It is a specious argument at best, that a causal relationship exists between prohibition and organized crime. The government grossly underestimated the task of enforcing the prohibition of alcohol. Today, the DEA budget is 11 billion dollars. That would have been approximately 800 million 1930 dollars. Today, we understand the magnitude of such a task.
Mayor Laguardia was arguing in favor of a repeal of the 18th amendment when he said "It would take a police force of 250,000 to enforce the Prohibition Act". I wonder how he would respond to today's police force of 650,000?
"anti-drug laws created more problems then they ever solved."
There may be evidence to support that opinion, but the vast majority of the public adamantly disagrees. Federal drug policy has been a success. Drug use has been reduced by 50% since 1982, and cocaine use alone has declined by 75% since 1987.
My recommendation is for Alcohol to be placed under DEA control as a Schedule II narcotic, and Tobacco under Schedule I. By eliminating these two deadly exceptions to Federal anti-drug laws, the DEA can operate without being criticized for hypocrisy. Also, the ATF can concentrate on controlling explosives and firearms.
>I mean, poor american taxpayers, how much are >you paying a year now to try and keep those >dangerous stoners from running amok?
Eleven Billion Dollars.
I've decided that no "legalization" or "decriminialization" effort will ever work. So I am seeking support for an effort to have Alcohol classified as a Schedule II narcotic, and Tobacco as Schedule I (tobacco has no known medical uses), and placed under DEA authority as Federally controlled substances.
Our society does not tolerate the use of dangerous drugs. Federal enforcement of drug control regulations is a success. Alcohol is a dangerous drug, and the people have consistently shown an inability to use it without causing death and destruction. If you have a medical reason for using alcohol, then you should be able to get a prescription for it. Otherwise, possession and sale should be treated exactly like the other dangerous drugs.
Re:Am I the only one who is not surprised by this?
on
Examining Microsoft Update
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
>This has got to stop.
Why do you say that it has "got to stop?"
Do you thing the DOJ consists of a group of people who took power via a coup d'ètat? Or do you concede that the Department consists of individuals who have been appointed by elected executives and confirmed by an elected Congress?
Whether the current government is a true expression of the will of the American people, or the current government is a result of our apathy (even antipathy) toward the democratic process and the political party structure, it is not reasonable to wait until a crisis at the Federal level to take action.
"Something" can be done. In twelve years or less, the Federal government will be largely composed of individuals who are at this moment seeking State and local office. If you have not developed a relationship with these politicians or their parties NOW, while they are accessible, and if you have not participated in the process of putting them in office by CAMPAIGNING and VOTING, you may find yourself in precisely the same position a decade from now, claiming to be powerless to affect the process, and demanding that "something" be done.
Something *is* done, and the people who make a priority of participation in the political process of this country are the people who shape government. Whether you choose to participate or not, you are still part of the process.
You laugh, but parodies have been roundly protected. Even risqé parodies.
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/metaschool/fisher/d om ain/tmcases/llbean.htm
I note that the site has already been updated to acknowledge the trademark status, justice was served by people doing the Right Thing, and there's nothing to see here.
I would go as far as to characterize it as a gentle encouragement to give credit to the people responsible. Dictionaries routinely note what words are trademarks. Websters does it with "trademark for" in italics. There's already a place for etymology.
There's nothing in US trademark law that actually requires anyone to engage in hostile actions just to protect the trademark. The problem though, is that in order to prevail in a trademark dilution case, the plantiff needs evidence, and the best way to get the evidence is by creating a paper trail -- hence, the C&D letters.
If you don't like it, why the hell did you ignore the political process that gave us 1996?
>your server will have been trained to ask "is >Pepsi okay,"
You are spot on there -- and I think that Pepsi missed the boat. Instead of being "okay", which is to imply that it's somehow a lesser substitute, the server should say something like "we offer Pepsi here." Or whatever magic would make the customers think they're getting a better treat. Much, much too late of course. Coke is Coke, and everything else is Not Coke, no matter what it may be, and Pepsi has gotten a little bit of mindshare to be something maybe a little above "Not Coke", but only a little, and mainly because it is sold in situations where Coke is not, and the customer must do something to tide himself over until the next Coke Fix.
