I have scratched foil on commercial audio CDs that I bought recently and have only ever kept in a jewel case or CD book, never exposed to heat, never left out not in a case, etc. The flaking occurs pretty often on really cheap CDRs, I think, but I've also seen flaking and chipping on name-brand CDRs, and I do try to take good care of them. Do you keep your CDs/DVDs in the CD books, or just in jewel cases?
A problem that I see much more often than scratched plastic is scratched foil. I wonder to myself---why isn't the top layer of the CD coated with another layer of plastic? The foil is pretty much exposed to any particles... a thin layer of paint isn't going to do much. The CD cases (the big book-like things, not jewel cases) always seem to accumulate little particles in the sleeves, which will rub against the foil, and scratch it, or worse, make it start coming off. This happens especially with cheap CDRs (also, exposing CDRs to heat tends to make the foil start cracking). I don't understand why the data layer isn't well-protected on BOTH SIDES.:( I guess the solution to things rubbing against the disc would be to use only jewel cases, as they suspend the disc in air so that particles wouldn't be forced up against it, but, I can't carry around huge crates filled with jewel cases everywhere I go. Perhaps the best solution is to keep original CDs in jewel cases, never use cheap CDRs, and only carry around copies of CDs/CDRs in the big CD books, and keep a portable air-can or hand-held vacuum handy to suck dirt out of the case every time it's opened/closed, and never leave it open (just open it to take something in/out, then immediately close it), and never put anything heavy on top of the case (it could press particles that are in the case into the foil).
Is there a better option? I've lost so many things this way... Are there CDR manufacturers that put extra layers of paint or a thin layer of plastic on the top of the CDR? I seem to recall some audio CDs I own having a layer of plastic overtop of the foil (especially older ones), but most don't seem to.
I'm foreseeing drug detection systems installed in schools... and administrators walking past all the lockers with super-sensitive hand-held sniffers (much easier than bringin in dogs!).
Why do I keep remembering statistics about how many dollar bills have traces of cocaine...
"novel object or scene" -- not really! Sometimes when seeing something that I know I haven't seen before I will feel that it's familiar, and sometimes when in a place I know I've never visited before I will feel that I have been there, but what's much much stronger in effect is the sensation I sometimes get when there's a sequence of events or thoughts. I'll have a sensation that "the things from the last few minutes... have happened before!" and the sensation will stick for a while. Maybe it's just more profound because it's more closely tied to internal processes than simple sensory input? I often will be lying on my bed, waiting to fall asleep, and thinking, and I'll think that I've had this exact same train of thought before---not something similar, but identical. Or, I'll be having a conversation on AIM, and I'll think the conversation has happened identically before.
Maybe by 'object' they mean 'anything tangible' and 'scene' is 'any temporal thought process', but, it sounds like they're studying simple recognition of items, and that's never been half the mindfuck of things that are temporally extended. Maybe it's "recognition in the mind's eye" tied to the recognition-circuitry somehow re-triggering itself repeatedly? (Maybe thinking "I'm having deja vu" will make it more likely for the feeling to continue? Suggestion and association?)
The end of the article does mention things about the temporal lobe... maybe future research will go in this direction (I'm very curious to see)
An annotated documentation of CSS tags that explains what will and won't work in different browsers.
An online "simulator" that will output a web page whose styles have been demented according to rules about what various browsers ignore or do wrong. In other words, a sort of CSS->IE (and others) babelfish. (It doesn't have to render the page, just alter the styles to be what some particular browser actually does.)
Better documentation about how multiple floating elements interact (and absolute positioning, etc.). Based on what I've read, I can't understand how a browser would do all but the simplest of layouts (maybe I just need to read the detailed CSS design documents off of W3C's site? I think that's an unreasonable amount of stuff for any and all web developers to have to read---the relevant, important, and noteworthy parts should just be condensed (see "(1) An annotated...") *grin*)
It looks like the goal of this is really a talent competition, but only an idiot (or the idiot's parent(s)) would actually agree to this: "I represent that my Entry is my original creation and hereby grant to Sponsor the copyright and all other rights now known or hereafter existing to use my Entry throughout the universe, in perpetuity, in whole or in part, in edited, unedited or distorted form, in connection with this Contest, for any trade, advertising, or promotional purpose whatsoever, without review, approval, notification or payment from or to any person or entity, in all media now known or hereafter discovered. I understand and agree that Sponsor shall be entitled to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, license, create derivative works from and distribute or incorporate Entries into any form, medium, or technology now known or later developed throughout the universe, for any purpose whatsoever."
