Wow, three posts in a row that made the same lame joke. That's gotta be clue that you're not as clever as you thought you were.
There has to be some kind of intelligent filtering. If it's not done for me, it's done by me, when I choose which result to click. The biggest problem with paying someone to do that sorting for you is the simple fact that it's too expensive. Yahoo might have stayed a human-sorted list forever, except that it would have taken an army of "surfers" to do it. The web just got too big to be done that way all the time.
Google results used to be a lot more relevant than they are now. Far too often, I'm interested in X, and search for "X" on Google, I find millions of people who want to sell me X. But I'm not even sure if I want to buy it. I'm looking for information about X. That is getting harder and harder to find. The quote in the summary is correct - people have learned how to "game" the system.
How often do you "google" something, and then just go to the Wikipedia link? I do all the time. That way, I can be sure to get actual information about the subject, rather than a link to its Amazon page. In many ways, because of the search engine optimizers, Wikipedia is already replacing Google as the default source of information.
getoffmylawn! Oh wait, you're a youngster, not an oldster, so I guess the right tag for you is getonmylawn!
Age has a lot less to do with it than intelligence. I'm 36, and I live with two college students who are 23, and I can tell you that they don't know a gosh darned thing about computers. They're clueless when it comes to effective searching, they don't know how to avoid viruses, and they don't know their way around their own computers.
The problem with patting yourself on the back for being young is that it has no future. If you want to boost your self-esteem, tell yourself that you're smarter than most other people. That too will fade in time, but it takes a lot longer (usually).
It's like what those wanna be Jack Baur types always say about fighting terrorism: we have to be right every single time; they only have to be right once. Honestly, I think these DRM folks go home and laugh themselves to sleep. In what other industry is total failure so acceptable? If condom manufacturers were held to the same low standards, half the planet would have AIDS (but not most/. readers, har har).
The various content providers will get it through their heads eventually that DRM punishes their paying customers while it barely slows the pirates down. The downside to the average consumer is that all of this content will have to be paid for somehow. ABC isn't going to keep cranking out Lost out of the goodness of their hearts. So what that will mean is more and more "product integration".
I actually sort of miss the old days. We had the ability to time shift - it was called a VCR, and it worked fine. You zapped the commercials with your remote, and you could keep the tape for years if you wanted. Now, I can get any show I want on Bit Torrent, but given that so many shows have become long commercials, do I really want them?
Sometimes product integration doesn't feel too intrusive - James Bond has always driven a flashy car. But sometimes, it's not nearly so feasible. If they find a way to work an ad for Red Bull into John Adams, I swear I will never watch TV again.
I do agree that my ISP conspiracy theory was based on far too little information. I took TFA at face value - probably always a mistake. Trying to get some journalism major to understand tech is like trying to teach my dog algebra... he'll never make it past chapter 2.
That said, after reading the bill two or three times, I still have no idea what it says. In attempting to explain, you used two words in your last post that seem to be at loggerheads: unwittingly, and intentional. I don't see how anything can be both unwitting and also intentional.
Furthermore, I fail to see how any court could ever establish intent when prosecuting this "crime". If they had access to an email or instant message where I gloated about how awesome it was to be stealing my neighbor's access, that would be one thing, but how often can we expect such a smoking gun? And even if there was, what law enforcement agency would expend the type of resources it would take to bring such evidence to court?
The whole gosh darned mess seems pretty silly to me at this point. The main thing I am taking away from all this, thanks to you, is that the tech press must not be trusted!
And I'll tell you something else, Shouty McShouter: I'm not a lawyer either, but one amateur to another, I don't think you're reading the bill correctly. The document says "A PERSON MAY NOT INTENTIONALLY, WILLFULLY, AND WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION" tap into someone else's computer or network. So where does it say that if your phone does it without your knowledge, you've committed a crime?
If you're going to get this excited over some trivial shit, the least you could do is be correct.
Certainly, from a legal standpoint, the door being unlocked doesn't matter. I never said that it did. But your post made me chuckle. Most minor thefts get no investigation at all, so it's somewhat ridiculous to suggest that the door being locked or not matters. I'm just saying that the cops would give you a hard time for not locking your door.
