If you honestly believe that any company is incapable of shooting themselves in the foot by purchasing a successful company and then destroying it by imposing their own culture on it then I can only assume that you have not been in the IT industry as a "Dell Ops Manager" or anything else for very long.
The IT industry in particular has a long and inglorious history of doing just that.
I'm not saying that Dell will contribute to that list, but it is by no means impossible.
Dell: OK Alienware dudes, love your work, but the parts you use are way too expensive. It would be great if you starterd ordering your parts off this supplier catalog here, in order to take advantage of Dells enormous buying power
Alienware: Ummm, but our expensive parts are what sets us apart from all the rest?
Dell: Oh, don't worry, the parts from Chinhowan Golden Monkey Electronics Funtime Co are manufactured to the highest standards possible I assure you, otherwise we at Dell wouldn't be using them! You're not suggesting that Dell uses inferior quality parts now are you?
This is true of course, but it requires a lot of effort on behalf of the authorities so they would have to believe that the fruits of their labours were valuable enough to justify the work and expense of getting them.
What is being proposed here is a system that makes it easy for the authorities to not only identify you, but revoke your access at a whim.
I have no doubt that were they to do this some sort of "illegal" underground network based on some sort of wireless mesh or tunneling would spring up overnight (yes I'm a aware that both these things currently exist)
"I think extending that model onto the internet would be an interesting experiment."
I think it would be an irreversible disaster. You need to consider that it is much easier to lose freedom than it is to gain it. What you are proposing is moronically naive.
"I very much doubt it would threaten forums like Slashdot which allow anonymous speech;"
I very much doubt that you have the slightest clue what you are talking about.
If someone in power can easily identify you at will then it is quite simply impossible for you to post anonymously
The two concepts are mutually exclusive,
To think otherwise is quite frankly insane.
The day that you are not able to voice an opinion without fear of governmental reprisals is the day you live in a fascist state.
I can't believe you people that want to give up your fundamental human rights just to gain the illusion of safety.
No wonder the worlds democracies are all crumbling.
OK, it is possible I'm suffering a rush of blood after the first two posts I responded to and I may have unfairly accused you of being sympathetic to their opinions. I'm still not 100% sure because your post is somewhat ambiguous, but after a couple of other readings I now have some doubts.
Right, because it would have been so much better if he had have called his Uncle who works at Verisign and had your "internet privileges" canceled because you are an "unpatriotic flag burner"
Geez, you people live in a country run by a fricking insane megalomaniac who is tearing out the pages of your constitution faster than you could fucking read them yet you are all queuing up to help him, just because some lame arse teenager in his mothers basement threatened to "KICK YOUR FUCKING ASS"
How fucking lame is that? Some people just don't deserve the freedom that they have.
"What I'd like to see is a more "public" internet. Register your name, address, drivers license, arc of your piss, etc. at some place like Verisign"
Are you nuts? What happens when you decide to inform someone on the internet of your opinion regarding GWB and his ridiculous "Warr on Terrah" and that person just happens to have links to GWB and decides to give his "old college buddy' at Versign a call and have them yank your "internet priveleges"
From then on you become persona non-gratis and you can't even get on the internet and raise a good old fashioned grassroots stink campaign.
Good lord, what you are suggesting is a fascist dictators wet dream
Good grief, it is true. You are either an utter moron or a clueless teenager.
The original "spirit of the internet" (post arpanet) was to promote the free and unrestricted exchange of information.
Just because a bunch of money craving fascists have come along in the past few years and decided that the internet is something that they need to control and monetize doesn't make this sort of crap right.
If you want guaranteed safety then stick to TV.
If you want to explore the world (the good and the bad of it) without viewing it through the filtered portal that is provided by big media then we have the internet.
The day the internet gets controlled for the purpose of sanitizing it is the day the undernet is born (and I'm not referring to the irc network by that name)
I agree. I like that KDE is there, and I like that other people like it, and I know that a lot of people hate Gnome.
Me? I simply don't get KDE.
To me, it looks messy, cluttered and slightly juvenile.
That is coming from someone who migrated to Tux around about the time XP was released (meaning I was a bonafide 2K user). The person that helped me switch told me that I should use KDE because "it is most like Windows".
That lasted about 6 months until I discovered Gnome. I much prefer the clean lines of Gnome.
I still have KDE on my Ubuntu box, and fire it up occasionally just for fun (ie new version). I also use it at Uni (Scientific Linux) and I have XFCE on my old P3 laptop. I'm not fanatical about any of them, I just prefer Gnome, XFCE and KDE in that order.
