When I was in elementary school, they told us that if the polar ice caps melted, only the upper floors of the highest buildings in NYC would be above sea level. A few years ago, research starting coming out saying that a high percentage of the ice at the north pole was already melted. Clearly somebody was (or is) lying. It would be nice to get real facts from time to time instead of alarmist B.S.
I was waiting for the collective head of slashdot to explode...
1) Video game censorship == bad 2) Christians with an agenda == bad
3) People trying to censor video games created by Christians with an agenda == ??? *POP*
While certainly an interesting idea just in terms of what the outcome would be, it is not, by any means, a "good" idea. The problem is that, as easy as it is to say that "pappy" made the millions and future generations just lived off it, the future generations can't just sit on/squander the cash and expect to maintain. Contrary to what most people seem to think, turning a million into ten million still takes some brains and work (maybe not down-and-dirty blue-collar work, but work nonetheless). Families that have large amounts of cash (and that maintain or increase the bank accounts while still living extravagantly) are probably (not always, but probably) doing smart things with the money to stay in shape financially. You don't just spend tons of cash and expect to stay rich.
For an example of how easy it is to blow literally millions, look no further than Mr. T, MC Hammer, a whole host of professional athletes, and pretty much ever child t.v. star ever. These people are complete idiots with their cash, and they managed to lose millions.
It's not that hard to get rich in this country, but it requires working hard AND working smart, and most people these days seem to be willing to do neither -- or at most only one -- of those two. There is no greater democratizer of wealth in the world than Wall Street, where any old joe can buy $100 worth of the biggest companies in the world. Just like the lottery, you can only win if you play, but unlike the lottery, you actually have a decent shot at making some cash. Now, how often do you see the lower class family putting $100 into lottery tickets vs. putting $100 into the stock market? Like another poster said, making $40,000/yr and putting 5% into a modest 401K that makes 8% will put you in the top 10% of this country. Sure beats lottery tickets.
For someone so concerned with the U.N., one would think that you would have found Saddam's utter disregard for sanction after sanction after sanction from the U.N. to be a much bigger deal. Saddam ignores U.N. sanctions over and over again, but somehow that is OK (or, at the very least, not action-worthy). Bush goes ahead on a war where the U.N. said (in so many words): "We won't stop you, but we aren't going to help you," and somehow Bush is the one who is such a threat the the sanctity of the U.N.? Maybe you should get your facts straight. Which leader would you say was in greater defiance of the U.N.? The answer is clear.
Moreover, the largest monetary scandal in the history of the world took place on Kofi Annan's watch (with his own son being a key figure). It makes it tough for me to justify taking advice on any matter from a group despicable enough knowingly turn their heads while billions of dollars are stolen from programs designed to feed the poor. You don't think the financial interests of France and Russia (amongst others) heavily weighed in to their decision of whether or not to back this war? Get real. I support the general intentions of the U.N., and I do believe that it is a necessary entity, but I have to take their suggestions with a grain of salt lately given their track-record and other interests at the present time.
OK, I am obviously getting pounded with comments on "fact #2," so maybe I misspoke. There were some people who never believed from the start that Iraq had and WMDs, but they were ignoring a LOT of evidence, and were probably already in the camp that was going to oppose any military action (especially under this president) no matter what the evidence stated. What I suppose I meant to say was that the intel community, the world, and almost everyone in congress (Democrat and Republican), largely believed that Iraq had WMDs.
And see, here we are again, arguing about why we are there. Pretend I included NO list of facts in that first post. Doing so was clearly a mistake on my part. You believe what you want about the build up to the war, I will believe what I want, but the one fact remains that we are there now, and that this bickering does NOTHING to fix that.
I thought it was a pretty well-established fact at this point that Mac OS X is considered to be more secure not because it is less vulnerable to attacks, but because it is a less desirable target for attacks. Think of OS X as, say, Sweden. It is safe to live in Sweden, not because they have a massive defense system, but because no one cares to attack them. Windows, according to this analogy, would be more like the U.S.: A huge defense system, but every hole in the security matters, because people are actually trying to get through. Anyone who has worked in software (which I imagine many Slashdotters have) can tell you that no software is secure, and anyone who tells you that their software is 100% secure is blatantly lying.
That said, what I really want to know is why big companies like MS and Apple don't explain more fully WHY they aren't releasing patches to known issues. As a software product manager, I spend a lot of my time determining what issues are deserving of patches, and there certainly ARE good reasons not to patch a bug, but I would probably take it an extra step and explain to my clients exactly why the decision not to patch was made. We don't necessarily want patches, we just want an explanation.
