Well, goddamn, that does make sense. I knew that. Don't ask me why I was thinking it was 17" when I typed that (on the T-60, staring at the 15" screen, no less).
It could also be due to how they are used. The majority of laptop owners I know, myself included, treat it more as a desktop that's not quite such a pain in the ass to take somewhere if needed. I don't need the ultimate in portability, I need something with a big enough screen that I can do some real work on it when needed, but small enough that I can throw it in my carrying case, take it in the car with me, and pull it out at panera/starbucks/a friend's house/etc. if needed.
Now, I'll give you that I'm not using the largest, baddest laptop around. I'm using a Thinkpad T-60 which, as far as 17" display laptops go, is pretty reasonably sized. I had a Dell D810 for awhile, though, which was a monster of a laptop. It still fit my purpose above, though.
The Plastic Constellations, Black Moth Super Rainbow, Lotus, Tal Wilkenfeld, The Bird and the Bee, Marjit Vinjerui and many others are artists I don't think I would have ever gotten through the mainstream, to name a few. If some of the these acts are RIAA, sorry on my part
The Bird and The Bee is on Blue Note which is an RIAA label and part of EMI, in case you're really concerned about it. I'm not sure on the others but am familiar with The Bird and The Bee through work.
I managed to catch a re-run of one of those on late night tv back in like '99/'00 time frame. It was hilarious. I'm sure some, maybe most, of the funny was because I remember watching the less overtly dirty Pee Wee's Playhouse as a kid rather than it truly being funny. I was entertained, though, and have been disappointed ever since when trying to find episodes on the internet ever since (not that I've looked very hard or often).
If only we had a member of the majority for the majority of the majority to vote for.
I'm only half joking there. Really, when I look at the elections I see (as many here do, I'm sure) 3 choices.
1) The right wing guy who will strip away my rights and abuse their power. 2) The left wing guy who will strip away my rights and abuse their power. 3) The minority guy that almost kind of sort of stands a chance if he really gets lucky in the election and probably believes he'll do a good job but once in power will probably strip away my rights and abuse their power.
Article is slashdotted, so I can't go read it to see how relevant this really is.
I have known people that have used patterns and formulas to pick lottery numbers weekly and overall come out on top. Now this was with regular state lottery which has a far better chance of being won anyway. Also, it certainly wasn't anything they could live off of, wasn't consistent, and took a few thousand dollars that you could risk losing to get started with and keep spending monthly.
Overall, though, the guys that I have known who have done this sort of stuff have won, though. Not tons, maybe an average of a couple hundred dollars per month at best with the risk of losing thousands. Seems to be working so far, though.
Troll? Hundreds of posts everyday that are various versions of "christians are dumb lolololol!", many of them getting modded to +5 insightful/intelligent, including ones right here in this thread.
A post saying that I am interested in the topic of the article but most people involved don't understand what they're doing or the tech they're using, showing exactly how they're misusing/misunderstanding that tech as the most common evidence of "ghosts", and pointing out how even in the article about the "qualified professionals" the desire to see a ghost trumps science and/or understanding of their tech is a troll?
Yep, seen plenty of those in my time researching this sort of stuff.
If ghosts/spirits/etc exist I think photographic evidence is going to be pointless anyway. Anything clear and obvious enough that you can say "yes, that is definitely a ghost" is also going to make any reasonable person say "damn, you're amazing with photoshop" if shown digitally and "Wow, how'd you fake that?" if you see a real photo with negative.
Also, nice job on reading that sentence of mine. It's almost English. I can't believe I wrote that.
Agreed. I used to be rather interested in paranormal stuff. I still am to an extent. It can make for a fun evening and it sure would be cool to find real, solid, tangible proof if such a thing is possible.
In my experience, though, most of the people involved have no clue what they are talking about. They want to see a ghost and prove their existence so badly that they see them anywhere. They also do not understand the technology they are using.
The fools in this article seem to be the same... at least one of them, who talks of photographing ghost orbs. Ghost orbs are the most ridiculous load of crap. You know what else causes those orbs? Dust in the air. Moisture in the air because you're outside at night when the temps are changing (I've got just such a picture about with hundreds of "ghosts"). That streetlight off in the distance that you didn't notice while just standing there because it's just a streetlight (I've seen this from a local ghost hunting group with pictures of a place that was maybe 10 minutes from where I lived at the time). Reflections off of shiny polished headstones. About a billion other things.