"spewing everything into c:\windows\system32 instead of having programs be self-contained. There is some argument as to whether complete self-containment is good, though."
Personally, I think the main reason that Microsoft designed the whole registry + system32 shitfight is to make it harder for people to copy programs from one machine to another. I remember waaaay back in the day when it was possible to copy MS Office by zipping the program folder and copying it to another PC.
Microsoft ramped up the complication factor to make this sort of thing impossible.
But then that could just be me being ultra cynical too.
It may just be that they are simply a bunch of retarded dumbfucks.
P.S. I'm aware that all the hand-wringing they are doing includes crying about passing the traffic across net segments where the middlemen don't get their cut but that's an even more lame thing to cry about than the aforementioned and it can be solved the same way. Negotiate better peering agreements with your upstream channel partners or suck it up.
Not only do they charge users for their bandwidth, they also charge the providers for the bandwidth they use to send their content.
It's not like all the BBC gets to put all of their streaming videos on the net for free for fricks sake. If their (BBCs) isp is not happy with their cut for all the video uploads the beeb is doing then they need to negotiate better terms.
It's as simple as that.
They can all go suck goats balls as far as I'm concerned. Most telcos make more margin off the internet than they do off voice traffic.
Many, many people get dybamic ip's from their craptastic isp's (allegedly to stop them from running servers @ home although that is trivially easy to get around)
Slashdot Mirror
If you honestly believe that any company is incapable of shooting themselves in the foot by purchasing a successful company and then destroying it by imposing their own culture on it then I can only assume that you have not been in the IT industry as a "Dell Ops Manager" or anything else for very long.
The IT industry in particular has a long and inglorious history of doing just that.
I'm not saying that Dell will contribute to that list, but it is by no means impossible.
Why do you Windows users think that enduring this sort of shitfight just to install your OS of choice is acceptable?
The mind boggles.
Well, it was primarily a joke, hence the smiley. but there is more to an alienware PC than a shitload of graphics RAM
Dell: OK Alienware dudes, love your work, but the parts you use are way too expensive. It would be great if you starterd ordering your parts off this supplier catalog here, in order to take advantage of Dells enormous buying power
Alienware: Ummm, but our expensive parts are what sets us apart from all the rest?
Dell: Oh, don't worry, the parts from Chinhowan Golden Monkey Electronics Funtime Co are manufactured to the highest standards possible I assure you, otherwise we at Dell wouldn't be using them! You're not suggesting that Dell uses inferior quality parts now are you?
Alienware: Ummmm, I gues not, no. :-)
If that is true then you haven't seen many applications for windows.
Oh, and frosty piss
Developing drugs-as-an-investment creates another problem.
Drug companies have an incentive to create drugs to manage symptoms rather than cure the illness.
Sell a man a cure and you sell him a single packet, sell a man symptom relief and you have a customer for life.
You should see my folks monthly drug bill. We're talking $500 a month.
This is true of course, but it requires a lot of effort on behalf of the authorities so they would have to believe that the fruits of their labours were valuable enough to justify the work and expense of getting them.
What is being proposed here is a system that makes it easy for the authorities to not only identify you, but revoke your access at a whim.
I have no doubt that were they to do this some sort of "illegal" underground network based on some sort of wireless mesh or tunneling would spring up overnight (yes I'm a aware that both these things currently exist)
"I think extending that model onto the internet would be an interesting experiment."
I think it would be an irreversible disaster. You need to consider that it is much easier to lose freedom than it is to gain it. What you are proposing is moronically naive.
"I very much doubt it would threaten forums like Slashdot which allow anonymous speech;"
I very much doubt that you have the slightest clue what you are talking about.
If someone in power can easily identify you at will then it is quite simply impossible for you to post anonymously
The two concepts are mutually exclusive,
To think otherwise is quite frankly insane.
The day that you are not able to voice an opinion without fear of governmental reprisals is the day you live in a fascist state.
I can't believe you people that want to give up your fundamental human rights just to gain the illusion of safety.
No wonder the worlds democracies are all crumbling.
OK, it is possible I'm suffering a rush of blood after the first two posts I responded to and I may have unfairly accused you of being sympathetic to their opinions. I'm still not 100% sure because your post is somewhat ambiguous, but after a couple of other readings I now have some doubts.
So please accept my apologies. Or not.
Right, because it would have been so much better if he had have called his Uncle who works at Verisign and had your "internet privileges" canceled because you are an "unpatriotic flag burner"
Geez, you people live in a country run by a fricking insane megalomaniac who is tearing out the pages of your constitution faster than you could fucking read them yet you are all queuing up to help him, just because some lame arse teenager in his mothers basement threatened to "KICK YOUR FUCKING ASS"
How fucking lame is that? Some people just don't deserve the freedom that they have.
