...or spending it on something equally as retarded like, oh, 400W halogen headlights, neon running lights, and a muffler that makes their piece of shit Civic sound like a sports car?
I think that should be "makes their piece of shit Civic sound like a large lawn mower?"
Murphy's Law is actually "If there are two or more ways to do something, and one of those ways can result in a catastrophe, then someone will do it." (link)
"Anything that can go wrong, will" is actually Finagle's Law
True, therre are a lot of RFC's on that page, but every single one of them talks about DNS, or extensions to DNS (the "Domain Name System"), which is, a system for mapping IP addresses to hostnames and vice-versa. That's what DNS does.
What is it, specifically, that you wanted to point out?
Well I think what you have to say is interesting, and I certainly agree with you on a majority of points. What party do you see yourself running under? It looks closely aligned with the Libertarian party, but you might want to consider running as an independent since Libertarians only get into office in Vermont. 1/2;-)
Independent is where I stand. I can't see being tied to a party line, because that's not how I think. I'll be the first one to furrow my eyebrows with something someone says, if I think it's wron, whether friend or foe.
I think overusing the "50 million people die every year because we have not perfected nanotechnology" quote is a good approach; it pulls at people's heartstrings and is, in fact, the truth. Someone on Nanodot.org has been using this approach and gaining karma.
It's an approach that has merits, but at the same time, the alternative is population growth of 50 million people a year, there are arguments that could be readily built around that counterpoint, and overpopulation is such a touchy subject that it's almost never mentioned (the solutions tend to be unpopular).
Regarding nanotechnology: I said that I thought the ideal nanotechnology you mentioned was 100 years off. I think that certain medical applications of nanotechnology will become common within 20 years, but employing nanotechnology on a large scale and applied to things as generic as landfills (more specifically, the contents of landfills) has issues that will take time and forethought to address. There are social barriers to the use of nanotechnology the will be shored up with arguments about "grey goo", regardless of whether there are verifiable controls on the operation of the nanomachines in question. Imagine how easy it would be to convince a room full of people that nanomachines run amok would "Destroy The Earth!". Two well-placed prime-time specials (ala "Meteor Impact!") would make a big impression on most people. Because of the social factors, and the fact that (at present) we *don't* have a known way to control or contain nanomachines that would be hardy enough for waste processing, it'll be a long time before they see widespread use. My 100 years was a conservative estimate, IMHO.
You mentioned that prisoners could learn much faster in a virtual prison...how so? I haven't seen any information on the topic, so I'm wondering if you have...I'd be interested in looking at it as well.
I agree with your stance on medicinal patents, for drugs that are directly derived from naturally-occurring biological compounds. I think that health care's major problems have to do with the high cost of health insurance, and a lot of that cost stems from insurance company reactions to excessive awards in malpractice/negligence suits. There are a number of issues that need to be looked at, from cost controls on insurance premiums, to tort reform, to medical review board standards. There should be a guaranteed minimum level of free (or very low cost...$10 copay?) health care provided to individuals eligible for unemployment or on welfare, I agree, the cost should be absorbed equally by the state and the federal government, for reasons of oversight and long-term stability.
The environment: I suppose the biggest dangers to our environment today are deforestation, groundwater contamination, and pollution caused by coal and fossil fuel combustion. The first two are the result of the human race's growing population and the creation of supporting farmland that accompanies it. There are plenty of reasons for space exploration, and overpopulation is the biggest one I can see. In a few hundred years, the human race is going to need a bigger "house". Pollution is an issue that should be mostly solved. It isn't, because it's not economically advantageous. There are other ways to power cars, houses, etc, but they come with trade-offs in performance or make the objects being sold less attractive compared to current products from a "conspicuous consumption" po
We should go back to the original way of picking our President and Vice President...everybody runs for president, person with the most votes becomes president, person with the second-most votes becomes vice president. Sad that this method went away, really...