And it is theft if someone uses your network without your consent, in my mind. It's a particularly minor form of theft, given that it's almost impossible to measure the inconvenience caused to access point's owner. It may be no inconvenience at all. But, if I logged on to your network and ran a Bit Torrent client to download a few gigs of Linux distros at the exact same moment that you were trying to upload a term paper, I could cause you rather substantial inconvenience. What is that if not theft? I know, you said "unless of course you are abusing the connection"... who decides what constitutes abuse? It's not theft as long as I just check my email? Does it become theft if I visit Youtube? Where is the line? You're on shaky ground, imho.
If I came on to your property and took a lemon from your lemon tree without asking, is that not theft? Suppose that you were not going to eat the lemon, but rather let it fall to the ground and rot. It's still theft, by the letter of the law.
I'm just saying that the law proposed in TFA is silly. It's essentially impossible to enforce, unless far more resources were invested than the crime warrants. Rather than any government wasting time or money on such a thing, it's better if people just secure their networks, if they care about strangers having access.
It would help the big corporations not so much because of enforcement, but the general FUD that the law would cause. Share your internet connection? I can't do that, isn't it illegal?!?
But your scenario is pretty valid as well. It wouldn't shock me to my core if you were totally correct. It's just that I don't know how someone who is too clueless to secure his wireless network suddenly becomes clueful enough to realize that he's got a freeloader. But it's far from impossible. I have no clue how hard it is to get the attention of a Maryland Delegate. It's not a huge state, and it might not be too hard.
I guess I'm just always inclined to first blame the entity that has the most powerful lobbying organization. And we all know that the various ISPs are pretty good at that.
Ok, fair enough. You're white, I'm white - let's call each other redneck.
Did you know that the state of Maryland has the fifth largest percentage of non-white people in the Union? So even if it's not offensive, your use of the term to refer to people from Maryland is puzzling. Funny how ignorance and racially charged terms seem to travel together like that...
It's especially silly when the access point is unsecured. If someone took the time to hack my encryption, that would piss me off. But if I leave it unsecured...
Could you imagine summoning the police to your house to report theft of physical property, and then telling them that you left the door unlocked and open? I can just imagine what those cops would have to say. I'm sure they would not investigate the crime with the usual rigor, which isn't much for minor theft anyhow.
Are there no meth dealers to bust in Maryland? We need to have some sane priorities. I know that this is just a proposed law, and probably the work of one crackpot politician, but still... it's lame.
I think that the term "redneck" is offensive. I'm not foaming at the mouth or anything, but still... why use a racial epithet at all? And if you're white, that doesn't make it ok in my book. I'm sure there are dark skinned people out there with unsecured wireless networks. Would you have posted a comment with the subject line "stupid [n word]"? Surely not. So why is this different?
Also, when I think "redneck", Maryland is hardly the first state that comes to mind. If you're going to use racial slurs, use them properly!;)
Are you sure that it isn't? Ask yourself, why did the Maryland government feel a need to address this issue at all? Because they had been flooded by emails from constituents who were furious over their stolen bandwidth? Or because telcos/cablecos/ISPs realized how easy wireless makes it to share a connection with your neighbor? I can't say for sure either way, but I know which of the two groups has more pull with most politicians.
It's not just the Season 3 spoilers, there are also some less huge but still (to me) significant spoilers regarding the season yet to air, which is even harder to fathom.
And then, once a few people post angry comments, she comments back with this little rejoinder:
Ok so there's been a lot of disappointment by the fact that I didn't include a huge, all caps, neon, flashing light warning that there were spoilers in the post if you weren't up to speed on the season. I'm sorry about that, but I really thought this would stop you from reading if you hadn't finished season three.
"The streaming revelation along with other show secrets and anecdotes, was revealed last night at the Morgan Library during a panel discussion with series executive producers David Eick and Ron Moore and nine of the show's stars.
More news on a confirmed BSG prequel, identifying the final cylon and what it's like to find out you're a toaster, all after the jump."
And that's where I would stop reading if I was worried about spoilers.
Eeeesh! Sorry I read your article, lady! I won't next time. I am so glad I am not this chick's boyfriend. That must be a rough gig.
For what it's worth, there was no "jump" for me. I clicked on a link on my Google homepage and was taken right to the article. What's more, there were lots of interesting and non-spoiler facts in the article, such as the fact that there are no plans for a BSG movie, and that Ron Moore directs and episode in Season 4. Those are behind the scenes details, rather than something about the plot. I don't think they diminish anyone's enjoyment of the show.
