I was thinking the same thing. However I'm not sure how it could be accomplished in a way that would improve black levels. Ideally the screen would be as black as possible but still reflective of those colors.
Perhaps an active projection screen could be done with electronic paper, the projection surface is black except where the laser is currently focused. The scanning laser and scanning screen would need to be synced and aligned, so it wouldn't be portable... but it would make front projection realistic in bright rooms, and knock the socks off any other front projection setup in a dark room as far as black levels and contrast are concerned.
I'm not much of a fan of YouTube... most of the crap on there is a waste of bandwidth... but this video is by far the most entertaining and well done piece of web video I have seen on YouTube. Thank you for posting the link!
Google realizes that it cannot make money through advertising indefinately... so what does it do, it researches new ides to an extreme previously unheard of. Their ads are lightwight and unobtrusive. Essentially they are ad funded, but overall they are good to their users/customers.
Yahoo, who doesn't seem to get it, simply finds ways to put ads where they haven't been before. Great for the ad revenue, bad for their users.
Is there really anyone who hasn't figured out why Google is such a majority favorite? If not for google, I suspect that flash based ads would still be the standard, and everyone would be experiementing with streaming video ads or some crap like that. Thank god google came along and showed their competition that the business model doesn't require large, annoying ads, but instead a huge volume of well placed ads that appeal instead of repel the user!
If yahoo wan't ad's in PDF's, so be it... all the more reason for me to stick with google.
Competition assumes that there is a viable alternative... though Linux and OSX are alternatives, are they viable?
Imagine that your the CIO of a fortune 500 company... could you standardize on either product and get business done effectively? Not likely, without a least a few windows machines around to handle proprietary software, to handle document compatibility issues, etc.
I think that the day is very near... essentially there are only a few areas where MS products are so dominate in the marketplace that going with something different could cause problems in getting business done.
1. Office/productivity applications... with ODF making strides, it's only a matter of time (I hope) before all office suites talk the same language! 2. Proprietary applications... most of the recent proprietary applications I have seen developed in recent times have been web based. Once our organization (part of the US Federal Govt.) moves 2 or three more of them to web-based interfaces, we could easily go cross platform (except for #1). 3. General acceptance of workers... More and more is done in a web browser, and you can put someone in almost any browser and they can be productive, so as 2 happens it gets easier to consider alternatives to Windows/IE.
Sure there are other concerns, but I believe that most of them will resolve themselves in the meantime.
I think that Judge Jackson was right to extend the duration of the antitrust monitoring... but I suspect that at the end of the extension it will be unnecessary. Microsoft has done a great job of opening the market for alternative products... just look at Vista and OOXML!
Re:Welcome to the world of modern research ...
on
Open Source Math
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· Score: 2, Insightful
I thought the same thing... shouldn't mathematic proofs be independent of outside influence, shouldn't they stand on their own and make as few assumptions as possible. I figured that a proof, properly done, would be a large step by step solution to the problem.
Then I realized that many proofs aren't concerned with single-input single-output situations, but instead may require thousands of iterations based upon large sets of inputs. You can't do that by hand.
I am certain, that because computers/software are being used we will eventually find an accepted proof that is scrapped because it exploited (inadvertently) a bug/limitation of the software used to test it. Unfortunately there is nothing to be done!
I am not thinking of myself but the neighbour who has no firewall running (unless you count XP's software firewall), no method of monitoring/restricting outgoing traffic, and wouldn't have the faintest idea what to look for to determine if her machine had been compromised.
I am more concerned about outbound traffic as it relates to the article in question... if the ISP prevented everything but http(s) traffic by default and you had to manually enable other forms of traffic by visiting a website and selecting the protocol/application in question, they could prevent your machine from sending anything OUT as well as blocking incoming garbage.
I don't know the best solution... only that ISP's COULD and probably SHOULD look at ways of making it safer to connect to their service.
As long as they don't restrict what a knowledgeable user can do of course!
I swear... if I could get one of these that could fool my girlfriend into thinking I'm "McDreamy". I'd be a VERY happy man, even if I have to put up with role playing all the drama!
Oh wait, this is slashdot and I have a girlfriend... I guess I should just be happy with what I have!
Why don't isp's implement firewalls at their end that effectively eliminate all traffic except those protocols demanded by the user.
It would be relatively simple to create a web page that could enable/disable these protocols... the page would know which IP, as you would be connecting from it, and could be protected by a simple captcha or password to make it difficult for malware to enable these protocols itself.
Obviously, the user could disable all filtering if they so desired.
This solution would prevent a ton of issues for most users, while still allowing those of us who are wise enough to monitor our own systems to enable everything ourselves.
In addition, why don't ISP's notify the user if they suddenly see an unusual amount of traffic on an unusual port or protocol... a simple email to say "we are seeing IRC traffic on your connection, you have never used IRC in the past. Some malicious software communicates via IRC protocols which may cause this unusual activity. Please read this linked article if you would like to know more."
I realize that most of us would rather our ISP stay out of our online activity... however I feel that if they actively participated in preventing the spread of malware on thier customers machines, they would not only increase customer satisfaction, but reduce the bandwidth being wasted. At first it would be an expense, but as the network was cleared of wasted traffic it would eventually pay for itself.
I think it's time for someone with some experience managing open source projects, and a significant bank roll, to start a fully open source voting machine initiative.
I mean open hardware, open software, open everything.
I am pretty certain that the open community could devise something that would be nearly tamper proof... probably using two devices. One, managed by the voting officials in the district that actually records the votes, the second is managed by a 3rd party and is used to verify the results.
For example I vote on one machine, which prints a verification slip that is scanned into the second which display and records my votes. At the end of the day, both machines should have the same count... otherwise one of the two was tampered with. At which point they turn to the verification slips for a manual count.
I would agree with you that most people who complain do not actively participate in their government, and thus don't have a right to complain. But I do...