I agree pretty much completely with all but the last 4 of the new issues you raised. Interesting that you mentioned the movie "Dave", since that's what I think of when I think about working on the budget.
Nanotech - I agree that we need to spend additional money on nanotechnology, probably in the form of incentives. There is already a lot of work being done that would benefit from additional funding, and (especially in medical applications) there are some potential near-term benefits. The replicator will be an eventual thing, but I don't see widespread adoption of it until you can convince a manufacturer of said device that he's not putting himself out of business by making one;)
Singularity - like the concept ideally, but you'd never get it past a country full of people who have seen "The Matrix" and "Terminator". Not a good platform point today (or in 2008, most likely).
Welfare - I would imagine that your ideal application of nanotechnology is about 100 years off, and singularity may be more like 500-1000 (even just in terms of time-to-build). That said, it'd be pretty hard to apply the benefits of those as-yet non-existent technologies to welfare in 2008-2012. I think our current welfare system is pretty broken, but still useful for keeping people alive. In the days before government-sponsored welfare, community and family played an important role. I don't know enough about how things have changed to speak intelligently on an answer, but I'm willing to do plenty of research, and I favor handing out jobs over handing out money alone (think public works dept...think guys picking up trash with pointy sticks).
Virtual prisons - if we back up to the drugs issue, and de-criminalize the use of (and regulate the sale of) one or two substances, we'd free up a lot of space in the jails that could be much better used. Violent offenders spend time in jail to seperate them from a population that they have demonstrated a lack of concern for, and pose an obvious danger to. I think that those individuals that wind up in jail for non-violent crimes should be seperated from the violent offenders, as well, but I don't think they need virtual prisons. I think work release (hey, we can make GPS devices to keep tabs on them for a while) or seperate housing in a jail would suffice for most of them (non-violent offenders). Imprisoning a person's mind is (to me) far worse than making them live in a box with bars.
I'd personally prefer to deal with the issues that can be addressed in the near future, and let the next issues become obvious in their own time (although I admire your forward-thinking). Any more issues to address?
Someone careless enogh to allow that to happen would fall in to the "nut-job" category, as far as I'm concerned. That degree of carelessness isn't sane.
Yes, and some of the pols think that's wrong, somehow, so I wanted to say *specifically* that I agree that the government should continue to stay out of it.
See, I told you I need a campaign manager. Want a job?
Damn...I was *sure* I wrote "should be allowed, but not required". I think I already need a campaign manager (and a proof-reader).
I don't misunderstand that particular law (although there may be a few that I do misunderstand, I'm not sure), I just wanted to make it clear that I don't think it should be required explicitly or barred explicitly (which I conveniently didn't type ).
That tears it. I'm sick of republican/democrat/libertarian/pick-a-platform crap. I agree with about 20% of the things any given political figure says, which leaves all of them seriously wanting.
I'm only 31 (32 in October), so I can't run in the coming election, but I hereby announce my candidacy for President of the United States of America in 2008.
Here's how I stand on a few issues:
Abortion: pro-choice, although I couldn't see doing it in my family
Taxes: I think they're about right as they stand (for individuals), but the budget's seriously screwed up
Death Penalty: Haven't made up my mind. There are some people I don't feel bad about losing, but how do you know for certain they're guilty?
Gun Control: People have guns, and have for a long time. I don't have one, but I don't care if you want to, as long as you can reasonably prove you're not a nut-job or a violent felon.
Space Program: Needs about 10 billion dollars a year. We should have commercial space programs by now.
Prayer in school: Well, seeing as how we're all supposed to be free from religious persecution, it should be allowed (for any religion).
Education: Teachers should get graded along with their students, and students should have to demonstrate basic reading, writing, and math skills, as well as a basic understanding of geography and US and world history.
War in Iraq: Split decision, we're there for the wrong reason, but working towards the right goal (removing Saddam permanently). Get it finished, get the UN and Iraqis to take over, and get out when it reasonably safe. Try not to spend too much money on it.
