I may have mentioned this in a previous article about the Newton, but it was used to coordinate battlefield information during a Marine Corps war fighting experiment called Hunter-Warrior, which was part of a program called Operation Sea Dragon.
The Hunter Warrior Experiment showed how lightly-armed units can dominate large coastal regions, not by landing on the beaches, but by leaping over them in V-22s, spreading out and operating deep inside enemy territory. They used hand-held Apple Newton computers to send out hard-to-detect digital bursts to call in long-range, precision firepower from ships, choppers, fighters and other military assets.
This experiment tested the tactical concept of squads acting as independent elements on the dispersed battlefield. To do this, a communications system allowed the squads to talk to their headquarters elements at distances of 100 miles. This type of radio did not exist, so we took existing palm-top computers, tied them into a digital radio and built a communication infrastructure of towers in the desert. The result was a communication system that was a "surrogate" and allowed us to see if squads could act as independent units on the dispersed battlefield.
The Dalai LLama ...short-timer transferred to a headquarters unit a few months before the actual operation...
Every game made today..
The first level is easy to accomplish.
Second level is marginally harder...
The games are DESIGNED to
entertain you. You don't make subscription money if you don't have a good core base of players.
MMORPG's are designed to last for years. The more enjoyable gameplay, and the ability to constantly provide rewards througout the game, will keep a guy playing a game he enjoys for years.
The games are not intentionally designed to be addicting, they are intentionally designed to be fun. It goes without saying that the more enjoyable the game is, the more people will play it and the longer they will play it. The games are designed to provide long-term entertainment for players who want that.
As in any other game, the gameplay starts easy and gets harder as you progress because that's what players enjoy, and that's what keeps the game fun.
Of course there will be players who become "addicts" and take it too far, just as there are people who get "addicted" to any other behavior and take it too far. Until someone is able to prove to me that Blizzard and Sony Online Entertainment are using every 32nd frame to display subliminal messages, I will be unconvinced that these games are designed to "addict" rather than simply to entertain.
The Dalai LLama ...I can quit any time I want to...
I used to work for a company that made memory upgrades. One of the key purchasing agents was a smoking hot little petite blonde who, at the time of this story, was not even old enough to drink.
One year at CES some would-be vendor made a remark about the company having a piece of "fluff" at the booth. She wheeled on him and let fly with a diatribe that showcased her comprehensive knowledge of RAM chips, PCB issues, and our company's component needs and then she let him know, in no uncertain terms, that whether or not we ever purchased a single capacitor from his company would be a decision made by the petite piece of fluff with bubble gum-pink fingernails that he was speaking with at that very moment.
He walked away dazed. I don't think we ever did business with him.
...let alone grasp the principles that surround it well enough to mount his doddering charge to have it regulated.
How much longer do we have to wait until we get a crop of politicians who don't think digital watches represent cutting-edge technology? Furthermore, how much damage to the laws governing technology can the current batch of luddites do before they finally get too senile to find their own offices and either get voted out or die?
The Dalai LLama ...wasn't Orrin Hatch one of the wagon drivers on the original pilgrimage from Nauvoo?...
Its
purpose is to provide U.S. leadership with a researched presentation on attribution and intellectual property problems with the hybrid source code model, particularly Linux. It is our hope that leadership would find this document helpful with public policy decisions regarding its future investment in Linux and other hybrid source products.
Whether he had an agenda when he started or not, after conducting his research and interviews, of course he knows the difference. Influencing Public Policy = Money + Attention, however, and that's a pretty powerful incentive to convince yourself of a lot of things.
The Dalai LLama ...I'm going to publish an article showing that Linux was actually a communist plot developed by Stalin...I'm just waiting for SCO and Microsoft to put me on retainer...
I'm all about the "free" as in "speech" idealism, but since I can't read a line of programming it's a little less important to me than "free" as in "beer".
I haven't gotten to play with Sodipodi yet, but I'm glad that there are free alternatives to Illustrator. Now that I'm not in junior high anymore, the coolness of using cracked programs has lost much of its appeal and I'm grateful for the chance to use legitimate apps that, at least pretty well, approximate "the real thing".
The Dalai LLama ... broke-ass-not-wanting-to-pay-seven-hundred-duckets -for-illustrator-mofo...
Bingo. It's in the best interest of the *IAA's to thoroughly convince everyone that any IP theft is taking place outside the studios, paving the way for things like DRM & DMCA. These measures are necessary because the theft is obviously taking place out in the public, beyond the studios' control.