To quote a slashdot meme: Sonia, you must be new here.
I really question the usefulness of this type of article. One can no more make accurate blanket statements about an age demographic than one could about an ethnic demographic. We don't see articles about what types of risks Latino workers pose to an IT infrastructure. No one would touch that with a ten foot pole. If anyone asked me to make such an assessment, I'd point out that people are all individuals, and I could easily point to good and bad examples from any given group. People should be assessed on their own merits, and not prejudged before they even act based on membership in some arbitrary category.
But while anything that could be perceived as bashing a gender or ethnic group is off limits, the age demographics are still fair game apparently. Why? What useful information is to be gained by collecting anecdotal evidence, and then posting this type of "kids these days..." article? Should IT people treat workers differently based on age? Certainly not! Should hiring practices be informed by this type of article? I think that would be a mistake.
I can't wait for the article that tells me not to hire Caucasian lesbians between the ages of 30 and 45, because they spend all day downloading episodes of The L Word on Bit Torrent.
I'd prefer that I be judged on what I do or don't do, rather than someone's perception of my "group"... whatever that is.
Normally, this is where I'd call you a dumbass, because I'm a jerk. But, I puzzled about this at first too. So, since we're both dumbasses, I figure I should help you out.
What you wanna do is click the "reply" button at the top of the comments page (towards the right), above any of the comments, rather than the "reply to" link that you clicked to post this current comment. It's not actually the most intuitive UI ever designed.
I agree with everything that you've said, and it's certainly a fascinating area of study. Philosophy and science seem to collide somewhat when we ask ourselves, what is intelligence?
But, the Turing test doesn't ask if the entity that is being conversed with is intelligent, not exactly. Instead, it asks the person conducting the test whether or not they believe they are conversing with a human, and then assumes that if you can convince a human, than the program must actually be intelligent.
So, I'm saying that the Turing test is a rather poor test of whether a true AI has been created, only because I believe that many humans could be duped by a rather unintelligent entity.
What I might propose is a more robust test. Rather than simply saying that the program must convince a human, maybe it would be better to say that the program must convince several humans. Or perhaps it would be better to aid the person conducting the test, by supplying some thoughtful questions ahead of time. It's just not good enough to me to rely on the judgment of just any old human. What if you sat a 5 year old down to conduct a Turing test... if the program can fool a 5 year old, then would it be accurate to say that the program has a 5 year old level of intelligence? Perhaps.
But you do raise a great point, which is that humanity and intelligence are not the same thing.
I have no idea why the original poster was modded troll, but this dipshit AC is considered funny. Search your hearts on that one,/. mods...
The original poster raised a good point... passing a Turing test is not the same thing as creating intelligence, artificial or not. But many members of the slashdot community seemed to think so, because the story was tagged "singularity" - a term which, when applied to the field of intelligence research, is used to refer to the creation of an intellect greater than that of humanity.
Passing a Turing test is probably merely a step towards a true AI - and possibly a rather small step. It is not necessarily an AI.
Well, it's a bit tough to argue with the rhetorical genius that is "blah blah blah zzz", but I'll give it a go.
No, the situation is not in any way "cut and dry". For one thing, the expression is "cut and dried". Further, that expression is to descrive something is already completed, and requires no further work. The future of Wikipedia has NOT been decided.
If you don't have enough money, you have to raise more money... on that much we can agree. However, it's asinine so say that ads are the ONLY way to do that.
Can't Google bail these people out? They have huge piles of money laying around... I think the founders probably have enough cash in the cushions of their couches to save Wikipedia.
If adding video to the site is only possible with ad revenue, then how about not adding video to the site. That would be a real shame of course, considering that no other sites do video, and I mean none at all
I don't see this as being a huge problem for MS. Obviously, they'll need to lower their prices. But, as more and more units get sold due to the lower retail price, I think that MS will end up still making plenty of dough.
I certainly do hope I'm wrong about that. And you make a great point about familiarity - to me, as someone who has used XP a great deal, Ubuntu's standard interface is a lot more familiar than Vista's.
