How dare BT remove my revenue-source and jeopardize my ability to continue providing a Free website to my customers?
It is my understanding that BT won't be removing your ads. Instead, "WebWise" will be a competing advertising provider to the likes of Google, Microsoft, etc. You can elect to put Phorm ads on your site instead, and in theory, those ads will be behaviorally targeted at the people browsing your site. (Or at least, the people who haven't opted out.) If you don't use Phorm, whatever provider's ads you sign up for will be shown.
The shitstorm, as I understand it, isn't that website owners' ads won't be displayed. It's that people using this WebWise thing while browsing your site will be reporting what they're doing to a third party, and since it's opt-in, many (most?) probably won't even know that they're doing it.
Worse, because WebWise now knows that Joe Schmo is interested in whatever it is your web site is advertising, say, cars, then it will start displaying car ads from your competitors on sites that have contracts with Phorm because Joe browsed your site.
All in all, pretty scummy, but I'd genuinely be surprised if it actually removes ads from sites that have nothing to do with it. Especially since they're talking about making it opt-in, I can't imagine that wouldn't be unquestionably illegal.
For me, this would cut out the "firefighters" and "police" charitable funds, and a couple of others that call locally. But the ones that really irk me are the "lower your credit card interest rates" that I get every few days, and it's different caller id each time. Usually falsified caller id. So I would still end up getting about the same number of nuisance calls.
First of all, don't EVER give money to these "firefighters" and/or "police" charitable funds. Many, many scammers pose as these charitable organizations, and they only want your credit card/checking account info. Also, even if such a charity is legitimate, there's no reason to fund their administrative costs, money that doesn't go to the police or firefighters, money that pays for them to—you guessed it—make more telemarketing calls.
If you want to support your local firefighters and/or police, call them and tell them that you'd like to make a donation. I assure you that they will be more than happy to accept your kindness, and best of all, they will make use of 100% of the money you donate, not pay people to bother yet more people by making unsolicited calls.
Second of all, you're missing part of how this gadget works. If you're not on the whitelist or the blacklist, you'll be asked to say your name. It then rings your line and tells you what the name of the person is who is calling. Or, at least, what they recorded as their name. At that point, you can either answer, whitelist them, or blacklist them.
I suppose your phone might still ring, which could be considered a nuisance, but you're never actually talking to the idiot who is calling you, and there's a measure of satisfaction knowing that they're getting a message that says something like, "This person is refusing to take your call. Have a nice day!"
Meh, neither one of them really made me laugh, though the hyperbondage one made me giggle a little.
It's hard to spontaneously be funny about something specific at any given time. Well, unless you're Robin Williams, in which case it's easy. But you get my point. I don't think that improvisation is either one of their strong suit, but given some time to let something come to them, and the freedom to draw about whatever neurons happen to be firing in their brain at the time... That's when the funny happens. (As witnessed by the copies of xkcd hanging on my cube wall, to the delightful reaction of people walking by, staring for a few seconds, and saying, "huh?")
Improvisational comedy can be hilarious. Improvisational comic-drawing, not so much, at least by these artists.
Actually, it was down before Slashdot posted the story. I tried to access it a couple of hours ago, and it was down then. (Albeit without the ContentHelmNoodle error.)
The actual text was "The instruction at '0x77f41d24 referenced memory at '0x595c2a4c.' The memory could not be 'read.' Click OK to terminate program." You're right, this is not "basically" (or even remotely close to) the text in Ars's little joke screenshot or what was posted in the summary.
Anyone who wants to contribute to Ms. Lindor can do so here.
Ray, that link doesn't work, it looks like it was copied from someone in the process of administering their PayPal account or making a contribution, with a temporary session ID embedded in the URL.
You might want to get whoever's PayPal account that is to go into the administration of the account and get the correct link from there.
Give 'em hell, Ray. I don't even download music or movies illegally, and what the RIAA/MPAA is doing makes me sick. I've already donated today to the EFF specifically because of this story, and right now, I'm off to make a donation to Ray Beckerman PC. Keep up the great work, you really are making a difference.
Now stop reading Slashdot and go work on those response papers.:-P If you need character witnesses, post a story. I'm sure we can round up a few hundred thousand of them.
