It's amazing how this discussion has degenerated into IT people bashing non-IT people, and vice-versa. From my point of view, the real problem here is the beaurocracy itself.
I have worked with many IT departments in many companies, large and small, over the years. Most of the people I have communicated with are helpful people who are willing to help me out as much as they can. Sure, sometimes I am not a priority and what I want to have done ends up on the bottom of the queue, but usually I am told this up front and am given a timeline that I can plan around.
The real problem, I find, is the upteen layers of beaurocracy that have nothing to do with IT that still are a major part of how the IT department works. Someone in finance wants everything justified in triplicate from every member of the company in order to get something done. Many of these beaurocrats don't understand the necessity of a timely response to X request/procedure/whatnot (which isn't their job), but they're not willing to take the recoomendations of people who have been trained in such things either (which is their job). They justify it with not wanting the IT department to pull a "fast one" with their budget; I understand that there does have to be accountability, but it does become ridiculous.
In my experience, most of the time it's not the IT people who are to blame for it taking 6 months to get a new stick of RAM approved. It's the fault of the beaurocracy itself. So here is my solution:
1) Document the timeline and costs, including man hours, of getting a non-essential piece of equipment/software/whatnot replaced. 2) Present this data to the bean counters. 3) Suggest that all of this be able to be authorized in retrospect within a certain time limit. i.e. IT person has new RAM ordered, installs it, THEN the majority of the paperwork can be done. 4) Point out that a low-level peon or temp could be hired at a much smaller wage than yourself or an IT professional to do the necessary accountability paperwork, hence saving the dept. even more money. 5) Repeat all steps as necessary.
It will take perseverance (squeaky wheel gets the grease, yadda yadda yadda) and probably some time, what with administration shuffles and how long policy changes can take. But once the policy has been changed, it will be well worth it.
I get on/. to try and escape this crap for a few minutes! Thanks a bunch!
If you were trying to escape from this kind of issue, Slashdot was probably the worst place to go. Wouldn't your favorite pron site be the best place to visit when you need to releive, ummm, stress?
I'll start suing the manufacturers of the various amplifiers, receivers, and speakers I've had over the past ~25 years of brutalizing my ears.
Common sense isn't; apparently, it isn't a logical conclusion to think that plugging loud music directly into your ears could possibly lead to hearing loss. Who knew?
"To avoid hearing damage, set your iPod volume to a safe level. If you experience ringing in your ears, reduce volume or discontinue use of your iPod. Warning: Permanent hearing loss may occur if earbuds or headphones are used at high volume. You can adapt over time to a higher volume of sound that may sound normal but can be damaging to your hearing. If you experience ringing in your ears or muffled speech, stop listening and have your hearing checked. The louder the volume, the less time is required before your hearing could be affected. Hearing experts suggest that to protect your hearing..."
Yadda yadda yadda. Basically, this guy doesn't have a leg to stand on.
That's it. I'm just writing my credit card numbers & expiry dates, passwords and PINs on stickies and leaving them on my monitor and in my wallet. That's about equally as secure as giving them to any company these days...
No matter what your field, temping while looking for a well-paying permanent, full-time job is the way to go. You continue to get experience and training in your desired field while at the same time earning a decent paycheck. As a temp, there are fewer issues with you leaving to go to a full-time job; you are rarely indespensable. Temp agencies love it when you get the job you wanted because it makes them look good. They will work with you to schedule your contracts around interviews. Also, as a temp there is usually little to no need for you to take your work home at night, leaving evenings free to job hunt.
Since leaving a more-than-full-time position that payed practically nothing, I have been temping for just over six months. Before I started temping, I couldn't get an interview at the company I wanted to work for for the life of me. Now, with the additional skills and varied experience I have from temping, I have scored myself an interview next week. I don't even have to miss work for the interview, as I am between contracts for a few days. Win/win.
...no matter how new, will not necessarily have all of the "driving aids" that a more expensive car does. They have to cut costs somewhere to make the car more affordable, and gizmos are the first place they start.
Maybe this isn't so bad because if I buy a car, it's generally going to be newer than the one it replaces, and so it will have more gizmos, not fewer.
The thing is, in any given year, there are different makes and models of cars that are produced to meet various budgets. When you replace your current car, even if it's with a newer model, you can still get one will fewer "driving aids". A 10-year-old stock BMW probably has more "safety features" than this year's most popular stock Mazda.
While we all would like to assume that our finances will be secure enough to buy a new vehicle when the time comes, there is no way to guarantee that whatever you buy will have the same options as your previous vehicle within your price range. Peoples' finances fluctuate, that's just life.
Also, what happens if you have to drive someone else's car, and theirs does not have all the gadgets and gizmos? You may have to rent a car, or be the DD in someone else's car, or drive somebody to the hospital in their car, etc. What happens if you are incapable of driving safely because you can't operate without ABS, traction control, proximity sensors, GPS, and all that jazz? That's just an accident waiting to happen.
Now, if the ID advocates had their way, we would have just said, "Hey, God makes bees fly. Since I already know the real reason, there's no real reason to keep studying it."
What I've never understood is why ID advocates seem to think that the two are mutually exclusive; just because we understand how it happens, doesn't mean that God couldn't have done it. God gave us brains, why shouldn't we use them? Yes, by that logic, God gave us many things that can do harm, but if you religious, your religion should help you define what is right and what is wrong. The Ten Commandments are one of the most fundamental tenets in the Christian (and Jewish, I believe) religions, and are as follows:
1. Don't worship anyone else than God. 2. Don't be idolators. 3. Don't swear by God. 4. Honour the sabbath. 5. Respect your elders. 6. Don't kill. 7. Don't commit adultery. 8. Don't steal. 9. Don't lie. 10. Don't covet.
