Our right to privacy is eroding in the information age, well all know that. There's not even an expectation of privacy when you bring your computer into for repair. I mean how can you have high expectations or any realistic expectations for that matter when you're getting your computer fixed but someone who is likely a young kid barely making over the minimum wage? It's a harsh fact not too many people like but that's the way it is. You have to be proactive with your privacy nowadays and if you don't want to take those proactive measures(installing antivirus, asking about privacy policies, etc) don't expect to have any.
Still, by whatever means the discovery came doesn't change the fact what this guy did is WRONG and he needs some serious help.
In ending, as the good book says, "You reap what you sow"
How can that not be a bad thing? If a company is more critical of an employee months away from retirement, that is by definition age discrimination. Sorry, but saving a few bucks is not justification for prejudice in the workplace.
And what about the guy wasting the companies time and money by searching sites he shouldn't be searching instead of being productive for work? I know we all tend to slack off at work at times(human nature and the way business goes) but you should know your boundaries and don't get carried away.
In today's politically correct environment, I don't care if he was 2 days into a new job or 2 days from retiring he deserves to be fired because everyone with a half of brain knows surfing porn/having sexual talk on company's time is a big no no. Granted the motives behind IBM's decision could be sly and I'm not in favor of that corporation at all but regardless, keep your act clean.
Except managmenet don't give an f about letting you know you do a good job(and also in this day and age its rare to get thx for doing a good job from ANYONE), they only care when something goes wrong and you get yelled at, your fault or not. Im all for it though cause its a sobering thought to know that someone out there will take the time to apreciate.
I mean, there are millions of tech people that don't matter, yours truly included.
You are right. I don't completely agree with the list either. M$ matters, Sony matters. Why do they matter? We live in a capitlistic society and they have money beyond our wildest imaginations. Money talks and is the most important thing in the equation. Granted having a brilliant idea and the consumer are high on my list too but if your idea doesn't get any financial backing, it'll never see the light of day.
Oh yes I loved being in new york when the trains werent running. 60K a year retire at 55 and they wanted to retire at 50. No one owes you a job or a life you have to make your own.
Yes I definately agree with your sentiment. Being a New Yorker myself, I know how stressful that time was. I do appreciate what labor unions did in the past and what they accomplish but the fact is, nowadays there just breeding grounds for lazy employees who know they can't be fired short of murdering someone on the job, and they get better benefits the most but that's never enough for them. Now I know not all union workers are like that but there's enough of them and enough corruption at top to make unions no better than management. You don't need to look farther than professional sports to see how absurd unions have become.
All too often you get some script reader on the other end of the line
I have to agree with you. I called Dell technical support once for my company over a bad power supply and they still put my through hurdles when I explain in detail what the problem is. "Is the power cord plugged in? (Though I do understand why she asked this question) Do you see a green light button on? Can you reseat the memory for me, the memory is a component that looks like a chocolate bar(no joke she really said that)"
In my experience though, business level support is a little better. Most the time they seem to have a better idea and understanding. Not all(as I still had a few bad experiences in that end too) but most. And if I give them a detail description of the problem(at least in IBM's case, Dell is still another story) they won't hassle me. They'll send out the part I need and that's that. I'm not sure how much the business level support people get paid but I have a hunch its more than $7/hr.
Do I feel for someone for having a cs degree and not being able to find a better job? Of course I do. I was and sometimes still am in the same boat as with I'm sure many other on here. Am I surprised she gets paid only $7 for the reasons many of you pointed out already? Not at all.
I have your military secrets right here! It's yours for only 3 easy payments of 19.95?! That's right only 19.95! And if you act now before you finish reading this post, we'll throw in keys to the pentagon, absolutely FREE!!!!
*NY residents must pay sales tax. Offer only good in the continent u.s.
What field are you in now if I may ask? I need ideas myself since I'm on the fence:).