Hot damn, that's an awesome idea. I did too, and I'm even getting a nifty t-shirt in the process. Wow, I think I just became an activist. Way to go, RIAA!
Here's the link, to everyone else who is sick of just sitting there waiting for the problem to be solved by other people.
Damn, I don't even download copyrighted stuff, and what the RIAA/MPAA is doing makes me sick.
The site's either been Slashdotted, or the Secret Service has had the people who run it killed. In either case, you can see the article via the Coral Cache if you want.
There are plenty of applications that I think should would make perfectly good or even great web applications that have traditionally not been. Anything that could be shared with or among people is game. Also, applications written using the web as a platform, when done right, tend to be much more portable. I can access my e-mail, Google docs, maps, etc. from any OS, most browsers, any location, even on my mobile phone.
Honestly, unless there's some compelling reason an application shouldn't be a web app (e.g. security), I can't imagine any application that wouldn't benefit from being a web app, all other things being equal. (Which, as time goes on and products like Chrome and companies like Google push us towards web applications being more robust and capable, all things will eventually become more equal.)
And yes, I have used applications like Google Docs and Spreadsheets. It is very handy being able to share documents on the fly, track revisions, simultaneously edit them (without some insane check-out/check-in system), access documents from anywhere I have a browser, and discuss documents live--from right there inside the document--with other people. It's not as feature-rich or user-friendly as mainstream non-web apps... Yet. But when it does catch up further, yes, I do indeed want it to be a web app.
but a web browser should still be a relatively lightweight application by itself...i should be able to have a web browser running in the background while i'm working in Photoshop, Illustrator, or other memory-intensive applications.
The idea behind Chrome is that "under the hood, [Google is] able to build the foundation of a browser that runs today's complex web applications much better".
In other words, if you want a lightweight browser that can simply browse simple web pages, there probably are better browsers out there. But Google is saying (and I agree) that as time goes on, browsers are being asked to do more and more, and we need something a little better to serve not just as a lightweight web surfing application, but an actual application platform itself. Pretty soon, your Photoshop, Illustrator, and other memory-intensive applications will probably run within your browser, not as stand-alone applications on your OS of choice. (In fact, Adobe has already launched an online "express" version of Photoshop with some photo editing capabilities that are limited, but well within the realm of what used to be handled by stand-alone applications. And Adobe is not alone in doing this.)
Some people disagree, and say that a web browser should be a web browser and leave other applications stuff to, well, applications. I can see advantages both ways. Javascript, Flash, Silverlight, or whatever your Web 2.0 platform of choice is aren't the most robust of development of platforms, but that may change over time. Browsers will undoubtedly get more bloated, but as long as it's not as fast as low-end computer capabilities grow, I don't really see that as a problem. And of course, most of these platforms (well, most not developed by the company that has a vested interest in you being locked into its operating system) will work under any OS. In the end, I guess it just boils down to what all you'll be asking of your web browser. Fortunately, web browsers tend to play nice with each other and you have choices galore for which one(s) best suit your needs.
The problem is that a lot of sites require you to actually verify the e-mail address. When you sign up, it sends you an e-mail with a link you must click before your account is valid. Until you click on it, you can't log in.
If you put a fake e-mail address in, you don't get access. Thus, the needs for services like Mailinator. But Me Not is an end-run around this entire process. You don't have to register anything; valid account information is already provided for you.
Just for reference for those who may also be blocked or otherwise can't get to it...
You know all those sites where you have to register for a free account in order to access the content, sites where there's no real logical reason why you should have to register for an account except for the purpose of them harvesting your e-mail and personal information?
What Bug Me Not does is provide usernames and passwords for registrations that people have created and uploaded to their site that you can use to access content without giving up your personal information.
Perhaps a simple example would make it more clear. Let's say you go to some news site, and they insist that in order to access the site, you register for a free account. Of course, they want your name, address, and e-mail address. Even after you fill out your information, they drop you a registration e-mail that you have to validate. Then, and only then, you can access the site.
If you don't want to go through these hoops or give up your information to them, what you can do instead is go to Bug Me Not. Punch in the site name, and voila, you get a username and password you can use to access the site that someone else has already registered. If one doesn't exist and you're motivated enough, you can register one (probably using a service like Mailinator) and provide the username and password so that the next schmoe that comes along that needs one will have it.
