How are your going to be able to explain NOT fixing a bug that got through in your code when you had time to include an un-spec'ed Easter egg?
Blame the intern.
I included an easter egg that popped up an error message with the boss's home phone number. He told me that that error would never occur, so I felt confident (wink, wink) that no one would ever see the message. Of course, it did occur. And when it did, the boss blamed the temp!
It also says "I think I am more important than you, and that what I want is more important than what you want, and I am willing to break the law to act on my self-centered desire".
There is no ethical obligation to a corporate entity. As a natural person, yes, I am more important.
I wouldn't. A friend of mine worked for the Red Cross, and was required to keep an emergency phone on her at all times when she was on-call-- and those on-call periods could last upwards of a week. Or how about a doctor who needs to be accessible immediately, but also has social obligations?
Any place that deliberately blocks mobile communications should post notice of the fact. But anyone who relies on their mobile phone for emergency contact would be wise to periodically verify connectivity, since they could also be blocked by any number of innocent or unintentional activities or natural phenomena.
"Of course, some may use it to just talk to a loved one any time they can."
Oh, don't you just feel so bad for those poor prisoners who just want to talk to a loved one? Quick, someone cue the sad violin music! Next time try not to commit a felony jackass. It really isn't that hard. All it takes is demonstrating a little concern for those around you rather than focusing on satisfying your needs at all costs.
TFA also mentions extending the power to local governments, too. That means county and city jails. Inmates in those facilities are serving short sentences for minor crimes. Else, they are accused criminals who can't make bail while awaiting trial, and who are innocent until proven otherwise.
Remember, too, that most inmates will eventually be released. Contact with their families outside may make their re-integration into society easier for them and for everyone else.
The state makes a fortune off prison telephones. All of the talk about "planning crimes" or "drug deals" is total BS.
You got that right. I worked in the inmate phone racket (as a peon engineer) many years ago, when the market first opened up. In the beginning, county jails and smaller prisons were served by independent phone companies. These companies were mostly local pay-telephone operators -- a market created with the AT&T breakup -- who discovered that it was far more profitable to operate jail-phones than coin operated pay phones. For one thing, you didn't need to go around collecting the coin: inmate phones were collect call only. Secondly, they charged the highest tariffed rate: person-to-person, operator-assisted, collect with sugar on top rates.
There was no actual operator to pay, the inmate just dialed and said his name at the voice prompt and the phone called up his mom/wife/girlfriend with the recorded message: "Will you accept a collect call from inmate x in the county jail? Dial 'one' to accept, 'two' to refuse." Even a local call would cost at least 25 cents plus $1.50 to $3.00 in fees. If the applicable tariff allowed, even these local calls were charged by the minute. An inmate's loved ones could easily get charged hundreds of dollars a month just to keep in touch. There was no warning that these calls would be that expensive.
The jails were happy to provide this service, since the commissions they would receive really helped the jail budget. The jail operators weren't too concerned with the ethics of taking kickbacks, since it was common practice for pay telephone operators to pay a site commission to the property manager in exchange for allowing the placement of the pay phone in the store/bar/restaurant/office building/etc. Of course, the inmates were literally captive consumers. There was no other legal method of real-time communication with the outside world.
Some places had laws that required that the commissions be used for inmate welfare and education only. And there were some particularly ethical jail administrators that also used site commissions only for benefit of the prisoners even without a law requiring it. But usually the commissions went right back into the general fund operating the facility, with the benefit that the administrator or his/her boss could spend it as they pleased, whereas government provided (tax) funding had to be spent where the governing authority specified.
There were also "gifts" provided to sheriffs and jail administrators. These were usually "in-kind", to provide some cover from bribery laws. An in-kind gift could be an artist-signed wildlife lithograph by a well-known, first-class illustrator.
I've long since been out of that field, and the small operators have consolidated and many have sold out to big communications firms, but the business model remains the same.
I suggest you read the rest of my post before responding next time. I made it abundantly clear that the lack of terrorist wasn't proof of success, merely that it meant the absence of terrorist arrests was not proof of failure.
I'm still not clear, are you saying his rock works, or just that we can't be sure it's failed?