On that note I'm not ready to leave IT in the short term though. Two years in the business world is ALOT of time and who knows maybe things will change for the better. They could change for the worse too but it's still worth it to wait and see for me as I am a relative newbie.
Plus everything always looking greener on the other side. Case in point I mention how I'm on the fence, an accountant I know was contemplating leaving his field to get into being a network admin. There are alot of other stressful, not always well paid career fields and knowing that alone has kept me from acting hastily.
Amen brother. That is exactly my plan except I havn't found a job yet:) Right now I'm a system admin in the New York area, 3 years exp, making 42k(living at home because 42k is not enough to afford to live on your own in nyc/long island area). I want to move out of state for personal and financial reasons. I may settle for the same salary though I'm looking for at least 50k 'cause moving virtually anywhere else in the country it'll still be a raise because of cost of living factors plus I would finally be able to afford living on my own.
Thank youm I was about to say something like that. And granted it's not the city but long island, the outskirts of the city, can, will and have gotten hurricanes. Not nearly as often as the south does and not always as strong but I figure we average one hurricane in every 10 years. The one we had in the mid 80's, hurricane gloria did alot of damage and we were without power for a week.
If some still want to believe that it was bad luck/fate/god's vengeance/*pick dump excuse* that braught the south of the USA to the ground... let them do.
What brought the south to the ground was the levee's breaking because *surprise surprise* no one wanted to fix them. If the levee's were properly maintained the south would of survived the hurricane.
Congratulations, you've been sucked in by the Jack Thompson hype. Bully is a game where you fight against the bullies. But don't let little things like facts get in the way, will you?
Well that's kind of a catch 22. If your beating up the bully then in turn you are the bully now!:)
I work for a small private company with only 2 1/2 IT people (the other guy only spends half his time on IT and half on other projects) for 100+ people and 100+ machines and servers. I wish the users would revolt more. They have more power than what I do and we desperately need at the very least one more guy.
I do know what my only option is but its still sad the ceo can't see the value of IT, he only looks at it in terms of cost burden.
Because I've seen it all before, now they're re-doing it all and nothing surprises me.
You go that right more than you know. Not only are they redoing the same movies but they're reusing similar story lines. Like the new amanda bynes movie where she poses as a man(don't remember the name nor do i care to). That's already been done in "lady bugs" and "just one of the guys".
The box is only warrantied for 1 year, but you can be under contract for up to 3! If the box dies on you 13 months into your contract, you're stuck either paying for 23 more months of service on a box you can't use, or paying TiVo a fee to swap your box for a refurbished model and move your service to it.
That was one of my biggest concerns when I picked up my tivo box a year and a half ago. The only reason I was concerned is because Tivo was a experiment for me to see if I would like it(as this is my first box) and I wanted the lifetime option(which I did end up doing). I was concerned about the box dying on me 366 days later and then me being assed out $300 dollars in investing in the life time plan. Now that I'm near the break even point(the money saved from me doing the lifetime option as compared to monthly payments) it doesnt bother me anymore.
To add I enjoy my Tivo experience and so long as I can fast forward commericials, record my favortie programs and tranfer those programs on my computer as Tivo allows you to(with some caveats of course) I'll remain happy. Wether I'll be a loyal Tivo customer depends upon how long this box lasts and the next subsequent box I'll get....
While the issue of privacy and violation of rights is definate cause of concern, I feel the example of "cheating on income taxes" or "how to grow pot" is silly. Contrary to popular belief, the government really doesn't give an f on these issue and cares as much about them as someone stealing a piece of candy from a store. Well it does care about cheating on income taxes but only IF you really do cheat on income taxes and I'm sure it'll have to be for an substantial amount of money too.
The government is not as much as a concern for me(since I'm confident enough people would freak out if they tried anything stupid to make them think otherwise) but google and the other companies I'm concerned with. They have very little guidelines or laws on what to do with the data and can pretty much do as they please with it. It's not always the known "evil" ones you have to watch out for. Its the ones that are pointing the finger at other people trying to get you to buy into their "don't be evil" mentality you need to keep both eyes on.
