Um, that's exactly what I said. Yes, a CIO has higher rank than regular old developer. A district manager for Starbuck's, who worked his way up from Barista, has higher status than someone at his first year as a consultant at Deloitte and Touche. But compare the rank-and-file for each - the first-year consultant with the barista; the regional manager for Starbuck's with a VP at Deloitte and Touch - and it all becomes clear. Within any sector, there is a ladder. I said as much.
But don't be disingenous - what is being compared is infrastructure technicians versus developers. Look at educational requirements. Look at aspirations. Count how many IT helper monkeys are studying to become developers, and count how many developers are hoping to becoming network admins. The direction of aspiration is a good indication of what the relative positions are.
I'm neither in IT nor a developer at this time. My ego has nothing to do with it.
IT is a career path, but development and engineering are higher ones.
Uncomfortable with the idea that some careers are higher than others? Are you uncomfortable with the idea that yours is higher than that of a burger-flipper or a ditch-digger?
That doesn't mean you can't climb to senior management through IT, but the rank-and-file career is over a lower overall status.
Aesthetics are not entirely arbitrary. Fashion is - I'm not calling for people to go around blowing their budgets on the latest trends. I understand the so-called "argument" (really, a whine) quite well.
Some looks are better than others. Clean clothes are better than dirty; coordinating colors are better than not-coordinating colors. That it may partially be a matter of convention is irrelevant - 'convention' says that flipping you off is an insult, but it still is an insult.
Do you want someone showing up to your wedding in cut-off shorts and a tank top?
Because people exist in space. We aren't abstract, floating spirits who only perceive the world without being perceived. We are part of the environment for people around us, and looking decent is generally a courtesy to them.
I've never known a place that understood this less than the US. People dress in public as if they were invisible.
Making a reasonable effort to keep the environment of your colleagues pleasant and attractive is basic politeness, and you, my friend, are part of that environment.
The physical habituation aspect of drug addiction is actually a fairly minor aspect of it. But there's a "middle layer" between the "purely" physical (e.g., the decline in endorphine or dopomine production for 'physically' addictive drugs that leads to withdrawal symptoms) and the "just" cognitive (you keep doing something you like for relatively 'rational' reasons) - the displacement of normal goals (by one definition or another) with those rewards created by the object of addiction, whether it is a substance or a behaviour, is the most intractable type of addiction, and the one that tends to come back the most.
90% of people who become addicted to opiates do not seek them out after they go through withdrawal and detox - their addiction is just physical.
Ultimately, remember, it is all physical, even the act of you reading these words is an electrochemical process that probably even involves the endocrine system.
Combat and violence are exciting because, even if symbolically, they represent the ultimates: ultimate risk (dying), ultimate reward (the projection of power, which is the prerequisite to other forms of reward), ultimate domination (the ability to destroy the other.)
Don't get me wrong - I'm as tired of the dominance of the adolescent power fantasy in gaming as anyone. But it does little good to complain about it without looking at exactly what makes combat and violence so compelling - because even though I'm well past the adolescent power fantasy mode, I still can get swept away by the tension and drama of battle like little else does. And when other games approach that drama, they often do so by using combat as the primary metaphor.
Re:Socialist Attitude on Slashdot? -- Duh Were Sma
on
Bad Day To Be Sony
·
· Score: 1
OK, lets be honest with ourselves -- slashdot readers probably have some of the higest IQ on the internet.
Wow, that's some of the most tortured reasoning I've ever seen.
The gap between Sony's actions and those required by the LGPL are so huge, and the differences are essential. On one hand, we have a copyright restriction which generally acts like a Kantian categorical imperative: it demands that you act in such a way that perpetuates the very conditions by which you were able to obtain it in the first place. It is enforced by trust first and foremost.
In Sony's case, we have restrictions on how many times you can copy it from one medium to another. It is not a categorical imperative: musicians have historically borrowed from each other to produce music all the time, and many contemporary musicians cut their teeth via sampling and other appropriation techniques (see Paul Miller's "Rhythm Science.") Sony is enforcing a contradictory license by installing software which disables your hardware and compromises the security of your computer. The open-source redistribution requirement of the LGPL increases the security of your computer.
one of the few reasons I am proud to be an American
This is a digression, but does "pride" really come into it one way or another? I mean, "relieved" might be a better word. But while we can take credit for changes we help make, and have the responsibility to try to make things better, for the most part we can be as "proud" of the niceties of the legal millieu here as we can be of the weather.
