Go for it! No amount of money is worth slaving a way at a job that makes you miserable. Look at this way: 30 years from now, when you think back on this, are you going to be more proud of opportunities you took, or the opportunities you missed?
Having said that, you should also be prepared for disappointment. The grass isn't always greener on the other side. You may end up missing some of the friends that you made at your old job and find that your new coworkers aren't all that pleasant. It happens. At worst it will be a learning experience and will give you some perspective on how things are elsewhere; at best, you will have a found a job that makes you excited to go into work everyday.
In the late 19th to early 20th century with the development of the automobile and mass production came the need for mass consumption. Out of this necessity was borne marketing: the discipline that aims to convince people that they need things more than they really do. While marketing tactics have been around for a lot longer, marketing as a discipline has had a little under a century to hone its techniques.
Along comes the 21st century, and with it, immense knowledge to build really cool gadgets. But rather than step back and ask, "Do we really need this?", we take it on faith that the marketeers wouldn't lie to us: we just can't live without these newly developed toys.
In another 300 years, I'll probably be able to surf the internet with an optical implant in my eye, talk to my stock broker on the holograph-phone, while nanorobots wipe my bum after the dump I just took.
I also work in an environment where writing patents is strongly encouraged and have a bearing on performance evaluations. Unfortunately, the company I work for doesn't care about the quality of the patents, just the quantity that they get accepted. I remember being in one meeting where one of the senior architects on the team was suggesting that we patent a part of the code where we transmit a string of numbers (e.g., "128") in their numeric form rather than their string form (e.g.,for "128" transmit 1 byte: 10000000, instead of of 3 bytes: "1", "2", "8"). This was to be a patent on a compression. I'm not joking. This was actually being proposed. Never got written (thank god), but it's pretty demoralizing.
If you're working at the same company as me, my condolences. If not, and you're working for a (rare) company that tries to patent things that are truly original and worthwhile, why not write a patent? IMHO, a well-written patent on something that is novel can be in the same league as a peer-reviewed research paper in a scientific journal.
I was actually pleasantly surprised. It was pretty decent for a sitcom. I don't normally watch much TV, especially not sitcoms. (I consider 'Friends' one of the best reasons not to watch tv.)
Are all the episodes going to be online, or just the premiere?
"The aim of the laborer should be, not to get his living, to get "a good job," but to perform well a certain work; and, even in a pecuniary sense, it would be economy for a town to pay its laborers so well that they would not feel that they were working for low ends, as for a livelihood merely, but for scientific, or even moral ends. Do not hire a man who does your work for money, but him who does it for love of it."
"The community has no bribe that will tempt a wise man. You may raise money enough to tunnel a mountain, but you cannot raise money enough to hire a man who is minding his own business. An efficient and valuable man does what he can, whether the community pay him for it or not. The inefficient offer their inefficiency to the highest bidder, and are forever expecting to be put into office. One would suppose that they were rarely disappointed."
"A commerce that whitens every sea in quest of nuts and raisins, and makes slaves of its sailors for this purpose! I saw, the other day, a vessel which had been wrecked, and many lives lost, and her cargo of rags, juniper berries, and bitter almonds were strewn along the shore. It seemed hardly worth the while to tempt the dangers of the sea between Leghorn and New York for the sake of a cargo of juniper berries and bitter almonds. America sending to the Old World for her bitters! Is not the sea-brine, is not shipwreck, bitter enough to make the cup of life go down here? Yet such, to a great extent, is our boasted commerce; and there are those who style themselves statesmen and philosophers who are so blind as to think that progress and civilization depend on precisely this kind of interchange and activity, -- the activity of flies about a molasses-hogshead. Very well, observes one, if men were oysters. And very well, answer I, if men were mosquitoes."
Jack, an outraged father and activist lawyer, is on a mission to protect children from the violent and obscene video games, music lyrics, shock jock radio shows, and television programs he says are creating a culture of violence and degradation.
