It may not be earth shattering, but if there was a species (or subspecies) in the Homo line that could be defined by a radically different form (ie tiny size below anything seen in modern times), that would be interesting.
The human lineage is mostly made up of multiple snapshots, most of whom are probably no direct relation to anyone alive (ie any random Homo skull dug up is more likely than not part of a lineage similar to ours, but not precisely the same). Finding new populations is always fascinating, regardless of relation.
They could just be midgets, but the ratios make that unlikely.
I do believe the original question was how do you know when you're off-track, rather than asking if he should drop his specific technology.
Using the shoe analogy, I'd probably say that if she shoe was comfortable, wasn't breaking down after a week of use, and people weren't openly ridiculing your choice of footwear, then your brand should be fine. If it wasn't comfortable but everything else checked out, I'd suggest a different type of shoe regardless of brand. If it was breaking down immediately, hell yes get another brand, and consider spending more than $15 bucks next time. If people are laughing, then you venture into a whole new line of questioning.
Through that whole thing, I don't need to know what brand you wear now. If I did know, I could give you better advice, but what if you were wearing a brand that might not be popular on a particular forum? You would have to separate out the BrandX-haters who make reasonable arguments from people who honestly don't care but have a low opinion of that specific brand.
Which proves the man is running a Microsoft product, because he's hiding something. Only MS can produce that level of guilt.
If the system is already fully developed and no major changes are expected, that's a plus for sticking to their guns.
If they can find an already-good web developer who's willing to pick up a new platform (and they're in no rush to change it much), that's another plus for sticking with it.
If the system itself is older, then a rewrite becomes more reasonable even if it works great.
Is the website largely static? Platform barely matters then.
Is the site Java based? Dump that trash, because only bitches use Java.
That is some of my totally unbiased generic input.
Maybe it would be a good idea if a list of current "optimal" systems were given out. On second thought, though, maybe it would be better if the actual platform were named, as any ProductX blasting would still contain a few useful threads.
Give one example of an embargo working. You can't - they only end up hurting innocent people and isolating countries so change is slower. The Confederate States of America.
The Union embargo (at times backed up by a low-key blockade) was extremely effective at pressuring other countries into not cutting deals with them. Unable to sell cotton and other local goods, the CSA was more or less broke after a while.
There's a limit to just how responsible we are for their state of democracy. We should be encouraging them to develop a style of their own, not trying to force it down their throats on our terms.
As for the people being too rich to talk about democracy, isn't that has long since happened in the US?
Sanctions are a good method to employ for extreme cases, but they are destabilizing, polarizing, and create excess hostility over and beyond the original problem that spur them. They are also not as effective against major powers - how do you think we would have reacted had the UN declared sanctions against us after Iraq? On one hand, we might have paused to reconsider, but it's more likely that we would have become even more defiant. Big countries are proud, even when they're dealing against wealthier and more powerful nations.
On the other hand, Chinese reliance on trade with the US and Russia is what the 21st century will need for any hope of stability. During the Enlightenment most of the conflict was over power and trade dominance - but the major powers tended to avoid trading with each other directly. During the Cold War, the US didn't need the USSR, and vice versa. Unless we want a new conflict (cold, hot, or a more harmless drawn-out trade war), the major powers need to see their equals and near-equals as their best customers as well as their competition.
For instance... say oil begins to become seriously scarce ten years from now. Prices will rise, and the competition for it will be worse than today. Would you rather have multiple regional powers actively working to horde it for themselves, denying it to their competition in an effort to weaken them? Or would you rather have everyone grabbing what they can seeking advantage, but also wary of crippling the other economies (which would take theirs down with them)?
The best way to achieve peace is to make it a mutual commercial interest, not just an abstract.
Question is how do you get the average person to notice?
It's like patent abuse. If it was truly common knowledge, it wouldn't last long as a problem. Since most people don't understand or have never been exposed to it by the media, you only have a minority complaining - vocal, but not really heard by the rest of the world.
Maybe we should all wear masks and make vaguely threatening synthetic-speech announcements? On second thought, that might really not be very productive.
Opening your doors to such nations doesn't encourage them, it makes them able to easily get into your country.
There, fix that for you.
So you're the one who let the terrorists in. Jerk. I in no way support terrorists. In fact I denounce them. Or is that reject them? Denounce or reject... so complicated.
I wonder how hard it would be to support a decentralized publicity campaign to directly tie these lawsuits, via the RIAA, to the agencies and artists the RIAA supports?
At present, it's largely a free lunch for the record companies - who have a vicious attack dog that uses tactics that shouldn't be legal. The bad PR doesn't do a very good job of reflecting back on them.
If the masses begin to associate these lawsuits with the music they're buying, that's when the pressure would mount.
Yes... that's the way to promote freedom. Cut oppressive governments further off from the outside world, so that they are even less inclined or able to change.
I still believe if we had extended full trade relations towards Cuba as soon as they revolted, their communism would have quickly changed into something more balanced.
Oppression can only exist in a vacuum. Opening your doors to such nations doesn't encourage them, it makes them interdependant, and exposes them to better systems. Just look at China - they are by no means perfect, but exposure to the free market has changed them drastically.
I've also known other people to complain about it - while others have no idea what they're talking about. You have to love sporadic issues.
I'm pretty sure it has to be a combination of minor flaws in Firefox (as not every program I run has this issue), Windows XP (with memory handling far better than previous versions, but still not exactly the gold standard of memory management), and all the myriad changes to my system's configuration over time.
