One thing that I'll never understand is why we (humans) continue to put important things in the most vulnerable places
Because it looks pretty. Because there are developers who will buy it cheap and sell it high.
Plus, people never believe it will happen to them. How many people build million dollar houses on beaches on the atlantic ocean? And how many times do those houses get knocked down? Every 4 or 5 years? Every 10 years. There are some places it is next to impossible to buy home insurance.
The anwser is not to tell people not to build there. The anwser is not even to have strickter housing codes. Just let people know. Have a video of what Katrina did. Force people to see the damage. Will that make them want to build with materials and design that can withstand 150mph winds? Maybe not. Maybe they will go the cheap route and only build to withstand 120mph.
Nothing is an exact science.
Plus, there are many people who believe in God, that nature is under his control. Some believe the flood came to Sin City, the Big Easy because of the debauchery. When was the last major natural disaster in the bible belt? Many people are taking bets that if San Francisco marries one more homosexual couple, they will fall to the bottom of the ocean and all drown.
If you donate, give to an organization you trust. Don't get ripped off by donating just because someone has a website set up. These fraud sites are run by scum, while there is a tragedy, they want to take money which should help people in need, and take it for themseleves.
And I don't get why every company now has a donation website for people? Why does Microsoft need a link for donating? Is it all PR bullshit? Is it in fashion to appear to be helping? Why doesn't Bill gates take some of his billions, and give? I am sure he will, but it seems like he can donate far more than the web page will raise. It is better to let the groups which have been around for so long do the job, the Red Cross and known charities.
Warric Dunn had a great idea. He is a running back in the NFL. He challenged every NFL player to donate $5,000. A drop in the bucket for guys making millions. It would raise over $8,000,000 for New Orleans. We will soon find out who the good guys are, and who the assholes are.
Nominated by William J. Clinton on May 21, 1998, to a seat vacated by John F. Keenan;
I doubt Clinton knew what he was doing. The judge was probably suggested by some high ranking senator, and Clinton obliged and made the nomination. In almost all cases, the senator where the Judge will sit is the one who picks out a couple good candidates, and then the president picks one.
Before Clinton, actually before Reagan, in most cases it did not matter if the senator was in the same party as the president. It was considered a courtesy for the president to pick someone who the senator from that state was in agreement with. There was little political value, they just wanted a person who knew the law and would rule based on law, not idiology. It should not matter what the political idiology the judge is, the law should come to the same conclusion without regard to who is sitting in the judge's chair.
Now here is what I would like to know. What kinds of pictures are on president Clintons computer? What kinds of music is on his daughters MP3 player? Did she ever share music with friends? Look at the Bush daughters and their drinking problems. Kids are kids. They will share openly, they will drink together, they will be a better community than adults in many cases. They are not so bogged down with wanting money to start tearing the fabric of relationships.
How can the RIAA force people to pay money just because the RIAA believes a person from an IP address shared music?
It seems like a hard thing to prove in court. Isn't the threshold "beyond a reasonable doubt" for a crime, and "preponderance of the evidence" for civil cases?
Maybe it is time to chance the threshold for guilt from preponderance to "highly likely".
What happens if someone has a wireless router in their apartment and the neighbor downloads music using it?
What happens if a community college with a wireless lan network has students download music?
What if a parent has their childrens friends over, and the kids download music?
There are thousands of ways music can be shared, where the person who owns the IP address will have no knowldge of the downloading.
And what if someone masks their IP address on the P2P networks? How hard is it to use a proxy? How hard is it to find a hack? The RIAA might see my IP address, but how can they prove it came from my IP?
It is time for the ACLU to do something helpful to the people, why not defend the people the RIAA goes after? It is a better group to defend than homosexuals or blacks. Why not help EVERYONE?
People are going to mark this as a troll. But it seems like every small group has extra rights. The majority meanwhile is getting sued by these small pest groups. Aeithists sue to not have the pledge said in school because of "In God we trust". Muslims sue schools because of christmas plays. Homosexuals sue to get married, which is an act under GOD and not man. Blacks want reparations. And the RIAA wants to go after children who share. The world is going to hell in a handbasket. And at the same time, any American who likes France is a traitor.
Did I order French Fries? I meant Freedom Fries. I hope you did not get that on tape.
Lets hope that the RIAA starts loosing. Of course, that might be worse for the consumer, as the RIAA will go back to congress asking for more laws.
Either way we loose.
I guess the solution is closed networks where people are invited by trusted friends. Anyone know of any?? LOL
Not that long. By having USB devices to start cars, soon hackers will be doing more than writing viruses and "testing" websites. They will be stealing your car.
But this is a larger problem than meets the eye. If software is used to start a car, how long until government gets creative? What kinds of algorthims can be put in the car computer?
If there is a gas outage, the new flash only allows the car to be driven 100 miles per week, then you can't start it until next week?
Since there is an algorithm that makes each car unique, how long until the car broadcasts its VIN number to anyone who wants to listen? Will cops knock on your door because you parked in a mall, next to a store that had shoplifters?
How long until my car decides I am driving to fast, and calls the police to mail me a ticket. Before you write this off as never_gonna_happen, consider that many highways now have radar guns attached to cameras, and they mail out tickets in the mail.
And how long until a bank robber and hacker changes your flash to mask the car that robbed the bank. Imagine the extra people the police will need to hire to straighten out the messes. And imagine how many more tickets they will need to write to pay for those new employees.
The only good thing for software like this is we can keep track of kids. We can program cars that are started with certian USB keys, that the car will stop if it drives to a certain area. For example, we can have zones the car is not allowed to enter. We can also have software on the computer, to know what family member has the car, and where they are. Maybe we can even set up cars, so if the 16 year old daughter is going out with her friends, that the radio really listens to what is going on in the car to make sure she is not picking up a 18 year old drop out weed head. And if we hear something we don't like, we can drive to where the car is with out shotgun and have an old fashioned lynching.
one of the biggest defense of sharers: that they somehow need to preview before they buy.
My biggest reason for sharing is that it is sharing. It is not stealing. It is not taking something that will deprive another person of ownership. When I share a CD with a friend, you are not loosing anything. The artists are not loosing anything. The only one with a paranoia of loosing money is the Corporate executives. And the only thing the suits are loosing is sleep, hair, and customers who they disfranchise.
In the USA we have the right of free speech. Often, some of the most insightful ideas come from music. What was the history of the 1960's? What happened. What was the mood of the people. You can find out in the music. Fortunate Son by Creedence Clearwater Revival told you more about the Vietnam war than Nixon did in any speech.
This is the USA, not China. What will the USA do? Tax ideas? If you want to share this piece of music then you must pay $15 for the CD or $30 a month to download something you won't own, a file that will play today but not tomorrow?
If you want it to be different, file sharing copyright content will not make things better, it will just get your ass sued. Start voting with your dollars.
No matter what grass roots campaign you start, or how good of a candidate you find, we the people can NEVER win. The establishment uses money to buy votes. Why does a Senate seat cost 5+ million dollars?? How can Joe Sixpack, everyman, ever get elected to high office? Instead you get Senators that have debts to pay to those who contributed money. And guess where the money comes from? Corporations. So when the head of the RIAA or Sony calls Senator Hatch, guess what Senator Hatch does? He listens and votes. Guess what happens when Joe Sixpack calls Senator Hatch. Not a damn thing.
