There is nothing incompatible between the free market and environemntalism.
My sentiments exactly. I think the problem is that most people still do not see that the connection as to why capitalism (in its current form) destroys the environment is that the very nature of money demands this.
Think about it. Corporations strive to make money. Their resources are natural and finite. Money is created by government agencies and is of unlimited supply. As long as the objective is to make money and the potential supply of money is infinite, there can be no equilibrium with the environment.
Placing taxes on wasting natural resources is a good step in this direction, IMHO, but in the long run, the very nature of money as we know it (fiat money) has to change in order to prosper while protecting the environment.
You say If you didn't get your free money, let it go and move on
Occasionally, funny orders are placed in the stock market by people accidentally keying in the wrong orders. In most cases, if the trade goes through and the result doesn't bankrupt the system, the stock market usually allows the trade and forces the *ahem* sucker to pay up.
If I, having not been told about a mispriced monitor on buy.com, browsed their site and went "aha! what a bargain!" and ordered a monitor that subsequently didn't arrive because of a pricing mistake, I would be majorly pissed off. IANAL but I would dare say buy.com could be forced in court to honour the transaction.
my goodness. China's population is closer to 1.2 billion, not 1.5 billion or 3 billion (50% of world's population as stated in parent post)
0.1 billion is a big number of people to estimate wrongly.
in any case, don't underestimate the buying power of the Chinese. They own a BIG HEAP of US T-bonds. Also, while most of them still can't afford the proverbial piss pot, at the rate that their economy is growing, give them 20 years and extrapolate the shrinking cost of computers and a sizeable proportion of them *will* have computers.
Sure, you can design a safe to be more secure to thieves than the next safe, but if you leave the keys (or the combination) nearby or rattle it off to people...
Security needs to be taught, not put into a slidebar.
"I'm going to kill the president with help from my new friends in the terrorist group."
I suspect that if you try this, it'll get noticed the first time and then, after you've been looked at manually and deemed to be un-dangerous, a killfile of sorts will be set to ignore your pet phrases.
That is, of course, assuming nothing strange happens to you in the meantime...
unfortunately, though, I suspect the software is Windows only... the idea of a card (unfortunately ISA too) that has a phone jack is a great idea though...
2.Charging a few cents for each email will make me pay a few bucks a month, which I wouldn't like. Charging a very small amount per email will not produce effects, as it will only give the spammer a bill of a few hundred dollars (provided that the correct person is billed at all - see #1). considering the amount of money spam brings in (yes, sadly, this is still true), a few hundred dollars is nothing compared to the profits.
but - what if the small charge for email was not to the ISP but instead to the receiver of the email (with maybe an even smaller percentage commisison to the ISP)?
then you would be paid for receiving spam (as you should be) whilst if you were corresponding with a friend/relative/contact, the charges would tend to cancel out over time.
The only time that we'll ever have to be upset is if we build an AI machine that is capable of building AI machines that are smarter than the AI machines we are capable of building...
if an AI machine builds an AI machine that's smarter than itself, that machine could build another machine smarter than *itself*...
I KNOW! Linux is free and blah blah blah, but really. I work in a huge company, and the only plans that I've heard for possible Linux use are in Server applications (DNS, EMAIL, possibly intranet) and is most definetly not headed for desktops anytime soon.
You're still thinking of the US as the center of the universe. Just consider how much the average guy earns in India and China and think which OS he'll be using when his wage allows him to start considering a computer (ok ok... piracy of Windows might be a big option)
Hmm... doesn't Microsoft's stock price depend on them continually growing revenue? hehe... let's see the uptake rate in developing countries with suitable free OSes as alternatives...