Ouch. (1) Throughout the universe? What, are they afraid a competing alien civilization will try to infringe on the Sponsor's copyright? (2) Without payment, without approval, for any purpose, in any edited or distorted form? Erm.. so if I submitted a video of myself playing guitar, they could make an advertisement where I've been digitally inserted into Britney Spears music video, had a moustache drawn on my face, and use it as an advertisement to sell bull's-eye-targets with my head in the middle? If any kid is hoping to get famous this way, I have one suggestion: DON'T. It sounds like it's *worse* than getting the world's (err, universe's *grin*) worst record deal.
For almost everyone I've met, the ONLY thing they like about Wal-Mart is that you can get lots of stuff inexpensively and conveniently. (I've also heard once or twice that their employees get treated well, which, I have to admit, is admirable.) Their moral agenda, tendency to put local stores out of business (of course, in some cases it's just because it's hard to stay afloat when the giant that is Wal-Mart has sucked all the water out of the pool), policies about what they will and won't carry, and some of the ways I've seen customers treated...
[In some parts of the country, though (sometimes rural areas, economic ditches, etc.), it's the only way to buy some things without mail-ordering them... does that make it a necessary 'evil'?]
None of this adds up to explaining ESP (which could be bunk; humans have a tendency to interpret random coincidence as meaningful, because searching for patterns has proven biologically useful in the evolution of complex life forms), but it gives room for some interesting possibilities. It'd be really cool if ESP existed and people could learn to use it, but, if it doesn't, then we can still go on with our normal lives. I'd like to see it proven one way or another beyond doubt.
(IANAL) In Eurpoe, you aren't allowed to sing a song in public that's not yours. That was already against the law; it's public performance of someone else's work. In the USA, public performance of another's material is acceptable providing that the performance is your own (e.g., you can't sit on your front porch with your boombox nor roll your car windows down while playing a CD*, because the performance being emitted to the general public is the original artist's). At least, these things are all true in commerce, but might not apply to nonprofit events: if you are strumming nirvana on a guitar on a streetcorner, and you will only play when someone puts money in your hat, you're charging for your performance; if you just put your hat down hoping for tips (but don't TELL people to give you tips--although maybe you can say that you'd appreciate tips---you definitely can't request it of them, even if you play regardless of getting tipped), that might be OK (but it could be illegal on panhandling/loitering/solicitation/public nuisance/trespassing/harrassment/public endangerment/noise violation---basically, if a cop doesn't like you, he'll find SOME way to arrest you), and if you don't take tips at all you're probably OK.
* = I am not sure about radio. It might be OK to play radio with your windows down, because it's broadcast on [sort-of] public channels.
It'd be cool if a bunch of independent artists got together and ran a free lyrics database (minimal and non-annoying advertising, reproductions allowed under various terms on a song-by-song basis, maybe also mentioning public performance and recording covers policies alongside [e.g., creative commons licenses]) lyrics database, AND specifically forbid gracenote from using their lyrics in any way.;)
What I'd like to know is why the weight-problems-not-tied-to-metabolism drew conclusions from a study of only TWO people. That's what we call bad science... By that analysis, a schoolteacher who almost never sits down and is always running around the classroom should never be heavy except by overeating, and I know a few schoolteachers who eat so healthy they make vegetarians look bad, and who eat so little that they make anorectics look like pigs (and I know they don't just binge all weekend or anything, so I know they really do eat very little all the time), and they haven't lost any weight in years, no matter how hard they've tried and no matter how much they run around at home doing chores and yardwork etc. Sure, there are probably very few people with a biologically low metabolism, but with all the humans around, there almost HAVE to be outliers.
Hah! What I'd like to know: Does this work as a nested X server? In other words, can I run it in a window, using the native X's mouse as the primary mouse, and then have MPX have exclusive access to additional mice?
In the FAQ it talks about MPX having to 'guess' which pointer to use for QueryPointer. Looking at the xeyes screenshot, I wonder if it would be possible to extend it so that certain applications could be linked to a certain mouse in various ways (when multiple mice are possibly choices for function calls, define different rules for picking the cursor for different applications). Also, the FAQ talks about LeaveNotify events and xterm.. maybe add a special xterm handler that only generates LeaveNotify when no other cursors are still focused on the window?
which raises the question: exactly how is focus handled? Can I type in two xterms at once? Are there lots of different complex focus models to choose from now?
Old PC-controlled laboratory instruments. If the instrument still works, why (a) pay for a new instrument, (b) train technicians on the new instrument, (c) possibly buy new mounting hardware, (c) train technicians with new versions of the software, (d) come up with new calibration parameters for the new instrument, (e) work out new statistical correlations for the different sample types' properties, (f) get the instrument certified for certain industrial applications (automotive, medical, etc.), (g) possibly buy software to convert between older and newer data file formats?
