- If you are watching a movie, or doing something full screen, why the hell would you want to see a dialog box? That's why you're in full screen; that's the modality of window that shows nothingbut that window. Why should an OS let a popup show up?
- And the AV is not necessarily 3rd party. Vista comes bundled with an AV. And, quite frankly, nobody loves those little popup windows like Microsoft.
- Not being able to log onto servers is a big bummer, too, especially if you need those servers to do work. I mean, if you can't log onto Samba shares, you might as well use a Mac.../sarcasm
Obviously you didn't think very hard about it. While not all of the problems can be attributed to Vista, the above can. At least you're classier than most ACs.
"Can they model government indifference to the people's plight?"
FTA: "The model allows all unforeseen challenges to be solved..."
I hardly think that the government's indifference could be, ahem, classified as an unforeseen challenge.
Though I suppose, if the problem is foreseen, it could also probably be dealt with as well.
Your characterization of n-type silicon is wrong. There are not a number of unfilled holes; instead, there is an extra electron that is not involved in any covalent bonds, and is free to move about.
A better model, still in ASCII would look like this: .......:..........
where the extra dot in the colon shows the extra electron.
Additionally, that extra electron is not forced into the conduction band; some small minority will still be associated with an atom at room temperature. Additionally, the percentage of electrons in the conduction band is a function of temperature: at absolute zero, there are no electrons in the conduction band as there is no thermal energy that will give them the impetus to escape from the atom they are associated with.
Electrons are normally attached to an atom. However, at temperatures above absolute zero, some electrons from an atom can leave the atom. When an electron leaves an atom, it leaves behind a hole; because a hole can be thought of as an absence of an electron, it has the same magnitude charge, but opposite sign, and a hole is also mobile, just like a free electron. Just as electrons can spontaneously leave an atom, it can recombine with a hole, and they both "annihilate" each other; for any given temperature, the rates of recombination and creation of electron/hole pairs are equal at an equilibrium value. So, free electrons and holes are found in normal semiconductors, and because they are both charged and mobile, they are both charge carriers.
Pure semiconductors, like crystallized silicon, are electrically neutral, meaning that pure crystallized silicon has the same number of holes as it has free electrons. However, crystal silicon (Si) can be doped with different atoms. Phosphorous (P) and boron (B) are most commonly used. Where silicon has four valence electrons, phosphorous has five (an extra) and boron has three (a deficit). When crystal silicon is doped with an impurity atom like P or B, that atom is incorporated into the crystal lattice of the Si, and this lattice is formed by four bonds between adjacent atoms. A bond is formed when an attached electron from one atom joins another electron from another atom. Si, with four electrons, loves making four bonds because it has no electrons left over; on the other hand, when P incorporates into the crystal lattice, it makes four bonds, but has an extra electron left over. If that extra electron leaves the P atom, it will not create a hole. Similarly for B, it has only 3 electrons, so when it incorporates into the crystal lattice, it makes four bonds and creates a hole. In silicon doped with phosphorous, there are more electrons than holes and vice verse for B-doped Si.
The reason that much ado is made about holes is that they are different from electrons. A hole can move if it is filled with an electron that is bound to an adjacent atom because, as you said, the lack of an electron is then found on the atom the electron came from. However, if a hole is filled with a free electron, the hole does not move; instead, it is destroyed. When saying "an electron moved from point A to point B," one is talking about a free electron, which is not bound to an atom. When saying "a hole moved from point A to point B," one is saying that a series of electrons moved one atom over, thus displacing the absence of an electron from the atom at point A to the atom at point B. A hole moving is the same as a bunch of bound electrons moving one atom over in the opposite direction, but that is not the same as saying that a free electron moved in the opposite direction.
As an aside, saying "a hole moved from point A to point B" is the same as saying "a free electron moved from point B to point A" from the standpoint of current flow. Just to maybe beat you over the head with it because of an unfortunate lack of distinction between unbound and bound electrons, a hole moving in one direction is not equivalent to one (unbound) electron moving in the opposite direction; in one case, you are moving a positive charge and a positive charge ends up on a different atom, while in the other case you are moving a negative charge.