I guess the RIAA never saw the study that says that file sharers spent more money buying music online than those who don't share music at all
Not any more, not after the ridiculous penalties.
BTW, How much is exactly one song worth when shared? If the music industry did not lose sales or money, then what are the damages? I thought there is a principle in law that says if you did not suffer damages, then you can not sue. For example, if I trip in front of your house on your property, but am not hurt, I can't sue because there was no harm.
I loved Justin Wilson. I missed his stories he used to tell while cooking.
I was asked by a man for a good gumbo recipie. I said "all you neeed is a good rattle snake.". He came back the next day and said "I couldn't find any in the grocery store". I said "they all over my backyard, and I bet one or two found their way in your car. teeheehee, he was sure happy, i could tell the expression on his face".
Now people, to roast chicken, we need a couple cloves of garlic, some salt, and one cup of wine for the bottom of the roasting pan. But all I got is this jug, and I sure would hate to open it to just use one cup! I guess I am gonna have to drink some of it.
I am going to miss him too. They should release his show on DVD. He is better than Emril by bunches.
This statement is completely, flat-out wrong. There aren't all that many chemicals that cause cancer. There are even less in food. Trans and saturated fats causing heart disease? Yeah, sure. Cancer? Not so much.
Have you ever heard of carcinogens? How about Acrylamide? What is Acrylamide? It is just a chemical that food manufacturors put in French Fries and Chips.
And don't even get me started with using the word "chemicals" as a scary bugaboo word to mean "evil substance that doesn't have a natural origin and is therefore dangerous."
There are thousands of more chemicals which will kill a person than a person can eat. Do you remember sacchrinne? It was used in diet soda, then they discovered it caused cancer. Think about it, not just foods but all chemicals. Stuff like Tobacoo, which the tobacco industry lied and said was healthy have killed more people than Hitler gassed. I am sorry, I don't want to trust a chemist to tell me eating something that he made in test tubes is good for me. I rather eat what my great grandfather ate, and he lived to be 104 and very sharp, no mental slowdown like people get today. Speaking of mental slowdowns, do you know where it comes from? Aluminum in the diet. Where does the Aluminum come from? From all the machines that process food.
Processed foods do cause cancer. Why is it that 30 years ago most Ice Creams were made from milk and sugar, and a flavoring like vanilla beans or chocolate, but today they are made with an ingredient list of 20 chemicals?
I can give you an even better example. Sour Cream. Sour Cream used to be made with bacteria and acidophilus. This is very healthy for people. Do you know how Sour Cream is made today? They take guar gum or starch and thicken milk. It is not even Sour Cream, but they keep calling the thick product that name. Without the acidophilus in the digestive tract, people are more vulnerable to illness.
There aren't all that many chemicals that cause cancer.
Look up Free Radicals. Most foods are filled with them, and they cause people to age and get old and get sick and get cancer. They destroy cell membranes. But the body has a way of fighting them, a natural system. Foods rich in Vitamin E for example can stop free radical damage. And Vitamin E is found in natural foods that are not processed. Once a food is processed, the vitamins are greatly removed. It is not the same food anymore.
Look at a 50 year old in France and a 50 year old mid-level manager in the USA. Which one looks healthier? Which one has less wrinkles and healthier looking skin and hair? We already know the French ARE healthier, but they look it too.
If you want to see reasonably good cooking as science tune into "Good Eats" on the cooking channel. One of the things I really like about the show is that the host, Alton Brown, explains WHY to do certain steps instead of simply going, "this is the way we were taught at the culinary institute, so it's right."
And now that Alton Brown has hit about 300 epsiodes, he can't keep it straight anymore. I have caught re-runs where does the exact opposite of what he advocated in a previous episode for the exact same dish.
Alton does not have a background in Biology or Chemistry or any Science. His undergrad was in Drama. Alton wanted to be on TV, and was looking for anything. Anything. So he got the idea to make a cooking show that was entertainment. How did he do this? He puts on a show that makes you laugh, like when he goes to buy pans from the asian at Bed Bath and Beyond (plus a marketing bonus for in-episode commercials, very smart and sneaky!). He then makes you feel so smart. Cook your risotto stirring often, because you want to release the starch... c6h12o6, that don't taste as good as this creamy polysachharide that tastes like butter! And everyone nods their head because they too have some BS to tell others when cooking.
If you want good cooking, which tells you the basics of cooking science, try and catch the pre-2001 episodes of How To Boil Water. And Malto Mario is damn good too.
I knew that Good Eats and Alton Bran Jumped The Shark when the episode aired on how to make great Salmon, but without a stove. Elton then gets a garbage can, yesterdays newspaper, some branches that fell off a tree, and a metal knife to poke holes in the can, he then makes a make-shift roaster. That was about as good as the other Salmon fish episode, where he is stuck in a motel without an oven, and cooks his fish using salt.
While it might be interesting, it is not good eats! I'd rather find old episodes of the Frugal Gourmet or even that cook from Louisiana that always added a jug of wine to his gumbo and ended each show with "I gaurentee it".
Good for seven years? Does that mean the developed a twinkie sandwich?
If NASA trully wanted to be innovative, they would have made MRE's and not sandwiches that can last only 7 years. What is 7 years? That is not even long enough to make it to Pluto. And they are the space expolration agency? Look at our Army, they are serving troops with MRE's that have a shelf life of over 30 years. And yes, many of your favorites are there too. Eggs! Omlets! Ham! Fries! And more!!! I guess the Army is more realistic of how long a job takes than NASA. Plus, every Army MRE comes with a brownie or cookie. Because you have not really had a meal until you have had dessert. And the Sarg can tell who the weirdo's in his unit are. hey... he ate his cookie before the beef stroganoff. to the galley with him!
BTW, and old buddies father, who was in WWII told us back then MRE's used to come with 2 cigarettes and a bottle of beer. He was stationed with British troops at the time, and he used to trade his cigarettes and beer for a pint of whisky that came with the British soldiers lunches. His son, who was in Vietnam said back then they cut out the cigarettes because the enemy soldiers could see the bright red "inhale" at night and have a target to shoot at. But he said they had the beer.
I was talking to a chef about a month ago who was complaining about having to put loads of oils, creams, butter and mayo in foods to achieve the taste that the consumer wants, at the expense of their health. "We're paid to kill people," was his complaint, and sadly I think he's right.
The French eat more oil and fat than Americans, but the French have less than half the heart disease. Why is that? Could it be the fat is not as bad as the stress Americans have? The French get two hours for lunch. Many stores close their doors during the lunch time so they can go to cafe's, sit down with friends, and enjoy life. They also get government to gaurentee 5 weeks of vacation a year no matter what the job. That means the janitor gets 5 paid weeks of vacation, just like his boss.
And if you will eat fat, how about eating healthy fat? Eat butter instead of margirine. Eat natural olive oil instead of processed oils. The problem is not fat, the problem is companies like McDonalds, to save a few pennies, are using crappy oils that are manufactured and not natural. Plus, we only have 30 minutes to make it from the office, to the fast food joint, and back to the office again. Hope there is enough time to push the sandwich down the throat with one hand while honking the horn to get the asshole in front of us out of the way with the other hand.