There's also a nice Bug Me Not Firefox extension that will automagically fill in the information for you so that you don't even have to bother going to the web site.
The only problem, as someone else mentioned, is that if you're behind a content filter, some companies tag Bug Me Not as a "hacking" site. (As is Mailinator, usually.) Obviously, some people have trouble with the concept of people who don't like giving out their personal e-mail addresses or other personal information just to read a frickin' article.
Ha ha ha!!! Wow, we've never heard a joke about Trekkies never kissing a girl before, I totally didn't see that one coming! Man, you should consider becoming a comedian!
In fact, come to think of it, wouldn't it be just a stitch if we stereotype all Trekkies as nerdy goofballs and relentlessly make fun of them? OMG, I have one, let's act like they all live in their parents' basements, that would be a riot! I'll bet no one has ever heard of that one either!
Quick, someone mod the OP up to +5 funny, that one is so original that EVERYONE should see it!
From what I read in the photographer's rights document that I read, it came down to being able to get into the facility without a key, special permission or some credential.
Not having to use a key or credential does not make it public property.
Assuming you have a yard, if I went to your house, walked through your yard, and started taking pictures through the windows of your house, is it okay because I'm on public property? After all, you don't have your yard secured by a key or other credential. If you're having a party and it looks like a public place, does that make a difference?
The other posters are right. The mall is private property, you have no "right" to be there, and they can ask you to leave at any time. I agree that it's pretty sucky to ask you to do so because you're taking pictures, but there's no law against them being sucky. (There is a law, however, against you staying there after they've asked you to leave. It's called trespassing.)
Meanwhile, CEOs continue to spout off about how there's a shortage of skilled IT people in the US. Gosh, I wonder why. If China is the "factory to the world," I guess that would make the US the Wal-Mart of the world. Give it a few years once we're all working as cashiers for Wal-Mart, and that will probably be literally true.
Of course, the rub of it all is that as long as companies are laying off people a few hundred here and a few hundred there, something that human resource departments have mastered, no one will really be that worried about it. "Whew, glad it wasn't MY job," we all say as a few of our friends and coworkers are being escorted out the door each month. It's death by a thousand cuts, and what companies are doing will result in this country's ultimate demise as a superpower.
When companies systematically reads our e-mail, we've gotten desensitized to the point where we just don't care any more. When your cubicle neighbor does, though, they (literally) make a federal case of it.
Privacy? What privacy? It's just one more person knowing all the stupid little nitpicky details about my life. The best idea is to simply hole up somewhere and live the life of a hermit.
Okay, I'll bite. Funny thing is, I don't even have an iPhone, but I'm pretty familiar with another of Apple's products. I have a video iPod, and I absolutely love it.
It has little to do with it being an Apple product. Frankly, I'm not a big fan of the company, precisely because it tries to be all glitzy. But just as frankly, my iPod is head and shoulders above any other mp3 player I've ever used. Sure, it's pretty, but it also has a very nice display. I find that navigating using the touch wheel is much easier than the clunky buttons on most other players. Getting music and videos is stupidly simple. Although I'm technically proficient and can rip CDs and DVDs, jump through hoops encoding and transferring stuff, I appreciate the fact that with my iPod, I don't have to. I hate the DRM that Apple imposes on content, but it works well enough for me, and when I need to get past it, hey, I can still rip CDs and DVDs and jump through hoops encoding and transferring stuff.
You say, "I want it to work the way I want it to work and use it the way I want to use it." Well, you've pretty much stumbled onto why there are so many Apple devotees. Sure, there are some fanboys, but for most of them, Apple's products just work. It's that simple. They don't have to rip and encode and transfer and configure and read manuals and learn rocket science.
The iPhone undoubtedly has some areas where it falls short. I've used an iPhone, and I'd love to have one, but the game-breaker for me is that I'd rather shove bamboo shoots under my fingernails than to subscribe to AT&T's service, and although I probably could, I just don't have the motivation to hack it. (Better things to do with my time.) I really don't see the battery as an issue. Honestly, in about 15 years of having various cell phones, I've never once had to replace a battery. I always end up getting a new one before my battery stops holding a charge. Is it a consideration? Sure, I suppose, but stacked up against other things, it's not a major one.
