People use paypal for lack of a better alternative. Most people don't have any problem. That doesn't make it ok, of course. But it's difficult and prohibitively expensive (and even more risky than paypal), to set yourself up to accept credit cards and checks, for what amounts to a yard sale.
Paypal fills a niche that is in high demand, but not high enough that anyone else has overtaken them. By "anyone else", I mean, say, Wells Fargo comes out with an Internet-Auction account that fits the use case currently dominated by paypal. That's part of it. The other part is that the sellers would need to adopt it.
Sellers accept paypal, and it's important that they do. Many buyers won't even consider a seller who does not accept paypal, because it's the only convenient way to do transactions. A check can add up to a month to the transaction. Anything that requires the buyer to get out of his chair, is going to lose to a competiting auction that allows the entire transaction from order to payment to delivery, without moving a muscle.
I really do wonder why the banks never picked up on this niche.
"If these folks do their homework, they'd note a preponderance of e-voting initiatives are being pushed in majority Democratic districts."
Why would it make sense for the Repubs to push their stuff in Repub areas? Of *course* they want their machines in Democrat territory! They already *have* their own turf covered, no need to manipulate anything there!
I think it would put a lot of people in their place, if one or more states whose constitutions allowed it, decided to send their electors by vote of the legislature, and not by an at-large election.
Check your state constitution, it's quite likely that there is nothing in there that actually requires the electors to be chosen in a popular vote election. With all the talk of manipulated voting machines, or federal cancellations, or any of the other issues, I think it would be very interesting if a state legislature were to decide on that state's electors.
I checked your old post, hoping to find out that you had predicted the title would be "Revenge of the Sith." I was disappointed, and you're not entitled to do the i-told-you-so dance.
" When the Blair Witch Project came out, they had a website set up and designed to look so realistic that many, many people actually believed it. "
The thing about the Blair Witch movie was the limited intelligence that was released at first.
I had heard vague things about a movie that was put together from some dead guy's video tapes.
That's *it*. That's *all* I knew. From that I had no reason to believe or disbelieve anything, because there was nothing to the rumor to base any heavy opinions on. I just thought, sure, okay, cool, morbid, weird, but my bullshit meter didn't go off. Now, soon after that I heard that it was a ghost story and immediately realised that it was bogus, and was being passed off as a genuine documentary.
It was a *long* time before I actually understood that the filmmakers hadn't meant for it to be received as a documentary. I'm not convinced to this day. Never saw the film though. If it had really been made from some dead guy's camera, that would have been cool...
"Bank One" tellers will actaully instruct you to make your deposits at the ATM. I stood in line, went to the teller window to make a deposit, and was asked to make it at the ATM. It was the first strike against Bank One. Strike 2: They charged an overdraft fee on the overdraft that was caused by an overdraft fee. Strike 3: They refused to cancel an account that was opened in Texas, from a branch bank in Arizona. They made this impossible. I would have been forced to travel to Texas in person in order to close the account!
Needless to say, Bank One won't have me as a customer again, but it's hard to avoid using their ATMs sometimes.
Since when does Linux adoption and advocacy require a "compelling reason?"
There's a compelling reason to use Linux in *my* studio. Yeah, I'm an amateur, hobbyist, whatever. I have linux in my rig because I'm making my own synth.
"Because video camera resolution stinks? He's shooting a movie, as in maybe he wants to show it on a big screen and not have it look like a crappy TV show?"
Don't spend so much on consumer/prosumer stuff, that you could rent Panaflex gear. Doubtful that you'd really get into this sort of budget territory, but I've seen people go this far just for minor projects. (Had a roommate who worked for Victor Duncan, so there was some inside dealing involved, obviously.)
"There are lots more supported, I leave it up to you to find the rest in the link above."
Some cards that are unsupported though, happen to be a specific intersection with certain cards that are very commonly used in pro applications.
Now, my argument is, if you're really a pro, you're not looking to install linux on the DAW you already have, any more than someone would consider putting Mac OSX on their Windows DAW, get it? You're looking at linux because it offers a promise of flexibility, and in some areas, higher quality than what you have already. So the argument that DigiDesign or MOTU or Aardvark doesn't have linux support, ought never be raised. The best choice for your linux DAW happens to be the Delta 1010, so the design discussion should start there! Next, the idea that it's going to be easy to setup is out the window also. I wish ALSA exposed ASIO interfaces and gave latency guarantees.
I wish FLStudio and Magix had linux ports. I'm a dyed-in-the-wool linux advocate, but my home studio runs FLStudio and Magix on XP-Pro. However, I can see the promises for the future, being able to optimize the system for audio (kernel and driver tuning, or customization of the apps).
A pro studio isn't going to look at linux as a solution for the DAW. Shouldn't stop them from using linux for file servers and for the service desk though...