And then, just as lunch is over, I am back at my desk with my heart pumping and head dripping of sweat, just in time to make some sales calls. God, I hope I don't get any more bitch secretaries to screen calls for their bosses.
What will kill people is all the new manufactured foods, that are filled with chemicals our bodies can't expell. They will fill cells with toxic substances that will cause cancer.
I don't want science genetically engineering my food, I don't want them making meals that can be served 7 years later. I don't want the cancer or other diseases that come with it.
The world has done very well without scientists mucking up our food sources. How many thousands of years have people lived off what the earth grows?
I now see in my grocery store "organic milk", it is priced twice as expensive as the gallon of regular milk. The same thing is in produce, they have organic vegitables. What is this? 20 years ago everything was organic, now only the rich can get normal food. The rest of us must eat crap that has been genetically modified.
If the DoD systems are so easy to crack, what is stopping others to attack them?
Did you consider the USA wants those systems hacked by the Chinese.
It is like the old lawyer trick. My company made a product we knew would break and result in death (Say a car tire that we knew would explode and cause cars to turn over). Now your lawyers knows this, so they get a court to subpeona the papers showing we knew the product was bad. Instead of sending that one report, we send you that report mixed in 250,000 other reports. Hell, we might send you 249,999 reports and the 1 you wanted is missing. We send you so much stuff, that your whole legal staff is running at 110% and getting nowhere.
The point is if lawyers can use misinformation, I am sure the government is too. We did it with the USSR, causing them to spend so much on the military that their economy collapsed. Are we doing the same thing with China? Giving them a bunch of false "intel" that the Chinese believe they "stole" when in fact we wanted them to get it??
China's going to "win" BTW. They're the next superpower, already competeing for resources.
Look at your clothes, computer, TV, video, car labels. You can bet most or all of it's from China. That's going to continue till the exchange rate sorts itself out. It's a good thing that they recently "floated" their currency and that it's rising in value.
Unlike the USA which has no enemy country in striking distance, China has more than 2 countries capable of a long term war. They have Japan which is the economic superpower of the region. When people want quality and not cheap rip off products, they buy japanesse, not chinese. Then you have Tiwan, which will be the war to ruin China. The people of Tiwan don't want anything to do with China, and they have a military power that can fight back. How many f-16's did the USA sell Tiwan? And doesn't the USA have an aircraft carrier sitting right there? I can't even start to wonder how many nuclear subs are there too. And then there is Russia. At one time they were partners because of their shared political beliefs. But now, China and Russia act more like annoyed neighbors than partners.
Then there is Mayamar, or Burma, or whatever the hell the country is calling itself this week. They are the #1 producer of heroin and drugs in the region. And they are very unstable. If Chinese people start making any money, Burma will be ready to supply an endless stream of drugs. Unlike the USA, where we must deal with Cambodia, Burma shares a border with China.
And then there is North Korea right next to China. North Koera has weapons, and nothing else. Their people live in poverty, and they don't have enough food. That is a powderkeg waiting to explode.
And China also shares borders with India and Pakistan, two countries that have been in a pissing contest of hate for my entire lifetime. A nuclear war could break out there any time. The two countries have already had fights, with muslims murdering hindu's and hindu's trying to defend themselves.
And here is the bottom line. 20 years ago China could not grow enough food to feed all their people. The USA is the #1 exporter of food to China. If the USA stopped supplying exports of food, China would have one of the worst epidemics of famine the world has ever seen. The USA was smart, we got them to breed so many people, that if the USA withdrew food exports, millions of Chinese people would die.
How has China made money? By ripping off USA patents and copywrites. They might take a car, reverse engineer it, and then build it with low quality parts. They don't include the saftey standards. They pirate playstation games and computer games. China does not innovate, they don't produce anything the world demands.
No, China will not win. They can't feed themselves.
the "Get the Facts" campaign that used Microsoft-funded research to show the total cost of ownership of Windows as being lower than Linux
It all depends. If someone knows windows, has used windows for a long time, then windows might be cheaper. The person pays the hundred bucks or so for the OS and they are done.
If someone is new to linux, they might get the software for free, but then what about the time it takes to learn Linux? The first time I used red hat's RMP, I said "screw this" after a couple hours of looking for one package after another. APT-GET changed my opinion of how good Linux could be. This all changed over time. Linux is better than what it was 5 years ago.
But some things never change. I could not get linux to recoginze my sound card. I was told to get some second program to do it, but it was a hassel. Windows works out of the box.
I believe it would take a new person to linux 800 hours to become aquianted with the new OS enough to be equally skilled as they would be in Windows. That is about 20 weeks or so of playing with the OS full time. Or for a casual user, a year of messing around with Linux on saturdays.
So, what are those 800 hours of time worth? To a computer science student, it is something that will make them money, it is training. To a mom or pop who is 50 and just wants to send email, it is a waste, they would be better off paying the $100 to Microsoft for Windows.
With Windows, most things work without any effort. With linux, most things work with effort. For example, if you give a cd with data to a windows guy, all that person has to do is put the CD in the CD-rom. For a linux guy, they need to know something about mounting the drive.
I think good hackers tend to be obessive about what they hack - meaning that they eat, drink, and sleep the subject they are good at hacking at.
That is a disease. It is an obsession and is not healthy. Is it very different if someone spends 80 hours a week trying to hack a program, or if someone spends 80 hours a week looking at horse racing statistics trying to pick a winner? Both are addictions.
This is my issue with college - many of which try to teach a wide variety of subject to a student that really only wants a specific degree (say in Math or Science related) - studies have shown that people tend to remember less than 15-20% of what they learned in school/college several years after attending so why force something that will only be forgotten later for lack of interest?
Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it. If all you want to get out of college is a science degree, say in physics, then what will you do? Go to work for terrorists? What will be your point of reference to world events?
So you might only remember 10% of the shakespear you read in Humanities 101. But you will be a different person. You will get an understanding for some of the ideas that are timeless. You will know something more about power and curruption from Ceaser. You might only remember 10% of your psychology 100 survey class, but you will also be more tolerant of people with mental illness. You might not like that your college will force you to take a foriegn langugae, but after you are done, you will know about a different world perspective, and you might want to stick with it enough to be able to read newspapers from a foriegn land.
I have known some "hackers". And the term seems to go over a wide range of ability. It is a self describing term some idiots appoint to themselves not realizing what it means. The ones who tend to have the skillset are also the same ones who don't want anything to do with the term hacker.
I knew a guy who was arrested and sentanced to jail for one month, and 3 years probation, because he hacked into the school's library stystem. Why did he do it? Because the library had a start screen where the user could only access the card catalog over the internet, nothing else. This guy wanted to "un-cripple" the computer so he could use it for any website. It is worth saying the reason the school restricted the computers is because when they were using less restrictive computers, some students placed programs on the computers that harvisted emails and passwords and all sorts of stuff. This guy who was caught paid the price for what others did before him.
How did they catch him? Was it a high tech game of cat and mouse? No. LOL. The school put up security camera's in the library, and they monitored what people were doing.
The school also suspended other students for putting Knoppix in the CD-Rom drive and using it to connect to the internet. The kids screamed bloody murder, saying if the school did not want them using Knoppix, the school should have removed the CD-Roms from the computers. LOL!
