I read this years ago, not knowing much of anything at all about it. Not even sure where I heard of it. It just had to be read. His eclectecism reminds me of Tom Robbins. I wonder what Robbins would be like if he wrote cyberpunk.
People outside of the US and Canada (excluding Quebec for some unknown reason) are ineligible to win the book (as well as the other prizes).
(also, first post correct grammar first)
If you are flaunting your own grammar, you may want to note that your second sentence is not a sentence and has excessive punctuation. Your third sentence ends in a preposition (something generally frowned on in grammatical circles). If you were criticizing the original story itself, then you may want to note it was a spelling error in the title. The grammar of the post is generally fine.
You can even get the similar effect across dialects. My friends from New Zealand found it funny that one of my best friends (or anyone, for that matter) was named Sheila. Sheila is apparently a somewhat derogatory way of referring to women in New Zealand. They laughed hard several times when I mentioned her name.
Re:Now that MTV has lowered the IQ level a bit...
on
MTV's Hacker Portrayal
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· Score: 1
I won't be cutting my cable any time soon - I'd have no internet access:-)
We do have cable TV in order to watch PBS. I like PBS because the people on there are indeed like me or are people I'd like to be like (yes, even the Teletubbies).
I used to love MTV, back when they actually had music on that channel.
Hmm - it would seem there can be no crypto in Platonia since randomness appears to have been thrown out the window in this essay. I guess I'm off to write my 10-line 3DES cracker...
I'm not hardcore into mechanics, quantum, or otherwise, but your assesment rings true with me. It almost appears as if he's trying to apply Newtonian mechanics right on top of quantum. His concept seems too simplistic.
I think the question should be "What's right with PL/SQL?"
I do PL/SQL every day and am limited by lack of datatypes, crappy web integration, limited (32k) variable sizes, no OO, cumbersome syntax (the only thing that makes it "Pascal like" is the:= operator, AFAICT) and lack of decent array handling facilities outside of tables themselves.
Bring on the Java! I like Java. It's elegant and powerful. I can't wait until my employer finally moves forward to Oracle 8 (probably another year).
No, NT was built from scratch. Has common roots with OS/2, IIRC. They split the codebase into OS/2 and NT when they couldn't get along with IBM any more. This is could all be completely false, however.
That's odd. I setup AOL 4.x for my mother-in-law when she came to visit last spring on NT4 running in VMWare, no less. Worked great over my ISP's TCP/IP connection. Maybe it's the dialup that AOL doesn't like on NT4.
I've worked as both and I prefer to work as an employee because I can determine who it is that I spend my efforts on every day and what contribution that organization makes to our society/world. I could not, for example, allow myself to work for a company that produces nuclear weapons or clearcuts our forests. As a contractor, it's very difficult to select who you work for. You might end up turning down a lot of jobs (if you're picky like I am). As an employee, I only have to do that once (or at least once in a long while). I currently work for a university and feel good about the fact that my efforts are generally going to help people (yeah, it's a slippery slope, I know).
I agree with this principle as well. I also believe that (to use a construction analogy) picking a blueprint and then building in a swamp or on a crumbling precipice may be foolish. (I'll leave it up to the reader to relate the analogy back to OS choice.) I think the OS should be one of the many fators under consideration when choosing/developing a business system.
Great article. I'm amazed at how much they underestimated the ability of somone like yourself to do what you did when they could have put in a little more effort and made your job a lot harder. I guess I'm not that amazed. Good work.
What are people who are running *nix, PalmOS, BeOS, VIC-20 and other platforms which have no commercially available censorware going to do? I suppose lie like the rest of the poor sods who've been shat upon by their own government. At the risk of showing my ignorance - does Australia guarantee free speech as part of its' constitution?
I beleieve we are not the only pack of roaming wild freaks wrecking havoc on whatever fleck or spark may have attracted our attention for the moment. I suspect it was actually MacDotted.
I'm going to make a web page chock full of animated banner ads and make Mr. Gates and his highly trained engineers watch them as my refund. Can you say "Click the Monkey and win $500," Bill?
The whole "petrified" meme has me a bit wigged out over there, i.e. "Mae Ling Mak, Petrified" in all the posts and polls. To me it's one thing to see a bunch of lame, life-deficient adolescents talking about Natalie Portman's anatomy and a whole other thing to talk about turning women into stone statues. That crosses the line from funny & stupid to unfunny and scary to me. Anyone else find this a bit disturbing?
It certainly doesn't make me want to stand up and announce myself as a proud member of the Slashdot/Segfault/Freshmeat crowd. (Not that I want to announce membership to any club that'd have me, for that matter.)
I take a bit of issue with people that want to "tame the complexity" of computers. Yes, I want to avoid bloatware and features for features' sake, but computers serve many purposes. They are bound to be complex when we expect them to do as much as they do. I have a friend who wants his computer to be an appliance like his fridge or toaster. That's nice, but a fridge does one thing well - keep things cold. If you want a computer that does one thing well, buy a WebTV or something.
Please also know that I'm a programmer and a user interface/HCI freak. I think we have a _long_ way to go before computers are ever "intuitive."
Slashdot Mirror
I read this years ago, not knowing much of anything at all about it. Not even sure where I heard of it. It just had to be read. His eclectecism reminds me of Tom Robbins. I wonder what Robbins would be like if he wrote cyberpunk.