"Is Pepsi OK?" indeed. They should have trained the servers to act as if the customer had ordered urine, and recommend Pepsi as if it will be their very salvation. Apologizing for having Pepsi just makes Coke stronger.
Re:ok, so he removes it from his lexicon so what?
on
Verbing Weirds Google
·
· Score: 1, Offtopic
"Kleenexes"
Well, if you believe Latin is truly dead and not merely resting, you're correct. OTOH, if you believe that Latin is still evolving...
Kleenex looks like it should either be a feminine third declension noun, like "codex" becomes "codices"
kleenex, kleenicis, kleenici
or masculine, like rex
kleenex, kleenegis, kleenegi
And before anyone jumps down my throat about it, the plural of thermos is thermoi. (Greek, not Latin).
>I love my American friends, but if anybody needs >regime change, it's the USA.
Well, there's one scheduled. If the conservative party stays in power on the same sort of technicalities as last time, expect a peoples' revolution to ensue.
>I work with Americans every day
I am afraid that the ones I will associate with are far outnumbered by the ones I would not. I am also afraid to say they represent a hostile, xenophobic society that sees nothing wrong with killing of innocent people for their own benefit, although they do not have the stomach to do the killing directly.
I'd be willing to buy the theory that another party, unknown to Oswald, ALSO saw the unique opportunity for a presidential hit, and seized it. In other words, Oswald himself couldn't have identified the "co-conspirators" because he never knew they existed. There was more than one group or individual with a sincere motive to assassinate president K.
Area 51 is no more or less guarded than any other US military post, which is to say, if you have no business there, you won't get in. The same goes for shopping centers on base... If they have experimental aircraft there, you're damn right it'll be kept under a mysterious veil of secrecy.
Given the enigmatic nature of "area 51" itself, if I were commanding that post, I'd nurture the mystery. Then, a few miles away in a nondescript area, I'd do whatever secret stuff there:-) Watch my left hand... Watch my left hand...
When the students "approached" them, were they responding to flyers that claimed you could "make extra money working at home on the internet?"
I see those EVERYWHERE on my local college campus, and I assume they are exactly something like this. The students got the contact information from somewhere -- they did not all suddenly, independently, decide to offer their services to these folks.
>A riced up Honda civic could probably go faster >then these anachronisms.
Um, you're just trolling right?
Your Honda can probably wax a restrictor plate NASCAR machine on a quarter mile, but wouldn't even qualify for an endurance race. Hell, there are some VW's that can do the 9's on a quarter mile (and have to be rebuilt for each race day!)
There's a world of difference between a quarter mile drag race where your rice boys run, and a sustained stock car run.
OTOH, I'm a lot more impressed with Grand Prix than Daytona...
It appears that the standard record deal amounts to a high-interest loan. Makes me wonder what would happen if the band comes to the a&r's table with some working capital gotten from another source.
If the people screaming about the record label monopoly and unfair practices can prove that you can't negotiate a better deal even if you have your own production capital, there might be the start of an antitrust case. Otherwise, the only advice I can give is, don't sign. Finance your own studio time, cd manufacturing, visual art, and distribution.
To me, the whole matter boils down to "don't count your chickens before they're hatched."
Or even, if you borrowed the chickens, don't be surprised when the owner wants to keep the eggs.
Re:Students think CDs are expensive? No surprise.
on
The Future of the CD
·
· Score: 1
>We were told: "Price are high now, but as soon >as volume gets up there close to cassettes, >production prices will drop, and CDs will be >cheaper."
Yes, we were given that understanding in editorial opinions in hi-fi magazines, not in writing from the production companies.
The companies tested the market, found the limits of what the market will bear, proved they could ask a certain price and get it, and they continue to get that price. If volume goes down, they should adjust the price according to the demand curve. If that is not possible without costs overtaking revenue, then they should stop producing the product.
The big thing that throws a monkey wrench into the natural balance of the system is the widespread accpeptance of the idea that "internet piracy" is the key factor affecting the demand curve of the CD. If there were some way to eliminate that variable and still show that the CD is not in the same demand as it has been historically, then the production companies would have to look at their business model and adjust.
As long as the general public continues to believe that widespread copying of media is to blame for the decreased demand, we can expect "Them" to try any and all methods of eliminating copying as a variable, including of course, lobbying for harsher legislation.