When people positively act on values they identify as ones associated to a culture or place (for example, being friendly and generous, which many Americans can be proud of when they themselves act that way - a lot of Americans feel weirdly proud for other Americans' generosity), then pride makes sense. But since you or I did not draft libel law, I don't see where pride comes into it.
Microsoft has long been in a position to get the private information of every individual that has ever pirated Microsoft software. Yet their interest in security (admitted making up for deficiencies that they themselves created by going awkwardly from a consumer-grade to a business-grade model), in establishing their global position as a platform, and in general not being "about" private data is such that they haven't gone that route. They are most aggressive against piracy by business and conduct their audits therein.
Sony's content divisions have been in conflict with their hardware divisions for a while, and they lack the scruples (or the interests that motivate them) that MS has shown.
Remember, this isn't just about DRM. It is about rootkits, about EULAs that, even if you don't agree to them, act as if you have. It is about breaking computers by design. It is now about creating a launching-pad for trojans that has already been exploited. It is about crippling hardware to protect intellectual property, closing off the use of protected materials from archiving and fair-use applications, and more. MSN has just been about hegemony over the desktop turning into hegemony over the server and services. Their technology has had problems, and they have been aggressive and perhaps even unethical competitors. They have not declared war on their customers. Sony has.
It is enough, to be honest, to put an Xbox 360 on top of my gonna buy list over a PS3. (Of course, I have great hopes for the Revolution!) Sony is, at this point, more evil and more dangerous than MS: they and other **AA bulwarks are willing to go to lawmakers to screw over the consumer; MS largely screws over its competition.
I think it needs to be both/and. The ones who call the shots, and the ones who shoot. Insofar as the the engineers are more likely to understand the real problems of installing rootkits around the world, I think to not hold them culpable leads to a huge cloud of plausible deniability.
If middle-class aspirations are the things that engineers respond to, then, it is even more important that it be exactly where they get hit. The people who are responsible for this should be hit with heavy financial burdens, if not criminal ones. That way, acting ethically will be the financially rational choice.
If you claim that moral agency is diminished because of contingency (anxiety about security) then we have to make sure that the contingency does the things we need it to do.
See, the main problem I see with this defense comes from my experience in the industry: engineers are usually too eager to please, too enthusiastic about giving their bosses a solution. I've seen so many developers enjoy an almost conspiratorial glee in showing off just how clever and even devious they can be in delivering to management. I don't think it really takes a lot of hiding-the-truth from the engineers. They only have to frame it as a problem, and the engineers trip over each other to show how smart they are with a solution.
The ethical questions themselves never get raised. Partially, it may because ethics are seen as outside rationality.
The rootkit has already lead to an exploit. And predictably so. The financial consequences of this may make a comparison to organized crime a little less hyperbolic.
In the first world, there is almost no chance of someone with enough of an education to do this sort of work starving to death or going truly homeless. Quitting over this may be a matter of losing a house and having to move or rent. If people lack basic moral backbone over what, on a global scale, are "luxury" concerns and middle-class aspirations, then just who can you hold accountable for anything? The sense of entitlement is palpable.
I know people who have quit jobs for ethical reasons, and they often do much better when they go to their next job and say, "I quit my last one for ethical reasons." It sounds a lot better than "I got laid off after writing code that got us in deep legal doo-doo without raising a peep in protest, which resulted in our entire department getting sacked."
Someone at Sony had to incorporate it into a CD and write the code that loads it when the CD is inserted. It would be Sony's developers that would be responsible. It was not someone in marketing or legal who integrated the code. It was a programmer.
Well, the shareholders are ultimately going to be 'responsible' insofar as this will affect the value of their stock. That's how you 'punish' them for selecting a board that fails to do business ethically (and/or fails to adequately control executive management.) Sony itself needs to be held accountable for this kind of behavior, and that accountability needs to hurt.
Slashdot Mirror
Um, that's exactly what I said. Yes, a CIO has higher rank than regular old developer. A district manager for Starbuck's, who worked his way up from Barista, has higher status than someone at his first year as a consultant at Deloitte and Touche. But compare the rank-and-file for each - the first-year consultant with the barista; the regional manager for Starbuck's with a VP at Deloitte and Touch - and it all becomes clear. Within any sector, there is a ladder. I said as much.