Apple isn't perfect. I don't know of many people who think it is. And yes, they have a reputation for being excessively stylish. But that doesn't change that their products are very, very good. You want people not to get caught up in the glamour and not to overrate their products; I'd ask you to do the same and not underrate them, either.
Ohh good, An argument that other databases are crappy so you should only program to that level.
It has nothing to do with a DBMS being "crappy" and has everything to do with higher-end features being supported one way on one DBMS, another way on another DBMS, and/or not at all on yet another DBMS, and the real-world situation that some of your customers/users run Oracle, some run MS SQL Server, some run DB2, some run PostgreSQL, some run MySQL, etc.
All of the above examples implement higher-end features differently. Even if two different DBMSes support some high-end feature, writing a stored procedure that works on Oracle is quite different than writing a stored procedure that works on MS SQL Server. Shoot, even something as stupidly simple as creating an auto incrementing column is implemented differently between Oracle and MS SQL Server, neither of which could be considered "crappy" in terms of high-end features.
So think what you will, but out in the real world, if I can code to the lowest common denominator to avoid writing three, four, or five different versions of my application, unless there's some pretty extreme performance to be gained, that's what I'm going to do.
Oh, and if I'm coding my application to work across MS SQL Server and Oracle without modification, there's a really good chance it will work on pretty much every DBMS, including MySQL.
A lot of people think MySQL is great, but a lot of these same people have never worked on a "real" database that provides true ACID compliance, has powerful stored procedures, and instead of providing too many choices only have sensible options that all preserve data integrity.
That's because most of these people are writing their applications to be cross-platform applications, or at least with the intention of them being cross-platform at some point without re-writing the whole thing. If you don't know that you're going to be hitting against a DMBS that provides true ACID compliance and that has powerful stored procedures, it's probably a good idea not to depend on those features for critical functionality.
Also, you're forgetting who most of the databases we're talking about are aimed at: hobby or small-scale web developers. If you're writing something like Joomla! or phpBB or MediaWiki or whatever, it's pretty safe to assume that the people who are using your software won't have access rights to create things like powerful stored procedures (that, if written poorly, can <censored> up everyone using that database) even if they are supported by your DBMS. Such is the nature of $4.99 a month hosting plans; you typically don't get much more than INSERT and DELETE and SELECT.
Frankly, MySQL is a lot greater than what 99% of users use it for. Drizzle is targeted at 80% or so of those 99% to provide an even faster and better back-end. If your application is such that it needs features that aren't supported by Drizzle or even MySQL, by all means, use whatever it is you need. But really, I don't see much use in basically telling people, "You're not using it right!" when it does exactly what they want it to.
...they pay 50% or more of their taxable income in taxes.
Because I know people are probably going to choke on a figure like that, people need to be aware that because the taxes are so high in a place like Norway, they have a lot more government-provided services, stuff that we have to pay out the wazoo for in the U.S. Heath care is an obvious one. Obviously, I suppose it's ultimately up to individuals whether or not they want government paying for stuff for them. My personal opinion is that here in America, unfortunately, companies and our government are so corrupt that it couldn't possibly work.
But the point is that even if your taxes are 50% in Norway but only 35% here, it's entirely possible that your disposable income—and by extension, your standard of living—could actually be better.
Incidentally, the richest people here in America don't actually pay 35%. The dirty little secret that rich people don't want you to know because you'd probably vote it out of existence is that the tax rate on the wealthy is closer to 15%, which is much lower than you or I likely pay. (What's your marginal income tax rate?) The reason is because wealthy people don't earn most of their money through income—you know, salary and wages. Income earned by the really wealthy comes from capital gains (i.e. stocks, bonds, and other investment devices), which is only taxed at 15%.
What we need is new technology entirely. Clean, efficient, cool technology.
I totally agree.
Neal Boortz, a local talk show host that tends to sway conservative where I live, keeps railing on how the U.S. needs to have a "Manhattan Project" to explore for oil and develop domestic resources. He says that within three years, if we really focus our time, effort, energy, money, and our brightest minds on it, we could wean ourselves off dependence on foreign oil by replacing it with oil from domestic sources.
I can't help but think, if we're going to gather our time, effort, energy, money, and brightest minds, why can't we come up with a "Manhattan Project" to wean ourselves off of oil entirely?