These rules have staid pretty much the same, with different interpretations based on time period. However, "don't think for yourself" and "don't try to understand the gifts that God has given you" is not on that bloody list.
The universe is vast and probably will never be understood in its entirety by human beings. We are limited. Why is it such a hard thing to believe that God may have created everything, but in biblical times we didn't understand as much about the world we live in as we do now? Why must science and religion be constantly at odds? I don't get it. Religion creates a structure for beliefs, things which can't be proven; science creates a structure for the things that can be proven.
And even if we do explain everything over the course of history, we will still have religion. Why? Because the fact that anything exists at all is a bloody miracle. The chances against it are astronomical. Now, insisting that religion is science, or vice-versa... That's something else altogether.
Magnetic tape degrades, too. Plastic tape (e.g. VHS, cheap audio tapes, mini-DV) starts to have visible degradation after 5 years under optimal conditions. Metal tape (e.g. Betacam) takes up to ten years, IIRC, at optimal storage temperature, humidity, etc. Also, the thinner the tape (in both thickness and width), the more quickly it will degrade... It can take less than a year with mini-DV tapes.
Also, although consumer video and audio tape have remained in the same (poor-quality) tape format for some years now, professional formats are constantly changing. CDs and DVDs have been being used for backups for some time now because they still play back on 90% of computers with cheap (less than $100) drives. The tape format, especially for video, can vary from production to production -- Betacam SP, Digi-Beta, Mini-DV for smaller productions, etc. Finding a deck that will play back these tapes 5-10 years from now will be a challenge, even if the tape is in perfect condition. And a Betacam SP deck, which is now all but obselete, still goes for $5000+ USD.
How about an even more simple reason not to be able to watch your DRM-ed BluRay discs? One as simple as your network connection is down (because ISPs are so incredibly reliable), or, even better, you don't have an internet connection in the same building as your BluRay player? Contrary to popular beleif, not everyone has the internet at home. That may sound weird and backwards to the Slashdot crowd, but a) it's expensive, and b) it's not worth it if you don't have a computer in the first place. My 80-year-old grandmother has a DVD player; she would presumably purchase the next generation of movie player as well. However, she'd never need an internet connection, as she has never worked on a computer in her life.
Another scenario: what about when you move? From personal experience, it's not an instantaneous process to get your cable/satellite/whatever hooked up when you first move in, you usually have to wait a couple of weeks. And what do you watch when you're without television or internet connection? The movies you own, of course!
But now "own" is such an elastic term... The user means "own", as in it is yours forever to do with what you please within the limits of the law. The distributor means "own" as in "rent". Quite a difference.
Cost of Sony electronic book reader: $300 and $400 USD Cost of borrowing a book from the library: $0
Even if the prices of downloadable books are equal to or a little less than their paperback counterparts, it'll take a while for the difference to make up for the cash spent on the gadget up front. Then you still have to worry about the device crashing, potential DRM, and the battery dying.
Give me a paper novel any day. The e-book reader is a solution without a problem. If you argue that it will help the environment, I cry bullshit. Trees, despite our current management of them, are a renewable resource. Paper in landfills, if for some reason it isn't recycled, biodegrades quite quickly. Compare that to a plastic-and-metal e-book reader that will be obsolete in less than a year. Oh yes, and 100 years from now, a book could still be readable... Even if the e-book still functioned (and in today's age of disposable electronics, I highly doubt it), finding a compatible battery alone would be a challenge. This is one of the many reasons why, despite the prevalence of computers in the workplace, people still use paper.
If we converted to digital and left the poorest of our nation out in the cold, we'd devolve into some discussion about how the evil government was depriving the weakest among us from access to a free press, possibly even with a few stats peppered in about how TV is even more important for them because of illiteracy rates, and so on, and maybe some good socialism arguments to boot.
I see your point about damned if you do/dont, but that aside... The whole thing here is that nobody needs television. It's a privilege, not a right. And even if it was a right, who's stopping all of these poor, illterate, TV-starved people from going to a library (which the government already funds), which has *gasp* free books, movies, and often has screening rooms or free screenings. Even if all poor people were illiterate (which doesn't happen that much in the States, face it), that still leaves the other options open. Oh yes, and libraries provide warmth, shelter, and bathroom facilities as well, so even the homeless could use them without being "left in the cold".
Come on, government, put that $1.5 billion into the nation's libraries, not into upgrading peoples' ancient televisions!
1) Congress has budgeted $1.5 billion to provide vouchers for owners of outdated TVs to purchase digital-to-analog converters. Each owner will be entitled to two vouchers worth $40 apiece. Do the math: 70 million outmoded TVs x $80 in vouchers = $5.6 BILLION. Congress' proposed budget is woefully inadequate in comparison to its commitments.
2) Why in the world is the US government subsidizing television reception for outdated TVs in the first place? Couldn't they just announce the cut-off date and then say "sorry, the rest of you were warned"? Those who can afford to subscribe to cable/satellite will continue to do so, and those who can't will go to places where they can watch free public screenings, or spend more time reading. Television access is a luxury, not a right; why has it become one? FTA, Consumer groups say this is only fair because the government is essentially reducing the value of people's property. Well, they don't make media for my 8-track machine anymore -- where's my money???