It does it on both my work computer and my home computer. Then again, they're both XP Pro machines. They're very different in terms of hardware, which tentatively rules out a specific hardware config. The memory on my home machine is double that of my work machine, but the highpoint seems to be about the same - so I doubt it has much to do with total system memory. What sites I hit seems to have no relevance. The only other common factor I can think of is that I run NoScript on both - though if I remember right the problem predated my use of that (I first noticed it a while back, and had actually hoped 2 would fix it).
The main issue seems to be that a specific amount of memory is eaten up when you open a site in a tab - but closing that tab often doesn't clear up the space. I just now closed every tab except Slashdot - and it went from 157mb (when I had 14 tabs open) to a minuscule 153mb. From experience, waiting for it to dump cache is ineffective. If I close the program, the memory clears itself just fine - but only if there is no other Firefox window open. I'm guessing that multiple Firefox app windows share a footprint.
Then again, saying "all" of my memory was an exaggeration. I've rarely seen it hold on to much more than 150mb after closing all but one window, though if I go on for very long without at least shutting down firefox, that minimum can creep up - and on a few occasions really has taken more memory than I actually have on my machine (virtual cache trash time). It's also probably not a noticeable problem unless you're a heavy multitasker (in which case that footprint becomes painfully obvious).
I've noticed it doesn't happen on my fiance's Vista machine, or on any 2003 Server boxes I've run it on. It may be a problem that only occurs on XP, or it just doesn't like the way I smell.
However, if you are able to reproduce it, you'll see it happen whenever more than one tab has been opened. Opening one tab, then clearing it, seems to work - but once a second tab opens, clearing the original tab clears it's footprint, but any tab opened after that exhibits the problem.
The fact that every tab I open (and later close) seems to grab a chunk of memory and never release it (until all copies of FF are closed completely) is my biggest gripe.
For instance, at work I'm limited to 1gb of memory, but often need many tabs open. Over time, FF begins to suck up almost all of my memory. There seems to be an upper limit, but I would consider it a basic element of any multi-tab program if it were to, say, free up the resources used by a tab after that tab was closed.
Beyond that I have no significant issues with Firefox, and prefer to to IE. Admittedly, lately, the primary reason for that has been the same one for why I prefer Windows to other OS's - I'm simply used to it now. That, and I feel a little safer with things like NoScript and other FF-only tools.
The core problem with IP is that it is often based on a simple easily-replicated idea (one-click interfaces, etc) or it's protection lasts longer than is in the common good (ie 100+ year copyrights).
A tax on IP is a novel idea, but not a good one, for reasons abundantly explored in other posts.
There are three changes that, in my not-so-humble opinion,
First change: Drop patents on software, entirely. Patents on visible software methods simply should not apply. It should remain under copyright (for look and feel) and trademark (for identifying characteristics). There are already old and established laws in these areas that serve software and websites very well, whereas patents are not meant to apply to creative works. Patents themselves should be limited to a much shorter period than at present. This gives the creators ample time to not only profit, but dominate the market they created (for a totally new product type). Use licensing as a way to extend it, for a limited time (ie the more available they make the technology to competing manufacturers, the longer they're allowed to hold it). This promotes circulation of ideas, and is really only paying the engineer over time instead of at once. Software, however, has proven so highly incompatible with the manufacturing basis of patents, that it shouldn't apply. Luckily other areas of protection do work for software.
Second change: Place a hard limit on copyright itself. The longest it should run is for the lifetime of the creator, and only so long as he retains the copyright itself (licensing, etc). It's their creation, and it should support them indefinitely. That is much of the spirit of copyright. Otherwise, such as in cases where it's sold to other individuals or to a corporation, it's merely property, and should have a more defined span lasting only a few decades from it's creation (20-30 years maximum). After that, it's either valueless or has become part of culture - plus it's no longer supporting it's creator. Inheritance is more complex, but should still have a far shorter time limit placed on it (ie if you write a song at 20, and die at 60, that copyright dies with you). For example: does anyone honestly believe that 1984 shouldn't be in the public domain by now? It's a major work of literature, it's author is long dead, and his estate will never release it. I see no reason for it's protection to continue at this point (then again, that's British law).
Third change: Where applicable, some items who's very identity is copyrighted should instead be treated as trademarks. For example: Snow White is ancient history, and part of our culture now. It's creators are generally long dead, but the company will never die. The video itself should no longer be copyrighted - it's only a source of profit at this point. However - the primary original Disney characters themselves should not fall under copyright limitations primarily because they are quite literally trademarks of Disney. Mickey Mouse isn't just a character, he IS Disney. Goofy, Pluto, and Donald Duck aren't just old IP, they are more than anything else the definition of Disney's identity, and thus can be copied, but only for reference - in much the same way you have very limited rights to use a company logo. Some copyrights cover what are effectively logos, and logo protections should last as long as the entity that they apply to, whether that be decades or centuries. They are not products, they are the company. The only exceptions should be for the transfer of trademarks between organizations - but those exceptions get complicated.
Finally, when these protections expire, the result should go into the public domain. No complex licenses, no special rules.
Coalition governments seem to have a nasty tendency to break those coalitions, because they're not truly one government. They're parties agreeing to cooperate, under current circumstances, in a power sharing deal. I have long considered this to be one of the most delicate forms of democracy, only suitable for a fledgling government trying to find a final form.
For all the bickering, our two party system is effectively one government, but polarized largely along two artificial poles. What those poles are changes over time, but it's a constant adversarial system. It does not work very effectively, but it seems to do far better than most of what we see in the world.