If the answers were only that simple. If video games, music lyrics, and bad television programs caused all the problems we see today, then I would have no trouble supporting this guy. But things are not that simple. Violence and degradation has been around for a long long time, long before the stuff that Jack enjoys blaming. Our history is littered with violence and degradation: crucifixions, wars, torture, hatred, prejudice. You pick a century, and it would probably be fairly easy to find some example of man's inhumanity to man. What does Jack blame those instances of violence on? I doubt very much that Pontius Pilate was listening to his Marilyn Manson CD when he got the idea to order the crucifixion of Christ.
But what's even worse than the fact that Jack Thompson is flat-out wrong, is the fact that he, and those like him, end up hiding the real issues. Lets take the Columbine shootings as an example. There were plenty of people ready to blame music, tv, and video games for the shootings. Michael Moore examined the absurdity of these claims in Bowling for Columbine by observing that the shooters were bowling the morning of the shooting -- so why not blame bowling? The real issue was that these kids who committed the murders were the target of ongoing emotional torment and bullying from a lot of their classmates. Rather than say, hey wait a second, maybe we have to do something to prevent bullying and to teach kids to respect one another as human beings, Jack and his ilk blame all the wrong things. But then again, it's probably easier for Jack to attack these things than reach a 17-yr old highschool jock and try to get him to actually respect people who don't fit in.
With such technology, I'm surprised they aren't offering pre-written 'after death' notes. With this option, the user wouldn't even have to write their own contents. Simply click on the note that is most appealing to your situation. It would be on-par with the 1-click shopping feature at Amazon. There could be the 1-click Suicide Note, simply with the contents "Goodbye cruel world.". What about the 1-click Vengeful Sibling Note, which reads "Haha! I'm dead now and didn't leave you a single penny in the will!" The possibilities are really endless.
He stages an event at North Country Bank and Trust in Michigan's Traverse City, claiming that opening an account would entitle one to walk out of the bank with a gun in hand. The film shows him doing just that. But the key word is "staged." In reality, the bank does not provide guns for opening accounts, and you can't walk in or out of the bank with one--unless you're a security guard employed by the bank. The gun is one of several "giveaways" that can be chosen by customers in exchange for opening a CD account. In order to qualify for the gun, customers must open a 3-year CD with at least $5,000 and then must pass a background check for the gun, which can only be picked up at a licensed gun dealer.
So, how crazy are the things they've said about "Bowling for Columbine?" Here are my favorites:
"That scene where you got the gun in the bank was staged!"
Well of course it was staged! It's a movie! We built the "bank" as a set and then I hired actors to play the bank tellers and the manager and we got a toy gun from the prop department and then I wrote some really cool dialogue for me and them to say! Pretty neat, huh?
Or...
The Truth: In the spring of 2001, I saw a real ad in a real newspaper in Michigan announcing a real promotion that this real bank had where they would give you a gun (as your up-front interest) for opening up a Certificate of Deposit account. They promoted this in publications all over the country - "More Bang for Your Buck!"
There was news coverage of this bank giving away guns, long before I even shot the scene there. The Chicago Sun Times wrote about how the bank would "hand you a gun" with the purchase of a CD. Those are the precise words used by a bank employee in the film.
When you see me going in to the bank and walking out with my new gun in "Bowling for Columbine" - that is exactly as it happened. Nothing was done out of the ordinary other than to phone ahead and ask permission to let me bring a camera in to film me opening up my account. I walked into that bank in northern Michigan for the first time ever on that day in June 2001, and, with cameras rolling, gave the bank teller $1,000 - and opened up a 20-year CD account. After you see me filling out the required federal forms ("How do you spell Caucasian?") - which I am filling out here for the first time - the bank manager faxed it to the bank's main office for them to do the background check. The bank is a licensed federal arms dealer and thus can have guns on the premises and do the instant background checks (the ATF's Federal Firearms database--which includes all federally approved gun dealers--lists North Country Bank with Federal Firearms License #4-38-153-01-5C-39922).
Within 10 minutes, the "OK" came through from the firearms background check agency and, 5 minutes later, just as you see it in the film, they handed me a Weatherby Mark V Magnum rifle.
I think that once these are developed further, and people become more accustomed to them, it will be quite common to meet new people on the street through the medium of technology like this.
It's funny that if you go up to a complete stranger on the street, say hi and introduce yourself, they'll look at you like you're a complete whacko. But if you put yourself behind a keyboard (or a cell phone, in this case), it becomes a lot more acceptable.