War on drugs: Legalize pot and tax the shit out of it. Industrialize production to put the criminals out of business, make it legal for those of drinking age, and require filters on manufactured marijuana cigarettes. If people can get drunk and fight, they should be able to get high and nap. (No, I don't smoke pot, myself.)
Defense spending: US troops are in too many other parts of the world. Pull them back, except where there are places they have to fight, decrease deployment costs, and increase their paychecks. Find out (and publish) exactly how much money needs to be spent, and on what. Stick to that number.
Elections: Why the hell do we still have an electoral college? It's not like we couldn't count votes nationally in a timely fashion. Candidates are allowed to spend too much money on their campaigns, cap campaign contributions at $1,000,000 (higher than seems necessary, to me, really) and require 1 debate that includes all of the candidates...haven't figured out how to pick the questions, yet.
So, if you think I'm any better (or any worse) than who's in office, or who's about to be in office, or want to call me a raving lunatic, just say so.
Note that as someone who has, at times, needed to track down responsible parties of certain domains, I may have a different take on this than you. That said:
If you want to complain to the CEO of AT&T, you call him at work--not at home.
Undeniably true. And If I went and looked up the WHIOS data for ATT.com, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't find his home number there, or his work number. I'd also find plenty of contact information on the att.com website and company help staff would assist me or refer me to the proper department/person.
If the target registrant is using false information, the registrar itself [AS IS REQUIRED] would still find out--really, it's actually a non-change for them.
Been through this before, actually. Some registrars won't do anything at all unless you show them directly that there is fraudulent or missing registration info. The registrat will *never* find out about the false info if they don't bother to check it (and some don't).
If the registrar and the domain owners are associates, or the same person, the "handle complaints through the registrar" method is pointless.
If you have a business, and you have a website, you're going to have plenty of contact information available, and (hopefully) lots of people will use that information in order to contact you.
If, on the other hand, you're an individual, and you have a personal website, you have the option to have it hosted for you or host it yourself. If you host it yourself, and register a domain name, part of the registration process is you providing contact information to the registrar in order to deal with issues surrounding your domain. It's been this way for a lot of years.
I can't argue with your opinion, and I tend to feel the same way, personally. I'm not saying they're doing things the right way, just that they have every right to put ads in to generate revenue. It'll probably drive people like you (and me...I found Mandrake after getting irritated with Redhat's "demo" account bullshit) away from their products, but (presumably) they already considered that. I just finished downloading Gentoo...maybe my luck will hold a bit longer there.
Or, maybe donate money to Mandrake in the form of a purchase, and keep it free of ads...Mandrake is a company, and is in business to (hopefully) make money. I like that I can get a distro for no out-of-pocket cost, but I won't begrudge them charging money for putting it together *or* finding a way to make money from an otherwise profitless downloadable version.
The WHOIS database provides contact information that is necessary for the proper operation of the world wide web. It is not only registrars that need access to this information, if you have a complaint about a domain, and the registrar for said domain is the same company, who do you go to for contact information.
False or missing information in whois records is already a problem that helps (for instance) spammers hide their contact information from people with legitimate reasons to contact them. If you get no response from the contact listed in the domain's SOA record, abuse, admin, webmaster, postmaster, etc, and there is no contact information posted on the site (or false contact information), what do you do? You check out the WHOIS record for the domain. If the info that's supposed to be there is present and accurate, you have a way to contact somebody, if it isn't, you have ammo for asking the registrar to suspend the domain registration, and if *they* won't, you have ammo to ask ICANN to suspend the registrar's activities.
Unfortunately, people don't realize the reason that WHOIS records exist, which is to provide contact information. That's the WHOLE reason. Removing that information makes the WHOIS database useless.
From the obviously educated manner in which you have been arguing/discussing this with me, I assumed (my fault, I admint) that you would understand that I was being literal. This argument has been substantially about the semantics of the word "influence" as it relates to gravity since pretty much the start.
