Since when is it the job of the government to promote open source?
Since when was it the responsibility of government to promote open roads? Or electrical distribution? Or community waste disposal and water systems? Why are commodity services limited to just those things?
Explain how software, like an operating system, or something like internet access is any different? At a certain point those things should become commodity items...provided they're not being supported by a government enforced monopoly, like we have now.
Our economy has moved from things we make to brainshare products. The only way we can sustain a brainshare economy is by making artificial markets that allow the distributor to maintain artificially high prices. At some point we have to encourage our economy to move away from a brainshare base back to making things. Part of that will be knocking the props out IRP artificial monopolies we have now and letting things like software prices float. Actually, we'll have to do it sooner or later anyway. We'll be forced into it by the rest of the world. The real decision is do we do it in a controlled fashion we devise, or have it jammed...in some orifice...by the rest of the world? Oh, yeah, it's going to happen.
Some of this applies to drug research besides software. We get more bang for our buck having government do some of the research and then let drug companies competitively deliver the discoveries. We'd save billions in prescription costs. And drug companies would still be free to do their own R&D for specialty products.
The authors were spot on. It's a little dry but I'd heartily suggest RTFA. Very enlightening.
The move has placed the IT staff in cubicles that all face inward and lack, obviously, the ability to lock their doors at night.
I've noticed when people get booted out of offices into cubes there's a tendency to feel like they've been demoted. The security issue is digging fairly deep for a thin excuse to cover bruised feelings. You document to the higher ups how a lack of physical security threatens network security, that programmers working in noisy spaces are less productive, then move on. You've covered your ass, now play the hand you've been dealt. And, just a note of sympathy, working in cubicles does absolutely suck ass.
Here's what a group of us working on a development project did under very similar circumstances. Instead of letting them put us in the cubical farm we found part of the warehouse sectioned off with chain link fence and put our cube walls around the inside of one side and white boards along the outside of the opposite side, leaving the inside completely open. Instead of desks we used some rolling tables the warehouse people had left over and hauled in sofas and a loveseat we salvaged from the garbage pickup. We hooked up a TV in one corner, had a frig and microwave and even enough room outside the fence for a basketball hoop.
That was, by far, the best work space I've ever worked in. We were comfortable, headphones could block out the warehouse forklift traffic (and as a bonus the phones) and visitors had to clatter the latch on the chain link fence to get in. Not only did we finish the job on schedule but by the end of the project I could drain a 15 foot jumper with my eyes closed. I noticed we would be there very late at night. Sometimes working, sometimes playing netrek, sometimes because we fell asleep on the couch. Rarely were we in a big hurry to get out. It was comfortable if a bit drafty in the winter when they were loading/unloading but tolerable.
It really got me thinking about the whole concept of an office and what it should be like. Cubicles should be packaged up and shipped overseas to terrorist organizations. That would be guaranteed to kill any passion and smother any ambition they happen to have. That warehouse space was open, comfortable and encouraged more interaction between the project team. It wasn't private, but that wasn't a big handicap to productivity. We were actually more productive in the relaxed atmosphere.
If I ever start another company, that's just what it's going to be like. Not the first one to have an office like that. I got the idea from Chiat Day. Don't know if it's still like that but their office in Seattle used to be open with rolling tables and couches instead of traditional business furniture.
I can rent it for 3 dollars or wait until it hits the bargain bin at the Wal-Marte' for the same price.
Sony used to be a great company, now they're just a greedy, pathetic corporate troll. The Gollum of the entertainment industry. They wants to copy me preccccioussssssses. Nasty, stinky customers!
Why is anyone, no matter how reasonable they try to be, a zealot of they adopt a pro open source stance? I like OSS developers working for Linux for the simple reason the more apps available for OSS, the wider the adoption.
Windows doesn't need the help. On the other hand being able to use the same apps on any platform is pretty nice. But when it comes to donations, if I'm going to donate money, it's going to be for open source development.
Uhhhh, just a guess, but maybe because your customers are paying you to supply that pipe? You're charging customers for internet access, now you want to charge providers for delivering the content?
