"If Plait is so righteous, why does he refuse to debate RCH on the facts? Who is the real scientist and who is persuing the truth. Wait and see."
Plait
HAS offered to debate RCH, it's just the RCH refuses to agree on a list of topics, so as to avoid Plait getting dragged into a Tinfoil Hat 'Fest of RCH screaming, "Prove that I'm NOT right!"
"This sort of thing simply exemplifies the sad state of science education in the general public."
Not just science ed, but the basic skill of critical thinking. I can't speak for how things are going in the rest of the world, but here in the US it's gotten particularly sad. People as a whole just don't seem able or willing to be bothered by thinking for themselves.
Seems to me that many moons ago, even those who lacked formal higher education could be counted on to have "horse sense" - the simple ability to call "Shenanigans" when faced with something fishy, and run the snake oil salesman out of town.
These days it seems everyone's simply lining up for snake oil subscriptions. What's up? Too much "Reality" TV? Sure folks have always been duped, but damn it seems like a national pastime these days.
"Interestingly, among age/gender groups, internet access is highest among females 35-54."
And you thought mom was busy balancing the checkbook online....
Now all you teenagers now get to face the fact that 'HotChick69' you've been eagerly getting busy with in the chat rooms may in fact be just down the hall.
"I think that current electronic voting systems are better than the traditional systems in terms of security, and also in terms of usability for most people."
But how are those Diebold machines at allowing a recount? Do they finally create a paper trail, or is it still "faith-based voting"?
Now if they could just stick some broadband transceivers on the thing....
Satellite service is my only option (until bb-over-power-lines succeeds), but the built-in latency of the roundtrip to geosynchronous orbit makes it useless for realtime, and the crippled upload speeds makes it useless for teleconferencing.
Shouldn't be too hard to add a motor and SNR tracker to have a dish follow that thing around the sky....
"it's basically the best way to make money, next to taking advantage of lonely guys (pornsites, strippers) and taking advantage of lazy people (remote control, clapper)"
Tell me about it! I made an absolute fortune off my clapper-controlled porn site!
Which also finally answered the rhetorical question, "What is the sound of one hand clapping?"
"Ummm IBM, SGI and lots of other profit-oriented companies have contributed code to Linux. Do they actually believe in "freedom"? Why not opensource all of their products?
"
Yes, they believe in the freedom of linux. Their donated code and general support of the OS prove it. Why should that require that they open-source their entire product line?
"When you stick a flopy disk in a Windows machine you don't have to mount it,"
And for extra fun, Windows boxes also usually default to the floppy having boot priority over the harddrive.
Which is really fun when Joe User leaves a floppy disk in the drive from the previous day and can't understand why his Windows box can't start up anymore.
Windows ain't user-friendly either, Bub. Not even close.
"But why would Microsoft want to back such a chancy scheme? Bad publicity when the case fails must more than make up for the FUD they've managed to spread."
Because they face no real consequences? They've never had to pay any reasonable penalty for their behavior. Giving away free copies of MS products?!? That's a marketing expense, for cryin' out loud! "Allowing" hardware resellers to add something to the desktop? Oooooh! The pain! Make it stop!
So what, exactly, does MS have to lose with even such a bizarre scheme as this?
"How do people manage to get this much spam? I'm on about 20 Mailing list and I give my e-mail t a lot of those sites that ask me to sign up. I get maybe 3 a day."
Maybe you're lucky. Or maybe your ISP blocks it before you ever see it. Or maybe your addresses haven't been around long enough.
I own a few domains, have email links on them, belong to mailing lists, etc. I get around 80-100 pieces of spam each and every day. With MacOS X's mail filter I rarely actually see any of them in my inbox, but I still have to quickly scan the pile for the odd message or two that was legit.
Slashdot Mirror
"If Plait is so righteous, why does he refuse to debate RCH on the facts? Who is the real scientist and who is persuing the truth. Wait and see."
Plait HAS offered to debate RCH, it's just the RCH refuses to agree on a list of topics, so as to avoid Plait getting dragged into a Tinfoil Hat 'Fest of RCH screaming, "Prove that I'm NOT right!"
"I'm extremely disapointed in the reactions here. The space.com article was clearly a character assasination of Hoagland."
Nice to see you joining us on Slashdot, Mr. Hoagland. Now go away.
"This sort of thing simply exemplifies the sad state of science education in the general public."
Not just science ed, but the basic skill of critical thinking. I can't speak for how things are going in the rest of the world, but here in the US it's gotten particularly sad. People as a whole just don't seem able or willing to be bothered by thinking for themselves.
Seems to me that many moons ago, even those who lacked formal higher education could be counted on to have "horse sense" - the simple ability to call "Shenanigans" when faced with something fishy, and run the snake oil salesman out of town.