Wrong!
Anonymity begets freedom. What you and the other guy are championing is the internet equivalent of an ID tattoo from birth.
You guys need to think about the consequences of what you are suggesting.
Weigh up the benefits of an internet "with less asshats" vs an internet with "complete government and corporate control"
Which one do you choose?
"What I'd like to see is a more "public" internet. Register your name, address, drivers license, arc of your piss, etc. at some place like Verisign"
Are you nuts? What happens when you decide to inform someone on the internet of your opinion regarding GWB and his ridiculous "Warr on Terrah" and that person just happens to have links to GWB and decides to give his "old college buddy' at Versign a call and have them yank your "internet priveleges"
From then on you become persona non-gratis and you can't even get on the internet and raise a good old fashioned grassroots stink campaign.
Good lord, what you are suggesting is a fascist dictators wet dream
Good grief, it is true. You are either an utter moron or a clueless teenager.
The original "spirit of the internet" (post arpanet) was to promote the free and unrestricted exchange of information.
Just because a bunch of money craving fascists have come along in the past few years and decided that the internet is something that they need to control and monetize doesn't make this sort of crap right.
If you want guaranteed safety then stick to TV.
If you want to explore the world (the good and the bad of it) without viewing it through the filtered portal that is provided by big media then we have the internet.
The day the internet gets controlled for the purpose of sanitizing it is the day the undernet is born (and I'm not referring to the irc network by that name)
Uh, ok
[backs slowly away]
Hey, that's a great idea.
Alternatively, I guess he could just go and use another desktop.
I agree. I like that KDE is there, and I like that other people like it, and I know that a lot of people hate Gnome.
Me? I simply don't get KDE.
To me, it looks messy, cluttered and slightly juvenile.
That is coming from someone who migrated to Tux around about the time XP was released (meaning I was a bonafide 2K user). The person that helped me switch told me that I should use KDE because "it is most like Windows".
That lasted about 6 months until I discovered Gnome. I much prefer the clean lines of Gnome.
I still have KDE on my Ubuntu box, and fire it up occasionally just for fun (ie new version). I also use it at Uni (Scientific Linux) and I have XFCE on my old P3 laptop. I'm not fanatical about any of them, I just prefer Gnome, XFCE and KDE in that order.
Having said that, it really is all about choice.
I guess that's what makes Linux great.
"spewing everything into c:\windows\system32 instead of having programs be self-contained. There is some argument as to whether complete self-containment is good, though."
Personally, I think the main reason that Microsoft designed the whole registry + system32 shitfight is to make it harder for people to copy programs from one machine to another. I remember waaaay back in the day when it was possible to copy MS Office by zipping the program folder and copying it to another PC.
Microsoft ramped up the complication factor to make this sort of thing impossible.
But then that could just be me being ultra cynical too.
It may just be that they are simply a bunch of retarded dumbfucks.
Oh, OK, so we are excited about how bad the game probably is.
Sort of like a vintage Daikatana?
I don't understand what all the excitement is for. The game is not "unreleased", it has just not been released on a specific platform.
BFD
It's not as if its never been seen before, like when a never before heard Steven Stills tape was found at that dump recently.
Yeah,
But I thought the whole point of a fast track was to pass standards that are already in widespread use?
Clearly this is not the case with OOXML yet it was fast tracked anyway.
Thunderbirds
P.S. I'm aware that all the hand-wringing they are doing includes crying about passing the traffic across net segments where the middlemen don't get their cut but that's an even more lame thing to cry about than the aforementioned and it can be solved the same way. Negotiate better peering agreements with your upstream channel partners or suck it up.
It's that simple.
It is indeed ridiculous.
Not only do they charge users for their bandwidth, they also charge the providers for the bandwidth they use to send their content.
It's not like all the BBC gets to put all of their streaming videos on the net for free for fricks sake. If their (BBCs) isp is not happy with their cut for all the video uploads the beeb is doing then they need to negotiate better terms.
It's as simple as that.
They can all go suck goats balls as far as I'm concerned. Most telcos make more margin off the internet than they do off voice traffic.
Grow up you big babies
Many, many people get dybamic ip's from their craptastic isp's (allegedly to stop them from running servers @ home although that is trivially easy to get around)
Umm, you know when you you use your passport and some airport security drone stamps it when you go thru immigration?
Yep, that's a "foreign travel record"