As a sort of pre-rebuttal, I would like to add that anybody who attempts to justify their finger-pointing uselessness by stating that "George Bush did it first, so it's OK" is officially at the mental level of a 6 year old fighting with his brother over a matchbox car, and should not be posting on Slashdot. I hear this constantly when I say that we need to quit placing blame and start getting to work. Yes, those in favor of the war can be just as unreasonable about the whole thing (arguably more so) than those opposed, but the key is to rise above that and actually take the higher ground, not to use it as a lame excuse to act like a little kid. As my mom used to say, "I don't care who started it. I care who ends it."
I have read obituaries that have been more positive than slashdotters' comments on the Iraq War. I know it doesn't look great, but what looks even worse is if this whole country obsesses over how bad it all looks instead of remaining confident and positive.
Established facts: 1) There were no WMDs 2) We all thought there were WMDs 3) We are currently in Iraq 4) Most of us think we should not have gone in the first place, largely based on what we know now
I am tired of disputing these topics. We are there, right now, regardless of why, and whether or not you did support/would have supported the invasion. Let's get past that and talk about what to do now to try and make the best of this. This report (which, BTW, none of us have actually read) allegedly starts from the present and tries to figure out the best course of action from this point forward, and I applaud that. I just wish that some slashdotters could do the same thing.
We get it, you hate George Bush. He is not (by a long shot) my favorite president either, but that shouldn't matter right now. Can we grow up and move on to actually accomplish something, or do we need to keep pointing fingers and accomplishing nothing?
It seems like if I do a search by an uploaded file, and I upload (or point to the URL of) an image that I have posted on Flickr, that image should come up first in the list of results, but it doesn't. How are these other pictures better matches to my picture than that picture's duplicate?
Anyone care to explain to me how a comment which has not yet been moderated can be "overrated"?
I mean, you don't often hear things like, "Man, that new quarterback who nobody has ever heard of is so freaking overrated" because that wouldn't make any damn sense, would it?
Sorry, feel free to moderate this one overrated and off-topic as you wish, oh intelligent moderators.
All I was doing was attempting to express the *possibility* that these two extremist groups *might* not be representative of the American public, not to say definitively that they aren't. Did I not make my point? Is it NOT possible that a majority if moderate Americans exist?
There is no need to be an asshole and imply that I just don't hang out with a diverse enough crowd, unless, of course, you need to say things like that to try and feel better about whatever it is that has your panties in such a bunch.
You got religious freaks on the right and you got frothy eggheads on the left. Blend the two together in a classroom and you got a civil war going on. Makes it hard to be a moderate who believes in both God and science.
If it is so true that this country is so starkly divided between "religious freaks" and "frothy eggheads," then why is that you are a religious person who believes in science, I am a religious person who believes in science, the vast majority of my friends are religious people who believe in science (and even those who aren't religious don't have anything against those who are), and the vast majority of random people I have talked to all around the country are religious people who believe in science? Could it be *GASP* that the vocal minorities of frothy eggheads and religious freaks are actually not at all representative of mainstream Americans? Could media sensationalism (even right here on our beloved/.) have ANYTHING to do with the fact that the nutbags appear to be taking over the world?
I am tired of this "line in the sand" BS that we all appear to have fallen into. The overwhelming majority of Americans are reasonable people who are nothing like the extremist nutjobs portrayed on TV, and our biggest downfall will be ignoring that fact.
Finally a 527 that claims to be non-partisan and in search of only the truth! We have waited so long for a group to come along that can claim to be nothing be honest.
No news to see here, move along. Same old "we-aren't-taking-sides-when-we-take-sides" political B.S. as far as I can tell.
So, when it is a bipartisan effort that is a good idea (Online Budget Database), we dare not give the president any credit, but when it is a bipartisan effort that is a bad idea (No Child Left Behind), we dare not give anyone besides the president any blame.
I am not an Apple lover, nor am I an Apple hater, so I think I am well qualified to throw in my two cents here. Steve Jobs works his ass off (and is so proud) to be the industry leader in the portable mp3 market. He has made it very clear that he wants the whole world to think of "iPod" when they think of an mp3 player, and yet the second that people actually do begin to genericize the word "iPod," he flips out. Which is it? Kleenex, Xerox, Band-Aid, Coke etc. will tell you that it is better to be an industry leader and have people try to copy/genericize your name than to never have your name associated with a generic product. Then again, those companies won't hesitate to sue over misuse of their names either.
This has been a main criticism of the internet since the first newsgroups began appearing years ago. You could always write a blog or review of something posing as anyone pretending to know anything. YouTube is no different, save the fact that manipulation and misrepresentation of facts can be created and shared easily in a video format. I fail to see how this is a new (read: interesting) question.