You're one of the many that *say* they do, but do you have a credible scenario that leads to rebellion? Here's mine: The federal government orders troops ("agents") to "assist" with the elections. Then, these agents get orders to stop elections (for your safety, you know.) But certain states have sent their militias with orders to ensure that the elections are not to be interfered with, and no exception is made for federal agents. So the irresistable force of federal authority meets the immovable force of a state militia.
I can imagine a shot fired in defense of states' rights and sovreignty, in that scenario.
What I cannot picture is anything resembling random individuals against US forces, nor can I see any issue divisive enough to engender the sort of hostile disloyalty that could cause factions to form within the military.
People talk a good fight, but by and large are not really all that upset.
> My guess is more that it's a typical IT... BS > statement
Of course, but, most of the time, IT BS doesn't amount to as high a crime as treason. Denying a freedom of information act request without solid cause, might be.
You're totally wrong. I've been downright harrassed by AT&T. They call very early in the morning on weekends, which is an offense guaranteed to get you a scalding response from a grumpy old man (me.)
What's more, AT&T is a competitor of my company (at least in the voip area), and keeps trying to sell me their voip plan or else sell themselves as a local provider. I make it absolutely crystal clear every single time they call that I do not want to hear from them again under any circumstances, and that the reason I cancelled my AT&T long distance was because of their ceaseless marketing attempts to sell me on their local plan.
You're the boss, and you've framed the problem in such a way that there isn't one. But don't complain when your solution ceases to scale. What works for 208 clients won't work for 28,000 necessarily.
I think a lot of people who use console apps don't realize that you can get high resolution text consoles using the framebuffer support, and that it is even possible to get high resolution, accelerated graphics modes without using X.
I find the framebuffer console to be the ultimate interface, period. I am especially fond of the 160x64 character mode, and sometimes use higher resolutions than that. However, in recent kernels, that is, since 2.5 and all through 2.6, the framebuffer support has been very broken for all three video devices where I need it, Radeon 8500LE, Trident Cyberblade/A1, and NForce2.
On some of these, I can compromise and still use vesafb, but not on the NForce. The kernel developers do not seem concerned at all with this problem, and 2.6.x kernels continue to be released with broken framebuffer console drives marked as stable.
I think too many people think of 80 column screens when they think of the console, and that I am very much in the minority in that I greatly prefer the native console in linux, together with fbconsole for wider screens, to ANY X terminal solution. Nevertheless, I don't understand how such a significant feature makes it into a stable kernel without being marked as experimental, when it is clearly broken.
In particular, the device for the Radeon really bothers me, because it worked perfectly in 2.4, and then broke for 2.6, and remains broken despite my persistent reports.
You might find it much more effective to put your club calendar on a web page, doesn't have to be any fancier than whatever you email out. All 208 members of your club know to look there for updates.
This approach beats the "spamming out the newsletter to a list" approach, hands down. Especially when your list grows past manageable sizes.
If you want to operate a mailing list for your interest group, there are good ways to go about that. If you want to dissemenate information periodically, there are much more effective ways than email, more reliable, an overall better use of resources, easier to manage, and just plain the right way to do things.
Why not? You're free to do anything that's not illegal. And if the state wants to call something illegal, they are obliged to make such laws in a way that does not conflict with the Constitution.
If you want to live in a country where the only rights the people have are those that are specifically granted, and only those rights are granted, you have choices.
1. Persuade Congress and the voters among the States to agree with you, and amend the Constitution to fit your preferred model.
2. Move to a country whose government better fits your beliefs.
In the US, the very essence of "freedom" is that you are free to do anything that's not specifically forbidden. You seem to want to turn that on its head:
The 10th Amendment is an important pillar in the basis of the entire system.
You are not constrained only to those rights that are enumerated. It's the opposite. You have *every* right not specifically abridged.
The whole point of the Constitution is to establish a government wherein the State is fully empowered except in the specific ways it is constrained. You, as a citizen of the state, are likewise granted all rights not prohibited by the state.
This is pretty much the basis of what we call "freedom."
"I think there is a big flaw with the airlines in that anyone can purchase an airline ticket for anyone else."
I don't understand. I buy plane tickets for other people all the time. You have to give the passenger's name. They have to check in with ID that jibes with that name. What's the problem?
Slashdot Mirror
"Remember that they're not a bank, so they can fuck you any way they want to. "
You're suggesting that merely "not being a bank"
excuses one from the rule of law. I don't think it's that simple.
People use paypal for lack of a better alternative.
Most people don't have any problem. That doesn't make it ok, of course. But it's difficult and prohibitively expensive (and even more risky than paypal), to set yourself up to accept credit cards and checks, for what amounts to a yard sale.
Paypal fills a niche that is in high demand, but not high enough that anyone else has overtaken them. By "anyone else", I mean, say, Wells Fargo comes out with an Internet-Auction account that fits the use case currently dominated by paypal. That's part of it. The other part is that the sellers would need to adopt it.