Lots of luck with that. But he sure has some Darl McBride size balls for trying.
after blind and other visually impaired state workers raised concerns.
I didn't realize that the MSFT reps shoveling thousands in campaign contributions to MA legislators were visually impaired state workers. But I guess it looks bad to say the senate was holding hearings because one of their big donors doesn't like what the state is doing. So they hold up those poor visually impaired state workers as the reason they're suddenly so concerned. Never mind the format has nothing to do with whether they can read a document on the computer screen, what relevance do facts have when there's money on the line?
Probably the same state workers that the senators bump out of the way while heading out to lunch with one of their good buddy lobbyists.
vendors from BEA to Microsoft are eager to take up the blunt cudgel of subscription licensing, which merely asserts that, if you don't pay up again at the end of the year, your software stops working.
I can see where they could start thinking they could get away with it. MSFT users take a porking and keep coming back for more. They pay for an operating system, prove they own it to get it working, then pay for an anti-virus and anti-spyware subscription to keep it working right. In the business setting I'll watch customers pay for MSFT licenses, then find out they have to buy this or that CAL on top of it, depending how they're using it. It's insane, but they have their passive aggressive little snit fit and write the check.
Somewhere this is going to hit a wall. Open source alternatives are getting better, big software companies are boning their customers at every opportunity. You have to think there's a tipping point where customers will say this far and no more. Some have already gotten there, more consider it all the time. OpenOffice, despite its flaws, is a very functional alternative.
I'm wondering if it will keep happening little by little or if there will be a big bang type migration that will cause big software to start looking at their price points, probably way beyond the too late point? I have a hard time not believing that somewhere, not far away, this tendency to keep porking the customer is going to come back and bite them on the ass.
I remember a DoE contract researcher years ago who was putting so much pressure on his techs they were giving him the results he wanted to see. But as long as he kept getting grants the lab was willing to cover it up, even though the director of QA/QC department was provided with enough detailed results to demonstrate the scientist was presenting falsified data. It wasn't just a little tweak here or there, these were completely bogus results.
For going to the trouble of turning in the fraudulent research the tech had their phone tapped (which the lab later denied), was transferred out to a dingy little building in the middle of the desert to do menial tasks and just generally harassed until they eventually got another job.
There's so much pressure for getting grant money that producing the results that will get more grant money is pretty much the norm, espeically in contract research. Everyone likes to think science is pure, but you're deluded if you think that. It's all about making sure you've got enough charge codes to bill your time and supporting that 200% overhead rate.
Basically, Microsoft is threatening to take their marbles and go home if they don't get the ruling they want.
It will be really interesting to see who blinks first. This has wider implications than just Windows, this is a test case for how much the rest of the world respects our brain share products. They make things, solid tangible things, we have up to 80% of our value in brain share products. Solid things have a certain intrinsic value, now we get to find out the value of our brain share economy. What's stopping Korea from saying, "Okay, would you like to see our new version of Kia WIndows? We're quite proud of it." The same thing goes for drug patents and other over-priced software products.
It's also interesting to see MSFT threatening a trade war with a foreign country. A country that the US owes a LOT of money. Korea and China buy a whole lot of the national debt we're using to fight the folly in Iraq and pay for the natural disaster rebuilding. We're trillions of dollars in debt and Japan, Korea and China own the bulk of those markers.
This is going to be really interesting. MSFT may win this one, I imagine there will be a lot of diplomatic weasels working in the background. It really depends on whether Korea thinks it's worth pushing.
But the hand writing on the wall is saying the day will come when some American company like MSFT is going to start flexin' and that foreign power is going to tell them to go stuff. And the US government isn't going to come to the rescue because of the very certain knowledge that it's no longer a guarantee that we could win a trade war, especially with countries that make everything we now depend on.
Economic Pearl Harbor is going to happen, it's just a matter of when.
As much as three-quarters of the value of publicly traded companies in America comes from intangible assets, up from around 40% in the early 1980s.