And what about all the script kiddies? The ones who have no brains but found a place to download some tool to hack with? What should be done with them? If a script kidde uses a tool a hacker programmed, and that script kidde causes damage, who is responsible? Should the hacker be arrested for releasing the tool?
In my opinion, a hacker is a derogatory term. They are people who have little respect for others rights. A hacker only cares about what he is interested in, and it does not matter who holds the rights to the computers, the property, or the intellectual rights. A hacker wants to, so a hacker does. In my opinion, a hacker is a term to descrive a type of criminal.
Hacking is a state of mind, but not in the typical sense of the word hacker. This book defines hacker as one who delights in solving problems in interesting ways, and I think *that* is a state of mind more than breaking into someone else's machine.
10 years ago hacker was a dirty word. To many people today, a hacker still is a dirty word. It is someone who breaks into systems, either their own or those owned by others, and snoops around. For example, is there a better description of the people who hacked the playstaions with mod chips so pirated games can be played?
When I was in school, bad was "hacker", good was "analytical thinker". The difference is, the analytical thinker will not break into systems, they will use what they own, both physically and with licenses. The hacker does not care about licenses.
There is one other example. A friend I know runs a forum using software he purchased. Someone hacked his forum and left a PM for him describing how they got in, and what the vulnerabilities are. Should that "hacker" be arrested? He clearly broke into something he did not own. But in todays age, that hacker might say "I was trying to help". Even if the original person who owned the forum was not asking for help. An analytical thinker would never try and "test" a website.
I think the best description of a hacker is someone who can't avoid temptation. They will mess with stuff they don't own the rights to just because it is so irresistable to them. Hackers are social bandits.
Richard Lynn, the emeritus professor of psychology at Ulster University claims that, on average, men are more intelligent than women
Many people might get pissed off. But that does not make the research false. Just like some christians get pissed off at Darwin. I am sure there are those who believe they are right, and everyone else is wrong. For the record, I believe in Intelligent Design. I don't believe that everything could have happened in such a random fashion to create humans. But that is a different discussion.
There was a book that came out a decade ago called the Bell Curve. I got to meet with a person who was responsible for doing research with the authors. He was dumbfounded as to why people were pissed off. In his mind, he was simply measuring something. In this case, IQ.
The guys name is Richard Bailey, he is a professor at NU. He now does sexuality research (last I heard of him, which is over 6 years ago, so he might be doing something different now). He is a typical nerd. He can crunch numbers in his head like nobody I have ever met. He even came up with mathematical forumlas to try and figure out how much of a trait is genetic. He does this by tracking the difference in behavior between monozygotic twins. Since they are genetically identical, and difference must be enviormental. This greatly oversimplifies his work. He has a whole mathematical framework for every kind of genetic relationship.
But back to the topic at hand. When the Bell Curve came out, it said the research showed the avarage IQ was slightly over 100. Most blacks were at 80-90, most whites at 110, and most asians at over 110. When this book came out it was devistating to many people. Blacks called it racist. Every black, regardless of individaul IQ, was pissed off.
About a decade later, another book came out called Emotional IQ. This book argued that to be sucessful, one must have more than IQ. The hypothesis the author had was that IQ does not predict how sucessfull a person will be in life, or how much money a person will make.
The authors conducted a long term study. The research originated with childern 7 or younger in kindergarden. The research was simple, a plate of candy or treats was put in front of a child, along with a small bell. The child was told that if they wait 10 minutes, the child would get more treats, but if the child could not wait, the child was to ring the bell and they could get the treat in front of them, often something small.
The study followed these kids into adulthood. The authors discovered those who can postpone immediate gratification were most sucessfull, and those who could not were less sucessfull.
I have been able to live a while, and I think I have discovered some of my own revelations. IQ is important to advance to the top levels. But at the middle levels, IQ is not important. At the middle levels, just showing up on time is most important. Check out the movie Office Space for further study.
I don't know if men have higher IQ's. They might. Maybe thousands of years where men had to find ways to catch animals to feed their families created some kind of genetic marker that makes men smarter. Maybe it is society, where women are not encouraged to take the advanced math and science classes. God knows the few women I have met who have taken the advanced classes were far smarter than I am. Maybe women have genes that make them better at nurturing. Women have a bond with children that they claim no man can have/
The point is that science can measure many things, but can explain very few.
Vonage wants to raise $600,000,000? But they only have 800,000 customers. That is $750 per current customer? Can Vonage even make that much per customer? What growth do they expect?
To date, the company has raised more than $400 in venture capital
They way I understand, VC will own most of the company. How much of a % ownership did the $400 million buy, and how much of a % ownership will the $600 million have? Are the VC cashing out? This is the stage of the game where they normally do. And I would like to know how much influance the VC has, did they strike a deal with the original investment that the VC has control of when the company goes IPO?
There was a great movie about how VC ruined a company, the DVD is called startup.com. Some very smart guys came up with a great idea. They did all the work, but needed funding. They found VC, and had a big party, they took all their employees on a vacation. Then they realized how much control the VC had. The VC ran the show. The VC fired one of the founders, the guy who was the technical mastermind. It was a nightmare what they did. And the company eventually went bankrupt.
This seems like a bad deal to me. As others have pointed out, cell phones are getting cheaper all the time, and now there are free VoIP services available.
I just can't see how this kind of company could get a billion dollars. It is like we are living in 1999.
Is it ignorant to believe an IT manager should be a knowledgeable in technology as a whole?
Short answer: Yes
Long answer: Hell yes.
I disagree.
One of the best things very rich people do is delegate crap to subordinates.
Henry Ford said that he needs 100% of his brain to think about things that others can not. He assigned everything else to other people. He simply did not have the time to deal with the bullshit. Even if he took 1 hour a day to deal with crap that someone else can do, that is 1 hour less of innovative thought.
So what if the IT Manager has spyware on his computer and does not know how to get rid of it. And so what if the IT Manager can't use the internet wizard to connect to the internet? That is not his job. His job is to manage.
If I was him, I would fire my IT staff and find people that don't need to be hand held every step of the way.
This is like if a Janator asked "Should the office manager know about heavy duty plastic garbage bags? I mean, how many times must these thin bags tear open, and how often must I clean up the mess?". The anwser is shut your mouth and clean the shit up.
I have worked with so many people in IT who are plain out stupid, except that they know something about computers. And they think that makes them smart in other things. That is not true. How about if tech staff took 4 years to get a buisness degree, then worked 2 or 3 years in a low level management position, then went back for 2 more years to get a MBA? And then after 8 or 9 years of preparing, they get the IT Manager position and have the burden of managing millions of dollars, and making choices that determine the growth of the company. Hopefully the IT Manager will be smart enough to find good IT staff and not have to worry about office politics or people who are "too good" to do work they consider beneath them.
Another issue I have with AOL is that AOL digs roots very deeply into your computer. I don't know if this is still true since I haven't seen anyone using the service in a while, but it used to do stuff like replace your built-in dial-up networking functionality with its own, and even replacing various parts of the TCP/IP software and system files with its own. Uninstall? Useless.
I am not an AOL fan, but to be fair to them, I will say that when I cancled my cousins AOL and he got a cable modem, the AOL software was uninstalled without a problem. There was no problem with the cable modem working.
AOL != Real Media and their deceptive practices.
