I understand what you're saying, though I lean pretty far to the open source side.
Unfortunately, you don't see opponents of a particular point of view quoting the moderates of that point of view...They quote the worst examples they can find in order to make the point of view that they don't like look as ridiculous as possible. I've talked to closed-source people who have the idea that all OSS advocates are zealots, because that's the only type that gets talked about in the magazines they read and the forums they frequent.
And, of course, it holds true in other debates. Left and Right wing political forums are generally full of posts about stupid or horrible things people on the Other Side have said or done.
Is someone just trying to provoke Slashdotters into an absolute frenzy lately? I've been seeing a flamebait, as-offensive-as-possible anti-F/OSS story every couple of days, and not the same one over and over again.
I'm all for showing both sides of the fence, but damn, choose people closer to the center instead of moonbat extremists.
Of course not; trying to make older computers perform as well as modern ones at tasks suited to the modern ones is ridiculous. The point, as I understand it, is to recognize which tasks older machines can perform well and avoid wasting resources by letting them handle those tasks.
A laptop that's intended to be used solely for non-graphical word-processing (obviously for a fancy document you'll want more resources) doesn't need blazing specs to be able to run vi or nano. A machine intended to be a home fileserver doesn't have to run a desktop.
I don't find someone believing in young-earth Creationism, or even teaching it to their kids, to be offensive. As long as they don't try to smother any other opinions. Atheists are often guilty of the latter as well, I've noticed.
I had a similar situation at my church, and I pretty much just stated what I believe in a non-offensive manner, and no one freaked out or anything. One or two people argued with me a bit, but nothing big. Unless you go to a VERY conservative church, you shouldn't have any problems...The fundamental part of Christianity is belief in God and Jesus and love for your fellow man, not how many days it took to create the world and mankind.
I guess some zealots just won't trust anything that comes from Apple. Sad, really.:)
Seriously, I don't know many Christians, even young-earth creationists, who'd actively go after companies that promoted this exhibit. Jerry Falwell's group might bitch a bit, but they do that anyway.
Why? Because I'm not willing to give up my rights so that someone else feels they can relax and let Mommy and Daddy Government take care of everything? A police state is an abomination, no matter how many lives it saves. The "nothing matters but life" approach is ridiculous and winds up rendering worthless the one thing it claims to value.
Yes, I would rather live in a free society where there was a greater chance of my family being raped and murdered than a police state where they were completely safe. We'll defend ourselves and keep our rights, thank you very much.
Some people talk about "saving lives" as if it were a worthy end goal. I'd rather half the people in my country die and the rest live as men than all of them live safely as sheep.
Seriously, how do you NOT have people freaking the hell out after seeing that sort of thing? That would be enough to start riots here, possibly a small rebellion...and it wouldn't be partial to one side of the political fence or the other.
Over here, you'd be a nice friendly picture of a cheery person with a headset watching a screen, like in the car insurance commercials.
I went to TIP at the Davidson, NC campus in the late 90's, and it was horrible. The majority of the participants that I came into contact with were MTV-watching, spoiled teenagers whose egos had been inflated to no end. There were a couple of people on my hall who weren't, and I formed friendships with them, but all in all it wasn't worth it. The fact that we were just about prohibited from using computers didn't help (they assumed everyone would look at porn, games, and chatrooms), as computer science was my area of interest.
GHP was a lot better (possibly because the people going to it were older and had matured a bit), but I still ran into the situations that I described in my original post. One major difference was that when it occurred, I was allowed to secede from the group and start my own project. We were also given access to VSU's computer labs, and this is where I got my start with a lot of things that I hadn't had access to before.
I've noticed that really smart kids, instead of complaining, will bring a book or something else to occupy their attention during a "boring class". If it's something that they're required to take, but is not in their area of interest, they'll probably get a B instead of an A due to a lack of paying attention, but they won't really care.
About stupid projects getting chosen when "gifted" kids are given a choice:
The "gifted program" when I was in school was infested with kids who weren't really gifted, but had well-known parents. Usually, when we were supposed to think up projects, we were split into groups. These groups tended to consist of 1-3 not-really-gifted males, 1-3 not-really-gifted females, and maybe one or two actually gifted children. Generally, the males and usually at least one of the females would start talking about something unrelated and one of the females would propose something that was horribly ridiculous.
The geek would point out all the flaws in the idea, but all the females would vote one way and the males wouldn't really care and would probably go with whatever the females were saying. After the project had been started, the females would run into all kinds of problems that the geek warned them about, give up, start talking to the males, and leave the geek to do the rest.
Suffice it to say, all of those projects sucked, horribly. This didn't just happen in public schools, either, but at "geek Summer paradises" like TIP or GHP.
Re:Brilliant kids have different goals.
on
The Prodigy Puzzle
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· Score: 4, Insightful
Hear, hear.
When I was a kid, people asked me if I wanted to become "the next Bill Gates". Most seemed to think that money or power was my end goal in life.