Our government has repeatedly passed legislation, or denied legislation based upon business interests over individual interests for quite some time now. It's not surprising, considering that the risks are low that they will face consequences, and the rewards are spectacular. The worst bit is that they can screw their constituents and look good doing it through deceptive naming and phrasing of bills/laws, by including commercial interest pork in a bill whose intent is completely unrelated, etc.
I am not suggesting that our government's problems are not the product of our own indifference (on a whole), because if the people exercised due diligence to research, elect, and monitor their representatives things would likely be much better. Unfortunately, American Idol is far more entertaining than following politics (I suppose that's debatable at this point too), so the people care more about who gets the $1 Million dollar recording contract than who's adding $300 Million in spending for an unneeded bridge to nowhere.
No, I have not been either poor or wealthy... what does that have to do with anything. It is clear to any observer that the stronger the community, the more opportunities the members of that community enjoy. Foundations for communities can be social, economic, race, religion, etc. If the members of any of those communities support one another to elevate the community as a whole, given time every member of the community will benefit.
I am not suggesting that it's an overnight change, but there is a positive effect. I have seen lower class, even poor, neighborhoods that started down this path of mutual benefit. The entire subdivision began to see increased property values, reduction in crime, an influx of new business, and best of all the members of this community stopped blaming everyone else for their problems and began to work together to make thier situations better. Of course there were individuals who didn't participate, those who caused problems or failed to keep their property to standards were hounded by police, fined by the city, or had their landlords contacted... quickly the majority of the problem residents either came around or found a more comfortable place to make problems.
This happened in a small section of Detroit, a few miles from my home. Similar stories are occurring all over the city of Detroit and other urban centers as gas prices rise and urban live becomes more desirable. It usually begins with a new buyer moving in and encouraging their neighbours to start a neighbourhood watch.
I am familiar with this because I spent 5 years working for Steven Vogel, Dean of Architecture at University of Detroit, and a very reputable urban designer and great promoter of the city of Detroit. Working for him opened my eyes to just how beautiful this city was only 50-60 years ago... and he's done the same for other residents. In fact, his neighbourhood, Rosedale Park, has been so beautifully restored that they hold annual home tours that draw thousands of visitors... in Detroit!
All I am saying is that it doesn't take money to have a community, it takes the realization that working together makes everyone better off. It sad to see communities where no one even calls the cops when there is a shooting... really sad!
As I clearly stated previously, I find your argument interesting and valid. I would not choose to jump to such a conclusion however because I find that frequently things can be explained much more simply.
In addition, while I cannot discount paranormal or supernatural like events or abilities altogether, I fear that I have no concrete evidence of anything ever happening that could be considered such. Thus, without evidence to study, it is impossible to speculate on the possibility.
History has shown that even the most accepted and understood scientific beliefs can be replaced overnight through new discovery. I will not deny that some phenomenon that science has categorized as paranormal or supernatural might be easily explained in the future, however I have doubts.
My doubts stem mostly from the fact that such events are rare, unpredictable, and most often experienced by those who readily accept such explanations. Though there have been very reasonable minds who have come forward to claim things such as ghosts, telepathy, alien abduction, and such are true, for the most part the scientific community dismisses such things for lack of evidence and the inability to study and prove of disprove them.
The scientific method clearly states that in order for a theory to be valid it must be verifiable or falsifiable. Your theory falls into the realm of theoretical speculation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory#Currently_unverifiable_theories, along with string theory upon which it is based.
My theory however has been tested and verified repeatedly. In fact most scientists believe that many phenomenon that we experience are purely manufactured in our brains and not actually the result of sensory experience. For example, the bright light and out of body experiences upon death. One cannot deny that it is possible that the abnormal activity in our brain is unrelated to such visions, the alternative however would be theoretical speculation or worse, and thus it is more logical to accept science's explanation while continuing to explore other explanations in hopes of making a discovery that replaces it.
Of course, with Feyerabend's ideas, it doesn't matter. However, though he has some very interesting ideas, even he would admit that without structure to science there would be no credibility. I think he was more concerned that without great minds exploring unpopular and outlandish ideas, we hurt the progress of science. However I would argue that the scientific method and Feyerabend's ideals are not mutually exclusive. String theory is a great example of the merging of the scientific method and Feyerabend's belief. Most of what is discussed in string theory is speculation, however as scientists come to accept it as possible and adjust past beliefs to make them compatible, progress is made. Science does not always refuse to dismiss the past, but it takes a clearly thought out and reasonable theory to get scientists to try and reconcile past beliefs with new ideas. Spend some time thinking your idea through, make some unbiased observations, and document your idea. It's possible that when looked at from all angles by individuals much smarter than us, your idea will actually hold water.
Again thank you for sharing your ideas, and please know that I think they are truly a refreshing alternative to some of the mumbo-jumbo that is spewed from the mouths of some believers in paranormal or supernatural phenomenon. I would love to believe that we might evolve to have such abilities, or even be able to tap into another dimension to see the future, and your idea allows for that possibility. However I choose to believe that the currently accepted explanation until something better comes along or I experience something that I cannot imagine an explanation for without looking to ideas such as yours.
Normally I would not even consider replying much less agreeing with a bunch of racist drivel.
However, there is something to be said about the lack of community and the attitude of being owed something on the part of those effected by Katrina.
I don't believe it was exactly along race lines, but rather along economic and education lines... unfortunately the majority of undereducated poor people in New Orleans were Black.
I think the worst thing about the whole situation is that the community that needs to depend on each other the most, instead chose to be selfish and greedy. If you look up the economic ladder, you will see the further up you get, the more cohesive the elements of society. If the lower class were to scratch eachother's backs the way the wealthy do, they could easily supplant them through pure numbers.
You see this effect everywhere... I live in a middle class neighborhood... some of us are independent and some of us our more apt to work together to improve our situation... low class neighborhoods it's nearly all independents. Upper-middle class, the neighbours form associations and psudo-governments to benefit everyone with security, beautification, etc.
Can you imagine how beautiful and safe a lower class neighborhood could be if most of it's population actively participated in improving their community. It doesn't cost anything, clean up your lawn, help your neighbor clean theirs, and report any undesirable or suspicious activity to law enforcement.
