You are closer to the truth than you might know. For more than a thousand years, Jewish males became part of the community when, at age 13, and after seven or more years of study, they demonstrated their literacy skills by publicly reading the bible (torah) and conducting a religious service. (Today called a Bar Mitzvah.) Illiterate males were not seen as "desirable" and so may have had a tougher time finding a mate and reproducing.
Even worse, at the same time, many countries made it a crime for Jews to marry non-Jews, and so the poor, illiterate Jewish male had little chance of finding a mate.
During the dark and middle ages, the majority of the population of Europe was illiterate (the royalty and the church the general exceptions).
[Off-topic sidebar:] We owe a great debt to the Catholic Monks of Ireland who, during this time, transcribed not only bibles, but classic texts from the Roman, Greek, African, and Mid-Eastern civilizations that are the base of Western Civilization. See the special on PBS or The History Channel, or buy the book on Amazon, "How the Irish Saved Civilization (Hinges of History) by THOMAS CAHILL. Without the Irish, there may have never been a renaissance, then an industrial revolution, and then the era of slash dot and online pr0n. [/End off-topic sidebar]
During this same period of time, many countries' laws prohibited Jews from becoming tradesmen, artisans, or farmers. As a result, banking and trade, professions that require math and literacy, became the Jew's primary source of income. A Jew without math and language skills had a much tougher time of making a living and supporting any mouths he might reproduce and so was further discouraged from marrying.
SOoo....
From within the community, illiterate Jews were seen as undesirable matches. They were often outlawed from marrying non-Jews. In addition, at a time when non-Jewish peasants could be illiterate farmers, the Jews could not. The pressure on lower-intelligence Jews NOT to reproduce or at least minimize the number of offspring was enormous.
From the isolation of the Jews around 70 AD through the renaissance, there were approximately 70 generations. This was more than enough time to depress the proportion of illiterate adults in the community.
I too am in a situation where a proprietary windows application is required. In our case, our customers who don't want the application on their desktop use either Citrix or Microsoft Terminal Server (M-TS)for remote access. (I am biased toward Citrix, but that is only through years of comfort, not through an objective evaluation.)
Our clients who use M-TS seem happy and stick with it. Our clients who use Citrix seem happy and sitck with that product.
In 1981, Osborne Computer released the world's first truly portable Personal Computer, the OCC-1. With a Z80, 5 inch screen and CP/M operating system, I had word processing (Wordstar), database (dBase), spell-checking (Lightning ?), and spreadsheet (SuperCalc and Multi-calc). It was a hit and I LOVED my machine.
In 1982, the Osborne Computer Company announced a successor, the Executive model OCC-2, with a larger screen and a cooling fan, and the Vixen, an even higher-end machine.
Unfortunately, Osborne made the announcements with a warehouse full of inventory of OCC-1's. Potential customers just stopped buying the OCC-1's while waiting for the newer machines. Sales plummeted and Osborne quickly ran out of money and filed for bankruptcy in September of 1983.
Osborne's true value to the industry for the last twenty years has been as a lesson for hardware makers. Unlike software makers, never pre-announce features that give customers excuses to hold off buying your current product. Intel has been careful that their various "roadmaps" have provided evolutionary paths designed not to scare off current customers.
Apple is creating anticipation for product that is a year or more away, but must keep selling their current product up to full availability of the new product. This may be "cross the beams" bad. As an Apple fan, I hope the Osborne Scenario (TM) does not materialize for Apple.
Which is to say that once the 18-34 demographic...
I realize that a significant portion of the gaming community is 18-34, but the core of the market is age 12-24 and they have already voted with their wallets.
My two sons, ages 9 and 13 each have a brand-new, nicely equipped PC, but their gaming time is 90% Game Cube, 9% Game Boy Advanced, and 1% Nintendo 64. (64? Yeah. I know. It just won't die.) PC=Internet surfing and Open Office for homework.
They save their money and it is a rare month that neither buys a new game for the game players. However, neither has EVER spent a dollar on PC gaming.
I've got one nephew (age 17) who takes his X-box to friends' houses where they network the devices. Yes, all also have PCs for schoolwork.
Casual conversations with friends show that their kids focus on game systems as well.
I do have one dear friend (think/. stereotype - technical, intelligent, and alone), age 41, who uses the PC for Tribes, Quake, etc., but he is pretty much it for anyone I can find using the PC for games. And he spends less than $100 a year for games for the PC platform.
If someone is going to code new games, the PC market doesn't seem to have a prayer.
I prefer using a credit card over a debit card because I get to use the credit card co's money for (up to) 30 days. With a debit card, the transaction is immediate. I'd rather earn a little interest on my money before handing it over.... air miles... A debit card might be what works for you, but I think a wisely used credit card can be more beneficial.
As someone with many years of experience in credit card direct marketing, my eyes used to glisten every time a sentiment such as the one above is expressed. Just as one lottery winner makes it easy to sell lots of lottery tickets to the general population, your story is great for selling plastic to the masses.
Many (most?) credit card companies depend that
o you don't pay attention to their changing fine print periodically tossed out with other junk mail
o as a fallible human, you will eventually pay a bill late
o or that a payment will take too long to get through the postal system
Not today, not tomorrow, but eventually the day comes and.... BAM!
A late payment translates to
o BAM!: late fees of between $20 and $70
then
o BAM!: your no-fee free annual membership now costs $50
then
o BAM!: your low teaser interest rate shoots from 6.99% to 24.99%
and
o BAM!: All of your "savings" by using the float are wiped out as you spend your time (and what is that worth) to surf the web for a better card, apply, and then eventually deal with moving any automatic payments you may have to the new card. (Look at all the pr0n surfing time you lose!)
Yes, I have a "points" card to earn those benefits, (just got back from a trip to Australia...now those are miles that add up), but in addition to maintaining a zero balance, I also send out a small payment on the first of every month to make sure (a) the credit card company NEVER has me noted as a late payor and (b) the statement that arrives comes with a small credit balance.
Loss of float you say? Pay $50 at the beginning of the month that they have use of for 2 weeks out of the month. Your loss of interest (at 5% annually ) is $1.25 PER YEAR.
I'm probably a good example of how one person represents many downloads. On my PC, I've downloaded and installed a few times. More importantly, almost every client visit includes me installing FireFox on multiple, sometimes dozens, of PCs.
I've got all kinds of clients. (All remote.)
For more than a hundred, I've got remote access via PcAnywhere or Citrix Server or MS Terminal Server or GoToMyPC.com.