The irony of it is, we all want social interaction, but we all want it through inherently less social mediums (at least initially).
The one thing that the article doesn't comment on is the bizzare form of suicide method. It is one thing to ingest a poison like cyanide, but for it to be "a cyanide laced apple" is not particularly common.
Turing was an amateur chemist in addition to being a world-class mathematician. His choice of suicide method was intended to lessen the impact it would have on other members of his family, in particular his mother. By eating a cyanide laced apple, it has been speculated that he wanted to make his death look like an accident. His mother would think that he had been performing some chemistry experiment, and then forgot to thoroughly wash his hands before eating the apple. Having one's son die is bad enough, but for it to be a suicide is doubly worse.
On the more dramatic side, if one were so inclined, it could be said that his method of suicide was rather symbolic. Turing had partook in what was in his day forbidden. For this, he had been "cast out" of his chosen profession and what he loved to do -- in some sense, his Eden. As a final gesture before leaving this world, he ate a piece of forbidden fruit that was symbolic of this fact.
It's a tragedy that the ignorance and intolerance of first half of the 20th century could have driven such a brilliant man to suicide. If it weren't for Turing, much of what we take for granted today may be a lot different or may not even exist at all. Hopefully the world has wisened over the last 50 years.
Umm, actually, Keynsian economics is what made this country what it is (at least after the Great Depression). If it wasn't for government social assistance programs that arose during that period, it would have taken a lot longer to get the economy going again. If there is a downfall, it will be in no small part due to the ignorance and arrogance of the neo-con capitalists.
As has already been pointed out numerous times, if you want to do the really *interesting* stuff in Computer Science, you need a lot of math. Lets look at the different fields/specialities in CS:
Theory
CS theory consists of a wide range of problems: some very heavily mathematical (Does P = NP?) to the not so mathematical (eg. Theory of Distributed Systems). Although the latter is not "mathematical" in the traditional sense, it still requires strong mathematical reasoning abilities. In any case, needless to say, studying CS theory requires a good foundation in mathematics.
Graphics
This one has already been described by other people. No chance in hell you're going to write a kick-ass 3d engine without knowing a lot of linear algebra (i.e. math).
Artificial Intelligence
Machine Learning (Neural Nets, Support Vector machines, etc) is all hardcore statistics. You need to have a good knowledge of linear algebra and multivariate calculus to even begin to comprehend this field. At the other end of the spectrum within the AI field is Knowledge Representation; this type of AI is more logic based, and again requires good mathematical reasoning abilities.
Operating Systems
Here's a field for which you may argue a minimal amount of math is required. Of all the subdisciplines within CS, this one probably does require the least math. However, that doesn't mean you'll get away without a math background. A lot of research done in this field involves understanding/presenting quantitative results. So you do need some basic knowledge of statistics. Besides that, a lot of OS research also involves proving systems correct; this is very heavily logic based stuff, and again an ability to reason about problems abstractly (mathematically) is extremely useful.
Numerical Analysis
Math, math, math, and more math.
Software Engineering
Proving systems correct and defining systems using logic -- very mathematical stuff. If on the other hand you get into the more wishy-washy side of SE then you may be able to avoid math.
Anyways, there's probably some sub disciples I missed, but you should get the idea. Math is required in almost all aspects of CS. The only reason it isn't required in the RealWorld(tm) is because most of the stuff done there is grunt work that involves nothing more than reinventing the wheel.
So, if you are really interested in CS, then do it right -- take as much math as you can. If, on the other hand, you are just interested in hacking, then don't go into CS. CS != hacking degree.
Leading by example during the blackout was one of the things the politicians in charge did not do.
In Ontario, the first week we were told to conserve as much power as possible because some of our generating stations had been knocked out badly and would take a long time to get back online. This meant no air conditioners -- in 40 degree (celcius) heat. Of course, when you watched the politicians give the daily updates of the situation on TV, they even commented once or twice on having the air conditioning going in the building where they were.