I think the following quote sums up nicely exactly what the problem with the whole paranormal investigation field is, why it gets no respect, and why it deserves no respect.
Wilson says his camera work paid off roughly seven years ago at an investigation at a private residence in Western Maryland. Wilson got called in after a strange mist appeared in the home on various occasions. After setting up various recording equipment, Wilson's team captured images of a reverse shadow that looked like a moving cloud of mist, Wilson says. He's still unsure of what he shot on film, but Wilson says it was vaguely human in size and shape and it actually passed through furniture. That is the most substantial piece of evidence that he's ever collected, Wilson says.
To paraphrase, "I can't tell what it is in this picture, so it must be a ghost." That's their most solid evidence is a picture that they're not sure what it is. What the hell is a "reverse shadow" anyway? Light?
The post you replied to made no mention of the average user customizing that stuff. He said large businesses. Most large businesses put their own images on computers with specific combinations of software and modify/skin commercial software when applicable frequently write their own tools to do things like migrate users to a new computer without losing personal data or deploy images and software. A build of open office or any other OSS app compiled with their preferred flags to configure or their preferred skin/theme on an app is well within the realm of reality at these places.
For example, years ago when I worked for Best Buy, the techs used a fairly standard trouble ticket and inventory app (I'll be damned if I can remember the name), but it was rebranded as "STAR" by best buy and integrated with the POS software to a certain extent. I later worked at Capital One where they used the exact same application by it's normal name, but highly modified the interface to their needs (which Best Buy also almost surely did). We had a scripted tool built around some user migration tools MS provides to move user data from one computer to another. At the place I work now we use a modified Bugzilla and we're far from a large company. And as already mentioned, pretty much every large company has their own custom images for computers with software packages and versions that have been tested and verified to work together.
Interesting. I'll have to look into it again. I watched the first season.... maybe second season, too, I don't remember. Much of the math use seemed pretty weak to me, although I did enjoy the show. Not weak as in inaccurate but that the ways it was used were very contrived and from what I remember frequently made assumptions that I didn't see as a given to make the math work in solving the crime.
I'll definitely have another look at it, though. Like I said, I did enjoy it, and that the math is accurate is rather interesting. Whenever it went into math that was above my head, I figured that just like with all the other science/computer/technical stuff, they started just tossing some numbers and buzzwords out and figure most people won't know the difference and those who do are expecting made up crap anyway and so won't care. Knowing that they aren't doing that makes it more interesting to me.
The various incarnations of CSI feature and glorify various sciences, although not necessarily to the extent that numb3rs does for math.
Also, while to a lesser extent, some of the spy shows such as Alias and 24, use technology heavily and frequently talk about various computer network and programming related things in the show and attempt to make them "cool". Of course, while the characters involved in that stuff are in nearly every show, they are still minor characters. They also tend to stick to the "computer and science people are geeks lacking in social skills" stereotype, which probably hurts as much as having the "cool" programming/networking/hacking helps.
These also are still not doing the same level of promotion (I guess is the best word) for various technical and science related fields as something like ER or Boston Legal (just a guess as I've never actually watched this or any other lawyer oriented show) might be doing for medical and law industries.
The vast majority of users want "A computer that does what I want" not "A computer that I have to make do what I want".
The problem with that is that computers due to what they are, highly configurable, multi-purpose machines, are just not prone to just doing what you want.
If you want just the basics... e-mail, web, an off ice suite, and maybe IM then you're golden with Windows or the desktop/home user oriented Linux distros. Beyond that and you've generally got a bit of a learning curve and some manuals to read no matter what OS you choose.
Most other highly complex things I can think of, most of which still don't have as many possible uses and configurations as a desktop PC, people accept that they in the very least may break and someone else will charge you to fix it rather than just tell you how. The also generally accept that if they want to do anything beyond the basic task(s) that it is designed for(perhaps a nice home theater setup instead of just a tv with the built in speakers) that they will have to read some instructions. In the case of some things, such as a vehicle, they even accept that regular maintenance which takes very basic knowledge needs to be done and most know, whether they do it or not, that less frequent more major regular maintenance needs done. They accept that if they can't do those things themselves that they will have to pay someone else to do it.