For more than a hundred, one of my staff (or me) must physically be onsite for access to client PCs. For some it is a lack of remote control technology. For other clients (banks and pharma), they have prohibitions on remote access that I'm never going to get repealed.
I know many/. readers want control over what gets updated on their computers, but end user PCs should be something else altogether.
When I hear that FireFox is combating a security flaw by making an update available that requires a human to manually download and install the "new" product, I groan and am tempted back to the MS camp.
Firefox should have some sort of option, (even an obscure option set only by editing an ASCII configuration file) that forces the PC to connect to Mozilla at 3:00 AM local time (or whatever) every day and downloads and installs whatever the current stable edition is.
Otherwise, every update becomes months of aggravation as we schedule and charge customers to go onsite, update their user PCs, and then take the grief because they don't see why they should have to pay when they didn't ask for anything "new," just to keep surfing, emailing, and using OO.
When we talk about Total Cost of Ownership (TCO), every FireFox upgrade that costs the customer money is yet another reason for them to return to I.E.
AAArrrggghhhhhh!
Don't blame me. I'm just some guy who shows up, fixes what's broke, and tells you how to run your business.
> If you're talking about, say, a small business that needs basic desktop machines, the overhead in say, going with an OS OS will far exceed any price savings.
>And what sort of "overhead" might that be? A modern Linux distro practically installs and configures itself, comes with boatloads of software, and does not require an advanced degree to sit down and start using for everyday (non-development) purposes.
No overhead? I'm hoping the long-term benefits will out-weigh the short-term learning curve pain as I have mandated my users to adopt Open Office. To illustrate:
User call: "Quick. I'm under deadline. Every other paragraph in this document is in Spanish and every other paragraph is in English. I had no problem highlighting and spell-checking when I did this in Word, but how to do this now? Where the ***** is the Spanish spell checker and no, I don't want my MENUS to mysteriously turn Spanish?"
While going through help text to address this question, I am interrupted by a call from user two, "I used to use the menu choices w, x, and y, to accomplish z in Word. Remember that by the time I ask you how to do something, I'm already frustrated and yes I've tried the help and WHAT IS THE ANSWER THIS INSTANT?"
What I really need is a web site that mimics the MS Word menus and at the end of every chain tells me how to do just that in OO. My users have anywhere from 2 to 15 years of MS Word Processing experience and I need help in easing this transition.
They don't care what their employer's licensing costs were for MS O/S and apps. They only know they thought they were more productive before.
While I'm all in favor of OO, the community needs to develop some more transition tools.
Why is India doing this? It is a developing nation with crushing poverty, corruption, debt, and the caste system. They can't afford the luxury on spending resources on high-tech stuff like this. They should spend on education, public health, agriculture, and social programs.
I'm going to act as if the poster was sincere and not a troll, therefore deserving of a thoughtful answer.
Every government is faced with the challenge of balancing the short term needs of the impoverished with the long term obligation to develop the national infrastructure and long term high paying jobs and therefore wealth of their economy.
In the US from the 1960's onward, there were cries by some that the billions of dollars spent on our space program should have been spent on our poor. While we don't have the numbers of poor that are in India, a visit to American rural areas like Appalachia or any number of American Indian reservations or a visit to American inner city areas will tell you that we still have our own millions of people living in violent areas, without adequate food, medical care, education, or hope for improvement in these areas.
Even so, others will argue that much of American wealth created and shared by most of the population was helped by research in space and other military programs. (The reason we started our program was to maintain parity with the former Soviet Union.) If spin-offs from the Indian investments in space translate to private sector jobs, then an argument may be made that it has long term value.
If there is anything the Ronald Reagan taught us Americans (and no, I was NOT a big fan of Reagan's in many areas), it was that symbols, even costly symbols, can motivate millions to take actions toward better goals. (He followed Jimmy Carter. A man whose intelligence, sincerity and battles for human rights, were overshadowed during his presidency by American feelings of "malaise" and general helplessness felt during the hostage crisis, oil shortages, and resulting recession.)
Maybe some/. readers have additional knowledge than what was in the article to share with the rest of us:
From the article: [Isro's work is not commercially driven, Mr Nair makes clear: "Our main mission is to make high technology serve society and poor people in particular."]
Ok, but to address the ideas expressed in the/. comments, the article does NOT say:
1. Will the images be available via the web to web community without charge? If not, then a whole bunch of the benefits listed in the thread are vapor.
2. I thought the US government has regulations that blur feeds from US satellites to limit the resolution we untrustworthy slobs in the private sector have access to. If the Indian government does make these pictures available, will US citizens have access to locations and resolutions not currently available?
3. The article does not mention the nature of the satellites orbit or if there are any limitations (intentional or not) on where the satellite focuses. Are they mapping the whole world or only India and rival Pakistan or some other subset of the planet?
According to french.about.com 113 million people speak it fluently on a regular basis. It is the second most widely taught second language after English.
English #1 and French #2? Really?
The only way this discussion makes sense is if you conclude that (Europe=World).
I certainly support their effort to preserve their language and culture. I love France for Lafayette, Descartes, & French Food, but let's keep the facts straight and with regard to all of our bretherin:
The facts m'am, just the fact:
MAJOR LANGUAGES OF THE WORLD
(Number of native speakers)
1. Mandarin Chinese 836,000,000
2. Hindi 333,000,000
3. Spanish 332,000,000
4. English 322,000,000
5. Bengali 189,000,000
6. Arabic 186,000,000
7. Russian 170,000,000
8. Portuguese 170,000,000
9. Japanese 125,000,000
10. German 98,000,000
11. French 72,000,000
12. Malay 50,000,000
(http://www.al-bab.com/arab/language/lang.htm)
And when I go to an employer, and I say "I can code in C and C++', and they say "That's great, but we use Visual.net", I'll give them the finger.
As long as there are C and C++ jobs in the location you want to work, that pay what you want to earn, then good for you.
But for people in other circumstances, (let's say you are caring for an aging parent or disabled loved one), your arrogant approach might mean real problems in real life.
May you never have to make such value judgments in your day-to-day living.
I make no apologies for making a great living supporting my loved ones where they want to live even though it means supporting clients who are almost exclusively MS based (servers too) and who want to stay that way.
Proprietary products from MS and Oracle and Sun have provided for my family for a quarter century. Yes I use open source where I can and when I can. That doesn't mean MS and Oracle and Sun are evil or should all be treated as such.
This is an honest question. Why isn't OpenOffice experiencing the same explosive success as Firefox? What is keeping these same Firefox "switchers" from getting their hands on OpenOffice, as well?