"Harassed"? Harassed how exactly? They were searched. Everyone gets searched every time they get on a plane. My hand luggage goes through a scanner, I walk through a metal detector, have I been harassed? Several times I've been taken aside and patted down too, was that harassment?
Inconvenienced, insulted, accused, annoyed. Take your pick. I do find being searched demeaning. It's all harassment. Therefore, I would like as little of it as possible. As a feeling animal, I seek pleasure and avoid pain. Clearly, not everyone is equally annoyed by these things. Perhaps some are just Authoritarian Personality Types. Perhaps some feel the tradeoff is "worth it".
I don't agree that the tradeoff is worth it, so I feel harassed every time I fly. I'm not the only one. So before anyone asks, yes, I'd rather see hundreds of planes in flames and the establishment of a Caliphate and I'm gonna marry a carrot.
no you have him prosecuted for assault, serve him with a dmca/performance violation if he used the "staying alive" trick and then sue him for trespassing.
I think that Barry, Maurice and Robin Gibb would have to prosecute the violation of that work.
That has a ton more to do with the federal government's failure of the public education system than it does rich parents. In fact, the household income threshold where people below that threshold would attend public schools is moving further further toward the lower-middle class. That suggests a strong shift in household spending priorities, which is partially due to education competition but even moreso due to the failure of the public school system.
First, let me state that I'm speaking from a US perspective. I'll agree that public schools often do a poor job of educating students. And the poorer the students' families, the poorer job the schools often do. It helps to have rich parents, but it really hurts to have poor ones. As TFA stated, if a student has to work part time to put food on his family, he's not going to have 10000 hours free between the years of 10 and 20 to become the next great anything.
I don't think this is a federal failure, since until recently, the federal government didn't have much involvement in education. Even now, federal involvement is mostly just forcing school districts to prepare the kids to take standardized tests instead of taking art or band or gym. In my state, at least, the real culprits in ruining public education are the so-called "conservative republicans". These are the former democrats who left their party in a huff when Civil Rights became a plank of the Democratic platform.
Particularly in my state, starting around 20-25 years ago, when these new Repubs consolidated their power and marginalized the progressive Dems and "moderate" Repubs, they made it a priority to give all the kids in the state an equal shot at an education. It sure sounded like a noble goal, since richer, suburban districts spent far more money per student than urban and rural schools. I'm sure that everyone here can think of at least 2 ways to ensure equality in education spending across the board statewide: either subsidize poorer districts or legally limit spending by richer districts. Being as the "conservative" Repubs had their roots in their Southern immigrant ancestors, you can guess that their answer was setting a legal limit to per-student school spending. Under state law, districts cannot spend more than the legal maximum per student even if local voters authorize additional local taxes to do so.
Many many families are paying double for education (taxation to fund public schools, tuition to pay the school they actually utilize and benefit from).
In the US, schools are primarily funded by general taxation at the state and local level. Parents who enroll their kids in private schools are not really paying double tuition, since even childless people pay taxes.
I suggested that to my friend when he wanted to borrow my solar panels (rated 45w) for a camping trip. All he could do was whine about his wheelchair and bi-pap machine.
Useful tip: at least in the US, trailer campgrounds attract dense tree cover. Arrive early to get a sunny spot for your solar cells.
After 6 Republican Presidential terms, they still haven't managed to overturn Roe.v.Wade.
If they overturned it, then they couldn't come back to the pro-life voters next election and ask for their votes again. By not overturning, they can get re-elected and continue with their actual agenda.*
*Not my original insight. I stole it from Thomas Frank.
For that matter, are the sick automatically irresponsible? Sure, some illnesses are due to one's own actions. Others we are born with. Still others are come from one's environment. Many combine all these and other factors.
The current system in the UK, for example, offers both private and state healthcare, with the NHS free for all and private healthcare available if you want to pay a bit of money for a TV in your hospital room and a shorter wait for your elective surgery.
Where's my choice not to pay into your system, though? Or, my choice to use treatments not permitted by the government. There is no choice.
I guess that's where you lobby and vote or move to another country. I don't think any country allows its citizens to opt out of taxes for programs they don't use. Otherwise you'd get old folks opting out of education, young folks opting out of pensions, and peaceful folks opting out of wars.
