{sarcasm}Hmmm . . . ready access to food, clothing, shelter, education and computing for all children here in the USA. Gee, I didn't know that we were so affluent that all of our citizens were already fully provided for! I was under the mistaken impression that many children in the USA were what any reasonable person would consider 'underpriveledged'. Thank you for clearing that up for me! Now that I know that all those poor, inner-city and rural kids can afford access to technology, I can sleep much better!{/sarcasm}
1. There are plenty of underpriveledged children here in the United States who could benefit from this kind of program . . . inner-city and rural. At the risk of seeming selfish or callous, shouldn't we take care of our own first?
2. If there is an absolute mandate to help the children in underdeveloped nations, wouldn't food, shelter, clothing and basic education be more suitable areas in which to provide assistance? To lift a line from M*A*S*H* - it is wholly inappropriate to give dessert to a child who hasn't had dinner.
it seems to me that $Soft should simply fix the OS elements which permit virus' to do that voodoo they do. They could upload it for free as a part of Windoze update.
Wasn't the implication that most of the Borg weren't asked if they wanted implants (as opposed to actors/actresses who positively will take any implant as long as it looks good).
When I was in school at Berzerkely, I supported myself as a personal care attendant assisting the physically handicapped. A (frighteningly intelligent and insightful) friend of mine once commented that I could design the ultimate cybernetic prosthesis, one which could replace any damaged body part and work perfectly, but that the vast majority of those with physical handicaps would shun my invention if it didn't look good - i.e., most physically handicapped people would choose a good-looking but non-functional prosthetic over a functioning but ugly one. I confirmed this by talking candidly with many of my clients.
Somehow, I just don't see these things catching on. They're ugly.
WHY is it illegal for municipalities to provide free (tax-supported) wi-fi? The only justification I've heard is that this will prevent private industry from being able to make a profit from providing this same service (which in this day and age IS a utility, not a luxury).
Y'know, if the same mentality were applied to some existing government services . ..
(Caller): Help! My house is on fire!
(Phone voice): Do you have a FlameOut (tm) customer ID number?
(Caller): No, but my house is burning! My children are in there--Please help me!
(Phone voice): I'm sorry, but since you're not a FlameOut (tm) customer, I can't help you. However, we will be rolling our FlameOut (tm) Wagons to protect your neighbor, who I see is a subscriber in good standing. Thank you for notifying us of this condition and have a nice day.
Didn't Microsoft recently announce that their next version of Office would be using an XML-based standard for files (rather like a free software suite whose name I won't mention but whose initials are OpenOffice)?
So . . . they're planning to submit the XML standard for approval? Or are they just hoping somebody will write a free converter to port all of the crufty old MS-Office.DOCs over to a reasonably portable form of XML?
Oh, well - seems like they're trying to do the right thing. To the men and women of Redmond I say: keep up the good work! Oh, and adopt a motto, like "Don't be evil.";^D
Heisenberg stated that it is meaningless to attempt measurement of quantum events because the act of observing those events alters them - i.e., if you look at where an electron "is", it ain't there by the time you finish your observation.
This is folly. Consider: quantum computing requires (afaik) considerable resources, thereby limiting the number and type of people with access to the computational power under discussion. By the time such access becomes more common (even as microcomputers have become nearly ubiquitous), quantum cryptography will also become available to ensure 1) that messages can only be decrypted by their intended recipients, and 2) that any outside attempt at access will be immediately and unalterably plain to the intended recipients.
As has been noted elsewhere at great length, DRM suffers from the same flaws which plague virtually every other digital security system - that being that they cannot be perfect; that is, there will always be a flaw subject to exploitation.
That said, there appears to be no way to retroactively protect the vast wealth of content which is already available in digital form. Even the average consumer is unlikely to migrate from the tried-and-true Audio CD technology which is currently in virtually every American home; that technology is wholly unsecured, and ensuring that any new technology remains "backward compatible" also ensures that no security scheme can be implemented which will provide more than a nuisance obstacle to digital piracy.