Sorry to go so in-depth, but I noticed a number of people grasping this difficulty and wanted to explain the whole thing so that ignorance wasn't bandied about anymore.
And another snag in the numbers is that it doesn't include individual retailers...like Apple. That's important because I will bet that the majority of iPods sold are sold through Apple. For that matter, how many Zunes were sold from PriceGrabber, or Shopping.com?
And for eBay...great, so a lot of people don't want their Zune anymore and are selling it...that's a real winner. A lot of these news stories are sensationalized and meant to evoke an "OMG@@!@!11!" response even though on a logical level they are full of holes.
The Zune does take spots 1, 2, and 4. However, the most recent generation of iPods is conspicuously absent...the iPod in space three is the previous generation. Where is the iPod Classic? So the Zune is getting spots 1, 2, and 4 on that specific page because there is a lack of current generation iPods. The same is true of the PDMP bestseller list: the iPods listed are the previous generation. If you notice on the first screen you get to navigating from Amazon's homepage to the MP3 & Media Players, the iPods are their own category. The conspicuous lack of any current generation iPods showing up in any of the 3 subcategories of MP3 (flash-based, hard drive-based and PDMPs) may be because Amazon has listed them as iPods, and not as flash-based etc.
Also, how many people do you think get their iPods from Apple vs. Amazon? Does Microsoft even sell the Zune directly (answer: no)? So regarding on the sales from Amazon is kinda ludicrous...
Regardless of Microsoft's involvement of it, anyone using these data to claim that the Zune is outpacing the iPod sales has had their reality cable become unplugged...
With monopolistic practices or collusion, corporations can severly undercut an aspiriting individual with capital. The system is not perfect. I mean, in theory, communism is a fucking fantastic government; communism fucking sucks as a government in real life. The same thing applies to free market theory. You say that an aspiriting individual with capital and an idea can muscle his way into a market. But that is not true. With collusion and monopoly practices, the incumbent players could undercut his prices (and, according to the theory, that is all that matters). We have seen this again and again. The invisible hand does not work in a market that is not free, and any market where monopolies, duopolies or collusion exists is not free. Any real market is not free. In theory, the invisible hand works. In reality, it doesn't.
If an incorruptible authority could referee the market and keep it free, then the invisible hand works; that is the theoretical point of "government interference." However, because incumbent corporations with great power want the market to be captive, they have corrupted the authority to maintain their power. Stop blowing Adam Smith, get into the real world and realize that strictly adhering to any theory is an exercise in stupidity.
Oh, and get some balls and don't post AC, and also, take some time to actually read my post (I've said nothing new) before spewing shit.
I completely agree. In fact, I have nothing further to say to that other than I cannot agree more. Too bad, as you say, it's not going to be easy to make it happen.
Wrong! I don't confuse Libertarians and Republicans.
Libertarianism is about no government interference in anything, especially the lives of citizens. I said nothing about Libertarians wanting big government. However, the idea that "everything is better is the government does nothing" is Libertarian, and in this case, not supported by facts. I am all for a complete lack of lobbying, and a reasonable restriction on laws and a flourishing of a citizen's right to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness unhindered by undue governance. My point was that capitalistic entities will try to subvert a fair market; libertarians believe that the government should touch nothing, including the economy. That what was the OP said: the problem stems from the government holding an unfair auction. And I say that is not true. If you want to preserve a truly fair market, there needs to be some empowered entity that will work against those agents which try to turn the market to their advantage.
Capitalism is basically financial engineering: figure out a way to get "the most buck for your bang/product." In a lot of instances, the most cost-effective way to do that is to rig the playing field in your favor. Capitalism is premised on a Free Market; however, once a company is successful beyond a point, it gains the power to tie up the Invisible Hand (with monopoly practices, collusion, government interference, subsidies, etc.) and thereby destroy the Free Market*, which is how they rig the playing field in their favor. It is actually in the best interests of a corporation to not have a free market. They all want captive markets where they can wring as much profit as possible. Capitalism is the problem because it is capitalism that brought about corporate government interference in an effort to maximize profits. The other problem is that corporations do not give a fig about consumers (beyond the fact that they must be kept happy enough to keep consuming); it is, however, the government's sworn and bounden duty to protect its citizens, at least according to the principles espoused by John Locke, whose thinking, coincidentally, greatly influenced the Founding Fathers of the US.
