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User: morgan_greywolf

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  1. Infrastructure investments on Afghan Government Turns To Iran For Internet · · Score: 1

    I seriously doubt that the Iranian government and it's nationalized telecom company will be the only company with infrastructure investments in Iraq or Afghanistan. If there's money to be made, the global conglomerates will make it.

  2. Re:And this is a bad thing? on Google, Apple and Others Accused of 'No Poaching' Deal · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Well, there are antitrust laws that preclude them from collusion, both in the customer marketplace and in the labor market. I don't necessarily agree with such manipulation of markets, but such collusion is as anti-competitive as was Microsoft's attempted collusion with Netscape (divide the browser between Windows and everything else) and Apple ("knife the baby").

    So if you were calling for blood when Microsoft was doing it, you should be calling for blood when Google or Apple does it, at least if you're trying to be consistent.
     

  3. Re:Name on Developers Fork Mandriva Linux, Creating Mageia · · Score: 1

    It probably doesn't have to do with its name. Many corporations ban open source because they developed software licensing policies that reflected the need to avoid piracy of closed-source software, intentional or otherwise. Unfortunately, the policies usually say that they won't use a software program unless they have paid a license fee to someone. Such rules also sometimes preclude the use of "bundled"[1] applications as well.

    [1] An example of what I mean by "bundled" in this case would be like a scanner that comes bundled with a photo editing tool.

  4. Re:Each day, Google. Each day. on Skyhook Wireless Sues Google Over Anti-Competitive Practices · · Score: 1

    Asynchrony. You know, asynchronous communications. As in not synchronous.

    Apple was bad at that in the 90s. The state of networking for Apple products was pathetic at best. AppleTalk was a hopeless failure. This prompted a whole cottage industry dedicated to coming up with kludgy third party hardware products that made Apple machines work in TCP/IP and Windows networks. (Farallon computing had one, I forget what they called it.)

  5. Re:Each day, Google. Each day. on Skyhook Wireless Sues Google Over Anti-Competitive Practices · · Score: 1

    Well, there was definitely quite a bit of poor leadership and mismanagement at Apple prior to the return of Steve Jobs. John Sculley, Michael Spindler and Gil Amelio each did their part to run Apple into the ground. (Actually, the history is a bit unfair to Gil Amelio, who was the man who made the call to buy NeXT and NeXTSTEP, upon which OS X is based.)

    As for Atari, I don't know the whole story, but what I do know is that they were never able to outsell their closest competitor, Commodore.

  6. Re:Me too! on Skyhook Wireless Sues Google Over Anti-Competitive Practices · · Score: 1

    Google also did search better than AltaVista and, in fact, everyone else. Sure, now you have Bing, but Bing would never have existed if Microsoft hadn't have been forced to compete with Google.

    Google also pretty much drove Web 2.0 innovations such as AJAX That might sound silly (since it was Microsoft, not Google, who invented AJAX), but until Google adopted it for its sites like Google Maps and Gmail, very few websites were using it, and those that were lacked the mastery Google had of the technology.

    Furthermore, Google implemented all of these technologies using open source and open standards, unlike the other companies you mention, which locked everything up tight. I certainly give them kudos for doing that.

    You may not like Google, but they're certainly of the most influential driving forces on the Web today. Give credit where credit is due.

  7. Re:Each day, Google. Each day. on Skyhook Wireless Sues Google Over Anti-Competitive Practices · · Score: 1

    Commodore operated an open OS with no restrictions whatsoever, including the ability to run your own personal OS, and look where they are today (bankrupt).

    WTF are you talking about? You can run on your own personal OS on any commodity PC today. And that includes Apple's machines. Just hack any one of the dozens of open source operating systems, ranging from the *BSDs to Linux to one of the BeOS clones to a Windows NT clone.

    Additionally, Commodore's implosion had little to do with operating systems or openness and everything to do with horrible mismanagement and poor leadership.

  8. Re:Breakfast what? on Turning Your Home Wiring Into a Giant Antenna · · Score: 1

    I've heard the story repeated -- a lot. However, I've never seen the claim backed up by real evidence that the whistles ever existed. Since the whistles in questioned allegedly existed in the 1960s, before I was even born, I added the disclaimer that it may be an urban legend.

    Now, produce one of these whistles, and I'll redact my disclaimer.

  9. Re:Breakfast what? on Turning Your Home Wiring Into a Giant Antenna · · Score: 1

    No, the other way around. Atari were old Captain Crunch fans.

  10. Re:$1.73 million on SCO Puts Unix Assets On the Block · · Score: 1

    Yes, but the same company also claims that the Linux kernel contains source code ripped straight from Unix System V. I wouldn't be surprised if they also claimed ownership of the Brooklyn Bridge.

  11. Re:As long as we're selling software we don't own on SCO Puts Unix Assets On the Block · · Score: 1

    Or you can buy VMS rights from me! All you Windows NT-derived OS users better get out your $699 per processor!

  12. Re:Aptitude on Why Are Terrorists Often Engineers? · · Score: 1

    The engineers working for military contractors aren't blowing anything up or killing people; the equipment that they design may be used by volunteer soldiers, blowing stuff up and killing people under orders of their commanders and, ultimately, the federal government, but that's entirely different. (Disclaimer: I have worked for one major and one very minor military contractor.)

  13. Re:Breakfast what? on Turning Your Home Wiring Into a Giant Antenna · · Score: 2, Informative

    Im sorry, what is a breakfast cereal prize?

