I just want to say, "thanks," for actually using a more than marginally accurate stating of Occam's Razor. (And, for that matter, illustrating exactly how difficult it can be to determine what "necessary complexity" is - is a conspiracy of that nature more complex than a rocket? - especially when you are mistakenly applying Occam's Razor to human motivation.)
Gah. Yes, you do, as long as you lived with yourself for the entire year, were a citizen of the U.S., or a U.S., Canadian or Mexican resident, provided half of your support, and meet one of the following criteria:
1) You had a gross income of less than $2750 in the tax year in question
2) You are your own child, and under 19 or a student under 24.
Here's the really fun part. Anyone claimed as a dependent cannot claim their personal exemption. Guess what? The personal exemption is the same as the dependent exemption. So even if you ARE your own child, you still don't actually get any money out of it.
I guess I should have been more clear in my initial statement. The argument was not over whether or not you COULD, it was over whether or not you could ever gain financially by doing so.
This is all from IRS Publication 17, pages 23-30. http://ftp.fedworld.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p17.pdf
I find it HILARIOUS that this reply came about, WITHOUT A CITATION, in response to my calling someone out for not providing a citation.
Uh... yeah. Can you cite that law? Or is this like that whole, "No, really, you _can_ claim yourself as a dependent! My brother, the CPA, told me so!" argument I was in last week?
Yeah, you can. Ship it accidentally to some of the other posters on this list, then try to get it back. Indeed, based on some comments, if you drive it on a city street, and the city decides to retain ownership, they can.
Except, of course, that Microsoft was not giving him a gift. Microsoft was selling him a product. Admittedly, there are still parallels. If I go to a restaurant and order a cup of coffee, and a waiter mistakenly places a fine steak dinner on my table, am I legally entitled to that fine steak dinner? If I am trying to buy a hot dog from a friendly hot dog vendor, and as I hand him my $20 bill, a strong gust of wind blows it into the hat of a nearby performance artist, is it now his $20 bill?
The idea is that you don't own something just because it was delivered to your house. You own something because its ownership was transfered to you. If you hand me an item, that does not necessarily mean it is a gift. I've valet parked my car quite a bit, and every time I've gotten it back. I've handed a $20 bill to a guy to pay for a $.33 candy bar once, and he handed me back more than $19! I didn't even have to call the cops.
And that's why they needed the police in this case - not to ensure that they got back the $1M prototype, but to make sure the guy took delivery of his WebTV system without incident.
Why is it that the primary quality reviewers look for in an install program is ease of use? As if, the more automatic the installation process is, the better it is for newbies? I mean, Win95 has a relatively easy install, when all goes well, but when it's done installing, you have no idea what it's done. Almost all of these reviews seem to want a black-box install where you power on the machine, tell it your name ("What are you doing, Dave?") and walk away for 20 minutes while it finishes up. I haven't adequately surveyed the installation packages that are out there - only used Slackware and Redhat - but it seems to me that the ideal installation would provide you with the opportunity to see what it's doing; to actually learn something about it while it's working, and to use that learning to make informed decisions, but always provide a working default if you don't feel like learning.
And believe me - I know that this goal is to some degree addressed by most Linux installs out there - I just don't know why it isn't addressed by these sorts of reviews, or the comments about them.
Micro Center is fabulous about this, for some reason. The one near me has (I believe) every one of the recent big commercial Linux game releases. It's all over-priced, of course.
Trademarks aren't for situations like Sesame Street where you have two GoTo logos and one GO logo and you're supposed to tell which doesn't belong. They're for when you go to the store and you see a pair of jeans called "Primo Levi's" and you think, "Wow, I've always liked Levi's - they're the brand that fits!" so you buy the "Primo Levi's", even though they're actually just named after an author completely independently of the OTHER jeans manufacturer. And of course they don't fit, and now all you'll buy is Guess because Levi's SUCK.
