I couldn't agree more. When I read this my only thought was "what the fuck?". On a German Mac keyboard, \ is Alt+Shift+7. I think on Linux and Windos it's something equally retarded.
Will the people who made PHP a good programming language please fork it and take it away from the clueless morons who have taken over?
Gates' personal pursuit of breakthrough ideas in science and technology.
Good that he finally gets started on some. Seriously, the guy is great in stealing and rebranding other ideas as his own, but that's it. I've yet to hear of even one original idea by Bill Gates.
You wouldn't want a game to follow scientifically realistic principles. For one thing doing so would involve including the possibility that it would go off on a tangent and fail. You don't want that, not in a game anyway, which means you have to add a lot of constraints, which in turn means a truly scientific approach is pretty much impossible.
Nevertheless, it is still possible to build a game around that. For example, on the creature stage all you need to do is go away from Spore's stupid "your entire species evolves in parallel" concept. Have each individual creature evolve on its own (a game-simplification, in reality you would have groups evolve independently) and allow me to switch between them at will (not unusual, many games allow that), so when one branch of the species dies out, I simply continue with a different one.
Yes, truly scientific valid evolution is probably not a great game concept. But you could do a good approximation and still end up with a fun game.
I get the feeling that Spore originally was meant to be more but Maxis has always had trouble delivering. SimCity of course were amazing games. For their time. It is the reason the francise died. Because as it aged, the graphics improved but the quality of the simulation didn't and we as players became aware that more was needed. More paths, more options, more choice. Instead SimCity and the likes have always had a rather narrow path to victory and if veered of that path, the game model couldn't cope.
They put in more options - but at the wrong points. The later games had a lot of stuff the earlier ones did not - except that it didn't really add anything to gameplay. On the contrary, it was a bother, mostly. Water pipes - anyone here who doesn't cringe at the thought? Absolutely no gameplay value whatsoever except that you had to think about an additional step.
However, research isn't the total of the scientific method. Scrutiny is explicitly part of it, and peer-review is the most common form of scrutiny. Thus I consider it a part of the method.
WP appears to work in a similar way - by having your article open for scrutiny by every random John Doe. But that's by far not the same thing, and pointing the difference out was my point.
Just another fool who fell into the economist trap. What he calls "labour", the people who actually do it call "hobby". It's not "unpaid work", stupid. There is more to life than work and consumerism.
One big, very big, area is that humans do a tremendeous amount of things for social currency - networking, making friends, spending time with friends, or just being "with other people" (instead of lonely).
The ideal Wikipedia article provides a source for every disputable statement from which the reader can judge how reliable the statement is.
The problem isn't with the sources that are there.
The problem is with those that have been omitted, and the simple fact that as a non-expert on the topic, you will likely never even know that something is missing.
A lot of criticism against WP isn't that articles are faked or outright lies, but against selective editing and selective removal.
The "peer" in "peer review" doesn't mean some socio-romantic "we are all equals" dream, it is an actual statement of purpose, with meaning. Namely, that other experts within the field get to check on you. Basically, the four-eyes principle, formalized. Credentials is exactly what it's all about, so discarding that is - exactly as I said - ignoring a vital aspect of the process. In other words: Applying human rights to plants - it won't work, because you're ignoring an important part of the system.
I've got no idea about your experiences with the scientific community, but from what I know, "client-server" does not describe it very well. The publications are not part of the architecture, they are just one specific implementation. Scientists in all fields do and always have communicated directly with each other, and some of the most valuable exchanges happened in personal letters. There's a reason that letters of famous dead scientists are found so interesting that they are surprisingly often published as books.
You don't charge others to receive a show flyer (which could take a few hours to design, plus hours to print and many hours to distribute), so why charge for music?
While I'm with you on other ideas, this one is simply misleading.
The flyer is clearly a secondary/supportive item - the show is the main item. The music, on the other hand, is the main item of a band. There's nothing that it supports. It is the thing.
So you can't compare them. Two different classes of things.
