Been there... done that... it's not hard to not be intimidated.
Realize that their beliefs are just that... their beliefs...
I'm an Agnostic that went through Catholic school, and I was one of three people out of five hundred that did not go up for communion during the mandatory masses... Amazingly enough, I didn't feel intimidated at all...
I've done the same thing at weddings, at baptisms (Born again fundie church... interesting experience...), and at various different Christian churches...
The rote and ritual cause me no pain, and minimal discomfort (Keep the pews where they belong! In Irish Pubs!)...
I personally have never understood the statement of being uncomfortable with people praying, perhaps it has to do with the fact that I am secure in my faith, perhaps it has to do with the fact that I was originally raised Roman Catholic, perhaps it has to do with poking around at various religions when deciding which fit me the best...
Right, I'll get right on giving users the ability to install new applications that I'm told "they need to do their jobs", as soon as you can educate all the users how not to install those other *necessary* apps such as CoolWebSearch, and 5000 smileys, and New.Net. Until you do that, how about I not let them install things on their machines?
I will gladly help them get what they actually *need* to do their jobs, most of those requests take under half an hour...
Instead of branching all over... I'll just append here... yep, I'm cynical... I accept it... and I agree that the Rule of Law is a cornerstone of any representative government... (Pet Peeve: The United States of America is *not* a Democracy, it is a Republic.) My comment was probably born more of a growing intolerance of ignorance then anything else... to have someone say:
"everyone is equally important. Something about all men (as in, mankind) being created equally or something."
And not even realize the difference between the two clauses ("everyone is equally important." and "being created equally") just irks me...
Nephilium
(And apologies if this dupes... it appears slashdot ate my first attempt to post this.)
Instead of branching all over... I'll just append here... yep, I'm cynical... I accept it... and I agree that the Rule of Law is a cornerstone of any representative government... (Pet Peeve: The United States of America is *not* a Democracy, it is a Representative Republic.) My comment was probably born more of a growing intolerance of ignorance then anything else... to have someone say:
"everyone is equally important. Something about all men (as in, mankind) being created equally or something."
And not even realize the difference between the two clauses ("everyone is equally important." and "being created equally") just irks me...
Everyone is not equal... you referenced this in the last line of your post... everyone is CREATED equal. What they do after that determines if they're important, meaningless, rich, or poor.
How about the idea of whatever the hell I do on my own time is no one's business but mine? If I were to spend every night at the pub, drinking until I can't stand up, what business is it of my employer? (Assuming that I'm not late to work, and my performance doesn't suffer.)
My employer's hold over me begins and ends with the time I'm scheduled. What I do on my own time should be no concern of theirs.
And for the other question: When I purchase a CD from you, am I purchasing the physical media, or a license to the music on the media? If you prevent me from copying the music off of the CD, will you provide me a replacement copy (for a modest fee of course) if/when my CD gets damaged/stolen/lost? If your song is played on the radio, what rights (if any) do I have to record it and listen to it again? Now mind you, most of the bands that I like support bootlegging their concerts (and have some songs that have not yet been released on CD) because to them it's free advertising, and they're not going to get the big top 40 radio play...
Also, just an analogy correction, it would be more of purchasing a video, the sneaking into the movie is more like sneaking into a concert...
Ctrl-PgUp: Go one tab to the left
Ctrl-PgDown: Go one tab to the right
And what do you mean about losing a whole setup just because of a browser crash, there's extensions that fix that. Much better then having the whole of explorer need to be restarted because of a browser crash.
The problem with the US's political parties is the existence of the electoral college. The President -- head of the executive branch of government (which is currently arguably the most powerful branch) -- is elected through the electoral college, a system by which each state selects a group of electors to go and cast votes for President on behalf of the people. In 48 out of 50 states, all electors go to whichever candidate gets the most votes in that state. An in-depth history is here.
I wouldn't say it's a problem... it should be yet another check and balance system. IIRC there is no rule in the Constitution that says how a state must choose it's electors. As of right now, all but one (I think... Maine); go by whoever wins the popular vote in the state, wins the electoral votes. But a state could decide that the governer or state legislature just chooses the electors. Of course, this would have to be ratified through the state...
Of course, I'm also all for getting rid of the direct election of Senators... and re-reading the 9th and 10th amendment... but I'm a freak that way...
Remember... we are geeks... sometimes it can be better that a sequal isn't made rather then having the franchise we know and love corrupted. (See reference: Deus Ex; Star Wars; Star Trek)
Personally, I think Bethesda went downhill... I much preferred the original Arena and Daggerfall then Morrowind, and I'm not even going to mention Battlespire.
