...but if what this guy says is the truth, suddenly I'm very scared.
Or you use it to control thoughts. A lot of people don't like to be alone with their thoughts. The best way to avoid that is to listen to music.
Wow. So people put these things (and by "these things", I mean any headphoney-musicy thingie...iPod, Walkman, whatever) to block out their own thoughts. Auto-mind-control. That is friggin' sad.
My mom, for a long time, didn't realize you could (or maybe just never bothered to) type an URL directly into the browser; she would always put the main component of the name into a search (being that she was on MSN, that search was always MSN Search). It was kinda hit-or-miss, but she still did it. Most of the time, on Google, this will work fine (even better if you use the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button) -- leading me to believe there are far more people out there as you describe than we may realize.
The ATMs at my bank (Washington Mutual) has a big bright flashing green light strip just below the lip of the card slot. (Also at the cash slot.) If something were in front of it, you'd notice either (1) the lack of the light (especially effective if there's more than one machine there to compare, as is usually the case), or (2) the odd way there seems to be a light flashing inside the card reader. You'd either have to make the add-on light-tight, or do all the machines, or both. Or just rely on people being clueless, which in fact may be a good bet.
On a side tangent, we need to come up with better names for things. ATM is a lousy name. PIN is a lousy name. SUV is a lousy name (should be PCV -- Penile Compensation Vehicle). VCR, DVD, ATV, PVR, and any other TLA are all lousy names. When I visited Moscow, I found that an ATM is called a "bankomat". Infinitely better, and avoids people referring to an "ATM machine" -- "Automatic Teller Machine Machine". No more TLAs, marketing departments. Seriously.
P.S. My bank's ATMs have a refreshingly breezy style for their text -- "Feed me your envelope", "Hi! Let's get started", "Anything else?", and so on. They avoid saying "PIN" (much less "PIN number") by saying "secret code". Makes you feel like a spy and stuff. Kinda.
In December, when my wife and I went to the local INS (sorry, BCIS) office to get her green card, in addition to the other mounds and mounds of ridiculous security procedures that cost everyone a half-hour of their lives, the security guards were inspecting cell phones for lenses and asking "can this phone take pictures?". I wonder what sort of incredible state secret you're going to uncover by taking snapshots inside a waiting room for an hour.
You're right, as far as I can tell. At some level, code is data. That's kind of the whole point of computers. If you can never write data that can be executed, you can never run a program. That's not to say some of these schemes (W^X and so on) aren't useful, nor to say that they're not kind of a buzzkill (self-modifying code is fun!).
When all is said and done, just as you can't legislate morality, you can't enforce good programming.
Doesn't matter how rude or belligerent or whatever you are to a cop -- it ain't illegal. Some cop comes up to you and demands ID, or even asks your name, you should be able to tell him "What's it to ya, ya lousy screw?" and flip him off, if you want, without repercussion.
It's a cop's job to deal with every kind of situation. If you're so thin-skinned that some meanie insulting you or being rude to you causes you to alter your behavior in any way, you shouldn't be a cop.
The TiVo remote is indeed well-designed and more or less a joy to use. However, it seems to suffer a problem pandemic to all remotes: the eventual mysterious "buttons need ever-larger amounts of pressure to make electrical contact" problem. I tried taking it apart (which, of course, no remote is designed for), breaking the tiny points of the circuit board at the front. I washed the contacts anyway and put it back together, only to discover that the buttons now worked well, but the visible-light LED no longer worked. Sigh.
So I ordered a replacement from the TiVo website. Oddly expensive -- $35. Plus, only the translucent blue was available. On top of that, when it came, I discovered it was slightly different from the old remote in form and function. The immediate upshot was that it's slightly longer, which, having gotten used to the good layout so intuitively before, required a period of adjustment to the new positions without having to look or feel for it.
Anwyay. Anyone have a better method to cure (or prevent) that button-mashing problem?
Exactly right -- with onerous government intrusion like this (how about reporting to a central government server that person X at IP address Y is trying to counterfeit currency Z?), everyone will just switch to open source, where they know what they're getting -- legal or not.
Next step: Open source hardware. Printers, scanners, etc., that are user-buildable and -alterable. May become a reality on the ground soon if "3-D printers" proliferate.
(I use scare quotes here because you would almost certainly weigh more on this therapy than off it -- it's just that the weight would be in the form of attractive muscle rather than unattractive fat.)
The first to develop such a magic fat-to-muscle bullet would surely make billions.
Slashdot Mirror
...the bomb. No, I mean: ...for jokes galore. Consider:
"Like the original, except everyone's disappointed with it."
"Reloaded? More like reBOOTed! BURN!"
"Here comes Desktop Agent Clippy Smith! 'It looks like you're trying to type a letter, Mister Anderson...'"
"XP has you!"
And so on.
...the Omega 13 from Galaxy Quest.
Well...I'd be able to get major numbers in SETI@Home...um...
Video encoding? (Now, where'd I put that parallel-processing version of AVISynth?)
Rent it out to a university?
Program it to solve chess and leave it going till it does?
Get a decent frame rate in any FPS, once and for all? (Note to self: develop parallel-processing graphics card.)