There was also one TV station (Global TV) that went around knocking on doors of houses where they saw the air conditioner was running. After they finished embarrasing the house owner by throwing a camera in his/her face demanding to know why the air conditioner was on in this time of crisis, they would cut back to the studio where the news anchor would be sitting in his suit and tie. He was undoubtedly under a set of blaring hot studio lights, the weather was in the high 30's outside, and there wasn't a single drop of sweat to be seen on his face. Of course, with their righteous attitude about power conservation, I'm sure they didn't have the air conditioning going in the studio. Yeah. Right, my ass.
So what do I remember about the blackout? The hypocrisy.
That a federal election isn't that far off... And slogans like "Helene Scherre wants to put your kids in prison" look great on T-shirts and the news...
Unfortunately, the only real alternatives to the Liberals are a bunch of homophobic rednecks in suits who make George Bush look like a moderate conservative, or the NDP. While I'm probably going to vote NDP, the chances that they'll win even a minority government are pretty slim. I'd much rather see the Liberals back in power than Stephen Harper as our new PM.
This whole idea of copying the Windows desktop is one of the reasons I get turned off Linux. If I want to use a Windows like interface why wouldn't I just use the real thing?
There is more to an operating system than just a UI. There's this thing called the kernel that's making the whole show run. True, most users could care less about what's going on behind the scenes, and if you even mentioned the word kernel to them, they'll ask you what an army colonel has to do with their computer. (I've actually had this happen to me once when I tried explaining the inner workings of a computer to someone who was not terribly computer literate).
With XPde, users now have a choice between two products that are visually identical, but are different under the hood. The one running linux under the hood is more stable and likely to perform better in the long run.
It's like giving a consumer the choice between a Toyota Corolla and a Chevy Cavalier. Visually the two are not that much different, but one is likely to last you, the other to drain your pocket with all the repairs you're going to have to put into it.
Which one are you going to choose? (I'm guessing from your comments about a Minority Report style UI, you'd probably choose neither the Corolla or the Cavalier, and go for some futuristic space looking car instead).
For a user to execute it, they'd have to save the attachment, switch to their file manager, change the permissions on the file, then run it. That's one more step that is require on Microsoft Windows, and following the data that's more than 2 clicks away is too far away rule, a lot of people won't bother if it takes that much effort.
Well, that's the thing. When a user's buddy sends him an executable of some sort that he knows is safe, he wants to be able to click on it and run it.
Sure, his ignorance/laziness will save him the trouble of having his machine infected with a virus if he's running Linux/OS X/etc, but the same ignorance/laziness is going to annoy him when he knows he's being sent something that's safe, which in turn will lead him to use Windows instead. Unfortunate, but true.
So what you're saying is, Bill Gates possibly secretly wishes to quash the pro-democracy movement in China???
Not at all. I do, however, believe that Microsoft, among other companies, are taking an amoral stance. As Cisco Systems was quoted in this article, "We are politically neutral." This is nothing but doublespeak for, "We don't care what our product is used for, even if it is to kill or harm people. We definitely are not condoning such actions, but nor are we against them, as long as we get our money." This is capitalist amorality in its finest form.
A similar claim was levelled against IBM and the role that in helping the Nazis. According to Edwin Black, author of _IBM and the Holocaust_, IBM supplied equipment to the Nazi's for tracking and sorting prisoners in their concentration camps. Some people have made the argument that since IBM didn't know what its equipment was being used for, it really wasn't doing anything wrong. However, Black also contended that IBM had to maintain all the equipment it supplied, meaning that IBM engineers and other staff had to be onsite and that there was no way that they could have not known what was going on in those concentration camps.
I think the problem with all these large companies is their choice to hide behind the almighty buck. Capitalism reigns supreme. `Hey, what is it any of my business if you use my product to harm or kill people? Just as long as you pay up.'
I'm not implying that companies are responsible for finding out every last detail of how their product will be used when they sell it to a customer. However, I do think that turning a blind-eye to how their product will be used when it's fairly obvious that it will be employed in unethical ends is wrong.
... except for all the sick people I would have to deal with.