Slashdot posts, what, maybe two dozen "stories" a day? To support this Slashdot has a crew of paid, therefore professional, "editors". Is it really that much to ask that rudimentary spelling and grammar rules are obeyed?
My gut agrees with you but I am torn. If this were English class you would get an F Mr. Taco!!!!! Of course being geeks how many of us care about proper English:)
Now here's why I am torn. I know I make grammatical errors all the time when I reply to topics so how can I hold anyone else in an informal setting when I can't do the same thing myself. BUT a part of me can't help but ask why not copy and paste into a text editor and do a quick simple spell check that'll pick up most if not all the spelling errors.
The fact remains that IBM charged the company $20,350 for the investigation of the matter, which apparently the company paid. The company was out that money, he caused it out of spite and did it illegally. I have no sympathy for the guy. I'd say he got what he deserved.
I have no sympathy for the guy either but IBM is a bigger crook. Where's the justice on IBM for having the balls to quote a price of 2 grand(no I'm not exaggerating) to change out of freaking myrinet cable?! And while they are out the money in the grand scheme of things I somehow doubt IBM misses a mere few grand in their multi-billion dollar operation.
Low ratings for a critically-acclaimed show? How about better promotion and not jacking around with the schedule? The word-of-mouth behind these programs makes people want to watch them, but that doesn't do much good if new viewers can't find the proper time slot.
I agree with you on both accounts. You have to give a show some time to develop. I mean look at shows like full house and seinfeld. They didn't take off when they first air but over the years they became wildly popular and drew in high ratings. And yes it doesn't help either if you can't find when the show is on.
When you have nothing else better to do than write on the merit of the names of programs. Names of programs don't matter as much as the popularity and knowledge of the program.
The biggest case in point is windows. We take for granted we know what it is but go to any 3rd world country or any tribe and ask them what windows is and they'll look at you as if you have two heads. Or just ask anyone without exposure to a computer yet what windows is and they'll probably tell you "its those things in my house that lets me see outside and I can open up to get air"
So what I'm trying to say is both os' have both good and bad names but if the program is GOOD(as in gets the job done) no one is gonna give an f about how well the program is named.
There's no reason to report a successful, legal, pleasant experience on eBay, but people love to read about how others got ripped off. And those that get ripped off complain louder than those who have not will 'advertise' their non-fraudulent experience..
That's the way everything works but reading these comments here on slashdot its not so much the ripping off part people are complaining about more so than the lack of care for ebay to do anything about it.
With that said time for my obliged ebay stories:). I've been frauded once(not a major scammer just some punk kid trying to make a quick buck) and a couple of bad experiences. The time I was frauded was for a autograph from a band member, about 25 bucks, which is in line for a band like this and I did get the money back months later.
My other problems involved inexperienced sellers. People who see ebay as a quick way to make a buck so they jump on the bandwagon and they are unsure how to handle the volume and/or requests. I'm not referring to professional sellers too I'm referring to regular people trying to make money selling things. I think this problem is as much or more so of a problem than fraud. The cases I have for this are people who say are selling a legit dvd(shows the real dvd in the ad) and end up giving you a bootleg copy(this happen to my g.f.), sellers who somehow run out of merchandise and I bought a religious book one time, cheap thing about 2 bucks. Never heard back never thought much of it since it was only 2 bucks and almost a year later I get my check back with a note saying "I do not know what this check is for."
These 3 to 4 bad exepriences though don't outweight the 20+ times I was sucessful, the last time scoring an awesome vintage replica brand new sealed new york rangers jersey:). But yea it sux to get frauded but unfortunately as a medium as big and not always having good organizatioin like ebay you got to expect it. Doesn't make it right but it happens.