The new HD standards may give the movie industry a leg up on that roadblock; even so, with so many DVD's in use (and the spectacular failure of CSS to safeguard DR on that medium), the industry will find it difficult at best to continue providing protection for the movies they wish to market, especially given the number of existing DVD players which would need to be rendered obsolete in order to implement a more robust protection scheme.
Law enforcement would seem to be the only remaining mechanism for the combatting of digital piracy, then. For so long as efforts remain centered around the individual copyright infringer, such efforts are doomed to failure. With factories abroad churning out huge quantities of bootlegged or pirated content, there will be a financial incentive for bright and talented individuals to break the law. Your average Joe (or even the technically gifted among us who *might* be pirating digital content for home use) isn't going to expend more effort in stealing digital content than the content is worth, but an unscrupulous businessman can always be counted on to flout copyrights if the bottom line ends up in the black.
The situation is analagous to the current "war on drugs" being waged in the United States. So long as tax dollars and police efforts remain centered on the identification and punishment of the "end users" in either chain, those efforts will be unable to produce the desired end because of the vast number of potential targets. Only when the efforts of interdiction are directed at the criminals who are making financial gain from enterprise-level violation of the law can enforcement of these prohibitions possibly succeed.
Don't just stand there . . . grab a shovel!
on
Video Tombstones
·
· Score: 1
A short answer - if the meter were shorter than we currently define it, then the number we assign to c would be larger, eh? Only if that were true, the number of units of energy we get out of "e=m*c**2" also be larger; but of course each unit would be commensurately smaller.
Put it another way - the measures are arbitrary; but if you use the same set of measures to gauge energy (y'know, newtons=kilogram*meters/second**2, for example), the equation "e=m*c**2" will work out - if our dear Uncle Al was right, that is!
(For the record, I think he was right as far as he went. Obviously, he couldn't possibly get us all the way to understanding the Universe, but he did quite a lot to move us in that direction).
"...if you cannot answer questions about the extent of your company's license compliance..."
M$ or SCOtum rhetoric for certain, eh? Lemme guess - the Yankee Group still insists that proprietary OS's with per CPU or per seat licensing schemes are still cheaper than an OS with a $0.00 purchase price, right?
Isn't that rather like a eunich trying to convince a whole man that it's great to be neutered?
There is a difference. I'm not saying that the government of the United States is a totalitarian regime; merely that it tends to be run by (and displays the weaknesses of) people with a taste for power and authority.
Oh, and let's not forget the tributary governments which form the U. S. Government - namely the fifty State governments. How often have we seen power squabbles between the two (medical marijuana comes to mind as a recent example)? What one doesn't legislate the other may regulate, with only the court system and the wisdom of the founding fathers to prevent the grossest of abuses.
Slashdot Mirror
{sneer}
2. If there is an absolute mandate to help the children in underdeveloped nations, wouldn't food, shelter, clothing and basic education be more suitable areas in which to provide assistance? To lift a line from M*A*S*H* - it is wholly inappropriate to give dessert to a child who hasn't had dinner.
$sys$BellSouthEthics
Oh, wait, now I see . . .
(1) Write buggy OS
(2) Sell to public
(3) $PROFIT
(4) Fix some of the bugs
(5) Sell bugfixes to public
(6) $PROFIT even more!
(7) $sys$Ethics!
Wasn't the implication that most of the Borg weren't asked if they wanted implants (as opposed to actors/actresses who positively will take any implant as long as it looks good).
Somehow, I just don't see these things catching on. They're ugly.
Y'know, if the same mentality were applied to some existing government services . . .
(Caller): Help! My house is on fire!
(Phone voice): Do you have a FlameOut (tm) customer ID number?
(Caller): No, but my house is burning! My children are in there--Please help me!