You are looking at the Documents created with the system. The other poster was speculating that DMCA restrictions can be used to prohibit the development of another compatable system.
"Monopolies" and "Cartels" don't really enter into it.
Congressmen come from State and local politicians. These are elected based on apathy, and the jobs are not considered to be worth much except as starting points for national politics.
If we would simply be involved in local government, by actually voting, and by developing personal relationships with the politicians and party staff, we would end up with national politicians who actually represent the will of the people.
Another view, which terrifies me, is that we ARE doing this, and the national politicians DO represent the will of the people. We are greedy, insular hawks who know or care nothing of world politics or domestic diversity.
"Buying and selling black children was allowed by the constitution as was their being treated as slaves and punished unto death by their owners."
And the compromise that allowed the central government to regulate commerce between the states was made in return for the abolitionists' silence.
This was arguably the largest debate that stood in the way of ratification. And some of the founders knew it was a risk factor that could lead to civil war, and they wrote about it.
The Constitution did one Right Thing, IMHO: It allowed the States to maintain a certain amount of sovreignty. Considering the wide range of incomatible political views we have in America today, and the social and political differences between regions of the US, I wonder if a little more sovreignty would be a bad thing?
Regrettable that the focus of the civil war is so easily summarized as "slavery". Now, anyone who would argue in favor of a confederacy or other federation, against the total authority of a central State, can be dismissed as pro-slavery. Just like arguing against restraint of speech makes you pro-kiddie-porn, or arguing against the motives of "homeland security" makes you a terrorist, I suppose.
What studies have been published to support the hypothesis?
What was tested, and how? What controls were used?
Moore was making an economic projection in order to formulate a business plan. He was not establishing a new field of theoretical physics. If we had to, and if we could discount the variables of economic incentive and R&D time, we could try to directly approach the theoretical limitations. Maybe find something other than silicon and transistors that will work better than the semiconductors we use today. (We only have made incremental improvements on the same basic structures).
The true appeal of "Moore's Law" is that we have become accustomed to seeing doublings of power in our computing devices. So much so, that any consumer product that doesn't promise twice the speed/capacity of what came before it, won't be all that exciting to us.
There are plenty of industries where a fraction of a percent increase in production will make you a hero, even in electronics engineering.
>If I laid out a serious amount of money to >establish COs and copper to (nearly) every house >in the United States, I'd be a little pissed at >the government for making me open it up to >people who are offering competing services.
If you've paid taxes in the past century, you DID lay out a serious amount of money for that stuff.
The real big problem with broadband is that you can't know whether you are allowed to have it until you try to get it. This has kept me from moving! I would rather stay in my apartment where I have 1.2 megabit dsl, static routing, etc., (costs $109/mo from the ISP + $65/mo from Qwest!), than to try to move without knowing in advance whether I can get the same service. The telco would expect me to move first, close a real estate deal, get a phone line and THEN find out whether or not DSL is available.
If I were to try to move, I would have to do two things. 1. Stay at the current address until the deal is setup at the new one, phone line is installed, DSL is working, THEN cancel the old service and move. This will increase the cost of moving substantially. 2. Ensure that the real estate agent or landlord understands that it's a deal-breaker (escrow money is refunded, deposits returned) if it turns out DSL is not available, and that it might be a month after closing before this is discovered. I'd need that explicitly written into the contract, and absolutely clearly understood by everyone involved.
If I'm looking at a piece of real estate, I want to know what utilities are available, as the very first items to evaluate. I want to know if it has running water, electrical service, natural gas, if there's garbage collection, telephone service, cable tv, and, DSL. Since my career depends on the internet access, it's actually on the same list as running water and electricity. And I can actually work around the lack of water and electricity, but if there's no DSL I'm stuck.
So, why can't I find out BEFORE getting involved with a piece of real estate, whether it has this service available? Also, what kind of approach can I take to force the issue? I don't want to sign a contract or a lease without knowing in advance whether I can get DSL, what signal rate it will support, and what providers will offer the service.