As sort of an aside to that, keep in mind that the symbol for prosperity in the middle ages was being fat. Maybe once everyone can afford to get fat (or, in this case, drive a big stupid SUV), we will just find something else to concern ourselves with. A few hundred years ago, food was much harder to come by. Maybe a few hundred years from now, energy won't be so hard to come by (given that there happens to be this weird giant ball of it warming our planet each and every day), and we will stop showing off our stupid cars to each other.
Or maybe we will all die of Bird Flu long before that. Who knows?
I just want to point out that if this same action took place during the Clinton years, the post would read more like:
The always progressive and forward thinking Bill Clinton has proposed legislation that will modernize the nation's research libraries by making all of the information contained in the libraries available online, eliminating the wasteful need for old-fashioned brick-and-mortar facilities. At least some people in the federal government are embracing technology. Kudos, Bill!
I would love to think that this formula was devised and is used solely by Slashdot submitters, but I fear that the process has hit the mainstream media as well:
1. Scan news for "Bush"
2. Figure out how to write/re-write article to ensure that Bush looks as evil as possible
3. Leave out any actual facts in favor of baseless speculation, particularly facts that might help to explain Bush's actions in a reasonable way
4. Comment on the demise of society, blaming it all on Bush
5. For an extra bit of irony, mention/imply that only Republicans are responsible for dividing this country
6. Sell news bits for profit
I agree that this is as editorialized of a tidbit as I have seen on Slashdot in a while, and that is saying a lot. As a person who has yet to RTFA, I have to wonder, based on this blurb, what the motivation behind closing down these libraries would be. I know, I know, RTFA, but the point is that you can always tell a heavily biased article/news-bit by the sheer lack of an attempt to explain any motivation besides citing "evil."
Which is more ridiculous, assuming that humans did not, at some stage, evolve, or believing that this president/administration somehow created fundamentalist religious-types and made America dumber?
Slashdot Mirror
When I was in elementary school, they told us that if the polar ice caps melted, only the upper floors of the highest buildings in NYC would be above sea level. A few years ago, research starting coming out saying that a high percentage of the ice at the north pole was already melted. Clearly somebody was (or is) lying. It would be nice to get real facts from time to time instead of alarmist B.S.
1) Video game censorship == bad
2) Christians with an agenda == bad
3) People trying to censor video games created by Christians with an agenda == ??? *POP*
For an example of how easy it is to blow literally millions, look no further than Mr. T, MC Hammer, a whole host of professional athletes, and pretty much ever child t.v. star ever. These people are complete idiots with their cash, and they managed to lose millions.
It's not that hard to get rich in this country, but it requires working hard AND working smart, and most people these days seem to be willing to do neither -- or at most only one -- of those two. There is no greater democratizer of wealth in the world than Wall Street, where any old joe can buy $100 worth of the biggest companies in the world. Just like the lottery, you can only win if you play, but unlike the lottery, you actually have a decent shot at making some cash. Now, how often do you see the lower class family putting $100 into lottery tickets vs. putting $100 into the stock market? Like another poster said, making $40,000/yr and putting 5% into a modest 401K that makes 8% will put you in the top 10% of this country. Sure beats lottery tickets.
Moreover, the largest monetary scandal in the history of the world took place on Kofi Annan's watch (with his own son being a key figure). It makes it tough for me to justify taking advice on any matter from a group despicable enough knowingly turn their heads while billions of dollars are stolen from programs designed to feed the poor. You don't think the financial interests of France and Russia (amongst others) heavily weighed in to their decision of whether or not to back this war? Get real. I support the general intentions of the U.N., and I do believe that it is a necessary entity, but I have to take their suggestions with a grain of salt lately given their track-record and other interests at the present time.
And see, here we are again, arguing about why we are there. Pretend I included NO list of facts in that first post. Doing so was clearly a mistake on my part. You believe what you want about the build up to the war, I will believe what I want, but the one fact remains that we are there now, and that this bickering does NOTHING to fix that.
That said, what I really want to know is why big companies like MS and Apple don't explain more fully WHY they aren't releasing patches to known issues. As a software product manager, I spend a lot of my time determining what issues are deserving of patches, and there certainly ARE good reasons not to patch a bug, but I would probably take it an extra step and explain to my clients exactly why the decision not to patch was made. We don't necessarily want patches, we just want an explanation.
As a sort of pre-rebuttal, I would like to add that anybody who attempts to justify their finger-pointing uselessness by stating that "George Bush did it first, so it's OK" is officially at the mental level of a 6 year old fighting with his brother over a matchbox car, and should not be posting on Slashdot. I hear this constantly when I say that we need to quit placing blame and start getting to work. Yes, those in favor of the war can be just as unreasonable about the whole thing (arguably more so) than those opposed, but the key is to rise above that and actually take the higher ground, not to use it as a lame excuse to act like a little kid. As my mom used to say, "I don't care who started it. I care who ends it."