These days it seems everyone's simply lining up for snake oil subscriptions. What's up? Too much "Reality" TV? Sure folks have always been duped, but damn it seems like a national pastime these days.
"I don't see these e-voting problems going away until geeks start running these kinds of companies.
At which point Natalie Portman, Yoda and the cast of Farscape will unexpectedly sweep the national elections.
"I'm sorry Senator Kerry, supporters, and reporters not affiliated with Fox News, but we can't let you on this flight."
:-/
And to think that prior to Shrub/Ashcroft/Rummy/Cheney I would have thought that to be +5 Tinfoil Hat....
"Interestingly, among age/gender groups, internet access is highest among females 35-54."
And you thought mom was busy balancing the checkbook online....
Now all you teenagers now get to face the fact that 'HotChick69' you've been eagerly getting busy with in the chat rooms may in fact be just down the hall.
The horror... the horror...
Now if die-hard Trekkie geeks can get something that simulates Nurse Chapel, life will finally be complete.
"You, you must be almost 30... have you ever kissed a gir?!?" - William Shatner, SNL
"I think that current electronic voting systems are better than the traditional systems in terms of security, and also in terms of usability for most people."
But how are those Diebold machines at allowing a recount? Do they finally create a paper trail, or is it still "faith-based voting"?
"just imagine the length of fibre you'd need to get to 70,000 ft!!!"
At least 70,000 ft, I'd say. :-)
Now if they could just stick some broadband transceivers on the thing....
Satellite service is my only option (until bb-over-power-lines succeeds), but the built-in latency of the roundtrip to geosynchronous orbit makes it useless for realtime, and the crippled upload speeds makes it useless for teleconferencing.
Shouldn't be too hard to add a motor and SNR tracker to have a dish follow that thing around the sky....
"it's basically the best way to make money, next to taking advantage of lonely guys (pornsites, strippers) and taking advantage of lazy people (remote control, clapper)"
Tell me about it! I made an absolute fortune off my clapper-controlled porn site!
Which also finally answered the rhetorical question, "What is the sound of one hand clapping?"
"Just imagine the day when Darl realizes that his intellectual property helps powering everybodys houses..."
One word... Caligula.
"what would Nick Park have used in his Wallace and Grommit movie?"
Meerkats, plain and simple. I've never trusted the looks of 'em. Like little zombie squirrels intent on stealing your soul.
SCO stock skyrockets.
"and worth some reflection on just how far Linux has come in the last decade."
Well for one, penguin awareness across the globe is way up.
"I take offense at suggesting Detroit is a hellhole, hellholes are much nicer."
Apologies, O' Evil One. I stand corrected. See you after the trial!
Love,
-Darl
I'd arrive in Bombay only to discover they've started outsourcing. To some real hellhole. Like Antarctica. Or Detroit.
"Ummm IBM, SGI and lots of other profit-oriented companies have contributed code to Linux. Do they actually believe in "freedom"? Why not opensource all of their products? "
Yes, they believe in the freedom of linux. Their donated code and general support of the OS prove it. Why should that require that they open-source their entire product line?
"When you stick a flopy disk in a Windows machine you don't have to mount it,"
And for extra fun, Windows boxes also usually default to the floppy having boot priority over the harddrive.
Which is really fun when Joe User leaves a floppy disk in the drive from the previous day and can't understand why his Windows box can't start up anymore.
Windows ain't user-friendly either, Bub. Not even close.
"But why would Microsoft want to back such a chancy scheme? Bad publicity when the case fails must more than make up for the FUD they've managed to spread."
Because they face no real consequences? They've never had to pay any reasonable penalty for their behavior. Giving away free copies of MS products?!? That's a marketing expense, for cryin' out loud! "Allowing" hardware resellers to add something to the desktop? Oooooh! The pain! Make it stop!
So what, exactly, does MS have to lose with even such a bizarre scheme as this?
"stty erase r"
Insert at end of victim's
"Aren't we screwed if the spammers move their "business" to the caribbean
No, because once they're down there it will be easier to deploy a Narn Bat Squad via midnight beach assault on their sorry asses.
"Unless you actually respond to some of those free pr0n or enlargment offers"
So you're saying it was a mistake to join the penis enlargement mailing list? Damn! I knew it!
"How do people manage to get this much spam? I'm on about 20 Mailing list and I give my e-mail t a lot of those sites that ask me to sign up. I get maybe 3 a day."
Maybe you're lucky. Or maybe your ISP blocks it before you ever see it. Or maybe your addresses haven't been around long enough.
I own a few domains, have email links on them, belong to mailing lists, etc. I get around 80-100 pieces of spam each and every day. With MacOS X's mail filter I rarely actually see any of them in my inbox, but I still have to quickly scan the pile for the odd message or two that was legit.
Now all we're missing is the obligatory Simpsons quote.