Given that, why do they expect a computer to just do what they want and when it doesn't why do they expect that someone should just do it for them or tell them how to do it for free?
Why do the linux devs necessarily need to be printing from linux? I develop software that runs on linux, but I print from windows. All of my development is done on a remote server via ssh while my workstation (unfortunately) runs XP.
I guess I'm jaded then, too. Having done some time contracting I've seen plenty of internal corporate websites. The majority I've seen would in no way be helped by using web 2.0 stuff. As you said, they would take longer to build, be harder to troubleshoot when there is an issue, and require more technical people to create and maintain them who could probably be doing more for the company using those skills on some other project.
I don't know if the breaking up of music into so many sub-genres is really the problem. I don't think most radio stations really care. Back in Iowa when I lived there the rock station I listened to played Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, Van Halen, Judas Priest, Metallica, Megadeth, The Breeders, Boston, etc. Pretty much anything with a guitar that wasn't clearly not rock from classic rock to the latest metal and everything in between.
Hell, even now the local Clear Channel station manages to squeeze in some Lamb of God and Primus in between the latest Nickelback hit and overplaying classic Metallica in an attempt to sound like the station still has its edge (if it ever had an edge). Every so often I even catch some Helmet. On Sunday nights they have a couple hours dedicated to local bands.
The other problem I seen in my training (Bak Fu Pai and Je Ying Kuen) is that so many of the teachers are out to make easy money based on the continued belief by so many people that eastern martial arts are about magical powers and chi rather than proper fighting techniques and physical training. This has resulted in a ton of limp wristed, slow moving, out of shape "martial artists" relying on their chi super powers.
Partially the fault of those taking advantage and teaching in such a way and of course partially the fault of the students for A) believing such crap in the first place and B) not realizing that after years of training they still punch like their little sister and that their training is obviously shit.
Well, it's way late to reply to this, but I'm going to anyway. Yeah, 5 lbs less is probably off there as I think about it. But in the 170-180 range seems awfully thin to me at 6'2". Part of that may come from having grown into and then right past a proper weight for my height since then.
I most definitely fall into the endomorph class, though. Pretty much everyone on my dad's side of the family pretty easily does. We all gain muscle very easily and are generally stronger than expected but gain 10 lbs of fat just thinking about a bag of doritos. Without going to the gym 5 days/week I'd look roughtly like weird al in his fat suit.
I work in the mobile industry. What I find odd every time I think about it is these companies such as EMI and UMG being willing to sell full tracks with no DRM yet they still keep insisting we only sell the 10-30 second clip ringtones of their songs with DRM.
The only thing I can think of is that they are leaving it on the ringtones because no one is bitchg about it. After all, does anyone want to use that 30 second clip (for legal uses... not buying it once and then sending it to all of your friends) anywhere other than their phone?
Unless this is combined with human judgement and common sense, this is bad. Even with that I think it's highly questionable. BMI doesn't account for how much of your weight is muscle over fat. Someone who lifts weights regularly can be "overweight" according to BMI.
For example I'm 6'2" and 280 lbs. I've got some fat on me, I won't argue that. I also work out daily, deadlift 350+lbs, and can run a 6 minute mile (although I wish I hadn't after I do). I'm going to be generous and say 30% bodyfat, which I think is a good bit above reality. That's 84 lbs of fat. Losing 20% (56 lbs) to put me at 10% bodyfat, which is fairly low for anyone other than professional bodybuilders (and those guys who go way lower are being arguably just as unhealthy) leaves me at 224 lbs. According to this BMI calculator I'm still way overweight and nearly obese and am currently ridiculously obese in my 40" waist jeans. According to that I should weigh 145 to 195 lbs. 145 lbs? Talk about unhealthy for someone who's 6'2". My Junior year in high school I weight 190-195. I was skinny. Not muscled, not ripped, skinny. Not unhealthy thin, but I would say more than 5-10lbs less than that would have been unhealthy.