Established facts:
1) There were no WMDs
2) We all thought there were WMDs
3) We are currently in Iraq
4) Most of us think we should not have gone in the first place, largely based on what we know now
I am tired of disputing these topics. We are there, right now, regardless of why, and whether or not you did support/would have supported the invasion. Let's get past that and talk about what to do now to try and make the best of this. This report (which, BTW, none of us have actually read) allegedly starts from the present and tries to figure out the best course of action from this point forward, and I applaud that. I just wish that some slashdotters could do the same thing.
We get it, you hate George Bush. He is not (by a long shot) my favorite president either, but that shouldn't matter right now. Can we grow up and move on to actually accomplish something, or do we need to keep pointing fingers and accomplishing nothing?
A crummy commercial?!? Sheesh! Why did we even bother decoding that?
It seems like if I do a search by an uploaded file, and I upload (or point to the URL of) an image that I have posted on Flickr, that image should come up first in the list of results, but it doesn't. How are these other pictures better matches to my picture than that picture's duplicate?
I mean, you don't often hear things like, "Man, that new quarterback who nobody has ever heard of is so freaking overrated" because that wouldn't make any damn sense, would it?
Sorry, feel free to moderate this one overrated and off-topic as you wish, oh intelligent moderators.
There is no need to be an asshole and imply that I just don't hang out with a diverse enough crowd, unless, of course, you need to say things like that to try and feel better about whatever it is that has your panties in such a bunch.
If it is so true that this country is so starkly divided between "religious freaks" and "frothy eggheads," then why is that you are a religious person who believes in science, I am a religious person who believes in science, the vast majority of my friends are religious people who believe in science (and even those who aren't religious don't have anything against those who are), and the vast majority of random people I have talked to all around the country are religious people who believe in science? Could it be *GASP* that the vocal minorities of frothy eggheads and religious freaks are actually not at all representative of mainstream Americans? Could media sensationalism (even right here on our beloved
I am tired of this "line in the sand" BS that we all appear to have fallen into. The overwhelming majority of Americans are reasonable people who are nothing like the extremist nutjobs portrayed on TV, and our biggest downfall will be ignoring that fact.
No news to see here, move along. Same old "we-aren't-taking-sides-when-we-take-sides" political B.S. as far as I can tell.
I think I am starting to understand.
I am not an Apple lover, nor am I an Apple hater, so I think I am well qualified to throw in my two cents here. Steve Jobs works his ass off (and is so proud) to be the industry leader in the portable mp3 market. He has made it very clear that he wants the whole world to think of "iPod" when they think of an mp3 player, and yet the second that people actually do begin to genericize the word "iPod," he flips out. Which is it? Kleenex, Xerox, Band-Aid, Coke etc. will tell you that it is better to be an industry leader and have people try to copy/genericize your name than to never have your name associated with a generic product. Then again, those companies won't hesitate to sue over misuse of their names either.
Maybe THIS story was posted by YouTube's competitors! NOW WHO DO YOU BELIEVE?
This has been a main criticism of the internet since the first newsgroups began appearing years ago. You could always write a blog or review of something posing as anyone pretending to know anything. YouTube is no different, save the fact that manipulation and misrepresentation of facts can be created and shared easily in a video format. I fail to see how this is a new (read: interesting) question.
Or maybe we will all die of Bird Flu long before that. Who knows?
The always progressive and forward thinking Bill Clinton has proposed legislation that will modernize the nation's research libraries by making all of the information contained in the libraries available online, eliminating the wasteful need for old-fashioned brick-and-mortar facilities. At least some people in the federal government are embracing technology. Kudos, Bill!
Am I wrong?
1. Scan news for "Bush"
2. Figure out how to write/re-write article to ensure that Bush looks as evil as possible
3. Leave out any actual facts in favor of baseless speculation, particularly facts that might help to explain Bush's actions in a reasonable way
4. Comment on the demise of society, blaming it all on Bush
5. For an extra bit of irony, mention/imply that only Republicans are responsible for dividing this country
6. Sell news bits for profit
No "Step 2: ???" necessary.
I agree that this is as editorialized of a tidbit as I have seen on Slashdot in a while, and that is saying a lot. As a person who has yet to RTFA, I have to wonder, based on this blurb, what the motivation behind closing down these libraries would be. I know, I know, RTFA, but the point is that you can always tell a heavily biased article/news-bit by the sheer lack of an attempt to explain any motivation besides citing "evil."
Seems like a toss-up to me.
Americans says that badly grammar is well, say a new survey.
You spelled "grammar" wrong, and since when is the word "caps" capitalized?