Firstly, the Anglosphere has a long tradition of research into the study of signs and symbols. See, for example, Peirce (pronounced "purse").
Secondly, the term "semiotics" is wide-spread in English-speaking communities, while the term "semiology" (or varaints) tends to crop up in European discussion.
Thirdly, the fields mentioned may make use of semiotics, but semiotics is a discipline in its own right, with its own journals and authors. Just because a particular Slashdotter has only encountered these concepts in a cognitive science course does not mean that they enjoy no independent existence. (Calculus exists independently of engineering!)
Fourthly, semiotics is often broken down - very loosely - into three areas: syntactics (the form of signs), semantics (meaning of signs) and pragmatics (use of signs). Hence, semantics is one area of semiotic study.
To find out more about how the study of signs and symbols intersects with computers and information systems, try this bibliography. In particular, the work of Ron Stamper is quite influential.
1) It should be pretty clear I was being more than a little facetious. To those who shared the genuine stories of serious gaming addicition and offered advice - the problem is nowhere near as dire as that. But I hope anyone who is in that situation gets the help they need.
2) Yes, I appreciate having a geek-oriented girlfriend. No, I won't be passing on her details to anyone else >:-(
3) I will suggest broadening her gaming interests. We'll look into some of the titles suggested. Thanks for those.
4) NetHack is a wonderful game. But, please, be careful.
Not a bad suggestion... to that end I wrote her a little batch program to "backup" and "restore" her save games. Still took her a couple of years to get off NetHack and onto ADOM. There's a helluva lot a Rogue-likes out there though.
Yep, nothing says "romance" like asking Slashdot geeks for personal advice.
Re:Give her my number, I'll fix things just fine
on
Getting Off NetHack?
·
· Score: 1
Don't get me wrong - I was way impressed that I found a smart, sexy woman who confided early on that she'd table-topped a few times (as in RPG not dancing!). And when I showed her NetHack, she dug the Tolkien references - and even the Herbert (Dune) material! (I've since put her on to Lovecraft too.) How cool is that?
So while I don't want a "typical girlfriend", after a few *years* bathed in that eery glow... something's not right.
Why can't she just watch TV like the rest of us?:-)
I think even the most committed NetHack devotee would struggle with a dvorak keyboard. Failing that, she can damn well pick out letters with a mouse and onscreen keyboard.
Not sure where this domain is, now that there is officially no limbo.
That's right, according to the Vatican, there is no Catholic basis for limbo. No limbo? Turns out it had the theological sophistication of Kryten asking "Then where do all the calculators go?"
You really need a business case. There's lots of resources out there to help, but the basic idea is to compare the costs of having IT with the costs of NOT having IT. It's pretty easy to work out the former using TCO calculators and the like.
Working out the cost of NOT having IT is the hard part, but ultimately it's what will convince your boss. You have to look at opportunity costs and costs-to-revenue too.
For example, the sticker-price for an anti-virus package might be $100. The TCO for three years might be $500. (Straightforward.) The cost of NOT having that anti-virus package would be the cost of losing data, losing time, losing clients, losing revenue etc multiplied by the probability of those events happenining. (Difficult.)
There is one saving grace: you don't really need to work out the cost of NOT having the anti-virus package in any great detail, just whether it's (significantly) above or below $500. So, in this case, you don't need to fuss about whether it's actually $725 or $730 (or whatever) - if it's over the threshold then you demonstrably need it!
People, it was not a troll. I was genuinely interested in the information privacy/liberty thing.
The reason it came across as troll-ish was because the trivial example of contradictory ideas I used was - I realise now - inflammatory to about half of Americans, who seem to be about 90% of Slashdotters.
To all those wishing to engage in me debate about the death penalty, abortion, separation of church and state and other uninteresting issues: I'm not going to help you untangle your fucked up worldview.
(If you're desperate to have your say, why don't you run along to my blog and post on the forum there?)
To those who stayed on-topic with thoughtful replies, thanks for your discussion. I read and appreciated them.
To those who've emailed me with back-slapping congratulatory emails about "good troll" and "take that slashweenies" etc - it was not my intent, so save your praise.
Yeah, it may have looked like a troll because of the death penalty/abortion example. Whoops.
I was genuinely curious about exploring the ideas around information liberty (and how that sits with eg. intellectual property vs privacy).
Unfortunately, while there were a few good posts in the ensuing discussion they got drowned out by the death penalty/abortion issue, which I only used as an example of contradictory ideas. I'd like to explain why.
