the usefulness of tablets is purely a marketing creation
Riiiiiiiight. Because "useful to me" is synonymous with "useful to anyone". You're the ur-consumer. Everyone actually enjoying and consistently using their tablets is doing it wrong.
Actually, if you look at Slashdot's history for getting the next big thing in tech completely wrong (rather lame, actually), all you have to do is find the next device that Slashdot Groupthink really hates and bet long on it.
Interestingly, the Hunger Games series is one of the few on Amazon that is significantly cheaper on the Kindle (and apps) then the paper version. And for some bizarre reason, they're the only Kindle books that I've seen that aren't plastered with typos.
You can get a rough estimate of this data by looking over past credit card statements and figuring in changes in the cost of gas over time, but it won't be nearly as accurate as manual tracking.
True, but that level of precision isn't always needed. Do you need to know that you drove 12872 miles and use 92.8 gallons of fuel or will 15000 and 100 do when deciding whether or not to plunk down $30,000 on a new car? Some of the stuff he seems to be doing is like trying to get 5 digit precision on a Fermi Calculation.
Encarta didn't have to be useful. As TFA points out, most people didn't crack open their copies of Encyclopedia Britannica (although it appears from the anecdotes around here that the Slashdot demographic, as is typical, is behaves completely different from the rest of the human population).
It was a status symbol, an attempt in some way to mitigate the boob tube. Sort of an intellectual comfort blanket.
"Your honor, members of the jury, I have but two words to explain the plaintiffs' injuries. Just two words that describe the depth and gamut of his problems. These two words are not the fault or at the behest of my client, they are as a result of the defendant's own actions."
I won't write my thesis on an iPad (although along with a wireless keyboard it has more memory, a better screen, better performance and more storage than the Otrona Attache that I did write my thesis on - ah, Wordstar....) but I would use it to look up patient med lists, vital signs and the like.
The electronic clipboard is really here. Don't underestimate clipboards.
Our new method (i) accomplishes the goals of stratification, dampening or removing the effect of covariates, without the need to divide drug-exposed reports into strata; (ii) is both adaptive (it removes different covariates for different drugs) and appropriate for systematic application and routine analysis; and (iii) is designed to complement modern signal detection approaches and thus extends the applicability and power of existing methods. Our model is inspired by the case-control approach to cohort selection in observational clinical studies. Each drug-exposed patient is matched to one (or more) nonexposed patients (controls). The nonexposed patients are selected on the basis of how well they match an exposed patient on a set of predefined covariates. Propensity score matching (PSM)—a statistical method designed to yield an unbiased estimate of treatment effects—has emerged as the preferred method of matching exposed and nonexposed patients in observational cohort studies and has yielded similar estimates of effects when compared to the results of randomized control trials (9–11). However, like other confounder controlling methods, PSM requires the covariates to be both known and measured; neither parameter is guaranteed to be present in spontaneous reporting systems. Instead, to match patients, we adapted PSM to use only the co-reported drugs and co-reported indications. We hypothesize that many confounders correlate with these key variables and do not need to be modeled.
As usual with these sorts of studies, my head asplode.
Epocrates will do that. It's free. BUT it has the same problem that every other adverse drug effect database has - it is sensitive, but not specific. Most entries basically imply that you will explode, dissolve or get turned into a Newt if you take the drug.
What's needed are accurate statistics on how many people get Newted and whether you are more likely to get into trouble if you take other medications or have other conditions. This paper says you can do some data mining to get at new insights to the problem but you still need to go out and see if your model is real. And that's the problem - it's hard to get a representative sample of people taking SSRIs and thiazide diuretics. Now, smaller countries, especially the Scandinavian countries (God baiting evil socialists that they are) have databases that might help answer those questions, but it's still lots of work.
Slashdot Mirror
Riiiiiiiight. Because "useful to me" is synonymous with "useful to anyone". You're the ur-consumer. Everyone actually enjoying and consistently using their tablets is doing it wrong.
Actually, if you look at Slashdot's history for getting the next big thing in tech completely wrong (rather lame, actually), all you have to do is find the next device that Slashdot Groupthink really hates and bet long on it.
Profit!
Yeah, he got to get up close and personal with Charlotte Rampling and a few other attractive actresses. Such sacrifices....
Oh, I survived it, but I think it permanently scarred me.
Sean Connery in a pink diaper with suspenders - one of those horrid images that pop into my consciousness at inappropriate moments.
Interestingly, the Hunger Games series is one of the few on Amazon that is significantly cheaper on the Kindle (and apps) then the paper version. And for some bizarre reason, they're the only Kindle books that I've seen that aren't plastered with typos.