I'm so sick of all this libertarian "The Government Scares Me" tripe. The government scares me too, but when I look at what's bad in the government, it has all been brought about by powerful lobbies, the vast majority of which are corporations or industry groups. Those scare me so much more because in this day and age, they are (almost) effectively puppet-masters.
However, I completely agree that this problem wouldn't exist if we didn't have auctions or we had completely fair auctions. And also that Google is much much better than AT&T. It's just the tired, fallible libertarian claptrap that gets to me. I'm sorry for venting on you; believe me, it's not personal.
*As an aside, I find it ironic that/.ers don't like invisible hands that Create or Intelligently Design things, but are downright chummy with other invisible hands.
I completely agree with the unnecessary hatred towards Novell. In fact, I wish/. didn't exist in such a mob mentality with regards to it; I mean, for a site where the greatest number of people see themselves as libertarians, it is both ironic and sad that no one seems to think for themselves about this issue.
But also, I don't think this is about Microsoft being found guilty of infringement. I believe that what a lot of people are (rightfully) salivating over is because Microsoft will be conveying GPLv3 code, Microsoft's claims of "patent infringement" by Linux will be rendered moot. And for that, if that eventuality was Novell's purpose for this agreement, another laurel should be given to Novell.
IAAAE&CE (I am also an Electrical & Computer Engineer)...and designing and optimizing circuits is a mathematical problem.
The Quine-McCluskey algorithm is, I believe, the best method of getting a provably optimized circuit. Granted, it isn't used in real-life because it's complexity is NP, but it is the basis of all the optimization algorithms out there.
Designing digital circuits is also math because logic is a subset of mathematics, and all digital circuits are physical manifestations of boolean logic.
Furthermore, mathematics is used always in ECE. Math is used always in any engineering; engineering - math = guesswork. Problems in engineering always reduce to equations, always reduce to math.
The point was made repeatedly in the second linked article that LQG (or at least this variant) are in fact testable. The claim was also made that these experiments could be made in a few years (TM).
As an example you probably saw the case earlier in the week of a Chinese Laundry in the United States being sued for $54M for loosing a pair of trousers, belonging to a lawyer.
Obviously, it is not only slashdotters who are loosing their minds...
Actually, there is a mathematical basis for "seeing patterns in randomness." It's called chaos theory, and, slightly disturbingly, it turns out that randomness does have a pattern and a self similarity. However, the patterns are not predictive; they are simply an indication that even chaos is ordered.
What is laughable, however, is the fact that the H.264 codecs run on anything (mulitple OSes and processor architectures) while WMP is restricted solely to...Windows. VC-1 is completely uncompetitive, by default, for anyone not using Windows (and not using the latest version of WMP, which precludes anyone not using Vista or XP SP2 "Genuine.)"
That being said, will VC-1 ever make it to a wider audience?
If you followed your own link, you'd see Apple's website says UNIX based. Apparently The Open Group doesn't think that OS X is UNIX either...
Mac OS X
Apple has stated they will pursue UNIX 03 certification in Mac OS X v10.5, their upcoming BSD/Mach-based commercial product due in October of 2007[2].
But you can keep using your annoying and baseless "facts." I'm sure they make everybody love you.
Uh, go look at crime statistics (especially violent crimes, and crimes including a gun) for US vs. Canada, Australia, France, Sweden, UK. The US has a much higher rate, while the other countries have gun control laws.
If the gunman had pulled his psycho bullshit in a crowded Virginia mall, the shooter's life may have ended a lot quicker, but that does not mean that fewer people would be dead. If someone started shooting back, there would have been more bullets flying around, and with more bullets flying around, there's a lot higher chance that people will get hit, especially if this is taking place in a mall with a lot of people.