I was routinely asked to report hours different from those worked. When I started asking about this practice, I discovered that it was not simply a matter between me and my employer, but is actually a Federal offence for such a policy to be instituted. Federal offense you ask? Tax fraud. You see, by reporting hours and wages with fabricated numbers, they "save" on their Social Security and Federal Withholding amounts. I think a class action (civil) lawsuit was the wrong way to go against WalMart. If the case was strong enough for a civil suit, it might have been sufficient to command decades-long sentences in Federal Pound-Me-In-The-Ass Prison for the individual managers responsible, and Whopping Huge Bankrupting Fines for the corporation if they were complicit in the crimes.
You simply do not falsify reports of hours worked, wages paid, and taxes withheld. Federal law prohibits this. Screw the class action suit. I would have asked for prosecution under RICO. If the stories are true, these store managers belong in prison, and should not be released until the Segway is old enough to vote.
I'm going a bit further and saying it is a set of features that Linux offers and Windows does not.
Even further, the console support is high on the list of reasons I haven't switched back to Windows + Cygwin! It might be the only reason that I can actually quantify.
The biggest thing I find missing from Windows, is the lack of virtual consoles, in particular, the lack of anything like SVGATextMode or the Framebuffer console.
I mean, sure, I can get an XTerm (Rxvt), or I can run in a "dos box" giving me an 80x25 or 80x50 or 80x60 console. But what I want is the ability to have multiple console ttys, the ability to setup the video mode and font so that I can have things like a 1600x1280 text mode with an 8x8 font on one terminal, and a 1280x1024 mode with a 12x20 font on another terminal, and NOT have these terminals be in managed windows. And they need to be just as efficient as the ones I have under Linux.
Why can't I have this? Or can I? If it's something that "Windows can't do", I get a whole bunch of "neener neener points." If it's something that Windows *can* do, I need to know how to do it.
Virtual terminals. Like Linux. With SVGA text modes and user defined fonts. Please.
Slashdot Mirror
"Prohibition gave rise to the mob"
It is a specious argument at best, that a causal relationship exists between prohibition and organized crime. The government grossly underestimated the task of enforcing the prohibition of alcohol. Today, the DEA budget is 11 billion dollars. That would have been approximately 800 million 1930 dollars. Today, we understand the magnitude of such a task.
Mayor Laguardia was arguing in favor of a repeal of the 18th amendment when he said "It would take a police force of 250,000 to enforce the Prohibition Act". I wonder how he would respond to today's police force of 650,000?
"anti-drug laws created more problems then they ever solved."
There may be evidence to support that opinion, but the vast majority of the public adamantly disagrees. Federal drug policy has been a success. Drug use has been reduced by 50% since 1982, and cocaine use alone has declined by 75% since 1987.
My recommendation is for Alcohol to be placed under DEA control as a Schedule II narcotic, and Tobacco under Schedule I. By eliminating these two deadly exceptions to Federal anti-drug laws, the DEA can operate without being criticized for hypocrisy. Also, the ATF can concentrate on controlling explosives and firearms.
>I mean, poor american taxpayers, how much are
>you paying a year now to try and keep those
>dangerous stoners from running amok?
Eleven Billion Dollars.
I've decided that no "legalization" or "decriminialization" effort will ever work.
So I am seeking support for an effort to have Alcohol classified as a Schedule II narcotic, and Tobacco as Schedule I (tobacco has no known medical uses), and placed under DEA authority as Federally controlled substances.
Our society does not tolerate the use of dangerous drugs. Federal enforcement of drug control regulations is a success. Alcohol is a dangerous drug, and the people have consistently shown an inability to use it without causing death and destruction. If you have a medical reason for using alcohol, then you should be able to get a prescription for it. Otherwise, possession and sale should be treated exactly like the other dangerous drugs.
>This has got to stop.
Why do you say that it has "got to stop?"
Do you thing the DOJ consists of a group of people who took power via a coup d'ètat? Or do you concede that the Department consists of individuals who have been appointed by elected executives and confirmed by an elected Congress?
Whether the current government is a true expression of the will of the American people, or the current government is a result of our apathy (even antipathy) toward the democratic process and the political party structure, it is not reasonable to wait until a crisis at the Federal level to take action.