3) FTA, Sets hooked up to cable or satellite services should work fine no matter what. This means that coax input will remain constant, and this means that we've had digital-to-analog TV converters for YEARS. They're commonly called VCRs; actual tape machines or digital ones will work, so long as it has coax in and out, and RCA out. To convert the signal, the recording part of the machine doesn't even have to operate properly. VCRs that eat tapes but still have working connections are easy to find second-hand at the Salvation Army and garage sales, usually for $5 or less. (This is what I did when I was in college; I hooked up a VHS VCR that ate tapes to a Commodore 64 monior, and I basically had a television set with tuner. All for less than $15. And this was "all the way back" in 2000.) New machines can cost as little as $50 for a VHS VCR and $100 for a DVD recorder. So to think that new analog-to-digital converters, without tape or DVD writing mechanisms, should be $40 to $80 apiece is ludicrous.
4) FTA, People are supposed to apply for the vouchers during a three-month window in 2008, and use them within three months. But there probably won't be enough vouchers to go around... You think? When the allocated budget is about a quarter of what it should be? Say it ain't so! And the logistics surrounding such a short turn-around time are horrendous.
6) For 20 million people who have been watching TV over radio spectrum, the digital-to-analog converters are going to be rather useless. Why? Because one of the reasons that they were watching free TV is because they couldn't afford to pay for cable/satellite in the first place! Why does the government figure that these people can suddenly afford to have cable/satellite installed and pay the monthly fees? This is a modern-day rendition of "let them eat cake!"
6) You may remember a previous Slasdot post about the Digital Content Security Act, which has legislators introducing a "measure [that] will outlaw the manufacture or sale of electronic devices that convert analog video signals into digital video signals, effective one year from its enactment..." Digital-to-analog and analog-to-digital devices are easily reversable, especially when you're talking coax to RCA. So once the MPAA has all television converted to digital, they want to outlaw the hardware that the government plans to subsidize so that people can watch their content? Am I the only one who sees a flaw with this?
I got stuck on the last train ride to Osaka from Tokyo on a recent stay in Japan. Bad planning on my part, but part of the problem is that I only speak very, very basic Japanese (e.g. "Where is the bathroom?"). It was about 1:00am and all the trains had stopped, and the next one left the station at 6:00am. I didn't have the money to take a cab to an expensive hotel and then cab back to the station in the morning, nor did I really speak enough Japanese to ask where the closest cheap hotel was (and ryokans, while they can be cheap, rarely have all-night entry), but I did have enough cash to pay for the capsule hotel located right there in the station. I can't read enough Japanese to be able to tell from the signage if a capsule hotel caters to only men, or to men and women both. Being a woman, I poked my head inside to ask if they accomodated women and if there was a capsule free, and I basically got yelled out of the establishment. I hadn't even cleared the front entrance! They yelled me out of the place despite the fact that I am obviously gaijin (blond-haired and blue-eyed), and equally as obviously didn't speak much of the language, so it was pretty darn likely that I'd just made a mistake. For a culture that is known worldwide for its politeness, these people were damned rude!
Funny, though, it didn't seem to bother them that I had to camp out in the train station for the night, not twenty feet from the doorway of their establishment. That being said, a) I wasn't the only one to do it (there were a couple of obviously not homeless college-aged guys who did the same thing), and b) that train station was one of the safest places in a city where I have been late at night. (I'm comparing it to major Canadian cities, and one particular small town with a municipal campground fairly close to what passes for the downtown core, where I, as a young girl with the rest of my Girl Guide troupe, were terrorized by drunks who pissed on and sliced up our tents.)
Back to the point, here, though... Basically, any room that is comfortable, affordable, and doesn't discriminate against female customers is good in my books. From personal experience, women won't enjoy the capsule hotel experience as much as they probably will the Yotel experience.
From what I've read, the main source of scratches occurring on the XBox 360 is when the machine is moved while it's turned on. Now, granted, I can see the silliness of changing it from vertical to horizontal with a disc spinning in the drive -- you wouldn't do that with a PC, would you? (Although, Joe Blow's common sense when it comes to electronics is fairly limited, I'll grant you.) However, the fact that you pretty much can't touch the box while it's running without scratching the disk (check out the previous comments about bumping the console, shifting it a little, leveling it off while running) makes me incredibly leery. Think about how many children play console games, and how rough any child is on anything they own... Assuming they follow the parents' instructions and never move the box intentionally, even! And what happens if you have a loose cable in the back or some such that you have to wiggle? Time to get a new copy of your favorite game! Essentially:
1) Market XBox 360's that require only feather-light touches to scratch discs. 2) DRM the media and the console to death so that it's damned-near impossible to play burned backup games of legitimately purchased discs. 3) Warn in manual that no-one ever reads that moving console could kill off media, so as to avoid legal repercussions. 4) Charge each console owner full price for replacements for scratched discs. 5) Profit!
5-7 days for a brand new / fixed console, for a friend of mine
So, you're telling us that a friend of yours already had to have their XBox 360 repaired/replaced? This despite the fact that the XBox 360 has been on the market for maybe two months now, so it's not like your friend could have worn out their console through constant use over a long period of time. (Especially since the hardware isn't being pushed to its max through the available games.) You're also telling us that, despite the fact that your console doesn't have any defects, you know someone who has already had to repair/return theirs.
The reason people are constantly bashing Microsoft in general, and the XBox 360 in specific, is specifically because of this issue. There are a lot of people out there who have had problems with their practically-brand-new machines, and even if many XBox 360 owners have no problems, practically every one of them knows someone who's had to have their console repaired/replaced.
As a comparison, the iPod Video has been released for approximately the same amount of time as the xBox 360. Sure, it's a different kind of device, but it, too, is a later version of a pre-exisiting and market-tested product. And if the iPod Video had had the same repair/replacement/error rate as the XBox 360, you'd see just as many articles about irate customers and return policies. Actually, you'd probably also see a lot more rants from competitors like Microsoft Sony if the latest iPod had defects than you currently hear from Apple about the 360's defects.
