Groklaw used to be a place where I could get a detailed analysis of legal issues I didn't understand. Now, it seems to have disintegrated into blind zealotry. Maybe they were trying to be funny in the article, and I just didn't get the joke... Here's a free clue: apply Occam's Razor the question of why your opinion changed. Could it perhaps be that you've misunderstood the danger to the Free software community posed by Microsoft's obvious attempt to ambrace, extend, extinguish?
From this week's BOFH:
I'm betting it says something about 'right-tasking', 'examining organisational structure' and identifying roles and the people best suited to them."
"Yeah, sort of."
"Then yes, they want to get rid of someone."
I know tons and tons of people who opposed the war because they can't stand the idea of being involved in a choosing which 10,000 people are going to die, 5,000 civilians and 5,000 evil people right now because we invade, or 10,000 nameless "disappeared civilians" per year inside a foreign country that we don't control.Actually, the deaths run rate is about 100 per day - three thousand a week.
... that's in Baghdad alone. The rest of the country? Right now, I don't think anyone's really counting any more. I was just reading in the LA Times that barricades are going up in Baghdad, and the ethnic cleansing is really taking hold. Pretty grim, and there are now only bad choices remaining for the US.
There are very few reporters anywhere else in the country because it's too dangerous.
Actually, no, it wasn't . Westmoreland ran the war up to '68, when he was replaced by Abrams, who instituted a comprehensive review of strategy and tactics, and switched US forces towards advisory / support roles. Nixon and Congress then (as Rumsfeld, Cheney et al see it) stabbed them in the back, in the face of growing domestic anti-war pressure.
Course, there was a draft then. Now (thanks to Milton Friedman) that you have a volunteer army, the long arm of the US military doesn't reach as far or punch as hard - smart bombs, kevlar and remote-control fighting doesn't change that as much as Rummy had hoped. Ha, ha, ha.
Established facts:
1) There were no WMDs
2) We all thought there were WMDs
Speak for yourself, bud. I and the other three million people who demonstrated against it before they got going weren't fooled: we tended to give some credence to Blix and the U.N. Remember the U.N.? Another institution fucked by President George "Ook!" Bush.
Actually, it's much worse than that. Consider that the US is now essentially militarily defenceless (well, 'defence' in the US sense of "defending our perceived interests in other people's countries", anyway.) Put it like this, could the US take on Iran, or North Korea, or Buttphuckistan tomorrow? Not a chance, and they know it. Hence Syria marching happily back into Lebanon; Hezbollah are heroes across the Muslim world for having comprehensively trounced the most recent Israeli attempt to "kill all the terrorists"; Iran and Syria are now starting to get quite nervous as the numbers of Iraqi refugees, now with a lot of distrust and intercommunal Shia-Sunni hatreds and suspicions well to the forefront, flood into the neighbouring countries. Oh and US foreign policy is fucked for a generation, at least. There's not a cat in hell's chance that the UK will lend military assistance to an overseas US war. Perhaps if Mexico invades. And the rest of the world won't even take the President's calls. Now, personally I think this is a Bad Thing; a strong military alliance between European and American countries makes sense, and makes for a safer world - all things being equal.
Worst of all, all the political capital and genuine world-wide sympathy the world felt for the US after 911 has been pissed up the wall. The swivel-eyed anti-Americans now get a much better hearing than five years ago. And Afghanistan is going to hell again, in case you hadn't noticed, opium production's back to pre-Taliban levels and European and Asian cities are once more flooded with cheap, uncut smack. "The Gate of A Thousand Sorrows", indeed.
Ah well, I should be grateful the penny finally seems to be dropping with the US electorate, tho' I have a horrible feeling that it's the 3000 dead from the forces that's changed their minds, rather than the nightmarish maelstrom of horror into which Iraq is now inexorably descending, or the 600,000 dead (mostly civilians.) A tragedy, in the Greek sense of the word - and yes, as others have said, everyone else in the world pretty much saw this coming.
That's a really depressing take. Do you think that the reason the US has failed in Iraq (and is failing in Afghanistan) is the handful of US casualities, rather than the 200x greater civilian death toll - the vast majority of which are not (directly) US-inflicted?