Consider that we have (if I am right), the longest running continual government - only broken once, partially, by a civil war. That civil war managed to crystalize a new format that, for all of it's faults, was more manageable over the long term than the previous form, and managed to effectively stay the same model of government (but with the balance of power shifted in ways that not everyone likes). Even the UK, while still the same nation, has changed drastically in waves, and each new government that comes in is virtually a new government, whereas ours is designed - imperfectly - to make the transition of power between parties relatively mild and - in the end - of little relevance except to policy.
I'd agree with Washington that static parties are a generally bad idea. It promotes partisanship, and that partisanship is preventing us from having the government we could have. It is, however, far superior to a parliamentary system - a system that rarely seems to function as well as our own inefficiently adversarial model.
Sadly, any religion that claims to be a religion of peace is lying through its teeth. When people abandon their faculty of reason and start to believe in the imaginary, they lose their means to negotiate with others. The only remaining alternative is the use of force, either directly (kidnappings, murders, bombings) or indirectly (using coercive power of government to enforce one's "divinely inspired" whims).
Just a moment... wasn't it Judaism (in the western world, at least) that effectively pioneered the concept of goodwill for goodwill's sake? Or the idea of a deity that primarily wanted you to behave (if you read between the lines) rather than simply fall to your knees and worship? Wasn't Christianity the religion that replaced competitors that were primarily centered around appeasement and little else, and taught the powerful that simply killing the weak wasn't proper? Wasn't Islam the advanced moral framework that made the Pax Islamica possible? And if you head further east, wasn't Buddhism oriented primarily towards teaching you how to find peace through helping others find it themselves? There are others, but these are the dominant religions, and by no coincidence happen to focus heavily on morality itself.
Humans are innately imperfect beings, regardless of the cause. Some believe it was a matter of our creation. Others blame it on demons. I blame it on a primate heritage, primates being one of the most violent, rage-driven, and spiteful branches on the tree of life. Either way, being imperfect, we can and often do warp any cultural heritage, any belief, any moral concept, into something that suits our basest desires. Even the most high-minded secular concepts, such as liberty, are more often than not converted into bloodthirsty rampages and bloodbaths, abused by those who seek power, and used as an excuse to kill by those who don't understand it.
Seriously, not all kids are the same. Okay, if you want a relative benchmark: when they're old enough to enjoy it. There. They're still young enough that you can control what games they play and for how long.
Agreed. I don't believe there is a lower boundary to gaming, only lower limits for specific types of games - and those limits depend on the child.
I started my niece and nephew on games at an early age - but I kept it strictly limited to older and simpler games, primarily Atari 2600 ports. When they're 3-4 years old, they can't understand anything overly complicated and should focus primarily on movement and avoidance, as well as pursuit of obvious goals. The games should be fairly easy as well, until they begin to reach their second decade (or until they start to show real skill and need a challenge).
A younger kid can easily enjoy a primitive video game just as well as we could (back when those games were new). It's not until they're exposed to more modern games that the old games begin to show their age. Tempest, Galaga, Pac-Man, Space Invaders, Robotron, and other simple games are ideal for children. Save the modern console games for later, when their minds are hungry for more. Educational games are great, but entertainment is a goal in itself - and entertainment is the first priority of any game, with educational value being a secondary bonus in some cases. Do the education yourself, and let them learn to have fun with their games before you start turning them into work.
That said, educational games are extremely useful, and can form a major component of their learning. They have little value until the child can read well, though. Reading software is entertaining, but usually (from what I've experienced with my relatives) are susceptible to being bypassed by an imaginative child - my niece got through most of her "reading" games without bothering to actually read much.
The key issue, and the one that people usually seem to miss or be incapable of enforcing, is moderation. Limited video game time will not harm your child. Parents can maintain total control of any source of video games when their children are young, and can maintain significant control even into their teens. The primary mistake average parents make is the same one our parents usually made with TV - specifically, using it as a pacifier. If you hand your kid a console, show them how to use it on their own, and then provide very little supervision, the kid WILL spend hours upon hours on his games. Too much time spent in a virtual environment just plain isn't good - but that doesn't mean that limited and controlled time, especially when active parental interaction is involved, is in any way damaging.
Moderation is key, in almost all things. Especially when it comes to children and video games.
It's morally right to offer some assistance to the truly needy. If a man has no food, it's very little effort to provide him with sustenance. If he has no shelter, it can be provided by a society with the will to do so.
But... how far should we be expected to go for the poor? If someone works hard for their wages, and has worked to possess at least some skill in even a simple area, but cannot afford basic healthcare, housing, and food, I believe society should have a secure safety net in place for them. Others have worked, but presently can't - either due to temporary unemployment or a physical problem (or even a mental issue). Those apply as well, as long as they try to find their way back into the working category.
The reality, though, is that there are many... many... people in this country who do not work, who often have never worked, and when given the chance by charity and government groups do not show any serious interest in working. People who simply dropped out of high school, who became criminals early on, or who were raised in a welfare system and know nothing else, even when they're shown the way out. Not all poor are like this. I prefer to believe, seriously, that the vast majority are not like this. People who are forever doomed to unemployment and who will never be productive in any capacity.
There are many reasons people end up this way, and to say it's all their own fault is inaccurate, let alone cold blooded. But - just how responsible am I, as a free individual, for their access to all the modern amenities that I have to work for? When does charity have to extend to an innate right to be supported when your need is not truly dire?