The problem with Col. Cooper's statement is that killing people is seen as a bad thing, and is something that should be avoided. That is why soldiers and/or cops have to be authorized to use lethal force. A rifle is a tool, but it's purpose is, basically, to kill. So, while a rifle may have no moral stature, it is a tool whose purpose it is to effect a morally wrong action. Because, even if evil men can be "corrected" by men with rifles, those men with rifles have done something that we as a society frown upon.
As for your assertion that gun-free zones are in effect "unarmed victim zones," think about the fact that in our legal system there is a difference between manslaughter and murder; in order for murder to be committed, malice and forethought must be proved. If you piss someone with a gun off, they could very easily kill you, even if they weren't justified in their action. Without guns, it is a whole lot harder, involved, and personal to kill someone, and that means that fewer people will die. It is very true that people kill people, and as long as that is the case, people will continue to kill people, no matter what weapons we outlaw. However, removing weapons from the market makes it much harder, and that means that fewer people die; hence, why some people place their personal safety in front of their right to bear arms, and call for tighter gun control.
There is no logical flaw in that argument. The theorem states that a formal theory is inconsistent if and only if it says something about its own consistency. The axioms of mathematics do not do this; this is why Bertrand Russell famously tried to throw them out in the search for a provably complete and consistent theory of arithmetic. Godel's Theorems proved it was impossible to do this. It is possible to prove that the axioms of mathematics are consistent because its axioms do not contain any references to their consistency. And I do believe that the 2nd theorem can be applied to mathematics; however, it says nothing about math because, well, it contains no statements about its consistency. Whoops. Again.
There are a few logical inconsistencies with what you wrote, which is ironic. But anyway, if your axioms are consistent with each other (i.e. are self-consistent), then anything proven with those axioms is consistent with those axioms, and so is self-consisent.
This is what Godel's First Incompleteness Theorem
For any consistent formal theory that proves basic arithmetical truths, an arithmetical statement that is true, but not provable in the theory can be constructed. That is, any theory capable of expressing elementary arithmetic cannot be both consistent and complete.
OK, and the second one states:
For any formal theory T including basic arithmetical truths and also certain truths about formal provability, T includes a statement of its own consistency if and only if T is inconsistent.
Now, mathematics does not state it is consistent or inconsistent, therefore, it is not inconsistent. Because, I mean, from the first thing I said, the axioms of mathematics are consistent, and so mathematics, which is not self-referential, is not inconsistent. Godel implies nothing about the group of theories that we call mathematics; what Godel shows is that it is futile to try and build a logical system without axioms. That is not mathematics.
Slashdot Mirror
- If you are watching a movie, or doing something full screen, why the hell would you want to see a dialog box? That's why you're in full screen; that's the modality of window that shows nothingbut that window. Why should an OS let a popup show up?
- And the AV is not necessarily 3rd party. Vista comes bundled with an AV. And, quite frankly, nobody loves those little popup windows like Microsoft.
- Not being able to log onto servers is a big bummer, too, especially if you need those servers to do work. I mean, if you can't log onto Samba shares, you might as well use a Mac.../sarcasm
Obviously you didn't think very hard about it. While not all of the problems can be attributed to Vista, the above can. At least you're classier than most ACs.
Obviously, he's not from here. He suggesting reading TFA, for instance.
FTA: "The model allows all unforeseen challenges to be solved..."
I hardly think that the government's indifference could be, ahem, classified as an unforeseen challenge.
Though I suppose, if the problem is foreseen, it could also probably be dealt with as well.
Your characterization of n-type silicon is wrong. There are not a number of unfilled holes; instead, there is an extra electron that is not involved in any covalent bonds, and is free to move about. A better model, still in ASCII would look like this:
.......:..........
where the extra dot in the colon shows the extra electron.
Additionally, that extra electron is not forced into the conduction band; some small minority will still be associated with an atom at room temperature. Additionally, the percentage of electrons in the conduction band is a function of temperature: at absolute zero, there are no electrons in the conduction band as there is no thermal energy that will give them the impetus to escape from the atom they are associated with.