If (as seems to have been the case from 911-the last few months) the US public really believe that their technologically superior military enables them to do whatever they want to whomever they want, it's hardly surprising that politicians play the easy wartime card and shovel those brave volunteers into a pointless furnace such as Iraq, on the basis of nothing more than a few meaningless aphorisms about "fighting them there rather than here". I'm sorry to say that the universe (in the form of human nature) is currently in the process of spitting out US foreign policy (having chewed it up), and that many tens of thousands of people are now paying the price - not only the physical casualties, but the next three decades of veteran tragedies like the current awful alleged murder in California. (Most of the casualties will be a lot quieter than that, solitary men committing suicide in 10, 15, 20 years' time, families torn apart by alcohol and drug abuse and psychological trauma.) Of course if there are tens of thousands of US citizen affected, there are literally millions in Iraq (and, increasingly, in Syria and Iran as everyone who can get out, does so.)
Hopefully in 20 years' time the US public will have a more realistic view of the capabilities of their (or anyone else's) military. And perhaps they might educate themselves in the complex history, social geography and dare I say it expert opinion of the likely outcome, the next time they feel the need to demand violent retribution for a perceived threat that in reality is nothing more than a phantom in the mind of the media-political complex that governs the American psyche so effectively today.
Every bug we reported got a patch very quickly.Wait, this is the same Oracle that silently fixes bugs three years after they've been reported?!
This study doesn't make SQL Server look good. It's security record is pretty average over the last couple of years, since the SDL stuff Litchfield mentions. (A comparison of MSSS with MySQL and PostgreSQL... now, that would be interesting.) Oracle are without doubt the worst so-called "Enterprise Software" vendor going today; their attitude is notorious. The fact that they make MS SQL server look good by comparison is, I suspect, intended to tell you something about just how shit Oracle is, rather than how great MSSS is.
Bollocks, bollocks, bollocks. Go know just enough to be dangerous by spewing misinformation. Please, go and read some real science before you regurgitate am radio.
We are seeing the effects of methane growth rates in the 1980's and 1990's...it'll get worse before it gets better.
Actually, methane has a very short life in the atmosphere; it breaks down via some very straightforward chemistry (details left as an exercise for the reader:)
This is in stark contrast to CO2, which once released is around until natural processes soak it up. Natural processes such as the formation of rocks and oil... slow processes.
The real 800lb gorilla for methane is the Arctic. If the predictions are right then this is the calm before the storm. If the Arctic melts, which it is, it'll release vast amounts of methane.
You are mistaken. There is no methane in Arctic ice. You may be thinking of the enormous deposits of methane in the form of hydrates, an icy substance that is stable under enormous pressures in cold deep water. There's a serious theory that rising temps at some point could trigger them to start melting, which really would cause utterly catastrophic short-term heating - think 15 degrees in a couple of decades. This has happened naturally in the past.
some reading on hydrates, Google & wikipedia will also help.
In the words of the Manics' song: I live to fall asleep. Life without sleep would be my idea of pure hell. And a life of permanent, 24 hour sleep is... my dream.
(Professional help was sought, but proved not to be much use. But hey, thanks for the thought.)
Radia Perlmann. Gave us spanning tree and much excellent original work on routing. Cool woman (not not, I think, 'girl')...
Joanna Rutkowska - the blue pill rootkit queen.
Marx meant it as a means to tame an oppressed class "Suffering in this life guarantees you Paradise in the afterlife!".
We can hardly call the american middle-class "oppressed" in any way.
*sigh* they don't really teach you folks anything about politics and history do they...
Marx' basic proposition is that capitalism's innate flaw is the distinction between owners of capital (yes, capital-ists) and providers of labour (workers.) In a Marxist analysis, we are *all* workers except the few people who have sufficient unearned income to not have to work. That obviously includes the "middle classes", certainly in the US context. Being separated from the fruits of their labours (the capitalist keeps the profit, the worker just gets paid a flat rate), workers are alienated (that's where the word comes from you know.)
If you go listen to a Manic Street Preachers or Radiohead album I think you'll see what I mean about the middle classes being just as alienated and oppressed as the traditional working class / underclass. The whole beauty of the US system is how it's managed to eat it's children - the most oppressed people are mostly doing it to themselves because they think it's the only rational way to behave:(
(Story submitter here) What made it even more surreal is that I was just coming to the end of a marathon total-immersion Chris Morris retrospective, consisting of the Radio One shows, the original "On The Hour" radio shows and finally the Blue Jam Radio 1 shows, where you can't help getting the uneasy feeling that you've just followed Morris over the lip of the Cliffs of Insanity (sorry, that should be "The Cliffs of Insanity!!!!!!") into a very unsettling parallel universe that's exactly the same as our own. UK readers with long memories and a twisted sense of humour will understand what I meant about having to check the primary source because it couldn't possibly be true.