But don't be disingenous - what is being compared is infrastructure technicians versus developers. Look at educational requirements. Look at aspirations. Count how many IT helper monkeys are studying to become developers, and count how many developers are hoping to becoming network admins. The direction of aspiration is a good indication of what the relative positions are.
I'm neither in IT nor a developer at this time. My ego has nothing to do with it.
IT is a career path, but development and engineering are higher ones.
Uncomfortable with the idea that some careers are higher than others? Are you uncomfortable with the idea that yours is higher than that of a burger-flipper or a ditch-digger?
That doesn't mean you can't climb to senior management through IT, but the rank-and-file career is over a lower overall status.
Aesthetics are not entirely arbitrary. Fashion is - I'm not calling for people to go around blowing their budgets on the latest trends. I understand the so-called "argument" (really, a whine) quite well.
Some looks are better than others. Clean clothes are better than dirty; coordinating colors are better than not-coordinating colors. That it may partially be a matter of convention is irrelevant - 'convention' says that flipping you off is an insult, but it still is an insult.
Do you want someone showing up to your wedding in cut-off shorts and a tank top?
Because people exist in space. We aren't abstract, floating spirits who only perceive the world without being perceived. We are part of the environment for people around us, and looking decent is generally a courtesy to them.
I've never known a place that understood this less than the US. People dress in public as if they were invisible.
Making a reasonable effort to keep the environment of your colleagues pleasant and attractive is basic politeness, and you, my friend, are part of that environment.
The physical habituation aspect of drug addiction is actually a fairly minor aspect of it. But there's a "middle layer" between the "purely" physical (e.g., the decline in endorphine or dopomine production for 'physically' addictive drugs that leads to withdrawal symptoms) and the "just" cognitive (you keep doing something you like for relatively 'rational' reasons) - the displacement of normal goals (by one definition or another) with those rewards created by the object of addiction, whether it is a substance or a behaviour, is the most intractable type of addiction, and the one that tends to come back the most.
90% of people who become addicted to opiates do not seek them out after they go through withdrawal and detox - their addiction is just physical.
Ultimately, remember, it is all physical, even the act of you reading these words is an electrochemical process that probably even involves the endocrine system.
Combat and violence are exciting because, even if symbolically, they represent the ultimates: ultimate risk (dying), ultimate reward (the projection of power, which is the prerequisite to other forms of reward), ultimate domination (the ability to destroy the other.)
Don't get me wrong - I'm as tired of the dominance of the adolescent power fantasy in gaming as anyone. But it does little good to complain about it without looking at exactly what makes combat and violence so compelling - because even though I'm well past the adolescent power fantasy mode, I still can get swept away by the tension and drama of battle like little else does. And when other games approach that drama, they often do so by using combat as the primary metaphor.
OK, lets be honest with ourselves -- slashdot readers probably have some of the higest IQ on the internet.
You've got to be kidding.
Wow, that's some of the most tortured reasoning I've ever seen.
The gap between Sony's actions and those required by the LGPL are so huge, and the differences are essential. On one hand, we have a copyright restriction which generally acts like a Kantian categorical imperative: it demands that you act in such a way that perpetuates the very conditions by which you were able to obtain it in the first place. It is enforced by trust first and foremost.
In Sony's case, we have restrictions on how many times you can copy it from one medium to another. It is not a categorical imperative: musicians have historically borrowed from each other to produce music all the time, and many contemporary musicians cut their teeth via sampling and other appropriation techniques (see Paul Miller's "Rhythm Science.") Sony is enforcing a contradictory license by installing software which disables your hardware and compromises the security of your computer. The open-source redistribution requirement of the LGPL increases the security of your computer.
They have to name it the'Kwyjibo'
one of the few reasons I am proud to be an American
This is a digression, but does "pride" really come into it one way or another? I mean, "relieved" might be a better word. But while we can take credit for changes we help make, and have the responsibility to try to make things better, for the most part we can be as "proud" of the niceties of the legal millieu here as we can be of the weather.