Some lab instruments will run for a good 10-20 years... there are probably still a few DEC PDP's and Apple II/GS's out there connected to instruments somewhere!
When you lose power during a bios upgrade, have to reset your console's flash, and lose all your registration keys to games that can no longer be validated... I mean, maybe it would be implemented in a really reliable way, but, what if it isn't? Or, what if you lose power while the validation key is being transferred?
You're right---I think after a few consumer reviews/reports, nobody would buy crap that breaks that easily. But, then again, if there's enough propaganda about how DRM "protects the consumer" and a software license instead of actual ownership "ensures quality products," enough people would be misled to make it profitable, and that's all that really matters, unless you lose a lot of money on a later class-action lawsuit.
[Random pseudo-related backronym thoughts: dmca = deathless moneymaking via consumer adulteration; drm = destroying the reputations of manufacturers]
Or, we could pronounce them the way they're spelled. wh used to be a 'hw' sound, ay ey and ei used to be defined more carefully, and gh actually represents a variation of voiced spirant that often took the place of g when it fell between two vowels. (a form of this shows up as the f-sound at the end of trough) But, there are still big problems. A lot of words underwent I-mutation (a form of vowel and diphthong sound shifting) in prehistoric (i.e., before written manuscripts) Old English from its Germanic roots; sometimes, verb stems changed to accomodate this, and sometimes they didn't. In Old English, this wasn't so much a problem, because the pronunciation was almost always clear from the spelling, as long as the vowel length was known (sometimes written, sometimes clear from context). I-mutations sometimes occur between different forms of a word, giving us a variety of stem changes in verbs, and vowel changes in other words. Sometimes a very regular ending change in an Old English word has become an irregular spelling, when the spelling or pronunciation changed in one form but not another. Multiple sound shifts in the language weren't consistently applied to spelling; that's why we have tons of different spellings for the same sound, and multiple sounds that are all written the same way. If you want to see a fairly predictable but complicated early version of English, look up Old English (you know, Beowulf-era); for a more simplified variant (but having its own odd quirks and a good bit of spelling variation) check out Chaucer's English and classical Middle English. (I am not a linguist, please correct my ignorance)
I'm guessing that, given some time, many common words will have simpler 'modern' spellings. Maybe we can use old-style vowel lengthening to distinguish homophones in our speech in the future (would greatly aid foreign english speakers, and since I hear there's more of them than native speakers...), although we don't usually seem to have a problem figuring that out from context (although the fact that there are many more homophones than homographs explains why we are very reluctant to change our written system, as it is a less ambiguous way of recording the language). For example, weigh might be pronounced with a longer vowel than way and written waay -- fixes the homonym, and fixes the homograph that simplified spelling would give (of course, this is assuming that some homonyms will start to vary in pronunciation, but that's entirely possible, given the number of foreign speakers) (Or, how about throwing a [j schwa] at the end of a syllable whose spelling ends in an unpronounced gh? weigh -> "way-uh" -- well, maybe not for the more common words...)
He should've added a few more frames to the animation that said... "THIS IS A JOKE. (DUMBASS)" After the whole debauchle with that girl on livejournal talking about the president and getting interrogated by the secret service, I put a disclaimer on my livejournal page saying that nothing I say is actually a threat (if it seems like a threat, it's a joke), and that if anything seems like it's defamatory (libel, slander, what-have-you), then I'm exaggerating or fabricating for literary effect or humor's sake.
Maybe I have a crappy sense of humor. So what? I think I'm entitled to make bad jokes, even if I have to provide a disclaimer. (of course, there WAS that case about the lawyers suing these guys who were making lawyer jokes in front of them... but I think it was on grounds of harassment---still over the top to sue, though, IMHO.)
It's true that you don't always know when someone's joking... and after some of the high school shootings, I guess it's understandable for the school to take it seriously, but, they should have just asked Aaron---"Is this a joke? Do you actually want to harm your teacher? Do you have plans to harm your teacher?" and perhaps requested that he make it obvious that he's joking, or stop using the icon, or something. (Anybody with a copy? Put it on freenet, please?)
If I were to write or rewrite a user manual, I'd find some way to do it in LaTeX, since that allows all sorts of template and macro forms, and can be output as PDF, HTML, and other things, and can be edited in a plain text editor. There's also lots of packages out there already (see CTAN) that might be helpful by having templates and such that might be close to what you need.