What do auto insurance companies offer drivers? Do they help pay for cars? do they change your oil? They actually bring nothing to the table
In the US, where I live, I am required to purchase a minimum amount of auto insurance. What they bring to the table is "not getting prosecuted". Extras, like replacing my car if it were totaled is optional coverage -- unless of course I'm borrowing money from a bank to buy the car, in which case they would insist on that coverage, too.
As far as your insurance company taking care of you if you got cancer: good luck with that. And not in a sarcastic way, either. Health insurers, like all insurers, will try to minimize the amount they pay out.
Speaking of hubris, perhaps you aren't as smart as you think on military affairs? Ok, so yes, I set up a false-dillemma--perhaps there is another explanation. I'm just throwing my 2-cents out there, helping the discussion by contributing my military expertise to counter common misconceptions about how the military works.
I'm no military expert, but I did stay in a Holiday Inn last night. I also read all those C. B. Colby books that my elementary school had in the library. And I'll agree, that for the military, the mission to invade Iraq and disable it's military was "accomplished". And if Bush had sent that memo to the US Armed Forces, then that would be that.
But what you don't understand, and what every civilian does understand -- sorry, my snark was unbuttoned -- ahem . . . What the public saw was: Bush put on his flight suit, went to the Lincoln, made sure the TV cameras were there and unfurled a huge banner to The Whole World. This was the gaffe: to tell the whole world that the mission was accomplished. It's not like a local news crew was already there reporting on a brush fire on the flight deck and just happened to catch the president and his entourage and that big sign making an announcement to the crew. The whole thing was orchestrated for the whole country. It's not our fault for assuming the sign meant what we all assumed it meant. We were meant to assume that. The administration made sure of it.
So perhaps you're right that "gaffe" is not a good word for it after all. Bush's statement was accurate for those immediately present, but intentionally misleading for everyone else -- and intentionally broadcast to a much wider audience, knowing how it would be interpreted.
(I thought failures were unmitigated and successes were unqualified)
They both pretty much mean "complete" or "total". To mitigate is to blunt or lessen (lit. soften), whereas to qualify is to add a footnote or an "except for" (lit. to make less general), a "qualification". So both success and failure could be unmitigated or unqualified. Both also mean: "I'm paid by the word, big ones extra."
We won because we stayed and fought instead of leaving in the middle of the conflict.
It's strange the way "winning" has come to be defined as "not leaving". The US is not leaving to prove that Iraq isn't another Vietnam. Vietnam is considered a loss for the US, so doing the opposite must be winning.
When Bush was blustering and chomping to invade Iraq, he did not state that we hoped to "win" by not leaving. Hardly anyone but rabid right-wing-Christian-mission-from-God types would have supported that plan, and rightfully so. If leaving means losing to these folks, then they'll just have to find another means of compensation.
Anyone who cites the "Mission Accomplished" statement as some sort of gaffe is either purely partisan, or doesn't understand military operations.
I think I'll just go ahead and call it a gaffe. Or bluster. Or hubris. Uh oh, now I have to choose which horn of your false dilemma to sit upon. Oh well, I guess I'll just marry a carrot.
Now for the serious stuff. In war, the mission is accomplished when it's over. If you haven't satisfied your civilian population that the mission you sold them on has been accomplished and the war is over, then "OPORDER" or no, you haven't accomplished your mission.
Now that's the State Troopers words, and may not be true
short: If it's a cop describing a case, it's a lie.
long: When the cops describe a case for the press and public, they state as true any assumptions they make, and as assumptions any speculations they can come up with. They are not looking to present the case in a fair and unbiased manner, rather they are attempting to prove guilt by tainting the jury pool as early as possible in order to find the suspect guilty in order to justify the arrest.
Slashdot Mirror
Blame the intern.
I included an easter egg that popped up an error message with the boss's home phone number. He told me that that error would never occur, so I felt confident (wink, wink) that no one would ever see the message. Of course, it did occur. And when it did, the boss blamed the temp!
How are your going to be able to explain NOT fixing a bug that got through in your code when you had time to include an un-spec'ed Easter egg?
This isn't about charm. This is about having to explain to management why a customer is unhappy.
Ya, like management is gonna fix a bug.
It also says "I think I am more important than you, and that what I want is more important than what you want, and I am willing to break the law to act on my self-centered desire".