But, as far as those "niche" markets you mention - they're pretty big niches. You could store a battleship in some of those niches. The largest of those, as I see it, is games. If you grew up with MS, because you played WoW, then MS is your thing, and you're likely to stick with it.
But, while I don't see MS being in big trouble in the short term, in the longer term, like say 20 years, I do think that this effect will erode their business. The percentage of the retail price of a new box that they get will shrink, but slowly. As it shrinks, MS's power will fade. But a beast this big takes decades to die.
The only thing that could really damage MS in the short term (less than 10 years) is if they got really serious about stopping piracy. If the college kids and poor people of the world could no longer get pirated Windows, they would turn to Linux in droves.
Curse you for beating me to the obligatory gamma ray joke! I think life will be fun with 6 billion green Hulksters running around... although there won't be anything to destroy within a matter of hours. We'll just have to amuse ourselves by having hot angry gamma irradiated sex. I can't wait to try out my two foot long green member!
I didn't have to have the DMG open to the to-hit tables... at least not in later years. I had (if I remember the name correctly) the Dungeon Master's Shield, which was basically two big cardboard "cheat sheets" that had those tables and a few other common ones. You stood them upright in such a way as to shield the prying eyes of the players from your various secret nefarious doings.
But as to the substance of your post, I think you're pretty much spot on. The older rules were a tad byzantine for my tastes.
>> disconnecting the ground from an electrical device can be dangerous.
Yeah, I found that out the hard way. Back in my younger and stupider rock band days, I got a nice shock on the lips by playing electric guitar and then singing into a mic. It was an old house that didn't have 3 pronged outlets, so we just got those little grey adapters that defeat the ground. It hummed like crazy, and was a bit too "shocky" for my tastes.
I had a conversation with my electrical engineer father, asking him about what might have gone wrong, and after he was done slapping me for being so stupid, he gave me the exact same informative lecture that's in the parent post.
Shawb, I hope you saved the lips of some young rawker somewhere from an unpleasant surprise. An easy way to sidestep the issue is to use a wireless guitar rig... but that introduces a whole new set of issues.
I was so proud of the/. community for adding the "valis" tag to this story. Valis is one of Philip K. Dick's best novels, in my book. It's part of a loosely related quadrilogy of books that feature similar themes (religion, technology, fascism, satan). If you haven't, you really should read everything the man ever wrote.
Slashdot Mirror
Wow, three posts in a row that made the same lame joke. That's gotta be clue that you're not as clever as you thought you were.
There has to be some kind of intelligent filtering. If it's not done for me, it's done by me, when I choose which result to click. The biggest problem with paying someone to do that sorting for you is the simple fact that it's too expensive. Yahoo might have stayed a human-sorted list forever, except that it would have taken an army of "surfers" to do it. The web just got too big to be done that way all the time.
Google results used to be a lot more relevant than they are now. Far too often, I'm interested in X, and search for "X" on Google, I find millions of people who want to sell me X. But I'm not even sure if I want to buy it. I'm looking for information about X. That is getting harder and harder to find. The quote in the summary is correct - people have learned how to "game" the system.
How often do you "google" something, and then just go to the Wikipedia link? I do all the time. That way, I can be sure to get actual information about the subject, rather than a link to its Amazon page. In many ways, because of the search engine optimizers, Wikipedia is already replacing Google as the default source of information.
getoffmylawn! Oh wait, you're a youngster, not an oldster, so I guess the right tag for you is getonmylawn!
Age has a lot less to do with it than intelligence. I'm 36, and I live with two college students who are 23, and I can tell you that they don't know a gosh darned thing about computers. They're clueless when it comes to effective searching, they don't know how to avoid viruses, and they don't know their way around their own computers.
The problem with patting yourself on the back for being young is that it has no future. If you want to boost your self-esteem, tell yourself that you're smarter than most other people. That too will fade in time, but it takes a lot longer (usually).
It's like what those wanna be Jack Baur types always say about fighting terrorism: we have to be right every single time; they only have to be right once. Honestly, I think these DRM folks go home and laugh themselves to sleep. In what other industry is total failure so acceptable? If condom manufacturers were held to the same low standards, half the planet would have AIDS (but not most /. readers, har har).
The various content providers will get it through their heads eventually that DRM punishes their paying customers while it barely slows the pirates down. The downside to the average consumer is that all of this content will have to be paid for somehow. ABC isn't going to keep cranking out Lost out of the goodness of their hearts. So what that will mean is more and more "product integration".