How about a better idea? If you go to the doctor all the fucking time you pay more.
Why not a truck so that we can just keep piling stuff on it and never get clogged? After the tubes ordeal you'd think they'd be smart enough not to use something so similar like a pipe or hose.
Just because you vote with your dollars doesn't mean you should only vote with your dollars. Explaining exactly what you are unhappy with and why makes it more likely that it will be corrected in a way that you want rather than just made different but still crappy or all out taken away.
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Well, goddamn, that does make sense. I knew that. Don't ask me why I was thinking it was 17" when I typed that (on the T-60, staring at the 15" screen, no less).
It could also be due to how they are used. The majority of laptop owners I know, myself included, treat it more as a desktop that's not quite such a pain in the ass to take somewhere if needed. I don't need the ultimate in portability, I need something with a big enough screen that I can do some real work on it when needed, but small enough that I can throw it in my carrying case, take it in the car with me, and pull it out at panera/starbucks/a friend's house/etc. if needed.
Now, I'll give you that I'm not using the largest, baddest laptop around. I'm using a Thinkpad T-60 which, as far as 17" display laptops go, is pretty reasonably sized. I had a Dell D810 for awhile, though, which was a monster of a laptop. It still fit my purpose above, though.
Wait, there's a back button on slot machines? Damn it, I've lost so much money needlessly.
I managed to catch a re-run of one of those on late night tv back in like '99/'00 time frame. It was hilarious. I'm sure some, maybe most, of the funny was because I remember watching the less overtly dirty Pee Wee's Playhouse as a kid rather than it truly being funny. I was entertained, though, and have been disappointed ever since when trying to find episodes on the internet ever since (not that I've looked very hard or often).
But in the case of goatse is "where the sun don't shine" really valid?
If only we had a member of the majority for the majority of the majority to vote for.
I'm only half joking there. Really, when I look at the elections I see (as many here do, I'm sure) 3 choices.
1) The right wing guy who will strip away my rights and abuse their power.
2) The left wing guy who will strip away my rights and abuse their power.
3) The minority guy that almost kind of sort of stands a chance if he really gets lucky in the election and probably believes he'll do a good job but once in power will probably strip away my rights and abuse their power.
Might as well flip a coin... a, uh, 3 sided coin?
Article is slashdotted, so I can't go read it to see how relevant this really is.
I have known people that have used patterns and formulas to pick lottery numbers weekly and overall come out on top. Now this was with regular state lottery which has a far better chance of being won anyway. Also, it certainly wasn't anything they could live off of, wasn't consistent, and took a few thousand dollars that you could risk losing to get started with and keep spending monthly.
Overall, though, the guys that I have known who have done this sort of stuff have won, though. Not tons, maybe an average of a couple hundred dollars per month at best with the risk of losing thousands. Seems to be working so far, though.
Troll? Hundreds of posts everyday that are various versions of "christians are dumb lolololol!", many of them getting modded to +5 insightful/intelligent, including ones right here in this thread.
A post saying that I am interested in the topic of the article but most people involved don't understand what they're doing or the tech they're using, showing exactly how they're misusing/misunderstanding that tech as the most common evidence of "ghosts", and pointing out how even in the article about the "qualified professionals" the desire to see a ghost trumps science and/or understanding of their tech is a troll?
Interesting.
Yep, seen plenty of those in my time researching this sort of stuff.
If ghosts/spirits/etc exist I think photographic evidence is going to be pointless anyway. Anything clear and obvious enough that you can say "yes, that is definitely a ghost" is also going to make any reasonable person say "damn, you're amazing with photoshop" if shown digitally and "Wow, how'd you fake that?" if you see a real photo with negative.
Also, nice job on reading that sentence of mine. It's almost English. I can't believe I wrote that.
In my experience, though, most of the people involved have no clue what they are talking about. They want to see a ghost and prove their existence so badly that they see them anywhere. They also do not understand the technology they are using.