Electrons are normally attached to an atom. However, at temperatures above absolute zero, some electrons from an atom can leave the atom. When an electron leaves an atom, it leaves behind a hole; because a hole can be thought of as an absence of an electron, it has the same magnitude charge, but opposite sign, and a hole is also mobile, just like a free electron. Just as electrons can spontaneously leave an atom, it can recombine with a hole, and they both "annihilate" each other; for any given temperature, the rates of recombination and creation of electron/hole pairs are equal at an equilibrium value. So, free electrons and holes are found in normal semiconductors, and because they are both charged and mobile, they are both charge carriers.
Pure semiconductors, like crystallized silicon, are electrically neutral, meaning that pure crystallized silicon has the same number of holes as it has free electrons. However, crystal silicon (Si) can be doped with different atoms. Phosphorous (P) and boron (B) are most commonly used. Where silicon has four valence electrons, phosphorous has five (an extra) and boron has three (a deficit). When crystal silicon is doped with an impurity atom like P or B, that atom is incorporated into the crystal lattice of the Si, and this lattice is formed by four bonds between adjacent atoms. A bond is formed when an attached electron from one atom joins another electron from another atom. Si, with four electrons, loves making four bonds because it has no electrons left over; on the other hand, when P incorporates into the crystal lattice, it makes four bonds, but has an extra electron left over. If that extra electron leaves the P atom, it will not create a hole. Similarly for B, it has only 3 electrons, so when it incorporates into the crystal lattice, it makes four bonds and creates a hole. In silicon doped with phosphorous, there are more electrons than holes and vice verse for B-doped Si.
The reason that much ado is made about holes is that they are different from electrons. A hole can move if it is filled with an electron that is bound to an adjacent atom because, as you said, the lack of an electron is then found on the atom the electron came from. However, if a hole is filled with a free electron, the hole does not move; instead, it is destroyed. When saying "an electron moved from point A to point B," one is talking about a free electron, which is not bound to an atom. When saying "a hole moved from point A to point B," one is saying that a series of electrons moved one atom over, thus displacing the absence of an electron from the atom at point A to the atom at point B. A hole moving is the same as a bunch of bound electrons moving one atom over in the opposite direction, but that is not the same as saying that a free electron moved in the opposite direction.
As an aside, saying "a hole moved from point A to point B" is the same as saying "a free electron moved from point B to point A" from the standpoint of current flow. Just to maybe beat you over the head with it because of an unfortunate lack of distinction between unbound and bound electrons, a hole moving in one direction is not equivalent to one (unbound) electron moving in the opposite direction; in one case, you are moving a positive charge and a positive charge ends up on a different atom, while in the other case you are moving a negative charge.
Sorry to go so in-depth, but I noticed a number of people grasping this difficulty and wanted to explain the whole thing so that ignorance wasn't bandied about anymore.
And another snag in the numbers is that it doesn't include individual retailers...like Apple. That's important because I will bet that the majority of iPods sold are sold through Apple. For that matter, how many Zunes were sold from PriceGrabber, or Shopping.com?
And for eBay...great, so a lot of people don't want their Zune anymore and are selling it...that's a real winner. A lot of these news stories are sensationalized and meant to evoke an "OMG@@!@!11!" response even though on a logical level they are full of holes.
The Zune does take spots 1, 2, and 4. However, the most recent generation of iPods is conspicuously absent...the iPod in space three is the previous generation. Where is the iPod Classic? So the Zune is getting spots 1, 2, and 4 on that specific page because there is a lack of current generation iPods. The same is true of the PDMP bestseller list: the iPods listed are the previous generation. If you notice on the first screen you get to navigating from Amazon's homepage to the MP3 & Media Players, the iPods are their own category. The conspicuous lack of any current generation iPods showing up in any of the 3 subcategories of MP3 (flash-based, hard drive-based and PDMPs) may be because Amazon has listed them as iPods, and not as flash-based etc.
Also, how many people do you think get their iPods from Apple vs. Amazon? Does Microsoft even sell the Zune directly (answer: no)? So regarding on the sales from Amazon is kinda ludicrous...
Regardless of Microsoft's involvement of it, anyone using these data to claim that the Zune is outpacing the iPod sales has had their reality cable become unplugged...