And moreover, why does "caring for the poor" end outside urban areas, when it's the majority of our land, in the rural areas, that the vast majority of the real poverty is found?
If I knew for certain that it was going towards food and shelter, basic clothing, and even completion of a high school education for those who missed it the first time around, I would have no problem shelling out tax dollars to provide services that mark an advanced civilization, and provide what are truly basic necessities to everyone, no matter what their story is. That alone would reduce crime by a greater amount than any level of police expansion could. I would even extend that towards basic health care (ie prevention, checkups, vaccination, and all the other critical medical offerings that really don't cost that much).
For all that, though, I have no interest in providing a terminally unemployed component of society with a level of healthcare that rivals the pitiful level of care that I receive as a working member of society. Charity does not have to extend to giving the poor everything the middle class has - at the expense of (primarily) the middle class. It's the middle class that will foot most of the bill, and who will see OUR health care costs increase in reaction.
Also consider this. If you are broke, today, you can still get basic health care. The problem is the hospitals offering it are not funded well enough to handle the immense load they're under. You will wait hours, and the staff who attend to you will be burned out when they finally make it to you, and the equipment will be adequate but overworked. It wouldn't take much in the way of government assistance for these hospitals to expand in capacity and numbers - but that doesn't score political points, and it's not as beautiful an idea as giving everyone health insurance. The most sensible method - providing the existing no-pay services with enough money to operate more extensively - is totally ignored.
Also, if I recall, Jesus (who you repeatedly mention) encouraged general charity towards the poor, but also berated individuals for asking for too much.
Imposed handicaps are worse than loose entry requirements. I'd rather have to worry about that one guy with the supercharged mitochondria than about how fairly distributed the handicaps are.
If you allow someone into a game who has any kind of physical irregularity, you have to accept them as they are, and on a level playing field. If they can't compete fairly on a level field (either due to improvement or handicap), then that sport just isn't for them, no matter how badly they want it or how well they did before their situation changed. Sports are largely a physical event, and they aren't a right available to all.
So what happens if (when) genetic engineering becomes commonplace in humans? Will the genetically superior then be banned from competition?
Who knows at that point - so many things will change when engineered babies become commonplace (and I do mean "when" - short of a nuclear/environmental holocaust, it will happen) that the Olympics will be just one of many battlegrounds.
Anyone who tinkers with their genes later in life will probably find themselves treated the same as if they had taken steroids (though I'm not sure how the Olympics views steroids used for purely medical purposes). Once you start seeing people born that way, they would probably be let in after the numbers are large enough.
The main problem is that while training technique can make a major impact in performance, as well as the will and basic body plan of the individual competitor, once you start turning it into a technology race the game changes completely. It will become like many car races - where the funding and technology of individual groups is roughly as important as the drivers themselves.
You'll certainly see new sporting events where such rules do not apply. The only reason you don't see more sports today that simply don't care about steroid use is that, at least until very recently, it was generally damaging to the players. Some of the recent baseball players seem to have had skillful doctors (or drug dealers, anyway) and may do just fine when they're done playing. Once THAT becomes a reality (and it probably will - long before useful genetic tweaking), I won't be surprised to see steroids and other enhancements become a monitored but legal component in many sports. Right now, it's cheating - but it's those cheaters who have made the past few years much more interesting for baseball and other sports. Once steroid use can be controlled delicately enough to not bring actual harm (just improved strength), the biggest obstacle will be out of the way.
At that point, all previous baseball records will mean nothing, football players will be able to bend steel, and boxing matches will never make it past the first round. Golf... ok, so some sports won't be affected.
Look at it another way. Consider glasses as a removable prosthetic (which they are - correcting a visual disability).
In sharpshooting competitions (which I've been in), you're allowed to compete even if you wear corrective lenses (I'm also a four-eyed "handicapable" person). This is largely because glasses and contacts provide vision that falls well within the range of the average human eye. No distinct advantage is provided by glasses (or contacts) other than allowing the myopic to see roughly as well as their peers can. Vision isn't the only deciding factor in who wins, but it's significant.
Lasig and other forms of eye surgery are now capable of providing vision (in some) that starts to reach into the upper ranges of human vision. This has caused some minor controversy in the sport, but most are not too concerned since it's a common procedure and can still easily be matched by anyone with pretty good vision.
Now what would happen if you took someone who had been blind, but given an operation that restored his sight? It would be uplifting to see such a person compete in a sport they had been previously incapable of competing in. Now what if that same operation involved bionic implants, no matter how simple or complicated, that gave him visual acuity that the very best "naturals" couldn't honestly beat? Even if his advantage was relatively minor, even if his story was so inspiring it made everyone want to cry, the ultimate outcome is that any specific competition he was a part of would be damaged due to one player having a distinctly unfair advantage, little different from allowing someone to use a scope (when others are not).
The Olympics is politically charged, utterly serious, and is full of athletes who devote a significant portion of their lifespan towards training for the opportunity to win. If the rules are all obeyed, they are guaranteed that no competitor will be physically superior to them except by the virtue of better genes or even more intense training. The day someone with a distinct man-made advantage enters the field, the nature of the game changes entirely - the basic measure of fairness is lost.
I'm always proud to see someone with a damaged body overcome their limitations (you know he didn't learn to run on those things overnight), and it's always invigorating to see technology find replacements that, even if limited in scope, surpass nature. But I don't believe that it serves the best interests of the Olympic Games to allow someone with a clear unnatural advantage to compete, no matter if it's their fault or not. Would it be a future track star's fault if his parents had chosen to have him genetically engineered to be a super-human runner?
