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  1. Re:Missing the point again on $2500 Tata Nano Car Unveiled in India · · Score: 1

    Totally off the cuff here, and I'm not a car salesman or designer, I'd guess the A/C would have to cost ~$500 with the expected markup around here, maybe $1k with greedy markup. Heater is unknown - maybe $200-$300?

  2. Re:Notice the Green hatred ... on $2500 Tata Nano Car Unveiled in India · · Score: 1

    Essential services and jobs can be easily placed within walking distances

    Can they? How? First, I guess you're talking about somehow mandating that we put in several million more services locations so they are within walking distance of everyone (what is that anyway? 1 mile? 2... Do you have to move when you get older and can't easily walk the 2 miles or whatever?).

    Secondly, are you also going to mandate where people work somehow so it's within walking distance of where they live (or force them to live in some apartment building built next to the company), and so if you change jobs, you have to move?

    As much as Personal Vehicles may not be a great solution - some sort of structured forced living/working dichotomety is worse by far in my opinion.

  3. Re:Somewhere on $2500 Tata Nano Car Unveiled in India · · Score: 1

    The desire for power might explain why modern Subarus start out at 173 HP... No idea how overpowered that is for the Impreza however.

  4. Re:Devil's Advocate on Is the IT Department Dead? · · Score: 1

    Wait, you're saying that in 2008, most teenagers *didn't* grow up using word at school? I was doing word processing in elementary school back in the early 1990s... I expect everyone gets exposed to it - not so many really know how to use it.

    I was being slightly facetious, I really doubt weird stuff will stop happening anytime soon - what with specialized software needed etc. In every job I've had, from Phone Collections to Retail to Research Lab, plus people I know doing child services to insurance claims are using some custom software. There's going to be stuff you have to hand hold, there's going to be the Word 2003 vs 2007 files you have to work out, there's going to be the PowerPoint on mac pics not showing up on power point on PC...

    Maybe if you're all using the same vendor it will all "just work", but I'm willing to bet some will be using IBM, some MS, some Novell, some roll their own still - and they still have to get files around etc. I just don't buy that every user will want to figure out how to work through all of that.

  5. Re:Devil's Advocate on Is the IT Department Dead? · · Score: 1

    @ 1 - I used to think that all the younger people would be able to use a PC with no help - but I know of plenty of teenagers who can't install software on their home PC, nor do they know much beyond turning it on. So even if the general user in 20 years can plug in a PC (and this is not assured as far as I can tell), they won't be able to use the specalized software (like word) rolled out for the device.

    Even in 100 years, there's going to be people good at tech, and people who are good at other stuff, and see no reason to waste time learning about it. Cars are a good analogy - many many people don't know how to change the oil in a car.

    I know people who don't know how to reset their circuit breaker in their house.

  6. Re:balderdash. IT will scale back, but never vanis on Is the IT Department Dead? · · Score: 1

    Yes and no. I agree, in general - people need to do their jobs, and it's mine to make Windows work or whatever. One thing that get's missed is that if the secretary's recent assignment is to scan in 200 paper forms a day into a PDF document database, they can't be calling me for each scan. I can't do their job AND mine(If I could, why not just fire the secretary, or vice versa?).

    So while I'd have no trouble teaching them how to use the scanner for a day or two - some technical things become part of other employee's jobs, and they ought to learn how to do that. I think most general e-mail falls into this category as well by now. Or, if you do need someone to write your e-mails for you, maybe an IT support person isn't the best choice (get a secretary?).

    To the other topics above - while IT is there to facilitate you doing your job - if you're a programmer, your program is crashing and you call IT and IT says, here's a link to that issue, you need to modify the way you load a dll, and you then use the Admin access you were given (due to a business case to need to add and remove hardware a lot) to *UNINSTALL you IDE!!!* - that's not so good.

    In fact, by ignoring IT, you've now taken your PC out of productive use for a day or so, and wasted some IT people's time, as well as your own.

    I'm not a programmer, but what thought process leads you to
    A) ask IT for programming assistance when you're hired as a programmer
    B) ignore their research and recommendations
    C) UNINSTALL your programming environment

    as some means to fix your problem? I guess it stops your program from crashing as you can no longer RUN it, or WORK on it, but really - could you have just run out screaming or something?

  7. Re:Ever sat in front of a fire? on Ask the Designers of D&D Fourth Edition · · Score: 1

    See my other reply regarding the jet of flame mistake. On the it's fantasy - that works if you don't care about internal consistency or reliable game mechanics. It depends on your prefence.