The GoTo logo is essentially a more stylized version of the Go logo, aside from the change in words. The fact that they are in exactly the same business, using names that are nearly identical, makes a lot of difference. The word "Albatross" in a traffic light would probably have been fine. "Allez" might not have been, qui sait?
This is actually the first notice I've received that Disney did not actually buy GoTo.com and take the To out of their name. Sure, the logo is obvious, but its ability to confuse is (to me, at least) obvious - I honestly believed that the GO network logo was just a revamped GoTo.com logo.
Yeah, sure, maybe they came up with it independently, and that sure would suck - but they are directly competing, younger, and someone who is not looking at them side-by-side is very likely to be confused.
Re:And the prizes for weirdest number of processor
on
Top 500 Supercomputers
·
· Score: 2
Augh. Should have used preview. Should be:
170 NEC NLR 8 - fastest computer with a number of processors less than 10
101 SGI "Government" 1024 - PRESUMED slowest computer with a number of processors greater than 1000
teach me to consider a less-than symbol "Plain Old Text."
And the prizes for weirdest number of processors..
on
Top 500 Supercomputers
·
· Score: 3
10 IBM UCSD 960 - fastest computer with a number of processors evenly divisible by 10
12 IBM Charles Schwab 2000 - fastest computer with a number of processors evenly divisible by 100
15 Fujitsu Kyoto 63 - fastest computer with a number of processors not evenly divisible by 2
46 Fujitsu NAL 167 - fastest computer with a number of processors neither evenly divisible by 2 nor equal to (2^x)-1
94 IBM MHPCC 243 - fastest computer with a number of processors in no way related to common powers of 2
170 NEC NLR 8 - fastest computer with a number of processors 1000
(Yeah, yeah, I know you've got 2k TRS-80s in a Beowulf cluster in your back yard.)
I think I've realized why so few of these comments, and the whole "Stallman is a Communist!" take on everything, make so little sense to me.
I see China, and the old USSR, as playing for a sports team whose mascot was "The Communists". Just like the failure of the Dallas Cowboys is not an indictment of the rustic way of life, the failure of China and the USSR to support or even treat humanely their citizens is not a reflection of the evil of Communism. AFAIK, there are "Democratic", "Capitalist" countries which abuse their citizens and have miserable standards of living. Sure, Communism isn't the beer of choice in the United States, or in many other regions, but it is no more to be feared and loathed than Heineken.
The word "Endorsement" keeps getting used in comments, here.
If we view this as analogous to selecting a State Bird, then it's not really an endorsement - the United States of America, in selecting the bald eagle as its State Bird, is not saying, "Bald eagles are really cool - you should all go out and get one."
On the other hand, making a firm commitment to using Linux and only Linux for all govt operations is a strong endorsement, no matter how "evil" those operations might be. Sure, it's possible that some of their evil might rub off on our operating system, but I don't think ANYONE will mistake the relationship for one of causation. A good tool is a good tool. I'm sure the Hammer is the official Hand Tool for Driving Nails into Wood of China, but that doesn't say anything about Hammers except that they're most excellent.
I find it ironic that Linux succeeds because it operates in a sphere where the chief pitfall of Communism is a non-issue. Linux is from each according to his ability, to all according to their desires - Linux is an inherently abundant product. The fact that I get just as much Linux as Linus does doesn't bother Linus because I'm not taking any Linux away from him. (Well, at least, I hope it doesn't bother Linus.)
i regret to inform you that i have patented the method of copyrighting subject lines. please contact me so that we can work out an agreement to license your use of my patented technology.
I thought it read "will be able to move his limbs by copying signals from his brains," and I thought "Wow, Professor Warwick has certainly made progress since the last time I read something about him."
Slashdot Mirror
I just want to say, "thanks," for actually using a more than marginally accurate stating of Occam's Razor. (And, for that matter, illustrating exactly how difficult it can be to determine what "necessary complexity" is - is a conspiracy of that nature more complex than a rocket? - especially when you are mistakenly applying Occam's Razor to human motivation.)