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It may not be earth shattering, but if there was a species (or subspecies) in the Homo line that could be defined by a radically different form (ie tiny size below anything seen in modern times), that would be interesting.
The human lineage is mostly made up of multiple snapshots, most of whom are probably no direct relation to anyone alive (ie any random Homo skull dug up is more likely than not part of a lineage similar to ours, but not precisely the same). Finding new populations is always fascinating, regardless of relation.
They could just be midgets, but the ratios make that unlikely.
I do believe the original question was how do you know when you're off-track, rather than asking if he should drop his specific technology.
Using the shoe analogy, I'd probably say that if she shoe was comfortable, wasn't breaking down after a week of use, and people weren't openly ridiculing your choice of footwear, then your brand should be fine. If it wasn't comfortable but everything else checked out, I'd suggest a different type of shoe regardless of brand. If it was breaking down immediately, hell yes get another brand, and consider spending more than $15 bucks next time. If people are laughing, then you venture into a whole new line of questioning.
Through that whole thing, I don't need to know what brand you wear now. If I did know, I could give you better advice, but what if you were wearing a brand that might not be popular on a particular forum? You would have to separate out the BrandX-haters who make reasonable arguments from people who honestly don't care but have a low opinion of that specific brand.
Which proves the man is running a Microsoft product, because he's hiding something. Only MS can produce that level of guilt.
My unreasoning hatred for Java blinds me to any semblance of logic. I would suggest Ada before I'd suggest Java.
There is no single general answer, but:
If the system is already fully developed and no major changes are expected, that's a plus for sticking to their guns.
If they can find an already-good web developer who's willing to pick up a new platform (and they're in no rush to change it much), that's another plus for sticking with it.
If the system itself is older, then a rewrite becomes more reasonable even if it works great.
Is the website largely static? Platform barely matters then.
Is the site Java based? Dump that trash, because only bitches use Java.
That is some of my totally unbiased generic input.
Maybe it would be a good idea if a list of current "optimal" systems were given out. On second thought, though, maybe it would be better if the actual platform were named, as any ProductX blasting would still contain a few useful threads.
Maybe he wants an objective response?
If you know what platform he's talking about, opinions would be skewed based on what people think of that platform. It would be a distraction.
Not knowing the specifics makes it easier to provide the general answers he's looking for.
The Union embargo (at times backed up by a low-key blockade) was extremely effective at pressuring other countries into not cutting deals with them. Unable to sell cotton and other local goods, the CSA was more or less broke after a while.
There's a limit to just how responsible we are for their state of democracy. We should be encouraging them to develop a style of their own, not trying to force it down their throats on our terms.
As for the people being too rich to talk about democracy, isn't that has long since happened in the US?
Sanctions are a good method to employ for extreme cases, but they are destabilizing, polarizing, and create excess hostility over and beyond the original problem that spur them. They are also not as effective against major powers - how do you think we would have reacted had the UN declared sanctions against us after Iraq? On one hand, we might have paused to reconsider, but it's more likely that we would have become even more defiant. Big countries are proud, even when they're dealing against wealthier and more powerful nations.
On the other hand, Chinese reliance on trade with the US and Russia is what the 21st century will need for any hope of stability. During the Enlightenment most of the conflict was over power and trade dominance - but the major powers tended to avoid trading with each other directly. During the Cold War, the US didn't need the USSR, and vice versa. Unless we want a new conflict (cold, hot, or a more harmless drawn-out trade war), the major powers need to see their equals and near-equals as their best customers as well as their competition.
For instance... say oil begins to become seriously scarce ten years from now. Prices will rise, and the competition for it will be worse than today. Would you rather have multiple regional powers actively working to horde it for themselves, denying it to their competition in an effort to weaken them? Or would you rather have everyone grabbing what they can seeking advantage, but also wary of crippling the other economies (which would take theirs down with them)?
The best way to achieve peace is to make it a mutual commercial interest, not just an abstract.
Problem is they tend to spoof from the $CHARITY range...
Question is how do you get the average person to notice?
It's like patent abuse. If it was truly common knowledge, it wouldn't last long as a problem. Since most people don't understand or have never been exposed to it by the media, you only have a minority complaining - vocal, but not really heard by the rest of the world.
Maybe we should all wear masks and make vaguely threatening synthetic-speech announcements? On second thought, that might really not be very productive.
There, fix that for you. So you're the one who let the terrorists in. Jerk. I in no way support terrorists. In fact I denounce them. Or is that reject them? Denounce or reject... so complicated.
I wonder how hard it would be to support a decentralized publicity campaign to directly tie these lawsuits, via the RIAA, to the agencies and artists the RIAA supports?
At present, it's largely a free lunch for the record companies - who have a vicious attack dog that uses tactics that shouldn't be legal. The bad PR doesn't do a very good job of reflecting back on them.
If the masses begin to associate these lawsuits with the music they're buying, that's when the pressure would mount.
Yes... that's the way to promote freedom. Cut oppressive governments further off from the outside world, so that they are even less inclined or able to change.
I still believe if we had extended full trade relations towards Cuba as soon as they revolted, their communism would have quickly changed into something more balanced.
Oppression can only exist in a vacuum. Opening your doors to such nations doesn't encourage them, it makes them interdependant, and exposes them to better systems. Just look at China - they are by no means perfect, but exposure to the free market has changed them drastically.