You can note the fact that the technical definition of the word "influence" is what we've been discussing, or you can retreat from the original discussion, and inform me that I'm not using a common-sense meaning of the word in question (hey, I already know that, I thought we were debating a fine point to death, for crying out loud).
I tend, on occasion, to take people to task for saying things that are technically incorrect, just because it makes them think harder, and that's (IMHO) "a good thing", but I'm not a total correctness-nazi.
Now, I am going to be forced to friend you out of simple respect for your ability to defend your point.
I pray to god that you don't *really* think that Darl and I have anything in common <shudder>
Actually, even the RIAA isn't saying it's illegal to download copyrighted files. They've said it's *wrong*.
What they HAVE said (legally, anyway) is that it's illegal to PROVIDE copyrighted files to others without some sort of payment arrangement that's sanctioned by them.
Interestingly, at the same time, many of the associations members are using bigchampagne to track hot downloads in different geographic regions and tell radio stations to increase the airplay of those songs, which has been helping album sales. Too bad there's no "legitimate" reason for people to download mp3's, eh?
I think most people did not agree with Saddam but that's not enough to justify war if you don't act like the world's bully and want to follow international law.
please note that what follows is not predicated on law, but on feelings of what is right (to me)
I don't just disagree with him. I hate him intensely for a number of reasons not related to terrorism directly. I visited Iraq in 1991 in an Army uniform, and saw first-hand some things attributable to him that were just plain wrong. Iraqi soldiers should not have been more happy to see me than Kuwaitis were, but they were.
We put him in power (and helped make sure that he stayed in power), and us removing him seems a reasonable endeavor to me. He's no Hitler, but he's damn sure not a nice guy. International law is important, but my personal feelings eclipse any bad feelings about that.
To me, not doing anything about Saddam is kind of like watching a sixth grader tying first-graders to the fence and punching them without stopping him.
War with Iraq (Saddam, and the Baath party, specifically) may not be right or justified in terms of international law, but the first-graders benefit.
Holy shit! Now *why* have I not heard anything about that story at all? I heard plenty about the Iraqi guy who snuck around the hospital and brought a map to the marines, etc...nothing about an attempted delivery by ambulance, or any of that.
Somebody please mod the parent up. I support the war, because I hate Saddam, but this smells distinctly bad, if it's true. There should be reporters *still* talking to people about this.
That link is going in my journal for comment and posterity.
Well, not too terribly long after that, something called the Geneva Convention outlawed that. The reason people don't go on about it is because they can't remember any farther back than last tuesday.
Slashdot Mirror
I think that should be "makes their piece of shit Civic sound like a large lawn mower?"
Note that none of the above change the fact that DNS maps IP addresses to hostnames, or the fact that it was created precisely for that purpose.
"Anything that can go wrong, will" is actually Finagle's Law
What reason did they give for denying the transfers? How many transfer requests have you put in? Speak up!
Mod parent up "+1 reasonable"
True, therre are a lot of RFC's on that page, but every single one of them talks about DNS, or extensions to DNS (the "Domain Name System"), which is, a system for mapping IP addresses to hostnames and vice-versa. That's what DNS does.
What is it, specifically, that you wanted to point out?
Many ISPs are already blocking that IP address...your ISP might be one of them. If so, I applaud them.
Independent is where I stand. I can't see being tied to a party line, because that's not how I think. I'll be the first one to furrow my eyebrows with something someone says, if I think it's wron, whether friend or foe.
I think overusing the "50 million people die every year because we have not perfected nanotechnology" quote is a good approach; it pulls at people's heartstrings and is, in fact, the truth. Someone on Nanodot.org has been using this approach and gaining karma.
It's an approach that has merits, but at the same time, the alternative is population growth of 50 million people a year, there are arguments that could be readily built around that counterpoint, and overpopulation is such a touchy subject that it's almost never mentioned (the solutions tend to be unpopular).