If anyone who lives in a 'poor' neighbourhood reads this, please GET INVOLVED in your community! Even spending an hour a week doing something for someone or everyone else in your community would make a difference if it encourages others to do the same! Once your community is united, you can use the power of numbers to ensure that someone in your community gets elected, policies benefit your community, and finally you can do favors for each other.
Do you think the wealthy stay that way beacause they are smarter, or better than the poor? No, they give and receive favours from other wealthy people. For example, entrance into Universities, jobs, business opportunities, political support, etc. If the poor would work together to the same degree, they could easily improve their situation quickly. No one keeps them down but themselves!
"It was absolutely a bad decision. I regret it happened. Certainly... I should have stopped it," said John "Pat" Philbin, FEMA's director of external affairs. "I hope readers understand we're working very hard to establish credibility and integrity, and I would hope this does not undermine it."
First of all... your the director of external affairs... Yep you should have stopped it... SO WHY THE FUCK DIDN'T YOU.
Second, your working very hard to establish credibility and integrity... by trying to trick us into thinking your credible and trustworthy... that's exactly what you DON'T do to establish credibility and integrity.
Finally... I would say that doing exactly the wrong thing hasn't undermine your credibility and integrity, you didn't have any to begin with... this simply ensures that you never will until the current >20% has been eliminated, everyone in that conference resigns, and your agency actually handles a disaster like it knows what it is doing.
It is kind of ironic that FEMA, the agency that is supposed to clean up disasters, actually turns every disaster it is involved in into a bigger disaster through it's absolute incompetence and piss poor public image.
Sorry isn't gonna cut it... try mass resignations!
A government organization went on national TV and intentionally tried to fool millions of Americans into believing a lie so that they didn't look bad.
Oh wait... never mind... I forgot, this is the USA. And we are talking about the government after all. The idiot who thought this up should run for President!
Flying Spaghetti Monster I cant wait until our government acts with our best interests in mind... hell I'd be happy to see it happen just once before I die.
I agree with most of what you say... mostly because you are saying "it's possible", and "in my experience". Both of which are the only valid arguments when discussing things that are impossible to scientifically explain.
While the idea that the umpteen dimensions beyond those that we usually perceive might be the source of some of these unexplained phenomenon is certainly a valid argument, it is no more or less valid that one suggesting that the flying spaghetti monster is responsible.
What I am suggesting is an argument based upon current knowledge. Not that it is more correct, but it assumes far less and is thus more readily proven false, which is key to any scientific argument. Your original argument, though still valid, is not based upon any knowledge we have of the world nor is it even possible to imagine how it might be proven false.
I will agree however, that it is impossible to explain how one might have foreseen a quake level 8 months in advance using my explanation. However I would probably assume a few things before I jumped to supernatural, or even multiple dimension speculation. I would assume either 1. I saw something in some sort of publication, 2. the level designer and I had extremely similar ideas, 3. my drawing was observed by or relayed to the level designer, 4. The level in question was inspired by a similar design in previous games and it was easy to imagine how it would be rendered by the new game.
We have all had ideas or thoughts that we believed to be original until we find someone with the same idea... with 4 billion people in the world it's not hard to imagine 2 of them thinking nearly identical thoughts at some point in their lives. This is not proof of anything.
lets face facts: Even great minds like philosophers acknowledged strange abilities in the ancient world, there is too much congruence with rational minds to think that there is not some real phenomena that is being misinterpreted that is MORE then brain signal errors and memory corruption.
This statement is a non-argument. Any rational mind can clearly see that their are things in our universe that are not explainable and may never be explainable. This doesn't make the assumption of the supernatural or other sceptical beliefs any more or less valid. The fact that the ancient philosophers acknowledged strange abilities is not surprising... imagine you met an autistic savant, like Kim Peek, without any knowledge that they existed... I think they have nearly supernatural abilities even now, a few hundred years ago I might think they were an angel, devil, witch, or what have you. The world was very small, even just two hundred years ago, people rarely had knowledge of what was happening in the next town let alone in the rest of the world... it would be easy to find people who appeared to have supernatural powers.
If precognition, like you speak of with your quake picture, were real, I believe we would have significant evidence of it, which would drive some serious research into the issue. Proof of the ability would not be difficult to validate, and unless the circumstances/ability that result in precognition are so rare that it is impossible to study (which is possible I suppose), I would imagine we would have had someone with scientifically verified evidence by now. Something like the guy on Heroes who paints the future, it would only take one painting done years prior to a setting or event, to show that it happens... assuming that the painter had no logical way of predicting the setting or event.
Please keep in mind that it wasn't long ago that innocent girls were murdered as witches for having "supernatural" powers. We have come a long way in the effort to understand our universe in the last two hundred years, faster than ever before, and I suspect we have only just begun.
I suspect that there will always be those who have experiences that they cannot rationalize, and will thus assume that something "supernatural" occurred.
Better yet, let's direct our attention to our brain that is infinitely fallible.
I could get you names of a bunch of people who could fool your senses into seeing something you didn't see. I can personally make you think you heard something you didn't hear (play any mp3 for an example). And so on.
Our brains can even be fooled by themselves... I bet you know a liar who has told the same lie for so long that they actually believe it. I remember telling stories as a kid that today I realize I'm not sure if they were true or just embellishments to impress chicks.
I think it's perfectly reasonable to believe that many, so called, "supernatural" experiences are simply natural, brief, electric/chemical occurrences within our heads. Those with prolonged occurrences can be found in mental health hospitals all over the world. If you want to have a prolonged one yourself, many drugs can trigger such states of mind.
I get "deja vu" all the time, I have never been able to be certain that I actually knew anything in advance... only that things seemed to unfold exactly as I thought they would... perhaps it's just that there is some resonance, reflection, or short circuiting happening in my neurons causing the new input to feel like it's coming from memory as well as our senses. When I can actually, reliably, predict what is to happen BEFORE it happens, then I will look for other explanations.