That makes me glad I don't partake in online banking:)
On that note I can see both sides of the issues. I can see the concern of those who use online banking but at the same time if your virus infected machine somehow infects the banks servers(shouldn't be an issue but you never know) or causes all of your money in your accounts wiped out, guess who has to spend valuable resources to clean up your mess?
While I don't deny what you and other posts are taking about with your priveledges taking away because you are now a "security risk", I feel the bigger security risk is the time period when you know you are going to leave and didn't tell the company yet. If somebody is willing to compromise the company, they'll be smart enough and do it during this period. Just makes more sense because why compromise the company when all eyes are on youwhen you could do it beforehand with little if any resistance?
I can't help but feel too part of it is bitterness on the company for leaving. Anyhow this whole thread is helpful 'cause I want to leave my current company soon and I don't think my company will go to that extreme(quite frankly were undermanned so they can't afford to) but at least I know what I could possibly expect in the future.
..which looks to see if it can clear that part of the system so that it can be updated. If it can do that, it does, and that happens without a reboot
Knowing windows, it'll probably have a million critical services which each accesses a different part of the system thus making this concept for windows null and void.
I wish I had a Bible near me to post the appropriate quote but since I don't I'll just go on to paraphrase the point: beware of wolf in sheeps clothing and many who say they are of Christ and appear to be that of Christ are not and you know them by their works. While I do agree with many points(and thus why I posted up the previous saying) I do have to disagree with some of yours especially:
God does not want societal laws to mandate morality and ethics in people who do not want to adhere to them. and God would not want laws against murder
What God wants is to give God His due praise and obey His will and in doing His will is obeying God's commandments which includes "thou shalt not kill"
But yea I definately agree many of the "christians" who are the most vocal are doing it for their own personal gain rather than that of God's.
Slashdot Mirror
Our right to privacy is eroding in the information age, well all know that. There's not even an expectation of privacy when you bring your computer into for repair. I mean how can you have high expectations or any realistic expectations for that matter when you're getting your computer fixed but someone who is likely a young kid barely making over the minimum wage? It's a harsh fact not too many people like but that's the way it is. You have to be proactive with your privacy nowadays and if you don't want to take those proactive measures(installing antivirus, asking about privacy policies, etc) don't expect to have any.
Still, by whatever means the discovery came doesn't change the fact what this guy did is WRONG and he needs some serious help.
In ending, as the good book says, "You reap what you sow"
And what about the guy wasting the companies time and money by searching sites he shouldn't be searching instead of being productive for work? I know we all tend to slack off at work at times(human nature and the way business goes) but you should know your boundaries and don't get carried away.
In today's politically correct environment, I don't care if he was 2 days into a new job or 2 days from retiring he deserves to be fired because everyone with a half of brain knows surfing porn/having sexual talk on company's time is a big no no. Granted the motives behind IBM's decision could be sly and I'm not in favor of that corporation at all but regardless, keep your act clean.
Except managmenet don't give an f about letting you know you do a good job(and also in this day and age its rare to get thx for doing a good job from ANYONE), they only care when something goes wrong and you get yelled at, your fault or not. Im all for it though cause its a sobering thought to know that someone out there will take the time to apreciate.
You are right. I don't completely agree with the list either. M$ matters, Sony matters. Why do they matter? We live in a capitlistic society and they have money beyond our wildest imaginations. Money talks and is the most important thing in the equation. Granted having a brilliant idea and the consumer are high on my list too but if your idea doesn't get any financial backing, it'll never see the light of day.
Yes I definately agree with your sentiment. Being a New Yorker myself, I know how stressful that time was. I do appreciate what labor unions did in the past and what they accomplish but the fact is, nowadays there just breeding grounds for lazy employees who know they can't be fired short of murdering someone on the job, and they get better benefits the most but that's never enough for them. Now I know not all union workers are like that but there's enough of them and enough corruption at top to make unions no better than management. You don't need to look farther than professional sports to see how absurd unions have become.