But, I'm not sure what output forms you need... SGML? manpages? (Is there a link on the reply-to-a-comment page that takes me to the main article? Before the redesign, I thought there might have been, but I don't think there's anything now *pout*)
I think I have a better example of my thought... it is common for people, when reading something, to mark their thoughts in the margin. There aren't margins on webpages, so if an online article is what you're replying to... (perhaps a better system is needed, where I can write an overlay-webpage and you can let your browser show it overlayed on an existing article?)
Perhaps it is true that there really are very few good reasons to quote, and almost no reasons to quote more than short pieces of text. (There are still plenty of examples from academia that would seem to discredit that, though.) But, in many instances, your work's readability goes to hell...
There's a post I saw regarding a portion in the last chapter of Michael Krasnow's My Life as a Male Anorexic. If the post didn't use quoting, it would go something like this: "Well, Mr. Krasnow, when you mention your fear that gaining a little weight will lead to a loss of control, where does all the self-control (that you mentioned when describing your anorexia as a method of control) go?" But, with quoting, it shows two sentences from the source side-by-side, and then replies to both of them put together.
Or, consider that a portion of an article might be instructions to type into a command-line interpreter; basically, a shell script. If your computer's response to the instructions differs from what is expected, you might be able to summarize, or only quote a few pieces, but in some cases I would think it wouldn't be possible to not list the interactions in whole.
Maybe this only applies, though, to things like philosophical, scientific, and mathematical subjects.
But we already agree that your example is clear-cut. What's not clear-cut are things like line-by-line or paragraph-by-paragraph replies to some essay, post, argument, etc. You end up quoting very large portions of an article, although your reply is original work. There might not be a feasible way to pose your reply without quoting an awful lot, or at least paraphrasing an awful lot. (I would argue that paraphrasing large amounts of material is dangerous, even with proper citation, because it may introduce errors of interpretation and make the distinction of where your original work ends and your source begins to be difficult; plus, if what is cited is not depicted clearly, some people might say you have "thought plagiarism.")
Sometimes viewing many quotes in their entirety is the only way for someone to understand your response to your source. But, if you can't copy much quoted content, then how are you to direct the reader to what part of your original source you're replying to? You could resort to "Where Bob said, 'The name of my cat... . . .... which is why my mother smells like ham," or, "starting at the 17th word on the 8th line of the 4th paragraph that begins on the 9th page of the article as is printed in the 2nd edition of the book," but those sorts of things are confusing and can make your work hard to follow. It would be interesting to pop up side-by-side frames of your work and your source, and perhaps have some color-coded directions for where to find the appropriate parts of your source (if the source uses proper A NAME="" tags, you could have #links all over the place, but what if they don't?), but if you're displaying (or arguably even linking to) someone else's stuff right next to your own, then you're deep-linking, which I'm told is a no-no, even if you properly attribute the source. And, what if you're replying to an essay in a book, or something which is available online only to a selected audience?
For example, Peter van Inwagen has published some very interesting philosophical essays. If I want to write some personal comments and responses to an essay in my blog, my replies might seem incoherent without quoting significant portions of his original arguments. (Of course, maybe this is more acceptable in the world of philosophy, particularly due to the form that these essays can take; I've seen large quotes of portions of arguments quoted in many professional philosophical papers.)
Disclaimer: I probably make both good points and really bad points in my post above. I just didn't feel like reading back over it and re-doing parts that suck.
Something that used to cause bizarre delusions, hallucinations, and misperceptions in mideival times was tainted rye bread.
Some of these things _really_ sound like a bad acid trip to me. I'm not kidding---what if these people do have some bizarre infectious agent that causes rashes and secretes hallucinogenic agents into the bloodstream, making the rashes appear to be outlandish and twirl out of the skin and dance around inside your arms?
Hallucinogens as potent as LSD-25 are extremely difficult to detect. If this is a new, unusual, and very strong hallucinogen (perhaps one that doesn't cause the notorious pupil dilatation that would normally be a tip-off of a chemically-altered mental state) secreted by an infectious agent, it would all add up, at least in my eyes.
Has this possibility even been investigated? It would also be consistent with the disease being treatable with BOTH anti-infectious and anti-psychotic methods.
Of course, this doesn't entirely explain the pictures on the MRF website... but perhaps some of the things being labelled as Morgellons don't involve the same infectious agent at all.
Unless you're using something with a lower boiling point. (perhaps flourinert fc-72, at 56 deg C? http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php ?t=42878) And, my laptop CPU can get close to water's boiling point, if the thermometer chip is to be believed.
Slashdot Mirror
I have scratched foil on commercial audio CDs that I bought recently and have only ever kept in a jewel case or CD book, never exposed to heat, never left out not in a case, etc.
The flaking occurs pretty often on really cheap CDRs, I think, but I've also seen flaking and chipping on name-brand CDRs, and I do try to take good care of them.