I can't understand why most in the science and engineering fields, not only don't believe but disregard it, with out little thought. Disregard would suggest no thought... I, like most engineers I'm sure, gave significant thought to the subject through their lives and decided that ghosts, cannot currently be proven to exist or not to exist and will wait for evidence in either direction to think on it further. I suspect that is part of what makes a good engineer, the ability to see that most phenomenon can be explained through study and thought.
I think most engineers do not disbelieve or believe, they have reached a higher level where they accept that they cannot KNOW, so choose to not take a position on the issue.
If all engineers believed in the supernatural, no progress would ever be made. Any flaw would be the fault of some demon, gremlin, etc. Instead of a scientific explanation being sought, and prevented in future versions. Could you imagine where we would be today if humans all believed in supernatural phenomenon, I doubt we would ever have learned to use fire as surely it would be considered evil because of it's destructive power. I am very grateful that most of the brightest minds in the sciences and engineering are sceptical about anything that cannot be scientifically proven!
As my congressional representative and fellow U of D Graduate, I would encourage your support for HR 1201: Freedom and Innovation Revitalizing U.S. Entrepreneurship Act of 2007.
This bill amends some serious issues in past legislation regarding the copying of copyrighted materials that include some form of copy protection measures.
It has always been a concern for the producers and publishers of audio, visual, print, and other copyright works that the public will violate their copyright and illegally distribute their product. Finally, in the "information age" technology exists which allow these copyright owners to attempt to protect their work.
History has shown, repeatedly, that these copy protection measures are not only inadequate, but can often cause limitations for legitimate use of the product. For example, I would like to create a "scratch copy" of my legitimately purchased DVD's for my children to use, or copy my music collection to my portable music player or computer.
Both of these actions are considered "fair use" by copyright law. But more recent laws, such as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), have made it illegal to bypass the copy protection measures that have become commonplace on modern media (CD, DVD, software, etc.).
Essentially, the bill I encourage you to support would decriminalize the act of bypassing these copy protection measures so that the copyrighted work might be used for legal purposes as defined by copyright law.
I realize that the copyright holders will argue that these measures prevent mass distribution (piracy) of the protected works. However, time has shown that these measures do not deter those interested in piracy and are easily bypassed. Therefore, the only thing they actually achieve is to prevent honest customers from using the product as allowed by fair use.
One example I would like to provide is one regularly faced by educators. If a teacher would like to create a multimedia presentation that includes clips from movies, songs, or even text from an electronic book (an use that is clearly allowed under copyright law), they must first bypass copy protection measures on all of their sources... an act which requires the use of software or hardware that is illegal to produce, distribute, and use. HR 1201 resolves this discrepancy.
Thank you for your time and efforts on behalf of myself and all of those you represent.
Truly,
Joe Fry
Grammer Nazi's have fun with this, the rest of you feel free to modify it and send it to your representative:
I would agree with you 100%... except your wrong! Linux CAN be difficult to install. You MAY have hardware issues. You WILL need to spend some time adapting.
However, for most (and I mean almost any average user), you will not experience the frustration you experienced when installing the latest Ubuntu (and likely other) distros. It seems that the primary, and only very common, hardware issue is with wireless cards... most of which will automatically install after your first boot (as long as you have an alternate internet connection such as dial-up or ethernet).
If given a decent chance, taken in baby steps, it really takes very little time for a windows power user to become proficient in Linux. I have been 100% linux for about 6 months now and I honestly get bored on my computer now. I used to constantly have to remove malware, defrag, update drivers, etc. just so I could be nagged by a dozen or so shareware nag screens, WGA nag screens, windows update reboots, virus scans... and maybe I would actually read an email or two while I kept my system running lean and clean. Now, I can update everything (except firmware) within a minute or two, and that includes keeping up with the latest drivers.
Do yourself a favor... grab an older laptop, or perhaps a quiet desktop, and keep it somewhere that it's handy to have quick web access... kitchen, den, whatever... and when your bored pick a topic and see if you can do what you need to do with that system. Nothing mission critical, just tinker a bit. For example, I got started with linux purely to use mythtv. You will find that some of the projects you pick will be absolute frustration, but don't blame the OS, or the software... if you were as proficient with linux as you are with windows you wouldn't have the problems. What you will eventually find is that though your ignorance and windows background makes things seem difficult at first, things slowly begin to feel easier, and much more friendly than windows. (Friendly in a, "I'll let you to do what you want, when you want" kind of way... not a "I'll hold your hand through this" kind of way)
Oh, and get into the command line. A graphical file manager is all fine and dandy, but once your comfortable at the command line, most file managers feel clunky. With wildcards,regex, piping, and all of the other handy commandline tricks, you can do some pretty amazing things in a single command that I only dreamed of doing with entire batch scripts in windows.
I still find some things that I miss from OSX and Windows... I would love to be able to work with disk images as easily as I do on my Mac... and I sometimes feel the lack of windows when it comes time to update firmware, or I want to try out a new game... but those are easily relieved with dualboot or a second machine if your not committed to the transition as I am forcing myself to be.
And most importantly, if you do give it a shot, participate in the "Linux community". Hop on IRC, report bugs, read and post in forums, etc. I have found the community to be the most encouraging thing about Linux. The fact that I can actually discuss my problems with the author/maintainer/packager of a piece of software I use, and often single handedly influence the future of that software really makes me feel as though it's truly MY COMPUTER for a change, and thus it is only limited by my desire and imagination.
PS... A year or so ago, I never would have imagined these words coming out of my mouth... I felt the same as you do then.
A cluster is still a set of discrete OS's working in concert... I believe what they are intending to do is use a hardware layer to allow the "OS" to utilize the hardware independent of an operating system on the individual components.
The closest parallel I can draw is that of a Fiber Channel SAN... any machine that is physically/logically connected to that SAN can access the storage as though it is local to that machine.
Imagine a protocol, implemented purely in hardware, that allowed distributed processing, storage, redundancy, etc. You would buy the equipment without an OS, and simply plug it in to make it part of your supercluster (tm).