I have to agree with you. I called Dell technical support once for my company over a bad power supply and they still put my through hurdles when I explain in detail what the problem is. "Is the power cord plugged in? (Though I do understand why she asked this question) Do you see a green light button on? Can you reseat the memory for me, the memory is a component that looks like a chocolate bar(no joke she really said that)"
In my experience though, business level support is a little better. Most the time they seem to have a better idea and understanding. Not all(as I still had a few bad experiences in that end too) but most. And if I give them a detail description of the problem(at least in IBM's case, Dell is still another story) they won't hassle me. They'll send out the part I need and that's that. I'm not sure how much the business level support people get paid but I have a hunch its more than $7/hr.
Do I feel for someone for having a cs degree and not being able to find a better job? Of course I do. I was and sometimes still am in the same boat as with I'm sure many other on here. Am I surprised she gets paid only $7 for the reasons many of you pointed out already? Not at all.
I have your military secrets right here! It's yours for only 3 easy payments of 19.95?! That's right only 19.95! And if you act now before you finish reading this post, we'll throw in keys to the pentagon, absolutely FREE!!!! *NY residents must pay sales tax. Offer only good in the continent u.s.
On that note I'm not ready to leave IT in the short term though. Two years in the business world is ALOT of time and who knows maybe things will change for the better. They could change for the worse too but it's still worth it to wait and see for me as I am a relative newbie.
Plus everything always looking greener on the other side. Case in point I mention how I'm on the fence, an accountant I know was contemplating leaving his field to get into being a network admin. There are alot of other stressful, not always well paid career fields and knowing that alone has kept me from acting hastily.
Amen brother. That is exactly my plan except I havn't found a job yet :) Right now I'm a system admin in the New York area, 3 years exp, making 42k(living at home because 42k is not enough to afford to live on your own in nyc/long island area). I want to move out of state for personal and financial reasons. I may settle for the same salary though I'm looking for at least 50k 'cause moving virtually anywhere else in the country it'll still be a raise because of cost of living factors plus I would finally be able to afford living on my own.
Thank youm I was about to say something like that. And granted it's not the city but long island, the outskirts of the city, can, will and have gotten hurricanes. Not nearly as often as the south does and not always as strong but I figure we average one hurricane in every 10 years. The one we had in the mid 80's, hurricane gloria did alot of damage and we were without power for a week.
What brought the south to the ground was the levee's breaking because *surprise surprise* no one wanted to fix them. If the levee's were properly maintained the south would of survived the hurricane.
Well that's kind of a catch 22. If your beating up the bully then in turn you are the bully now! :)
I do know what my only option is but its still sad the ceo can't see the value of IT, he only looks at it in terms of cost burden.
You go that right more than you know. Not only are they redoing the same movies but they're reusing similar story lines. Like the new amanda bynes movie where she poses as a man(don't remember the name nor do i care to). That's already been done in "lady bugs" and "just one of the guys".
That was one of my biggest concerns when I picked up my tivo box a year and a half ago. The only reason I was concerned is because Tivo was a experiment for me to see if I would like it(as this is my first box) and I wanted the lifetime option(which I did end up doing). I was concerned about the box dying on me 366 days later and then me being assed out $300 dollars in investing in the life time plan. Now that I'm near the break even point(the money saved from me doing the lifetime option as compared to monthly payments) it doesnt bother me anymore.
To add I enjoy my Tivo experience and so long as I can fast forward commericials, record my favortie programs and tranfer those programs on my computer as Tivo allows you to(with some caveats of course) I'll remain happy. Wether I'll be a loyal Tivo customer depends upon how long this box lasts and the next subsequent box I'll get....
The government is not as much as a concern for me(since I'm confident enough people would freak out if they tried anything stupid to make them think otherwise) but google and the other companies I'm concerned with. They have very little guidelines or laws on what to do with the data and can pretty much do as they please with it. It's not always the known "evil" ones you have to watch out for. Its the ones that are pointing the finger at other people trying to get you to buy into their "don't be evil" mentality you need to keep both eyes on.