Do you keep your CDs/DVDs in the CD books, or just in jewel cases?
A problem that I see much more often than scratched plastic is scratched foil. :(
I wonder to myself---why isn't the top layer of the CD coated with another layer of plastic?
The foil is pretty much exposed to any particles... a thin layer of paint isn't going to do much.
The CD cases (the big book-like things, not jewel cases) always seem to accumulate little particles in the sleeves, which will rub against the foil, and scratch it, or worse, make it start coming off. This happens especially with cheap CDRs (also, exposing CDRs to heat tends to make the foil start cracking). I don't understand why the data layer isn't well-protected on BOTH SIDES.
I guess the solution to things rubbing against the disc would be to use only jewel cases, as they suspend the disc in air so that particles wouldn't be forced up against it, but, I can't carry around huge crates filled with jewel cases everywhere I go.
Perhaps the best solution is to keep original CDs in jewel cases, never use cheap CDRs, and only carry around copies of CDs/CDRs in the big CD books, and keep a portable air-can or hand-held vacuum handy to suck dirt out of the case every time it's opened/closed, and never leave it open (just open it to take something in/out, then immediately close it), and never put anything heavy on top of the case (it could press particles that are in the case into the foil).
Is there a better option? I've lost so many things this way... Are there CDR manufacturers that put extra layers of paint or a thin layer of plastic on the top of the CDR? I seem to recall some audio CDs I own having a layer of plastic overtop of the foil (especially older ones), but most don't seem to.
I'm foreseeing drug detection systems installed in schools... and administrators walking past all the lockers with super-sensitive hand-held sniffers (much easier than bringin in dogs!).
Why do I keep remembering statistics about how many dollar bills have traces of cocaine...
"novel object or scene" -- not really! Sometimes when seeing something that I know I haven't seen before I will feel that it's familiar, and sometimes when in a place I know I've never visited before I will feel that I have been there, but what's much much stronger in effect is the sensation I sometimes get when there's a sequence of events or thoughts. I'll have a sensation that "the things from the last few minutes... have happened before!" and the sensation will stick for a while. Maybe it's just more profound because it's more closely tied to internal processes than simple sensory input? I often will be lying on my bed, waiting to fall asleep, and thinking, and I'll think that I've had this exact same train of thought before---not something similar, but identical. Or, I'll be having a conversation on AIM, and I'll think the conversation has happened identically before.
;)
Maybe by 'object' they mean 'anything tangible' and 'scene' is 'any temporal thought process', but, it sounds like they're studying simple recognition of items, and that's never been half the mindfuck of things that are temporally extended. Maybe it's "recognition in the mind's eye" tied to the recognition-circuitry somehow re-triggering itself repeatedly? (Maybe thinking "I'm having deja vu" will make it more likely for the feeling to continue? Suggestion and association?)
The end of the article does mention things about the temporal lobe... maybe future research will go in this direction (I'm very curious to see)
I think I've posted this comment before...
Hence "your parent/guardian must submit an affirmative response to our request for their approval of your account"... (or whatever it says) ;)
It looks like the goal of this is really a talent competition, but only an idiot (or the idiot's parent(s)) would actually agree to this:
"I represent that my Entry is my original creation and hereby grant to Sponsor the copyright and all other rights now known or hereafter existing to use my Entry throughout the universe, in perpetuity, in whole or in part, in edited, unedited or distorted form, in connection with this Contest, for any trade, advertising, or promotional purpose whatsoever, without review, approval, notification or payment from or to any person or entity, in all media now known or hereafter discovered. I understand and agree that Sponsor shall be entitled to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, license, create derivative works from and distribute or incorporate Entries into any form, medium, or technology now known or later developed throughout the universe, for any purpose whatsoever."
Ouch. (1) Throughout the universe? What, are they afraid a competing alien civilization will try to infringe on the Sponsor's copyright? (2) Without payment, without approval, for any purpose, in any edited or distorted form? Erm.. so if I submitted a video of myself playing guitar, they could make an advertisement where I've been digitally inserted into Britney Spears music video, had a moustache drawn on my face, and use it as an advertisement to sell bull's-eye-targets with my head in the middle? If any kid is hoping to get famous this way, I have one suggestion: DON'T. It sounds like it's *worse* than getting the world's (err, universe's *grin*) worst record deal.
For almost everyone I've met, the ONLY thing they like about Wal-Mart is that you can get lots of stuff inexpensively and conveniently. (I've also heard once or twice that their employees get treated well, which, I have to admit, is admirable.) Their moral agenda, tendency to put local stores out of business (of course, in some cases it's just because it's hard to stay afloat when the giant that is Wal-Mart has sucked all the water out of the pool), policies about what they will and won't carry, and some of the ways I've seen customers treated...