I think what they mean by "Data Center OS" is that they are developing an OS that utilizes an entire datacenter as it's resource... rather than a series of discrete systems that are linked by their OS's.
Essentially I imagine it will be similar to the way a mainframe acts... a large number of resources, all controlled by a single OS. But instead of a single manufacturer implementation, this will be a proprietary "standard" that allows 3rd party components to be added to the cloud and become available to the "OS"
It's actually a great idea... it's the next evolution from virtualization... Why should a data center admin need to ever concern themselves with the individual servers and storage devices... instead they just add another processor (server), storage device (NAS array), or external network, and the OS will utilize it as it chooses.
I'd imagine that if it is properly executed, it will greatly improve utilization and make managing the data center infinitely easier as all you do is plug the device in and it is automatically assimilated into the system.
All I hope is that they make it a true industry standard, it would suck if only a combination of Cisco, Dell, and EMC devices (for example) would work with the new "OS".
I am not familiar with this switch, as you appear to be, but do these switches us multiple (redundant) processor modules. I know on some Cisco and other vendor's higher end switches, you can do a flash to one module and force a fail over so you can flash the other... or remove the processor board altogether and update it in spare chassis and return it to service.
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I was thinking the same thing. However I'm not sure how it could be accomplished in a way that would improve black levels. Ideally the screen would be as black as possible but still reflective of those colors.
Perhaps an active projection screen could be done with electronic paper, the projection surface is black except where the laser is currently focused. The scanning laser and scanning screen would need to be synced and aligned, so it wouldn't be portable... but it would make front projection realistic in bright rooms, and knock the socks off any other front projection setup in a dark room as far as black levels and contrast are concerned.
I'm not much of a fan of YouTube... most of the crap on there is a waste of bandwidth... but this video is by far the most entertaining and well done piece of web video I have seen on YouTube. Thank you for posting the link!
Google realizes that it cannot make money through advertising indefinately... so what does it do, it researches new ides to an extreme previously unheard of. Their ads are lightwight and unobtrusive. Essentially they are ad funded, but overall they are good to their users/customers.
Yahoo, who doesn't seem to get it, simply finds ways to put ads where they haven't been before. Great for the ad revenue, bad for their users.
Is there really anyone who hasn't figured out why Google is such a majority favorite? If not for google, I suspect that flash based ads would still be the standard, and everyone would be experiementing with streaming video ads or some crap like that. Thank god google came along and showed their competition that the business model doesn't require large, annoying ads, but instead a huge volume of well placed ads that appeal instead of repel the user!
If yahoo wan't ad's in PDF's, so be it... all the more reason for me to stick with google.
Competition assumes that there is a viable alternative... though Linux and OSX are alternatives, are they viable?
Imagine that your the CIO of a fortune 500 company... could you standardize on either product and get business done effectively? Not likely, without a least a few windows machines around to handle proprietary software, to handle document compatibility issues, etc.
I think that the day is very near... essentially there are only a few areas where MS products are so dominate in the marketplace that going with something different could cause problems in getting business done.
1. Office/productivity applications... with ODF making strides, it's only a matter of time (I hope) before all office suites talk the same language!
2. Proprietary applications... most of the recent proprietary applications I have seen developed in recent times have been web based. Once our organization (part of the US Federal Govt.) moves 2 or three more of them to web-based interfaces, we could easily go cross platform (except for #1).
3. General acceptance of workers... More and more is done in a web browser, and you can put someone in almost any browser and they can be productive, so as 2 happens it gets easier to consider alternatives to Windows/IE.
Sure there are other concerns, but I believe that most of them will resolve themselves in the meantime.
I think that Judge Jackson was right to extend the duration of the antitrust monitoring... but I suspect that at the end of the extension it will be unnecessary. Microsoft has done a great job of opening the market for alternative products... just look at Vista and OOXML!
I thought the same thing... shouldn't mathematic proofs be independent of outside influence, shouldn't they stand on their own and make as few assumptions as possible. I figured that a proof, properly done, would be a large step by step solution to the problem.
Then I realized that many proofs aren't concerned with single-input single-output situations, but instead may require thousands of iterations based upon large sets of inputs. You can't do that by hand.
I am certain, that because computers/software are being used we will eventually find an accepted proof that is scrapped because it exploited (inadvertently) a bug/limitation of the software used to test it. Unfortunately there is nothing to be done!
I am not thinking of myself but the neighbour who has no firewall running (unless you count XP's software firewall), no method of monitoring/restricting outgoing traffic, and wouldn't have the faintest idea what to look for to determine if her machine had been compromised.
I am more concerned about outbound traffic as it relates to the article in question... if the ISP prevented everything but http(s) traffic by default and you had to manually enable other forms of traffic by visiting a website and selecting the protocol/application in question, they could prevent your machine from sending anything OUT as well as blocking incoming garbage.
I don't know the best solution... only that ISP's COULD and probably SHOULD look at ways of making it safer to connect to their service.
As long as they don't restrict what a knowledgeable user can do of course!
I swear... if I could get one of these that could fool my girlfriend into thinking I'm "McDreamy". I'd be a VERY happy man, even if I have to put up with role playing all the drama!
Oh wait, this is slashdot and I have a girlfriend... I guess I should just be happy with what I have!
Why don't isp's implement firewalls at their end that effectively eliminate all traffic except those protocols demanded by the user.
It would be relatively simple to create a web page that could enable/disable these protocols... the page would know which IP, as you would be connecting from it, and could be protected by a simple captcha or password to make it difficult for malware to enable these protocols itself.
Obviously, the user could disable all filtering if they so desired.
This solution would prevent a ton of issues for most users, while still allowing those of us who are wise enough to monitor our own systems to enable everything ourselves.
In addition, why don't ISP's notify the user if they suddenly see an unusual amount of traffic on an unusual port or protocol... a simple email to say "we are seeing IRC traffic on your connection, you have never used IRC in the past. Some malicious software communicates via IRC protocols which may cause this unusual activity. Please read this linked article if you would like to know more."