We've farmed our manufacturing capacity out to countries that do not necessarily share our best interests. Our business economy is no longer based on things we make, but on brain share products.
I'm not an economist but from a common sense perspective that just seems like a really shaky foundation for an economy. Why would the countries that make everything we buy give a rat's fanny about respecting our brain share assets? What are going to do if China starts pirating Disney movies? Or if they get tired of monkey boy and decide to field a chinese version of Windows? Threaten them with economic retaliation? Good luck with that, they own us. We take our money and buy things they produce, many time with machines we shipped over there so they could do it cheaper. Then they take our money and buy tangible things like property, oil, and natural resources.
The feeling I get is their economy is based on things with some intrinsic value while ours is fundamentally based on things with very little intrinsic value.
Myth Busters," said the experiment at the Hunters Point Shipyard showed that Archimedes' death ray was most likely a myth.
That comes out the day after I have the winning bid for the Archimedes Death Ray on eBay.
You'd have to live in Madison to appreciate this
on
Zombie Lurch
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· Score: 1
What a great idea for a Halloween event. It would also be a great place to grab some guerrilla footage for your next homemade zombie movie.
I really like the zombie flash mob idea, too. Wonder if that would work for independent filmmaking when you needed a bunch of extras? The extra call flash mob, not necessarily a zombie mob, maybe you just need some extras.
We are now. I know many older Americans skipping or cutting down on their meds because they can't afford them. People without insurance can't afford brand name drugs as it is. The reality is people are dying now because they can't afford insurance and proper health care, including some of those 500 dollar prescriptions.
Perhaps you meant "many, many drugs for people who have insurance will never get developed." Which might be true. All in all, I think having fewer drugs more widely affordable would be a step ahead of where we are today.
If those windfall profits were actually going into R&D, I'd have more sympathy for the big name drug makers. But the bulk of those profits are going toward enhancing shareholder value, making rich people even more rich. Otherwise how can drug makers ship drugs to Canada who then sells them back to our own citizens for less than we can buy them here? Canadian pharmacies are still making a profit. The only way that math works is the certain knowledge that we're getting boned on drug prices.
What you say is true from one narrow perspective but not on the macro scale. Drugs are likely only to be the first patents ignored on the world market. Technology might be next. Perhaps you've noticed the really hot tech doesn't premiere here anymore. The new buzz phrase is "No word on when it will be available in the US." Maybe never.
As our patent system becomes ever more litigious and retarded more countries are going to be tempted to bust technology patents for use in their own country.
And, of course, we can't take on patent reform without first making sure all those people in bankruptcy because of catastrophic medical expenses go to credit counseling and pay back their credit card bills and that we shield those poor gun makers from legal liability. Those are obviously hugely important compared to poor people dying, and old people we're almost dead anyway, but I'm sure our Republican servants of the people will get to that patent thing just any day now.
Just a little while ago RIM lost their appeal of someone's stupid patent of a product someone else got to market first. It's so retarded.
Now our government is wrapped around the axle about the Miers nomination, the war in Iraq, energy and budget issues. Another hurricane is steaming toward Florida, the bird flu is spreading everywhere so nothing is going to change for quite a while. I don't think Congress is going to be able to agree on anything significant, and most definitely not patent reform. Even though it's desperately needed.
On another point the bird that's jumped over to humans kills half the people it infects. After it sweeps around the planet there may not be enough of us left to buy the services those companies are suing each other over.
It is both disappointing and unsettling that ABC would embark on a new -- and competitive -- network program distribution partnership without the fundamental courtesy of consultation
You mean like the rest of us got used to the idea of having our jobs outsourced to east Crapistan? I don't remember any consultation for that, do you guys?
So what's stopping you from forming a local group and developing your own content? Maybe that idea would occur to you if you weren't so busy whining about the world moving on.
This is what capitalism is all about. New technolgies arise and induce change. The market adapts and either business adapts or goes the way of RCA. You can either keep whining to the parent network, hoping they'll throw you a bone to get you to shut up. Or you can start understanding the new environment and content creation and get off your big, fat rolling in cash TV ass and learn to operate in the new reality.
