans really need to be looking at the real reasons for such classification. The reasons probably are more terristic than the terrorists intentions.
There is a bit more to this story. NASA has locked up most of their crash investigation info as "Top Secret" and will not be releasing it with their report.
The reality is that the foam experiment shown was a complete makeup fabrication job to cover up what they have found. Here is why:
The shuttle was going the horrendous speed of less than 400mph when it was struck by the foam. The closure speed of the foam was something in the order of about 50mph and did little or no damage. The Test was done at nearly 600mph impact speed. The kenetic energy loading differential here is about 2500/360000 of the amount used in the test. It was an impressive test but completely irrelevant.
Numerous other poster persons have noted the reasons that the foam was not going so fast
There is a real reason NASA wants the press to buy such crap! NASA has a serious problem in procurement which probably caused the failure.
Without going into too many details and assuming it was the foam as they claim, the factory where the foam is applied has about 85% H-1B Visa Holders as their employees. As a result there is nobody of consequence in that factory would ever dare the ire of management to tell that the work was defective. The reports will always be squeeky clean.
More importantly the most likely cause of the loss is easily ignored. The Columbia was running a brand new "Glass Cockpit" with most of the software having been written and tested in India and Pakistan. How do Americans like their national treasures being run by persons who might not like us!? Pretty scary isn't it. Just a minor defect in software could account for the entire set of problems leaving all of the other stories as nonsense.
Those of us who write software are aware of a substantial difference between the American and Asian writers. No disrespect to the quality of the software written by Non-Americans is intended but their style rarely includes the rigorous inventive skills required of Space Flight.
NASA intending to save money and disdaining Americans probably just cooked 7 people and destroyed several billion dollars of national treasure. (Cheap wasn't it?)