I realize that most of us would rather our ISP stay out of our online activity... however I feel that if they actively participated in preventing the spread of malware on thier customers machines, they would not only increase customer satisfaction, but reduce the bandwidth being wasted. At first it would be an expense, but as the network was cleared of wasted traffic it would eventually pay for itself.
... of countries to escape to when things continue to get worse here in the US!
Maybe somewhere in the Swiss Alps?
I think it's time for someone with some experience managing open source projects, and a significant bank roll, to start a fully open source voting machine initiative.
I mean open hardware, open software, open everything.
I am pretty certain that the open community could devise something that would be nearly tamper proof... probably using two devices. One, managed by the voting officials in the district that actually records the votes, the second is managed by a 3rd party and is used to verify the results.
For example I vote on one machine, which prints a verification slip that is scanned into the second which display and records my votes. At the end of the day, both machines should have the same count... otherwise one of the two was tampered with. At which point they turn to the verification slips for a manual count.
I would agree with you that most people who complain do not actively participate in their government, and thus don't have a right to complain. But I do...
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=341413&cid=21136749
Our government has repeatedly passed legislation, or denied legislation based upon business interests over individual interests for quite some time now. It's not surprising, considering that the risks are low that they will face consequences, and the rewards are spectacular. The worst bit is that they can screw their constituents and look good doing it through deceptive naming and phrasing of bills/laws, by including commercial interest pork in a bill whose intent is completely unrelated, etc.
I am not suggesting that our government's problems are not the product of our own indifference (on a whole), because if the people exercised due diligence to research, elect, and monitor their representatives things would likely be much better. Unfortunately, American Idol is far more entertaining than following politics (I suppose that's debatable at this point too), so the people care more about who gets the $1 Million dollar recording contract than who's adding $300 Million in spending for an unneeded bridge to nowhere.
It's sad!
No, I have not been either poor or wealthy... what does that have to do with anything. It is clear to any observer that the stronger the community, the more opportunities the members of that community enjoy. Foundations for communities can be social, economic, race, religion, etc. If the members of any of those communities support one another to elevate the community as a whole, given time every member of the community will benefit.
I am not suggesting that it's an overnight change, but there is a positive effect. I have seen lower class, even poor, neighborhoods that started down this path of mutual benefit. The entire subdivision began to see increased property values, reduction in crime, an influx of new business, and best of all the members of this community stopped blaming everyone else for their problems and began to work together to make thier situations better. Of course there were individuals who didn't participate, those who caused problems or failed to keep their property to standards were hounded by police, fined by the city, or had their landlords contacted... quickly the majority of the problem residents either came around or found a more comfortable place to make problems.
This happened in a small section of Detroit, a few miles from my home. Similar stories are occurring all over the city of Detroit and other urban centers as gas prices rise and urban live becomes more desirable. It usually begins with a new buyer moving in and encouraging their neighbours to start a neighbourhood watch.
I am familiar with this because I spent 5 years working for Steven Vogel, Dean of Architecture at University of Detroit, and a very reputable urban designer and great promoter of the city of Detroit. Working for him opened my eyes to just how beautiful this city was only 50-60 years ago... and he's done the same for other residents. In fact, his neighbourhood, Rosedale Park, has been so beautifully restored that they hold annual home tours that draw thousands of visitors... in Detroit!
All I am saying is that it doesn't take money to have a community, it takes the realization that working together makes everyone better off. It sad to see communities where no one even calls the cops when there is a shooting... really sad!
As I clearly stated previously, I find your argument interesting and valid. I would not choose to jump to such a conclusion however because I find that frequently things can be explained much more simply.
In addition, while I cannot discount paranormal or supernatural like events or abilities altogether, I fear that I have no concrete evidence of anything ever happening that could be considered such. Thus, without evidence to study, it is impossible to speculate on the possibility.
History has shown that even the most accepted and understood scientific beliefs can be replaced overnight through new discovery. I will not deny that some phenomenon that science has categorized as paranormal or supernatural might be easily explained in the future, however I have doubts.
My doubts stem mostly from the fact that such events are rare, unpredictable, and most often experienced by those who readily accept such explanations. Though there have been very reasonable minds who have come forward to claim things such as ghosts, telepathy, alien abduction, and such are true, for the most part the scientific community dismisses such things for lack of evidence and the inability to study and prove of disprove them.
The scientific method clearly states that in order for a theory to be valid it must be verifiable or falsifiable. Your theory falls into the realm of theoretical speculation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory#Currently_unverifiable_theories, along with string theory upon which it is based.
My theory however has been tested and verified repeatedly. In fact most scientists believe that many phenomenon that we experience are purely manufactured in our brains and not actually the result of sensory experience. For example, the bright light and out of body experiences upon death. One cannot deny that it is possible that the abnormal activity in our brain is unrelated to such visions, the alternative however would be theoretical speculation or worse, and thus it is more logical to accept science's explanation while continuing to explore other explanations in hopes of making a discovery that replaces it.
Of course, with Feyerabend's ideas, it doesn't matter. However, though he has some very interesting ideas, even he would admit that without structure to science there would be no credibility. I think he was more concerned that without great minds exploring unpopular and outlandish ideas, we hurt the progress of science. However I would argue that the scientific method and Feyerabend's ideals are not mutually exclusive. String theory is a great example of the merging of the scientific method and Feyerabend's belief. Most of what is discussed in string theory is speculation, however as scientists come to accept it as possible and adjust past beliefs to make them compatible, progress is made. Science does not always refuse to dismiss the past, but it takes a clearly thought out and reasonable theory to get scientists to try and reconcile past beliefs with new ideas. Spend some time thinking your idea through, make some unbiased observations, and document your idea. It's possible that when looked at from all angles by individuals much smarter than us, your idea will actually hold water.