The Dalai LLama ...hey, can I score a pair of those googles?...
[rationalization]This is a little off-topic, but if you consider the article in question to be Microsoft-generated FUD intended specifically to emasculate Linux, then it ties in a little better.[/rationalization]
As I read the user comments on this article, the top of the page is showing an ad saying that Windows 2003 is 400% faster than Linux...
I noticed yesterday that one of the articles was on a page with a Microsoft ad that said more people were using Windows Server than Apache, and I've also seen one that compared Windows Server to Red Hat.
Seems to me that Microsoft is now being forced to address the challenge posed by OSS, rather than ignore it. That's not exactly news, but it's interesting to see Linux popping up in MS's ads. Using the competition's actual name in your own advertisements is a bad sign - it says that they are credible enough to warrant discrediting.
The Dalai LLama ... picture it: two servers side by side, then the Apache server starts bumping some bangin' MP3's and bouncing up and down on hydraulics like a tech guy's hittin' the switches, the IT boyz start noddin' their heads, the Windows Server says, "That was awesome!"....
The truly scary part, however, is that the law passed by such a huge margin.
That was one of the horrible things about 9/11 - its impact was so great that we handed over the keys to the kingdom without question. America was so shocked that a lot of the normal restraints (reasonable debate, a healthy skepticism of government, a fourth estate that watches the government rather than cheerleading for it) on the government's actions were almost completely suspended by a public that suddenly believed questioning the government at all was tantamount to treason.
The Dalai LLama ... as usual: I Am Not a Political Science Guy...
Don't forget the bit about how the law itself keeps the public from ever hearing that it has been used or challenged.
What's disturbing is not that the people under investigation don't know they're being investigated (that's sort of a no-brainer). What's disturbing is the fact that there is no judicial oversight and that attempts to question or challenge the law are silenced.
"The group was not even allowed to announce the existence of the suit for over two weeks..."
IANAL, but my guess is that they had to fight for that concession tooth and nail. One of the most important elements of a "free" society is the right of the people to hold their government accountable for its actions.
The Dalai LLama
- Govt: "The American People love the protection provided by the Patriot Act... have you heard of anyone challenging it?" - ACLU/ISP-Not-Wishing-For-A-Stint-In-FPMITAP: "..."
- Govt: "See?"
Warning, the Emergency Rant Sequence has been initiated...
Lemme also throw my.02 in here (and this is not in response to anything in the parent post) to say that I would love to see every browser conform to a set of common standards because I don't have any idea what I'm doing.
I'm sure it's tough for web-professionals, but it's absolutely fucking maddening for non-technical hobbyists like me who are trying to cobble pages together despite our ignorance. HTML for Dummies is open in your lap, 6 Firefox tabs are open to a different reference or Google search result, you've got a tab for the page you're working on, a window for editing your CSS, plus a window for editing the HTML of the page itself, Saturn finally aligns with Jupiter in the third house of Aries rising and lo and behold your page looks great - the boxes line up, the text is placed correctly, and the images look good - so you flip over to check it in I.E. and EVERYTHING IS FUCKING BROKEN AND YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHY!.
I know that in the best of all possible worlds I would have a full and complete understanding of every rule guiding the implementation of CSS and HTML, comprehensive knowledge of the way that each browser will respond to all aspects of the code, and the computer science and programming background necessary to write and implement the 14 ugly hacks necessary to make a relatively simple fucking page look decent in multiple browsers, but until that day: can't we all just get along?!?!?! Get it together, people. Please, Bill, make a browser that conforms. Do it for the children.
The Dalai LLama ...concludes this test of the Emergency Rant System...
Here I go again with another late-in-the-game post...
If the big music conglomerates die, people will still continue to make music...
I think your post highlights the fact that music is art.
If Tom Waits was a fry cook, Tori Amos was a waitress, and Leonard Cohen washed the dishes I bet they'd still be writing some kick-ass tunes on their breaks.
I wonder how much music the New Kids on the Block and Milli Vanilli are writing today.
The Dalai LLama ... although I think I can safely say that Milli Vanilli is producing at least 50% less music...heh...
If one uses the airlines approach to safety as a guide, at the point where it costs them more than 3.4 million dollars in liability and litigation per person is what each person's life is worth.
Somebody's gotta say it, might as well be me:
Narrator: A new car built by my company leaves somewhere traveling at 60 mph. The rear differential locks up. The car crashes and burns with everyone trapped inside. Now, should we initiate a recall? Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one.