I'm so tired of the U.S. taking a technological back seat to the rest of the world, but it looks like we're about to yet again. Let other countries develop, test, and build the products while we sit back and get further behind. That way, we'll have yet more industries we can't compete with and yet a higher trade deficit.
Slashdot Mirror
It is my understanding that BT won't be removing your ads. Instead, "WebWise" will be a competing advertising provider to the likes of Google, Microsoft, etc. You can elect to put Phorm ads on your site instead, and in theory, those ads will be behaviorally targeted at the people browsing your site. (Or at least, the people who haven't opted out.) If you don't use Phorm, whatever provider's ads you sign up for will be shown.
The shitstorm, as I understand it, isn't that website owners' ads won't be displayed. It's that people using this WebWise thing while browsing your site will be reporting what they're doing to a third party, and since it's opt-in, many (most?) probably won't even know that they're doing it.
Worse, because WebWise now knows that Joe Schmo is interested in whatever it is your web site is advertising, say, cars, then it will start displaying car ads from your competitors on sites that have contracts with Phorm because Joe browsed your site.
All in all, pretty scummy, but I'd genuinely be surprised if it actually removes ads from sites that have nothing to do with it. Especially since they're talking about making it opt-in, I can't imagine that wouldn't be unquestionably illegal.
Hey, don't knock the wiki. If you don't like it, write your own encyclopediums.
First of all, don't EVER give money to these "firefighters" and/or "police" charitable funds. Many, many scammers pose as these charitable organizations, and they only want your credit card/checking account info. Also, even if such a charity is legitimate, there's no reason to fund their administrative costs, money that doesn't go to the police or firefighters, money that pays for them to—you guessed it—make more telemarketing calls.
If you want to support your local firefighters and/or police, call them and tell them that you'd like to make a donation. I assure you that they will be more than happy to accept your kindness, and best of all, they will make use of 100% of the money you donate, not pay people to bother yet more people by making unsolicited calls.
Second of all, you're missing part of how this gadget works. If you're not on the whitelist or the blacklist, you'll be asked to say your name. It then rings your line and tells you what the name of the person is who is calling. Or, at least, what they recorded as their name. At that point, you can either answer, whitelist them, or blacklist them.
I suppose your phone might still ring, which could be considered a nuisance, but you're never actually talking to the idiot who is calling you, and there's a measure of satisfaction knowing that they're getting a message that says something like, "This person is refusing to take your call. Have a nice day!"
Meh, neither one of them really made me laugh, though the hyperbondage one made me giggle a little.
It's hard to spontaneously be funny about something specific at any given time. Well, unless you're Robin Williams, in which case it's easy. But you get my point. I don't think that improvisation is either one of their strong suit, but given some time to let something come to them, and the freedom to draw about whatever neurons happen to be firing in their brain at the time... That's when the funny happens. (As witnessed by the copies of xkcd hanging on my cube wall, to the delightful reaction of people walking by, staring for a few seconds, and saying, "huh?")
Improvisational comedy can be hilarious. Improvisational comic-drawing, not so much, at least by these artists.
How does that help? If you have hearing loss, the obvious solution is to turn UP the volume, so you can hear the music better, of course.
Actually, it was down before Slashdot posted the story. I tried to access it a couple of hours ago, and it was down then. (Albeit without the ContentHelmNoodle error.)
Check your local friendly mirror. ;-)
The actual text was "The instruction at '0x77f41d24 referenced memory at '0x595c2a4c.' The memory could not be 'read.' Click OK to terminate program." You're right, this is not "basically" (or even remotely close to) the text in Ars's little joke screenshot or what was posted in the summary.
Ray, that link doesn't work, it looks like it was copied from someone in the process of administering their PayPal account or making a contribution, with a temporary session ID embedded in the URL.
You might want to get whoever's PayPal account that is to go into the administration of the account and get the correct link from there.
Give 'em hell, Ray. I don't even download music or movies illegally, and what the RIAA/MPAA is doing makes me sick. I've already donated today to the EFF specifically because of this story, and right now, I'm off to make a donation to Ray Beckerman PC. Keep up the great work, you really are making a difference.
Now stop reading Slashdot and go work on those response papers. :-P If you need character witnesses, post a story. I'm sure we can round up a few hundred thousand of them.