Sellers accept paypal, and it's important that they do. Many buyers won't even consider a seller who does not accept paypal, because it's the only convenient way to do transactions. A check can add up to a month to the transaction. Anything that requires the buyer to get out of his chair, is going to lose to a competiting auction that allows the entire transaction from order to payment to delivery, without moving a muscle.
I really do wonder why the banks never picked up on this niche.
"If these folks do their homework, they'd note a preponderance of e-voting initiatives are being pushed in majority Democratic districts."
Why would it make sense for the Repubs to push their stuff in Repub areas? Of *course* they want their machines in Democrat territory! They already *have* their own turf covered, no need to manipulate anything there!
I think it would put a lot of people in their place, if one or more states whose constitutions allowed it, decided to send their electors by vote of the legislature, and not by an at-large election.
Check your state constitution, it's quite likely that there is nothing in there that actually requires the electors to be chosen in a popular vote election. With all the talk of manipulated voting machines, or federal cancellations, or any of the other issues, I think it would be very interesting if a state legislature were to decide on that state's electors.
I checked your old post, hoping to find out that you had predicted the title would be "Revenge of the Sith." I was disappointed, and you're not entitled to do the i-told-you-so dance.
Ah, Bank of America, founded a merchant in Little Italy in order to exploit ("assist") people whose lives were destroyed in the '06 fire.
" When the Blair Witch Project came out, they had a website set up and designed to look so realistic that many, many people actually believed it. "
The thing about the Blair Witch movie was the limited intelligence that was released at first.
I had heard vague things about a movie that was put together from some dead guy's video tapes.
That's *it*. That's *all* I knew. From that I had no reason to believe or disbelieve anything, because there was nothing to the rumor to base any heavy opinions on. I just thought, sure, okay, cool, morbid, weird, but my bullshit meter didn't go off. Now, soon after that I heard that it was a ghost story and immediately realised that it was bogus, and was being passed off as a genuine documentary.
It was a *long* time before I actually understood that the filmmakers hadn't meant for it to be received as a documentary. I'm not convinced to this day. Never saw the film though. If it had really been made from some dead guy's camera, that would have been cool...
"Bank One" tellers will actaully instruct you to make your deposits at the ATM. I stood in line, went to the teller window to make a deposit, and was asked to make it at the ATM. It was the first strike against Bank One. Strike 2: They charged an overdraft fee on the overdraft that was caused by an overdraft fee. Strike 3: They refused to cancel an account that was opened in Texas, from a branch bank in Arizona. They made this impossible. I would have been forced to travel to Texas in person in order to close the account!
Needless to say, Bank One won't have me as a customer again, but it's hard to avoid using their ATMs sometimes.
"My favourite ATM is a local drive-thru in Connecticut. It has keys marked in braille."
Then it's a good thing blind people in CT won't have to give their PIN to the taxi driver, isn't it?
Since when does Linux adoption and advocacy require a "compelling reason?"
There's a compelling reason to use Linux in *my* studio. Yeah, I'm an amateur, hobbyist, whatever. I have linux in my rig because I'm making my own synth.
"Because video camera resolution stinks? He's shooting a movie, as in maybe he wants to show it on a big screen and not have it look like a crappy TV show?"
Don't spend so much on consumer/prosumer stuff, that you could rent Panaflex gear. Doubtful that you'd really get into this sort of budget territory, but I've seen people go this far just for minor projects. (Had a roommate who worked for Victor Duncan, so there was some inside dealing involved, obviously.)
>and what is the price btw?
About five grand. But there are quite a few accessories you're going to want...
"Good lighting is EVERYTHING when it comes to video and film."
The ability to sync audio to video while keeping everything in the digital domain is pretty important too.
"Oh no! Another $30 per year (if you read the article) in order to download all the free music you want for four years?"
Only the music that *they* want you to hear, not all the music you want.
"There are lots more supported, I leave it up to you to find the rest in the link above."
Some cards that are unsupported though, happen to be a specific intersection with certain cards that are very commonly used in pro applications.
Now, my argument is, if you're really a pro, you're not looking to install linux on the DAW you already have, any more than someone would consider putting Mac OSX on their Windows DAW, get it? You're looking at linux because it offers a promise of flexibility, and in some areas, higher quality than what you have already.
So the argument that DigiDesign or MOTU or Aardvark doesn't have linux support, ought never be raised. The best choice for your linux DAW happens to be the Delta 1010, so the design discussion should start there! Next, the idea that it's going to be easy to setup is out the window also. I wish ALSA exposed ASIO interfaces and gave latency guarantees.
I wish FLStudio and Magix had linux ports. I'm a dyed-in-the-wool linux advocate, but my home studio runs FLStudio and Magix on XP-Pro. However, I can see the promises for the future, being able to optimize the system for audio (kernel and driver tuning, or customization of the apps).