Slightly off topic story: I was in the doctor's office a few months ago, suffering from some kind of nasty combo of cough and sore throat. (The symptoms had lasted long enough to make me think it wasn't just a run of the mill cold). So the doctor does the open-wide-and-say-ahhh routine, and I do, and then, just as she's peering into my mouth, I go into an involuntary coughing fit. I sprayed the doctor pretty good. I apologized profusely after it happened, but the thing is, the doctor never flinched once. It was as though it was all par for the course. I could not imagine myself in that position, having a patient cough all over me and not giving it a second thought. What's more, I realized, having someone cough all over me probably is one of the more pleasant experiences I would have to endure as a doctor.
For a perspective on how stressful a life in medicine is, check out the book The Intern Blues. I read this a while back when I was trying to figure out what else I might want to do with my life besides IT. (Definitely not medicine.)
I totally agree with you. Unfortunately, justice is an entrepreneurial enterprise. This means that a large corporation like Microsoft, SCO, or (insert favourite evil business entity) can hire lawyers that charge exorbitant fees, and then when they grind the opposition into the dust, claim that they are owed hundreds of thousands of dollars. It's already bad enough that individuals (or corporations) with large bank accounts have the upper-hand in a court of law. Introducing the scheme that you suggest, while on the surface appears like a good idea, would swing the balance of justice even more in the direction of the rich.
What there needs to be is some sort of standard which can be used to judge how much money constitutes a reasonable defense/prosecution for a particular case. Then when Evil Corporation, Inc. claims that it is owed enormous amounts of money, the court can say, "Well, actually, NO. The reasonable legal costs for this case should not have exceeded $x, you're on the hook for the rest." This would put people on a slightly more level playing field.
If you write 'I understand the position also requires a candidate who is team- and detail-oriented, works well under pressure, and is able to deal with people in departments throughout the firm' then at best people will think you're a bullshit artist and at worst they will think that you were not born with the part of the brain that allows you to form your own thoughts and ideas.
Unfortunately, if you are a student just graduating, then this is precisely the type of crap that the career services department at your university will tell you to put on your resume and cover letter. I had a fairly decent technical resume that didn't include the type of fluff mentioned above, but after getting it reviewed by an "expert" in the career services department at my university, I was told that I needed to stress my "soft" skills more, that HR departments are looking for that kind of stuff.
So who am I supposed to believe? My BS detector tells me to leave that stuff off, but then I'm faced with "experts" telling me to put it in.
Slashdot Mirror
Why was this modded Funny? I think he was serious. Should have been modded Insightful.
Having said that, you should also be prepared for disappointment. The grass isn't always greener on the other side. You may end up missing some of the friends that you made at your old job and find that your new coworkers aren't all that pleasant. It happens. At worst it will be a learning experience and will give you some perspective on how things are elsewhere; at best, you will have a found a job that makes you excited to go into work everyday.
Along comes the 21st century, and with it, immense knowledge to build really cool gadgets. But rather than step back and ask, "Do we really need this?", we take it on faith that the marketeers wouldn't lie to us: we just can't live without these newly developed toys.
In another 300 years, I'll probably be able to surf the internet with an optical implant in my eye, talk to my stock broker on the holograph-phone, while nanorobots wipe my bum after the dump I just took.
But will I be any happier? No, probably not.
If you're working at the same company as me, my condolences. If not, and you're working for a (rare) company that tries to patent things that are truly original and worthwhile, why not write a patent? IMHO, a well-written patent on something that is novel can be in the same league as a peer-reviewed research paper in a scientific journal.
Are all the episodes going to be online, or just the premiere?
Oh.. you meant geek as in computer geek. Not geek as in a circus performer that bites the heads off of chickens. Sorry.. my mistake.
But what's even worse than the fact that Jack Thompson is flat-out wrong, is the fact that he, and those like him, end up hiding the real issues. Lets take the Columbine shootings as an example. There were plenty of people ready to blame music, tv, and video games for the shootings. Michael Moore examined the absurdity of these claims in Bowling for Columbine by observing that the shooters were bowling the morning of the shooting -- so why not blame bowling? The real issue was that these kids who committed the murders were the target of ongoing emotional torment and bullying from a lot of their classmates. Rather than say, hey wait a second, maybe we have to do something to prevent bullying and to teach kids to respect one another as human beings, Jack and his ilk blame all the wrong things. But then again, it's probably easier for Jack to attack these things than reach a 17-yr old highschool jock and try to get him to actually respect people who don't fit in.