Meanwhile... I await some screen-shots, a demo, and a wildly inaccurate release date (and to know what song they're using for the voice over intro...)
And I hope that it's not first person... they could even use the same engine, as long as it's got good writing, I'd be happy...
I know that this idea of increasing the limit has been kicked out in at least one column by Jonah Goldberg (don't have the link handy now, but it should be on National Review). This also goes hand in hand with ideas such as the Enumerated Powers Act (every law congress passes must point out where in the Constitution allows them to pass the law) and the idea of Federalization (those pesky ninth and tenth amendments). This also contains the interesting idea that Congressional gridlock is good. How many *good* laws have come out of Congress in the past ten to twenty years, how many horrible laws?
Nephilium
"I meant," said Iplsore bitterly, "what is there in this world that makes living worthwhile?" Death thought about it. "CATS," he said eventually, "CATS ARE NICE." -- Death is obviously not a dog person Terry Pratchett, Sourcery
Yep, and this is one of the things that pissed me off about the Libertarians in the last election. I look over my choices, and see one and only one Libertarian on the whole ballot, Badnarik. None for local, none for state, none for congress. Just President.
When the party of small government ignores the smaller units of government, they deserve to lose.
Nephilium
A desire not to butt into other peoples business is at least 80of all human wisdom. -- Jubal Harshaw in Stranger in a strange land
Now it may take 3 hours to install an OS and apps if you're sitting there watching everything churn (Oooohh... blue bars moving across a screen...). But I (and I guess most here), will click on the Install button, and once we see blue bars start moving, go work and play on another machine while the blue bars move.
It also depends on what apps you're installing. Installing and patching the games is what takes the longest time for me to setup a new machine...
Nephilium
Simony's eyes gleamed with the gleam of a man who had seen the future and found it covered with armour plating. -- (Terry Pratchett, Small Gods)
Well I know (at least MAME) has the base ROM, then all of the alternatives listed, so you can play all of the variants, including the "pirate" variants.
Yep, we will consider the processor and memory limitaitons, but I'll also consider the price point. I'm not willing to drop almost $1000 (US) to have a Mac to play around with. But for $500, I'll consider it. (Alright, we'll make it $580 to bump the memory up to 512... I'm not that masochistic...:) ) You can't even find an old ebay-ed Mac for that much.
The size and noise level (supposedly) are both other little perks that make me interested in it. I'm also wondering how well something like this would work as a little file server or firewall. (Yes I know, I could build a cheaper PC compatible to do it, but I wouldn't be able to get something that small/quiet (supposedly) easily.)
Do I think it will be a Mini-Mac in every house? Nope, do I think it's a swank and nifty little toy I may need to pick up? Yep.
The Mac Mini is aimed clearly at PC users looking to switch, but featurewise it is a disappointment.
I think you've got the target audience wrong... I'm guessing that we're the target audience. Not the mainstream computer user; but rather, the geeks who keep computers working. I know that I wouldn't mind picking one of these up as a second box to play around with and learn OSX. I will say that you left out some information in your comparison:
1) OS Cost not factored in. Unless you're assuming that the Windows XP copy would be pirated (an understandable assumption)
2) The volume of the Mac Mini (that needs to be reversed, henceforth, it is the Mini-Mac) is listed in the description of the product (6.5" x 6.5" x 2"; 16.5 cm x 16.5 cm x 5.1 cm)
Pretty much, it's a cheap Mac that I'm interested in picking up... (especially since I need to learn how to fix my mom's new iBook G4...)
But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong...
Nephilium
What I did promote was to RTFM. Manufacturers will never provide systems that are secure out of the box. This would create an abundance of returned items that supposedly "don't work." The problem lies within consumers not reading the damn manual. Most consumers don't know that security measures are available and/or needed, let alone eager enough to read a paragraph or two in order to learn how to set them up. Therefore, my simple hack only prompted my neighbors to read a paragraph or two, whereupon they learned how insecure their situation was and decided by themselves to change.
The problem is that the actual manual (at least for LinkSys) and the quickstart sheet specifically specify NOT to enable WEP. IIRC, it also never says to turn broadcast off, it just mentions that if you change the SSID that you will need to plug that information into your wireless card. It was one of scary quickstart guide.
Of course, I was hoping one of my neighbors had gotten broadband and a wireless network, and followed these splendid directions. It could have saved me some money...:)
And if you want to sample a nice collection of other authors that will already have books on the shelves, the Legends series (edited by Robert Silverberg) is a very good selection. Each one of the two (hardcover) books has a short story/novella from an author with a series being worked on or completed. Each of the stories stands outside the direct continuity of the series, and adds more background information about them.