Regarding nanotechnology: I said that I thought the ideal nanotechnology you mentioned was 100 years off. I think that certain medical applications of nanotechnology will become common within 20 years, but employing nanotechnology on a large scale and applied to things as generic as landfills (more specifically, the contents of landfills) has issues that will take time and forethought to address. There are social barriers to the use of nanotechnology the will be shored up with arguments about "grey goo", regardless of whether there are verifiable controls on the operation of the nanomachines in question. Imagine how easy it would be to convince a room full of people that nanomachines run amok would "Destroy The Earth!". Two well-placed prime-time specials (ala "Meteor Impact!") would make a big impression on most people. Because of the social factors, and the fact that (at present) we *don't* have a known way to control or contain nanomachines that would be hardy enough for waste processing, it'll be a long time before they see widespread use. My 100 years was a conservative estimate, IMHO.
You mentioned that prisoners could learn much faster in a virtual prison...how so? I haven't seen any information on the topic, so I'm wondering if you have...I'd be interested in looking at it as well.
I agree with your stance on medicinal patents, for drugs that are directly derived from naturally-occurring biological compounds. I think that health care's major problems have to do with the high cost of health insurance, and a lot of that cost stems from insurance company reactions to excessive awards in malpractice/negligence suits. There are a number of issues that need to be looked at, from cost controls on insurance premiums, to tort reform, to medical review board standards. There should be a guaranteed minimum level of free (or very low cost...$10 copay?) health care provided to individuals eligible for unemployment or on welfare, I agree, the cost should be absorbed equally by the state and the federal government, for reasons of oversight and long-term stability.
The environment: I suppose the biggest dangers to our environment today are deforestation, groundwater contamination, and pollution caused by coal and fossil fuel combustion. The first two are the result of the human race's growing population and the creation of supporting farmland that accompanies it. There are plenty of reasons for space exploration, and overpopulation is the biggest one I can see. In a few hundred years, the human race is going to need a bigger "house". Pollution is an issue that should be mostly solved. It isn't, because it's not economically advantageous. There are other ways to power cars, houses, etc, but they come with trade-offs in performance or make the objects being sold less attractive compared to current products from a "conspicuous consumption" po
We should go back to the original way of picking our President and Vice President...everybody runs for president, person with the most votes becomes president, person with the second-most votes becomes vice president. Sad that this method went away, really...
Just vote for me in 2008 ;) here's where I stand
I'd personally prefer to deal with the issues that can be addressed in the near future, and let the next issues become obvious in their own time (although I admire your forward-thinking). Any more issues to address?
Someone careless enogh to allow that to happen would fall in to the "nut-job" category, as far as I'm concerned. That degree of carelessness isn't sane.
See, I told you I need a campaign manager. Want a job?
I don't misunderstand that particular law (although there may be a few that I do misunderstand, I'm not sure), I just wanted to make it clear that I don't think it should be required explicitly or barred explicitly (which I conveniently didn't type ).
I'm only 31 (32 in October), so I can't run in the coming election, but I hereby announce my candidacy for President of the United States of America in 2008.
Here's how I stand on a few issues:
So, if you think I'm any better (or any worse) than who's in office, or who's about to be in office, or want to call me a raving lunatic, just say so.
If you want to complain to the CEO of AT&T, you call him at work--not at home.
Undeniably true. And If I went and looked up the WHIOS data for ATT.com, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't find his home number there, or his work number. I'd also find plenty of contact information on the att.com website and company help staff would assist me or refer me to the proper department/person.
If the target registrant is using false information, the registrar itself [AS IS REQUIRED] would still find out--really, it's actually a non-change for them.
Been through this before, actually. Some registrars won't do anything at all unless you show them directly that there is fraudulent or missing registration info. The registrat will *never* find out about the false info if they don't bother to check it (and some don't).
If the registrar and the domain owners are associates, or the same person, the "handle complaints through the registrar" method is pointless.
If you have a business, and you have a website, you're going to have plenty of contact information available, and (hopefully) lots of people will use that information in order to contact you.