Business woman on plane: Are there a lot of these kinds of accidents?
Narrator: You wouldn't believe.
Business woman on plane: Which car company do you work for?
Narrator: A major one.
And as for straight coffee beans... Try instant. Just shovel a few spoonfuls into your mouth, and wash it down with water. 10 seconds and you're super caffinated.
Military M.R.E.'s come with a small pack of freeze-dried instant coffee. On long guard shifts (...must stay alert...gotta stay alert...zzzzzzz......), some guys said they put it into their lips like a plug of chewing tobacco; I always just mixed it with a little bit of cold canteen water, in exactly the manner described above.
It didn't taste anywhere near as good as chocolate-covered espresso beans, though.
The Dalai LLama "I like my women like I like my coffee: ground up in the freezer." - Somebody here on Slashdot; if you know the source, credit him for me cause it's funny as hell.
That's 'cause the parent post was completely wrong on the computer (almost offensively so, if you're a computer geek)
Sorry, my sentence was unclear: Underground Education didn't address computers at all. Now that you bring it up, however, I sorta wondered why Babbage didn't even rate a mention in the parent post. I'm not even cool enough to be considered a real geek, and I've heard of him.
See a much better history over at Everything2.
Thanks for the cool link.
The Dalai LLama ... let's try this "No Karma Bonus" thing...
...I would have said Edison and Bell. I can't even recall a mention in reading or lecture about anyone else in those fields from my primary education in America.
I would have said the same, except that I read An Underground Education just last week. It had the correct information on those topics (telephone, lightbulb, and auto - not computers), and a lot more information about the parts of history that get glossed over or never mentioned. It's a thought-provoking book. It's broken into sections that make it easy to pick up and put down, but it's well-written and entertaining enough to be read cover-to-cover.
You might also be interested in Lies My Teacher Told Me. It's similar, but I haven't read it in a few years so I can't tell you much more than that.
The Dalai LLama ... loves his country, warts and all...
The Ogallala Sioux and Apache Nations have voted to revoke immigration visas issued to those who immigrated here illegally from England and Spain, and to revoke the American citizenship of all of the immigrants' descendants. Chief Brokenfeather of the
DamnWhereTheHellDidAllMyPeopleGo Tribe is quoted in the release as saying, "Who let those impolite fuckers in here in the first place?"
The Dalai LLama ...not a big fan of the "conquered peoples are inherently better than the rest of us mystique"...but, damn...that troll was hungry...
This comment would have worked better as a reply to yours, except that yours didn't show up until after I got mine posted. At least I'm not the only one thinking along these lines.
I had a friend who knew this guy one time and his sister's cousin built a jet engine just like the one in the article and bolted it to the top of this old Nova that he had. He took it for a test run in the desert in, like, Arizona. He forgot that his normal brakes wouldn't be enough to stop it, and the accident investigators found the remains of the jet engine 80 feet up the side of a mesa.
Dude, his teeth were still embedded in the melted steering wheel. That's how they identified him. Don't mess with home-brewed jet propulsion, it's a recipe for trouble. You could put someone's eye out.
Slashdot Mirror
I may have mentioned this in a previous article about the Newton, but it was used to coordinate battlefield information during a Marine Corps war fighting experiment called Hunter-Warrior, which was part of a program called Operation Sea Dragon.
Taken from This desription:The Dalai LLama
...short-timer transferred to a headquarters unit a few months before the actual operation...
The games are not intentionally designed to be addicting, they are intentionally designed to be fun. It goes without saying that the more enjoyable the game is, the more people will play it and the longer they will play it. The games are designed to provide long-term entertainment for players who want that.
As in any other game, the gameplay starts easy and gets harder as you progress because that's what players enjoy, and that's what keeps the game fun.
Of course there will be players who become "addicts" and take it too far, just as there are people who get "addicted" to any other behavior and take it too far. Until someone is able to prove to me that Blizzard and Sony Online Entertainment are using every 32nd frame to display subliminal messages, I will be unconvinced that these games are designed to "addict" rather than simply to entertain.
The Dalai LLama
...I can quit any time I want to...
I used to work for a company that made memory upgrades. One of the key purchasing agents was a smoking hot little petite blonde who, at the time of this story, was not even old enough to drink.
One year at CES some would-be vendor made a remark about the company having a piece of "fluff" at the booth. She wheeled on him and let fly with a diatribe that showcased her comprehensive knowledge of RAM chips, PCB issues, and our company's component needs and then she let him know, in no uncertain terms, that whether or not we ever purchased a single capacitor from his company would be a decision made by the petite piece of fluff with bubble gum-pink fingernails that he was speaking with at that very moment.