    I prefer things to be somewhat like the books, and somewhat like reality. That is, if evasion was described as some sort of spell resistance, then fine - you stand in one place, do some magic, and aren't affected as much or at all by a spell. But if you're talking about essentially dodging a spell, the dodging has to make sense within the rest of the game rules environment or it all breaks suspension of disbelief for me.

    That is, like many of the funny web comics imagine this:

    Fighter: Go steal that doodad in plain sight!
    Rogue: How? It's the middle of the day etc...
    Fighter: Just do what you did when that wizard blasted us last night. You know, you instantzapped out of the fireball, and back to where you were. I didn't even see you move! Just zap over there grab it and you'll be back faster than anyone can see!
    Rogue: Ummm, I can't actually do that.
    Fighter: What? You did it last night!
    Rogue: I can only do it if I'm dodging a fireball...
    Fighter: ?!?

    Just doesn't work that well for me. Or it leads to parties strategically fireballing their rogues for diversions/fast movement.

  8. Re:Evasion on Ask the Designers of D&D Fourth Edition · · Score: 1

    Well said on the spell, I was implying that, but didn't say explicitly. The fireball spell reads more like a rocket launched grenade. Now, I understand you'll want to dodge that, but we're talking about how to dodge the blast you have to actually *get out of the way*, no amount of fancy dancing in place is going to make it miss you, unlike say a standard arrow or sword thrust. In fact, more than an explosion, the spell says it just instantly heats up a cylender of air - every part of that space is heated. The only way to reduce damage is get out of the way.

    Now, you may argue about the wording of the spell - is it heating everything in the area, or just the air around people. That's why I make a much bigger deal about greater evasion where you save for NO damage - I can see half if you curl up fast or what not. But to take no damage from what's basically a sort of explosion - you have to leave the area IMO.

  9. Re:Who are you trying to please? on Ask the Designers of D&D Fourth Edition · · Score: 1

    I think you're very wrong with regard to D&D3.0. When it came out in Aug 1999, my gaming group played for several months with JUST the players handbook, and some downloads from the website. I think we got the DMG + MM a while after they came out for ease of play - but they weren't really necessary (Though I liked not having to invent monsters stats all the time). We actually had done the same with 2E, we played with just the PHB for several YEARS.

    The other books were nice options, and I eventually bought a bunch, and had lots of fun with them, but they were not necessary to play the game - all the rules necessary were in the PHB. Everything else was just timesavers or cool ideas I hadn't thought of. And now, with the OGL - the PHB, DMG, MM and some third party stuff is available on line, hyperlinked FOR FREE!

    The rules are far simpler in 3E than in 2 IMO - they are mostly algorithmic. I expect they are looking to increase this for 4e.

  10. Re:Evasion on Ask the Designers of D&D Fourth Edition · · Score: 1

    Ok.. but how do you move to evade a 20' ball of flame? I'm figureing that's like being in an oven - you can't dodge the heat without *getting out* of the *oven*! That's why my house rules always added some requirement of being able to physically move out of the way of what you're evading.

  11. Re:MOD UP! on Ask the Designers of D&D Fourth Edition · · Score: 1

    Well, on the one side, there has been a history of ~10 years between major releases and a middle cleanup @ year 5 or so. This is 1 year early for that, so maybe some money grubbing - but like OSs, you want to clean up things, and introduce new features every so often. A ten year cycle seems ok to me. That said, I don't really like MMOs, and haven't messed with 3.5 at all, so I'm more interested in 3.5 right now than 4.0.

  12. Re:Duh. on Online Sex Offender Database Leads To Murder? · · Score: 1

    Hmmm, I didn't mean to imply that there weren't differences of opinion among Americans, in fact, that's one reason these policies do so well.

    I think, in general anectadotal sense, most people just want to be left alone - by criminals, by governement and by corporations.

    I think there is large public feeling that modern corporatism vis a vis illegial aliens, offshoring, and the "we're not responsible for anything, including lost mail or misapplied payments if your payment doesn't get in our system by {date}" sort of coproate unfairness. People feel that many of the laws are bought and paid for, and if not specifically drugs, that there are a lot of "white collar crimes" that are not punished appropriately, whether it's not enough punishment for Enron or way too much for others so we're having non-violent offenders pushing out murderers and rapists as discussed in this thread.