(Phone voice): I'm sorry, but since you're not a FlameOut (tm) customer, I can't help you. However, we will be rolling our FlameOut (tm) Wagons to protect your neighbor, who I see is a subscriber in good standing. Thank you for notifying us of this condition and have a nice day.
{CLICK}
oops!
$sys$Hayabusa
The force can have a strong influence on the weak-minded.
Without risking FOD.
So . . . they're planning to submit the XML standard for approval? Or are they just hoping somebody will write a free converter to port all of the crufty old MS-Office .DOCs over to a reasonably portable form of XML?
Oh, well - seems like they're trying to do the right thing. To the men and women of Redmond I say: keep up the good work! Oh, and adopt a motto, like "Don't be evil." ;^D
Schroedinger's cat is {blink}not{/blink} dead.
Just don't let 'em put a Fritz chip in it!
(Prof. Farnsworth): No fair - you changed the outcome by observing it!
That said, there appears to be no way to retroactively protect the vast wealth of content which is already available in digital form. Even the average consumer is unlikely to migrate from the tried-and-true Audio CD technology which is currently in virtually every American home; that technology is wholly unsecured, and ensuring that any new technology remains "backward compatible" also ensures that no security scheme can be implemented which will provide more than a nuisance obstacle to digital piracy.
The new HD standards may give the movie industry a leg up on that roadblock; even so, with so many DVD's in use (and the spectacular failure of CSS to safeguard DR on that medium), the industry will find it difficult at best to continue providing protection for the movies they wish to market, especially given the number of existing DVD players which would need to be rendered obsolete in order to implement a more robust protection scheme.
Law enforcement would seem to be the only remaining mechanism for the combatting of digital piracy, then. For so long as efforts remain centered around the individual copyright infringer, such efforts are doomed to failure. With factories abroad churning out huge quantities of bootlegged or pirated content, there will be a financial incentive for bright and talented individuals to break the law. Your average Joe (or even the technically gifted among us who *might* be pirating digital content for home use) isn't going to expend more effort in stealing digital content than the content is worth, but an unscrupulous businessman can always be counted on to flout copyrights if the bottom line ends up in the black.
The situation is analagous to the current "war on drugs" being waged in the United States. So long as tax dollars and police efforts remain centered on the identification and punishment of the "end users" in either chain, those efforts will be unable to produce the desired end because of the vast number of potential targets. Only when the efforts of interdiction are directed at the criminals who are making financial gain from enterprise-level violation of the law can enforcement of these prohibitions possibly succeed.
Lemme outta here!
Put it another way - the measures are arbitrary; but if you use the same set of measures to gauge energy (y'know, newtons=kilogram*meters/second**2, for example), the equation "e=m*c**2" will work out - if our dear Uncle Al was right, that is!
(For the record, I think he was right as far as he went. Obviously, he couldn't possibly get us all the way to understanding the Universe, but he did quite a lot to move us in that direction).
"They set us up the bot!"
when it's such an old story, well -- it makes me as nervous as a Christian Scientist with appendicitis!
You know - Readin', Ritin', and 'Rithmatic? After all, it worked for decades here in the USA!
M$ or SCOtum rhetoric for certain, eh? Lemme guess - the Yankee Group still insists that proprietary OS's with per CPU or per seat licensing schemes are still cheaper than an OS with a $0.00 purchase price, right?
Isn't that rather like a eunich trying to convince a whole man that it's great to be neutered?
Whitehousecom is still up and running!
There is a difference. I'm not saying that the government of the United States is a totalitarian regime; merely that it tends to be run by (and displays the weaknesses of) people with a taste for power and authority.
Oh, and let's not forget the tributary governments which form the U. S. Government - namely the fifty State governments. How often have we seen power squabbles between the two (medical marijuana comes to mind as a recent example)? What one doesn't legislate the other may regulate, with only the court system and the wisdom of the founding fathers to prevent the grossest of abuses.
Any wagers that the power still resided in the hands of the same specific people (who probably got transferred along with the power)?