The first one has King, Goodkind, Card, and Jordan amongst others. The second one has Gaiman, Brooks, Martin, and others.
They're a great introduction to picking new authors up.
Slashdot Mirror
Been there... done that... it's not hard to not be intimidated.
Realize that their beliefs are just that... their beliefs...
I'm an Agnostic that went through Catholic school, and I was one of three people out of five hundred that did not go up for communion during the mandatory masses... Amazingly enough, I didn't feel intimidated at all...
I've done the same thing at weddings, at baptisms (Born again fundie church... interesting experience...), and at various different Christian churches...
The rote and ritual cause me no pain, and minimal discomfort (Keep the pews where they belong! In Irish Pubs!)...
I personally have never understood the statement of being uncomfortable with people praying, perhaps it has to do with the fact that I am secure in my faith, perhaps it has to do with the fact that I was originally raised Roman Catholic, perhaps it has to do with poking around at various religions when deciding which fit me the best...
Nephilium
The capital of West Virigina? Probably about $25...
Nephilium
Right, I'll get right on giving users the ability to install new applications that I'm told "they need to do their jobs", as soon as you can educate all the users how not to install those other *necessary* apps such as CoolWebSearch, and 5000 smileys, and New.Net. Until you do that, how about I not let them install things on their machines?
I will gladly help them get what they actually *need* to do their jobs, most of those requests take under half an hour...
Nephilium
Instead of branching all over... I'll just append here... yep, I'm cynical... I accept it... and I agree that the Rule of Law is a cornerstone of any representative government... (Pet Peeve: The United States of America is *not* a Democracy, it is a Republic.) My comment was probably born more of a growing intolerance of ignorance then anything else... to have someone say:
"everyone is equally important. Something about all men (as in, mankind) being created equally or something."
And not even realize the difference between the two clauses ("everyone is equally important." and "being created equally") just irks me...
Nephilium
(And apologies if this dupes... it appears slashdot ate my first attempt to post this.)
Instead of branching all over... I'll just append here... yep, I'm cynical... I accept it... and I agree that the Rule of Law is a cornerstone of any representative government... (Pet Peeve: The United States of America is *not* a Democracy, it is a Representative Republic.) My comment was probably born more of a growing intolerance of ignorance then anything else... to have someone say:
"everyone is equally important. Something about all men (as in, mankind) being created equally or something."
And not even realize the difference between the two clauses ("everyone is equally important." and "being created equally") just irks me...
Nephilium
Everyone is not equal... you referenced this in the last line of your post... everyone is CREATED equal. What they do after that determines if they're important, meaningless, rich, or poor.
Nephilium
How about the idea of whatever the hell I do on my own time is no one's business but mine? If I were to spend every night at the pub, drinking until I can't stand up, what business is it of my employer? (Assuming that I'm not late to work, and my performance doesn't suffer.)
My employer's hold over me begins and ends with the time I'm scheduled. What I do on my own time should be no concern of theirs.
Nephilium
Well... ummmm... you are aware that e-mail isn't a secure communication medium... right?
If you don't want people reading your mail, you have one option. Have people sending you mail, and people you send mail to encrypt it.
Nephilium
So...
:)
You got an MCSE?
Nephilium
An armed society is a polite society. -- Monroe-Alpha in Beyond This Horizon
And for the other question: When I purchase a CD from you, am I purchasing the physical media, or a license to the music on the media? If you prevent me from copying the music off of the CD, will you provide me a replacement copy (for a modest fee of course) if/when my CD gets damaged/stolen/lost? If your song is played on the radio, what rights (if any) do I have to record it and listen to it again? Now mind you, most of the bands that I like support bootlegging their concerts (and have some songs that have not yet been released on CD) because to them it's free advertising, and they're not going to get the big top 40 radio play...
Also, just an analogy correction, it would be more of purchasing a video, the sneaking into the movie is more like sneaking into a concert...
Nephilium
Don't forget about:
Ctrl-PgUp: Go one tab to the left
Ctrl-PgDown: Go one tab to the right
And what do you mean about losing a whole setup just because of a browser crash, there's extensions that fix that. Much better then having the whole of explorer need to be restarted because of a browser crash.
Nephilium
Of course, I'm also all for getting rid of the direct election of Senators... and re-reading the 9th and 10th amendment... but I'm a freak that way...
Nephilium
Remember... we are geeks... sometimes it can be better that a sequal isn't made rather then having the franchise we know and love corrupted. (See reference: Deus Ex; Star Wars; Star Trek)
Personally, I think Bethesda went downhill... I much preferred the original Arena and Daggerfall then Morrowind, and I'm not even going to mention Battlespire.