"Something" can be done. In twelve years or less, the Federal government will be largely composed of individuals who are at this moment seeking State and local office. If you have not developed a relationship with these politicians or their parties NOW, while they are accessible, and if you have not participated in the process of putting them in office by CAMPAIGNING and VOTING, you may find yourself in precisely the same position a decade from now, claiming to be powerless to affect the process, and demanding that "something" be done.
Something *is* done, and the people who make a priority of participation in the political process of this country are the people who shape government. Whether you choose to participate or not, you are still part of the process.
Apathy elects our leaders.
In a fair fight between your First Amendment Right to Freedom of Speech and this patent, who will win?
>Er...shouldn't that be "MicroSHAFTed"?
d om ain/tmcases/llbean.htm
You laugh, but parodies have been roundly protected. Even risqé parodies.
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/metaschool/fisher/
I note that the site has already been updated to acknowledge the trademark status, justice was served by people doing the Right Thing, and there's nothing to see here.
>It is NOT a Cease and Desist letter.
I would go as far as to characterize it as a gentle encouragement to give credit to the people responsible. Dictionaries routinely note what words are trademarks. Websters does it with "trademark for" in italics. There's already a place for etymology.
There's nothing in US trademark law that actually requires anyone to engage in hostile actions just to protect the trademark. The problem though, is that in order to prevail in a trademark dilution case, the plantiff needs evidence, and the best way to get the evidence is by creating a paper trail -- hence, the C&D letters.
If you don't like it, why the hell did you ignore the political process that gave us 1996?
>your server will have been trained to ask "is
>Pepsi okay,"
You are spot on there -- and I think that Pepsi missed the boat. Instead of being "okay", which is to imply that it's somehow a lesser substitute, the server should say something like "we offer Pepsi here." Or whatever magic would make the customers think they're getting a better treat. Much, much too late of course. Coke is Coke, and everything else is Not Coke, no matter what it may be, and Pepsi has gotten a little bit of mindshare to be something maybe a little above "Not Coke", but only a little, and mainly because it is sold in situations where Coke is not, and the customer must do something to tide himself over until the next Coke Fix.
"Is Pepsi OK?" indeed. They should have trained the servers to act as if the customer had ordered urine, and recommend Pepsi as if it will be their very salvation. Apologizing for having Pepsi just makes Coke stronger.
"Kleenexes"
Well, if you believe Latin is truly dead and not merely resting, you're correct. OTOH, if you believe that Latin is still evolving...
Kleenex looks like it should either be a feminine
third declension noun, like "codex" becomes "codices"
kleenex, kleenicis, kleenici
or masculine, like rex
kleenex, kleenegis, kleenegi
And before anyone jumps down my throat about it, the plural of thermos is thermoi. (Greek, not Latin).
>I love my American friends, but if anybody needs
>regime change, it's the USA.
Well, there's one scheduled. If the conservative party stays in power on the same sort of technicalities as last time, expect a peoples' revolution to ensue.
>I work with Americans every day
I am afraid that the ones I will associate with are far outnumbered by the ones I would not. I am also afraid to say they represent a hostile, xenophobic society that sees nothing wrong with killing of innocent people for their own benefit, although they do not have the stomach to do the killing directly.
I'd be willing to buy the theory that another party, unknown to Oswald, ALSO saw the unique opportunity for a presidential hit, and seized it.
:-) Watch my left hand... Watch my left hand...
In other words, Oswald himself couldn't have identified the "co-conspirators" because he never knew they existed. There was more than one group or individual with a sincere motive to assassinate president K.
Area 51 is no more or less guarded than any other US military post, which is to say, if you have no business there, you won't get in. The same goes for shopping centers on base... If they have experimental aircraft there, you're damn right it'll be kept under a mysterious veil of secrecy.
Given the enigmatic nature of "area 51" itself, if I were commanding that post, I'd nurture the mystery. Then, a few miles away in a nondescript area, I'd do whatever secret stuff there
When the students "approached" them, were they responding to flyers that claimed you could "make extra money working at home on the internet?"
I see those EVERYWHERE on my local college campus, and I assume they are exactly something like this. The students got the contact information from somewhere -- they did not all suddenly, independently, decide to offer their services to these folks.
"Is great, having those hours when no-one can contact you."
Just like Gary Kildall, eh?