I actually sort of miss the old days. We had the ability to time shift - it was called a VCR, and it worked fine. You zapped the commercials with your remote, and you could keep the tape for years if you wanted. Now, I can get any show I want on Bit Torrent, but given that so many shows have become long commercials, do I really want them?
Sometimes product integration doesn't feel too intrusive - James Bond has always driven a flashy car. But sometimes, it's not nearly so feasible. If they find a way to work an ad for Red Bull into John Adams, I swear I will never watch TV again.
I do agree that my ISP conspiracy theory was based on far too little information. I took TFA at face value - probably always a mistake. Trying to get some journalism major to understand tech is like trying to teach my dog algebra... he'll never make it past chapter 2.
That said, after reading the bill two or three times, I still have no idea what it says. In attempting to explain, you used two words in your last post that seem to be at loggerheads: unwittingly, and intentional. I don't see how anything can be both unwitting and also intentional.
Furthermore, I fail to see how any court could ever establish intent when prosecuting this "crime". If they had access to an email or instant message where I gloated about how awesome it was to be stealing my neighbor's access, that would be one thing, but how often can we expect such a smoking gun? And even if there was, what law enforcement agency would expend the type of resources it would take to bring such evidence to court?
The whole gosh darned mess seems pretty silly to me at this point. The main thing I am taking away from all this, thanks to you, is that the tech press must not be trusted!
And I'll tell you something else, Shouty McShouter: I'm not a lawyer either, but one amateur to another, I don't think you're reading the bill correctly. The document says "A PERSON MAY NOT INTENTIONALLY, WILLFULLY, AND WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION" tap into someone else's computer or network. So where does it say that if your phone does it without your knowledge, you've committed a crime?
If you're going to get this excited over some trivial shit, the least you could do is be correct.
WHAT'S WITH ALL THE CAPS? Seriously, take a deep breath dude.
Certainly, from a legal standpoint, the door being unlocked doesn't matter. I never said that it did. But your post made me chuckle. Most minor thefts get no investigation at all, so it's somewhat ridiculous to suggest that the door being locked or not matters. I'm just saying that the cops would give you a hard time for not locking your door.
And it is theft if someone uses your network without your consent, in my mind. It's a particularly minor form of theft, given that it's almost impossible to measure the inconvenience caused to access point's owner. It may be no inconvenience at all. But, if I logged on to your network and ran a Bit Torrent client to download a few gigs of Linux distros at the exact same moment that you were trying to upload a term paper, I could cause you rather substantial inconvenience. What is that if not theft? I know, you said "unless of course you are abusing the connection"... who decides what constitutes abuse? It's not theft as long as I just check my email? Does it become theft if I visit Youtube? Where is the line? You're on shaky ground, imho.
If I came on to your property and took a lemon from your lemon tree without asking, is that not theft? Suppose that you were not going to eat the lemon, but rather let it fall to the ground and rot. It's still theft, by the letter of the law.
I'm just saying that the law proposed in TFA is silly. It's essentially impossible to enforce, unless far more resources were invested than the crime warrants. Rather than any government wasting time or money on such a thing, it's better if people just secure their networks, if they care about strangers having access.
It would help the big corporations not so much because of enforcement, but the general FUD that the law would cause. Share your internet connection? I can't do that, isn't it illegal?!?
But your scenario is pretty valid as well. It wouldn't shock me to my core if you were totally correct. It's just that I don't know how someone who is too clueless to secure his wireless network suddenly becomes clueful enough to realize that he's got a freeloader. But it's far from impossible. I have no clue how hard it is to get the attention of a Maryland Delegate. It's not a huge state, and it might not be too hard.
I guess I'm just always inclined to first blame the entity that has the most powerful lobbying organization. And we all know that the various ISPs are pretty good at that.
Ok, fair enough. You're white, I'm white - let's call each other redneck.
Did you know that the state of Maryland has the fifth largest percentage of non-white people in the Union? So even if it's not offensive, your use of the term to refer to people from Maryland is puzzling. Funny how ignorance and racially charged terms seem to travel together like that...
It's especially silly when the access point is unsecured. If someone took the time to hack my encryption, that would piss me off. But if I leave it unsecured...