There is no ethical obligation to a corporate entity. As a natural person, yes, I am more important.
I wouldn't. A friend of mine worked for the Red Cross, and was required to keep an emergency phone on her at all times when she was on-call-- and those on-call periods could last upwards of a week. Or how about a doctor who needs to be accessible immediately, but also has social obligations?
Any place that deliberately blocks mobile communications should post notice of the fact. But anyone who relies on their mobile phone for emergency contact would be wise to periodically verify connectivity, since they could also be blocked by any number of innocent or unintentional activities or natural phenomena.
"Of course, some may use it to just talk to a loved one any time they can."
Oh, don't you just feel so bad for those poor prisoners who just want to talk to a loved one? Quick, someone cue the sad violin music! Next time try not to commit a felony jackass. It really isn't that hard. All it takes is demonstrating a little concern for those around you rather than focusing on satisfying your needs at all costs.
TFA also mentions extending the power to local governments, too. That means county and city jails. Inmates in those facilities are serving short sentences for minor crimes. Else, they are accused criminals who can't make bail while awaiting trial, and who are innocent until proven otherwise.
Remember, too, that most inmates will eventually be released. Contact with their families outside may make their re-integration into society easier for them and for everyone else.
"I don't get why are cellphones themselves a problem, and why the solution is jamming them."
http://mediaresearchhub.ssrc.org/grants/funded-projects/prison-phone-service-provider-contracts-kickbacks-and-fiscal-impact-on-prisoners2019-families
The state makes a fortune off prison telephones. All of the talk about "planning crimes" or "drug deals" is total BS.
You got that right. I worked in the inmate phone racket (as a peon engineer) many years ago, when the market first opened up. In the beginning, county jails and smaller prisons were served by independent phone companies. These companies were mostly local pay-telephone operators -- a market created with the AT&T breakup -- who discovered that it was far more profitable to operate jail-phones than coin operated pay phones. For one thing, you didn't need to go around collecting the coin: inmate phones were collect call only. Secondly, they charged the highest tariffed rate: person-to-person, operator-assisted, collect with sugar on top rates.
There was no actual operator to pay, the inmate just dialed and said his name at the voice prompt and the phone called up his mom/wife/girlfriend with the recorded message: "Will you accept a collect call from inmate x in the county jail? Dial 'one' to accept, 'two' to refuse." Even a local call would cost at least 25 cents plus $1.50 to $3.00 in fees. If the applicable tariff allowed, even these local calls were charged by the minute. An inmate's loved ones could easily get charged hundreds of dollars a month just to keep in touch. There was no warning that these calls would be that expensive.
The jails were happy to provide this service, since the commissions they would receive really helped the jail budget. The jail operators weren't too concerned with the ethics of taking kickbacks, since it was common practice for pay telephone operators to pay a site commission to the property manager in exchange for allowing the placement of the pay phone in the store/bar/restaurant/office building/etc. Of course, the inmates were literally captive consumers. There was no other legal method of real-time communication with the outside world.
Some places had laws that required that the commissions be used for inmate welfare and education only. And there were some particularly ethical jail administrators that also used site commissions only for benefit of the prisoners even without a law requiring it. But usually the commissions went right back into the general fund operating the facility, with the benefit that the administrator or his/her boss could spend it as they pleased, whereas government provided (tax) funding had to be spent where the governing authority specified.
There were also "gifts" provided to sheriffs and jail administrators. These were usually "in-kind", to provide some cover from bribery laws. An in-kind gift could be an artist-signed wildlife lithograph by a well-known, first-class illustrator.
I've long since been out of that field, and the small operators have consolidated and many have sold out to big communications firms, but the business model remains the same.
I suggest you read the rest of my post before responding next time. I made it abundantly clear that the lack of terrorist wasn't proof of success, merely that it meant the absence of terrorist arrests was not proof of failure.
I'm still not clear, are you saying his rock works, or just that we can't be sure it's failed?
"Harassed"? Harassed how exactly? They were searched. Everyone gets searched every time they get on a plane. My hand luggage goes through a scanner, I walk through a metal detector, have I been harassed? Several times I've been taken aside and patted down too, was that harassment?