It's a neat idea, but this particular model will never catch on as the EyeBud has the unfortunate effect of making the wearer looking like a Borg from Star Trek (and not 7 of 9, either!). While the iPod is a great device, the main reason that it was practically sold-out in stores and online this Christmas is its sleek look, small size, and stylish marketing campaign. In general, that's when all techy devices catch on in the general population, from home PC's to laptops to cell phones -- when they're small enough and attractive enough that the user doesn's look like a geek. Well, that and the price tag; nobody's going to pay $600 to look like the biggest dork on the block.
Bring the price down under $200, and streamline the design so that it looks like an extension of a bluetooth headset or maybe a pair of mirrored Oakley look-alikes. Sure, that'll probably take a couple of years. But only then will it be worth marketing this device as "the next big thing".
"Technologys?"... This is atrocious. GeneOff gets sent back to the fourth grade, and Zonk is fired for not seeing this.
I'm surprised that you didn't catch the use of the fictional word "whimp", as in, Here is a hackable real robot that won't whimp out on you. I do believe that Zonk meant wimp.
Come on, people. Both of these could have been caught by running the text through a spell check. I'm sure your favorite open-source Office program or the text editor that comes with OSX has a decent one built in. As a last resort, MS Word has a decent spell check too.
...they merely show themselves to be poorly misinformed at best...
I think what you're trying to say here is that they are poorly informed, or misinformed. "Poorly misinformed" would mean that they would have been given very little misinformation, or that they were actually well-informed.
I think we know what you're trying to get at, but that's not actually what you said.
...the measure will outlaw the manufacture or sale of electronic devices that convert analog video signals into digital video signals, effective one year from its enactment.
I run a small video production company. Everything is entirely above-board; we use only media that we own the copyright to or that we have secured permission from the copyright holders to use. We do a lot of video transfer from analog to digital formats, because a lot of clients now want their old videos re-circulated in DVD format or video for the web.
As an individual as well as a small business owner, I pay my taxes and I respect the terms of copyright. Why am I, as a law-abiding citizen, being penalized?
There are a lot of totally legitimate, law-abiding, non-copyright-infringing ways to use analog-to-digital technology. Hell, the entire video industry uses this technology on a regular basis. You know all of those older television series' that have been put on DVD and sold as boxed sets? Those were all originally on analog media. Same with all pre-digital movies. That's pretty much all of the video work that's been done in the last 100 years, minus the last five years or so. Oh, and most of the video work that's done these days, if it's not shot on digital in the first place, is converted to digital in order to be edited. The RIAA/MPAA, who I am sure lobbied for this, is really shooting itself in the foot here, because suddenly the technology that allows them to make and distribute movies/TV shows in any kind of digital format will be ILLEGAL. This is the same group of people who embraced digital technology because it's smaller, cheaper, and more efficient.
This is possibly the stupidest idea that I have ever heard. Way to shoot yourselves in the feet, people. It's back to the stone age of video production for all of us, now, unless we have George Lucas' budget.
The only question is, will everyone be willing to relearn how to type?
No.
Simple answer, simple reason: people resist change. There have been many new kinds of keyboards styles and layouts that have been discussed on Slashdot over the years. All of them claim to have advantages, and most have been tested as being "more efficient" than QWERTY keyboards. But the QWERTY layout has been around since the manual typewriter, meaning that we have generations of people who have been trained on its layout. A new layout may be more efficient in the long run, but if it was adopted, millions of people would have to re-learn how to type. Can you really see companies endorsing a change that is effectively going to slow down their business, even if there is a potential future payoff? Have you ever tried to get a company to adopt a new piece of software, let alone hardware?
QWERTY is also a standard; you can sit down at just about anything with a keyboard and touch-type. Have you ever sat down at a computer that was set up for a French keyboard without knowing it? Isn't it a pain in the ass to try and figure out where everything is? Now, imagine what it would be like if every third computer used a different keyboard layout.
Medical research should be strictly reserved for terminal patients with no other options not terminally poor patients with no affordable options.
I find your logic faulty, for multiple reasons:
1) Medical research cannot be effectively conducted on terminal patients because they are terminal patients. Their immune system is compromised in an extreme way, which will bias the testing. Yes, most testing will have some bias due to age, race, sex, etc., but these are normal variables; most people are not terminally ill. There would be no point to doing medical research on a terminal patient unless the testing had something specifically to do with the patient's original problem -- and most testing won't.
2) As previous commentors have pointed out, the people in India who are being tested on are poor, not stupid. As with every decision that every person makes in life, they will weigh the pros and cons as they understand them, and decide for themselves whether it has a greater potential to make their life better or worse. These treatments are not being forced on the poor of India.
This issue is charged with ethical considerations. However, an argument such as the one stated above is ridiculously illogical and does not touch upon the ethics of the issue in a rational manner.
...which is still fine for web programmers with a Serial port.
Serial ports are so 90's; my web programmer came fully equipped with USB 2.0. However, despite the upgrades, I still have reliability issues with him, especially when the hockey game's on...
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It's amazing how this discussion has degenerated into IT people bashing non-IT people, and vice-versa. From my point of view, the real problem here is the beaurocracy itself.
I have worked with many IT departments in many companies, large and small, over the years. Most of the people I have communicated with are helpful people who are willing to help me out as much as they can. Sure, sometimes I am not a priority and what I want to have done ends up on the bottom of the queue, but usually I am told this up front and am given a timeline that I can plan around.