Again thank you for sharing your ideas, and please know that I think they are truly a refreshing alternative to some of the mumbo-jumbo that is spewed from the mouths of some believers in paranormal or supernatural phenomenon. I would love to believe that we might evolve to have such abilities, or even be able to tap into another dimension to see the future, and your idea allows for that possibility. However I choose to believe that the currently accepted explanation until something better comes along or I experience something that I cannot imagine an explanation for without looking to ideas such as yours.
Normally I would not even consider replying much less agreeing with a bunch of racist drivel.
However, there is something to be said about the lack of community and the attitude of being owed something on the part of those effected by Katrina.
I don't believe it was exactly along race lines, but rather along economic and education lines... unfortunately the majority of undereducated poor people in New Orleans were Black.
I think the worst thing about the whole situation is that the community that needs to depend on each other the most, instead chose to be selfish and greedy. If you look up the economic ladder, you will see the further up you get, the more cohesive the elements of society. If the lower class were to scratch eachother's backs the way the wealthy do, they could easily supplant them through pure numbers.
You see this effect everywhere... I live in a middle class neighborhood... some of us are independent and some of us our more apt to work together to improve our situation... low class neighborhoods it's nearly all independents. Upper-middle class, the neighbours form associations and psudo-governments to benefit everyone with security, beautification, etc.
Can you imagine how beautiful and safe a lower class neighborhood could be if most of it's population actively participated in improving their community. It doesn't cost anything, clean up your lawn, help your neighbor clean theirs, and report any undesirable or suspicious activity to law enforcement.
If anyone who lives in a 'poor' neighbourhood reads this, please GET INVOLVED in your community! Even spending an hour a week doing something for someone or everyone else in your community would make a difference if it encourages others to do the same! Once your community is united, you can use the power of numbers to ensure that someone in your community gets elected, policies benefit your community, and finally you can do favors for each other.
Do you think the wealthy stay that way beacause they are smarter, or better than the poor? No, they give and receive favours from other wealthy people. For example, entrance into Universities, jobs, business opportunities, political support, etc. If the poor would work together to the same degree, they could easily improve their situation quickly. No one keeps them down but themselves!
First of all... your the director of external affairs... Yep you should have stopped it... SO WHY THE FUCK DIDN'T YOU.
Second, your working very hard to establish credibility and integrity... by trying to trick us into thinking your credible and trustworthy... that's exactly what you DON'T do to establish credibility and integrity.
Finally... I would say that doing exactly the wrong thing hasn't undermine your credibility and integrity, you didn't have any to begin with... this simply ensures that you never will until the current >20% has been eliminated, everyone in that conference resigns, and your agency actually handles a disaster like it knows what it is doing.
It is kind of ironic that FEMA, the agency that is supposed to clean up disasters, actually turns every disaster it is involved in into a bigger disaster through it's absolute incompetence and piss poor public image.
Sorry... sorry... WTF!!!!
Sorry isn't gonna cut it... try mass resignations!
A government organization went on national TV and intentionally tried to fool millions of Americans into believing a lie so that they didn't look bad.
Oh wait... never mind... I forgot, this is the USA. And we are talking about the government after all. The idiot who thought this up should run for President!
Flying Spaghetti Monster I cant wait until our government acts with our best interests in mind... hell I'd be happy to see it happen just once before I die.
While the idea that the umpteen dimensions beyond those that we usually perceive might be the source of some of these unexplained phenomenon is certainly a valid argument, it is no more or less valid that one suggesting that the flying spaghetti monster is responsible.
What I am suggesting is an argument based upon current knowledge. Not that it is more correct, but it assumes far less and is thus more readily proven false, which is key to any scientific argument. Your original argument, though still valid, is not based upon any knowledge we have of the world nor is it even possible to imagine how it might be proven false.
I will agree however, that it is impossible to explain how one might have foreseen a quake level 8 months in advance using my explanation. However I would probably assume a few things before I jumped to supernatural, or even multiple dimension speculation. I would assume either 1. I saw something in some sort of publication, 2. the level designer and I had extremely similar ideas, 3. my drawing was observed by or relayed to the level designer, 4. The level in question was inspired by a similar design in previous games and it was easy to imagine how it would be rendered by the new game.
We have all had ideas or thoughts that we believed to be original until we find someone with the same idea... with 4 billion people in the world it's not hard to imagine 2 of them thinking nearly identical thoughts at some point in their lives. This is not proof of anything.
This statement is a non-argument. Any rational mind can clearly see that their are things in our universe that are not explainable and may never be explainable. This doesn't make the assumption of the supernatural or other sceptical beliefs any more or less valid. The fact that the ancient philosophers acknowledged strange abilities is not surprising... imagine you met an autistic savant, like Kim Peek, without any knowledge that they existed... I think they have nearly supernatural abilities even now, a few hundred years ago I might think they were an angel, devil, witch, or what have you. The world was very small, even just two hundred years ago, people rarely had knowledge of what was happening in the next town let alone in the rest of the world... it would be easy to find people who appeared to have supernatural powers.
If precognition, like you speak of with your quake picture, were real, I believe we would have significant evidence of it, which would drive some serious research into the issue. Proof of the ability would not be difficult to validate, and unless the circumstances/ability that result in precognition are so rare that it is impossible to study (which is possible I suppose), I would imagine we would have had someone with scientifically verified evidence by now. Something like the guy on Heroes who paints the future, it would only take one painting done years prior to a setting or event, to show that it happens... assuming that the painter had no logical way of predicting the setting or event.
Please keep in mind that it wasn't long ago that innocent girls were murdered as witches for having "supernatural" powers. We have come a long way in the effort to understand our universe in the last two hundred years, faster than ever before, and I suspect we have only just begun.
I suspect that there will always be those who have experiences that they cannot rationalize, and will thus assume that something "supernatural" occurred.
Better yet, let's direct our attention to our brain that is infinitely fallible.
I could get you names of a bunch of people who could fool your senses into seeing something you didn't see. I can personally make you think you heard something you didn't hear (play any mp3 for an example). And so on.