It is one thing to lie to people, and another thing to be unresponsive. AOL's problems are not that they lie so much as they drag their feet. It is a customer service problem, not a software problem.
Now if they could only get something better than 5k/sec on their dial-up, I don't think people would be running away like crazy. And with AOL charging $20+ a month, and Verizon just announced they are offering DSL for $15 a month, it does not take a genius to figure out what the better deal is.
Even back when AOL was the biggest ISP, many people I knew picked companies like Juno because they charged half as much and ran just as quick.
I never could figure out why AOL became such a large company. They charged more than anyone else. They were not the best or the fastest. All they did was package in an IM. But anyone can download Yahoo IM or something else. Did AOL become so huge because they were the only company that handed out free CD's at every computer store?
How many customers does AOL have? They agreed to pay 1.25 million, is that enough of a fine? Or will AOL figure they are making more money than loosing? They charge over 20 a month, and if this fine is just 3 or 4 bucks per user, did AOL make out better than having an honest system? Is AOL like the car companies that ask "what costs us less, to have a recall or to be sued and pay damages"?
Are there any ethics in buisness, or is it just about the money?
I tried to cancel my cousins service over a year ago. I was on hold for over half an hour. I hung up and called back, but this time selected "new customer" and I had a person on the phone right away.
Why should a new customer get a person on the phone right away, and someone who wants to cancel service must wait a long time?
Maybe one good first law is to say "the time wait for an existing customer must be less than the time wait for a new customer". That would gaurentee that customers can cancel without having to wait and wait and wait for someone to anwser their call.
A good second law should be that a customer can dispute any service and does not have to pay for that month. If a customer disputes too many months, the service provider can drop them. But that might stop the bad service. If AOL has an outage, or dial numbers are busy, then the person should have the ability to dispute that days charge and not pay. This should be very easy to do, and not require more than 1 minutes time of the consumer.
Slashdot Mirror
Because it looks pretty. Because there are developers who will buy it cheap and sell it high.
Plus, people never believe it will happen to them. How many people build million dollar houses on beaches on the atlantic ocean? And how many times do those houses get knocked down? Every 4 or 5 years? Every 10 years. There are some places it is next to impossible to buy home insurance.
The anwser is not to tell people not to build there. The anwser is not even to have strickter housing codes. Just let people know. Have a video of what Katrina did. Force people to see the damage. Will that make them want to build with materials and design that can withstand 150mph winds? Maybe not. Maybe they will go the cheap route and only build to withstand 120mph.
Nothing is an exact science.
Plus, there are many people who believe in God, that nature is under his control. Some believe the flood came to Sin City, the Big Easy because of the debauchery. When was the last major natural disaster in the bible belt? Many people are taking bets that if San Francisco marries one more homosexual couple, they will fall to the bottom of the ocean and all drown.
And I don't get why every company now has a donation website for people? Why does Microsoft need a link for donating? Is it all PR bullshit? Is it in fashion to appear to be helping? Why doesn't Bill gates take some of his billions, and give? I am sure he will, but it seems like he can donate far more than the web page will raise. It is better to let the groups which have been around for so long do the job, the Red Cross and known charities.
Warric Dunn had a great idea. He is a running back in the NFL. He challenged every NFL player to donate $5,000. A drop in the bucket for guys making millions. It would raise over $8,000,000 for New Orleans. We will soon find out who the good guys are, and who the assholes are.
I doubt Clinton knew what he was doing. The judge was probably suggested by some high ranking senator, and Clinton obliged and made the nomination. In almost all cases, the senator where the Judge will sit is the one who picks out a couple good candidates, and then the president picks one.
Before Clinton, actually before Reagan, in most cases it did not matter if the senator was in the same party as the president. It was considered a courtesy for the president to pick someone who the senator from that state was in agreement with. There was little political value, they just wanted a person who knew the law and would rule based on law, not idiology. It should not matter what the political idiology the judge is, the law should come to the same conclusion without regard to who is sitting in the judge's chair.
Now here is what I would like to know. What kinds of pictures are on president Clintons computer? What kinds of music is on his daughters MP3 player? Did she ever share music with friends? Look at the Bush daughters and their drinking problems. Kids are kids. They will share openly, they will drink together, they will be a better community than adults in many cases. They are not so bogged down with wanting money to start tearing the fabric of relationships.
It seems like a hard thing to prove in court. Isn't the threshold "beyond a reasonable doubt" for a crime, and "preponderance of the evidence" for civil cases?
Maybe it is time to chance the threshold for guilt from preponderance to "highly likely".
What happens if someone has a wireless router in their apartment and the neighbor downloads music using it?
What happens if a community college with a wireless lan network has students download music?
What if a parent has their childrens friends over, and the kids download music?
There are thousands of ways music can be shared, where the person who owns the IP address will have no knowldge of the downloading.
And what if someone masks their IP address on the P2P networks? How hard is it to use a proxy? How hard is it to find a hack? The RIAA might see my IP address, but how can they prove it came from my IP?
Does the defendant have to prove innocence here?
Is the IP address infallible?
People are going to mark this as a troll. But it seems like every small group has extra rights. The majority meanwhile is getting sued by these small pest groups. Aeithists sue to not have the pledge said in school because of "In God we trust". Muslims sue schools because of christmas plays. Homosexuals sue to get married, which is an act under GOD and not man. Blacks want reparations. And the RIAA wants to go after children who share. The world is going to hell in a handbasket. And at the same time, any American who likes France is a traitor.
Did I order French Fries? I meant Freedom Fries. I hope you did not get that on tape.
Lets hope that the RIAA starts loosing. Of course, that might be worse for the consumer, as the RIAA will go back to congress asking for more laws.
Either way we loose.
I guess the solution is closed networks where people are invited by trusted friends. Anyone know of any?? LOL
A: Start multiple cars that they own
B: Start other people's cars
Not that long. By having USB devices to start cars, soon hackers will be doing more than writing viruses and "testing" websites. They will be stealing your car.
But this is a larger problem than meets the eye. If software is used to start a car, how long until government gets creative? What kinds of algorthims can be put in the car computer?
The only good thing for software like this is we can keep track of kids. We can program cars that are started with certian USB keys, that the car will stop if it drives to a certain area. For example, we can have zones the car is not allowed to enter. We can also have software on the computer, to know what family member has the car, and where they are. Maybe we can even set up cars, so if the 16 year old daughter is going out with her friends, that the radio really listens to what is going on in the car to make sure she is not picking up a 18 year old drop out weed head. And if we hear something we don't like, we can drive to where the car is with out shotgun and have an old fashioned lynching.
My biggest reason for sharing is that it is sharing. It is not stealing. It is not taking something that will deprive another person of ownership. When I share a CD with a friend, you are not loosing anything. The artists are not loosing anything. The only one with a paranoia of loosing money is the Corporate executives. And the only thing the suits are loosing is sleep, hair, and customers who they disfranchise.
In the USA we have the right of free speech. Often, some of the most insightful ideas come from music. What was the history of the 1960's? What happened. What was the mood of the people. You can find out in the music. Fortunate Son by Creedence Clearwater Revival told you more about the Vietnam war than Nixon did in any speech.
This is the USA, not China. What will the USA do? Tax ideas? If you want to share this piece of music then you must pay $15 for the CD or $30 a month to download something you won't own, a file that will play today but not tomorrow?
