I think it's high time our public offices stop feeding monopolistic practices by continuing with document format requirements that more or less pre-determine software choice.
That is a fantastic idea, and I completely agree with it. Basically what you're suggesting, it sounds like, is that we have document format requirements that actually guarantee any software provider the legal right to implement support for the format chosen. I totally support that.
Yes, that would be a great cure for the abuse of monopolistic practices that these evil ODF people are threatening.
The idea that you give people a computer and magically their lives will be better is one of the worst jokes currently being pushed on the uneducated public who believe everything they are told.
Indeed. In fact, more generally, it's ludicrous to suggest that any single effort can automagically make anyone's life better in poor undeveloped countries. So your statement applies more generally: all efforts to help anyone in any way should immediately be abandoned. They're not magic wands; only a magic wand will be satisfactory.
What a grand testament it is to the present political situation in the UK that no one so far thinks you deserve a "troll" mod. (I don't think you do, either.)
It's my impression that the very countries who are trying to block the.xxx TLD are precisely the same people as the ones who would prefer it to be compulsory. This is obviously unrealistic, which is why I have very little sympathy for the delayers.
The ones who think the.xxx TLD is a good idea, however, seem to me to be doing so because there's a market for it -- and that line of reasoning doesn't have very much to do with compulsion.
Make and play your own music (I play guitar), they can't DRM or control that in any way.
Yet.
No, I'm serious. I too am a musician (piano, mostly). Consider: it's not out of the question that some software company might decide one day that they want to control what you do with your own data that you have created using their software. After that, there's not a big conceptual leap between controlling what you do with your data and controlling all private artistic output; the only thing missing is the technology.
OK, OK, my tinfoil hat is on really tight today, but I'm thinking say a few decades into the future, when everything might potentially be "tagged" in one way or another, -- including acoustic musical instruments. And that bit, I fear, is not at all a paranoid fantasy; I think it's very likely.
Thanks, that is informative, and I'm sure a lot of us non-Americans would have misunderstood the situation as the GP did. The scenario you describe astonishes me, but it does certainly explain why electronic voting is such a big issue -- I've been puzzled about this for a long time.
... there's just a few companies at the top who get to eat meat?
(goes and checks OED this time, instead of a Greek dictionary)
Ah, I see. I do hate it when a word has not much connection to the words from which it's descended. I do wish whoever made this one up had thought of "oligony" instead (< oneo to buy), though I can see how that could be confusing too.
Put it in a nice, glossy box on a shelf at Best Buy and only then will they consider it.
They'll consider it even less, I fear -- consumers (I choose the word intentionally; personally, I am a "customer") tend to be put off by a price-tag of $2.95 for a fully-featured office suite.
On the other hand, when I put my lecture notes online in OpenDocument format (as well as PDF; TeX isn't used much in humanities), quite a lot of my students are motivated by curiosity to download the necessary software and check it out. They might never open the software again, but it's still exposure. Baby steps.
Could try the Cambridge University Library cataloguing system, which shelves books on the basis of book size in four (IIRC) separate categories. It's counter-intuitive at first, but very effective at saving space. Link: NEWTON catalogue.
Your comment bugs me. I am a grammar pedant. Amongst the things I don't get pedantic about are so-called "split infinitives". Sure, some people think they're ugly -- to the point where some random guy in the 1860s invented a "rule" out of thin air prohibiting them from good English.
Other people, like me, don't happen to care particularly about rules that were invented out of thin air in the 1860s and which most guides to English grammar written since about 1910 suggest you should ignore. It is true, I tend to think that "split infinitives" can often sound ugly; but as a rule, I tend not to think that stomping on others who do "split" is a great way to win friends and influence people.
The "rule" that infinitives should not be split is derived from parallels with classical Greek and Latin. But English hasn't had proper infinitival forms corresponding to Greek and Latin infinitives since the 1300s (or perhaps earlier, I'm uncertain): "want", not "to want", is the closest we now have to the infinitive of the verb in question (Old English verbs standardly had the infinitive ending -an), other than in terms of semantics. Now, if you will agree that "want" is the infinitive, then I shall agree that it should not be split -- in the sense that a sentence like "make them to wa not nt to do it" is rather silly; but anything beyond that is a figment of a 19th century Englishman's imagination.
Gothic means "ugly." Ironically the term was coined by the baroque.
Pedantry time. No, it doesn't, and according to the OED the earliest citation of "Gothic" to refer to architecture is not only wholly positive in tone -- "1641 EVELYN Diary Aug., This..towne..hath one of the fairest Churches, of the Gotiq design, I had seene." -- but also pre-dates by over 50 years the earliest citation of the word being used to mean "4. Barbarous, rude, uncouth, unpolished, in bad taste. Of temper: Savage."
Wishful thinking does not make things so. You may not prefer that translation of Übermensch, but pretty much everyone else in the universe does. So, tough. Would you translate the Nazi term Untermensch as "underman"? Well, no one else does.
Slashdot Mirror
That is a fantastic idea, and I completely agree with it. Basically what you're suggesting, it sounds like, is that we have document format requirements that actually guarantee any software provider the legal right to implement support for the format chosen. I totally support that.
Yes, that would be a great cure for the abuse of monopolistic practices that these evil ODF people are threatening.