Hot damn, that's an awesome idea. I did too, and I'm even getting a nifty t-shirt in the process. Wow, I think I just became an activist. Way to go, RIAA!
Here's the link, to everyone else who is sick of just sitting there waiting for the problem to be solved by other people.
Damn, I don't even download copyrighted stuff, and what the RIAA/MPAA is doing makes me sick.
The site's either been Slashdotted, or the Secret Service has had the people who run it killed. In either case, you can see the article via the Coral Cache if you want.
There are plenty of applications that I think should would make perfectly good or even great web applications that have traditionally not been. Anything that could be shared with or among people is game. Also, applications written using the web as a platform, when done right, tend to be much more portable. I can access my e-mail, Google docs, maps, etc. from any OS, most browsers, any location, even on my mobile phone.
Honestly, unless there's some compelling reason an application shouldn't be a web app (e.g. security), I can't imagine any application that wouldn't benefit from being a web app, all other things being equal. (Which, as time goes on and products like Chrome and companies like Google push us towards web applications being more robust and capable, all things will eventually become more equal.)
And yes, I have used applications like Google Docs and Spreadsheets. It is very handy being able to share documents on the fly, track revisions, simultaneously edit them (without some insane check-out/check-in system), access documents from anywhere I have a browser, and discuss documents live--from right there inside the document--with other people. It's not as feature-rich or user-friendly as mainstream non-web apps... Yet. But when it does catch up further, yes, I do indeed want it to be a web app.
The idea behind Chrome is that "under the hood, [Google is] able to build the foundation of a browser that runs today's complex web applications much better".
In other words, if you want a lightweight browser that can simply browse simple web pages, there probably are better browsers out there. But Google is saying (and I agree) that as time goes on, browsers are being asked to do more and more, and we need something a little better to serve not just as a lightweight web surfing application, but an actual application platform itself. Pretty soon, your Photoshop, Illustrator, and other memory-intensive applications will probably run within your browser, not as stand-alone applications on your OS of choice. (In fact, Adobe has already launched an online "express" version of Photoshop with some photo editing capabilities that are limited, but well within the realm of what used to be handled by stand-alone applications. And Adobe is not alone in doing this.)
Some people disagree, and say that a web browser should be a web browser and leave other applications stuff to, well, applications. I can see advantages both ways. Javascript, Flash, Silverlight, or whatever your Web 2.0 platform of choice is aren't the most robust of development of platforms, but that may change over time. Browsers will undoubtedly get more bloated, but as long as it's not as fast as low-end computer capabilities grow, I don't really see that as a problem. And of course, most of these platforms (well, most not developed by the company that has a vested interest in you being locked into its operating system) will work under any OS. In the end, I guess it just boils down to what all you'll be asking of your web browser. Fortunately, web browsers tend to play nice with each other and you have choices galore for which one(s) best suit your needs.
The problem is that a lot of sites require you to actually verify the e-mail address. When you sign up, it sends you an e-mail with a link you must click before your account is valid. Until you click on it, you can't log in.
If you put a fake e-mail address in, you don't get access. Thus, the needs for services like Mailinator. But Me Not is an end-run around this entire process. You don't have to register anything; valid account information is already provided for you.
Just for reference for those who may also be blocked or otherwise can't get to it...
You know all those sites where you have to register for a free account in order to access the content, sites where there's no real logical reason why you should have to register for an account except for the purpose of them harvesting your e-mail and personal information?
What Bug Me Not does is provide usernames and passwords for registrations that people have created and uploaded to their site that you can use to access content without giving up your personal information.
Perhaps a simple example would make it more clear. Let's say you go to some news site, and they insist that in order to access the site, you register for a free account. Of course, they want your name, address, and e-mail address. Even after you fill out your information, they drop you a registration e-mail that you have to validate. Then, and only then, you can access the site.
If you don't want to go through these hoops or give up your information to them, what you can do instead is go to Bug Me Not. Punch in the site name, and voila, you get a username and password you can use to access the site that someone else has already registered. If one doesn't exist and you're motivated enough, you can register one (probably using a service like Mailinator) and provide the username and password so that the next schmoe that comes along that needs one will have it.