If you want it to be different, file sharing copyright content will not make things better, it will just get your ass sued. Start voting with your dollars.
No matter what grass roots campaign you start, or how good of a candidate you find, we the people can NEVER win. The establishment uses money to buy votes. Why does a Senate seat cost 5+ million dollars?? How can Joe Sixpack, everyman, ever get elected to high office? Instead you get Senators that have debts to pay to those who contributed money. And guess where the money comes from? Corporations. So when the head of the RIAA or Sony calls Senator Hatch, guess what Senator Hatch does? He listens and votes. Guess what happens when Joe Sixpack calls Senator Hatch. Not a damn thing.
Not any more, not after the ridiculous penalties.
BTW, How much is exactly one song worth when shared? If the music industry did not lose sales or money, then what are the damages? I thought there is a principle in law that says if you did not suffer damages, then you can not sue. For example, if I trip in front of your house on your property, but am not hurt, I can't sue because there was no harm.
I was asked by a man for a good gumbo recipie. I said "all you neeed is a good rattle snake.". He came back the next day and said "I couldn't find any in the grocery store". I said "they all over my backyard, and I bet one or two found their way in your car. teeheehee, he was sure happy, i could tell the expression on his face".
Now people, to roast chicken, we need a couple cloves of garlic, some salt, and one cup of wine for the bottom of the roasting pan. But all I got is this jug, and I sure would hate to open it to just use one cup! I guess I am gonna have to drink some of it.
I am going to miss him too. They should release his show on DVD. He is better than Emril by bunches.
Have you ever heard of carcinogens? How about Acrylamide? What is Acrylamide? It is just a chemical that food manufacturors put in French Fries and Chips.
http://www.cspinet.org/new/200206251.html
And don't even get me started with using the word "chemicals" as a scary bugaboo word to mean "evil substance that doesn't have a natural origin and is therefore dangerous."
There are thousands of more chemicals which will kill a person than a person can eat. Do you remember sacchrinne? It was used in diet soda, then they discovered it caused cancer. Think about it, not just foods but all chemicals. Stuff like Tobacoo, which the tobacco industry lied and said was healthy have killed more people than Hitler gassed. I am sorry, I don't want to trust a chemist to tell me eating something that he made in test tubes is good for me. I rather eat what my great grandfather ate, and he lived to be 104 and very sharp, no mental slowdown like people get today. Speaking of mental slowdowns, do you know where it comes from? Aluminum in the diet. Where does the Aluminum come from? From all the machines that process food.
Processed foods do cause cancer. Why is it that 30 years ago most Ice Creams were made from milk and sugar, and a flavoring like vanilla beans or chocolate, but today they are made with an ingredient list of 20 chemicals?
I can give you an even better example. Sour Cream. Sour Cream used to be made with bacteria and acidophilus. This is very healthy for people. Do you know how Sour Cream is made today? They take guar gum or starch and thicken milk. It is not even Sour Cream, but they keep calling the thick product that name. Without the acidophilus in the digestive tract, people are more vulnerable to illness.
http://www.healthcentral.com/encyclopedia/408/7/Ac idophilus.html
Back to your original statement:
There aren't all that many chemicals that cause cancer.
Look up Free Radicals. Most foods are filled with them, and they cause people to age and get old and get sick and get cancer. They destroy cell membranes. But the body has a way of fighting them, a natural system. Foods rich in Vitamin E for example can stop free radical damage. And Vitamin E is found in natural foods that are not processed. Once a food is processed, the vitamins are greatly removed. It is not the same food anymore.
Look at a 50 year old in France and a 50 year old mid-level manager in the USA. Which one looks healthier? Which one has less wrinkles and healthier looking skin and hair? We already know the French ARE healthier, but they look it too.
And now that Alton Brown has hit about 300 epsiodes, he can't keep it straight anymore. I have caught re-runs where does the exact opposite of what he advocated in a previous episode for the exact same dish.
Alton does not have a background in Biology or Chemistry or any Science. His undergrad was in Drama. Alton wanted to be on TV, and was looking for anything. Anything. So he got the idea to make a cooking show that was entertainment. How did he do this? He puts on a show that makes you laugh, like when he goes to buy pans from the asian at Bed Bath and Beyond (plus a marketing bonus for in-episode commercials, very smart and sneaky!). He then makes you feel so smart. Cook your risotto stirring often, because you want to release the starch... c6h12o6, that don't taste as good as this creamy polysachharide that tastes like butter! And everyone nods their head because they too have some BS to tell others when cooking.
If you want good cooking, which tells you the basics of cooking science, try and catch the pre-2001 episodes of How To Boil Water. And Malto Mario is damn good too.
I knew that Good Eats and Alton Bran Jumped The Shark when the episode aired on how to make great Salmon, but without a stove. Elton then gets a garbage can, yesterdays newspaper, some branches that fell off a tree, and a metal knife to poke holes in the can, he then makes a make-shift roaster. That was about as good as the other Salmon fish episode, where he is stuck in a motel without an oven, and cooks his fish using salt.
While it might be interesting, it is not good eats! I'd rather find old episodes of the Frugal Gourmet or even that cook from Louisiana that always added a jug of wine to his gumbo and ended each show with "I gaurentee it".
If NASA trully wanted to be innovative, they would have made MRE's and not sandwiches that can last only 7 years. What is 7 years? That is not even long enough to make it to Pluto. And they are the space expolration agency? Look at our Army, they are serving troops with MRE's that have a shelf life of over 30 years. And yes, many of your favorites are there too. Eggs! Omlets! Ham! Fries! And more!!! I guess the Army is more realistic of how long a job takes than NASA. Plus, every Army MRE comes with a brownie or cookie. Because you have not really had a meal until you have had dessert. And the Sarg can tell who the weirdo's in his unit are. hey... he ate his cookie before the beef stroganoff. to the galley with him!
BTW, and old buddies father, who was in WWII told us back then MRE's used to come with 2 cigarettes and a bottle of beer. He was stationed with British troops at the time, and he used to trade his cigarettes and beer for a pint of whisky that came with the British soldiers lunches. His son, who was in Vietnam said back then they cut out the cigarettes because the enemy soldiers could see the bright red "inhale" at night and have a target to shoot at. But he said they had the beer.
Don't war suck?
The French eat more oil and fat than Americans, but the French have less than half the heart disease. Why is that? Could it be the fat is not as bad as the stress Americans have? The French get two hours for lunch. Many stores close their doors during the lunch time so they can go to cafe's, sit down with friends, and enjoy life. They also get government to gaurentee 5 weeks of vacation a year no matter what the job. That means the janitor gets 5 paid weeks of vacation, just like his boss.
And if you will eat fat, how about eating healthy fat? Eat butter instead of margirine. Eat natural olive oil instead of processed oils. The problem is not fat, the problem is companies like McDonalds, to save a few pennies, are using crappy oils that are manufactured and not natural. Plus, we only have 30 minutes to make it from the office, to the fast food joint, and back to the office again. Hope there is enough time to push the sandwich down the throat with one hand while honking the horn to get the asshole in front of us out of the way with the other hand.
And then, just as lunch is over, I am back at my desk with my heart pumping and head dripping of sweat, just in time to make some sales calls. God, I hope I don't get any more bitch secretaries to screen calls for their bosses.