If, on the other hand, you're an individual, and you have a personal website, you have the option to have it hosted for you or host it yourself. If you host it yourself, and register a domain name, part of the registration process is you providing contact information to the registrar in order to deal with issues surrounding your domain. It's been this way for a lot of years.
Seems to me that funding is a budgetary consideration...doesn't congress handle that stuff?
I can't argue with your opinion, and I tend to feel the same way, personally. I'm not saying they're doing things the right way, just that they have every right to put ads in to generate revenue. It'll probably drive people like you (and me...I found Mandrake after getting irritated with Redhat's "demo" account bullshit) away from their products, but (presumably) they already considered that. I just finished downloading Gentoo...maybe my luck will hold a bit longer there.
Or, maybe donate money to Mandrake in the form of a purchase, and keep it free of ads...Mandrake is a company, and is in business to (hopefully) make money. I like that I can get a distro for no out-of-pocket cost, but I won't begrudge them charging money for putting it together *or* finding a way to make money from an otherwise profitless downloadable version.
False or missing information in whois records is already a problem that helps (for instance) spammers hide their contact information from people with legitimate reasons to contact them. If you get no response from the contact listed in the domain's SOA record, abuse, admin, webmaster, postmaster, etc, and there is no contact information posted on the site (or false contact information), what do you do? You check out the WHOIS record for the domain. If the info that's supposed to be there is present and accurate, you have a way to contact somebody, if it isn't, you have ammo for asking the registrar to suspend the domain registration, and if *they* won't, you have ammo to ask ICANN to suspend the registrar's activities.
Unfortunately, people don't realize the reason that WHOIS records exist, which is to provide contact information. That's the WHOLE reason. Removing that information makes the WHOIS database useless.
You can note the fact that the technical definition of the word "influence" is what we've been discussing, or you can retreat from the original discussion, and inform me that I'm not using a common-sense meaning of the word in question (hey, I already know that, I thought we were debating a fine point to death, for crying out loud).
I tend, on occasion, to take people to task for saying things that are technically incorrect, just because it makes them think harder, and that's (IMHO) "a good thing", but I'm not a total correctness-nazi.
Now, I am going to be forced to friend you out of simple respect for your ability to defend your point.
I pray to god that you don't *really* think that Darl and I have anything in common <shudder>
What they HAVE said (legally, anyway) is that it's illegal to PROVIDE copyrighted files to others without some sort of payment arrangement that's sanctioned by them.
Interestingly, at the same time, many of the associations members are using bigchampagne to track hot downloads in different geographic regions and tell radio stations to increase the airplay of those songs, which has been helping album sales. Too bad there's no "legitimate" reason for people to download mp3's, eh?
I think most people did not agree with Saddam but that's not enough to justify war if you don't act like the world's bully and want to follow international law.
please note that what follows is not predicated on law, but on feelings of what is right (to me)
I don't just disagree with him. I hate him intensely for a number of reasons not related to terrorism directly. I visited Iraq in 1991 in an Army uniform, and saw first-hand some things attributable to him that were just plain wrong. Iraqi soldiers should not have been more happy to see me than Kuwaitis were, but they were.
We put him in power (and helped make sure that he stayed in power), and us removing him seems a reasonable endeavor to me. He's no Hitler, but he's damn sure not a nice guy. International law is important, but my personal feelings eclipse any bad feelings about that.
To me, not doing anything about Saddam is kind of like watching a sixth grader tying first-graders to the fence and punching them without stopping him.
War with Iraq (Saddam, and the Baath party, specifically) may not be right or justified in terms of international law, but the first-graders benefit.
Somebody please mod the parent up. I support the war, because I hate Saddam, but this smells distinctly bad, if it's true. There should be reporters *still* talking to people about this.
That link is going in my journal for comment and posterity.
Well, not too terribly long after that, something called the Geneva Convention outlawed that. The reason people don't go on about it is because they can't remember any farther back than last tuesday.