Consider also the following (not necessarily all happen simultaneously):
Programming languages which are meant for the lowest common denominator. Those languages are used which are not the best ones, but for which you can find enough adequately skilled work force. Mediocrity begets mediocrity.
Processes which hinder progress (using humans to do what a machine should be made to do automatically).
Things are made artificially hard for the programmer. The more you type, the better the codeline production must be!
Outdated, irrelevant, "dumb" platforms, operating systems and APIs with which to work.
Automation is avoided like a plague.
Everyone is too busy to think in creative ways. Try making crossword puzzles for 8 hours each working day for four months, non-stop. Do you burn out? How much do you innovate? Does it start to feel stupid? Could you automate it? You don't have time to build the automation, remember: you need to do the crossword puzzles 8 h each working day!
Lousy salary, lousy bonuses, it's just a day job churning out code. If you put in more, you get nothing out for yourself (except an ulcer).
Programmers are considered to be like conveyor belt automatons instead of creative beings, artists, that they are.
Etc.
If you want programming to not-stink, MAKE IT EASY FOR THE PROGRAMMERS. It really is that simple.
Stop thinking user-centered, and inventing idiot-proof systems which a 2-year old could use, because you can't. Think programmer-centered. If programming is EASY for the people who do it, they can make any kind of user interface, and any kind of program, anything you want.
You can also boldly go where no man has gone before from the comfort of your own home and your chair, and the vicinity of your refridgerator and assorted beverages, with Celestia, a real-time 3D space simulator.
If the user of that machine is sending legitimat mail, he's sending it via his ISP's mailserver, not direct. Anything that machine is sending directly is crap.
In that case, yes. But what happens when the infected machine sends the outbound mail via the mailserver of the ISP? In that case, how can you distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate use? How do you know who to block, if any network with >= 1 compromised Windows machine (the usual case) could be sending spam?
Technically, yes, Google cache is in violation of copyright. But then again all proxies anywhere are in violation... So basically you couldn't even surf the said pages, as the bits get copies in transit. Just read some $BIG_CORP Terms of Use and you'll see.
But using common sense should prevail here. If Slashdot directs x thousand people to some site simultaneously, it would be prudent to mirror the entire site. Some people pay for bandwidth. Some people have a bandwidth/transferred bytes limit, if you exceed it and no more pages for you. And so on. I'm sure the mirroring would benefit everyone.
Besides, if Slashdot is so afraid of copyright violations, why are the mirror URLs posted by individuals allowed in the forums...? Let's have automated Slashdot mirroring. How would it be different from what Google is doing?
"Through my communication with him telepathically and through his delay in arrival I was able to attend a music conference that was very important to me at that time."
(Emphasis mine)
After that I'm uncertain whether I believe anything this person has to say.
I think you can plug in DSpam at the ISP level too, which would be quite effective too. Maybe mark the spam as X-Spam: Yes or such.
As for blocking spammer-hosting networks, I agree with its effectiveness. But who gets to decide who hosts spammers and who doesn't? Most of the spam comes from infected and/or compromised machines, or misconfigured proxies etc. so you can't really block those.
I don't think micropayments suck. Having a micropayment system would offer many interesting possibilities: think about receiving 0.1 e whenever you're forced to watch a banner. 0.1 e whenever you've forced to see a pop-up ad. 0.1 e whenever you follow a sponsored link in the internet. 0.1 e whenever your precious time has been "bothered" in some way. Receive micropayments whenever you're forced to see/hear/consume something you don't care about. You could take micropayments from people who are downloading some home-made background pictures from your site, and so on.
Micropayments would enable these kind of things, but of course they wouldn't create such a system all by themselves. You would need some technical solutions as well.
But I agree, the idea was "daft" due to the human factor involved in it. You just can't rely on humans to be a mechanical part of a big machine, they don't work that way. They make mistakes and the bend the rules, if not discard them altogether.
Slashdot Mirror
Consider also the following (not necessarily all happen simultaneously):
If you want programming to not-stink, MAKE IT EASY FOR THE PROGRAMMERS. It really is that simple.
Stop thinking user-centered, and inventing idiot-proof systems which a 2-year old could use, because you can't. Think programmer-centered. If programming is EASY for the people who do it, they can make any kind of user interface, and any kind of program, anything you want.
You can also boldly go where no man has gone before from the comfort of your own home and your chair, and the vicinity of your refridgerator and assorted beverages, with Celestia, a real-time 3D space simulator.
If the user of that machine is sending legitimat mail, he's sending it via his ISP's mailserver, not direct. Anything that machine is sending directly is crap.
In that case, yes. But what happens when the infected machine sends the outbound mail via the mailserver of the ISP? In that case, how can you distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate use? How do you know who to block, if any network with >= 1 compromised Windows machine (the usual case) could be sending spam?
Technically, yes, Google cache is in violation of copyright. But then again all proxies anywhere are in violation... So basically you couldn't even surf the said pages, as the bits get copies in transit. Just read some $BIG_CORP Terms of Use and you'll see.
But using common sense should prevail here. If Slashdot directs x thousand people to some site simultaneously, it would be prudent to mirror the entire site. Some people pay for bandwidth. Some people have a bandwidth/transferred bytes limit, if you exceed it and no more pages for you. And so on. I'm sure the mirroring would benefit everyone.
Besides, if Slashdot is so afraid of copyright violations, why are the mirror URLs posted by individuals allowed in the forums...? Let's have automated Slashdot mirroring. How would it be different from what Google is doing?
Brave New World. An excellent book, I might add.
"Through my communication with him telepathically and through his delay in arrival I was able to attend a music conference that was very important to me at that time." (Emphasis mine)
After that I'm uncertain whether I believe anything this person has to say.
I think you can plug in DSpam at the ISP level too, which would be quite effective too. Maybe mark the spam as X-Spam: Yes or such.
As for blocking spammer-hosting networks, I agree with its effectiveness. But who gets to decide who hosts spammers and who doesn't? Most of the spam comes from infected and/or compromised machines, or misconfigured proxies etc. so you can't really block those.
I don't think micropayments suck. Having a micropayment system would offer many interesting possibilities: think about receiving 0.1 e whenever you're forced to watch a banner. 0.1 e whenever you've forced to see a pop-up ad. 0.1 e whenever you follow a sponsored link in the internet. 0.1 e whenever your precious time has been "bothered" in some way. Receive micropayments whenever you're forced to see/hear/consume something you don't care about. You could take micropayments from people who are downloading some home-made background pictures from your site, and so on.
Micropayments would enable these kind of things, but of course they wouldn't create such a system all by themselves. You would need some technical solutions as well.
But I agree, the idea was "daft" due to the human factor involved in it. You just can't rely on humans to be a mechanical part of a big machine, they don't work that way. They make mistakes and the bend the rules, if not discard them altogether.