Inconvenienced, insulted, accused, annoyed. Take your pick. I do find being searched demeaning. It's all harassment. Therefore, I would like as little of it as possible. As a feeling animal, I seek pleasure and avoid pain. Clearly, not everyone is equally annoyed by these things. Perhaps some are just Authoritarian Personality Types. Perhaps some feel the tradeoff is "worth it".
I don't agree that the tradeoff is worth it, so I feel harassed every time I fly. I'm not the only one. So before anyone asks, yes, I'd rather see hundreds of planes in flames and the establishment of a Caliphate and I'm gonna marry a carrot.
no you have him prosecuted for assault, serve him with a dmca/performance violation if he used the "staying alive" trick and then sue him for trespassing.
I think that Barry, Maurice and Robin Gibb would have to prosecute the violation of that work.
That has a ton more to do with the federal government's failure of the public education system than it does rich parents. In fact, the household income threshold where people below that threshold would attend public schools is moving further further toward the lower-middle class. That suggests a strong shift in household spending priorities, which is partially due to education competition but even moreso due to the failure of the public school system.
First, let me state that I'm speaking from a US perspective. I'll agree that public schools often do a poor job of educating students. And the poorer the students' families, the poorer job the schools often do. It helps to have rich parents, but it really hurts to have poor ones. As TFA stated, if a student has to work part time to put food on his family, he's not going to have 10000 hours free between the years of 10 and 20 to become the next great anything.
I don't think this is a federal failure, since until recently, the federal government didn't have much involvement in education. Even now, federal involvement is mostly just forcing school districts to prepare the kids to take standardized tests instead of taking art or band or gym. In my state, at least, the real culprits in ruining public education are the so-called "conservative republicans". These are the former democrats who left their party in a huff when Civil Rights became a plank of the Democratic platform.
Particularly in my state, starting around 20-25 years ago, when these new Repubs consolidated their power and marginalized the progressive Dems and "moderate" Repubs, they made it a priority to give all the kids in the state an equal shot at an education. It sure sounded like a noble goal, since richer, suburban districts spent far more money per student than urban and rural schools. I'm sure that everyone here can think of at least 2 ways to ensure equality in education spending across the board statewide: either subsidize poorer districts or legally limit spending by richer districts. Being as the "conservative" Repubs had their roots in their Southern immigrant ancestors, you can guess that their answer was setting a legal limit to per-student school spending. Under state law, districts cannot spend more than the legal maximum per student even if local voters authorize additional local taxes to do so.
Many many families are paying double for education (taxation to fund public schools, tuition to pay the school they actually utilize and benefit from).
In the US, schools are primarily funded by general taxation at the state and local level. Parents who enroll their kids in private schools are not really paying double tuition, since even childless people pay taxes.
We need truth in labelling in everything, it seems, and not just on foods and drugs.
Although, it would be pretty cool to get it working on food and drugs again, too.
Emigration may be in order (if you're a U.S. subject--er, citizen).
Don't let the door hitcha on the way out, wink, wink.
Just get rid of your portable devices.
I suggested that to my friend when he wanted to borrow my solar panels (rated 45w) for a camping trip. All he could do was whine about his wheelchair and bi-pap machine.
Useful tip: at least in the US, trailer campgrounds attract dense tree cover. Arrive early to get a sunny spot for your solar cells.
There are also solar bags from Voltaic in messenger and backpack format. I haven't tried them either.
After 6 Republican Presidential terms, they still haven't managed to overturn Roe.v.Wade.
If they overturned it, then they couldn't come back to the pro-life voters next election and ask for their votes again. By not overturning, they can get re-elected and continue with their actual agenda.*
*Not my original insight. I stole it from Thomas Frank.
For that matter, are the sick automatically irresponsible? Sure, some illnesses are due to one's own actions. Others we are born with. Still others are come from one's environment. Many combine all these and other factors.
The current system in the UK, for example, offers both private and state healthcare, with the NHS free for all and private healthcare available if you want to pay a bit of money for a TV in your hospital room and a shorter wait for your elective surgery.
Where's my choice not to pay into your system, though? Or, my choice to use treatments not permitted by the government. There is no choice.
I guess that's where you lobby and vote or move to another country. I don't think any country allows its citizens to opt out of taxes for programs they don't use. Otherwise you'd get old folks opting out of education, young folks opting out of pensions, and peaceful folks opting out of wars.