Could you imagine summoning the police to your house to report theft of physical property, and then telling them that you left the door unlocked and open? I can just imagine what those cops would have to say. I'm sure they would not investigate the crime with the usual rigor, which isn't much for minor theft anyhow.
Are there no meth dealers to bust in Maryland? We need to have some sane priorities. I know that this is just a proposed law, and probably the work of one crackpot politician, but still... it's lame.
I think that the term "redneck" is offensive. I'm not foaming at the mouth or anything, but still... why use a racial epithet at all? And if you're white, that doesn't make it ok in my book. I'm sure there are dark skinned people out there with unsecured wireless networks. Would you have posted a comment with the subject line "stupid [n word]"? Surely not. So why is this different?
;)
Also, when I think "redneck", Maryland is hardly the first state that comes to mind. If you're going to use racial slurs, use them properly!
>> Yeah, its a big conspiracy d00d!
Are you sure that it isn't? Ask yourself, why did the Maryland government feel a need to address this issue at all? Because they had been flooded by emails from constituents who were furious over their stolen bandwidth? Or because telcos/cablecos/ISPs realized how easy wireless makes it to share a connection with your neighbor? I can't say for sure either way, but I know which of the two groups has more pull with most politicians.
And then, once a few people post angry comments, she comments back with this little rejoinder:
Eeeesh! Sorry I read your article, lady! I won't next time. I am so glad I am not this chick's boyfriend. That must be a rough gig.
For what it's worth, there was no "jump" for me. I clicked on a link on my Google homepage and was taken right to the article. What's more, there were lots of interesting and non-spoiler facts in the article, such as the fact that there are no plans for a BSG movie, and that Ron Moore directs and episode in Season 4. Those are behind the scenes details, rather than something about the plot. I don't think they diminish anyone's enjoyment of the show.
To quote a slashdot meme: Sonia, you must be new here.
I really question the usefulness of this type of article. One can no more make accurate blanket statements about an age demographic than one could about an ethnic demographic. We don't see articles about what types of risks Latino workers pose to an IT infrastructure. No one would touch that with a ten foot pole. If anyone asked me to make such an assessment, I'd point out that people are all individuals, and I could easily point to good and bad examples from any given group. People should be assessed on their own merits, and not prejudged before they even act based on membership in some arbitrary category.
But while anything that could be perceived as bashing a gender or ethnic group is off limits, the age demographics are still fair game apparently. Why? What useful information is to be gained by collecting anecdotal evidence, and then posting this type of "kids these days..." article? Should IT people treat workers differently based on age? Certainly not! Should hiring practices be informed by this type of article? I think that would be a mistake.
I can't wait for the article that tells me not to hire Caucasian lesbians between the ages of 30 and 45, because they spend all day downloading episodes of The L Word on Bit Torrent.
I'd prefer that I be judged on what I do or don't do, rather than someone's perception of my "group"... whatever that is.
Normally, this is where I'd call you a dumbass, because I'm a jerk. But, I puzzled about this at first too. So, since we're both dumbasses, I figure I should help you out.
What you wanna do is click the "reply" button at the top of the comments page (towards the right), above any of the comments, rather than the "reply to" link that you clicked to post this current comment. It's not actually the most intuitive UI ever designed.
I agree with everything that you've said, and it's certainly a fascinating area of study. Philosophy and science seem to collide somewhat when we ask ourselves, what is intelligence?
But, the Turing test doesn't ask if the entity that is being conversed with is intelligent, not exactly. Instead, it asks the person conducting the test whether or not they believe they are conversing with a human, and then assumes that if you can convince a human, than the program must actually be intelligent.
So, I'm saying that the Turing test is a rather poor test of whether a true AI has been created, only because I believe that many humans could be duped by a rather unintelligent entity.
What I might propose is a more robust test. Rather than simply saying that the program must convince a human, maybe it would be better to say that the program must convince several humans. Or perhaps it would be better to aid the person conducting the test, by supplying some thoughtful questions ahead of time. It's just not good enough to me to rely on the judgment of just any old human. What if you sat a 5 year old down to conduct a Turing test... if the program can fool a 5 year old, then would it be accurate to say that the program has a 5 year old level of intelligence? Perhaps.
But you do raise a great point, which is that humanity and intelligence are not the same thing.