Meanwhile... I await some screen-shots, a demo, and a wildly inaccurate release date (and to know what song they're using for the voice over intro...)
And I hope that it's not first person... they could even use the same engine, as long as it's got good writing, I'd be happy...
Nephilium
There is no sequel. It's a horrible rumor. Do not look for the sequel, do not pretend there is a sequel. It is not real.
Really... nothing to see here, just a myth.
Nephilium
Doesn't sound that bad to me... someone to feed me... someone to clean up for me... someone to tend to my every need... Ahhhh...
Of course, the lack of language skills and motor skills would suck...
Nephilium
You mean getting a legislature to pass something completely idiotic? Too late, it's been done.
Nephilium
I know that this idea of increasing the limit has been kicked out in at least one column by Jonah Goldberg (don't have the link handy now, but it should be on National Review). This also goes hand in hand with ideas such as the Enumerated Powers Act (every law congress passes must point out where in the Constitution allows them to pass the law) and the idea of Federalization (those pesky ninth and tenth amendments). This also contains the interesting idea that Congressional gridlock is good. How many *good* laws have come out of Congress in the past ten to twenty years, how many horrible laws?
Nephilium
"I meant," said Iplsore bitterly, "what is there in this world that makes living worthwhile?" Death thought about it. "CATS," he said eventually, "CATS ARE NICE." -- Death is obviously not a dog person Terry Pratchett, Sourcery
Yep, and this is one of the things that pissed me off about the Libertarians in the last election. I look over my choices, and see one and only one Libertarian on the whole ballot, Badnarik. None for local, none for state, none for congress. Just President.
When the party of small government ignores the smaller units of government, they deserve to lose.
Nephilium
A desire not to butt into other peoples business is at least 80of all human wisdom. -- Jubal Harshaw in Stranger in a strange land
Now it may take 3 hours to install an OS and apps if you're sitting there watching everything churn (Oooohh... blue bars moving across a screen...). But I (and I guess most here), will click on the Install button, and once we see blue bars start moving, go work and play on another machine while the blue bars move.
It also depends on what apps you're installing. Installing and patching the games is what takes the longest time for me to setup a new machine...
Nephilium
Simony's eyes gleamed with the gleam of a man who had seen the future and found it covered with armour plating. -- (Terry Pratchett, Small Gods)
Sorry... you missed a line in that:
[Sam looks at camera]
Sam: Oh boy!
Nephilium
Well I know (at least MAME) has the base ROM, then all of the alternatives listed, so you can play all of the variants, including the "pirate" variants.
Nephilium
Yep, we will consider the processor and memory limitaitons, but I'll also consider the price point. I'm not willing to drop almost $1000 (US) to have a Mac to play around with. But for $500, I'll consider it. (Alright, we'll make it $580 to bump the memory up to 512... I'm not that masochistic... :) ) You can't even find an old ebay-ed Mac for that much.
The size and noise level (supposedly) are both other little perks that make me interested in it. I'm also wondering how well something like this would work as a little file server or firewall. (Yes I know, I could build a cheaper PC compatible to do it, but I wouldn't be able to get something that small/quiet (supposedly) easily.)
Do I think it will be a Mini-Mac in every house? Nope, do I think it's a swank and nifty little toy I may need to pick up? Yep.
Nephilium
1) OS Cost not factored in. Unless you're assuming that the Windows XP copy would be pirated (an understandable assumption)
2) The volume of the Mac Mini (that needs to be reversed, henceforth, it is the Mini-Mac) is listed in the description of the product (6.5" x 6.5" x 2"; 16.5 cm x 16.5 cm x 5.1 cm)
Pretty much, it's a cheap Mac that I'm interested in picking up... (especially since I need to learn how to fix my mom's new iBook G4...)
But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong...
Nephilium
The problem is that the actual manual (at least for LinkSys) and the quickstart sheet specifically specify NOT to enable WEP. IIRC, it also never says to turn broadcast off, it just mentions that if you change the SSID that you will need to plug that information into your wireless card. It was one of scary quickstart guide.
Of course, I was hoping one of my neighbors had gotten broadband and a wireless network, and followed these splendid directions. It could have saved me some money...
Nephilium
And if you want to sample a nice collection of other authors that will already have books on the shelves, the Legends series (edited by Robert Silverberg) is a very good selection. Each one of the two (hardcover) books has a short story/novella from an author with a series being worked on or completed. Each of the stories stands outside the direct continuity of the series, and adds more background information about them.
The first one has King, Goodkind, Card, and Jordan amongst others.
The second one has Gaiman, Brooks, Martin, and others.
They're a great introduction to picking new authors up.
Nephilium