[In some parts of the country, though (sometimes rural areas, economic ditches, etc.), it's the only way to buy some things without mail-ordering them... does that make it a necessary 'evil'?]
I don't know if some people are just exceptionally lucky or there is some sort of aciton-at-a-distance effect. But, we don't know much about consciousness and higher-level brain functionality; we don't have a complete model, so we don't have the full story.
These links might prove interesting:
http://www.quantumbrain.org/
http://www.nonlocal.com/hbar/qbrain.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_entanglement
None of this adds up to explaining ESP (which could be bunk; humans have a tendency to interpret random coincidence as meaningful, because searching for patterns has proven biologically useful in the evolution of complex life forms), but it gives room for some interesting possibilities. It'd be really cool if ESP existed and people could learn to use it, but, if it doesn't, then we can still go on with our normal lives. I'd like to see it proven one way or another beyond doubt.
(IANAL) In Eurpoe, you aren't allowed to sing a song in public that's not yours. That was already against the law; it's public performance of someone else's work. In the USA, public performance of another's material is acceptable providing that the performance is your own (e.g., you can't sit on your front porch with your boombox nor roll your car windows down while playing a CD*, because the performance being emitted to the general public is the original artist's). At least, these things are all true in commerce, but might not apply to nonprofit events: if you are strumming nirvana on a guitar on a streetcorner, and you will only play when someone puts money in your hat, you're charging for your performance; if you just put your hat down hoping for tips (but don't TELL people to give you tips--although maybe you can say that you'd appreciate tips---you definitely can't request it of them, even if you play regardless of getting tipped), that might be OK (but it could be illegal on panhandling/loitering/solicitation/public nuisance/trespassing/harrassment/public endangerment/noise violation---basically, if a cop doesn't like you, he'll find SOME way to arrest you), and if you don't take tips at all you're probably OK.
;)
* = I am not sure about radio. It might be OK to play radio with your windows down, because it's broadcast on [sort-of] public channels.
It'd be cool if a bunch of independent artists got together and ran a free lyrics database (minimal and non-annoying advertising, reproductions allowed under various terms on a song-by-song basis, maybe also mentioning public performance and recording covers policies alongside [e.g., creative commons licenses]) lyrics database, AND specifically forbid gracenote from using their lyrics in any way.
What I'd like to know is why the weight-problems-not-tied-to-metabolism drew conclusions from a study of only TWO people. That's what we call bad science...
By that analysis, a schoolteacher who almost never sits down and is always running around the classroom should never be heavy except by overeating, and I know a few schoolteachers who eat so healthy they make vegetarians look bad, and who eat so little that they make anorectics look like pigs (and I know they don't just binge all weekend or anything, so I know they really do eat very little all the time), and they haven't lost any weight in years, no matter how hard they've tried and no matter how much they run around at home doing chores and yardwork etc.
Sure, there are probably very few people with a biologically low metabolism, but with all the humans around, there almost HAVE to be outliers.
Hah!
What I'd like to know:
Does this work as a nested X server? In other words, can I run it in a window, using the native X's mouse as the primary mouse, and then have MPX have exclusive access to additional mice?
In the FAQ it talks about MPX having to 'guess' which pointer to use for QueryPointer. Looking at the xeyes screenshot, I wonder if it would be possible to extend it so that certain applications could be linked to a certain mouse in various ways (when multiple mice are possibly choices for function calls, define different rules for picking the cursor for different applications). Also, the FAQ talks about LeaveNotify events and xterm.. maybe add a special xterm handler that only generates LeaveNotify when no other cursors are still focused on the window?
which raises the question: exactly how is focus handled? Can I type in two xterms at once? Are there lots of different complex focus models to choose from now?
Old PC-controlled laboratory instruments. If the instrument still works, why (a) pay for a new instrument, (b) train technicians on the new instrument, (c) possibly buy new mounting hardware, (c) train technicians with new versions of the software, (d) come up with new calibration parameters for the new instrument, (e) work out new statistical correlations for the different sample types' properties, (f) get the instrument certified for certain industrial applications (automotive, medical, etc.), (g) possibly buy software to convert between older and newer data file formats?
Some lab instruments will run for a good 10-20 years... there are probably still a few DEC PDP's and Apple II/GS's out there connected to instruments somewhere!
When you lose power during a bios upgrade, have to reset your console's flash, and lose all your registration keys to games that can no longer be validated... I mean, maybe it would be implemented in a really reliable way, but, what if it isn't? Or, what if you lose power while the validation key is being transferred?