Here's why my projects use Subversion and not git. In no particular order, with no claim of absolute truth, this is just how I see it:
Subversion has a vast amount of support in other tools. You can plug the repository into Trac, for example, and have instant web-based changelog, source browser and can link to the code in your ticket system (and vice versa - few things are better when reviewing changes then being able to click on a link in the commit comment and be instantly transported to the ticket with the bug description). There's also SVN support in lots of IDEs, text editors, etc. and there's plenty of GUI frontends to pick from.
Lots of people know it, which reduces the time you spend teaching your developers a new tool. Those who don't know it will know CVS and it's similar enough to bring them up to speed in no time. Those who don't even know CVS you don't want near your code anyways.:-)
I'm used to it. Sounds like a small thing, but it means I can get a new repository up in less than two minutes. I can set up a subversion server from scratch (say, a fresh Debian install) in less than half an hour. I can do everything I need to do without having to look it up.
It serves my needs. While arch or git are more fancy and the concepts are very interesting, I've not yet found a compelling reason to switch.
I guess it depends mostly on the last point - your needs. If you're Linus and you're writing a kernel, git is probably your best choice, because it was built with that in mind. If you're working with a normal team on a normal programm, Subversion is probably more suited because it was built for that. Anywhere inbetween - your decision.:-)
If we want to stop spam, we need to remove the economic incentive. And throwing spammers in jail does not accomplish that.
That's not true.
It does raise the risk, which raises the cost for the spam-buyers. If you raise the risk, and thus the cost, enough, it will stop being profitable. First for a few items, then for the majority. Only a small number of exceptionally high profit margin items will remain "spam-worthy".
Which raises an interesting question that no one seems to be asking: What if the problem is not Wikipedia at all? What if Wikipedia is a symptom of a much larger problem in our culture? What if the solution isn't to berate Wikipedia for that which they cannot fix, but rather to ensure the foundations upon which the system is based are fixed?
WP might not be "the" problem, but a part of the problem, I agree on that.
However, the aggregation and the claims that WP makes about itself contribute to the problem. Most people with some critical thinking don't trust everything they read on the Internet, and have a clue about how reliable certain publications usually are. Most of us know which newspapers have good reporting and which ones don't.
WP merges everything. That means loss of differentiation. Someone decides which version is "true", maybe because he doesn't know the others.
More simply put: If you read it in a magazine, you're more likely to check at least one other source. If you read it in an encyclopedia, you aren't. For the most part, the encyclopedia is the most authoritative source a normal human will check.
Many years ago, someone coined the term "consensus reality". I think that is more than appropriate here. What Wikipedia does is create "consensus truth", where things are true if there is a consensus that they are. That's independent of fact, although there is a fairly strong correlation. However, there is no causation. There's quite a bit on WP that's verifiably false - but the falsifications never make it because they violate some WP policy. Lanier is a good example, I know a couple more like that.
WP is an interesting experiment in expanding the scientific method by removing the "peer" from "peer-review". Ironically, it works exactly there where we-as-common-humans are peers - in the facts of everyday life, that are within our capabilities to verify and thusly thanks to the vast popularity of WP, there'll always be someone to spot the error and correct it.
By my estimate, it fails on non-mainstream topics, be they obscure or just complicated. Also in anything subjective, where you get edit wars because of differing opinions.
May I suggest that we make tomorrow the Global Piracy Day in return? Everyone download at least one movie or game.
Seriously. When something's so common that your grandma does it, it's time to question the law that makes it illegal.
I don't say it automatically is right if enough people do it - speeding is an example, or drunk driving. But still, it's time to question the law and rework it. Laws codify the rules of society, they don't make them - contrary to what some politicians wish to believe.
In addition to the other comment, who's right about guerilla warfare:
My best in Iraq are on the one with the brains. Right now, that's not the US. You guys would have had a chance had you been willing to do what's necessary to carry a win in a territory where most people have to think hard to come up with something they hate even more. For example, obliterating the place, killing everyone who even looks funny or knows someone who once met someone who's brother's sister-in-law used to say a bad word about you.
Why don't you ask the veterans of a hundred other examples of where a superior military force rolled over an enemy armed with small arms? Oh yeah, I forgot: You can't ask them because they're mostly dead.