"If I use a CD-ROM drive to make a copy of Quake, you can still play your original. Since you haven't been deprived of anything, you can't claim theft."
this is nitpicking but actually, the English language might be more at fault than the law:
see http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Diction ary&va=theft
the definition of the word 'theft' still relates to physical property. the language hasn't caught up to how to handle software (the ubiquitous copyability of it) just yet.
there is an ethical issue (and, quite likely, a criminal issue once that becomes law) involved in copying someone's work without their permission, but it sure ain't theft.
there was this book I read some time ago that said how the US chose light water nuclear reactors as the standard instead of another design that was so inherently stable that it would not melt down even if the control rods were taken out of the reactor and used as kiddie toys.
the author was one of the scientists working on nuclear power. he was employed by General Atomics. (strangely enough, an ex-division... of GE)
the reason for the choice was political rather than scientific/technical. (the scientists were all for the safer reactor)
can anyone confirm this or do I have to go have another drink?
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There is nothing incompatible between the free market and environemntalism.
My sentiments exactly. I think the problem is that most people still do not see that the connection as to why capitalism (in its current form) destroys the environment is that the very nature of money demands this.
Think about it. Corporations strive to make money. Their resources are natural and finite. Money is created by government agencies and is of unlimited supply. As long as the objective is to make money and the potential supply of money is infinite, there can be no equilibrium with the environment.
Placing taxes on wasting natural resources is a good step in this direction, IMHO, but in the long run, the very nature of money as we know it (fiat money) has to change in order to prosper while protecting the environment.
Look around Singapore and count the number of Starbucks and Coffeebeans shops. Not to mention Kenny Rogers, Pizza Huts, McDonalds ...
Sydney thankfully has no chain coffee stores yet - and hopefully will not have any for a long while!
You say If you didn't get your free money, let it go and move on
Occasionally, funny orders are placed in the stock market by people accidentally keying in the wrong orders. In most cases, if the trade goes through and the result doesn't bankrupt the system, the stock market usually allows the trade and forces the *ahem* sucker to pay up.
If I, having not been told about a mispriced monitor on buy.com, browsed their site and went "aha! what a bargain!" and ordered a monitor that subsequently didn't arrive because of a pricing mistake, I would be majorly pissed off. IANAL but I would dare say buy.com could be forced in court to honour the transaction.
my goodness. China's population is closer to 1.2 billion, not 1.5 billion or 3 billion (50% of world's population as stated in parent post)
0.1 billion is a big number of people to estimate wrongly.
in any case, don't underestimate the buying power of the Chinese. They own a BIG HEAP of US T-bonds. Also, while most of them still can't afford the proverbial piss pot, at the rate that their economy is growing, give them 20 years and extrapolate the shrinking cost of computers and a sizeable proportion of them *will* have computers.
did they include this and all the terrorist bombings when they calculated the "guns kill this many people" rate?
Means knowing the limitations of your own box.
...
Sure, you can design a safe to be more secure to thieves than the next safe, but if you leave the keys (or the combination) nearby or rattle it off to people
Security needs to be taught, not put into a slidebar.
President Clinton announced a budget *surplus* some time ago. How come the US treasury still reports a higher US national debt every month?
hard to believe? take a look:
http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/op d/opdpenny.htm
buy gold, platinum and silver.
remember the maxim:
buy low sell high.
there must be at least half a billion Muslims in the world.
I'd like to see the NSA keep track of them all. hehe...
"I'm going to kill the president with help from my new friends in the terrorist group."
I suspect that if you try this, it'll get noticed the first time and then, after you've been looked at manually and deemed to be un-dangerous, a killfile of sorts will be set to ignore your pet phrases.
That is, of course, assuming nothing strange happens to you in the meantime...
http://www.ezfone.com/
... the idea of a card (unfortunately ISA too) that has a phone jack is a great idea though...
unfortunately, though, I suspect the software is Windows only
Malaysia - VCD pressing capitals of the world.
well, it was one year ago. haven't checked back yet.