There's also a nice Bug Me Not Firefox extension that will automagically fill in the information for you so that you don't even have to bother going to the web site.
The only problem, as someone else mentioned, is that if you're behind a content filter, some companies tag Bug Me Not as a "hacking" site. (As is Mailinator, usually.) Obviously, some people have trouble with the concept of people who don't like giving out their personal e-mail addresses or other personal information just to read a frickin' article.
Ha ha ha!!! Wow, we've never heard a joke about Trekkies never kissing a girl before, I totally didn't see that one coming! Man, you should consider becoming a comedian!
In fact, come to think of it, wouldn't it be just a stitch if we stereotype all Trekkies as nerdy goofballs and relentlessly make fun of them? OMG, I have one, let's act like they all live in their parents' basements, that would be a riot! I'll bet no one has ever heard of that one either!
Quick, someone mod the OP up to +5 funny, that one is so original that EVERYONE should see it!
How is it that AMD is able to release x86 chips, but nVidia can't without a license from Intel? Why would nVidia need AMD to be gracious?
Not having to use a key or credential does not make it public property.
Assuming you have a yard, if I went to your house, walked through your yard, and started taking pictures through the windows of your house, is it okay because I'm on public property? After all, you don't have your yard secured by a key or other credential. If you're having a party and it looks like a public place, does that make a difference?
The other posters are right. The mall is private property, you have no "right" to be there, and they can ask you to leave at any time. I agree that it's pretty sucky to ask you to do so because you're taking pictures, but there's no law against them being sucky. (There is a law, however, against you staying there after they've asked you to leave. It's called trespassing.)
Meanwhile, CEOs continue to spout off about how there's a shortage of skilled IT people in the US. Gosh, I wonder why. If China is the "factory to the world," I guess that would make the US the Wal-Mart of the world. Give it a few years once we're all working as cashiers for Wal-Mart, and that will probably be literally true.
Of course, the rub of it all is that as long as companies are laying off people a few hundred here and a few hundred there, something that human resource departments have mastered, no one will really be that worried about it. "Whew, glad it wasn't MY job," we all say as a few of our friends and coworkers are being escorted out the door each month. It's death by a thousand cuts, and what companies are doing will result in this country's ultimate demise as a superpower.
Good point.
When companies systematically reads our e-mail, we've gotten desensitized to the point where we just don't care any more. When your cubicle neighbor does, though, they (literally) make a federal case of it.
Privacy? What privacy? It's just one more person knowing all the stupid little nitpicky details about my life. The best idea is to simply hole up somewhere and live the life of a hermit.
At least see it working before dissing it. Looks kind of cool, even if in an "its a toy" kind of way.
I was intrigued at the mention of the possibility that they could be programmed to go specific places.
Okay, I'll bite. Funny thing is, I don't even have an iPhone, but I'm pretty familiar with another of Apple's products. I have a video iPod, and I absolutely love it.
It has little to do with it being an Apple product. Frankly, I'm not a big fan of the company, precisely because it tries to be all glitzy. But just as frankly, my iPod is head and shoulders above any other mp3 player I've ever used. Sure, it's pretty, but it also has a very nice display. I find that navigating using the touch wheel is much easier than the clunky buttons on most other players. Getting music and videos is stupidly simple. Although I'm technically proficient and can rip CDs and DVDs, jump through hoops encoding and transferring stuff, I appreciate the fact that with my iPod, I don't have to. I hate the DRM that Apple imposes on content, but it works well enough for me, and when I need to get past it, hey, I can still rip CDs and DVDs and jump through hoops encoding and transferring stuff.
You say, "I want it to work the way I want it to work and use it the way I want to use it." Well, you've pretty much stumbled onto why there are so many Apple devotees. Sure, there are some fanboys, but for most of them, Apple's products just work. It's that simple. They don't have to rip and encode and transfer and configure and read manuals and learn rocket science.
The iPhone undoubtedly has some areas where it falls short. I've used an iPhone, and I'd love to have one, but the game-breaker for me is that I'd rather shove bamboo shoots under my fingernails than to subscribe to AT&T's service, and although I probably could, I just don't have the motivation to hack it. (Better things to do with my time.) I really don't see the battery as an issue. Honestly, in about 15 years of having various cell phones, I've never once had to replace a battery. I always end up getting a new one before my battery stops holding a charge. Is it a consideration? Sure, I suppose, but stacked up against other things, it's not a major one.