Gah. Yes, you do, as long as you lived with yourself for the entire year, were a citizen of the U.S., or a U.S., Canadian or Mexican resident, provided half of your support, and meet one of the following criteria:
1) You had a gross income of less than $2750 in the tax year in question
2) You are your own child, and under 19 or a student under 24.
Here's the really fun part. Anyone claimed as a dependent cannot claim their personal exemption. Guess what? The personal exemption is the same as the dependent exemption. So even if you ARE your own child, you still don't actually get any money out of it.
I guess I should have been more clear in my initial statement. The argument was not over whether or not you COULD, it was over whether or not you could ever gain financially by doing so.
This is all from IRS Publication 17, pages 23-30. http://ftp.fedworld.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p17.pdf
I find it HILARIOUS that this reply came about, WITHOUT A CITATION, in response to my calling someone out for not providing a citation.
And goddamnit, I saw a police officer giving some woman directions! I want my bloody $.000005 back!
Uh... yeah. Can you cite that law? Or is this like that whole, "No, really, you _can_ claim yourself as a dependent! My brother, the CPA, told me so!" argument I was in last week?
Yeah, you can. Ship it accidentally to some of the other posters on this list, then try to get it back. Indeed, based on some comments, if you drive it on a city street, and the city decides to retain ownership, they can.
Except, of course, that Microsoft was not giving him a gift. Microsoft was selling him a product. Admittedly, there are still parallels. If I go to a restaurant and order a cup of coffee, and a waiter mistakenly places a fine steak dinner on my table, am I legally entitled to that fine steak dinner? If I am trying to buy a hot dog from a friendly hot dog vendor, and as I hand him my $20 bill, a strong gust of wind blows it into the hat of a nearby performance artist, is it now his $20 bill?
The idea is that you don't own something just because it was delivered to your house. You own something because its ownership was transfered to you. If you hand me an item, that does not necessarily mean it is a gift. I've valet parked my car quite a bit, and every time I've gotten it back. I've handed a $20 bill to a guy to pay for a $.33 candy bar once, and he handed me back more than $19! I didn't even have to call the cops.
And that's why they needed the police in this case - not to ensure that they got back the $1M prototype, but to make sure the guy took delivery of his WebTV system without incident.
Why is it that the primary quality reviewers look for in an install program is ease of use? As if, the more automatic the installation process is, the better it is for newbies? I mean, Win95 has a relatively easy install, when all goes well, but when it's done installing, you have no idea what it's done. Almost all of these reviews seem to want a black-box install where you power on the machine, tell it your name ("What are you doing, Dave?") and walk away for 20 minutes while it finishes up. I haven't adequately surveyed the installation packages that are out there - only used Slackware and Redhat - but it seems to me that the ideal installation would provide you with the opportunity to see what it's doing; to actually learn something about it while it's working, and to use that learning to make informed decisions, but always provide a working default if you don't feel like learning.
And believe me - I know that this goal is to some degree addressed by most Linux installs out there - I just don't know why it isn't addressed by these sorts of reviews, or the comments about them.
Ok, I'm honestly curious. In the full review, they say:
"Corel is based on the Debian distribution of Linux, but you'd be hard-pressed to tell."
What should they have said to not have "entirely missed that fact"?
Micro Center is fabulous about this, for some reason. The one near me has (I believe) every one of the recent big commercial Linux game releases. It's all over-priced, of course.
Trademarks aren't for situations like Sesame Street where you have two GoTo logos and one GO logo and you're supposed to tell which doesn't belong. They're for when you go to the store and you see a pair of jeans called "Primo Levi's" and you think, "Wow, I've always liked Levi's - they're the brand that fits!" so you buy the "Primo Levi's", even though they're actually just named after an author completely independently of the OTHER jeans manufacturer. And of course they don't fit, and now all you'll buy is Guess because Levi's SUCK.
The GoTo logo is essentially a more stylized version of the Go logo, aside from the change in words. The fact that they are in exactly the same business, using names that are nearly identical, makes a lot of difference. The word "Albatross" in a traffic light would probably have been fine. "Allez" might not have been, qui sait?