When people positively act on values they identify as ones associated to a culture or place (for example, being friendly and generous, which many Americans can be proud of when they themselves act that way - a lot of Americans feel weirdly proud for other Americans' generosity), then pride makes sense. But since you or I did not draft libel law, I don't see where pride comes into it.
Like I said, this is a digression....
The biggest differences are:
Microsoft has long been in a position to get the private information of every individual that has ever pirated Microsoft software. Yet their interest in security (admitted making up for deficiencies that they themselves created by going awkwardly from a consumer-grade to a business-grade model), in establishing their global position as a platform, and in general not being "about" private data is such that they haven't gone that route. They are most aggressive against piracy by business and conduct their audits therein.
Sony's content divisions have been in conflict with their hardware divisions for a while, and they lack the scruples (or the interests that motivate them) that MS has shown.
Remember, this isn't just about DRM. It is about rootkits, about EULAs that, even if you don't agree to them, act as if you have. It is about breaking computers by design. It is now about creating a launching-pad for trojans that has already been exploited. It is about crippling hardware to protect intellectual property, closing off the use of protected materials from archiving and fair-use applications, and more. MSN has just been about hegemony over the desktop turning into hegemony over the server and services. Their technology has had problems, and they have been aggressive and perhaps even unethical competitors. They have not declared war on their customers. Sony has.
It may be a shock to people who are obsessed with their operating systems, but I think Microsoft is a lot cleaner than Sony.
It is enough, to be honest, to put an Xbox 360 on top of my gonna buy list over a PS3. (Of course, I have great hopes for the Revolution!) Sony is, at this point, more evil and more dangerous than MS: they and other **AA bulwarks are willing to go to lawmakers to screw over the consumer; MS largely screws over its competition.
To make it clear: I want both of them to get the shaft.
You might want to talk to a urologist about that. I know one: his name is Doctor Peters.
Nice to meet you, Tom Commenter. I'm Sam Replies.
I think it needs to be both/and. The ones who call the shots, and the ones who shoot. Insofar as the the engineers are more likely to understand the real problems of installing rootkits around the world, I think to not hold them culpable leads to a huge cloud of plausible deniability.
If middle-class aspirations are the things that engineers respond to, then, it is even more important that it be exactly where they get hit. The people who are responsible for this should be hit with heavy financial burdens, if not criminal ones. That way, acting ethically will be the financially rational choice.
If you claim that moral agency is diminished because of contingency (anxiety about security) then we have to make sure that the contingency does the things we need it to do.
See, the main problem I see with this defense comes from my experience in the industry: engineers are usually too eager to please, too enthusiastic about giving their bosses a solution. I've seen so many developers enjoy an almost conspiratorial glee in showing off just how clever and even devious they can be in delivering to management. I don't think it really takes a lot of hiding-the-truth from the engineers. They only have to frame it as a problem, and the engineers trip over each other to show how smart they are with a solution.
The ethical questions themselves never get raised. Partially, it may because ethics are seen as outside rationality.
The rootkit has already lead to an exploit. And predictably so. The financial consequences of this may make a comparison to organized crime a little less hyperbolic.
In the first world, there is almost no chance of someone with enough of an education to do this sort of work starving to death or going truly homeless. Quitting over this may be a matter of losing a house and having to move or rent. If people lack basic moral backbone over what, on a global scale, are "luxury" concerns and middle-class aspirations, then just who can you hold accountable for anything? The sense of entitlement is palpable.
I know people who have quit jobs for ethical reasons, and they often do much better when they go to their next job and say, "I quit my last one for ethical reasons." It sounds a lot better than "I got laid off after writing code that got us in deep legal doo-doo without raising a peep in protest, which resulted in our entire department getting sacked."
Someone at Sony had to incorporate it into a CD and write the code that loads it when the CD is inserted. It would be Sony's developers that would be responsible. It was not someone in marketing or legal who integrated the code. It was a programmer.
Many traditional criminals are also motivated by financial anxiety. People in organized crime also have families to support. Does that exonerate them?
In the structure of the moral problem, not in the scale of it.
Please learn the art of interpreting analogy.
Well, the shareholders are ultimately going to be 'responsible' insofar as this will affect the value of their stock. That's how you 'punish' them for selecting a board that fails to do business ethically (and/or fails to adequately control executive management.) Sony itself needs to be held accountable for this kind of behavior, and that accountability needs to hurt.