There are a few examples in history where the superior army did not carry the victory, true. But one, two or even a dozen exceptions do not establish a rule. Usually, he with the bigger guns wins.
Afghanistan, specifically, is very easily disproved: You had half a population there willing to rather die than be ruled by the Soviets. Also, it was heavily supported by an equal enemy, the US. If either of those elementary points had not been true, things would have turned out differently. And we can get rid of the first one quickly. By my estimate, the actual number of people in the USA willing to lay down their lives in order to remove/reform the government, who aren't just saying it but who'll actually go and fight when push comes to shove - how many do you think there really are? I'd say not enough to survive even one battle.
Several comments tried to use Iraq or Afghanistan as counter-examples.
I think they're flawed and useless. You can not compare an invasion with a revolution. Totally different animals. Roughly the only thing they have in common is that bullets fly.
Why don't you compare things with Tianamen Square, for example? Here's a dictatorship bent on keeping control, with all the equipment a modern army can muster. Now, for the sake of the thought experiment, arm the students with pistols and rifles. Play it through in your head. Is the outcome different? I dare say no, except for two things: One, the west wouldn't have perceived the students as innocent victims and two, a lot more blood would have been shed.
And your gun will do what, exactly, against tanks and choppers?
The constitution was written in a time when a well-armed group of citizens had a chance in a firefight against the official army. But since then, we've invented machine guns, kevlar, tanks, planes and helicopters. Not to mention unmanned drones, spy satellites and missiles.
If the NRA goes toe to toe with the marines, or even any random division, I know where my bets are.
But is it worth having no choices? XP has been rock-solid stable for years, and if you buy a ThinkPad (for example) you have the following options that Apple does not offer on any of their new laptops:
I've rarely seen a post this far out of touch with reality.
Lots of people buy Macs specifically because they don't want XP (or Vista, or any other incarnation of that crap) anymore.
Lots of people buy Macs specifically because they don't want to spend 200 hours reviewing all options, reading various PC magazines, comparing everything online, getting conflicting information from different shops and then buying product A never being sure whether option B or C wouldn't have been better. Sometimes, less choice is actually more. For me, Apple offers the exact right amount of choice.
How relevant is the OS at this point anyway? Start thinking about functionality more than design aesthetics.
The OS is very, very relevant. After many years of (forced) windos usage at work and (chosen) Linux at home, I wouldn't go back to either. Linux still runs my servers, but as a desktop OS, it is 5-10 years behind OS X. While XP can not be measured in "behind" because it's not only behind, it also took a wrong turn years ago. The advantages of proper Drag & Drop alone could fill a small article.
And no, functionality doesn't matter 10% of what design does. Design isn't just "looks", it is usability and user comfort, too. As long as you think that design is just aesthetics, you've got no clue about design.
Probably depends a lot on the type of programs you install. You're right, small tools don't often require a reboot. Games (even demos!) very often do. Larger applications do. And of course, anything that installs a driver does.
When I was in school, I didn't feel bad about it because I didn't have the money anyways. 50 bucks for a computer game? I would've had to save 2-3 months to afford that, and very, very few games lasted that long before I was done with them, so it wouldn't have been a sustainable model.
Later on, when I could afford games, I bought most of the ones I played. And that was ok. I was occasionally unhappy because it sucked, which is a lot worse if you paid for it, but it was mostly ok.
But ever since the game industry started treating me, the honest customer, as a criminal, my feelings (and actions) have changed again. Today, I still insist on buying the game if it is from a small, indy publisher. EA and Co? No more money for you. Stop treating me like a criminal and I'll stop behaving like one.
Yes, good idea, old idea. Unfortunately, the math behind this type of encryption is too heavy to be feasable for actual use without considerable advantages in computing power first.
Of course, you can have multiple layers of encryption, but then you still have the problem of proving that there are no more layers, and so on.
If there were a simple solution, you can be sure there would be a product on the market already.
Hm. I run both Windows and Mac. I can't remember the last time I did any update to a Mac that didn't require a restart. It's really pretty annoying.
Two just recently, do you actually watch the screens you click "OK" on?