>A riced up Honda civic could probably go faster
>then these anachronisms.
Um, you're just trolling right?
Your Honda can probably wax a restrictor plate NASCAR machine on a quarter mile, but wouldn't even qualify for an endurance race. Hell, there are some VW's that can do the 9's on a quarter mile (and have to be rebuilt for each race day!)
There's a world of difference between a quarter mile drag race where your rice boys run, and a sustained stock car run.
OTOH, I'm a lot more impressed with Grand Prix than Daytona...
>pouvez vous avoir la grande honte pour traduire
>ceci
Errr, I only got as far as second year French in college, but, what you said is more like:
"Shame on you for translating this?"
>he who thinks he knows everything, knows nothing.
Celui qui pense il sait tout, ne sait pas rien?
It appears that the standard record deal amounts to a high-interest loan. Makes me wonder what would happen if the band comes to the a&r's table with some working capital gotten from another source.
If the people screaming about the record label monopoly and unfair practices can prove that you can't negotiate a better deal even if you have your own production capital, there might be the start of an antitrust case. Otherwise, the only advice I can give is, don't sign. Finance your own studio time, cd manufacturing, visual art, and distribution.
To me, the whole matter boils down to "don't count your chickens before they're hatched."
Or even, if you borrowed the chickens, don't be surprised when the owner wants to keep the eggs.
>We were told: "Price are high now, but as soon
>as volume gets up there close to cassettes,
>production prices will drop, and CDs will be
>cheaper."
Yes, we were given that understanding in editorial opinions in hi-fi magazines, not in writing from the production companies.
The companies tested the market, found the limits of what the market will bear, proved they could ask a certain price and get it, and they continue to get that price. If volume goes down, they should adjust the price according to the demand curve. If that is not possible without costs overtaking revenue, then they should stop producing the product.
The big thing that throws a monkey wrench into the natural balance of the system is the widespread accpeptance of the idea that "internet piracy" is the key factor affecting the demand curve of the CD. If there were some way to eliminate that variable and still show that the CD is not in the same demand as it has been historically, then the production companies would have to look at their business model and adjust.
As long as the general public continues to believe that widespread copying of media is to blame for the decreased demand, we can expect "Them" to try any and all methods of eliminating copying as a variable, including of course, lobbying for harsher legislation.
>How so?
You are looking at the Documents created with the system. The other poster was speculating that DMCA restrictions can be used to prohibit the development of another compatable system.
"Monopolies" and "Cartels" don't really enter into it.
>Remember, these people come from the population.
Congressmen come from State and local politicians.
These are elected based on apathy, and the jobs are not considered to be worth much except as starting points for national politics.
If we would simply be involved in local government, by actually voting, and by developing personal relationships with the politicians and party staff, we would end up with national politicians who actually represent the will of the people.
Another view, which terrifies me, is that we ARE doing this, and the national politicians DO represent the will of the people. We are greedy, insular hawks who know or care nothing of world politics or domestic diversity.
"Buying and selling black children was allowed by the constitution as was their being treated as slaves and punished unto death by their owners."
And the compromise that allowed the central government to regulate commerce between the states was made in return for the abolitionists' silence.
This was arguably the largest debate that stood in the way of ratification. And some of the founders knew it was a risk factor that could lead to civil war, and they wrote about it.
The Constitution did one Right Thing, IMHO: It allowed the States to maintain a certain amount of sovreignty. Considering the wide range of incomatible political views we have in America today, and the social and political differences between regions of the US, I wonder if a little more sovreignty would be a bad thing?
Regrettable that the focus of the civil war is so easily summarized as "slavery". Now, anyone who would argue in favor of a confederacy or other federation, against the total authority of a central State, can be dismissed as pro-slavery. Just like arguing against restraint of speech makes you pro-kiddie-porn, or arguing against the motives of "homeland security" makes you a terrorist, I suppose.
"The Hypothetical Moore Curve"
Is it testable?
Is his research repeatable?
What studies have been published to support the hypothesis?
What was tested, and how? What controls were used?
Moore was making an economic projection in order to formulate a business plan. He was not establishing a new field of theoretical physics.
If we had to, and if we could discount the variables of economic incentive and R&D time, we could try to directly approach the theoretical limitations. Maybe find something other than silicon and transistors that will work better than the semiconductors we use today. (We only have made incremental improvements on the same basic structures).