I've also known other people to complain about it - while others have no idea what they're talking about. You have to love sporadic issues.
I'm pretty sure it has to be a combination of minor flaws in Firefox (as not every program I run has this issue), Windows XP (with memory handling far better than previous versions, but still not exactly the gold standard of memory management), and all the myriad changes to my system's configuration over time.
It does it on both my work computer and my home computer. Then again, they're both XP Pro machines. They're very different in terms of hardware, which tentatively rules out a specific hardware config. The memory on my home machine is double that of my work machine, but the highpoint seems to be about the same - so I doubt it has much to do with total system memory. What sites I hit seems to have no relevance. The only other common factor I can think of is that I run NoScript on both - though if I remember right the problem predated my use of that (I first noticed it a while back, and had actually hoped 2 would fix it).
The main issue seems to be that a specific amount of memory is eaten up when you open a site in a tab - but closing that tab often doesn't clear up the space. I just now closed every tab except Slashdot - and it went from 157mb (when I had 14 tabs open) to a minuscule 153mb. From experience, waiting for it to dump cache is ineffective. If I close the program, the memory clears itself just fine - but only if there is no other Firefox window open. I'm guessing that multiple Firefox app windows share a footprint.
Then again, saying "all" of my memory was an exaggeration. I've rarely seen it hold on to much more than 150mb after closing all but one window, though if I go on for very long without at least shutting down firefox, that minimum can creep up - and on a few occasions really has taken more memory than I actually have on my machine (virtual cache trash time). It's also probably not a noticeable problem unless you're a heavy multitasker (in which case that footprint becomes painfully obvious).
I've noticed it doesn't happen on my fiance's Vista machine, or on any 2003 Server boxes I've run it on. It may be a problem that only occurs on XP, or it just doesn't like the way I smell.
However, if you are able to reproduce it, you'll see it happen whenever more than one tab has been opened. Opening one tab, then clearing it, seems to work - but once a second tab opens, clearing the original tab clears it's footprint, but any tab opened after that exhibits the problem.
The fact that every tab I open (and later close) seems to grab a chunk of memory and never release it (until all copies of FF are closed completely) is my biggest gripe.
For instance, at work I'm limited to 1gb of memory, but often need many tabs open. Over time, FF begins to suck up almost all of my memory. There seems to be an upper limit, but I would consider it a basic element of any multi-tab program if it were to, say, free up the resources used by a tab after that tab was closed.
Beyond that I have no significant issues with Firefox, and prefer to to IE. Admittedly, lately, the primary reason for that has been the same one for why I prefer Windows to other OS's - I'm simply used to it now. That, and I feel a little safer with things like NoScript and other FF-only tools.
Heh. Should have been clearer - the Disney video of Snow White.
Besides, the Grimms got it from folklore, so it's not even their original material. Public domain, baby!
Learn to proof before posting, you drooling moron.
The core problem with IP is that it is often based on a simple easily-replicated idea (one-click interfaces, etc) or it's protection lasts longer than is in the common good (ie 100+ year copyrights).
A tax on IP is a novel idea, but not a good one, for reasons abundantly explored in other posts.
There are three changes that, in my not-so-humble opinion,
First change: Drop patents on software, entirely. Patents on visible software methods simply should not apply. It should remain under copyright (for look and feel) and trademark (for identifying characteristics). There are already old and established laws in these areas that serve software and websites very well, whereas patents are not meant to apply to creative works. Patents themselves should be limited to a much shorter period than at present. This gives the creators ample time to not only profit, but dominate the market they created (for a totally new product type). Use licensing as a way to extend it, for a limited time (ie the more available they make the technology to competing manufacturers, the longer they're allowed to hold it). This promotes circulation of ideas, and is really only paying the engineer over time instead of at once. Software, however, has proven so highly incompatible with the manufacturing basis of patents, that it shouldn't apply. Luckily other areas of protection do work for software.
Second change: Place a hard limit on copyright itself. The longest it should run is for the lifetime of the creator, and only so long as he retains the copyright itself (licensing, etc). It's their creation, and it should support them indefinitely. That is much of the spirit of copyright. Otherwise, such as in cases where it's sold to other individuals or to a corporation, it's merely property, and should have a more defined span lasting only a few decades from it's creation (20-30 years maximum). After that, it's either valueless or has become part of culture - plus it's no longer supporting it's creator. Inheritance is more complex, but should still have a far shorter time limit placed on it (ie if you write a song at 20, and die at 60, that copyright dies with you). For example: does anyone honestly believe that 1984 shouldn't be in the public domain by now? It's a major work of literature, it's author is long dead, and his estate will never release it. I see no reason for it's protection to continue at this point (then again, that's British law).
Third change: Where applicable, some items who's very identity is copyrighted should instead be treated as trademarks. For example: Snow White is ancient history, and part of our culture now. It's creators are generally long dead, but the company will never die. The video itself should no longer be copyrighted - it's only a source of profit at this point. However - the primary original Disney characters themselves should not fall under copyright limitations primarily because they are quite literally trademarks of Disney. Mickey Mouse isn't just a character, he IS Disney. Goofy, Pluto, and Donald Duck aren't just old IP, they are more than anything else the definition of Disney's identity, and thus can be copied, but only for reference - in much the same way you have very limited rights to use a company logo. Some copyrights cover what are effectively logos, and logo protections should last as long as the entity that they apply to, whether that be decades or centuries. They are not products, they are the company. The only exceptions should be for the transfer of trademarks between organizations - but those exceptions get complicated.