With such technology, I'm surprised they aren't offering pre-written 'after death' notes. With this option, the user wouldn't even have to write their own contents. Simply click on the note that is most appealing to your situation. It would be on-par with the 1-click shopping feature at Amazon. There could be the 1-click Suicide Note, simply with the contents "Goodbye cruel world.". What about the 1-click Vengeful Sibling Note, which reads "Haha! I'm dead now and didn't leave you a single penny in the will!" The possibilities are really endless.
From the http://www.politicalusa.com/columnists/schlussel/s chlussel_014.htm link:
See How to Deal with the Lies and the Lying Liars When They Lie about "Bowling for Columbine". He addresses the above criticism about half-way down:The irony of it is, we all want social interaction, but we all want it through inherently less social mediums (at least initially).
Turing was an amateur chemist in addition to being a world-class mathematician. His choice of suicide method was intended to lessen the impact it would have on other members of his family, in particular his mother. By eating a cyanide laced apple, it has been speculated that he wanted to make his death look like an accident. His mother would think that he had been performing some chemistry experiment, and then forgot to thoroughly wash his hands before eating the apple. Having one's son die is bad enough, but for it to be a suicide is doubly worse.
On the more dramatic side, if one were so inclined, it could be said that his method of suicide was rather symbolic. Turing had partook in what was in his day forbidden. For this, he had been "cast out" of his chosen profession and what he loved to do -- in some sense, his Eden. As a final gesture before leaving this world, he ate a piece of forbidden fruit that was symbolic of this fact.
It's a tragedy that the ignorance and intolerance of first half of the 20th century could have driven such a brilliant man to suicide. If it weren't for Turing, much of what we take for granted today may be a lot different or may not even exist at all. Hopefully the world has wisened over the last 50 years.
Umm, actually, Keynsian economics is what made this country what it is (at least after the Great Depression). If it wasn't for government social assistance programs that arose during that period, it would have taken a lot longer to get the economy going again. If there is a downfall, it will be in no small part due to the ignorance and arrogance of the neo-con capitalists.
Theory CS theory consists of a wide range of problems: some very heavily mathematical (Does P = NP?) to the not so mathematical (eg. Theory of Distributed Systems). Although the latter is not "mathematical" in the traditional sense, it still requires strong mathematical reasoning abilities. In any case, needless to say, studying CS theory requires a good foundation in mathematics.
Graphics This one has already been described by other people. No chance in hell you're going to write a kick-ass 3d engine without knowing a lot of linear algebra (i.e. math).
Artificial Intelligence Machine Learning (Neural Nets, Support Vector machines, etc) is all hardcore statistics. You need to have a good knowledge of linear algebra and multivariate calculus to even begin to comprehend this field. At the other end of the spectrum within the AI field is Knowledge Representation; this type of AI is more logic based, and again requires good mathematical reasoning abilities.
Operating Systems Here's a field for which you may argue a minimal amount of math is required. Of all the subdisciplines within CS, this one probably does require the least math. However, that doesn't mean you'll get away without a math background. A lot of research done in this field involves understanding/presenting quantitative results. So you do need some basic knowledge of statistics. Besides that, a lot of OS research also involves proving systems correct; this is very heavily logic based stuff, and again an ability to reason about problems abstractly (mathematically) is extremely useful.
Numerical Analysis Math, math, math, and more math.
Software Engineering Proving systems correct and defining systems using logic -- very mathematical stuff. If on the other hand you get into the more wishy-washy side of SE then you may be able to avoid math.
Anyways, there's probably some sub disciples I missed, but you should get the idea. Math is required in almost all aspects of CS. The only reason it isn't required in the RealWorld(tm) is because most of the stuff done there is grunt work that involves nothing more than reinventing the wheel.
So, if you are really interested in CS, then do it right -- take as much math as you can. If, on the other hand, you are just interested in hacking, then don't go into CS. CS != hacking degree.
No previous experience with these sites, but I ran across a good site that details the different DVD-by-mail companies in Canada: http://www.geocities.com/oberstnwt/DVD/RentalHome. html
You might find some info there.