Most importantly, 99% of the Mac applications don't require a reboot, while >80% of the windows apps do (strictly speaking, they don't really require one, but they ask for it as if).
Slashdot Mirror
I couldn't agree more. When I read this my only thought was "what the fuck?". On a German Mac keyboard, \ is Alt+Shift+7. I think on Linux and Windos it's something equally retarded.
Will the people who made PHP a good programming language please fork it and take it away from the clueless morons who have taken over?
Gates' personal pursuit of breakthrough ideas in science and technology.
Good that he finally gets started on some. Seriously, the guy is great in stealing and rebranding other ideas as his own, but that's it. I've yet to hear of even one original idea by Bill Gates.
You wouldn't want a game to follow scientifically realistic principles. For one thing doing so would involve including the possibility that it would go off on a tangent and fail. You don't want that, not in a game anyway, which means you have to add a lot of constraints, which in turn means a truly scientific approach is pretty much impossible.
Nevertheless, it is still possible to build a game around that. For example, on the creature stage all you need to do is go away from Spore's stupid "your entire species evolves in parallel" concept. Have each individual creature evolve on its own (a game-simplification, in reality you would have groups evolve independently) and allow me to switch between them at will (not unusual, many games allow that), so when one branch of the species dies out, I simply continue with a different one.
Yes, truly scientific valid evolution is probably not a great game concept. But you could do a good approximation and still end up with a fun game.
Not having played CoD I do assume that it still does kill you. So while it is not the same thing, it somewhat realistically simulates it.
Spore doesn't. What Spore calls "evolution" doesn't have anything whatsoever to do with evolution.
The better metaphor would be if in CoD exploding grenades sprinkled an ammo bonus around instead of doing damage.
I get the feeling that Spore originally was meant to be more but Maxis has always had trouble delivering. SimCity of course were amazing games. For their time. It is the reason the francise died. Because as it aged, the graphics improved but the quality of the simulation didn't and we as players became aware that more was needed. More paths, more options, more choice. Instead SimCity and the likes have always had a rather narrow path to victory and if veered of that path, the game model couldn't cope.
They put in more options - but at the wrong points. The later games had a lot of stuff the earlier ones did not - except that it didn't really add anything to gameplay. On the contrary, it was a bother, mostly. Water pipes - anyone here who doesn't cringe at the thought? Absolutely no gameplay value whatsoever except that you had to think about an additional step.
Yes, WP doesn't do research.
However, research isn't the total of the scientific method. Scrutiny is explicitly part of it, and peer-review is the most common form of scrutiny. Thus I consider it a part of the method.
WP appears to work in a similar way - by having your article open for scrutiny by every random John Doe. But that's by far not the same thing, and pointing the difference out was my point.
Bla, bla, bla.
Just another fool who fell into the economist trap. What he calls "labour", the people who actually do it call "hobby". It's not "unpaid work", stupid. There is more to life than work and consumerism.
One big, very big, area is that humans do a tremendeous amount of things for social currency - networking, making friends, spending time with friends, or just being "with other people" (instead of lonely).
The ideal Wikipedia article provides a source for every disputable statement from which the reader can judge how reliable the statement is.
The problem isn't with the sources that are there.
The problem is with those that have been omitted, and the simple fact that as a non-expert on the topic, you will likely never even know that something is missing.
A lot of criticism against WP isn't that articles are faked or outright lies, but against selective editing and selective removal.
Au, that hurts.
The "peer" in "peer review" doesn't mean some socio-romantic "we are all equals" dream, it is an actual statement of purpose, with meaning. Namely, that other experts within the field get to check on you. Basically, the four-eyes principle, formalized. Credentials is exactly what it's all about, so discarding that is - exactly as I said - ignoring a vital aspect of the process. In other words: Applying human rights to plants - it won't work, because you're ignoring an important part of the system.
I've got no idea about your experiences with the scientific community, but from what I know, "client-server" does not describe it very well. The publications are not part of the architecture, they are just one specific implementation. Scientists in all fields do and always have communicated directly with each other, and some of the most valuable exchanges happened in personal letters. There's a reason that letters of famous dead scientists are found so interesting that they are surprisingly often published as books.