Finally, when these protections expire, the result should go into the public domain. No complex licenses, no special rules.
Coalition governments seem to have a nasty tendency to break those coalitions, because they're not truly one government. They're parties agreeing to cooperate, under current circumstances, in a power sharing deal. I have long considered this to be one of the most delicate forms of democracy, only suitable for a fledgling government trying to find a final form.
For all the bickering, our two party system is effectively one government, but polarized largely along two artificial poles. What those poles are changes over time, but it's a constant adversarial system. It does not work very effectively, but it seems to do far better than most of what we see in the world.
Consider that we have (if I am right), the longest running continual government - only broken once, partially, by a civil war. That civil war managed to crystalize a new format that, for all of it's faults, was more manageable over the long term than the previous form, and managed to effectively stay the same model of government (but with the balance of power shifted in ways that not everyone likes). Even the UK, while still the same nation, has changed drastically in waves, and each new government that comes in is virtually a new government, whereas ours is designed - imperfectly - to make the transition of power between parties relatively mild and - in the end - of little relevance except to policy.
I'd agree with Washington that static parties are a generally bad idea. It promotes partisanship, and that partisanship is preventing us from having the government we could have. It is, however, far superior to a parliamentary system - a system that rarely seems to function as well as our own inefficiently adversarial model.
Just a moment... wasn't it Judaism (in the western world, at least) that effectively pioneered the concept of goodwill for goodwill's sake? Or the idea of a deity that primarily wanted you to behave (if you read between the lines) rather than simply fall to your knees and worship? Wasn't Christianity the religion that replaced competitors that were primarily centered around appeasement and little else, and taught the powerful that simply killing the weak wasn't proper? Wasn't Islam the advanced moral framework that made the Pax Islamica possible? And if you head further east, wasn't Buddhism oriented primarily towards teaching you how to find peace through helping others find it themselves? There are others, but these are the dominant religions, and by no coincidence happen to focus heavily on morality itself.
Humans are innately imperfect beings, regardless of the cause. Some believe it was a matter of our creation. Others blame it on demons. I blame it on a primate heritage, primates being one of the most violent, rage-driven, and spiteful branches on the tree of life. Either way, being imperfect, we can and often do warp any cultural heritage, any belief, any moral concept, into something that suits our basest desires. Even the most high-minded secular concepts, such as liberty, are more often than not converted into bloodthirsty rampages and bloodbaths, abused by those who seek power, and used as an excuse to kill by those who don't understand it.
I started my niece and nephew on games at an early age - but I kept it strictly limited to older and simpler games, primarily Atari 2600 ports. When they're 3-4 years old, they can't understand anything overly complicated and should focus primarily on movement and avoidance, as well as pursuit of obvious goals. The games should be fairly easy as well, until they begin to reach their second decade (or until they start to show real skill and need a challenge).
A younger kid can easily enjoy a primitive video game just as well as we could (back when those games were new). It's not until they're exposed to more modern games that the old games begin to show their age. Tempest, Galaga, Pac-Man, Space Invaders, Robotron, and other simple games are ideal for children. Save the modern console games for later, when their minds are hungry for more. Educational games are great, but entertainment is a goal in itself - and entertainment is the first priority of any game, with educational value being a secondary bonus in some cases. Do the education yourself, and let them learn to have fun with their games before you start turning them into work.
That said, educational games are extremely useful, and can form a major component of their learning. They have little value until the child can read well, though. Reading software is entertaining, but usually (from what I've experienced with my relatives) are susceptible to being bypassed by an imaginative child - my niece got through most of her "reading" games without bothering to actually read much.
The key issue, and the one that people usually seem to miss or be incapable of enforcing, is moderation. Limited video game time will not harm your child. Parents can maintain total control of any source of video games when their children are young, and can maintain significant control even into their teens. The primary mistake average parents make is the same one our parents usually made with TV - specifically, using it as a pacifier. If you hand your kid a console, show them how to use it on their own, and then provide very little supervision, the kid WILL spend hours upon hours on his games. Too much time spent in a virtual environment just plain isn't good - but that doesn't mean that limited and controlled time, especially when active parental interaction is involved, is in any way damaging.
Moderation is key, in almost all things. Especially when it comes to children and video games.
It's morally right to offer some assistance to the truly needy. If a man has no food, it's very little effort to provide him with sustenance. If he has no shelter, it can be provided by a society with the will to do so.
But... how far should we be expected to go for the poor? If someone works hard for their wages, and has worked to possess at least some skill in even a simple area, but cannot afford basic healthcare, housing, and food, I believe society should have a secure safety net in place for them. Others have worked, but presently can't - either due to temporary unemployment or a physical problem (or even a mental issue). Those apply as well, as long as they try to find their way back into the working category.
The reality, though, is that there are many... many... people in this country who do not work, who often have never worked, and when given the chance by charity and government groups do not show any serious interest in working. People who simply dropped out of high school, who became criminals early on, or who were raised in a welfare system and know nothing else, even when they're shown the way out. Not all poor are like this. I prefer to believe, seriously, that the vast majority are not like this. People who are forever doomed to unemployment and who will never be productive in any capacity.
There are many reasons people end up this way, and to say it's all their own fault is inaccurate, let alone cold blooded. But - just how responsible am I, as a free individual, for their access to all the modern amenities that I have to work for? When does charity have to extend to an innate right to be supported when your need is not truly dire?