The fools in this article seem to be the same... at least one of them, who talks of photographing ghost orbs. Ghost orbs are the most ridiculous load of crap. You know what else causes those orbs? Dust in the air. Moisture in the air because you're outside at night when the temps are changing (I've got just such a picture about with hundreds of "ghosts"). That streetlight off in the distance that you didn't notice while just standing there because it's just a streetlight (I've seen this from a local ghost hunting group with pictures of a place that was maybe 10 minutes from where I lived at the time). Reflections off of shiny polished headstones. About a billion other things.
I think the following quote sums up nicely exactly what the problem with the whole paranormal investigation field is, why it gets no respect, and why it deserves no respect.
To paraphrase, "I can't tell what it is in this picture, so it must be a ghost." That's their most solid evidence is a picture that they're not sure what it is. What the hell is a "reverse shadow" anyway? Light?
I can't tell if that was a circumcision joke or a masturbation joke.
The post you replied to made no mention of the average user customizing that stuff. He said large businesses. Most large businesses put their own images on computers with specific combinations of software and modify/skin commercial software when applicable frequently write their own tools to do things like migrate users to a new computer without losing personal data or deploy images and software. A build of open office or any other OSS app compiled with their preferred flags to configure or their preferred skin/theme on an app is well within the realm of reality at these places.
For example, years ago when I worked for Best Buy, the techs used a fairly standard trouble ticket and inventory app (I'll be damned if I can remember the name), but it was rebranded as "STAR" by best buy and integrated with the POS software to a certain extent. I later worked at Capital One where they used the exact same application by it's normal name, but highly modified the interface to their needs (which Best Buy also almost surely did). We had a scripted tool built around some user migration tools MS provides to move user data from one computer to another. At the place I work now we use a modified Bugzilla and we're far from a large company. And as already mentioned, pretty much every large company has their own custom images for computers with software packages and versions that have been tested and verified to work together.
Interesting. I'll have to look into it again. I watched the first season.... maybe second season, too, I don't remember. Much of the math use seemed pretty weak to me, although I did enjoy the show. Not weak as in inaccurate but that the ways it was used were very contrived and from what I remember frequently made assumptions that I didn't see as a given to make the math work in solving the crime.
I'll definitely have another look at it, though. Like I said, I did enjoy it, and that the math is accurate is rather interesting. Whenever it went into math that was above my head, I figured that just like with all the other science/computer/technical stuff, they started just tossing some numbers and buzzwords out and figure most people won't know the difference and those who do are expecting made up crap anyway and so won't care. Knowing that they aren't doing that makes it more interesting to me.
The various incarnations of CSI feature and glorify various sciences, although not necessarily to the extent that numb3rs does for math.
Also, while to a lesser extent, some of the spy shows such as Alias and 24, use technology heavily and frequently talk about various computer network and programming related things in the show and attempt to make them "cool". Of course, while the characters involved in that stuff are in nearly every show, they are still minor characters. They also tend to stick to the "computer and science people are geeks lacking in social skills" stereotype, which probably hurts as much as having the "cool" programming/networking/hacking helps.
These also are still not doing the same level of promotion (I guess is the best word) for various technical and science related fields as something like ER or Boston Legal (just a guess as I've never actually watched this or any other lawyer oriented show) might be doing for medical and law industries.
If you want just the basics... e-mail, web, an off ice suite, and maybe IM then you're golden with Windows or the desktop/home user oriented Linux distros. Beyond that and you've generally got a bit of a learning curve and some manuals to read no matter what OS you choose.
Most other highly complex things I can think of, most of which still don't have as many possible uses and configurations as a desktop PC, people accept that they in the very least may break and someone else will charge you to fix it rather than just tell you how. The also generally accept that if they want to do anything beyond the basic task(s) that it is designed for(perhaps a nice home theater setup instead of just a tv with the built in speakers) that they will have to read some instructions. In the case of some things, such as a vehicle, they even accept that regular maintenance which takes very basic knowledge needs to be done and most know, whether they do it or not, that less frequent more major regular maintenance needs done. They accept that if they can't do those things themselves that they will have to pay someone else to do it.
Given that, why do they expect a computer to just do what they want and when it doesn't why do they expect that someone should just do it for them or tell them how to do it for free?