Violence is OK. They just have to keep sex out of it.
'The Gun is good. The penis is evil'
(Anybody remember Zardoz? You do? I'm very sorry.)
[Citation needed]
Look at your desk. If you can find it.
Then look at the recycle bin.
Been there, done that. Remember the Palms, Visors, HP whatevers and the original PDAs? All with IR ports. Wonderful things they were.
Could output to a printer. Made a wonderful TV remote. You could program it with a secret code to have the UN's black helicopters home in on it.
We've lost so many things. So many things.
In my mind's eye I see you writing a run-on sentence in the very near future.
That will be five dollars.
What the hell is a 'retired' PhD? Did he have to give his sheepskin back? It's not like the military where you resign your commission.
And, looking at his Wikipedia page, I'd have to agree with you that he's not 'some unknown nut-job'. He appears to be a well known nutjob.
Oh give CPU6502 a break. He's only an 8 bit. His algorithms run pretty slow.
Sony AND Microsoft in one device?
Man oh man. That's going to get some Slashdot love.....
Congratulations! You win, well, you ought to win something for all that heartache.
You can get a rough estimate of this data by looking over past credit card statements and figuring in changes in the cost of gas over time, but it won't be nearly as accurate as manual tracking.
True, but that level of precision isn't always needed. Do you need to know that you drove 12872 miles and use 92.8 gallons of fuel or will 15000 and 100 do when deciding whether or not to plunk down $30,000 on a new car? Some of the stuff he seems to be doing is like trying to get 5 digit precision on a Fermi Calculation.
Burma Shave.
And project the feeling of Haiku
You can sometimes get more mod points
If you're patient
Encarta didn't have to be useful. As TFA points out, most people didn't crack open their copies of Encyclopedia Britannica (although it appears from the anecdotes around here that the Slashdot demographic, as is typical, is behaves completely different from the rest of the human population).
It was a status symbol, an attempt in some way to mitigate the boob tube. Sort of an intellectual comfort blanket.
No, it means that you should clean up your room. Or maybe try to sign up for a stint on horders.
"Your honor, members of the jury, I have but two words to explain the plaintiffs' injuries. Just two words that describe the depth and gamut of his problems. These two words are not the fault or at the behest of my client, they are as a result of the defendant's own actions."
"Angry Birds."
"I rest my case."
I won't write my thesis on an iPad (although along with a wireless keyboard it has more memory, a better screen, better performance and more storage than the Otrona Attache that I did write my thesis on - ah, Wordstar....) but I would use it to look up patient med lists, vital signs and the like.
The electronic clipboard is really here. Don't underestimate clipboards.
Commercial break?
Chucko, they're going to take up the entire program.
From the fine (real article)
Our new method (i) accomplishes the goals of stratification, dampening or removing the effect of covariates, without the need to divide drug-exposed reports into strata; (ii) is both adaptive (it removes different covariates for different drugs) and appropriate for systematic application and routine analysis; and (iii) is designed to complement modern signal detection approaches and thus extends the applicability and power of existing methods. Our model is inspired by the case-control approach to cohort selection in observational clinical studies. Each drug-exposed patient is matched to one (or more) nonexposed patients (controls). The nonexposed patients are selected on the basis of how well they match an exposed patient on a set of predefined covariates. Propensity score matching (PSM)—a statistical method designed to yield an unbiased estimate of treatment effects—has emerged as the preferred method of matching exposed and nonexposed patients in observational cohort studies and has yielded similar estimates of effects when compared to the results of randomized control trials (9–11). However, like other confounder controlling methods, PSM requires the covariates to be both known and measured; neither parameter is guaranteed to be present in spontaneous reporting systems. Instead, to match patients, we adapted PSM to use only the co-reported drugs and co-reported indications. We hypothesize that many confounders correlate with these key variables and do not need to be modeled.
As usual with these sorts of studies, my head asplode.
Epocrates will do that. It's free. BUT it has the same problem that every other adverse drug effect database has - it is sensitive, but not specific. Most entries basically imply that you will explode, dissolve or get turned into a Newt if you take the drug.
What's needed are accurate statistics on how many people get Newted and whether you are more likely to get into trouble if you take other medications or have other conditions. This paper says you can do some data mining to get at new insights to the problem but you still need to go out and see if your model is real. And that's the problem - it's hard to get a representative sample of people taking SSRIs and thiazide diuretics. Now, smaller countries, especially the Scandinavian countries (God baiting evil socialists that they are) have databases that might help answer those questions, but it's still lots of work.
"Heterochrony in cavusgnathid conodonts"
I love titles that I cannot begin to pronounce, much less understand.