And moreover, why does "caring for the poor" end outside urban areas, when it's the majority of our land, in the rural areas, that the vast majority of the real poverty is found?
If I knew for certain that it was going towards food and shelter, basic clothing, and even completion of a high school education for those who missed it the first time around, I would have no problem shelling out tax dollars to provide services that mark an advanced civilization, and provide what are truly basic necessities to everyone, no matter what their story is. That alone would reduce crime by a greater amount than any level of police expansion could. I would even extend that towards basic health care (ie prevention, checkups, vaccination, and all the other critical medical offerings that really don't cost that much).
For all that, though, I have no interest in providing a terminally unemployed component of society with a level of healthcare that rivals the pitiful level of care that I receive as a working member of society. Charity does not have to extend to giving the poor everything the middle class has - at the expense of (primarily) the middle class. It's the middle class that will foot most of the bill, and who will see OUR health care costs increase in reaction.
Also consider this. If you are broke, today, you can still get basic health care. The problem is the hospitals offering it are not funded well enough to handle the immense load they're under. You will wait hours, and the staff who attend to you will be burned out when they finally make it to you, and the equipment will be adequate but overworked. It wouldn't take much in the way of government assistance for these hospitals to expand in capacity and numbers - but that doesn't score political points, and it's not as beautiful an idea as giving everyone health insurance. The most sensible method - providing the existing no-pay services with enough money to operate more extensively - is totally ignored.
Also, if I recall, Jesus (who you repeatedly mention) encouraged general charity towards the poor, but also berated individuals for asking for too much.
Imposed handicaps are worse than loose entry requirements. I'd rather have to worry about that one guy with the supercharged mitochondria than about how fairly distributed the handicaps are.
If you allow someone into a game who has any kind of physical irregularity, you have to accept them as they are, and on a level playing field. If they can't compete fairly on a level field (either due to improvement or handicap), then that sport just isn't for them, no matter how badly they want it or how well they did before their situation changed. Sports are largely a physical event, and they aren't a right available to all.
Who knows at that point - so many things will change when engineered babies become commonplace (and I do mean "when" - short of a nuclear/environmental holocaust, it will happen) that the Olympics will be just one of many battlegrounds.
Anyone who tinkers with their genes later in life will probably find themselves treated the same as if they had taken steroids (though I'm not sure how the Olympics views steroids used for purely medical purposes). Once you start seeing people born that way, they would probably be let in after the numbers are large enough.
The main problem is that while training technique can make a major impact in performance, as well as the will and basic body plan of the individual competitor, once you start turning it into a technology race the game changes completely. It will become like many car races - where the funding and technology of individual groups is roughly as important as the drivers themselves.
You'll certainly see new sporting events where such rules do not apply. The only reason you don't see more sports today that simply don't care about steroid use is that, at least until very recently, it was generally damaging to the players. Some of the recent baseball players seem to have had skillful doctors (or drug dealers, anyway) and may do just fine when they're done playing. Once THAT becomes a reality (and it probably will - long before useful genetic tweaking), I won't be surprised to see steroids and other enhancements become a monitored but legal component in many sports. Right now, it's cheating - but it's those cheaters who have made the past few years much more interesting for baseball and other sports. Once steroid use can be controlled delicately enough to not bring actual harm (just improved strength), the biggest obstacle will be out of the way.
At that point, all previous baseball records will mean nothing, football players will be able to bend steel, and boxing matches will never make it past the first round. Golf... ok, so some sports won't be affected.
Look at it another way. Consider glasses as a removable prosthetic (which they are - correcting a visual disability).
In sharpshooting competitions (which I've been in), you're allowed to compete even if you wear corrective lenses (I'm also a four-eyed "handicapable" person). This is largely because glasses and contacts provide vision that falls well within the range of the average human eye. No distinct advantage is provided by glasses (or contacts) other than allowing the myopic to see roughly as well as their peers can. Vision isn't the only deciding factor in who wins, but it's significant.
Lasig and other forms of eye surgery are now capable of providing vision (in some) that starts to reach into the upper ranges of human vision. This has caused some minor controversy in the sport, but most are not too concerned since it's a common procedure and can still easily be matched by anyone with pretty good vision.
Now what would happen if you took someone who had been blind, but given an operation that restored his sight? It would be uplifting to see such a person compete in a sport they had been previously incapable of competing in. Now what if that same operation involved bionic implants, no matter how simple or complicated, that gave him visual acuity that the very best "naturals" couldn't honestly beat? Even if his advantage was relatively minor, even if his story was so inspiring it made everyone want to cry, the ultimate outcome is that any specific competition he was a part of would be damaged due to one player having a distinctly unfair advantage, little different from allowing someone to use a scope (when others are not).
The Olympics is politically charged, utterly serious, and is full of athletes who devote a significant portion of their lifespan towards training for the opportunity to win. If the rules are all obeyed, they are guaranteed that no competitor will be physically superior to them except by the virtue of better genes or even more intense training. The day someone with a distinct man-made advantage enters the field, the nature of the game changes entirely - the basic measure of fairness is lost.
I'm always proud to see someone with a damaged body overcome their limitations (you know he didn't learn to run on those things overnight), and it's always invigorating to see technology find replacements that, even if limited in scope, surpass nature. But I don't believe that it serves the best interests of the Olympic Games to allow someone with a clear unnatural advantage to compete, no matter if it's their fault or not. Would it be a future track star's fault if his parents had chosen to have him genetically engineered to be a super-human runner?
Spell = smell Me = idiot non-proofreading mouth-breather