I have no idea why the original poster was modded troll, but this dipshit AC is considered funny. Search your hearts on that one, /. mods...
The original poster raised a good point... passing a Turing test is not the same thing as creating intelligence, artificial or not. But many members of the slashdot community seemed to think so, because the story was tagged "singularity" - a term which, when applied to the field of intelligence research, is used to refer to the creation of an intellect greater than that of humanity.
Passing a Turing test is probably merely a step towards a true AI - and possibly a rather small step. It is not necessarily an AI.
Thanks for the lesson in theology, but I'm pretty sure was joking. Read up on it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joke
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarcasm
And whoever modded this guy up needs to take the same remedial course on humor.
Well, it's a bit tough to argue with the rhetorical genius that is "blah blah blah zzz", but I'll give it a go.
No, the situation is not in any way "cut and dry". For one thing, the expression is "cut and dried". Further, that expression is to descrive something is already completed, and requires no further work. The future of Wikipedia has NOT been decided.
If you don't have enough money, you have to raise more money... on that much we can agree. However, it's asinine so say that ads are the ONLY way to do that.
Can't Google bail these people out? They have huge piles of money laying around... I think the founders probably have enough cash in the cushions of their couches to save Wikipedia.
If adding video to the site is only possible with ad revenue, then how about not adding video to the site. That would be a real shame of course, considering that no other sites do video, and I mean none at all
You'll wait... I should just never reply to you, and leave you waiting there forever, Mr. Smartmouth.
Yes, console games are a much bigger business than PC games. I said that in my post. So what's your point, smartmouth?
I don't see this as being a huge problem for MS. Obviously, they'll need to lower their prices. But, as more and more units get sold due to the lower retail price, I think that MS will end up still making plenty of dough.
I certainly do hope I'm wrong about that. And you make a great point about familiarity - to me, as someone who has used XP a great deal, Ubuntu's standard interface is a lot more familiar than Vista's.
But, as far as those "niche" markets you mention - they're pretty big niches. You could store a battleship in some of those niches. The largest of those, as I see it, is games. If you grew up with MS, because you played WoW, then MS is your thing, and you're likely to stick with it.
But, while I don't see MS being in big trouble in the short term, in the longer term, like say 20 years, I do think that this effect will erode their business. The percentage of the retail price of a new box that they get will shrink, but slowly. As it shrinks, MS's power will fade. But a beast this big takes decades to die.
The only thing that could really damage MS in the short term (less than 10 years) is if they got really serious about stopping piracy. If the college kids and poor people of the world could no longer get pirated Windows, they would turn to Linux in droves.
Curse you for beating me to the obligatory gamma ray joke! I think life will be fun with 6 billion green Hulksters running around... although there won't be anything to destroy within a matter of hours. We'll just have to amuse ourselves by having hot angry gamma irradiated sex. I can't wait to try out my two foot long green member!
I didn't have to have the DMG open to the to-hit tables... at least not in later years. I had (if I remember the name correctly) the Dungeon Master's Shield, which was basically two big cardboard "cheat sheets" that had those tables and a few other common ones. You stood them upright in such a way as to shield the prying eyes of the players from your various secret nefarious doings.
But as to the substance of your post, I think you're pretty much spot on. The older rules were a tad byzantine for my tastes.
>> disconnecting the ground from an electrical device can be dangerous. Yeah, I found that out the hard way. Back in my younger and stupider rock band days, I got a nice shock on the lips by playing electric guitar and then singing into a mic. It was an old house that didn't have 3 pronged outlets, so we just got those little grey adapters that defeat the ground. It hummed like crazy, and was a bit too "shocky" for my tastes.
I had a conversation with my electrical engineer father, asking him about what might have gone wrong, and after he was done slapping me for being so stupid, he gave me the exact same informative lecture that's in the parent post.
Shawb, I hope you saved the lips of some young rawker somewhere from an unpleasant surprise. An easy way to sidestep the issue is to use a wireless guitar rig... but that introduces a whole new set of issues.
I was so proud of the /. community for adding the "valis" tag to this story. Valis is one of Philip K. Dick's best novels, in my book. It's part of a loosely related quadrilogy of books that feature similar themes (religion, technology, fascism, satan). If you haven't, you really should read everything the man ever wrote.