    People feel that health care is broken, and spiriling costs are out of control. I think most will agree that it feels wrong to pay $100 for a medicine here when cuba can get it for $1. Many don't like enforced market segmentation, especially when it flies in the face of the vaunted free market globalism. Specifically, if IBM can go to india for 50% less than an american, why can't an american buy prescription drugs from Canada at a discount? Why can't they buy and import the DVD from Hong Cong for 10%(not talking about pirated, but just cheaper legit goods)?

    I could go on, but I'm not sure there are many people I've met online or off who disagree much about the above being problems. The answers are all over the map however. That said, I'd expect the approval ratings for congress and the president indicate much of america doesn't like where the people in power are going either.

  13. Re:Duh. on Online Sex Offender Database Leads To Murder? · · Score: 1

    Maybe I'm crazy, but it really seems like what the "man on the street" wants out of our society, and what Government and other powerful forces not only want but shove down our throats are quite divergent.

    The problem is that it is a huge problem, tied in with politics and more such that it seems impossible to solve.

  14. Re:CSS support on Users and Web Developers Vent Over IE7 · · Score: 1

    Umm, as far as I can see Opera has been making a browser for the whole time they've been making a browser, that is, they haven't sold or changed companies etc. I'm pretty sure Apple has been making Safari the whole time too. Maybe I just don't understand the above point regarding revision history...

  15. Re:Can I borrow his dictionary? on MPAA Boss Makes Case for ISP Content Filtering · · Score: 1

    Well, I expect many people might either downgrade their speed for web browsing/e-mail, or just not see any reason to upgrade from basic DSL @ 3Mbps to uber power boost Comcast @ 16Mbps or to buy FIOS etc...

  16. Re:Ohh-Kay on Old Software or Open Source? · · Score: 1

    Indeed, the worst part of it is that while a college feels it needs to spend a semester on Word, Excel and Access, on the job training can get the same level of competence in *whats needed* in *that* job for most employees in a week or so. So the school ends up wasting the students time, and spending a lot of money on the wrong things.

    I know most companies hate the idea of "On the job training", but it's really the only way to get people up to speed with your *specific* setup. And you can eat a week training them, or you can have them stumble along for years making random mistakes and asking questions of supervisors or co-workers wasting time because you didn't.

    I like my current position a lot. But I wasn't given any training, just sort of dumped in to work. I'm getting close to 2 years now, and am still asking people *where stuff is* because they didn't spend the week to just show me where stuff is or get a map together or whatever and I, of course, don't know what I don't know.

    At a previous job I hated, I got a week paid training before I started, and one month of mentored work. After that I didn't really have to ask any questions of co-workers, I knew where stuff was for my job, what to do for pretty much all situations that came up, and how to pass a problem up the chain effectively if it was an edge case. They ate some training costs, but their new employees didn't seem like idiots to customers and were pulling their weight fully in a month rather than a year or more.

    So my general point to get back on topic is: School should be teaching concepts, not specific workflows.

  17. Re:Alternative to GIMP/Photoshop on Old Software or Open Source? · · Score: 1

    If you're spending $100, why not get Photoshop Elements? I found very little difference for most use, and the UI is very similar.

  18. Re:Wake up on Old Software or Open Source? · · Score: 1

    Well, why does everyone assume that the choices are the GIMP or Photoshop? What about Photoshop Elements @ $99, or Paint.net as a freeware alternative? Both have usable UIs IMO, and are much closer to full Photoshop while being affordable for many/all. Then you're learning a current program that has similar UI design, and you can (likely) take it home if you want (Literally can hand out CDs with Paint.net).

  19. Re:The good news... on DoJ Sides With RIAA On Damages · · Score: 1

    I think this leads to an ideal (practically incorrect today, but an ideal none the less) that many people hold that while it's fine to not much about with medicine, cars, computers, what have you without knowing about them, and it's ok to expect you to spend some effort learning what rules and laws you live under, it's entirely another matter to expect that *you cannot understand* the rules and laws you live under. The need for lawyers seems to me to be a really bad form of a nanny state as you need your government appointed nannys to tell you what's right and wrong.

    At some level, there's a difference in not taking the time to read the rules and getting in trouble for breaking them, and getting in trouble for breaking rules that are stored in a code that takes up an entire library of books. At some point, I think we need to either pare down the law to where someone could concievably know what it is without being a law student/lawyer and extremely well read or allow some qualified defense that Ignorance *is* an excuse.