The real problem, I find, is the upteen layers of beaurocracy that have nothing to do with IT that still are a major part of how the IT department works. Someone in finance wants everything justified in triplicate from every member of the company in order to get something done. Many of these beaurocrats don't understand the necessity of a timely response to X request/procedure/whatnot (which isn't their job), but they're not willing to take the recoomendations of people who have been trained in such things either (which is their job). They justify it with not wanting the IT department to pull a "fast one" with their budget; I understand that there does have to be accountability, but it does become ridiculous.
In my experience, most of the time it's not the IT people who are to blame for it taking 6 months to get a new stick of RAM approved. It's the fault of the beaurocracy itself. So here is my solution:
1) Document the timeline and costs, including man hours, of getting a non-essential piece of equipment/software/whatnot replaced.
2) Present this data to the bean counters.
3) Suggest that all of this be able to be authorized in retrospect within a certain time limit. i.e. IT person has new RAM ordered, installs it, THEN the majority of the paperwork can be done.
4) Point out that a low-level peon or temp could be hired at a much smaller wage than yourself or an IT professional to do the necessary accountability paperwork, hence saving the dept. even more money.
5) Repeat all steps as necessary.
It will take perseverance (squeaky wheel gets the grease, yadda yadda yadda) and probably some time, what with administration shuffles and how long policy changes can take. But once the policy has been changed, it will be well worth it.
I get on /. to try and escape this crap for a few minutes! Thanks a bunch!
If you were trying to escape from this kind of issue, Slashdot was probably the worst place to go. Wouldn't your favorite pron site be the best place to visit when you need to releive, ummm, stress?
I'll start suing the manufacturers of the various amplifiers, receivers, and speakers I've had over the past ~25 years of brutalizing my ears.
Common sense isn't; apparently, it isn't a logical conclusion to think that plugging loud music directly into your ears could possibly lead to hearing loss. Who knew?
Oh, and from page 63 of the Apple user manual for 5th generation iPods:
"To avoid hearing damage, set your iPod volume to a safe level. If you experience ringing in your ears, reduce volume or discontinue use of your iPod. Warning: Permanent hearing loss may occur if earbuds or headphones are used at high volume. You can adapt over time to a higher volume of sound that may sound normal but can be damaging to your hearing. If you experience ringing in your ears or muffled speech, stop listening and have your hearing checked. The louder the volume, the less time is required before your hearing could be affected. Hearing experts suggest that to protect your hearing..."
Yadda yadda yadda. Basically, this guy doesn't have a leg to stand on.
It's bad enough that we have to worry about security so poor that personal data backups are transported in personal vehicles and then stolen, or that some companies allow data breaches that result in identity theft... Now they're just giving our important data away?
That's it. I'm just writing my credit card numbers & expiry dates, passwords and PINs on stickies and leaving them on my monitor and in my wallet. That's about equally as secure as giving them to any company these days...
As if that coyote didn't have it bad enough. "meep meep!" WHAM!!! "Agh....I'm so....thirsty."
Well, at least half the time the coyote fell into the river at the bottom of the canyon... Instant hydration!
No matter what your field, temping while looking for a well-paying permanent, full-time job is the way to go. You continue to get experience and training in your desired field while at the same time earning a decent paycheck. As a temp, there are fewer issues with you leaving to go to a full-time job; you are rarely indespensable. Temp agencies love it when you get the job you wanted because it makes them look good. They will work with you to schedule your contracts around interviews. Also, as a temp there is usually little to no need for you to take your work home at night, leaving evenings free to job hunt.
Since leaving a more-than-full-time position that payed practically nothing, I have been temping for just over six months. Before I started temping, I couldn't get an interview at the company I wanted to work for for the life of me. Now, with the additional skills and varied experience I have from temping, I have scored myself an interview next week. I don't even have to miss work for the interview, as I am between contracts for a few days. Win/win.
...no matter how new, will not necessarily have all of the "driving aids" that a more expensive car does. They have to cut costs somewhere to make the car more affordable, and gizmos are the first place they start.
Maybe this isn't so bad because if I buy a car, it's generally going to be newer than the one it replaces, and so it will have more gizmos, not fewer.
The thing is, in any given year, there are different makes and models of cars that are produced to meet various budgets. When you replace your current car, even if it's with a newer model, you can still get one will fewer "driving aids". A 10-year-old stock BMW probably has more "safety features" than this year's most popular stock Mazda.
While we all would like to assume that our finances will be secure enough to buy a new vehicle when the time comes, there is no way to guarantee that whatever you buy will have the same options as your previous vehicle within your price range. Peoples' finances fluctuate, that's just life.
Also, what happens if you have to drive someone else's car, and theirs does not have all the gadgets and gizmos? You may have to rent a car, or be the DD in someone else's car, or drive somebody to the hospital in their car, etc. What happens if you are incapable of driving safely because you can't operate without ABS, traction control, proximity sensors, GPS, and all that jazz? That's just an accident waiting to happen.
Now, if the ID advocates had their way, we would have just said, "Hey, God makes bees fly. Since I already know the real reason, there's no real reason to keep studying it."
What I've never understood is why ID advocates seem to think that the two are mutually exclusive; just because we understand how it happens, doesn't mean that God couldn't have done it. God gave us brains, why shouldn't we use them? Yes, by that logic, God gave us many things that can do harm, but if you religious, your religion should help you define what is right and what is wrong. The Ten Commandments are one of the most fundamental tenets in the Christian (and Jewish, I believe) religions, and are as follows:
1. Don't worship anyone else than God.
2. Don't be idolators.
3. Don't swear by God.
4. Honour the sabbath.
5. Respect your elders.
6. Don't kill.
7. Don't commit adultery.
8. Don't steal.
9. Don't lie.
10. Don't covet.
These rules have staid pretty much the same, with different interpretations based on time period. However, "don't think for yourself" and "don't try to understand the gifts that God has given you" is not on that bloody list.