I'm not American, and for non-American Westerners there is no serious debate around taking away abortion or instituiting the death penalty. It's been that way for generations and is not about to change any time soon. So, I (unthinkingly) chose that example because it's so, well, settled for us. Kind of the political version of the flat vs round Earth debate.
As a member of the Anglosphere, I should have been more aware that this is a contentious issue in the US. Hell, if I'd read the (later) post about equal time for creation I'm sure it would have been top of mind!
But, where I come from, church on Sunday, anti-abortion, pro-death penalty, prayer-in-school, creationists make up less than 5% of the population. Hell, only about a third are even Christian (and they're of a much milder variety).
So my mistake was using an example that (to Americans) is inflammatory while not taking into account the preponderance of Americans on this site.
My fault. I wished Cliff - persumably an American with his ear closer to the ground - had edited out that phrase as it didn't really add anything.
Japan's decision to retreat from plans to host the nuclear fusion reactor means they can pour more resources into their national obsession with scientific whaling.
Their research method - killing and eating hundreds of whales - aims to answer such pressing scientific questions as:
Are humpbacks a leaner alternative to minkes?
Soy sauce or wasabe?
Do the whales even mind when they've been harpooned?
High-protein, low-carb - can whale flesh play a role in the Atkins diet?
And why are they just so damn tasty anyway?
Naturally, this rigorous program requires repeated application of the same test methodology: firing grenade-tipped harpoons into inquisitive whales and electrocuting them.
Well done, Japan, on deciding to focus on core business.
Since setting up the HTPC, there are two competing digital content pipes into my house. Either way, it all ends up as MPEG2 files that I watch at my leisure, so I'm indifferent about delivery method.
First pipe: Cost is AU$70/month. Speed is 512kbps. (Sort-of broadband ADSL connection.)
Second pipe: Cost is free. Speed is is some 100+Mbps. (FTA digital tv).
It takes a special kind of incompetence from the media businesses to make the former a more attractive proposition.
Channel 7's behaviour around Arrested Development and Scrubs has cost them several hundred ad exposures to my household of four alone! Idiots.
TV content is too important to entrust to the network programmers and their devious schemes.
Slashdot Mirror
Much of this is not correct.
Firstly, the Anglosphere has a long tradition of research into the study of signs and symbols. See, for example, Peirce (pronounced "purse").
Secondly, the term "semiotics" is wide-spread in English-speaking communities, while the term "semiology" (or varaints) tends to crop up in European discussion.
Thirdly, the fields mentioned may make use of semiotics, but semiotics is a discipline in its own right, with its own journals and authors. Just because a particular Slashdotter has only encountered these concepts in a cognitive science course does not mean that they enjoy no independent existence. (Calculus exists independently of engineering!)
Fourthly, semiotics is often broken down - very loosely - into three areas: syntactics (the form of signs), semantics (meaning of signs) and pragmatics (use of signs). Hence, semantics is one area of semiotic study.
To find out more about how the study of signs and symbols intersects with computers and information systems, try this bibliography. In particular, the work of Ron Stamper is quite influential.
I strongly recommend this highly-readable introduction to semiotics.
Thanks for all the suggestions, guys.
1) It should be pretty clear I was being more than a little facetious. To those who shared the genuine stories of serious gaming addicition and offered advice - the problem is nowhere near as dire as that. But I hope anyone who is in that situation gets the help they need.
2) Yes, I appreciate having a geek-oriented girlfriend. No, I won't be passing on her details to anyone else >:-(
3) I will suggest broadening her gaming interests. We'll look into some of the titles suggested. Thanks for those.
4) NetHack is a wonderful game. But, please, be careful.
Cheers,
-Greg.
Not a bad suggestion ... to that end I wrote her a little batch program to "backup" and "restore" her save games. Still took her a couple of years to get off NetHack and onto ADOM. There's a helluva lot a Rogue-likes out there though.
Yep, nothing says "romance" like asking Slashdot geeks for personal advice.
Don't get me wrong - I was way impressed that I found a smart, sexy woman who confided early on that she'd table-topped a few times (as in RPG not dancing!). And when I showed her NetHack, she dug the Tolkien references - and even the Herbert (Dune) material! (I've since put her on to Lovecraft too.) How cool is that? So while I don't want a "typical girlfriend", after a few *years* bathed in that eery glow ... something's not right.
Why can't she just watch TV like the rest of us? :-)
An excellent suggestion, thanks!