Ok, bad choice of words. Shoulda said "auto-mind-nullification".
My mom, for a long time, didn't realize you could (or maybe just never bothered to) type an URL directly into the browser; she would always put the main component of the name into a search (being that she was on MSN, that search was always MSN Search). It was kinda hit-or-miss, but she still did it. Most of the time, on Google, this will work fine (even better if you use the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button) -- leading me to believe there are far more people out there as you describe than we may realize.
The ATMs at my bank (Washington Mutual) has a big bright flashing green light strip just below the lip of the card slot. (Also at the cash slot.) If something were in front of it, you'd notice either (1) the lack of the light (especially effective if there's more than one machine there to compare, as is usually the case), or (2) the odd way there seems to be a light flashing inside the card reader. You'd either have to make the add-on light-tight, or do all the machines, or both. Or just rely on people being clueless, which in fact may be a good bet.
On a side tangent, we need to come up with better names for things. ATM is a lousy name. PIN is a lousy name. SUV is a lousy name (should be PCV -- Penile Compensation Vehicle). VCR, DVD, ATV, PVR, and any other TLA are all lousy names. When I visited Moscow, I found that an ATM is called a "bankomat". Infinitely better, and avoids people referring to an "ATM machine" -- "Automatic Teller Machine Machine". No more TLAs, marketing departments. Seriously.
P.S. My bank's ATMs have a refreshingly breezy style for their text -- "Feed me your envelope", "Hi! Let's get started", "Anything else?", and so on. They avoid saying "PIN" (much less "PIN number") by saying "secret code". Makes you feel like a spy and stuff. Kinda.
In December, when my wife and I went to the local INS (sorry, BCIS) office to get her green card, in addition to the other mounds and mounds of ridiculous security procedures that cost everyone a half-hour of their lives, the security guards were inspecting cell phones for lenses and asking "can this phone take pictures?". I wonder what sort of incredible state secret you're going to uncover by taking snapshots inside a waiting room for an hour.
Well. That was...disappointing. Here I was, waiting for him to go to the stratosphere, but he just went...about how high you would expect. Feh.
(Still, you deserve +1 Informative for posting the link.)
...days! Yee haw!
This also goes for cell-phone 911.
Integrate GPS into the hardware (user-defeatable of course) to report your exact location (via separate data packets) when you dial 911.
Voila. Better than the real thing.
You're right, as far as I can tell. At some level, code is data. That's kind of the whole point of computers. If you can never write data that can be executed, you can never run a program. That's not to say some of these schemes (W^X and so on) aren't useful, nor to say that they're not kind of a buzzkill (self-modifying code is fun!).
When all is said and done, just as you can't legislate morality, you can't enforce good programming.
That's unbelievable! Is that the real audio? A JET ENGINE??
I'm almost more inclined to believe it's all a CG put-on.
Meh.
If electric motors, bleeding electric motors are harmful, we may as well all give up and move back into our great^1000 grandparent's caves.
Next dire warning, please.
...you will be assimilated.
Just kidding.
Doesn't matter how rude or belligerent or whatever you are to a cop -- it ain't illegal. Some cop comes up to you and demands ID, or even asks your name, you should be able to tell him "What's it to ya, ya lousy screw?" and flip him off, if you want, without repercussion.
It's a cop's job to deal with every kind of situation. If you're so thin-skinned that some meanie insulting you or being rude to you causes you to alter your behavior in any way, you shouldn't be a cop.
Suck.com.
Then: Hilarious, thoughtful, well-written social commentary on a daily basis.
Now: Stuck in eternal reruns.
Sad, really.
That sounds like Commie talk, bub. Let's see some identification.
Atario
Clearance level: plaid
--Kelso
The TiVo remote is indeed well-designed and more or less a joy to use. However, it seems to suffer a problem pandemic to all remotes: the eventual mysterious "buttons need ever-larger amounts of pressure to make electrical contact" problem. I tried taking it apart (which, of course, no remote is designed for), breaking the tiny points of the circuit board at the front. I washed the contacts anyway and put it back together, only to discover that the buttons now worked well, but the visible-light LED no longer worked. Sigh.
So I ordered a replacement from the TiVo website. Oddly expensive -- $35. Plus, only the translucent blue was available. On top of that, when it came, I discovered it was slightly different from the old remote in form and function. The immediate upshot was that it's slightly longer, which, having gotten used to the good layout so intuitively before, required a period of adjustment to the new positions without having to look or feel for it.
Anwyay. Anyone have a better method to cure (or prevent) that button-mashing problem?
Discuss.
Exactly right -- with onerous government intrusion like this (how about reporting to a central government server that person X at IP address Y is trying to counterfeit currency Z?), everyone will just switch to open source, where they know what they're getting -- legal or not.
Next step: Open source hardware. Printers, scanners, etc., that are user-buildable and -alterable. May become a reality on the ground soon if "3-D printers" proliferate.
"Weight loss", anyone?
(I use scare quotes here because you would almost certainly weigh more on this therapy than off it -- it's just that the weight would be in the form of attractive muscle rather than unattractive fat.)
The first to develop such a magic fat-to-muscle bullet would surely make billions.
Hey, don't knock toilet unclogging. Plumbers make serious dollars.