While there are bright kids that seek that, I'd say the majority of them would rather pursue interests in some field of study that appeals to them. Most of them don't have the disposition that they'd need in the business or political world, because 1: they don't like to screw people over and 2: they aren't willing to compromise their ideals. Knowledge for knowledge's sake, good for goodness' sake.
The cameras used in a lot of European countries to monitor traffic and catch speeders. There's site with dozens of pictures of vandalized Gatsos somewhere out there.
One group of people asking why the English let their government run roughshod over them, and a group of Brits claiming that they fully understand the reasons behind the measures their government is taking and are willing to endure scrutiny for the public good.
Why would Macs be in the top five Supercomputing slots? Or in the top 100 for that matter? That's not their game...Macs are geared to the Desktop, and only a certain portion of that market.
The problem is, it's not at 10%. It's at one or two percent of the Desktop market, which means that a corporation who holds 90% of the market can use their muscle to make using Linux difficult. It's hard enough to convince someone to make their application Linux-compatible or bundle their computer with Linux with such a small amount of marketshare, and it gets worse when someone is offering them deals NOT to do it. Ten percent would mean it was established enough that they couldn't do that, because coders and hardware manufacturers would look at it and see a sizable amount of users they could tap into.
I'd say Ubuntu's on par with Windows XP on user-friendliness (newbies aren't confused by a seven-item list of window managers to choose from, for example), so the only issues left are compatibility (which has been improving quickly) and exposure.
Someone who hasn't heard about the people trying to screw the Internet over probably isn't involved in it enough to know why listening to them would be a bad idea. And trust me, once you picked someone, he would soon be receiving letters from them.
Someone just failed a humor check.
I had plenty of problems with Windows when I used it at home, and still do when I wind up using it on the job, at a library, et cetera, but the name of the Start button wasn't one of them. "Menu" might've made more sense, but...Meh.
Considering that acquiring the SSNs of large groups of people is as easy as getting a desk job in certain businesses or educational institutions, I'd say getting an SSN is probably the EASY part of identity theft. How much can be done without having one would seem to be a moot point.
I do that a lot. Unfortunately, some Goodwills have started packaging everything into a system+monitor+peripherals package and won't sell you individual items, much less individual parts...At least the closest one to me hasn't started doing that yet, and there are always flea-markets.
Slashdot Mirror
I understand what you're saying, though I lean pretty far to the open source side. Unfortunately, you don't see opponents of a particular point of view quoting the moderates of that point of view...They quote the worst examples they can find in order to make the point of view that they don't like look as ridiculous as possible. I've talked to closed-source people who have the idea that all OSS advocates are zealots, because that's the only type that gets talked about in the magazines they read and the forums they frequent. And, of course, it holds true in other debates. Left and Right wing political forums are generally full of posts about stupid or horrible things people on the Other Side have said or done.
Is someone just trying to provoke Slashdotters into an absolute frenzy lately? I've been seeing a flamebait, as-offensive-as-possible anti-F/OSS story every couple of days, and not the same one over and over again.
I'm all for showing both sides of the fence, but damn, choose people closer to the center instead of moonbat extremists.
How long would taking out his kneecaps get you?
Seriously, these people don't learn until they piss off someone who's absolutely nuts and doesn't care about the consequences.
"You see what happens, Larry?!"
Of course not; trying to make older computers perform as well as modern ones at tasks suited to the modern ones is ridiculous. The point, as I understand it, is to recognize which tasks older machines can perform well and avoid wasting resources by letting them handle those tasks.
A laptop that's intended to be used solely for non-graphical word-processing (obviously for a fancy document you'll want more resources) doesn't need blazing specs to be able to run vi or nano. A machine intended to be a home fileserver doesn't have to run a desktop.
I don't find someone believing in young-earth Creationism, or even teaching it to their kids, to be offensive. As long as they don't try to smother any other opinions. Atheists are often guilty of the latter as well, I've noticed.
I had a similar situation at my church, and I pretty much just stated what I believe in a non-offensive manner, and no one freaked out or anything. One or two people argued with me a bit, but nothing big. Unless you go to a VERY conservative church, you shouldn't have any problems...The fundamental part of Christianity is belief in God and Jesus and love for your fellow man, not how many days it took to create the world and mankind.
I guess some zealots just won't trust anything that comes from Apple. Sad, really. :)
Seriously, I don't know many Christians, even young-earth creationists, who'd actively go after companies that promoted this exhibit. Jerry Falwell's group might bitch a bit, but they do that anyway.
Why? Because I'm not willing to give up my rights so that someone else feels they can relax and let Mommy and Daddy Government take care of everything? A police state is an abomination, no matter how many lives it saves. The "nothing matters but life" approach is ridiculous and winds up rendering worthless the one thing it claims to value.
Yes, I would rather live in a free society where there was a greater chance of my family being raped and murdered than a police state where they were completely safe. We'll defend ourselves and keep our rights, thank you very much. Some people talk about "saving lives" as if it were a worthy end goal. I'd rather half the people in my country die and the rest live as men than all of them live safely as sheep.