Mickos is being denounced as a traitor by noisy fanatics in the open source software community because last month he dared to make a deal with SCO Group
I expressed a very calm concern to MySQL that partnering with SCO in any fashion gives them an illusion of legitimacy that SCO does not deserve. How does that make me a "noisy fanatic"?
Or does anyone expressing disapproval of the SCO deal qualify for that label? Isn't that being a little Republican? Along the same vein as accusing anyone not supporting the war in Iraq as being unpatriotic?
Like any other business, if MySQL is in any kind of trouble, they're most likely there because of their own bad decisions or bad luck. In this case it seems more like a combination of bad judgment and bad luck. MySQL was doing quite well for a while.
My educated guess is they are worried about China, but even our aging Los Angeles class attack boats far outstrip their old Soviet hardware.
Educated guess? Your education is 15 years out of date.
Read up on the Yuan class diesel electric submarine and the phrase AIP. A lot of people still think diesel electric boats are something out of Das Boot. New de boats are a serious threat, especially in their own waters.
Despite the fact that de subs are very real threat, surface ships can be attacked by tube lauched torpedoes or tubed launched missiles. At longer range it's far more likely to be a missile threat. Just not sure why we're spending the time and research dollars on torpedo protection for surface ships when a) there are other more practical ways to address that threat and b) it ignores bigger threats that are more likely in modern engagements.
It's not the use as a defensive system that concerns environmentalists, it's the testing of the system in open ocean. Which could explain some of the whale and dolphin beachings over the last couple years. So it's an environmental threat with very little likelihood of practical application for a threat of diminishing potential.
Besides, the Chinese own our manufacturing capacity, they don't need to flip torpedoes at us anymore. All they have to do is cut off our supply of iPods and we'd be begging for mercy inside a week.
And their priority is making sure poor people can't discharge their credit card debt in bankruptcy court. Leave a legal extortion racket in place that costs all of us billions in hidden fees and costs and discourages companies from bringing innovative products to market...
...but make damn sure that trailer trash pays back their VISA bill.
please try to stick to things that can easily be killed with the tip of well-placed soldering iron.
No kidding. Let those plasmids slip into a few stray bacteria and you could have all kinds of fun on your hands. Those proteins don't take the form they do just for the fun of it. They fold certain ways, like a virus, because it's the low energy state.
Okay, spontaneous reconstruction isn't kind of unlikely, but what a way to find out mother nature is a cast iron bitch.
P4 labs usually know what they're doing. Most of them handle some pretty frisky stuff. Still, the 1918 flu was a killer. It infected the young and the healthy and killed them so fast that people had to lock coffins up at night because they were hot theft items.
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Since when was it the responsibility of government to promote open roads? Or electrical distribution? Or community waste disposal and water systems? Why are commodity services limited to just those things?
Explain how software, like an operating system, or something like internet access is any different? At a certain point those things should become commodity items...provided they're not being supported by a government enforced monopoly, like we have now.
Our economy has moved from things we make to brainshare products. The only way we can sustain a brainshare economy is by making artificial markets that allow the distributor to maintain artificially high prices. At some point we have to encourage our economy to move away from a brainshare base back to making things. Part of that will be knocking the props out IRP artificial monopolies we have now and letting things like software prices float. Actually, we'll have to do it sooner or later anyway. We'll be forced into it by the rest of the world. The real decision is do we do it in a controlled fashion we devise, or have it jammed...in some orifice...by the rest of the world? Oh, yeah, it's going to happen.
Some of this applies to drug research besides software. We get more bang for our buck having government do some of the research and then let drug companies competitively deliver the discoveries. We'd save billions in prescription costs. And drug companies would still be free to do their own R&D for specialty products.
The authors were spot on. It's a little dry but I'd heartily suggest RTFA. Very enlightening.