    That is if we want to try and not be a totaliarian state where the laws are just a flimsy excuse to disappear anyone the government does not like.

  20. Re:Can you feel it? on NJ Blogger Fights for Anonymous Free Speech · · Score: 1

    I wonder if that isn't the point? I don't think it's that great advice to go looking for the best paying job out of college for several reasons.

    1) You're going to presumably be doing this for awhile if you don't want it to just be a waste of money. Do you want to be doing something you hate for most of your life?

    2) The hot jobs tend to change suddenly. They may change while you're getting the degree. So you've again wasted the money.

    I've seen people doing a job they hate just for the money. It's not very pretty - they get sick more often, they are always unhappy at home and work, they have no energy after work. If the market shifts, they may end up slaves to that job as they'd lose lots of salary to change positions.

    On the other hand, I'm not saying that you should complain if you have massive college debt in something that lets you get a job at McDonalds ... If the position you're targetting pays $25k a year, you're going to have to be able to live on that.

    However, not everyone can get a position that pays $80k a year either. Think about it, as others have said, if everyone aimed for that "intelligent career" the pay will plumment - see what happened with IT. It was advertised exactly like you are saying before and up to the dotbomb...

  21. Re:Can you feel it? on NJ Blogger Fights for Anonymous Free Speech · · Score: 1

    I don't think it's practical to ban the corporations, so we need a system which levels the playing field for the common man.

    I'm not sure what you mean here - are you saying, like your earlier point, that short of a violent revolution we couldn't ban the corporations from politics, or that for some philosophical reason not pointed out you think we need them involved?

    Personally, I think it would be simple, stop the legal fiction that corporations are people. Contracts can still be between groups of people. However, the idea of shielded responsibility seems to be one of the big enablers of corporate malfesiance. Someone needs to be responsible, legally responsible. Then I think we'd see things reigned in a little better. Of course, it might well break mutual funds and the like if you could be sued for financially supporting a corrupt or damaging corporation.

  22. Re:Can you feel it? on NJ Blogger Fights for Anonymous Free Speech · · Score: 1

    I have replied to this elsewhere, but it's clearer here. I think (and others seem to agree) you have this exactly backwards:
    Since there is no right to anonymity in this case, there is nothing to prevent a state or local government from seeking this poster's ID. This power is not forbidden to the United States by the Constitution.
    The power is not granted to the United States by the Constitution, hence the United States does not have this power. The constitution is not about enumerating rights. In the 9th amendment as quoted, it specifically states it is not an enumeration of rights, the entire constitution prior to the ammendments is about enumerating Government Powers. It's not about what's forbidden to the United States, but what is granted. And this power is not granted.

  23. Re:The Constitution describes GOVERNMENT's power. on NJ Blogger Fights for Anonymous Free Speech · · Score: 1

    I think the argument is that this right is reserved to the people unless the state has passed a law taking said power, that is the power to make someone non-anonymous. Generally I think many people read the constitution as a permissive document, that is, what it states is what it allows. That part of the document, Amendment X that you quote, if read similarily would (to me) seem to imply the default power rests with the people.

    So anything not defined in the constitution as a government power is denied the government, unless a law is passed within the constraints of the constitution taking power for the government, it does not have that power.

    All of the above may be singularily unclear, but these arguments always come down to whether people are looking at the constitution and body of law as a whitelist or a blacklist... The arguemnt of the GPP is the body of law is a whitelist, government power is default deny.

    I personally would prefer that, and think that's what the founders were shooting for, but there are lots of room for argument.

  24. Re:You are free to say anything you want on NJ Blogger Fights for Anonymous Free Speech · · Score: 1

    I assume you are thinking either about freesites in Freenet, Syndie/eepsites in I2P or .onion sites via TOR.

  25. Re:Pricing is the big hurdle on Hands-On With The Kindle · · Score: 1

    Personally this is nothing new to me - slightly updated REB 1100 IMO. I still think the REB 1150 is a better deal with the ebookwise option - it's currently $129 for the device and $15 for the software to transfer anything from the web/txt etc to it...

    I still haven't fallen out of love with my old 1100 as I really like the backlight (one main point of an e-book to me, read in the dark), the price is now somewhat reasonable on the device and it's battery lasts quite long enough for me.

    Now the Kindle has all the failings of paper, I don't save money on the books, and I can break it... And it costs $400. I don't mind reading off a computer screen or LCD. I don't want a subscription for wireless either.