It took me a while to understand this one. I have converted a number of my clients to Firefox with no push-back. If they don't use tabbed browsing, there is no change to the way the menus work. A URL is a URL and favorites are favorites.
The same users have screamed and had me reinstall MS Office. The menus are dramatically different enough that you can't just muscle blindly through reformatting forms and formatting.
With Firefox, the learning curve is about five minutes. With Open Office, you really need to snuggle up with documentation for a couple of hours to get really comfortable.
Here would be my suggestion for part of the solution:
If there was an installation option in OO of "MS Compatibility Mode" where the menus mimicked MS Word, then we would have a fighting chance.
Don't underestimate the power of inertia!
Also, the issue of spreadsheet macro compatibility is enough to turn off most of my clients who are accountants. Many have developed or purchased so many macros over the years and have no motivation to even investigate converting these things.
So for now, I have both MS Office and OO on both home and work PCs. My kids have OO. My CPA wife won't even let it on her PC.
>Microsoft has kept a tradition of 'C:/Program Files/' for installed applications which makes it easy for any windows user to jump from one MS platform to another. These relatively simple standards are just another security blanket that people refuse to let go of when they're tempted to switch operating systems.
Oh if only this were true. If
1. installation of Windows resulted in locked down C;\Windows directories and a locked down registry and
2. all applications would run from c:\Program Files\ and
3. specific application information resided in an.ini file in that same application directory and
4. A single global ini file in c:\ contained a one-line pointer for each directory containing "installed" applications,
then
1. Hash files could finally secure windows from mal-ware.
2. With a simple directory copy, applications could easily be moved from one system to another without cumbersome "installation" processes."
3. Applications could be cleanly and completely removed merely by deleting the application directory and the one line reference in the root ini file.
The concepts here could probably even more easily be implemented in Linux at the distro level.
I vaguely remember a Microsoft executive's amazement at how long it took to "move" from a WindowsME box to a WindowsXP box due to hours and days of re-installing applications from one machine to another.
I would probably buy a new PC every year if not for the nightmare of re-installation. Between work and home, I always seem to have two Windows PCs in one location two Linux PCs in the other. In each case, one is my slow, "primary" PC and one is my "Real Soon Now" unit, with the latest OS and applications in some varying and weird state of installation. The cutover is never pretty and they pain of cutover means I only really make a move every 24 to 36 months. If Intel wants to sell more boxen this is certainly an area that it would be in their best interest to contribute to.
I can't believe that none of the discussion thus far has taken seriously the implication of Microsoft's announcement.
Whether real or for now, vaporware (the product still has "miles to go"), the questions should be:
- Will companies use an MS tool to manage networks containing varying OS'
or
- Will companies use another tool to manage networks containing varying OS'
Virtualization needed includes network-wide backup and restore of images and files, allocation of dasd, secure access, identification of failing boxen and then seamless rollover, etc.
I hope the subsequent discussion includes tools you are using today (Openview and its successors and 3rd party add-ons) and which may evolve to meet our needs.
What is being banned is the local government taking tax dollars from people who don't want to pay for "free" access. The question here is whether the government should be in this business.
(/sarcasm) After all, they've done such a good job at maintaining necessary investments in our electrical grid. (/end sarcasm).
There are two options today for achieving community-wide wireless coverage.
First, trust the for-profit companies to do their part. (That they will do in some places.)
Second, ANY educational, religious, or other non-profit organization can found a membership-based organization consisting of voluntary members whose dues cover bother their use and services to those who can't afford the service. Such an organization could either build the towers or contract out to the for-profits.
AARP and AAA and Sierra Club are all examples of very different organizations whose services delivered far exceed their narrow original core mission.
While I am in favor of taxes for police, fire, public schools, defense, and social services, I'm not so sure about taxes for universal wireless coverage in a nation where 43 million people have no health care coverage.
"Software products that do not compete with Microsoft's products fell in price by 12 percent from 1988 to 1995, but by 60 percent where there was competition from Microsoft.",
I spent Sunday on two different service calls. One to a private residence. One to a dentist office. Each one had a new Windows PC with no application software. (Linux was a no-go for each customer.)
Software I installed and/or updated included:
AVG Anti-Virus by Grisoft
Home PC: free
Office PC (pro version): $33.30
Open Office (incl. Spreadsheet and Word Processing)
Home & Office: free
Zone Alarm:
Home PC: free
Office licenses including download: $32.00
Spybot Search & Destroy:
Home & Office: free
______________
Total software cost:
Home: free
Office: $65.30
According to compusa.com, the current price for Microsoft Office standard edition is $399.99 AFTER you mail in for a $50.00 rebate.
SOooo......
Based on the article, Microsoft's products feel 12%, while the competing products in the consumer home environment fell by 100% (to free).
If you want to give Microsoft "credit" for "motivating" people and companies to create free software, that is fine by me. But Microsoft is only a recent entrant to the firewall market, they are only preparing to enter the anti-virus market, and deficiencies in their products are what has enabled the entire anti-spyware market that they don't currently participate in at all.
By allowing the competition from the generics, Canon retains the motivation to keep its own prices down.
As a result, I buy Canon's ink for high-end home photo requirements, but generic for office use.
If you really are aggravated by HP (and Lexmark and Dell) producing printers with proprietary cartridge chips and patented designs, there are still choices to consider on the open market.
Exactly what is it that HP offers that no one else does that keeps you buying such expensive supplies and generating endless whining on/.?
Non disclaimer: I do not have stock or other financial interest in any of these companies. I am a long-time Canon customer.
For my contact information and history: http://www.roomberg.com/
If someone who speaks three languages is trilingual,
and someone who speaks two languages is bilingual,
then someone who speaks one language still must be....................
>> Is that if they claim billions of dollars lost from piracy, then why are these losses not spelled out in their tax forms?
Oy. "The billions of dollars lost" referenced here is in potential revenue, not in actual physical losses.. I believe the only loss you can deduct on your tax forms is the amount of your investment(cash spent less undepreciated assets) minus revenues.
For example:
Invest/spend $ 1,000,000 in a business. This includes everything from salaries to advertising to equipment purchases.
Subtract your undepreciated assets (furniture, computers, etc.) of $250,000.
Subtract sales of $ 250,000.
You are left with a loss of $500,000 to report to the government.
The effect of such a loss is only that you don't pay taxes on profits. The government doesn't give you anything for the losses you do report. (Yes, there are offsets for future years, but that is not part of this thread.)