I've noticed when people get booted out of offices into cubes there's a tendency to feel like they've been demoted. The security issue is digging fairly deep for a thin excuse to cover bruised feelings. You document to the higher ups how a lack of physical security threatens network security, that programmers working in noisy spaces are less productive, then move on. You've covered your ass, now play the hand you've been dealt. And, just a note of sympathy, working in cubicles does absolutely suck ass.
Here's what a group of us working on a development project did under very similar circumstances. Instead of letting them put us in the cubical farm we found part of the warehouse sectioned off with chain link fence and put our cube walls around the inside of one side and white boards along the outside of the opposite side, leaving the inside completely open. Instead of desks we used some rolling tables the warehouse people had left over and hauled in sofas and a loveseat we salvaged from the garbage pickup. We hooked up a TV in one corner, had a frig and microwave and even enough room outside the fence for a basketball hoop.
That was, by far, the best work space I've ever worked in. We were comfortable, headphones could block out the warehouse forklift traffic (and as a bonus the phones) and visitors had to clatter the latch on the chain link fence to get in. Not only did we finish the job on schedule but by the end of the project I could drain a 15 foot jumper with my eyes closed. I noticed we would be there very late at night. Sometimes working, sometimes playing netrek, sometimes because we fell asleep on the couch. Rarely were we in a big hurry to get out. It was comfortable if a bit drafty in the winter when they were loading/unloading but tolerable.
It really got me thinking about the whole concept of an office and what it should be like. Cubicles should be packaged up and shipped overseas to terrorist organizations. That would be guaranteed to kill any passion and smother any ambition they happen to have. That warehouse space was open, comfortable and encouraged more interaction between the project team. It wasn't private, but that wasn't a big handicap to productivity. We were actually more productive in the relaxed atmosphere.
If I ever start another company, that's just what it's going to be like. Not the first one to have an office like that. I got the idea from Chiat Day. Don't know if it's still like that but their office in Seattle used to be open with rolling tables and couches instead of traditional business furniture.
No.
I can rent it for 3 dollars or wait until it hits the bargain bin at the Wal-Marte' for the same price.
Sony used to be a great company, now they're just a greedy, pathetic corporate troll. The Gollum of the entertainment industry. They wants to copy me preccccioussssssses. Nasty, stinky customers!
Windows doesn't need the help. On the other hand being able to use the same apps on any platform is pretty nice. But when it comes to donations, if I'm going to donate money, it's going to be for open source development.
Uhhhh, just a guess, but maybe because your customers are paying you to supply that pipe? You're charging customers for internet access, now you want to charge providers for delivering the content?
Lots of luck with that. But he sure has some Darl McBride size balls for trying.
/.ers that go to sci-fi cons now have a 2% better chance of getting laid by an actual earth girl! Wooohooo!
I didn't realize that the MSFT reps shoveling thousands in campaign contributions to MA legislators were visually impaired state workers. But I guess it looks bad to say the senate was holding hearings because one of their big donors doesn't like what the state is doing. So they hold up those poor visually impaired state workers as the reason they're suddenly so concerned. Never mind the format has nothing to do with whether they can read a document on the computer screen, what relevance do facts have when there's money on the line?
Probably the same state workers that the senators bump out of the way while heading out to lunch with one of their good buddy lobbyists.
I can see where they could start thinking they could get away with it. MSFT users take a porking and keep coming back for more. They pay for an operating system, prove they own it to get it working, then pay for an anti-virus and anti-spyware subscription to keep it working right. In the business setting I'll watch customers pay for MSFT licenses, then find out they have to buy this or that CAL on top of it, depending how they're using it. It's insane, but they have their passive aggressive little snit fit and write the check.
Somewhere this is going to hit a wall. Open source alternatives are getting better, big software companies are boning their customers at every opportunity. You have to think there's a tipping point where customers will say this far and no more. Some have already gotten there, more consider it all the time. OpenOffice, despite its flaws, is a very functional alternative.