With monopolistic practices or collusion, corporations can severly undercut an aspiriting individual with capital. The system is not perfect. I mean, in theory, communism is a fucking fantastic government; communism fucking sucks as a government in real life. The same thing applies to free market theory. You say that an aspiriting individual with capital and an idea can muscle his way into a market. But that is not true. With collusion and monopoly practices, the incumbent players could undercut his prices (and, according to the theory, that is all that matters). We have seen this again and again. The invisible hand does not work in a market that is not free, and any market where monopolies, duopolies or collusion exists is not free. Any real market is not free. In theory, the invisible hand works. In reality, it doesn't.
If an incorruptible authority could referee the market and keep it free, then the invisible hand works; that is the theoretical point of "government interference." However, because incumbent corporations with great power want the market to be captive, they have corrupted the authority to maintain their power. Stop blowing Adam Smith, get into the real world and realize that strictly adhering to any theory is an exercise in stupidity.
Oh, and get some balls and don't post AC, and also, take some time to actually read my post (I've said nothing new) before spewing shit.
Otherwise it would have to be pronounced "Oh, sex."
/.ers say a lot...
And that's not something many
I completely agree. In fact, I have nothing further to say to that other than I cannot agree more. Too bad, as you say, it's not going to be easy to make it happen.
Wrong! I don't confuse Libertarians and Republicans.
Libertarianism is about no government interference in anything, especially the lives of citizens. I said nothing about Libertarians wanting big government. However, the idea that "everything is better is the government does nothing" is Libertarian, and in this case, not supported by facts. I am all for a complete lack of lobbying, and a reasonable restriction on laws and a flourishing of a citizen's right to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness unhindered by undue governance. My point was that capitalistic entities will try to subvert a fair market; libertarians believe that the government should touch nothing, including the economy. That what was the OP said: the problem stems from the government holding an unfair auction. And I say that is not true. If you want to preserve a truly fair market, there needs to be some empowered entity that will work against those agents which try to turn the market to their advantage.
I hate this about /.
/.ers don't like invisible hands that Create or Intelligently Design things, but are downright chummy with other invisible hands.
Capitalism is basically financial engineering: figure out a way to get "the most buck for your bang/product." In a lot of instances, the most cost-effective way to do that is to rig the playing field in your favor. Capitalism is premised on a Free Market; however, once a company is successful beyond a point, it gains the power to tie up the Invisible Hand (with monopoly practices, collusion, government interference, subsidies, etc.) and thereby destroy the Free Market*, which is how they rig the playing field in their favor. It is actually in the best interests of a corporation to not have a free market. They all want captive markets where they can wring as much profit as possible. Capitalism is the problem because it is capitalism that brought about corporate government interference in an effort to maximize profits. The other problem is that corporations do not give a fig about consumers (beyond the fact that they must be kept happy enough to keep consuming); it is, however, the government's sworn and bounden duty to protect its citizens, at least according to the principles espoused by John Locke, whose thinking, coincidentally, greatly influenced the Founding Fathers of the US.
I'm so sick of all this libertarian "The Government Scares Me" tripe. The government scares me too, but when I look at what's bad in the government, it has all been brought about by powerful lobbies, the vast majority of which are corporations or industry groups. Those scare me so much more because in this day and age, they are (almost) effectively puppet-masters.
However, I completely agree that this problem wouldn't exist if we didn't have auctions or we had completely fair auctions. And also that Google is much much better than AT&T. It's just the tired, fallible libertarian claptrap that gets to me. I'm sorry for venting on you; believe me, it's not personal.
*As an aside, I find it ironic that
I completely agree with the unnecessary hatred towards Novell. In fact, I wish /. didn't exist in such a mob mentality with regards to it; I mean, for a site where the greatest number of people see themselves as libertarians, it is both ironic and sad that no one seems to think for themselves about this issue.
But also, I don't think this is about Microsoft being found guilty of infringement. I believe that what a lot of people are (rightfully) salivating over is because Microsoft will be conveying GPLv3 code, Microsoft's claims of "patent infringement" by Linux will be rendered moot. And for that, if that eventuality was Novell's purpose for this agreement, another laurel should be given to Novell.
IAAAE&CE (I am also an Electrical & Computer Engineer) ...and designing and optimizing circuits is a mathematical problem.