It doesn't matter that pirates screwed you out of billions in potential sales. These losses are not relevant for tax reporting purposes. Only actual losses are generally allowed.
Disclaimer: I'm not a CPA. I'm just married to one.
It is true that "most" employers of CS people hire based on actual skills. Even so, you should be aware that a great many top-tier companies (especially Pharmaceutical and Military Contractors) employ Human Resources people who "filter" inbound resumes based on the ignorant idea that specific degrees and college reputations are what matter most.
One of my current clients (hq for a major pharma company) loves my work (as a contractor). Even so, it is clear that I'll never get past the HR folks for even an interview for a job on the same level I hold as a contractor. (Yes, I probably make a lot more money as a contractor, but there are all kinds of perks available only to "real" employees that I wish I had.) The culture there is that they only hire people with advanced biology and chemistry degrees and then only from the best schools. (They assume that everyone comes equipped to learn any CS skills they need and generally do not value CS degrees as such.)
Consider where in the country you want to live and the major employers in that area. If their culture values college reputations, then your future happiness may be influenced by your choice of school.
Disclosure: While it took 12 years of night school, I graduated in 1996 with a non-CS masters from a non-Ivy League, yet generally respected university. Had I paid more attention in high school and gone to someplace like Princeton or the U. of Pa. and ALSO picked up more chemistry and biology, I have no doubt that there would have been more opportunities in the years that followed. (Yes, I live in an area where big pharma companies and military contractors dominate the high-end of the job market.)
This is not to say I shouldn't be grateful for what I've got. I still make a top-notch income. I love the people I work with. I've been programming (and/or software engineering) since 1980. I love what I do so much that I still show up for work early even after all these years in the workforce.
I was one of the first TIVO subscribers when Comcast rolled out a rental program years ago.
In 2003, I terminated it when the family budget got tight. TV viewing became a miserable, boring, and frustrating experience. I was so ready to sign up again at what ever the price.
In 2004, I signed up for the DISH network with a 100-hour PVR (Personal Video Recorder) (PVR-522) that added $10 a month to my 2-set bill.
When I got on the phone, they charged me two months programming up front, then waived the next two months of bills. The net: no real up front charge and the commitment is only month-to-month.
The dish PVR does most of what TIVO does. There are two things it does not do. First, it does not go out and record shows you have not requested but where the database shows you are LIKELY to enjoy. Second, when you like a show, you have to manually pick each of the channels you want to record from. (I.e. the West Wing is on two networks and you have to pick both.) Neither of these deficiencies were deal killers for me.
The PVR came with 1 box and one remote for each of my 2 TVs. You can record up to 2 shows at one and either TV can play anything recorded on the PVR. Once again I am watching 1-hour shows in 42 commercial-free minutes.
I now pay less for programming than I did with Comcast and less for the PVR than I did with TIVO.
(I must so sound like a shill for DishNetwork. I have no connection with them and none of their stock.)
Not only does the PVR have a fast-forward button like on TIVO, but there is also a 30-second forward button. Press 6 times during a prime-time commercial (or 8 times during the West Wing) and you have zapped past the commercials faster than TIVO's fast-forward.)
Based on all of this, I think a little less TIVO-centric ranting is in order. Ticked off at TIVO? Consider the competition.
In addition to my day job (and in addition to my night job), I seem to have allowed myself to have been sucked into the role of PC, web, and network support for a number of friends and associates.
Yes, I have installed Firefox on all of their desktops, but (to best of my knowledge) they do need MS IE for updating of Windows, Office, and office related downloads (like templates).
What is needed is a gentle, yet firm caution that IE should be used only for those web sites that are hostile to Firefox.
Instead of completely hiding IE, I change their IE home page to:
http://www.roomberg.com/warning.htm
Which displays a "skull & crossbones" and says:
___________________________
STOP
IF THIS PAGE IS THE FIRST DISPLAYED AFTER LOADING THE BROWSER,
YOU ARE USING INTERNET EXPLORER, NOT THE SAFER FIREFOX.
CLOSE NOW AND LOAD FIREFOX.
(Look for the FireFox icon: firefox)
ONLY IF YOU NEED TO UPDATE MICROSOFT PRODUCTS USING
THE MICROSOFT WEB SITE SHOULD YOU CONTINUE TO THIS LINK:
(above in large font)
www.microsoft.com
(line above in 8 point font)
___________________________
I know some/. readers will conlcude I have wussed out by not forcing my users to use only Firefox, but this approach has reduced my support calls while gently introducing a better solution.
>>There is no reason I should be involved in a Middle Eastern problem that I personally had no (or at least very little) part in creating.
>>
Just because you feel no connection to the place does not eliminate the fact that you are benefiting from thousands of years of the evolution of human social and scientific systems.
Those benefits came at a price. The technology age/space age is a product of the industrial revolution. The industrial revolution was a product of the enlightenment. The enlightenment was a product of the Holy Roman Empire which has been intermittently warring with Muslim countries for centuries.
While many in the US would like to believe that history started in 1776, the basis for our institutions and social organizations came partially from the Greeks and partially from Western Europe, but primarily from the Roman Empire.
The SIG for another/. poster is something like "History doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes." As you potentially have the education and experiences that are the product of all of these years of conflict, perhaps you might decide to become involved in some small part of the solution to our divided and warring species.
If we don't deal with those "other" parts of the world, they are going to contiunue come after us as they did on 9/11.
I hope you embrace your connection to the rest of humanity. Then maybe you won't resent begin part of the solution.
Funny how the same crowd that supports multiple operating system variants and multiple browsers treats google images like they were the one and only.
When I search with Google images for the phrase, "Abu Ghraib" , I get exactly 127 images.
When I search for the same phrase using Yahoo's image search:
http://images.google.com/advanced_image_search?hl= en
I get 3,493 images.
The moral here? Stop thinking about Google as the be-all and end all.
There IS competition out there, SO USE IT!
Only if you use the competition will google have the motivation to update their database and be competitive in this area!
That google is providing an inferior product is only an indication that we are being lazy consumers.
Personally, I like Google's GUI layout better than Googles. This is why I'm rooting for Google to come up to speed.
While we're identifying Google problems in the image area, Google might also think about suppressing images that are 98% the same color. Some searches are overwhelmed with that kind of drek.
And speaking of overwhelming drek, how about EITHER doing pre-display background checks for broken links and suppressing them, OR just developing a "cached" option like we get for web text pages. Either approach would save time and aggravation for the user.
And if the company that prides itself on not being evil would care to throw us a bone, give the advance image screen the same ability given to the other other screens to display results at 10, 20, 50, or 100 per screen!