In Ontario, the first week we were told to conserve as much power as possible because some of our generating stations had been knocked out badly and would take a long time to get back online. This meant no air conditioners -- in 40 degree (celcius) heat. Of course, when you watched the politicians give the daily updates of the situation on TV, they even commented once or twice on having the air conditioning going in the building where they were.
There was also one TV station (Global TV) that went around knocking on doors of houses where they saw the air conditioner was running. After they finished embarrasing the house owner by throwing a camera in his/her face demanding to know why the air conditioner was on in this time of crisis, they would cut back to the studio where the news anchor would be sitting in his suit and tie. He was undoubtedly under a set of blaring hot studio lights, the weather was in the high 30's outside, and there wasn't a single drop of sweat to be seen on his face. Of course, with their righteous attitude about power conservation, I'm sure they didn't have the air conditioning going in the studio. Yeah. Right, my ass.
So what do I remember about the blackout? The hypocrisy.
With XPde, users now have a choice between two products that are visually identical, but are different under the hood. The one running linux under the hood is more stable and likely to perform better in the long run.
It's like giving a consumer the choice between a Toyota Corolla and a Chevy Cavalier. Visually the two are not that much different, but one is likely to last you, the other to drain your pocket with all the repairs you're going to have to put into it. Which one are you going to choose? (I'm guessing from your comments about a Minority Report style UI, you'd probably choose neither the Corolla or the Cavalier, and go for some futuristic space looking car instead).
Sure, his ignorance/laziness will save him the trouble of having his machine infected with a virus if he's running Linux/OS X/etc, but the same ignorance/laziness is going to annoy him when he knows he's being sent something that's safe, which in turn will lead him to use Windows instead. Unfortunate, but true.
Not at all. I do, however, believe that Microsoft, among other companies, are taking an amoral stance. As Cisco Systems was quoted in this article, "We are politically neutral." This is nothing but doublespeak for, "We don't care what our product is used for, even if it is to kill or harm people. We definitely are not condoning such actions, but nor are we against them, as long as we get our money." This is capitalist amorality in its finest form.
I think the problem with all these large companies is their choice to hide behind the almighty buck. Capitalism reigns supreme. `Hey, what is it any of my business if you use my product to harm or kill people? Just as long as you pay up.'
I'm not implying that companies are responsible for finding out every last detail of how their product will be used when they sell it to a customer. However, I do think that turning a blind-eye to how their product will be used when it's fairly obvious that it will be employed in unethical ends is wrong.
A huge list of math texts.
David MacKay has posted his book Information Theory, Inference, and Learning Algorithms on his website. (This is despite it being a recently published work available through major bookstores.)
The classic, Numerical Recipes in C, is available online for free.
Some more math texts.
Another grab bag of online texts (mostly math).
Yet even more math and CS stuff.
Slightly off topic story: I was in the doctor's office a few months ago, suffering from some kind of nasty combo of cough and sore throat. (The symptoms had lasted long enough to make me think it wasn't just a run of the mill cold). So the doctor does the open-wide-and-say-ahhh routine, and I do, and then, just as she's peering into my mouth, I go into an involuntary coughing fit. I sprayed the doctor pretty good. I apologized profusely after it happened, but the thing is, the doctor never flinched once. It was as though it was all par for the course. I could not imagine myself in that position, having a patient cough all over me and not giving it a second thought. What's more, I realized, having someone cough all over me probably is one of the more pleasant experiences I would have to endure as a doctor.
For a perspective on how stressful a life in medicine is, check out the book The Intern Blues. I read this a while back when I was trying to figure out what else I might want to do with my life besides IT. (Definitely not medicine.)
What there needs to be is some sort of standard which can be used to judge how much money constitutes a reasonable defense/prosecution for a particular case. Then when Evil Corporation, Inc. claims that it is owed enormous amounts of money, the court can say, "Well, actually, NO. The reasonable legal costs for this case should not have exceeded $x, you're on the hook for the rest." This would put people on a slightly more level playing field.
So who am I supposed to believe? My BS detector tells me to leave that stuff off, but then I'm faced with "experts" telling me to put it in.