He walked away dazed. I don't think we ever did business with him.
The Dalai LLama
...let alone grasp the principles that surround it well enough to mount his doddering charge to have it regulated.
How much longer do we have to wait until we get a crop of politicians who don't think digital watches represent cutting-edge technology? Furthermore, how much damage to the laws governing technology can the current batch of luddites do before they finally get too senile to find their own offices and either get voted out or die?
The Dalai LLama
...wasn't Orrin Hatch one of the wagon drivers on the original pilgrimage from Nauvoo?...
From the article (emphasis is mine):
Whether he had an agenda when he started or not, after conducting his research and interviews, of course he knows the difference. Influencing Public Policy = Money + Attention, however, and that's a pretty powerful incentive to convince yourself of a lot of things.
The Dalai LLama
...I'm going to publish an article showing that Linux was actually a communist plot developed by Stalin...I'm just waiting for SCO and Microsoft to put me on retainer...
I'm all about the "free" as in "speech" idealism, but since I can't read a line of programming it's a little less important to me than "free" as in "beer".
I haven't gotten to play with Sodipodi yet, but I'm glad that there are free alternatives to Illustrator. Now that I'm not in junior high anymore, the coolness of using cracked programs has lost much of its appeal and I'm grateful for the chance to use legitimate apps that, at least pretty well, approximate "the real thing".
The Dalai LLama
... broke-ass-not-wanting-to-pay-seven-hundred-duckets -for-illustrator-mofo...
You should get extra mod points just for knowing what that damned thing is called.
The Dalai LLama
...filing away "placket"....
Bingo. It's in the best interest of the *IAA's to thoroughly convince everyone that any IP theft is taking place outside the studios, paving the way for things like DRM & DMCA. These measures are necessary because the theft is obviously taking place out in the public, beyond the studios' control.
The Dalai LLama
...hey, can I score a pair of those googles?...
[rationalization]This is a little off-topic, but if you consider the article in question to be Microsoft-generated FUD intended specifically to emasculate Linux, then it ties in a little better.[/rationalization]
I noticed yesterday that one of the articles was on a page with a Microsoft ad that said more people were using Windows Server than Apache, and I've also seen one that compared Windows Server to Red Hat.
Seems to me that Microsoft is now being forced to address the challenge posed by OSS, rather than ignore it. That's not exactly news, but it's interesting to see Linux popping up in MS's ads. Using the competition's actual name in your own advertisements is a bad sign - it says that they are credible enough to warrant discrediting.
The Dalai LLama
... picture it: two servers side by side, then the Apache server starts bumping some bangin' MP3's and bouncing up and down on hydraulics like a tech guy's hittin' the switches, the IT boyz start noddin' their heads, the Windows Server says, "That was awesome!"....
That was one of the horrible things about 9/11 - its impact was so great that we handed over the keys to the kingdom without question. America was so shocked that a lot of the normal restraints (reasonable debate, a healthy skepticism of government, a fourth estate that watches the government rather than cheerleading for it) on the government's actions were almost completely suspended by a public that suddenly believed questioning the government at all was tantamount to treason.
The Dalai LLama
... as usual: I Am Not a Political Science Guy...
I'm in the process of R'ing the FA. Hopefully, by next weekend I'll have read enough to post some thoughtful commentary.
The Dalai LLama
...hmmm..I might be able to cut the reading down to 13 pages if I only read the part directly pertaining to Slashdot...
Don't forget the bit about how the law itself keeps the public from ever hearing that it has been used or challenged.
What's disturbing is not that the people under investigation don't know they're being investigated (that's sort of a no-brainer). What's disturbing is the fact that there is no judicial oversight and that attempts to question or challenge the law are silenced.
IANAL, but my guess is that they had to fight for that concession tooth and nail. One of the most important elements of a "free" society is the right of the people to hold their government accountable for its actions.The Dalai LLama
- Govt: "The American People love the protection provided by the Patriot Act... have you heard of anyone challenging it?"
- ACLU/ISP-Not-Wishing-For-A-Stint-In-FPMITAP: "..."
- Govt: "See?"
Case in point that I don't know what I'm doing.
This is the relevant link.
The Dalai LLama
... but at least it will look good in all browsers...
I came across this site showcasing graphic design with simple, standards-compliant CSS. Just thought it might be of interest.