Update the base, suppress the monocolor trash, cash images or suppress the links fom the search results, make the advance search give count options. By god, they could be MUCH MUCH MUCH less sucky.
Meds kicking in.....
must sleep now....
Hillary tucking me in while in the Lincoln Bedroom in January, 2009.......sleep......
"... the global population will just grow to absorb the increase in resources, without actually increasing quality of life. The only way to increase quality of life for all of humanity is by instituting strict birth control policies so we do what nature used to do for us: limit population size so it matches available resources."
Fortunately, the Malthusian perspectives have been somewhat changed by our experiences in the last 50 years. In EVERY formerly poor country where the supply of food, education, supplies for voluntary birth control, industrialization, and opportunities for employment for both sexes has improved past the basic needs stage, birth rates have FALLEN DRAMATICALLY.
Based on the experiences of a bunch of countries (including ones from both Africa and Asia), the best ways to cross into negative population growth is to be sure all adults (this means both sexes) to have access to jobs, voluntary birth control, and a prosperous economy.
(By the way, don't use the US's population growth as your answer, once you subtract immigration, the birth rate has been almost as negative as Europe's for a number of years now.)
Nice to have something optimistic to reflect on now and then................
Slashdot Mirror
Even worse, at the same time, many countries made it a crime for Jews to marry non-Jews, and so the poor, illiterate Jewish male had little chance of finding a mate.
During the dark and middle ages, the majority of the population of Europe was illiterate (the royalty and the church the general exceptions).
[Off-topic sidebar:] We owe a great debt to the Catholic Monks of Ireland who, during this time, transcribed not only bibles, but classic texts from the Roman, Greek, African, and Mid-Eastern civilizations that are the base of Western Civilization. See the special on PBS or The History Channel, or buy the book on Amazon, "How the Irish Saved Civilization (Hinges of History) by THOMAS CAHILL. Without the Irish, there may have never been a renaissance, then an industrial revolution, and then the era of slash dot and online pr0n. [/End off-topic sidebar]
During this same period of time, many countries' laws prohibited Jews from becoming tradesmen, artisans, or farmers. As a result, banking and trade, professions that require math and literacy, became the Jew's primary source of income. A Jew without math and language skills had a much tougher time of making a living and supporting any mouths he might reproduce and so was further discouraged from marrying.
SOoo....
From within the community, illiterate Jews were seen as undesirable matches. They were often outlawed from marrying non-Jews. In addition, at a time when non-Jewish peasants could be illiterate farmers, the Jews could not. The pressure on lower-intelligence Jews NOT to reproduce or at least minimize the number of offspring was enormous.
From the isolation of the Jews around 70 AD through the renaissance, there were approximately 70 generations. This was more than enough time to depress the proportion of illiterate adults in the community.
Yes Wine is an option.
Yes VMware is an option.
I too am in a situation where a proprietary windows application is required. In our case, our customers who don't want the application on their desktop use either Citrix or Microsoft Terminal Server (M-TS)for remote access. (I am biased toward Citrix, but that is only through years of comfort, not through an objective evaluation.)
Our clients who use M-TS seem happy and stick with it. Our clients who use Citrix seem happy and sitck with that product.
In 1982, the Osborne Computer Company announced a successor, the Executive model OCC-2, with a larger screen and a cooling fan, and the Vixen, an even higher-end machine.
Unfortunately, Osborne made the announcements with a warehouse full of inventory of OCC-1's. Potential customers just stopped buying the OCC-1's while waiting for the newer machines. Sales plummeted and Osborne quickly ran out of money and filed for bankruptcy in September of 1983.
Osborne's true value to the industry for the last twenty years has been as a lesson for hardware makers. Unlike software makers, never pre-announce features that give customers excuses to hold off buying your current product. Intel has been careful that their various "roadmaps" have provided evolutionary paths designed not to scare off current customers.
Apple is creating anticipation for product that is a year or more away, but must keep selling their current product up to full availability of the new product. This may be "cross the beams" bad. As an Apple fan, I hope the Osborne Scenario (TM) does not materialize for Apple.
Which is to say that once the 18-34 demographic...
/. stereotype - technical, intelligent, and alone), age 41, who uses the PC for Tribes, Quake, etc., but he is pretty much it for anyone I can find using the PC for games. And he spends less than $100 a year for games for the PC platform.
I realize that a significant portion of the gaming community is 18-34, but the core of the market is age 12-24 and they have already voted with their wallets.
My two sons, ages 9 and 13 each have a brand-new, nicely equipped PC, but their gaming time is 90% Game Cube, 9% Game Boy Advanced, and 1% Nintendo 64. (64? Yeah. I know. It just won't die.) PC=Internet surfing and Open Office for homework.
They save their money and it is a rare month that neither buys a new game for the game players. However, neither has EVER spent a dollar on PC gaming.
I've got one nephew (age 17) who takes his X-box to friends' houses where they network the devices. Yes, all also have PCs for schoolwork.
Casual conversations with friends show that their kids focus on game systems as well.
I do have one dear friend (think
If someone is going to code new games, the PC market doesn't seem to have a prayer.
I prefer using a credit card over a debit card because I get to use the credit card co's money for (up to) 30 days. With a debit card, the transaction is immediate. I'd rather earn a little interest on my money before handing it over.
As someone with many years of experience in credit card direct marketing, my eyes used to glisten every time a sentiment such as the one above is expressed. Just as one lottery winner makes it easy to sell lots of lottery tickets to the general population, your story is great for selling plastic to the masses.
Many (most?) credit card companies depend that
o you don't pay attention to their changing fine print periodically tossed out with other junk mail
o as a fallible human, you will eventually pay a bill late
o or that a payment will take too long to get through the postal system
Not today, not tomorrow, but eventually the day comes and
A late payment translates to
o BAM!: late fees of between $20 and $70
then
o BAM!: your no-fee free annual membership now costs $50
then
o BAM!: your low teaser interest rate shoots from 6.99% to 24.99%
and
o BAM!: All of your "savings" by using the float are wiped out as you spend your time (and what is that worth) to surf the web for a better card, apply, and then eventually deal with moving any automatic payments you may have to the new card. (Look at all the pr0n surfing time you lose!)
Yes, I have a "points" card to earn those benefits, (just got back from a trip to Australia...now those are miles that add up), but in addition to maintaining a zero balance, I also send out a small payment on the first of every month to make sure (a) the credit card company NEVER has me noted as a late payor and (b) the statement that arrives comes with a small credit balance.