The true appeal of "Moore's Law" is that we have become accustomed to seeing doublings of power in our computing devices. So much so, that any consumer product that doesn't promise twice the speed/capacity of what came before it, won't be all that exciting to us.
There are plenty of industries where a fraction of a percent increase in production will make you a hero, even in electronics engineering.
>If I laid out a serious amount of money to
>establish COs and copper to (nearly) every house
>in the United States, I'd be a little pissed at
>the government for making me open it up to
>people who are offering competing services.
If you've paid taxes in the past century, you DID lay out a serious amount of money for that stuff.
The real big problem with broadband is that you can't know whether you are allowed to have it until you try to get it. This has kept me from moving! I would rather stay in my apartment where I have 1.2 megabit dsl, static routing, etc., (costs $109/mo from the ISP + $65/mo from Qwest!), than to try to move without knowing in advance whether I can get the same service. The telco would expect me to move first, close a real estate deal, get a phone line and THEN find out whether or not DSL is available.
If I were to try to move, I would have to do two things. 1. Stay at the current address until the deal is setup at the new one, phone line is installed, DSL is working, THEN cancel the old service and move. This will increase the cost of moving substantially. 2. Ensure that the real estate agent or landlord understands that it's a deal-breaker (escrow money is refunded, deposits returned) if it turns out DSL is not available, and that it might be a month after closing before this is discovered. I'd need that explicitly written into the contract, and absolutely clearly understood by everyone involved.
If I'm looking at a piece of real estate, I want to know what utilities are available, as the very first items to evaluate. I want to know if it has running water, electrical service, natural gas, if there's garbage collection, telephone service, cable tv, and, DSL. Since my career depends on the internet access, it's actually on the same list as running water and electricity. And I can actually work around the lack of water and electricity, but if there's no DSL I'm stuck.
So, why can't I find out BEFORE getting involved with a piece of real estate, whether it has this service available? Also, what kind of approach can I take to force the issue? I don't want to sign a contract or a lease without knowing in advance whether I can get DSL, what signal rate it will support, and what providers will offer the service.
Years ago I worked for Tandy (Radio Shack).
I was routinely asked to report hours different from those worked. When I started asking about this practice, I discovered that it was not simply a matter between me and my employer, but is actually a Federal offence for such a policy to be instituted. Federal offense you ask? Tax fraud. You see, by reporting hours and wages with fabricated numbers, they "save" on their Social Security and Federal Withholding amounts.
I think a class action (civil) lawsuit was the wrong way to go against WalMart. If the case was strong enough for a civil suit, it might have been sufficient to command decades-long sentences in Federal Pound-Me-In-The-Ass Prison for the individual managers responsible, and Whopping Huge Bankrupting Fines for the corporation if they were complicit in the crimes.
You simply do not falsify reports of hours worked, wages paid, and taxes withheld. Federal law prohibits this. Screw the class action suit. I would have asked for prosecution under RICO. If the stories are true, these store managers belong in prison, and should not be released until the Segway is old enough to vote.
>Is it something someone has coded? Probably not.
I'm going a bit further and saying it is a set of features that Linux offers and Windows does not.
Even further, the console support is high on the list of reasons I haven't switched back to Windows + Cygwin! It might be the only reason that I can actually quantify.
The biggest thing I find missing from Windows, is the lack of virtual consoles, in particular, the lack of anything like SVGATextMode or the Framebuffer console.
I mean, sure, I can get an XTerm (Rxvt), or I can run in a "dos box" giving me an 80x25 or 80x50 or 80x60 console. But what I want is the ability to have multiple console ttys, the ability to setup the video mode and font so that I can have things like a 1600x1280 text mode with an 8x8 font on one terminal, and a 1280x1024 mode with a 12x20 font on another terminal, and NOT have these terminals be in managed windows. And they need to be just as efficient as the ones I have under Linux.
Why can't I have this? Or can I? If it's something that "Windows can't do", I get a whole bunch of "neener neener points." If it's something that Windows *can* do, I need to know how to do it.
Virtual terminals. Like Linux. With SVGA text modes and user defined fonts. Please.