What will kill people is all the new manufactured foods, that are filled with chemicals our bodies can't expell. They will fill cells with toxic substances that will cause cancer.
The world has done very well without scientists mucking up our food sources. How many thousands of years have people lived off what the earth grows?
I now see in my grocery store "organic milk", it is priced twice as expensive as the gallon of regular milk. The same thing is in produce, they have organic vegitables. What is this? 20 years ago everything was organic, now only the rich can get normal food. The rest of us must eat crap that has been genetically modified.
Did you consider the USA wants those systems hacked by the Chinese.
It is like the old lawyer trick. My company made a product we knew would break and result in death (Say a car tire that we knew would explode and cause cars to turn over). Now your lawyers knows this, so they get a court to subpeona the papers showing we knew the product was bad. Instead of sending that one report, we send you that report mixed in 250,000 other reports. Hell, we might send you 249,999 reports and the 1 you wanted is missing. We send you so much stuff, that your whole legal staff is running at 110% and getting nowhere.
The point is if lawyers can use misinformation, I am sure the government is too. We did it with the USSR, causing them to spend so much on the military that their economy collapsed. Are we doing the same thing with China? Giving them a bunch of false "intel" that the Chinese believe they "stole" when in fact we wanted them to get it??
Look at your clothes, computer, TV, video, car labels. You can bet most or all of it's from China. That's going to continue till the exchange rate sorts itself out. It's a good thing that they recently "floated" their currency and that it's rising in value.
Unlike the USA which has no enemy country in striking distance, China has more than 2 countries capable of a long term war. They have Japan which is the economic superpower of the region. When people want quality and not cheap rip off products, they buy japanesse, not chinese. Then you have Tiwan, which will be the war to ruin China. The people of Tiwan don't want anything to do with China, and they have a military power that can fight back. How many f-16's did the USA sell Tiwan? And doesn't the USA have an aircraft carrier sitting right there? I can't even start to wonder how many nuclear subs are there too. And then there is Russia. At one time they were partners because of their shared political beliefs. But now, China and Russia act more like annoyed neighbors than partners.
Then there is Mayamar, or Burma, or whatever the hell the country is calling itself this week. They are the #1 producer of heroin and drugs in the region. And they are very unstable. If Chinese people start making any money, Burma will be ready to supply an endless stream of drugs. Unlike the USA, where we must deal with Cambodia, Burma shares a border with China.
And then there is North Korea right next to China. North Koera has weapons, and nothing else. Their people live in poverty, and they don't have enough food. That is a powderkeg waiting to explode.
And China also shares borders with India and Pakistan, two countries that have been in a pissing contest of hate for my entire lifetime. A nuclear war could break out there any time. The two countries have already had fights, with muslims murdering hindu's and hindu's trying to defend themselves.
And here is the bottom line. 20 years ago China could not grow enough food to feed all their people. The USA is the #1 exporter of food to China. If the USA stopped supplying exports of food, China would have one of the worst epidemics of famine the world has ever seen. The USA was smart, we got them to breed so many people, that if the USA withdrew food exports, millions of Chinese people would die.
How has China made money? By ripping off USA patents and copywrites. They might take a car, reverse engineer it, and then build it with low quality parts. They don't include the saftey standards. They pirate playstation games and computer games. China does not innovate, they don't produce anything the world demands.
No, China will not win. They can't feed themselves.
It all depends. If someone knows windows, has used windows for a long time, then windows might be cheaper. The person pays the hundred bucks or so for the OS and they are done.
If someone is new to linux, they might get the software for free, but then what about the time it takes to learn Linux? The first time I used red hat's RMP, I said "screw this" after a couple hours of looking for one package after another. APT-GET changed my opinion of how good Linux could be. This all changed over time. Linux is better than what it was 5 years ago.
But some things never change. I could not get linux to recoginze my sound card. I was told to get some second program to do it, but it was a hassel. Windows works out of the box.
I believe it would take a new person to linux 800 hours to become aquianted with the new OS enough to be equally skilled as they would be in Windows. That is about 20 weeks or so of playing with the OS full time. Or for a casual user, a year of messing around with Linux on saturdays.
So, what are those 800 hours of time worth? To a computer science student, it is something that will make them money, it is training. To a mom or pop who is 50 and just wants to send email, it is a waste, they would be better off paying the $100 to Microsoft for Windows.
With Windows, most things work without any effort. With linux, most things work with effort. For example, if you give a cd with data to a windows guy, all that person has to do is put the CD in the CD-rom. For a linux guy, they need to know something about mounting the drive.
That is a disease. It is an obsession and is not healthy. Is it very different if someone spends 80 hours a week trying to hack a program, or if someone spends 80 hours a week looking at horse racing statistics trying to pick a winner? Both are addictions.
This is my issue with college - many of which try to teach a wide variety of subject to a student that really only wants a specific degree (say in Math or Science related) - studies have shown that people tend to remember less than 15-20% of what they learned in school/college several years after attending so why force something that will only be forgotten later for lack of interest?
Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it. If all you want to get out of college is a science degree, say in physics, then what will you do? Go to work for terrorists? What will be your point of reference to world events?
So you might only remember 10% of the shakespear you read in Humanities 101. But you will be a different person. You will get an understanding for some of the ideas that are timeless. You will know something more about power and curruption from Ceaser. You might only remember 10% of your psychology 100 survey class, but you will also be more tolerant of people with mental illness. You might not like that your college will force you to take a foriegn langugae, but after you are done, you will know about a different world perspective, and you might want to stick with it enough to be able to read newspapers from a foriegn land.
Anwser: Pop his pimple.
I have known some "hackers". And the term seems to go over a wide range of ability. It is a self describing term some idiots appoint to themselves not realizing what it means. The ones who tend to have the skillset are also the same ones who don't want anything to do with the term hacker.
I knew a guy who was arrested and sentanced to jail for one month, and 3 years probation, because he hacked into the school's library stystem. Why did he do it? Because the library had a start screen where the user could only access the card catalog over the internet, nothing else. This guy wanted to "un-cripple" the computer so he could use it for any website. It is worth saying the reason the school restricted the computers is because when they were using less restrictive computers, some students placed programs on the computers that harvisted emails and passwords and all sorts of stuff. This guy who was caught paid the price for what others did before him.
How did they catch him? Was it a high tech game of cat and mouse? No. LOL. The school put up security camera's in the library, and they monitored what people were doing.
The school also suspended other students for putting Knoppix in the CD-Rom drive and using it to connect to the internet. The kids screamed bloody murder, saying if the school did not want them using Knoppix, the school should have removed the CD-Roms from the computers. LOL!
And what about all the script kiddies? The ones who have no brains but found a place to download some tool to hack with? What should be done with them? If a script kidde uses a tool a hacker programmed, and that script kidde causes damage, who is responsible? Should the hacker be arrested for releasing the tool?
In my opinion, a hacker is a derogatory term. They are people who have little respect for others rights. A hacker only cares about what he is interested in, and it does not matter who holds the rights to the computers, the property, or the intellectual rights. A hacker wants to, so a hacker does. In my opinion, a hacker is a term to descrive a type of criminal.
10 years ago hacker was a dirty word. To many people today, a hacker still is a dirty word. It is someone who breaks into systems, either their own or those owned by others, and snoops around. For example, is there a better description of the people who hacked the playstaions with mod chips so pirated games can be played?