Loss of float you say? Pay $50 at the beginning of the month that they have use of for 2 weeks out of the month. Your loss of interest (at 5% annually ) is $1.25 PER YEAR.
I've got all kinds of clients. (All remote.)
For more than a hundred, I've got remote access via PcAnywhere or Citrix Server or MS Terminal Server or GoToMyPC.com.
For more than a hundred, one of my staff (or me) must physically be onsite for access to client PCs. For some it is a lack of remote control technology. For other clients (banks and pharma), they have prohibitions on remote access that I'm never going to get repealed.
I know many /. readers want control over what gets updated on their computers, but end user PCs should be something else altogether.
When I hear that FireFox is combating a security flaw by making an update available that requires a human to manually download and install the "new" product, I groan and am tempted back to the MS camp.
Firefox should have some sort of option, (even an obscure option set only by editing an ASCII configuration file) that forces the PC to connect to Mozilla at 3:00 AM local time (or whatever) every day and downloads and installs whatever the current stable edition is.
Otherwise, every update becomes months of aggravation as we schedule and charge customers to go onsite, update their user PCs, and then take the grief because they don't see why they should have to pay when they didn't ask for anything "new," just to keep surfing, emailing, and using OO.
When we talk about Total Cost of Ownership (TCO), every FireFox upgrade that costs the customer money is yet another reason for them to return to I.E.
AAArrrggghhhhhh!
Don't blame me. I'm just some guy who shows up, fixes what's broke, and tells you how to run your business.
>And what sort of "overhead" might that be? A modern Linux distro practically installs and configures itself, comes with boatloads of software, and does not require an advanced degree to sit down and start using for everyday (non-development) purposes.
No overhead? I'm hoping the long-term benefits will out-weigh the short-term learning curve pain as I have mandated my users to adopt Open Office. To illustrate:
User call: "Quick. I'm under deadline. Every other paragraph in this document is in Spanish and every other paragraph is in English. I had no problem highlighting and spell-checking when I did this in Word, but how to do this now? Where the ***** is the Spanish spell checker and no, I don't want my MENUS to mysteriously turn Spanish?"
While going through help text to address this question, I am interrupted by a call from user two, "I used to use the menu choices w, x, and y, to accomplish z in Word. Remember that by the time I ask you how to do something, I'm already frustrated and yes I've tried the help and WHAT IS THE ANSWER THIS INSTANT?"
What I really need is a web site that mimics the MS Word menus and at the end of every chain tells me how to do just that in OO. My users have anywhere from 2 to 15 years of MS Word Processing experience and I need help in easing this transition.
They don't care what their employer's licensing costs were for MS O/S and apps. They only know they thought they were more productive before.
While I'm all in favor of OO, the community needs to develop some more transition tools.
I'm going to act as if the poster was sincere and not a troll, therefore deserving of a thoughtful answer.
Every government is faced with the challenge of balancing the short term needs of the impoverished with the long term obligation to develop the national infrastructure and long term high paying jobs and therefore wealth of their economy.
In the US from the 1960's onward, there were cries by some that the billions of dollars spent on our space program should have been spent on our poor. While we don't have the numbers of poor that are in India, a visit to American rural areas like Appalachia or any number of American Indian reservations or a visit to American inner city areas will tell you that we still have our own millions of people living in violent areas, without adequate food, medical care, education, or hope for improvement in these areas.
Even so, others will argue that much of American wealth created and shared by most of the population was helped by research in space and other military programs. (The reason we started our program was to maintain parity with the former Soviet Union.) If spin-offs from the Indian investments in space translate to private sector jobs, then an argument may be made that it has long term value.
If there is anything the Ronald Reagan taught us Americans (and no, I was NOT a big fan of Reagan's in many areas), it was that symbols, even costly symbols, can motivate millions to take actions toward better goals. (He followed Jimmy Carter. A man whose intelligence, sincerity and battles for human rights, were overshadowed during his presidency by American feelings of "malaise" and general helplessness felt during the hostage crisis, oil shortages, and resulting recession.)
From the article: [Isro's work is not commercially driven, Mr Nair makes clear: "Our main mission is to make high technology serve society and poor people in particular."]
Ok, but to address the ideas expressed in the /. comments, the article does NOT say:
1. Will the images be available via the web to web community without charge? If not, then a whole bunch of the benefits listed in the thread are vapor.
2. I thought the US government has regulations that blur feeds from US satellites to limit the resolution we untrustworthy slobs in the private sector have access to. If the Indian government does make these pictures available, will US citizens have access to locations and resolutions not currently available?
3. The article does not mention the nature of the satellites orbit or if there are any limitations (intentional or not) on where the satellite focuses. Are they mapping the whole world or only India and rival Pakistan or some other subset of the planet?
too poor to have a sig
English #1 and French #2? Really?
The only way this discussion makes sense is if you conclude that (Europe=World).
I certainly support their effort to preserve their language and culture. I love France for Lafayette, Descartes, & French Food, but let's keep the facts straight and with regard to all of our bretherin:
The facts m'am, just the fact:
MAJOR LANGUAGES OF THE WORLD
(Number of native speakers)
1. Mandarin Chinese 836,000,000
2. Hindi 333,000,000
3. Spanish 332,000,000
4. English 322,000,000
5. Bengali 189,000,000
6. Arabic 186,000,000
7. Russian 170,000,000
8. Portuguese 170,000,000
9. Japanese 125,000,000
10. German 98,000,000
11. French 72,000,000
12. Malay 50,000,000
(http://www.al-bab.com/arab/language/lang.htm)
As long as there are C and C++ jobs in the location you want to work, that pay what you want to earn, then good for you.
But for people in other circumstances, (let's say you are caring for an aging parent or disabled loved one), your arrogant approach might mean real problems in real life.
May you never have to make such value judgments in your day-to-day living.
I make no apologies for making a great living supporting my loved ones where they want to live even though it means supporting clients who are almost exclusively MS based (servers too) and who want to stay that way.
Proprietary products from MS and Oracle and Sun have provided for my family for a quarter century. Yes I use open source where I can and when I can. That doesn't mean MS and Oracle and Sun are evil or should all be treated as such.
This is an honest question. Why isn't OpenOffice experiencing the same explosive success as Firefox? What is keeping these same Firefox "switchers" from getting their hands on OpenOffice, as well?
It took me a while to understand this one. I have converted a number of my clients to Firefox with no push-back. If they don't use tabbed browsing, there is no change to the way the menus work. A URL is a URL and favorites are favorites.