Seriously, how do you NOT have people freaking the hell out after seeing that sort of thing? That would be enough to start riots here, possibly a small rebellion...and it wouldn't be partial to one side of the political fence or the other.
Over here, you'd be a nice friendly picture of a cheery person with a headset watching a screen, like in the car insurance commercials.
I went to TIP at the Davidson, NC campus in the late 90's, and it was horrible. The majority of the participants that I came into contact with were MTV-watching, spoiled teenagers whose egos had been inflated to no end. There were a couple of people on my hall who weren't, and I formed friendships with them, but all in all it wasn't worth it. The fact that we were just about prohibited from using computers didn't help (they assumed everyone would look at porn, games, and chatrooms), as computer science was my area of interest. GHP was a lot better (possibly because the people going to it were older and had matured a bit), but I still ran into the situations that I described in my original post. One major difference was that when it occurred, I was allowed to secede from the group and start my own project. We were also given access to VSU's computer labs, and this is where I got my start with a lot of things that I hadn't had access to before.
I've noticed that really smart kids, instead of complaining, will bring a book or something else to occupy their attention during a "boring class". If it's something that they're required to take, but is not in their area of interest, they'll probably get a B instead of an A due to a lack of paying attention, but they won't really care. About stupid projects getting chosen when "gifted" kids are given a choice: The "gifted program" when I was in school was infested with kids who weren't really gifted, but had well-known parents. Usually, when we were supposed to think up projects, we were split into groups. These groups tended to consist of 1-3 not-really-gifted males, 1-3 not-really-gifted females, and maybe one or two actually gifted children. Generally, the males and usually at least one of the females would start talking about something unrelated and one of the females would propose something that was horribly ridiculous. The geek would point out all the flaws in the idea, but all the females would vote one way and the males wouldn't really care and would probably go with whatever the females were saying. After the project had been started, the females would run into all kinds of problems that the geek warned them about, give up, start talking to the males, and leave the geek to do the rest. Suffice it to say, all of those projects sucked, horribly. This didn't just happen in public schools, either, but at "geek Summer paradises" like TIP or GHP.
Hear, hear.
When I was a kid, people asked me if I wanted to become "the next Bill Gates". Most seemed to think that money or power was my end goal in life.
While there are bright kids that seek that, I'd say the majority of them would rather pursue interests in some field of study that appeals to them. Most of them don't have the disposition that they'd need in the business or political world, because 1: they don't like to screw people over and 2: they aren't willing to compromise their ideals. Knowledge for knowledge's sake, good for goodness' sake.
The cameras used in a lot of European countries to monitor traffic and catch speeders. There's site with dozens of pictures of vandalized Gatsos somewhere out there.
One group of people asking why the English let their government run roughshod over them, and a group of Brits claiming that they fully understand the reasons behind the measures their government is taking and are willing to endure scrutiny for the public good.
1984 wasn't set in America.
Somehow, I don't see OS X running very well on a $100 laptop.
Why would Macs be in the top five Supercomputing slots? Or in the top 100 for that matter? That's not their game...Macs are geared to the Desktop, and only a certain portion of that market.
The problem is, it's not at 10%. It's at one or two percent of the Desktop market, which means that a corporation who holds 90% of the market can use their muscle to make using Linux difficult. It's hard enough to convince someone to make their application Linux-compatible or bundle their computer with Linux with such a small amount of marketshare, and it gets worse when someone is offering them deals NOT to do it. Ten percent would mean it was established enough that they couldn't do that, because coders and hardware manufacturers would look at it and see a sizable amount of users they could tap into.
I'd say Ubuntu's on par with Windows XP on user-friendliness (newbies aren't confused by a seven-item list of window managers to choose from, for example), so the only issues left are compatibility (which has been improving quickly) and exposure.
Someone who hasn't heard about the people trying to screw the Internet over probably isn't involved in it enough to know why listening to them would be a bad idea. And trust me, once you picked someone, he would soon be receiving letters from them.
Not to mention Ezekiel's "wheel within a wheel". Check out a model of the Solar System.
Someone just failed a humor check. I had plenty of problems with Windows when I used it at home, and still do when I wind up using it on the job, at a library, et cetera, but the name of the Start button wasn't one of them. "Menu" might've made more sense, but...Meh.
Considering that acquiring the SSNs of large groups of people is as easy as getting a desk job in certain businesses or educational institutions, I'd say getting an SSN is probably the EASY part of identity theft. How much can be done without having one would seem to be a moot point.
"Jesus freaks", "gun nuts"... You're blind if you think it's just the Right.
I do that a lot. Unfortunately, some Goodwills have started packaging everything into a system+monitor+peripherals package and won't sell you individual items, much less individual parts...At least the closest one to me hasn't started doing that yet, and there are always flea-markets.
A war like that wouldn't stop with their taking Taiwan, and the Chinese are smart enough to know that, otherwise they'd have already occupied it.