People outside of the US and Canada (excluding Quebec for some unknown reason) are ineligible to win the book (as well as the other prizes).
(also, first post correct grammar first)
If you are flaunting your own grammar, you may want to note that your second sentence is not a sentence and has excessive punctuation. Your third sentence ends in a preposition (something generally frowned on in grammatical circles). If you were criticizing the original story itself, then you may want to note it was a spelling error in the title. The grammar of the post is generally fine.
If you want good, thorough, intelligent, unbiased journalism, you don't go to MTV, you go to. . . um. . . any ideas?
PBS, NPR for starters. Not to mention News of the Weird and Slashdot, of course.
You can even get the similar effect across dialects. My friends from New Zealand found it funny that one of my best friends (or anyone, for that matter) was named Sheila. Sheila is apparently a somewhat derogatory way of referring to women in New Zealand. They laughed hard several times when I mentioned her name.
I won't be cutting my cable any time soon - I'd have no internet access :-)
We do have cable TV in order to watch PBS. I like PBS because the people on there are indeed like me or are people I'd like to be like (yes, even the Teletubbies).
I used to love MTV, back when they actually had music on that channel.
Hmm - it would seem there can be no crypto in Platonia since randomness appears to have been thrown out the window in this essay. I guess I'm off to write my 10-line 3DES cracker...
I'm not hardcore into mechanics, quantum, or otherwise, but your assesment rings true with me. It almost appears as if he's trying to apply Newtonian mechanics right on top of quantum. His concept seems too simplistic.
I think the question should be "What's right with PL/SQL?"
:= operator, AFAICT) and lack of decent array handling facilities outside of tables themselves.
I do PL/SQL every day and am limited by lack of datatypes, crappy web integration, limited (32k) variable sizes, no OO, cumbersome syntax (the only thing that makes it "Pascal like" is the
Bring on the Java! I like Java. It's elegant and powerful. I can't wait until my employer finally moves forward to Oracle 8 (probably another year).
Here ya go.
Hope they don't mind me taking a load off their server. Be gentle, now!
No, NT was built from scratch. Has common roots with OS/2, IIRC. They split the codebase into OS/2 and NT when they couldn't get along with IBM any more. This is could all be completely false, however.
This article was written by a woman.
The article was written by a woman.
> He'd have better luck... The article was written by a woman
That's odd. I setup AOL 4.x for my mother-in-law when she came to visit last spring on NT4 running in VMWare, no less. Worked great over my ISP's TCP/IP connection. Maybe it's the dialup that AOL doesn't like on NT4.
I've worked as both and I prefer to work as an employee because I can determine who it is that I spend my efforts on every day and what contribution that organization makes to our society/world. I could not, for example, allow myself to work for a company that produces nuclear weapons or clearcuts our forests. As a contractor, it's very difficult to select who you work for. You might end up turning down a lot of jobs (if you're picky like I am). As an employee, I only have to do that once (or at least once in a long while). I currently work for a university and feel good about the fact that my efforts are generally going to help people (yeah, it's a slippery slope, I know).
I agree with this principle as well. I also believe that (to use a construction analogy) picking a blueprint and then building in a swamp or on a crumbling precipice may be foolish. (I'll leave it up to the reader to relate the analogy back to OS choice.) I think the OS should be one of the many fators under consideration when choosing/developing a business system.
That Utah Phillips/Ani DiFranco story/song is one of my faves. Their new one is excellent, too.
Great article. I'm amazed at how much they underestimated the ability of somone like yourself to do what you did when they could have put in a little more effort and made your job a lot harder. I guess I'm not that amazed. Good work.
Just don't turn into the next Chris McCandless
What are people who are running *nix, PalmOS, BeOS, VIC-20 and other platforms which have no commercially available censorware going to do? I suppose lie like the rest of the poor sods who've been shat upon by their own government. At the risk of showing my ignorance - does Australia guarantee free speech as part of its' constitution?
I beleieve we are not the only pack of roaming wild freaks wrecking havoc on whatever fleck or spark may have attracted our attention for the moment. I suspect it was actually MacDotted.
I'm going to make a web page chock full of animated banner ads and make Mr. Gates and his highly trained engineers watch them as my refund. Can you say "Click the Monkey and win $500," Bill?
The whole "petrified" meme has me a bit wigged out over there, i.e. "Mae Ling Mak, Petrified" in all the posts and polls. To me it's one thing to see a bunch of lame, life-deficient adolescents talking about Natalie Portman's anatomy and a whole other thing to talk about turning women into stone statues. That crosses the line from funny & stupid to unfunny and scary to me. Anyone else find this a bit disturbing?
It certainly doesn't make me want to stand up and announce myself as a proud member of the Slashdot/Segfault/Freshmeat crowd. (Not that I want to announce membership to any club that'd have me, for that matter.)
This debate has been culled and included in the ORA book Open Sources. It's a great discussion/debate and a fascinating book.
I take a bit of issue with people that want to "tame the complexity" of computers. Yes, I want to avoid bloatware and features for features' sake, but computers serve many purposes. They are bound to be complex when we expect them to do as much as they do. I have a friend who wants his computer to be an appliance like his fridge or toaster. That's nice, but a fridge does one thing well - keep things cold. If you want a computer that does one thing well, buy a WebTV or something.
Please also know that I'm a programmer and a user interface/HCI freak. I think we have a _long_ way to go before computers are ever "intuitive."