You don't charge others to receive a show flyer (which could take a few hours to design, plus hours to print and many hours to distribute), so why charge for music?
While I'm with you on other ideas, this one is simply misleading.
The flyer is clearly a secondary/supportive item - the show is the main item.
The music, on the other hand, is the main item of a band. There's nothing that it supports. It is the thing.
So you can't compare them. Two different classes of things.
Here's why my projects use Subversion and not git. In no particular order, with no claim of absolute truth, this is just how I see it:
I guess it depends mostly on the last point - your needs. If you're Linus and you're writing a kernel, git is probably your best choice, because it was built with that in mind. If you're working with a normal team on a normal programm, Subversion is probably more suited because it was built for that. Anywhere inbetween - your decision. :-)
If we want to stop spam, we need to remove the economic incentive. And throwing spammers in jail does not accomplish that.
That's not true.
It does raise the risk, which raises the cost for the spam-buyers. If you raise the risk, and thus the cost, enough, it will stop being profitable. First for a few items, then for the majority. Only a small number of exceptionally high profit margin items will remain "spam-worthy".
Which raises an interesting question that no one seems to be asking: What if the problem is not Wikipedia at all? What if Wikipedia is a symptom of a much larger problem in our culture? What if the solution isn't to berate Wikipedia for that which they cannot fix, but rather to ensure the foundations upon which the system is based are fixed?
WP might not be "the" problem, but a part of the problem, I agree on that.
However, the aggregation and the claims that WP makes about itself contribute to the problem. Most people with some critical thinking don't trust everything they read on the Internet, and have a clue about how reliable certain publications usually are. Most of us know which newspapers have good reporting and which ones don't.
WP merges everything. That means loss of differentiation. Someone decides which version is "true", maybe because he doesn't know the others.
More simply put: If you read it in a magazine, you're more likely to check at least one other source. If you read it in an encyclopedia, you aren't. For the most part, the encyclopedia is the most authoritative source a normal human will check.
"a reasonable aggregate of truth."
Many years ago, someone coined the term "consensus reality". I think that is more than appropriate here. What Wikipedia does is create "consensus truth", where things are true if there is a consensus that they are. That's independent of fact, although there is a fairly strong correlation. However, there is no causation. There's quite a bit on WP that's verifiably false - but the falsifications never make it because they violate some WP policy. Lanier is a good example, I know a couple more like that.
WP is an interesting experiment in expanding the scientific method by removing the "peer" from "peer-review". Ironically, it works exactly there where we-as-common-humans are peers - in the facts of everyday life, that are within our capabilities to verify and thusly thanks to the vast popularity of WP, there'll always be someone to spot the error and correct it.
By my estimate, it fails on non-mainstream topics, be they obscure or just complicated. Also in anything subjective, where you get edit wars because of differing opinions.
May I suggest that we make tomorrow the Global Piracy Day in return? Everyone download at least one movie or game.
Seriously. When something's so common that your grandma does it, it's time to question the law that makes it illegal.
I don't say it automatically is right if enough people do it - speeding is an example, or drunk driving. But still, it's time to question the law and rework it. Laws codify the rules of society, they don't make them - contrary to what some politicians wish to believe.
In addition to the other comment, who's right about guerilla warfare:
My best in Iraq are on the one with the brains. Right now, that's not the US. You guys would have had a chance had you been willing to do what's necessary to carry a win in a territory where most people have to think hard to come up with something they hate even more. For example, obliterating the place, killing everyone who even looks funny or knows someone who once met someone who's brother's sister-in-law used to say a bad word about you.
I'm tired of Afghanistan coming up all the time.
Why don't you ask the veterans of a hundred other examples of where a superior military force rolled over an enemy armed with small arms? Oh yeah, I forgot: You can't ask them because they're mostly dead.
There are a few examples in history where the superior army did not carry the victory, true. But one, two or even a dozen exceptions do not establish a rule. Usually, he with the bigger guns wins.