    For those of you who have never eaten or purchased pre-sweetened "kids" cereals, popular breakfast cereals marketed to children in the U.S. and elsewhere in the West often have a little toy stuffed in them. A famous (infamous?) example that may be an urban legend is a plastic whistle that once came in Cap'n'Crunch cereal boxes that (allegedly) blew a tone of 2600 Hz, the exact frequency needed to place free phone long-distance phone calls on AT&T's POTS network.

  14. Re:Funny name on Turning Your Home Wiring Into a Giant Antenna · · Score: 1

    I can see the commercials/infomericals now:

    Don't use the wireless antenna that came with your router! Hang it on SNUPI!

    (Cue the McCoy's song, except with lyrics to changed to "Hang on SNUPI!")

  15. Re:Not surprising on Haystack and the Myth of the Boy Wizard · · Score: 5, Insightful

    But the problem in this case isn't with engineers that don't know tech, it's with journalists that don't know journalism. Consider what the article's author asked Newsweek:

    In your article "Computer Programmer Takes On the World's Despots" you appear to have taken the author of the supposed Haystack program at his word. There are no quotes from people who've used the software, nor from people who've seen the software. How do we know that Austin Heap is telling the truth, and, more importantly, how do we know that the software works as advertised?

    Surely, it's very basic journalism to have talked to more than one person about this subject.

    There John Graham-Cumming hits the head right on the nail: they spoke only to Austin Heap and failed to get a second source. That isn't a failure to understand tech, that's a failure to understand Journalism 101.

  16. Re:Why does linux get this? on Adobe Releases New 64-Bit Flash Plugin For Linux · · Score: 2, Informative

    No issues here, either. It helps to use a manually-installed Flash, rather than relying on the Ubuntu repositories.

  17. Re:Aptitude on Why Are Terrorists Often Engineers? · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And, more to the point, it's more likely that those terrorists got their engineering degrees as a result of their choice to be a terrorist, rather than the other way around. There are millions of engineers in this country that aren't going around blowing stuff up and killing people.

  18. Re:What the hell? on High Fructose Corn Syrup To Get a Makeover · · Score: 0, Troll

    Funny thing is, it's not as if high-fructose corn syrup is actually worse for you than a similar amount of cane sugar. The problem is not HFCS as much as it is "foods loaded with sugar."

  19. Re:Jewgle would have founded better on The Advent of Religious Search Engines · · Score: 1

    Whooosh.

    A proper Islamic search engine, should, of course, filter out or otherwise refuse to return such results.

  20. Re:So that's why the UW mail system went down on New Email Worm Squirming Through Windows Users' Inboxes · · Score: 1

    You'd think by now UW would have written their own mail client or something.....

  21. Re:Facebook is cancer on Facebook Glitch Let Spammer Post To Walls · · Score: 1

    I think you'll find the people hacking facebook are very innovative and creative 15 year-olds.

    Facebook is the new AOL.

  22. Re:oh darn on Craigslist Removes Its Controversial Adult Section · · Score: 1

    There was no argument made that sex is immoral. Sex is not the same as paying prostitutes.

    True, but only in the same way that eating a sandwich is not the same as buying a sandwich from Subway.

    There was no argument made that prostitution should be illegal. I pointed out that there are good arguments to make prostitution entirely legal.

    I must've missed where you said that.

    Morality and legality are not the same thing. Even insane chain-smoking cult leader Ayn Rand understood this.

    Ad hominem attacks on a prominent libertarian author do nothing to further your point and everything to make you look silly.

  23. Re:oh darn on Craigslist Removes Its Controversial Adult Section · · Score: 1

    (1) Prostitutes aren't necessarily "pretty" - don't get your ideas on the sex industry from Western porn sites;

    Not necessarily pretty, but not necessarily ugly either. What's your point? Personally, I get my ideas on the sex industry from watching "Las Vegas Jailhouse". :-P

    (2) Men have far more employment opportunities. Most societies still overtly discriminate against women, sometimes because they're physically weaker and sometimes just because.

    In the United States, and indeed, in most Western countries, this statement is far from true. Here, not only is it illegal to discriminate against women, but it is commonly seen as distasteful; morally reprehensible even. In fact, due to affirmative action, in most cases, a woman is more likely to get a particular job over and equally qualified man.

    Furthermore, neither of these statements furthers your point at all.

    Are they OK now? Just because some uneducated kid is fooled into thinking that prostitution is a lucrative way out of poverty it doesn't mean you get to judge them any differently when they're physically and emotionally broken a year later.

    You don't get judge them, either. It isn't for you to decide how other people live their lives.

  24. Re:oh darn on Craigslist Removes Its Controversial Adult Section · · Score: 1

    You mean from the woman or the fast-food worker?

    Yes.

  25. Re:5 page paper? on Facebook Post Juror Gets Fined, Removed, Assigned Homework · · Score: 1

    You swear an oath stating that you'll abide by the rules. It's still an agreement. The judge can't make you do anything, as you have free will, but he can put in you jail if you fail to comply.

    Besides, if you want to get out of it, it's easy. For example, if the defendant is a minority, when you're asked if there is anything that would keep you from being impartial in this case, just claim that you're a racist. Assuming you're a man, if the defendant is a woman, when you're asked if there is anything that would keep you from being impartial in this case, claim to be a misogynist. You get the idea. Furthermore, you can be excluded if you have certain disabilities, or if serving on the jury would otherwise prove to be an "undue burden" on you.