that's all fine and good, but she'll never be able to have a credit card again, buy a house, buy a car, or send her children to college on loans. I could go a lot of places and not pay for my goods or services, if I wasn't arrested, I could just keep refusing to pay. That doesn't mean I'd ever be allowed to shop there ever again.
anyway..."Bill's Main Street Foreign Car Repair." is great for a store, but "www.billsmainstreetforeigncarrepair.com" isn't too good. Names need to be short and rememberable, hence the proliferation of useless, unassociated names.
In my time as a market researcher, I've had to wade through company name after name, a whole lotta "com"s and "tech"s and 'solution"s. They don't stand out to me; they sound like everyone else. Since most normal english words are gone, you don't want a huge company name that describes what you do if customers have to type it in ("www.mikesconsultingcompany.com" ain't gonna get you hits"). The solution, in my eyes, is to come up with something people will remember. Although that's the point with the "com"s and "tech"s, everyone's doing it, so it really doesn't stand out. To me, yahoo! and amazon made me think. What the hell do they mean? What do they have to do with onlne directories and books, respectivly? Nothing. That's the point. They were chosen because they'd be remembered. Yes, they're silly. Yes, they're not descriptive. And yes, you remember them.
etoys? Why is it lame? Yes, I'm kinda tired of the "e"ing of the world, but if I'm Joe webnewbie is online, and looking to buy toys for his kid, "etoys.com" is the one of the first guesses he'd make. (after toys.com, and toysrus.com). It's just smart business.
Of course, there isn't much chance of Microsoft ever doing such a thing...
I'd bet that they already have. It's sitting on a shelf somewhere, or maybe being used on the inside. Will they ever release it? Who knows? If I was in Microsoft Marketing, and I was interested to see if it would be well received by reading a publication like slashdot, a known linux hangout, I'd be scared to even bring up the issue (with how MS is treated here). I sure as hell would use it, not because I like MS, but because my work involved a lot of browsing on the web, and Netscape, my perfered browser, can't handle a damn thing without falling apart. I'm under the assumption that IE 5.x for linux exists in Redmond, but may never exist for us.
Jupiter is what, 20 G's? and this thing is around 80?
I was under the impression (from earlier articles) that the planet was 4-J in size, but only.63 -J in mass. That would make it almost 13 Gs. Still too much and too hot for life as we know it, but a hell of a find regardless!
An unrelated question: can they use the same technique to search for moons of that planet?
Theoretically it could be, but the light reflecting from the moons would be SO minimal that it's unlikly. Maybe someday a tecnique similar to the one used to identify most planets (how they affect their star) could be used on a moon to planet scale, but that's a ways off too.
I remember reading books on astronomy when I was growing up; there are 9 planets, many moons, and they're all in our solar system. Scientists think there are probably other planets out there, but they can't be sure.
The books I was reading, in class and outside, were written in the late 80s and early 90s. An now, 10 years later, we've discovered scores of planets, and even seen light from one of them! It's amazing! I remember being angry to hear that funding for space travel/exploration was being cut every year; I could never say why I knew we needed to continue this research, but I just knew we did. We HAVE to go to Mars. We HAVE to send out more deep space probes. We HAVE to go back to the moon.
We're explorers. We always have been. These findings of planets have made it to the late night talk show monologue jokes, Comedy Central's The Daily Show, and most major media outlets. There's interest again. I just hope we keep it up and make sure we don't stop exploring because "there's better things we could be doing with our money"
All programmers? Please. There are a good deal of geeks of all sorts that believe computers will someday have levels of emotion, intelligence, consciousness, etc. as we enjoy as humans.
No, they do not need, nor will they will ever need, morality or spirituality.
That's quite a claim. In my expirence, the word "never", especially when applied to technology, is a dangerous thing to say.
Some studies have shown that hospital patients who are prayed for will statistically do better than patients who are not prayed for
Probably true. However, any positive energy release (a prayer, a wish, a spell, all names for the same thing) will tend to do that. I tend to believe it has a lot to do with us being human, and having the associated bioelectric energy, and I doubt computers (at this stage of the game, anyway) will have any similar power.
I'm betting the easiest way for all of us to live to see the next odd day will be digitally. Call me a geek, but with changes and advances in both cybernetics and computing power (and the structure of computing), we'll be able to become cybernetic, then finnaly get rid of the wetware all together. Ray Kurzweil's "The Age Of Spiritual Machines" is a great book with great explainations.