You're right---I think after a few consumer reviews/reports, nobody would buy crap that breaks that easily. But, then again, if there's enough propaganda about how DRM "protects the consumer" and a software license instead of actual ownership "ensures quality products," enough people would be misled to make it profitable, and that's all that really matters, unless you lose a lot of money on a later class-action lawsuit.
[Random pseudo-related backronym thoughts: dmca = deathless moneymaking via consumer adulteration; drm = destroying the reputations of manufacturers]
Or, we could pronounce them the way they're spelled.
wh used to be a 'hw' sound, ay ey and ei used to be defined more carefully, and gh actually represents a variation of voiced spirant that often took the place of g when it fell between two vowels. (a form of this shows up as the f-sound at the end of trough)
But, there are still big problems. A lot of words underwent I-mutation (a form of vowel and diphthong sound shifting) in prehistoric (i.e., before written manuscripts) Old English from its Germanic roots; sometimes, verb stems changed to accomodate this, and sometimes they didn't. In Old English, this wasn't so much a problem, because the pronunciation was almost always clear from the spelling, as long as the vowel length was known (sometimes written, sometimes clear from context).
I-mutations sometimes occur between different forms of a word, giving us a variety of stem changes in verbs, and vowel changes in other words.
Sometimes a very regular ending change in an Old English word has become an irregular spelling, when the spelling or pronunciation changed in one form but not another.
Multiple sound shifts in the language weren't consistently applied to spelling; that's why we have tons of different spellings for the same sound, and multiple sounds that are all written the same way.
If you want to see a fairly predictable but complicated early version of English, look up Old English (you know, Beowulf-era); for a more simplified variant (but having its own odd quirks and a good bit of spelling variation) check out Chaucer's English and classical Middle English.
(I am not a linguist, please correct my ignorance)
I'm guessing that, given some time, many common words will have simpler 'modern' spellings.
Maybe we can use old-style vowel lengthening to distinguish homophones in our speech in the future (would greatly aid foreign english speakers, and since I hear there's more of them than native speakers...), although we don't usually seem to have a problem figuring that out from context (although the fact that there are many more homophones than homographs explains why we are very reluctant to change our written system, as it is a less ambiguous way of recording the language).
For example, weigh might be pronounced with a longer vowel than way and written waay -- fixes the homonym, and fixes the homograph that simplified spelling would give (of course, this is assuming that some homonyms will start to vary in pronunciation, but that's entirely possible, given the number of foreign speakers)
(Or, how about throwing a [j schwa] at the end of a syllable whose spelling ends in an unpronounced gh? weigh -> "way-uh" -- well, maybe not for the more common words...)
He should've added a few more frames to the animation that said... "THIS IS A JOKE. (DUMBASS)"
After the whole debauchle with that girl on livejournal talking about the president and getting interrogated by the secret service, I put a disclaimer on my livejournal page saying that nothing I say is actually a threat (if it seems like a threat, it's a joke), and that if anything seems like it's defamatory (libel, slander, what-have-you), then I'm exaggerating or fabricating for literary effect or humor's sake.
Maybe I have a crappy sense of humor. So what? I think I'm entitled to make bad jokes, even if I have to provide a disclaimer. (of course, there WAS that case about the lawyers suing these guys who were making lawyer jokes in front of them... but I think it was on grounds of harassment---still over the top to sue, though, IMHO.)
It's true that you don't always know when someone's joking... and after some of the high school shootings, I guess it's understandable for the school to take it seriously, but, they should have just asked Aaron---"Is this a joke? Do you actually want to harm your teacher? Do you have plans to harm your teacher?" and perhaps requested that he make it obvious that he's joking, or stop using the icon, or something. (Anybody with a copy? Put it on freenet, please?)
If I were to write or rewrite a user manual, I'd find some way to do it in LaTeX, since that allows all sorts of template and macro forms, and can be output as PDF, HTML, and other things, and can be edited in a plain text editor. There's also lots of packages out there already (see CTAN) that might be helpful by having templates and such that might be close to what you need.
But, I'm not sure what output forms you need... SGML? manpages?
(Is there a link on the reply-to-a-comment page that takes me to the main article? Before the redesign, I thought there might have been, but I don't think there's anything now *pout*)
*sigh* If industry meant all OSs ever... trusted irix, trusted solaris, prime, vms, multics, nsa linux, stratus vos.... the list goes on
I think I have a better example of my thought... it is common for people, when reading something, to mark their thoughts in the margin. There aren't margins on webpages, so if an online article is what you're replying to... (perhaps a better system is needed, where I can write an overlay-webpage and you can let your browser show it overlayed on an existing article?)