My gut agrees with you but I am torn. If this were English class you would get an F Mr. Taco!!!!! Of course being geeks how many of us care about proper English :)
Now here's why I am torn. I know I make grammatical errors all the time when I reply to topics so how can I hold anyone else in an informal setting when I can't do the same thing myself. BUT a part of me can't help but ask why not copy and paste into a text editor and do a quick simple spell check that'll pick up most if not all the spelling errors.
I have no sympathy for the guy either but IBM is a bigger crook. Where's the justice on IBM for having the balls to quote a price of 2 grand(no I'm not exaggerating) to change out of freaking myrinet cable?! And while they are out the money in the grand scheme of things I somehow doubt IBM misses a mere few grand in their multi-billion dollar operation.
I agree with you on both accounts. You have to give a show some time to develop. I mean look at shows like full house and seinfeld. They didn't take off when they first air but over the years they became wildly popular and drew in high ratings. And yes it doesn't help either if you can't find when the show is on.
The biggest case in point is windows. We take for granted we know what it is but go to any 3rd world country or any tribe and ask them what windows is and they'll look at you as if you have two heads. Or just ask anyone without exposure to a computer yet what windows is and they'll probably tell you "its those things in my house that lets me see outside and I can open up to get air"
So what I'm trying to say is both os' have both good and bad names but if the program is GOOD(as in gets the job done) no one is gonna give an f about how well the program is named.
That's the way everything works but reading these comments here on slashdot its not so much the ripping off part people are complaining about more so than the lack of care for ebay to do anything about it.
With that said time for my obliged ebay stories :). I've been frauded once(not a major scammer just some punk kid trying to make a quick buck) and a couple of bad experiences. The time I was frauded was for a autograph from a band member, about 25 bucks, which is in line for a band like this and I did get the money back months later.
My other problems involved inexperienced sellers. People who see ebay as a quick way to make a buck so they jump on the bandwagon and they are unsure how to handle the volume and/or requests. I'm not referring to professional sellers too I'm referring to regular people trying to make money selling things. I think this problem is as much or more so of a problem than fraud. The cases I have for this are people who say are selling a legit dvd(shows the real dvd in the ad) and end up giving you a bootleg copy(this happen to my g.f.), sellers who somehow run out of merchandise and I bought a religious book one time, cheap thing about 2 bucks. Never heard back never thought much of it since it was only 2 bucks and almost a year later I get my check back with a note saying "I do not know what this check is for."
These 3 to 4 bad exepriences though don't outweight the 20+ times I was sucessful, the last time scoring an awesome vintage replica brand new sealed new york rangers jersey :). But yea it sux to get frauded but unfortunately as a medium as big and not always having good organizatioin like ebay you got to expect it. Doesn't make it right but it happens.
On that note I can see both sides of the issues. I can see the concern of those who use online banking but at the same time if your virus infected machine somehow infects the banks servers(shouldn't be an issue but you never know) or causes all of your money in your accounts wiped out, guess who has to spend valuable resources to clean up your mess?
I can't help but feel too part of it is bitterness on the company for leaving. Anyhow this whole thread is helpful 'cause I want to leave my current company soon and I don't think my company will go to that extreme(quite frankly were undermanned so they can't afford to) but at least I know what I could possibly expect in the future.
Knowing windows, it'll probably have a million critical services which each accesses a different part of the system thus making this concept for windows null and void.
God does not want societal laws to mandate morality and ethics in people who do not want to adhere to them. and God would not want laws against murder
What God wants is to give God His due praise and obey His will and in doing His will is obeying God's commandments which includes "thou shalt not kill"
But yea I definately agree many of the "christians" who are the most vocal are doing it for their own personal gain rather than that of God's.