The universe is vast and probably will never be understood in its entirety by human beings. We are limited. Why is it such a hard thing to believe that God may have created everything, but in biblical times we didn't understand as much about the world we live in as we do now? Why must science and religion be constantly at odds? I don't get it. Religion creates a structure for beliefs, things which can't be proven; science creates a structure for the things that can be proven.
And even if we do explain everything over the course of history, we will still have religion. Why? Because the fact that anything exists at all is a bloody miracle. The chances against it are astronomical. Now, insisting that religion is science, or vice-versa... That's something else altogether.
Magnetic tape degrades, too. Plastic tape (e.g. VHS, cheap audio tapes, mini-DV) starts to have visible degradation after 5 years under optimal conditions. Metal tape (e.g. Betacam) takes up to ten years, IIRC, at optimal storage temperature, humidity, etc. Also, the thinner the tape (in both thickness and width), the more quickly it will degrade... It can take less than a year with mini-DV tapes.
Also, although consumer video and audio tape have remained in the same (poor-quality) tape format for some years now, professional formats are constantly changing. CDs and DVDs have been being used for backups for some time now because they still play back on 90% of computers with cheap (less than $100) drives. The tape format, especially for video, can vary from production to production -- Betacam SP, Digi-Beta, Mini-DV for smaller productions, etc. Finding a deck that will play back these tapes 5-10 years from now will be a challenge, even if the tape is in perfect condition. And a Betacam SP deck, which is now all but obselete, still goes for $5000+ USD.
How about an even more simple reason not to be able to watch your DRM-ed BluRay discs? One as simple as your network connection is down (because ISPs are so incredibly reliable), or, even better, you don't have an internet connection in the same building as your BluRay player? Contrary to popular beleif, not everyone has the internet at home. That may sound weird and backwards to the Slashdot crowd, but a) it's expensive, and b) it's not worth it if you don't have a computer in the first place. My 80-year-old grandmother has a DVD player; she would presumably purchase the next generation of movie player as well. However, she'd never need an internet connection, as she has never worked on a computer in her life.
Another scenario: what about when you move? From personal experience, it's not an instantaneous process to get your cable/satellite/whatever hooked up when you first move in, you usually have to wait a couple of weeks. And what do you watch when you're without television or internet connection? The movies you own, of course!
But now "own" is such an elastic term... The user means "own", as in it is yours forever to do with what you please within the limits of the law. The distributor means "own" as in "rent". Quite a difference.
Cost of Sony electronic book reader: $300 and $400 USD
Cost of borrowing a book from the library: $0
Even if the prices of downloadable books are equal to or a little less than their paperback counterparts, it'll take a while for the difference to make up for the cash spent on the gadget up front. Then you still have to worry about the device crashing, potential DRM, and the battery dying.
Give me a paper novel any day. The e-book reader is a solution without a problem. If you argue that it will help the environment, I cry bullshit. Trees, despite our current management of them, are a renewable resource. Paper in landfills, if for some reason it isn't recycled, biodegrades quite quickly. Compare that to a plastic-and-metal e-book reader that will be obsolete in less than a year. Oh yes, and 100 years from now, a book could still be readable... Even if the e-book still functioned (and in today's age of disposable electronics, I highly doubt it), finding a compatible battery alone would be a challenge. This is one of the many reasons why, despite the prevalence of computers in the workplace, people still use paper.
Whoops, I forgot to log back in. That was me. (Obviously.)
If we converted to digital and left the poorest of our nation out in the cold, we'd devolve into some discussion about how the evil government was depriving the weakest among us from access to a free press, possibly even with a few stats peppered in about how TV is even more important for them because of illiteracy rates, and so on, and maybe some good socialism arguments to boot.
I see your point about damned if you do/dont, but that aside... The whole thing here is that nobody needs television. It's a privilege, not a right. And even if it was a right, who's stopping all of these poor, illterate, TV-starved people from going to a library (which the government already funds), which has *gasp* free books, movies, and often has screening rooms or free screenings. Even if all poor people were illiterate (which doesn't happen that much in the States, face it), that still leaves the other options open. Oh yes, and libraries provide warmth, shelter, and bathroom facilities as well, so even the homeless could use them without being "left in the cold".
Come on, government, put that $1.5 billion into the nation's libraries, not into upgrading peoples' ancient televisions!
1) Congress has budgeted $1.5 billion to provide vouchers for owners of outdated TVs to purchase digital-to-analog converters. Each owner will be entitled to two vouchers worth $40 apiece. Do the math: 70 million outmoded TVs x $80 in vouchers = $5.6 BILLION. Congress' proposed budget is woefully inadequate in comparison to its commitments.
2) Why in the world is the US government subsidizing television reception for outdated TVs in the first place? Couldn't they just announce the cut-off date and then say "sorry, the rest of you were warned"? Those who can afford to subscribe to cable/satellite will continue to do so, and those who can't will go to places where they can watch free public screenings, or spend more time reading. Television access is a luxury, not a right; why has it become one? FTA, Consumer groups say this is only fair because the government is essentially reducing the value of people's property. Well, they don't make media for my 8-track machine anymore -- where's my money???