Our brains can even be fooled by themselves... I bet you know a liar who has told the same lie for so long that they actually believe it. I remember telling stories as a kid that today I realize I'm not sure if they were true or just embellishments to impress chicks.
I think it's perfectly reasonable to believe that many, so called, "supernatural" experiences are simply natural, brief, electric/chemical occurrences within our heads. Those with prolonged occurrences can be found in mental health hospitals all over the world. If you want to have a prolonged one yourself, many drugs can trigger such states of mind.
I get "deja vu" all the time, I have never been able to be certain that I actually knew anything in advance... only that things seemed to unfold exactly as I thought they would... perhaps it's just that there is some resonance, reflection, or short circuiting happening in my neurons causing the new input to feel like it's coming from memory as well as our senses. When I can actually, reliably, predict what is to happen BEFORE it happens, then I will look for other explanations.
Your explanation is kinda fun though!
I think most engineers do not disbelieve or believe, they have reached a higher level where they accept that they cannot KNOW, so choose to not take a position on the issue.
If all engineers believed in the supernatural, no progress would ever be made. Any flaw would be the fault of some demon, gremlin, etc. Instead of a scientific explanation being sought, and prevented in future versions. Could you imagine where we would be today if humans all believed in supernatural phenomenon, I doubt we would ever have learned to use fire as surely it would be considered evil because of it's destructive power. I am very grateful that most of the brightest minds in the sciences and engineering are sceptical about anything that cannot be scientifically proven!
Grammer Nazi's have fun with this, the rest of you feel free to modify it and send it to your representative:
First get the +4 for your zipcode: http://zip4.usps.com/zip4/welcome.jsp
Then visit: http://www.house.gov/writerep/
Try "Thin Clients"
I would agree with you 100%... except your wrong! Linux CAN be difficult to install. You MAY have hardware issues. You WILL need to spend some time adapting.
However, for most (and I mean almost any average user), you will not experience the frustration you experienced when installing the latest Ubuntu (and likely other) distros. It seems that the primary, and only very common, hardware issue is with wireless cards... most of which will automatically install after your first boot (as long as you have an alternate internet connection such as dial-up or ethernet).
If given a decent chance, taken in baby steps, it really takes very little time for a windows power user to become proficient in Linux. I have been 100% linux for about 6 months now and I honestly get bored on my computer now. I used to constantly have to remove malware, defrag, update drivers, etc. just so I could be nagged by a dozen or so shareware nag screens, WGA nag screens, windows update reboots, virus scans... and maybe I would actually read an email or two while I kept my system running lean and clean. Now, I can update everything (except firmware) within a minute or two, and that includes keeping up with the latest drivers.
Do yourself a favor... grab an older laptop, or perhaps a quiet desktop, and keep it somewhere that it's handy to have quick web access... kitchen, den, whatever... and when your bored pick a topic and see if you can do what you need to do with that system. Nothing mission critical, just tinker a bit. For example, I got started with linux purely to use mythtv. You will find that some of the projects you pick will be absolute frustration, but don't blame the OS, or the software... if you were as proficient with linux as you are with windows you wouldn't have the problems. What you will eventually find is that though your ignorance and windows background makes things seem difficult at first, things slowly begin to feel easier, and much more friendly than windows. (Friendly in a, "I'll let you to do what you want, when you want" kind of way... not a "I'll hold your hand through this" kind of way)
Oh, and get into the command line. A graphical file manager is all fine and dandy, but once your comfortable at the command line, most file managers feel clunky. With wildcards,regex, piping, and all of the other handy commandline tricks, you can do some pretty amazing things in a single command that I only dreamed of doing with entire batch scripts in windows.
I still find some things that I miss from OSX and Windows... I would love to be able to work with disk images as easily as I do on my Mac... and I sometimes feel the lack of windows when it comes time to update firmware, or I want to try out a new game... but those are easily relieved with dualboot or a second machine if your not committed to the transition as I am forcing myself to be.
And most importantly, if you do give it a shot, participate in the "Linux community". Hop on IRC, report bugs, read and post in forums, etc. I have found the community to be the most encouraging thing about Linux. The fact that I can actually discuss my problems with the author/maintainer/packager of a piece of software I use, and often single handedly influence the future of that software really makes me feel as though it's truly MY COMPUTER for a change, and thus it is only limited by my desire and imagination.
PS... A year or so ago, I never would have imagined these words coming out of my mouth... I felt the same as you do then.
A cluster is still a set of discrete OS's working in concert... I believe what they are intending to do is use a hardware layer to allow the "OS" to utilize the hardware independent of an operating system on the individual components.
The closest parallel I can draw is that of a Fiber Channel SAN... any machine that is physically/logically connected to that SAN can access the storage as though it is local to that machine.
Imagine a protocol, implemented purely in hardware, that allowed distributed processing, storage, redundancy, etc. You would buy the equipment without an OS, and simply plug it in to make it part of your supercluster (tm).
I think what they mean by "Data Center OS" is that they are developing an OS that utilizes an entire datacenter as it's resource... rather than a series of discrete systems that are linked by their OS's.
Essentially I imagine it will be similar to the way a mainframe acts... a large number of resources, all controlled by a single OS. But instead of a single manufacturer implementation, this will be a proprietary "standard" that allows 3rd party components to be added to the cloud and become available to the "OS"
It's actually a great idea... it's the next evolution from virtualization... Why should a data center admin need to ever concern themselves with the individual servers and storage devices... instead they just add another processor (server), storage device (NAS array), or external network, and the OS will utilize it as it chooses.
I'd imagine that if it is properly executed, it will greatly improve utilization and make managing the data center infinitely easier as all you do is plug the device in and it is automatically assimilated into the system.
All I hope is that they make it a true industry standard, it would suck if only a combination of Cisco, Dell, and EMC devices (for example) would work with the new "OS".
I am not familiar with this switch, as you appear to be, but do these switches us multiple (redundant) processor modules. I know on some Cisco and other vendor's higher end switches, you can do a flash to one module and force a fail over so you can flash the other... or remove the processor board altogether and update it in spare chassis and return it to service.