When I was in school, bad was "hacker", good was "analytical thinker". The difference is, the analytical thinker will not break into systems, they will use what they own, both physically and with licenses. The hacker does not care about licenses.
There is one other example. A friend I know runs a forum using software he purchased. Someone hacked his forum and left a PM for him describing how they got in, and what the vulnerabilities are. Should that "hacker" be arrested? He clearly broke into something he did not own. But in todays age, that hacker might say "I was trying to help". Even if the original person who owned the forum was not asking for help. An analytical thinker would never try and "test" a website.
I think the best description of a hacker is someone who can't avoid temptation. They will mess with stuff they don't own the rights to just because it is so irresistable to them. Hackers are social bandits.
Many people might get pissed off. But that does not make the research false. Just like some christians get pissed off at Darwin. I am sure there are those who believe they are right, and everyone else is wrong. For the record, I believe in Intelligent Design. I don't believe that everything could have happened in such a random fashion to create humans. But that is a different discussion.
There was a book that came out a decade ago called the Bell Curve. I got to meet with a person who was responsible for doing research with the authors. He was dumbfounded as to why people were pissed off. In his mind, he was simply measuring something. In this case, IQ.
The guys name is Richard Bailey, he is a professor at NU. He now does sexuality research (last I heard of him, which is over 6 years ago, so he might be doing something different now). He is a typical nerd. He can crunch numbers in his head like nobody I have ever met. He even came up with mathematical forumlas to try and figure out how much of a trait is genetic. He does this by tracking the difference in behavior between monozygotic twins. Since they are genetically identical, and difference must be enviormental. This greatly oversimplifies his work. He has a whole mathematical framework for every kind of genetic relationship.
But back to the topic at hand. When the Bell Curve came out, it said the research showed the avarage IQ was slightly over 100. Most blacks were at 80-90, most whites at 110, and most asians at over 110. When this book came out it was devistating to many people. Blacks called it racist. Every black, regardless of individaul IQ, was pissed off.
About a decade later, another book came out called Emotional IQ. This book argued that to be sucessful, one must have more than IQ. The hypothesis the author had was that IQ does not predict how sucessfull a person will be in life, or how much money a person will make.
The authors conducted a long term study. The research originated with childern 7 or younger in kindergarden. The research was simple, a plate of candy or treats was put in front of a child, along with a small bell. The child was told that if they wait 10 minutes, the child would get more treats, but if the child could not wait, the child was to ring the bell and they could get the treat in front of them, often something small.
The study followed these kids into adulthood. The authors discovered those who can postpone immediate gratification were most sucessfull, and those who could not were less sucessfull.
I have been able to live a while, and I think I have discovered some of my own revelations. IQ is important to advance to the top levels. But at the middle levels, IQ is not important. At the middle levels, just showing up on time is most important. Check out the movie Office Space for further study.
I don't know if men have higher IQ's. They might. Maybe thousands of years where men had to find ways to catch animals to feed their families created some kind of genetic marker that makes men smarter. Maybe it is society, where women are not encouraged to take the advanced math and science classes. God knows the few women I have met who have taken the advanced classes were far smarter than I am. Maybe women have genes that make them better at nurturing. Women have a bond with children that they claim no man can have/
The point is that science can measure many things, but can explain very few.
To date, the company has raised more than $400 in venture capital
They way I understand, VC will own most of the company. How much of a % ownership did the $400 million buy, and how much of a % ownership will the $600 million have? Are the VC cashing out? This is the stage of the game where they normally do. And I would like to know how much influance the VC has, did they strike a deal with the original investment that the VC has control of when the company goes IPO?
There was a great movie about how VC ruined a company, the DVD is called startup.com. Some very smart guys came up with a great idea. They did all the work, but needed funding. They found VC, and had a big party, they took all their employees on a vacation. Then they realized how much control the VC had. The VC ran the show. The VC fired one of the founders, the guy who was the technical mastermind. It was a nightmare what they did. And the company eventually went bankrupt.
This seems like a bad deal to me. As others have pointed out, cell phones are getting cheaper all the time, and now there are free VoIP services available.
I just can't see how this kind of company could get a billion dollars. It is like we are living in 1999.
Long answer: Hell yes.
I disagree.
One of the best things very rich people do is delegate crap to subordinates.
Henry Ford said that he needs 100% of his brain to think about things that others can not. He assigned everything else to other people. He simply did not have the time to deal with the bullshit. Even if he took 1 hour a day to deal with crap that someone else can do, that is 1 hour less of innovative thought.
So what if the IT Manager has spyware on his computer and does not know how to get rid of it. And so what if the IT Manager can't use the internet wizard to connect to the internet? That is not his job. His job is to manage.
If I was him, I would fire my IT staff and find people that don't need to be hand held every step of the way.
This is like if a Janator asked "Should the office manager know about heavy duty plastic garbage bags? I mean, how many times must these thin bags tear open, and how often must I clean up the mess?". The anwser is shut your mouth and clean the shit up.
I have worked with so many people in IT who are plain out stupid, except that they know something about computers. And they think that makes them smart in other things. That is not true. How about if tech staff took 4 years to get a buisness degree, then worked 2 or 3 years in a low level management position, then went back for 2 more years to get a MBA? And then after 8 or 9 years of preparing, they get the IT Manager position and have the burden of managing millions of dollars, and making choices that determine the growth of the company. Hopefully the IT Manager will be smart enough to find good IT staff and not have to worry about office politics or people who are "too good" to do work they consider beneath them.
I am not an AOL fan, but to be fair to them, I will say that when I cancled my cousins AOL and he got a cable modem, the AOL software was uninstalled without a problem. There was no problem with the cable modem working.
AOL != Real Media and their deceptive practices.
It is one thing to lie to people, and another thing to be unresponsive. AOL's problems are not that they lie so much as they drag their feet. It is a customer service problem, not a software problem.
Now if they could only get something better than 5k/sec on their dial-up, I don't think people would be running away like crazy. And with AOL charging $20+ a month, and Verizon just announced they are offering DSL for $15 a month, it does not take a genius to figure out what the better deal is.
Even back when AOL was the biggest ISP, many people I knew picked companies like Juno because they charged half as much and ran just as quick.
I never could figure out why AOL became such a large company. They charged more than anyone else. They were not the best or the fastest. All they did was package in an IM. But anyone can download Yahoo IM or something else. Did AOL become so huge because they were the only company that handed out free CD's at every computer store?
Are there any ethics in buisness, or is it just about the money?
I tried to cancel my cousins service over a year ago. I was on hold for over half an hour. I hung up and called back, but this time selected "new customer" and I had a person on the phone right away.
Why should a new customer get a person on the phone right away, and someone who wants to cancel service must wait a long time?
Maybe one good first law is to say "the time wait for an existing customer must be less than the time wait for a new customer". That would gaurentee that customers can cancel without having to wait and wait and wait for someone to anwser their call.
A good second law should be that a customer can dispute any service and does not have to pay for that month. If a customer disputes too many months, the service provider can drop them. But that might stop the bad service. If AOL has an outage, or dial numbers are busy, then the person should have the ability to dispute that days charge and not pay. This should be very easy to do, and not require more than 1 minutes time of the consumer.