3) FTA, Sets hooked up to cable or satellite services should work fine no matter what. This means that coax input will remain constant, and this means that we've had digital-to-analog TV converters for YEARS. They're commonly called VCRs; actual tape machines or digital ones will work, so long as it has coax in and out, and RCA out. To convert the signal, the recording part of the machine doesn't even have to operate properly. VCRs that eat tapes but still have working connections are easy to find second-hand at the Salvation Army and garage sales, usually for $5 or less. (This is what I did when I was in college; I hooked up a VHS VCR that ate tapes to a Commodore 64 monior, and I basically had a television set with tuner. All for less than $15. And this was "all the way back" in 2000.) New machines can cost as little as $50 for a VHS VCR and $100 for a DVD recorder. So to think that new analog-to-digital converters, without tape or DVD writing mechanisms, should be $40 to $80 apiece is ludicrous.
4) FTA, People are supposed to apply for the vouchers during a three-month window in 2008, and use them within three months. But there probably won't be enough vouchers to go around... You think? When the allocated budget is about a quarter of what it should be? Say it ain't so! And the logistics surrounding such a short turn-around time are horrendous.
6) For 20 million people who have been watching TV over radio spectrum, the digital-to-analog converters are going to be rather useless. Why? Because one of the reasons that they were watching free TV is because they couldn't afford to pay for cable/satellite in the first place! Why does the government figure that these people can suddenly afford to have cable/satellite installed and pay the monthly fees? This is a modern-day rendition of "let them eat cake!"
6) You may remember a previous Slasdot post about the Digital Content Security Act, which has legislators introducing a "measure [that] will outlaw the manufacture or sale of electronic devices that convert analog video signals into digital video signals, effective one year from its enactment..." Digital-to-analog and analog-to-digital devices are easily reversable, especially when you're talking coax to RCA. So once the MPAA has all television converted to digital, they want to outlaw the hardware that the government plans to subsidize so that people can watch their content? Am I the only one who sees a flaw with this?
I got stuck on the last train ride to Osaka from Tokyo on a recent stay in Japan. Bad planning on my part, but part of the problem is that I only speak very, very basic Japanese (e.g. "Where is the bathroom?"). It was about 1:00am and all the trains had stopped, and the next one left the station at 6:00am. I didn't have the money to take a cab to an expensive hotel and then cab back to the station in the morning, nor did I really speak enough Japanese to ask where the closest cheap hotel was (and ryokans, while they can be cheap, rarely have all-night entry), but I did have enough cash to pay for the capsule hotel located right there in the station. I can't read enough Japanese to be able to tell from the signage if a capsule hotel caters to only men, or to men and women both. Being a woman, I poked my head inside to ask if they accomodated women and if there was a capsule free, and I basically got yelled out of the establishment. I hadn't even cleared the front entrance! They yelled me out of the place despite the fact that I am obviously gaijin (blond-haired and blue-eyed), and equally as obviously didn't speak much of the language, so it was pretty darn likely that I'd just made a mistake. For a culture that is known worldwide for its politeness, these people were damned rude!
Funny, though, it didn't seem to bother them that I had to camp out in the train station for the night, not twenty feet from the doorway of their establishment. That being said, a) I wasn't the only one to do it (there were a couple of obviously not homeless college-aged guys who did the same thing), and b) that train station was one of the safest places in a city where I have been late at night. (I'm comparing it to major Canadian cities, and one particular small town with a municipal campground fairly close to what passes for the downtown core, where I, as a young girl with the rest of my Girl Guide troupe, were terrorized by drunks who pissed on and sliced up our tents.)
Back to the point, here, though... Basically, any room that is comfortable, affordable, and doesn't discriminate against female customers is good in my books. From personal experience, women won't enjoy the capsule hotel experience as much as they probably will the Yotel experience.
From what I've read, the main source of scratches occurring on the XBox 360 is when the machine is moved while it's turned on. Now, granted, I can see the silliness of changing it from vertical to horizontal with a disc spinning in the drive -- you wouldn't do that with a PC, would you? (Although, Joe Blow's common sense when it comes to electronics is fairly limited, I'll grant you.) However, the fact that you pretty much can't touch the box while it's running without scratching the disk (check out the previous comments about bumping the console, shifting it a little, leveling it off while running) makes me incredibly leery. Think about how many children play console games, and how rough any child is on anything they own... Assuming they follow the parents' instructions and never move the box intentionally, even! And what happens if you have a loose cable in the back or some such that you have to wiggle? Time to get a new copy of your favorite game! Essentially:
1) Market XBox 360's that require only feather-light touches to scratch discs.
2) DRM the media and the console to death so that it's damned-near impossible to play burned backup games of legitimately purchased discs.
3) Warn in manual that no-one ever reads that moving console could kill off media, so as to avoid legal repercussions.
4) Charge each console owner full price for replacements for scratched discs.
5) Profit!
Am I missing anything?
5-7 days for a brand new / fixed console, for a friend of mine
So, you're telling us that a friend of yours already had to have their XBox 360 repaired/replaced? This despite the fact that the XBox 360 has been on the market for maybe two months now, so it's not like your friend could have worn out their console through constant use over a long period of time. (Especially since the hardware isn't being pushed to its max through the available games.) You're also telling us that, despite the fact that your console doesn't have any defects, you know someone who has already had to repair/return theirs.
The reason people are constantly bashing Microsoft in general, and the XBox 360 in specific, is specifically because of this issue. There are a lot of people out there who have had problems with their practically-brand-new machines, and even if many XBox 360 owners have no problems, practically every one of them knows someone who's had to have their console repaired/replaced.