Perhaps it is true that there really are very few good reasons to quote, and almost no reasons to quote more than short pieces of text. (There are still plenty of examples from academia that would seem to discredit that, though.) But, in many instances, your work's readability goes to hell...
There's a post I saw regarding a portion in the last chapter of Michael Krasnow's My Life as a Male Anorexic. If the post didn't use quoting, it would go something like this: "Well, Mr. Krasnow, when you mention your fear that gaining a little weight will lead to a loss of control, where does all the self-control (that you mentioned when describing your anorexia as a method of control) go?" But, with quoting, it shows two sentences from the source side-by-side, and then replies to both of them put together.
Or, consider that a portion of an article might be instructions to type into a command-line interpreter; basically, a shell script. If your computer's response to the instructions differs from what is expected, you might be able to summarize, or only quote a few pieces, but in some cases I would think it wouldn't be possible to not list the interactions in whole.
Maybe this only applies, though, to things like philosophical, scientific, and mathematical subjects.
But we already agree that your example is clear-cut. What's not clear-cut are things like line-by-line or paragraph-by-paragraph replies to some essay, post, argument, etc. You end up quoting very large portions of an article, although your reply is original work. There might not be a feasible way to pose your reply without quoting an awful lot, or at least paraphrasing an awful lot. (I would argue that paraphrasing large amounts of material is dangerous, even with proper citation, because it may introduce errors of interpretation and make the distinction of where your original work ends and your source begins to be difficult; plus, if what is cited is not depicted clearly, some people might say you have "thought plagiarism.")
... . . . ... which is why my mother smells like ham," or, "starting at the 17th word on the 8th line of the 4th paragraph that begins on the 9th page of the article as is printed in the 2nd edition of the book," but those sorts of things are confusing and can make your work hard to follow. It would be interesting to pop up side-by-side frames of your work and your source, and perhaps have some color-coded directions for where to find the appropriate parts of your source (if the source uses proper A NAME="" tags, you could have #links all over the place, but what if they don't?), but if you're displaying (or arguably even linking to) someone else's stuff right next to your own, then you're deep-linking, which I'm told is a no-no, even if you properly attribute the source. And, what if you're replying to an essay in a book, or something which is available online only to a selected audience?
Sometimes viewing many quotes in their entirety is the only way for someone to understand your response to your source. But, if you can't copy much quoted content, then how are you to direct the reader to what part of your original source you're replying to? You could resort to "Where Bob said, 'The name of my cat
For example, Peter van Inwagen has published some very interesting philosophical essays. If I want to write some personal comments and responses to an essay in my blog, my replies might seem incoherent without quoting significant portions of his original arguments. (Of course, maybe this is more acceptable in the world of philosophy, particularly due to the form that these essays can take; I've seen large quotes of portions of arguments quoted in many professional philosophical papers.)
Disclaimer: I probably make both good points and really bad points in my post above. I just didn't feel like reading back over it and re-doing parts that suck.
Hmm, so i'm not the first one to think of it, but it does look like it hasn't been given much thought...
Something that used to cause bizarre delusions, hallucinations, and misperceptions in mideival times was tainted rye bread.
Some of these things _really_ sound like a bad acid trip to me. I'm not kidding---what if these people do have some bizarre infectious agent that causes rashes and secretes hallucinogenic agents into the bloodstream, making the rashes appear to be outlandish and twirl out of the skin and dance around inside your arms?
Hallucinogens as potent as LSD-25 are extremely difficult to detect. If this is a new, unusual, and very strong hallucinogen (perhaps one that doesn't cause the notorious pupil dilatation that would normally be a tip-off of a chemically-altered mental state) secreted by an infectious agent, it would all add up, at least in my eyes.
Has this possibility even been investigated? It would also be consistent with the disease being treatable with BOTH anti-infectious and anti-psychotic methods.
Of course, this doesn't entirely explain the pictures on the MRF website... but perhaps some of the things being labelled as Morgellons don't involve the same infectious agent at all.
Is that you, Charles Babbage? :-D
A good exhibit mentions Multics... and not just as the father of unix.
Maybe visualization only develops a posteriori---in other words, your brain simply learns to imitate its surroundings, internally.
I really really want to see Sims-like games for linux. It's one of the few reasons I keep windows around...
Unless you're using something with a lower boiling point. (perhaps flourinert fc-72, at 56 deg C? http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php ?t=42878)
And, my laptop CPU can get close to water's boiling point, if the thermometer chip is to be believed.
"Invalid login. Please try again." Dammit. "Invalid login. Please try again." Goddammit. Piece of crap. "Invalid login. Please try again." ...As user becomes more agitated, probability of producing correct signatures decreases...