Warning, the Emergency Rant Sequence has been initiated...
Lemme also throw my .02 in here (and this is not in response to anything in the parent post) to say that I would love to see every browser conform to a set of common standards because I don't have any idea what I'm doing.
I'm sure it's tough for web-professionals, but it's absolutely fucking maddening for non-technical hobbyists like me who are trying to cobble pages together despite our ignorance. HTML for Dummies is open in your lap, 6 Firefox tabs are open to a different reference or Google search result, you've got a tab for the page you're working on, a window for editing your CSS, plus a window for editing the HTML of the page itself, Saturn finally aligns with Jupiter in the third house of Aries rising and lo and behold your page looks great - the boxes line up, the text is placed correctly, and the images look good - so you flip over to check it in I.E. and EVERYTHING IS FUCKING BROKEN AND YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHY! .
I know that in the best of all possible worlds I would have a full and complete understanding of every rule guiding the implementation of CSS and HTML, comprehensive knowledge of the way that each browser will respond to all aspects of the code, and the computer science and programming background necessary to write and implement the 14 ugly hacks necessary to make a relatively simple fucking page look decent in multiple browsers, but until that day: can't we all just get along?!?!?! Get it together, people. Please, Bill, make a browser that conforms. Do it for the children.
The Dalai LLama
...concludes this test of the Emergency Rant System...
Hope that area's not earthquake prone.
The Dalai LLama
...talk about heebeegeebees...
Here I go again with another late-in-the-game post...
I think your post highlights the fact that music is art.
If Tom Waits was a fry cook, Tori Amos was a waitress, and Leonard Cohen washed the dishes I bet they'd still be writing some kick-ass tunes on their breaks.
I wonder how much music the New Kids on the Block and Milli Vanilli are writing today.
The Dalai LLama
... although I think I can safely say that Milli Vanilli is producing at least 50% less music...heh...
Somebody's gotta say it, might as well be me:
The Dalai LLama
...damn, I love this quote...
Military M.R.E.'s come with a small pack of freeze-dried instant coffee. On long guard shifts (...must stay alert...gotta stay alert...zzzzzzz......), some guys said they put it into their lips like a plug of chewing tobacco; I always just mixed it with a little bit of cold canteen water, in exactly the manner described above.
It didn't taste anywhere near as good as chocolate-covered espresso beans, though.
The Dalai LLama
"I like my women like I like my coffee: ground up in the freezer." - Somebody here on Slashdot; if you know the source, credit him for me cause it's funny as hell.
Sorry, my sentence was unclear: Underground Education didn't address computers at all. Now that you bring it up, however, I sorta wondered why Babbage didn't even rate a mention in the parent post. I'm not even cool enough to be considered a real geek, and I've heard of him.
Thanks for the cool link.
The Dalai LLama
... let's try this "No Karma Bonus" thing...
I would have said the same, except that I read An Underground Education just last week. It had the correct information on those topics (telephone, lightbulb, and auto - not computers), and a lot more information about the parts of history that get glossed over or never mentioned. It's a thought-provoking book. It's broken into sections that make it easy to pick up and put down, but it's well-written and entertaining enough to be read cover-to-cover.
You might also be interested in Lies My Teacher Told Me . It's similar, but I haven't read it in a few years so I can't tell you much more than that.
The Dalai LLama
... loves his country, warts and all...
In other news:
The Dalai LLama
...not a big fan of the "conquered peoples are inherently better than the rest of us mystique"...but, damn...that troll was hungry...
From the headline:
If someone is using a pirated copy of Windows, seems to me the "revenue issue" has already been decided. ;)
The Dalai LLama
...on a pirated copy of Linux... hope my service packs will install...
This comment would have worked better as a reply to yours, except that yours didn't show up until after I got mine posted. At least I'm not the only one thinking along these lines.
The Dalai LLama
...damn, I hate that...
The FBI were right to go after you.
I had a friend who knew this guy one time and his sister's cousin built a jet engine just like the one in the article and bolted it to the top of this old Nova that he had. He took it for a test run in the desert in, like, Arizona. He forgot that his normal brakes wouldn't be enough to stop it, and the accident investigators found the remains of the jet engine 80 feet up the side of a mesa.
Dude, his teeth were still embedded in the melted steering wheel. That's how they identified him. Don't mess with home-brewed jet propulsion, it's a recipe for trouble. You could put someone's eye out.
The Dalai LLama
...true story, I swear...
I've never been to Canada.