The same users have screamed and had me reinstall MS Office. The menus are dramatically different enough that you can't just muscle blindly through reformatting forms and formatting.
With Firefox, the learning curve is about five minutes. With Open Office, you really need to snuggle up with documentation for a couple of hours to get really comfortable.
Here would be my suggestion for part of the solution: If there was an installation option in OO of "MS Compatibility Mode" where the menus mimicked MS Word, then we would have a fighting chance.
Don't underestimate the power of inertia!
Also, the issue of spreadsheet macro compatibility is enough to turn off most of my clients who are accountants. Many have developed or purchased so many macros over the years and have no motivation to even investigate converting these things.
So for now, I have both MS Office and OO on both home and work PCs. My kids have OO. My CPA wife won't even let it on her PC.
Oh well.....
Oh if only this were true. If .ini file in that same application directory and
1. installation of Windows resulted in locked down C;\Windows directories and a locked down registry and
2. all applications would run from c:\Program Files\ and
3. specific application information resided in an
4. A single global ini file in c:\ contained a one-line pointer for each directory containing "installed" applications,
then
1. Hash files could finally secure windows from mal-ware.
2. With a simple directory copy, applications could easily be moved from one system to another without cumbersome "installation" processes."
3. Applications could be cleanly and completely removed merely by deleting the application directory and the one line reference in the root ini file.
The concepts here could probably even more easily be implemented in Linux at the distro level.
I vaguely remember a Microsoft executive's amazement at how long it took to "move" from a WindowsME box to a WindowsXP box due to hours and days of re-installing applications from one machine to another.
I would probably buy a new PC every year if not for the nightmare of re-installation. Between work and home, I always seem to have two Windows PCs in one location two Linux PCs in the other. In each case, one is my slow, "primary" PC and one is my "Real Soon Now" unit, with the latest OS and applications in some varying and weird state of installation. The cutover is never pretty and they pain of cutover means I only really make a move every 24 to 36 months. If Intel wants to sell more boxen this is certainly an area that it would be in their best interest to contribute to.
Whether real or for now, vaporware (the product still has "miles to go"), the questions should be:
- Will companies use an MS tool to manage networks containing varying OS'
or
- Will companies use another tool to manage networks containing varying OS'
Virtualization needed includes network-wide backup and restore of images and files, allocation of dasd, secure access, identification of failing boxen and then seamless rollover, etc.
I hope the subsequent discussion includes tools you are using today (Openview and its successors and 3rd party add-ons) and which may evolve to meet our needs.
Your thoughts?
(/sarcasm) After all, they've done such a good job at maintaining necessary investments in our electrical grid. (/end sarcasm).
There are two options today for achieving community-wide wireless coverage.
First, trust the for-profit companies to do their part. (That they will do in some places.)
Second, ANY educational, religious, or other non-profit organization can found a membership-based organization consisting of voluntary members whose dues cover bother their use and services to those who can't afford the service. Such an organization could either build the towers or contract out to the for-profits.
AARP and AAA and Sierra Club are all examples of very different organizations whose services delivered far exceed their narrow original core mission.
While I am in favor of taxes for police, fire, public schools, defense, and social services, I'm not so sure about taxes for universal wireless coverage in a nation where 43 million people have no health care coverage.
I spent Sunday on two different service calls. One to a private residence. One to a dentist office. Each one had a new Windows PC with no application software. (Linux was a no-go for each customer.)
Software I installed and/or updated included:
AVG Anti-Virus by Grisoft Home PC: free Office PC (pro version): $33.30
Open Office (incl. Spreadsheet and Word Processing) Home & Office: free
Zone Alarm: Home PC: free Office licenses including download: $32.00
Spybot Search & Destroy: Home & Office: free
______________
Total software cost: Home: free Office: $65.30
According to compusa.com, the current price for Microsoft Office standard edition is $399.99 AFTER you mail in for a $50.00 rebate.
SOooo......
Based on the article, Microsoft's products feel 12%, while the competing products in the consumer home environment fell by 100% (to free). If you want to give Microsoft "credit" for "motivating" people and companies to create free software, that is fine by me. But Microsoft is only a recent entrant to the firewall market, they are only preparing to enter the anti-virus market, and deficiencies in their products are what has enabled the entire anti-spyware market that they don't currently participate in at all.
From the comments here, one would think there is a printer monoculture and that HP is the only source of printers. What a load.
/.?
Canon http://www.canonusa.com/ has a full line of printers, scanners, and copiers that use non-encoded cartridges.
This means that ink supplier sites (like http://www.gettoner.com/ and http://www.pacificink.com/) carry generic cartridges.
By allowing the competition from the generics, Canon retains the motivation to keep its own prices down.
As a result, I buy Canon's ink for high-end home photo requirements, but generic for office use.
If you really are aggravated by HP (and Lexmark and Dell) producing printers with proprietary cartridge chips and patented designs, there are still choices to consider on the open market.
Exactly what is it that HP offers that no one else does that keeps you buying such expensive supplies and generating endless whining on
Non disclaimer: I do not have stock or other financial interest in any of these companies. I am a long-time Canon customer. For my contact information and history: http://www.roomberg.com/
and someone who speaks two languages is bilingual,
then someone who speaks one language still must be....................
Oy. "The billions of dollars lost" referenced here is in potential revenue, not in actual physical losses.. I believe the only loss you can deduct on your tax forms is the amount of your investment(cash spent less undepreciated assets) minus revenues.
For example:
Invest/spend $ 1,000,000 in a business. This includes everything from salaries to advertising to equipment purchases.
Subtract your undepreciated assets (furniture, computers, etc.) of $250,000.
Subtract sales of $ 250,000.
You are left with a loss of $500,000 to report to the government.
The effect of such a loss is only that you don't pay taxes on profits. The government doesn't give you anything for the losses you do report. (Yes, there are offsets for future years, but that is not part of this thread.)
It doesn't matter that pirates screwed you out of billions in potential sales. These losses are not relevant for tax reporting purposes. Only actual losses are generally allowed.
Disclaimer: I'm not a CPA. I'm just married to one.
It is true that "most" employers of CS people hire based on actual skills. Even so, you should be aware that a great many top-tier companies (especially Pharmaceutical and Military Contractors) employ Human Resources people who "filter" inbound resumes based on the ignorant idea that specific degrees and college reputations are what matter most.