The other response comes from listening the I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue where last week they had a round where each panel member had to tell just the punchline to some terrible old jokes. And Barry Cryer said: "...paint it blue and join the police!"
when 90% of a population uses the dominant religion's ceremonies as the way to "do" life's important events, not participating on point of principle is going to make you one very alienated person.
Yup, it IS rather depressing sometimes to realise I'm out of sync with the brainwashed masses. On the other hand, as Kierkegaard once observed: (I paraphrase) "Anxiety is freedom".
Slashdot Mirror
The only good Microsoft is a dead Microsoft.
2:45pm off 37.5% - looks like it's plateau'd and there's even a small uptick. I guess that's it'll now be known as the "Dead Darl Bounce" :)
If ignoring UN resolutions merited an invasion, we'd have been running Israel since 1968.
This is funny ?? Some mods have a peculiar sense of humour...
... that's in Baghdad alone. The rest of the country? Right now, I don't think anyone's really counting any more. I was just reading in the LA Times that barricades are going up in Baghdad, and the ethnic cleansing is really taking hold. Pretty grim, and there are now only bad choices remaining for the US.
There are very few reporters anywhere else in the country because it's too dangerous.
Course, there was a draft then. Now (thanks to Milton Friedman) that you have a volunteer army, the long arm of the US military doesn't reach as far or punch as hard - smart bombs, kevlar and remote-control fighting doesn't change that as much as Rummy had hoped. Ha, ha, ha.
Speak for yourself, bud. I and the other three million people who demonstrated against it before they got going weren't fooled: we tended to give some credence to Blix and the U.N. Remember the U.N.? Another institution fucked by President George "Ook!" Bush.
Worst of all, all the political capital and genuine world-wide sympathy the world felt for the US after 911 has been pissed up the wall. The swivel-eyed anti-Americans now get a much better hearing than five years ago. And Afghanistan is going to hell again, in case you hadn't noticed, opium production's back to pre-Taliban levels and European and Asian cities are once more flooded with cheap, uncut smack. "The Gate of A Thousand Sorrows", indeed.
Ah well, I should be grateful the penny finally seems to be dropping with the US electorate, tho' I have a horrible feeling that it's the 3000 dead from the forces that's changed their minds, rather than the nightmarish maelstrom of horror into which Iraq is now inexorably descending, or the 600,000 dead (mostly civilians.) A tragedy, in the Greek sense of the word - and yes, as others have said, everyone else in the world pretty much saw this coming.
Islam does not command the faithful to kill all infidels.
That's a really depressing take. Do you think that the reason the US has failed in Iraq (and is failing in Afghanistan) is the handful of US casualities, rather than the 200x greater civilian death toll - the vast majority of which are not (directly) US-inflicted?
Here's a more articulate demolition of consumerism than I can manage.
Hopefully in 20 years' time the US public will have a more realistic view of the capabilities of their (or anyone else's) military. And perhaps they might educate themselves in the complex history, social geography and dare I say it expert opinion of the likely outcome, the next time they feel the need to demand violent retribution for a perceived threat that in reality is nothing more than a phantom in the mind of the media-political complex that governs the American psyche so effectively today.
This study doesn't make SQL Server look good. It's security record is pretty average over the last couple of years, since the SDL stuff Litchfield mentions. (A comparison of MSSS with MySQL and PostgreSQL... now, that would be interesting.) Oracle are without doubt the worst so-called "Enterprise Software" vendor going today; their attitude is notorious. The fact that they make MS SQL server look good by comparison is, I suspect, intended to tell you something about just how shit Oracle is, rather than how great MSSS is.
Bollocks, bollocks, bollocks. Go know just enough to be dangerous by spewing misinformation. Please, go and read some real science before you regurgitate am radio.
Enjoy :)
(Professional help was sought, but proved not to be much use. But hey, thanks for the thought.)
Radia Perlmann. Gave us spanning tree and much excellent original work on routing. Cool woman (not not, I think, 'girl')... Joanna Rutkowska - the blue pill rootkit queen.
what do you mean, 'up there'? It's head, all the way to the top.
The other response comes from listening the I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue where last week they had a round where each panel member had to tell just the punchline to some terrible old jokes. And Barry Cryer said: "...paint it blue and join the police!"
Well, yes, because by definition, if you believe in fairy stories, you ARE unenlightened.
http://www.littlebluelight.com/lblphp/quotes.php?i key=13