A pro studio isn't going to look at linux as a solution for the DAW. Shouldn't stop them from using linux for file servers and for the service desk though...
"Yeah , because it's so important that you be able to make a phone call.
More important than national security"
Communications infrastructure *is* national security.
> Am I the only one that smells civil war coming?
You're one of the many that *say* they do, but do you have a credible scenario that leads to rebellion? Here's mine: The federal government orders troops ("agents") to "assist" with the elections. Then, these agents get orders to stop elections (for your safety, you know.) But certain states have sent their militias with orders to ensure that the elections are not to be interfered with, and no exception is made for federal agents. So the irresistable force of federal authority meets the immovable force of a state militia.
I can imagine a shot fired in defense of states' rights and sovreignty, in that scenario.
What I cannot picture is anything resembling random individuals against US forces, nor can I see any issue divisive enough to engender the sort of hostile disloyalty that could cause factions to form within the military.
People talk a good fight, but by and large are not really all that upset.
Don't forget the tantalum.
> My guess is more that it's a typical IT ... BS
> statement
Of course, but, most of the time, IT BS doesn't amount to as high a crime as treason. Denying a freedom of information act request without solid cause, might be.
You're totally wrong. I've been downright harrassed by AT&T. They call very early in the morning on weekends, which is an offense guaranteed to get you a scalding response from a grumpy old man (me.)
What's more, AT&T is a competitor of my company (at least in the voip area), and keeps trying to sell me their voip plan or else sell themselves as a local provider. I make it absolutely crystal clear every single time they call that I do not want to hear from them again under any circumstances, and that the reason I cancelled my AT&T long distance was because of their ceaseless marketing attempts to sell me on their local plan.
>What other way is there than e-mail for this?
You're the boss, and you've framed the problem in such a way that there isn't one. But don't complain when your solution ceases to scale. What works for 208 clients won't work for 28,000 necessarily.
I think a lot of people who use console apps don't realize that you can get high resolution text consoles using the framebuffer support, and that it is even possible to get high resolution, accelerated graphics modes without using X.
I find the framebuffer console to be the ultimate interface, period. I am especially fond of the 160x64 character mode, and sometimes use higher resolutions than that. However, in recent kernels, that is, since 2.5 and all through 2.6, the framebuffer support has been very broken for all three video devices where I need it, Radeon 8500LE, Trident Cyberblade/A1, and NForce2.
On some of these, I can compromise and still use vesafb, but not on the NForce. The kernel developers do not seem concerned at all with this problem, and 2.6.x kernels continue to be released with broken framebuffer console drives marked as stable.
I think too many people think of 80 column screens when they think of the console, and that I am very much in the minority in that I greatly prefer the native console in linux, together with fbconsole for wider screens, to ANY X terminal solution.
Nevertheless, I don't understand how such a significant feature makes it into a stable kernel without being marked as experimental, when it is clearly broken.
In particular, the device for the Radeon really bothers me, because it worked perfectly in 2.4, and then broke for 2.6, and remains broken despite my persistent reports.
You might find it much more effective to put your club calendar on a web page, doesn't have to be any fancier than whatever you email out. All 208 members of your club know to look there for updates.
This approach beats the "spamming out the newsletter to a list" approach, hands down. Especially when your list grows past manageable sizes.
If you want to operate a mailing list for your interest group, there are good ways to go about that. If you want to dissemenate information periodically, there are much more effective ways than email, more reliable, an overall better use of resources, easier to manage, and just plain the right way to do things.
> I think not...
Why not? You're free to do anything that's not illegal. And if the state wants to call something illegal, they are obliged to make such laws in a way that does not conflict with the Constitution.
If you want to live in a country where the only rights the people have are those that are specifically granted, and only those rights are granted, you have choices.
1. Persuade Congress and the voters among the States to agree with you, and amend the Constitution to fit your preferred model.
2. Move to a country whose government better fits your beliefs.
In the US, the very essence of "freedom" is that you are free to do anything that's not specifically forbidden. You seem to want to turn that on its head:
Anything not MANDATORY is EXPRESSLY FORBIDDEN.
The 10th Amendment is an important pillar in the basis of the entire system.
You are not constrained only to those rights that are enumerated. It's the opposite. You have *every* right not specifically abridged.
The whole point of the Constitution is to establish a government wherein the State is fully empowered except in the specific ways it is constrained. You, as a citizen of the state, are likewise granted all rights not prohibited by the state.
This is pretty much the basis of what we call "freedom."
"I think there is a big flaw with the airlines in that anyone can purchase an airline ticket for anyone else."
I don't understand. I buy plane tickets for other people all the time. You have to give the passenger's name. They have to check in with ID that jibes with that name. What's the problem?