As a comparison, the iPod Video has been released for approximately the same amount of time as the xBox 360. Sure, it's a different kind of device, but it, too, is a later version of a pre-exisiting and market-tested product. And if the iPod Video had had the same repair/replacement/error rate as the XBox 360, you'd see just as many articles about irate customers and return policies. Actually, you'd probably also see a lot more rants from competitors like Microsoft Sony if the latest iPod had defects than you currently hear from Apple about the 360's defects.
It's a neat idea, but this particular model will never catch on as the EyeBud has the unfortunate effect of making the wearer looking like a Borg from Star Trek (and not 7 of 9, either!). While the iPod is a great device, the main reason that it was practically sold-out in stores and online this Christmas is its sleek look, small size, and stylish marketing campaign. In general, that's when all techy devices catch on in the general population, from home PC's to laptops to cell phones -- when they're small enough and attractive enough that the user doesn's look like a geek. Well, that and the price tag; nobody's going to pay $600 to look like the biggest dork on the block.
Bring the price down under $200, and streamline the design so that it looks like an extension of a bluetooth headset or maybe a pair of mirrored Oakley look-alikes. Sure, that'll probably take a couple of years. But only then will it be worth marketing this device as "the next big thing".
"Technologys?"... This is atrocious. GeneOff gets sent back to the fourth grade, and Zonk is fired for not seeing this.
I'm surprised that you didn't catch the use of the fictional word "whimp", as in, Here is a hackable real robot that won't whimp out on you. I do believe that Zonk meant wimp.
Come on, people. Both of these could have been caught by running the text through a spell check. I'm sure your favorite open-source Office program or the text editor that comes with OSX has a decent one built in. As a last resort, MS Word has a decent spell check too.
When posting this, there were only 21 comments total... And yet not only the primary sites, but the Google caches and mirrors were Slashdotted.
Maybe I can come back and read this tomorrow under "Old News".
...they merely show themselves to be poorly misinformed at best...
I think what you're trying to say here is that they are poorly informed, or misinformed. "Poorly misinformed" would mean that they would have been given very little misinformation, or that they were actually well-informed.
I think we know what you're trying to get at, but that's not actually what you said.
...the measure will outlaw the manufacture or sale of electronic devices that convert analog video signals into digital video signals, effective one year from its enactment.
I run a small video production company. Everything is entirely above-board; we use only media that we own the copyright to or that we have secured permission from the copyright holders to use. We do a lot of video transfer from analog to digital formats, because a lot of clients now want their old videos re-circulated in DVD format or video for the web.
As an individual as well as a small business owner, I pay my taxes and I respect the terms of copyright. Why am I, as a law-abiding citizen, being penalized?
There are a lot of totally legitimate, law-abiding, non-copyright-infringing ways to use analog-to-digital technology. Hell, the entire video industry uses this technology on a regular basis. You know all of those older television series' that have been put on DVD and sold as boxed sets? Those were all originally on analog media. Same with all pre-digital movies. That's pretty much all of the video work that's been done in the last 100 years, minus the last five years or so. Oh, and most of the video work that's done these days, if it's not shot on digital in the first place, is converted to digital in order to be edited. The RIAA/MPAA, who I am sure lobbied for this, is really shooting itself in the foot here, because suddenly the technology that allows them to make and distribute movies/TV shows in any kind of digital format will be ILLEGAL. This is the same group of people who embraced digital technology because it's smaller, cheaper, and more efficient.
This is possibly the stupidest idea that I have ever heard. Way to shoot yourselves in the feet, people. It's back to the stone age of video production for all of us, now, unless we have George Lucas' budget.
The only question is, will everyone be willing to relearn how to type?
No.
Simple answer, simple reason: people resist change. There have been many new kinds of keyboards styles and layouts that have been discussed on Slashdot over the years. All of them claim to have advantages, and most have been tested as being "more efficient" than QWERTY keyboards. But the QWERTY layout has been around since the manual typewriter, meaning that we have generations of people who have been trained on its layout. A new layout may be more efficient in the long run, but if it was adopted, millions of people would have to re-learn how to type. Can you really see companies endorsing a change that is effectively going to slow down their business, even if there is a potential future payoff? Have you ever tried to get a company to adopt a new piece of software, let alone hardware?
QWERTY is also a standard; you can sit down at just about anything with a keyboard and touch-type. Have you ever sat down at a computer that was set up for a French keyboard without knowing it? Isn't it a pain in the ass to try and figure out where everything is? Now, imagine what it would be like if every third computer used a different keyboard layout.
Medical research should be strictly reserved for terminal patients with no other options not terminally poor patients with no affordable options.
I find your logic faulty, for multiple reasons:
1) Medical research cannot be effectively conducted on terminal patients because they are terminal patients. Their immune system is compromised in an extreme way, which will bias the testing. Yes, most testing will have some bias due to age, race, sex, etc., but these are normal variables; most people are not terminally ill. There would be no point to doing medical research on a terminal patient unless the testing had something specifically to do with the patient's original problem -- and most testing won't.
2) As previous commentors have pointed out, the people in India who are being tested on are poor, not stupid. As with every decision that every person makes in life, they will weigh the pros and cons as they understand them, and decide for themselves whether it has a greater potential to make their life better or worse. These treatments are not being forced on the poor of India.
This issue is charged with ethical considerations. However, an argument such as the one stated above is ridiculously illogical and does not touch upon the ethics of the issue in a rational manner.
...which is still fine for web programmers with a Serial port.
Serial ports are so 90's; my web programmer came fully equipped with USB 2.0. However, despite the upgrades, I still have reliability issues with him, especially when the hockey game's on...