There are a number of reasons this won't work:
2.Charging a few cents for each email will make me pay a few bucks a month, which I wouldn't like. Charging a very small amount per email will not produce effects, as it will only give the spammer a bill of a few hundred dollars (provided that the correct person is billed at all - see #1). considering the amount of money spam brings in (yes, sadly, this is still true), a few hundred dollars is nothing compared to the profits.
but - what if the small charge for email was not to the ISP but instead to the receiver of the email (with maybe an even smaller percentage commisison to the ISP)?
then you would be paid for receiving spam (as you should be) whilst if you were corresponding with a friend/relative/contact, the charges would tend to cancel out over time.
we need cybercurrency. yesterday.
ohwell.
any scheme where you have to pull more suckers^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hcustomers in to survive surely must be a kind of Ponzi ...
then it means that the conspiracy stories about how easily the NSA cracks DES codes must be wrong.
...
If distributed.net, as you say, is 100 times faster than the world's fastest and it's still taking this zarking long to crack 64-bit DES
PGP should be safe for a while more.
how about Dungeon Keeper as a kewl process/network interface?
... corridors as network routes, doors as firewalls ...
... errant processes get dumped in the torture chamber ...
...
rooms as servers, monsters as processes
ahh... but the best bit
hehe... i see potential....
now if they'd release DK under the GPL sometime
How many green sweaters does Bill gates have?
hmm...... what happens when the repository gets to the stage where I can ask "how much in the red is Mr. Joe Black's finances this week?"
some things should never be public.
The only time that we'll ever have to be upset is if we build an AI machine that is capable of building AI machines that are smarter than the AI machines we are capable of building...
...
if an AI machine builds an AI machine that's smarter than itself, that machine could build another machine smarter than *itself*
would this be the beginning of the end?
Remember Wing Commander, anybody?
hehe..... destroying the planet wasn't the way I thought that game would end though.
Result? Look for the Free Software Foundation to get some major funding "slid under the door" until it starts to look like a P.A.C.
Seeing that the govt. funds basic research, why doesn't it fund writers of Free Software? (heck, the idea is to better society in both senses, right?)
I KNOW! Linux is free and blah blah blah, but really. I work in a huge company, and the only plans that I've heard for possible Linux use are in Server applications (DNS, EMAIL, possibly intranet) and is most definetly not headed for desktops anytime soon.
... piracy of Windows might be a big option)
... let's see the uptake rate in developing countries with suitable free OSes as alternatives...
You're still thinking of the US as the center of the universe. Just consider how much the average guy earns in India and China and think which OS he'll be using when his wage allows him to start considering a computer (ok ok
Hmm... doesn't Microsoft's stock price depend on them continually growing revenue? hehe
I do, from time to time.
...
I like the idea that this causes them to track various 'ghosts'
When will Netscape give an option to automatically refuse cookies from specified servers?
a game that was ahead of its time. most certainly.
... oh ... all of ... 9 years ago ...
I remember playing it
then again, I'm still waiting for someone to make a remake of Nuclear War
"If I use a CD-ROM drive to make a copy of Quake, you can still play your original. Since you haven't been deprived of anything, you can't claim theft."
n ary&va=theft
.... thoughtcrime? copycrime? hehe....
this is nitpicking but actually, the English language might be more at fault than the law:
see http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictio
the definition of the word 'theft' still relates to physical property. the language hasn't caught up to how to handle software (the ubiquitous copyability of it) just yet.
there is an ethical issue (and, quite likely, a criminal issue once that becomes law) involved in copying someone's work without their permission, but it sure ain't theft.
hmm... newspeak
there was this book I read some time ago that said how the US chose light water nuclear reactors as the standard instead of another design that was so inherently stable that it would not melt down even if the control rods were taken out of the reactor and used as kiddie toys.
... of GE)
the author was one of the scientists working on nuclear power. he was employed by General Atomics. (strangely enough, an ex-division
the reason for the choice was political rather than scientific/technical. (the scientists were all for the safer reactor)
can anyone confirm this or do I have to go have another drink?