Why do the linux devs necessarily need to be printing from linux? I develop software that runs on linux, but I print from windows. All of my development is done on a remote server via ssh while my workstation (unfortunately) runs XP.
I guess I'm jaded then, too. Having done some time contracting I've seen plenty of internal corporate websites. The majority I've seen would in no way be helped by using web 2.0 stuff. As you said, they would take longer to build, be harder to troubleshoot when there is an issue, and require more technical people to create and maintain them who could probably be doing more for the company using those skills on some other project.
I don't know if the breaking up of music into so many sub-genres is really the problem. I don't think most radio stations really care. Back in Iowa when I lived there the rock station I listened to played Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, Van Halen, Judas Priest, Metallica, Megadeth, The Breeders, Boston, etc. Pretty much anything with a guitar that wasn't clearly not rock from classic rock to the latest metal and everything in between.
Hell, even now the local Clear Channel station manages to squeeze in some Lamb of God and Primus in between the latest Nickelback hit and overplaying classic Metallica in an attempt to sound like the station still has its edge (if it ever had an edge). Every so often I even catch some Helmet. On Sunday nights they have a couple hours dedicated to local bands.
The other problem I seen in my training (Bak Fu Pai and Je Ying Kuen) is that so many of the teachers are out to make easy money based on the continued belief by so many people that eastern martial arts are about magical powers and chi rather than proper fighting techniques and physical training. This has resulted in a ton of limp wristed, slow moving, out of shape "martial artists" relying on their chi super powers.
Partially the fault of those taking advantage and teaching in such a way and of course partially the fault of the students for A) believing such crap in the first place and B) not realizing that after years of training they still punch like their little sister and that their training is obviously shit.
Well, it's way late to reply to this, but I'm going to anyway. Yeah, 5 lbs less is probably off there as I think about it. But in the 170-180 range seems awfully thin to me at 6'2". Part of that may come from having grown into and then right past a proper weight for my height since then.
I most definitely fall into the endomorph class, though. Pretty much everyone on my dad's side of the family pretty easily does. We all gain muscle very easily and are generally stronger than expected but gain 10 lbs of fat just thinking about a bag of doritos. Without going to the gym 5 days/week I'd look roughtly like weird al in his fat suit.
I work in the mobile industry. What I find odd every time I think about it is these companies such as EMI and UMG being willing to sell full tracks with no DRM yet they still keep insisting we only sell the 10-30 second clip ringtones of their songs with DRM.
The only thing I can think of is that they are leaving it on the ringtones because no one is bitchg about it. After all, does anyone want to use that 30 second clip (for legal uses... not buying it once and then sending it to all of your friends) anywhere other than their phone?
Unless this is combined with human judgement and common sense, this is bad. Even with that I think it's highly questionable. BMI doesn't account for how much of your weight is muscle over fat. Someone who lifts weights regularly can be "overweight" according to BMI.
For example I'm 6'2" and 280 lbs. I've got some fat on me, I won't argue that. I also work out daily, deadlift 350+lbs, and can run a 6 minute mile (although I wish I hadn't after I do). I'm going to be generous and say 30% bodyfat, which I think is a good bit above reality. That's 84 lbs of fat. Losing 20% (56 lbs) to put me at 10% bodyfat, which is fairly low for anyone other than professional bodybuilders (and those guys who go way lower are being arguably just as unhealthy) leaves me at 224 lbs. According to this BMI calculator I'm still way overweight and nearly obese and am currently ridiculously obese in my 40" waist jeans. According to that I should weigh 145 to 195 lbs. 145 lbs? Talk about unhealthy for someone who's 6'2". My Junior year in high school I weight 190-195. I was skinny. Not muscled, not ripped, skinny. Not unhealthy thin, but I would say more than 5-10lbs less than that would have been unhealthy.
How about a better idea? If you go to the doctor all the fucking time you pay more.
Why not a truck so that we can just keep piling stuff on it and never get clogged? After the tubes ordeal you'd think they'd be smart enough not to use something so similar like a pipe or hose.
Just because you vote with your dollars doesn't mean you should only vote with your dollars. Explaining exactly what you are unhappy with and why makes it more likely that it will be corrected in a way that you want rather than just made different but still crappy or all out taken away.