One of my current clients (hq for a major pharma company) loves my work (as a contractor). Even so, it is clear that I'll never get past the HR folks for even an interview for a job on the same level I hold as a contractor. (Yes, I probably make a lot more money as a contractor, but there are all kinds of perks available only to "real" employees that I wish I had.) The culture there is that they only hire people with advanced biology and chemistry degrees and then only from the best schools. (They assume that everyone comes equipped to learn any CS skills they need and generally do not value CS degrees as such.)
Consider where in the country you want to live and the major employers in that area. If their culture values college reputations, then your future happiness may be influenced by your choice of school.
Disclosure: While it took 12 years of night school, I graduated in 1996 with a non-CS masters from a non-Ivy League, yet generally respected university. Had I paid more attention in high school and gone to someplace like Princeton or the U. of Pa. and ALSO picked up more chemistry and biology, I have no doubt that there would have been more opportunities in the years that followed. (Yes, I live in an area where big pharma companies and military contractors dominate the high-end of the job market.)
This is not to say I shouldn't be grateful for what I've got. I still make a top-notch income. I love the people I work with. I've been programming (and/or software engineering) since 1980. I love what I do so much that I still show up for work early even after all these years in the workforce.
But you did ask.
In 2003, I terminated it when the family budget got tight. TV viewing became a miserable, boring, and frustrating experience. I was so ready to sign up again at what ever the price.
In 2004, I signed up for the DISH network with a 100-hour PVR (Personal Video Recorder) (PVR-522) that added $10 a month to my 2-set bill.
When I got on the phone, they charged me two months programming up front, then waived the next two months of bills. The net: no real up front charge and the commitment is only month-to-month.
The dish PVR does most of what TIVO does. There are two things it does not do. First, it does not go out and record shows you have not requested but where the database shows you are LIKELY to enjoy. Second, when you like a show, you have to manually pick each of the channels you want to record from. (I.e. the West Wing is on two networks and you have to pick both.) Neither of these deficiencies were deal killers for me.
The PVR came with 1 box and one remote for each of my 2 TVs. You can record up to 2 shows at one and either TV can play anything recorded on the PVR. Once again I am watching 1-hour shows in 42 commercial-free minutes.
I now pay less for programming than I did with Comcast and less for the PVR than I did with TIVO.
(I must so sound like a shill for DishNetwork. I have no connection with them and none of their stock.)
Not only does the PVR have a fast-forward button like on TIVO, but there is also a 30-second forward button. Press 6 times during a prime-time commercial (or 8 times during the West Wing) and you have zapped past the commercials faster than TIVO's fast-forward.)
Based on all of this, I think a little less TIVO-centric ranting is in order. Ticked off at TIVO? Consider the competition.
Yes, I have installed Firefox on all of their desktops, but (to best of my knowledge) they do need MS IE for updating of Windows, Office, and office related downloads (like templates).
What is needed is a gentle, yet firm caution that IE should be used only for those web sites that are hostile to Firefox.
Instead of completely hiding IE, I change their IE home page to:
http://www.roomberg.com/warning.htm
Which displays a "skull & crossbones" and says:
___________________________
STOP
IF THIS PAGE IS THE FIRST DISPLAYED AFTER LOADING THE BROWSER, YOU ARE USING INTERNET EXPLORER, NOT THE SAFER FIREFOX.
CLOSE NOW AND LOAD FIREFOX. (Look for the FireFox icon: firefox) ONLY IF YOU NEED TO UPDATE MICROSOFT PRODUCTS USING THE MICROSOFT WEB SITE SHOULD YOU CONTINUE TO THIS LINK:
(above in large font)
www.microsoft.com (line above in 8 point font)
___________________________
I know some /. readers will conlcude I have wussed out by not forcing my users to use only Firefox, but this approach has reduced my support calls while gently introducing a better solution.
Any one have a better approach?
>>
Just because you feel no connection to the place does not eliminate the fact that you are benefiting from thousands of years of the evolution of human social and scientific systems.
Those benefits came at a price. The technology age /space age is a product of the industrial revolution. The industrial revolution was a product of the enlightenment. The enlightenment was a product of the Holy Roman Empire which has been intermittently warring with Muslim countries for centuries.
While many in the US would like to believe that history started in 1776, the basis for our institutions and social organizations came partially from the Greeks and partially from Western Europe, but primarily from the Roman Empire.
The SIG for another /. poster is something like "History doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes." As you potentially have the education and experiences that are the product of all of these years of conflict, perhaps you might decide to become involved in some small part of the solution to our divided and warring species.
If we don't deal with those "other" parts of the world, they are going to contiunue come after us as they did on 9/11.
I hope you embrace your connection to the rest of humanity. Then maybe you won't resent begin part of the solution.
When I search with Google images for the phrase, "Abu Ghraib" , I get exactly 127 images.
When I search for the same phrase using Yahoo's image search:
http://images.google.com/advanced_image_search?hl= en
I get 3,493 images.
The moral here? Stop thinking about Google as the be-all and end all.
There IS competition out there, SO USE IT!
Only if you use the competition will google have the motivation to update their database and be competitive in this area!
That google is providing an inferior product is only an indication that we are being lazy consumers.
Personally, I like Google's GUI layout better than Googles. This is why I'm rooting for Google to come up to speed.
While we're identifying Google problems in the image area, Google might also think about suppressing images that are 98% the same color. Some searches are overwhelmed with that kind of drek.
And speaking of overwhelming drek, how about EITHER doing pre-display background checks for broken links and suppressing them, OR just developing a "cached" option like we get for web text pages. Either approach would save time and aggravation for the user.
And if the company that prides itself on not being evil would care to throw us a bone, give the advance image screen the same ability given to the other other screens to display results at 10, 20, 50, or 100 per screen!
Update the base, suppress the monocolor trash, cash images or suppress the links fom the search results, make the advance search give count options. By god, they could be MUCH MUCH MUCH less sucky.
Meds kicking in.....
must sleep now....
Hillary tucking me in while in the Lincoln Bedroom in January, 2009. ......sleep......
Fortunately, the Malthusian perspectives have been somewhat changed by our experiences in the last 50 years. In EVERY formerly poor country where the supply of food, education, supplies for voluntary birth control, industrialization, and opportunities for employment for both sexes has improved past the basic needs stage, birth rates have FALLEN DRAMATICALLY.
Based on the experiences of a bunch of countries (including ones from both Africa and Asia), the best ways to cross into negative population growth is to be sure all adults (this means both sexes) to have access to jobs, voluntary birth control, and a prosperous economy.
(By the way, don't use the US's population growth as your answer, once you subtract immigration, the birth rate has been almost as negative as Europe's for a number of years now.)
Nice to have something optimistic to reflect on now and then................