I'm wondering if it will keep happening little by little or if there will be a big bang type migration that will cause big software to start looking at their price points, probably way beyond the too late point? I have a hard time not believing that somewhere, not far away, this tendency to keep porking the customer is going to come back and bite them on the ass.
For going to the trouble of turning in the fraudulent research the tech had their phone tapped (which the lab later denied), was transferred out to a dingy little building in the middle of the desert to do menial tasks and just generally harassed until they eventually got another job.
There's so much pressure for getting grant money that producing the results that will get more grant money is pretty much the norm, espeically in contract research. Everyone likes to think science is pure, but you're deluded if you think that. It's all about making sure you've got enough charge codes to bill your time and supporting that 200% overhead rate.
It's a glitch in the Matrix. It usually means they've changed something...
It will be really interesting to see who blinks first. This has wider implications than just Windows, this is a test case for how much the rest of the world respects our brain share products. They make things, solid tangible things, we have up to 80% of our value in brain share products. Solid things have a certain intrinsic value, now we get to find out the value of our brain share economy. What's stopping Korea from saying, "Okay, would you like to see our new version of Kia WIndows? We're quite proud of it." The same thing goes for drug patents and other over-priced software products.
It's also interesting to see MSFT threatening a trade war with a foreign country. A country that the US owes a LOT of money. Korea and China buy a whole lot of the national debt we're using to fight the folly in Iraq and pay for the natural disaster rebuilding. We're trillions of dollars in debt and Japan, Korea and China own the bulk of those markers.
This is going to be really interesting. MSFT may win this one, I imagine there will be a lot of diplomatic weasels working in the background. It really depends on whether Korea thinks it's worth pushing.
But the hand writing on the wall is saying the day will come when some American company like MSFT is going to start flexin' and that foreign power is going to tell them to go stuff. And the US government isn't going to come to the rescue because of the very certain knowledge that it's no longer a guarantee that we could win a trade war, especially with countries that make everything we now depend on.
Economic Pearl Harbor is going to happen, it's just a matter of when.
That this information gets released AFTER the act is extended.
We've farmed our manufacturing capacity out to countries that do not necessarily share our best interests. Our business economy is no longer based on things we make, but on brain share products.
I'm not an economist but from a common sense perspective that just seems like a really shaky foundation for an economy. Why would the countries that make everything we buy give a rat's fanny about respecting our brain share assets? What are going to do if China starts pirating Disney movies? Or if they get tired of monkey boy and decide to field a chinese version of Windows? Threaten them with economic retaliation? Good luck with that, they own us. We take our money and buy things they produce, many time with machines we shipped over there so they could do it cheaper. Then they take our money and buy tangible things like property, oil, and natural resources.
The feeling I get is their economy is based on things with some intrinsic value while ours is fundamentally based on things with very little intrinsic value.
What are your nuclear weapons and an Army of millions in comparison to our monkey dancing, chair throwing chief executive?!!
How do you say "monkey dance" in Chinese?
That comes out the day after I have the winning bid for the Archimedes Death Ray on eBay.
I really like the zombie flash mob idea, too. Wonder if that would work for independent filmmaking when you needed a bunch of extras? The extra call flash mob, not necessarily a zombie mob, maybe you just need some extras.
It's a thought.
We are now. I know many older Americans skipping or cutting down on their meds because they can't afford them. People without insurance can't afford brand name drugs as it is. The reality is people are dying now because they can't afford insurance and proper health care, including some of those 500 dollar prescriptions.
Perhaps you meant "many, many drugs for people who have insurance will never get developed." Which might be true. All in all, I think having fewer drugs more widely affordable would be a step ahead of where we are today.
If those windfall profits were actually going into R&D, I'd have more sympathy for the big name drug makers. But the bulk of those profits are going toward enhancing shareholder value, making rich people even more rich. Otherwise how can drug makers ship drugs to Canada who then sells them back to our own citizens for less than we can buy them here? Canadian pharmacies are still making a profit. The only way that math works is the certain knowledge that we're getting boned on drug prices.