Afghanistan, specifically, is very easily disproved: You had half a population there willing to rather die than be ruled by the Soviets. Also, it was heavily supported by an equal enemy, the US. If either of those elementary points had not been true, things would have turned out differently. And we can get rid of the first one quickly. By my estimate, the actual number of people in the USA willing to lay down their lives in order to remove/reform the government, who aren't just saying it but who'll actually go and fight when push comes to shove - how many do you think there really are? I'd say not enough to survive even one battle.
Several comments tried to use Iraq or Afghanistan as counter-examples.
I think they're flawed and useless. You can not compare an invasion with a revolution. Totally different animals. Roughly the only thing they have in common is that bullets fly.
Why don't you compare things with Tianamen Square, for example? Here's a dictatorship bent on keeping control, with all the equipment a modern army can muster. Now, for the sake of the thought experiment, arm the students with pistols and rifles. Play it through in your head. Is the outcome different? I dare say no, except for two things: One, the west wouldn't have perceived the students as innocent victims and two, a lot more blood would have been shed.
And your gun will do what, exactly, against tanks and choppers?
The constitution was written in a time when a well-armed group of citizens had a chance in a firefight against the official army. But since then, we've invented machine guns, kevlar, tanks, planes and helicopters. Not to mention unmanned drones, spy satellites and missiles.
If the NRA goes toe to toe with the marines, or even any random division, I know where my bets are.
But is it worth having no choices? XP has been rock-solid stable for years, and if you buy a ThinkPad (for example) you have the following options that Apple does not offer on any of their new laptops:
I've rarely seen a post this far out of touch with reality.
Lots of people buy Macs specifically because they don't want XP (or Vista, or any other incarnation of that crap) anymore.
Lots of people buy Macs specifically because they don't want to spend 200 hours reviewing all options, reading various PC magazines, comparing everything online, getting conflicting information from different shops and then buying product A never being sure whether option B or C wouldn't have been better. Sometimes, less choice is actually more. For me, Apple offers the exact right amount of choice.
How relevant is the OS at this point anyway? Start thinking about functionality more than design aesthetics.
The OS is very, very relevant. After many years of (forced) windos usage at work and (chosen) Linux at home, I wouldn't go back to either. Linux still runs my servers, but as a desktop OS, it is 5-10 years behind OS X. While XP can not be measured in "behind" because it's not only behind, it also took a wrong turn years ago. The advantages of proper Drag & Drop alone could fill a small article.
And no, functionality doesn't matter 10% of what design does. Design isn't just "looks", it is usability and user comfort, too. As long as you think that design is just aesthetics, you've got no clue about design.
Probably depends a lot on the type of programs you install. You're right, small tools don't often require a reboot. Games (even demos!) very often do. Larger applications do. And of course, anything that installs a driver does.
When I was in school, I didn't feel bad about it because I didn't have the money anyways. 50 bucks for a computer game? I would've had to save 2-3 months to afford that, and very, very few games lasted that long before I was done with them, so it wouldn't have been a sustainable model.
Later on, when I could afford games, I bought most of the ones I played. And that was ok. I was occasionally unhappy because it sucked, which is a lot worse if you paid for it, but it was mostly ok.
But ever since the game industry started treating me, the honest customer, as a criminal, my feelings (and actions) have changed again. Today, I still insist on buying the game if it is from a small, indy publisher. EA and Co? No more money for you. Stop treating me like a criminal and I'll stop behaving like one.
Yes, good idea, old idea. Unfortunately, the math behind this type of encryption is too heavy to be feasable for actual use without considerable advantages in computing power first.
Of course, you can have multiple layers of encryption, but then you still have the problem of proving that there are no more layers, and so on.
If there were a simple solution, you can be sure there would be a product on the market already.
You have installed a new 'Instant On'(tm) aware application. Do you want to reboot in order for the change to take effect?
[Reboot Now] [Remind me every 2 minutes] [Go away but reboot without another warning in rand(5,10) minutes]
Hm. I run both Windows and Mac. I can't remember the last time I did any update to a Mac that didn't require a restart. It's really pretty annoying.
Two just recently, do you actually watch the screens you click "OK" on?
Most importantly, 99% of the Mac applications don't require a reboot, while >80% of the windows apps do (strictly speaking, they don't really require one, but they ask for it as if).
That's a lot more annoying.