What do auto insurance companies offer drivers? Do they help pay for cars? do they change your oil? They actually bring nothing to the table
In the US, where I live, I am required to purchase a minimum amount of auto insurance. What they bring to the table is "not getting prosecuted". Extras, like replacing my car if it were totaled is optional coverage -- unless of course I'm borrowing money from a bank to buy the car, in which case they would insist on that coverage, too.
As far as your insurance company taking care of you if you got cancer: good luck with that. And not in a sarcastic way, either. Health insurers, like all insurers, will try to minimize the amount they pay out.
Speaking of hubris, perhaps you aren't as smart as you think on military affairs? Ok, so yes, I set up a false-dillemma--perhaps there is another explanation. I'm just throwing my 2-cents out there, helping the discussion by contributing my military expertise to counter common misconceptions about how the military works.
I'm no military expert, but I did stay in a Holiday Inn last night. I also read all those C. B. Colby books that my elementary school had in the library. And I'll agree, that for the military, the mission to invade Iraq and disable it's military was "accomplished". And if Bush had sent that memo to the US Armed Forces, then that would be that.
But what you don't understand, and what every civilian does understand -- sorry, my snark was unbuttoned -- ahem . . . What the public saw was: Bush put on his flight suit, went to the Lincoln, made sure the TV cameras were there and unfurled a huge banner to The Whole World. This was the gaffe: to tell the whole world that the mission was accomplished. It's not like a local news crew was already there reporting on a brush fire on the flight deck and just happened to catch the president and his entourage and that big sign making an announcement to the crew. The whole thing was orchestrated for the whole country. It's not our fault for assuming the sign meant what we all assumed it meant. We were meant to assume that. The administration made sure of it.
So perhaps you're right that "gaffe" is not a good word for it after all. Bush's statement was accurate for those immediately present, but intentionally misleading for everyone else -- and intentionally broadcast to a much wider audience, knowing how it would be interpreted.
"Discuss the US Presidential Election & the War" is the wrong title
it should read "Trolls, Strawmen, Partisan Hacks, Propagandizers, Emotionally Unstable Wingnuts/Moonbats: Please Assemble Here"
I came here for a good argument!
But what if they expected us to find it and for us to know that they expected us to find it? Now we've got to vote for McCain again, right?
(I thought failures were unmitigated and successes were unqualified)
They both pretty much mean "complete" or "total". To mitigate is to blunt or lessen (lit. soften), whereas to qualify is to add a footnote or an "except for" (lit. to make less general), a "qualification". So both success and failure could be unmitigated or unqualified. Both also mean: "I'm paid by the word, big ones extra."
We won because we stayed and fought instead of leaving in the middle of the conflict.
It's strange the way "winning" has come to be defined as "not leaving". The US is not leaving to prove that Iraq isn't another Vietnam. Vietnam is considered a loss for the US, so doing the opposite must be winning.
When Bush was blustering and chomping to invade Iraq, he did not state that we hoped to "win" by not leaving. Hardly anyone but rabid right-wing-Christian-mission-from-God types would have supported that plan, and rightfully so. If leaving means losing to these folks, then they'll just have to find another means of compensation.
Anyone who cites the "Mission Accomplished" statement as some sort of gaffe is either purely partisan, or doesn't understand military operations.
I think I'll just go ahead and call it a gaffe. Or bluster. Or hubris. Uh oh, now I have to choose which horn of your false dilemma to sit upon. Oh well, I guess I'll just marry a carrot.
Now for the serious stuff. In war, the mission is accomplished when it's over. If you haven't satisfied your civilian population that the mission you sold them on has been accomplished and the war is over, then "OPORDER" or no, you haven't accomplished your mission.
To the civilian population, the ones supplying the money and fresh meat, war is over when the casualty rate drops suddenly, and matériel is being consumed at peacetime levels.
Now that's the State Troopers words, and may not be true
short: If it's a cop describing a case, it's a lie.
long: When the cops describe a case for the press and public, they state as true any assumptions they make, and as assumptions any speculations they can come up with. They are not looking to present the case in a fair and unbiased manner, rather they are attempting to prove guilt by tainting the jury pool as early as possible in order to find the suspect guilty in order to justify the arrest.