Indeed. In fact, more generally, it's ludicrous to suggest that any single effort can automagically make anyone's life better in poor undeveloped countries. So your statement applies more generally: all efforts to help anyone in any way should immediately be abandoned. They're not magic wands; only a magic wand will be satisfactory.
What a grand testament it is to the present political situation in the UK that no one so far thinks you deserve a "troll" mod. (I don't think you do, either.)
Oh so it's the hardware that crashes them, rather than what's on it. Ah well, it's a nice idea anyway ...
Your comment led me to try the IP 69.69.69.69 just to see what's there. Alas, there doesn't seem to be a server there.
Sorry, I don't get that. Who are you saying is trying to control whom?
It's my impression that the very countries who are trying to block the .xxx TLD are precisely the same people as the ones who would prefer it to be compulsory. This is obviously unrealistic, which is why I have very little sympathy for the delayers.
.xxx TLD is a good idea, however, seem to me to be doing so because there's a market for it -- and that line of reasoning doesn't have very much to do with compulsion.
The ones who think the
Yes, Hugh Laurie appeared in P.G. Wodehouse's novels.
Yet.
No, I'm serious. I too am a musician (piano, mostly). Consider: it's not out of the question that some software company might decide one day that they want to control what you do with your own data that you have created using their software. After that, there's not a big conceptual leap between controlling what you do with your data and controlling all private artistic output; the only thing missing is the technology.
OK, OK, my tinfoil hat is on really tight today, but I'm thinking say a few decades into the future, when everything might potentially be "tagged" in one way or another, -- including acoustic musical instruments. And that bit, I fear, is not at all a paranoid fantasy; I think it's very likely.
I think it was "take a look at me titties".
Thanks, that is informative, and I'm sure a lot of us non-Americans would have misunderstood the situation as the GP did. The scenario you describe astonishes me, but it does certainly explain why electronic voting is such a big issue -- I've been puzzled about this for a long time.
In related news, Take Two Interactive announced today that they are about to release Duke Nukem Forever.
(Yay! my first ever DNF joke on Slashdot ... and it was actually relevant)
Now that I did not know -- explains a lot. Thank you. It's the off-chance of learning a little tidbit like this that makes me glad I read /. ...
That sounds like a fun toy. Could I ask a favour -- would you post an image of it somewhere? Pretty please?
You've obviously never seen me play darts.
... there's just a few companies at the top who get to eat meat?
(goes and checks OED this time, instead of a Greek dictionary)
Ah, I see. I do hate it when a word has not much connection to the words from which it's descended. I do wish whoever made this one up had thought of "oligony" instead (< oneo to buy), though I can see how that could be confusing too.
**whooosh**
They'll consider it even less, I fear -- consumers (I choose the word intentionally; personally, I am a "customer") tend to be put off by a price-tag of $2.95 for a fully-featured office suite.
On the other hand, when I put my lecture notes online in OpenDocument format (as well as PDF; TeX isn't used much in humanities), quite a lot of my students are motivated by curiosity to download the necessary software and check it out. They might never open the software again, but it's still exposure. Baby steps.
Could try the Cambridge University Library cataloguing system, which shelves books on the basis of book size in four (IIRC) separate categories. It's counter-intuitive at first, but very effective at saving space. Link: NEWTON catalogue.
Your comment bugs me. I am a grammar pedant. Amongst the things I don't get pedantic about are so-called "split infinitives". Sure, some people think they're ugly -- to the point where some random guy in the 1860s invented a "rule" out of thin air prohibiting them from good English.
Other people, like me, don't happen to care particularly about rules that were invented out of thin air in the 1860s and which most guides to English grammar written since about 1910 suggest you should ignore. It is true, I tend to think that "split infinitives" can often sound ugly; but as a rule, I tend not to think that stomping on others who do "split" is a great way to win friends and influence people.
The "rule" that infinitives should not be split is derived from parallels with classical Greek and Latin. But English hasn't had proper infinitival forms corresponding to Greek and Latin infinitives since the 1300s (or perhaps earlier, I'm uncertain): "want", not "to want", is the closest we now have to the infinitive of the verb in question (Old English verbs standardly had the infinitive ending -an), other than in terms of semantics. Now, if you will agree that "want" is the infinitive, then I shall agree that it should not be split -- in the sense that a sentence like "make them to wa not nt to do it" is rather silly; but anything beyond that is a figment of a 19th century Englishman's imagination.
Its origins as an architectural term have nothing to do with that meaning, however.
Pedantry time. No, it doesn't, and according to the OED the earliest citation of "Gothic" to refer to architecture is not only wholly positive in tone -- "1641 EVELYN Diary Aug., This..towne..hath one of the fairest Churches, of the Gotiq design, I had seene." -- but also pre-dates by over 50 years the earliest citation of the word being used to mean "4. Barbarous, rude, uncouth, unpolished, in bad taste. Of temper: Savage."
OK, I'll bite. What's the second L in FLLA?
I'd like to hear an answer to this, too. ActiveX, maybe? In which case most of us are safe ...
Wishful thinking does not make things so. You may not prefer that translation of Übermensch, but pretty much everyone else in the universe does. So, tough. Would you translate the Nazi term Untermensch as "underman"? Well, no one else does.