This is actually the first notice I've received that Disney did not actually buy GoTo.com and take the To out of their name. Sure, the logo is obvious, but its ability to confuse is (to me, at least) obvious - I honestly believed that the GO network logo was just a revamped GoTo.com logo.
Yeah, sure, maybe they came up with it independently, and that sure would suck - but they are directly competing, younger, and someone who is not looking at them side-by-side is very likely to be confused.
Augh. Should have used preview. Should be:
170 NEC NLR 8 - fastest computer with a number of processors less than 10
101 SGI "Government" 1024 - PRESUMED slowest computer with a number of processors greater than 1000
teach me to consider a less-than symbol "Plain Old Text."
10 IBM UCSD 960 - fastest computer with a number of processors evenly divisible by 10
12 IBM Charles Schwab 2000 - fastest computer with a number of processors evenly divisible by 100
15 Fujitsu Kyoto 63 - fastest computer with a number of processors not evenly divisible by 2
46 Fujitsu NAL 167 - fastest computer with a number of processors neither evenly divisible by 2 nor equal to (2^x)-1
94 IBM MHPCC 243 - fastest computer with a number of processors in no way related to common powers of 2
170 NEC NLR 8 - fastest computer with a number of processors 1000
(Yeah, yeah, I know you've got 2k TRS-80s in a Beowulf cluster in your back yard.)
And we will chant back,
"If tortillas aren't about the destruction of Yankees, then why do Texans love them so much?"
Anyone who doesn't realize that sucky people like cool stuff, too, is obviously 12.
I think I've realized why so few of these comments, and the whole "Stallman is a Communist!" take on everything, make so little sense to me.
I see China, and the old USSR, as playing for a sports team whose mascot was "The Communists". Just like the failure of the Dallas Cowboys is not an indictment of the rustic way of life, the failure of China and the USSR to support or even treat humanely their citizens is not a reflection of the evil of Communism. AFAIK, there are "Democratic", "Capitalist" countries which abuse their citizens and have miserable standards of living. Sure, Communism isn't the beer of choice in the United States, or in many other regions, but it is no more to be feared and loathed than Heineken.
The word "Endorsement" keeps getting used in comments, here.
If we view this as analogous to selecting a State Bird, then it's not really an endorsement - the United States of America, in selecting the bald eagle as its State Bird, is not saying, "Bald eagles are really cool - you should all go out and get one."
On the other hand, making a firm commitment to using Linux and only Linux for all govt operations is a strong endorsement, no matter how "evil" those operations might be. Sure, it's possible that some of their evil might rub off on our operating system, but I don't think ANYONE will mistake the relationship for one of causation. A good tool is a good tool. I'm sure the Hammer is the official Hand Tool for Driving Nails into Wood of China, but that doesn't say anything about Hammers except that they're most excellent.
I find it ironic that Linux succeeds because it operates in a sphere where the chief pitfall of Communism is a non-issue. Linux is from each according to his ability, to all according to their desires - Linux is an inherently abundant product. The fact that I get just as much Linux as Linus does doesn't bother Linus because I'm not taking any Linux away from him. (Well, at least, I hope it doesn't bother Linus.)
"A country of peasants to one of the few superpowers."
A mink enjoys none of the benefits of the fur coat.
Use the text of this discussion! It's open source graphic design!
Mmm, nummy.
i regret to inform you that i have patented the method of copyrighting subject lines. please contact me so that we can work out an agreement to license your use of my patented technology.
If you can get your hands on the rights to http://rio.dhs.org/penguin.html, I think that would be great. You can't argue that it doesn't "Show Linux".
Do you not see the difference between loading the gun on the BBC and loading the gun in a compound surrounded by 2 feet of concrete?
I thought it read "will be able to move his limbs by copying signals from his brains," and I thought "Wow, Professor Warwick has certainly made progress since the last time I read something about him."
Yes, but they are attempting to USE the government to suppress someone's freedom of speech.