I think even the most committed NetHack devotee would struggle with a dvorak keyboard. Failing that, she can damn well pick out letters with a mouse and onscreen keyboard.
Not sure where this domain is, now that there is officially no limbo.
That's right, according to the Vatican, there is no Catholic basis for limbo. No limbo? Turns out it had the theological sophistication of Kryten asking "Then where do all the calculators go?"
You really need a business case. There's lots of resources out there to help, but the basic idea is to compare the costs of having IT with the costs of NOT having IT. It's pretty easy to work out the former using TCO calculators and the like. Working out the cost of NOT having IT is the hard part, but ultimately it's what will convince your boss. You have to look at opportunity costs and costs-to-revenue too. For example, the sticker-price for an anti-virus package might be $100. The TCO for three years might be $500. (Straightforward.) The cost of NOT having that anti-virus package would be the cost of losing data, losing time, losing clients, losing revenue etc multiplied by the probability of those events happenining. (Difficult.) There is one saving grace: you don't really need to work out the cost of NOT having the anti-virus package in any great detail, just whether it's (significantly) above or below $500. So, in this case, you don't need to fuss about whether it's actually $725 or $730 (or whatever) - if it's over the threshold then you demonstrably need it!
People, it was not a troll. I was genuinely interested in the information privacy/liberty thing.
The reason it came across as troll-ish was because the trivial example of contradictory ideas I used was - I realise now - inflammatory to about half of Americans, who seem to be about 90% of Slashdotters.
See here for full explanation:
Re:This is the BESTEST TROLL EVAR!!!! by thetan (Score:1) Friday August 05, @01:39PM
To all those wishing to engage in me debate about the death penalty, abortion, separation of church and state and other uninteresting issues: I'm not going to help you untangle your fucked up worldview.
(If you're desperate to have your say, why don't you run along to my blog and post on the forum there?)
To those who stayed on-topic with thoughtful replies, thanks for your discussion. I read and appreciated them.
To those who've emailed me with back-slapping congratulatory emails about "good troll" and "take that slashweenies" etc - it was not my intent, so save your praise.
-Thetan.
Yeah, it may have looked like a troll because of the death penalty/abortion example. Whoops.
I was genuinely curious about exploring the ideas around information liberty (and how that sits with eg. intellectual property vs privacy).
Unfortunately, while there were a few good posts in the ensuing discussion they got drowned out by the death penalty/abortion issue, which I only used as an example of contradictory ideas. I'd like to explain why.
I'm not American, and for non-American Westerners there is no serious debate around taking away abortion or instituiting the death penalty. It's been that way for generations and is not about to change any time soon. So, I (unthinkingly) chose that example because it's so, well, settled for us. Kind of the political version of the flat vs round Earth debate.
As a member of the Anglosphere, I should have been more aware that this is a contentious issue in the US. Hell, if I'd read the (later) post about equal time for creation I'm sure it would have been top of mind!
But, where I come from, church on Sunday, anti-abortion, pro-death penalty, prayer-in-school, creationists make up less than 5% of the population. Hell, only about a third are even Christian (and they're of a much milder variety).
So my mistake was using an example that (to Americans) is inflammatory while not taking into account the preponderance of Americans on this site.
My fault. I wished Cliff - persumably an American with his ear closer to the ground - had edited out that phrase as it didn't really add anything.
Cheers,-Thetan.
- Are humpbacks a leaner alternative to minkes?
- Soy sauce or wasabe?
- Do the whales even mind when they've been harpooned?
- High-protein, low-carb - can whale flesh play a role in the Atkins diet?
- And why are they just so damn tasty anyway?
Naturally, this rigorous program requires repeated application of the same test methodology: firing grenade-tipped harpoons into inquisitive whales and electrocuting them. Well done, Japan, on deciding to focus on core business.Exactly right.
Since setting up the HTPC, there are two competing digital content pipes into my house. Either way, it all ends up as MPEG2 files that I watch at my leisure, so I'm indifferent about delivery method.
First pipe: Cost is AU$70/month. Speed is 512kbps. (Sort-of broadband ADSL connection.)
Second pipe: Cost is free. Speed is is some 100+Mbps. (FTA digital tv).
It takes a special kind of incompetence from the media businesses to make the former a more attractive proposition.
Channel 7's behaviour around Arrested Development and Scrubs has cost them several hundred ad exposures to my household of four alone! Idiots.
TV content is too important to entrust to the network programmers and their devious schemes.
-Thetan.