The Quine-McCluskey algorithm is, I believe, the best method of getting a provably optimized circuit. Granted, it isn't used in real-life because it's complexity is NP, but it is the basis of all the optimization algorithms out there.
Designing digital circuits is also math because logic is a subset of mathematics, and all digital circuits are physical manifestations of boolean logic.
Furthermore, mathematics is used always in ECE. Math is used always in any engineering; engineering - math = guesswork. Problems in engineering always reduce to equations, always reduce to math.
The point was made repeatedly in the second linked article that LQG (or at least this variant) are in fact testable. The claim was also made that these experiments could be made in a few years (TM).
For precisely that reason. Nothing is funnier than an AC getting trolled.
Actually, there is a mathematical basis for "seeing patterns in randomness." It's called chaos theory, and, slightly disturbingly, it turns out that randomness does have a pattern and a self similarity. However, the patterns are not predictive; they are simply an indication that even chaos is ordered.
What is laughable, however, is the fact that the H.264 codecs run on anything (mulitple OSes and processor architectures) while WMP is restricted solely to...Windows. VC-1 is completely uncompetitive, by default, for anyone not using Windows (and not using the latest version of WMP, which precludes anyone not using Vista or XP SP2 "Genuine.)"
That being said, will VC-1 ever make it to a wider audience?
But you can keep using your annoying and baseless "facts." I'm sure they make everybody love you.
You don't have a UNIX machine. X is Not UNIX (XNU) and XNU is what the Mac OS X kernel is based on.
Now you can say it: You Nixed It. Yes, I did.
Uh, go look at crime statistics (especially violent crimes, and crimes including a gun) for US vs. Canada, Australia, France, Sweden, UK. The US has a much higher rate, while the other countries have gun control laws.
If the gunman had pulled his psycho bullshit in a crowded Virginia mall, the shooter's life may have ended a lot quicker, but that does not mean that fewer people would be dead. If someone started shooting back, there would have been more bullets flying around, and with more bullets flying around, there's a lot higher chance that people will get hit, especially if this is taking place in a mall with a lot of people.
The problem with Col. Cooper's statement is that killing people is seen as a bad thing, and is something that should be avoided. That is why soldiers and/or cops have to be authorized to use lethal force. A rifle is a tool, but it's purpose is, basically, to kill. So, while a rifle may have no moral stature, it is a tool whose purpose it is to effect a morally wrong action. Because, even if evil men can be "corrected" by men with rifles, those men with rifles have done something that we as a society frown upon.
As for your assertion that gun-free zones are in effect "unarmed victim zones," think about the fact that in our legal system there is a difference between manslaughter and murder; in order for murder to be committed, malice and forethought must be proved. If you piss someone with a gun off, they could very easily kill you, even if they weren't justified in their action. Without guns, it is a whole lot harder, involved, and personal to kill someone, and that means that fewer people will die. It is very true that people kill people, and as long as that is the case, people will continue to kill people, no matter what weapons we outlaw. However, removing weapons from the market makes it much harder, and that means that fewer people die; hence, why some people place their personal safety in front of their right to bear arms, and call for tighter gun control.
There is no logical flaw in that argument. The theorem states that a formal theory is inconsistent if and only if it says something about its own consistency. The axioms of mathematics do not do this; this is why Bertrand Russell famously tried to throw them out in the search for a provably complete and consistent theory of arithmetic. Godel's Theorems proved it was impossible to do this. It is possible to prove that the axioms of mathematics are consistent because its axioms do not contain any references to their consistency. And I do believe that the 2nd theorem can be applied to mathematics; however, it says nothing about math because, well, it contains no statements about its consistency. Whoops. Again.
This is what Godel's First Incompleteness Theorem OK, and the second one states: Now, mathematics does not state it is consistent or inconsistent, therefore, it is not inconsistent. Because, I mean, from the first thing I said, the axioms of mathematics are consistent, and so mathematics, which is not self-referential, is not inconsistent. Godel implies nothing about the group of theories that we call mathematics; what Godel shows is that it is futile to try and build a logical system without axioms. That is not mathematics.