What you say is true from one narrow perspective but not on the macro scale. Drugs are likely only to be the first patents ignored on the world market. Technology might be next. Perhaps you've noticed the really hot tech doesn't premiere here anymore. The new buzz phrase is "No word on when it will be available in the US." Maybe never.
As our patent system becomes ever more litigious and retarded more countries are going to be tempted to bust technology patents for use in their own country.
And, of course, we can't take on patent reform without first making sure all those people in bankruptcy because of catastrophic medical expenses go to credit counseling and pay back their credit card bills and that we shield those poor gun makers from legal liability. Those are obviously hugely important compared to poor people dying, and old people we're almost dead anyway, but I'm sure our Republican servants of the people will get to that patent thing just any day now.
Now our government is wrapped around the axle about the Miers nomination, the war in Iraq, energy and budget issues. Another hurricane is steaming toward Florida, the bird flu is spreading everywhere so nothing is going to change for quite a while. I don't think Congress is going to be able to agree on anything significant, and most definitely not patent reform. Even though it's desperately needed.
On another point the bird that's jumped over to humans kills half the people it infects. After it sweeps around the planet there may not be enough of us left to buy the services those companies are suing each other over.
See, there's always a bright side.
You mean like the rest of us got used to the idea of having our jobs outsourced to east Crapistan? I don't remember any consultation for that, do you guys?
So what's stopping you from forming a local group and developing your own content? Maybe that idea would occur to you if you weren't so busy whining about the world moving on.
This is what capitalism is all about. New technolgies arise and induce change. The market adapts and either business adapts or goes the way of RCA. You can either keep whining to the parent network, hoping they'll throw you a bone to get you to shut up. Or you can start understanding the new environment and content creation and get off your big, fat rolling in cash TV ass and learn to operate in the new reality.
I expressed a very calm concern to MySQL that partnering with SCO in any fashion gives them an illusion of legitimacy that SCO does not deserve. How does that make me a "noisy fanatic"?
Or does anyone expressing disapproval of the SCO deal qualify for that label? Isn't that being a little Republican? Along the same vein as accusing anyone not supporting the war in Iraq as being unpatriotic?
Like any other business, if MySQL is in any kind of trouble, they're most likely there because of their own bad decisions or bad luck. In this case it seems more like a combination of bad judgment and bad luck. MySQL was doing quite well for a while.
Educated guess? Your education is 15 years out of date.
Read up on the Yuan class diesel electric submarine and the phrase AIP. A lot of people still think diesel electric boats are something out of Das Boot. New de boats are a serious threat, especially in their own waters.
Despite the fact that de subs are very real threat, surface ships can be attacked by tube lauched torpedoes or tubed launched missiles. At longer range it's far more likely to be a missile threat. Just not sure why we're spending the time and research dollars on torpedo protection for surface ships when a) there are other more practical ways to address that threat and b) it ignores bigger threats that are more likely in modern engagements.
It's not the use as a defensive system that concerns environmentalists, it's the testing of the system in open ocean. Which could explain some of the whale and dolphin beachings over the last couple years. So it's an environmental threat with very little likelihood of practical application for a threat of diminishing potential.
Besides, the Chinese own our manufacturing capacity, they don't need to flip torpedoes at us anymore. All they have to do is cut off our supply of iPods and we'd be begging for mercy inside a week.
...but make damn sure that trailer trash pays back their VISA bill.
I think all this demonstrates is that to MSFT you're not just a customer, you're a revenue stream! And MSFT users just keep taking it. It's amazing.
No kidding. Let those plasmids slip into a few stray bacteria and you could have all kinds of fun on your hands. Those proteins don't take the form they do just for the fun of it. They fold certain ways, like a virus, because it's the low energy state.
Okay, spontaneous reconstruction isn't kind of unlikely, but what a way to find out mother nature is a cast iron bitch.
P4 labs usually know what they're doing. Most of them handle some pretty frisky stuff. Still, the 1918 flu was a killer. It infected the young and the healthy and killed them so fast that people had to lock coffins up at night because they were hot theft items.