Apple isn't perfect. I don't know of many people who think it is. And yes, they have a reputation for being excessively stylish. But that doesn't change that their products are very, very good. You want people not to get caught up in the glamour and not to overrate their products; I'd ask you to do the same and not underrate them, either.
It has nothing to do with a DBMS being "crappy" and has everything to do with higher-end features being supported one way on one DBMS, another way on another DBMS, and/or not at all on yet another DBMS, and the real-world situation that some of your customers/users run Oracle, some run MS SQL Server, some run DB2, some run PostgreSQL, some run MySQL, etc.
All of the above examples implement higher-end features differently. Even if two different DBMSes support some high-end feature, writing a stored procedure that works on Oracle is quite different than writing a stored procedure that works on MS SQL Server. Shoot, even something as stupidly simple as creating an auto incrementing column is implemented differently between Oracle and MS SQL Server, neither of which could be considered "crappy" in terms of high-end features.
So think what you will, but out in the real world, if I can code to the lowest common denominator to avoid writing three, four, or five different versions of my application, unless there's some pretty extreme performance to be gained, that's what I'm going to do.
Oh, and if I'm coding my application to work across MS SQL Server and Oracle without modification, there's a really good chance it will work on pretty much every DBMS, including MySQL.
That's because most of these people are writing their applications to be cross-platform applications, or at least with the intention of them being cross-platform at some point without re-writing the whole thing. If you don't know that you're going to be hitting against a DMBS that provides true ACID compliance and that has powerful stored procedures, it's probably a good idea not to depend on those features for critical functionality.
Also, you're forgetting who most of the databases we're talking about are aimed at: hobby or small-scale web developers. If you're writing something like Joomla! or phpBB or MediaWiki or whatever, it's pretty safe to assume that the people who are using your software won't have access rights to create things like powerful stored procedures (that, if written poorly, can <censored> up everyone using that database) even if they are supported by your DBMS. Such is the nature of $4.99 a month hosting plans; you typically don't get much more than INSERT and DELETE and SELECT.
Frankly, MySQL is a lot greater than what 99% of users use it for. Drizzle is targeted at 80% or so of those 99% to provide an even faster and better back-end. If your application is such that it needs features that aren't supported by Drizzle or even MySQL, by all means, use whatever it is you need. But really, I don't see much use in basically telling people, "You're not using it right!" when it does exactly what they want it to.
Because I know people are probably going to choke on a figure like that, people need to be aware that because the taxes are so high in a place like Norway, they have a lot more government-provided services, stuff that we have to pay out the wazoo for in the U.S. Heath care is an obvious one. Obviously, I suppose it's ultimately up to individuals whether or not they want government paying for stuff for them. My personal opinion is that here in America, unfortunately, companies and our government are so corrupt that it couldn't possibly work.
But the point is that even if your taxes are 50% in Norway but only 35% here, it's entirely possible that your disposable income—and by extension, your standard of living—could actually be better.
Incidentally, the richest people here in America don't actually pay 35%. The dirty little secret that rich people don't want you to know because you'd probably vote it out of existence is that the tax rate on the wealthy is closer to 15%, which is much lower than you or I likely pay. (What's your marginal income tax rate?) The reason is because wealthy people don't earn most of their money through income—you know, salary and wages. Income earned by the really wealthy comes from capital gains (i.e. stocks, bonds, and other investment devices), which is only taxed at 15%.
I totally agree.
Neal Boortz, a local talk show host that tends to sway conservative where I live, keeps railing on how the U.S. needs to have a "Manhattan Project" to explore for oil and develop domestic resources. He says that within three years, if we really focus our time, effort, energy, money, and our brightest minds on it, we could wean ourselves off dependence on foreign oil by replacing it with oil from domestic sources.
I can't help but think, if we're going to gather our time, effort, energy, money, and brightest minds, why can't we come up with a "Manhattan Project" to wean ourselves off of oil entirely?
I'm so tired of the U.S. taking a technological back seat to the rest of the world, but it looks like we're about to yet again. Let other countries develop, test, and build the products while we sit back and get further behind. That way, we'll have yet more industries we can't compete with and yet a higher trade deficit.