A friend has a keyboard that actually has a single key labeled "alt-control-delete". I wish I could find one; I understand they were made for the ubernewbie. Rumor has it that it also has an "any" key. Shouldn't there be a test or something to weed out those users out? Goodness.
They *really* spy on you when you're there. Cameras *ALL* over the rides, people watching your almost every move.
True. But one of the most important things to disney and it's theme parks is being "family friendly". It sucks that you can't wear your "eat the homeless" shirt. Oh well. Disney theme parks are private. You probably wouldn't be allowed in a lot of resturants, gov't buildings, courtrooms, etc. with it either. If they want to stop paying customers, it's their decision.
As for cameras, yeah, there's a lot of them. But from working at Anaheim's Disneyland, I've seen a lot of things people do just because they want to get away with something at "The happiest place on Earth". Disney would be stupid not to have cameras everywhere.
If the NSA wants to listen in on Ham Radio or Air Trafic control or CB. They have just as much right to do so as You or I do.
Indeed. I just wanted to note that I doubt the NSA cares what I say. I don't think they listen to my radio show, I don't think they record it, I doubt they even know it exists. The notion that someone (or some machine, even), somewhere is monitoring everything is absurd.
Organizations (like the NSA) that operate on the perception of power have it in their best interest to spread disinformation about themselves
Hell yeah. If Echelon/NSA/Big Brother/your neighbors/that telco truck outside was as powerful/all-knowing/influencial as x-files fanatics/the paranoid would like you to believe, we wouldn't know about them. They'd be in charge of the media, and open forums like/. wouldn't exist at all, "for the good of the people". The whole thing reeks of conspiracy theory much more than it reeks of collected world governments spying on me.
I bet some radio broadcasts are monitored. I bet some international email might be too. But to think ALL transmitions are filtered is silly. Does the NSA listen to my weekly radio show? Are the emails I send from my work box to my home box filtered? Are some 8 year old kid's walkie talkie convesations recorded somewhere? I'd bet no to all of those.
I seriously doubt that anyone cares that much about me. I have no doubt that the gov't has it's hands in some evesdropping, I'd be scared if they didn't. I don't believe, however, that I have too much to worry about.
The BBC article, as well as the Wired piece mention Austrailia, the US, and Britain, but no others. Are other countries involved? How wide spread? I've heard everything from "some radio communications" to "all email, phone, fax, and other communication". I've also heard from paranoid friends that they're being listened to right now. I'm also pretty sure there's no "good" sources out there with "true" information, because no one outside the NSA/other national equivilants knows. Where should the interested individuals go for info?
In the meantime, wave KILL BOMB WACO GUN ECHELON hello to the NSA;)
From everything I've heard, read about, and drempt of, this is far better. Silicon chip makers aren't going under today, chances are the existing companies will have a large stake in the new technologies. Nanotechnology is the next step, and I find it vey unlikely that it will just be some "useless, new" technology no one will care about. IMHO, we're in the beginning stages of a major paradigm shift, starting with the microcomputer revolution of the late 70s to the PC explosion of the mid/late nineties, and the shift ending (and new paradigm beginning) with the AI and nano revolution of the 2020s-2030s. That's judt my guesses, we have a few years yet =)
I don't see it happening with anything short of a programming miracle. Computers operate solely on logic. It'd take a hell of a lot of work to get anything resembling a real "personality" running on a box that only processes 1s and 0s.
Take a look at Eliezer S. Yudkowsky's remarks about the Singularity as well as Ray Kurweil's "The Age Of Spiritual Machines". Both give detailed, smart looks at the coming revolutions in computing, including AI and the "computer personalities" discussed here.
maybe it's better if the MTV flock of sheep is misinformed.
It's never better for someone to be misinformed. I don't know about anyone else, but I'd rather see the most minds possible on the thinking side of the fence.
what about alchahol? The best code is always written when drunk or sleep deprived buzzing on caffine
I think this is like saying you do your best work when you're under a deadline...there's a good possibility you've never worked any other way. I do my best coding when I'm awake/well fed/chemical free...
I have a feeling contestants have a better chance of dying from too much partying on The Real World than they do here. It's a "deserted" island, with camera crews, emergency supplies, and most likely a doctor. They won't let anyone starve, it's illegal and bad for ratings.
"Surviving" this game isn't about not kicking the bucket, it's about getting voted off. If Joe Contestant gets a snakebite, I'm sure a doctor is somewhere near. Joe Contestant doesn't lose because he got a snakebite, he'll lose if he can't/doesn't work well with the others, for whatever that's worth. As to spoonfeeding: Who cares if this is mindless entertainment? It will no doubt be interesting, talked about, and fun to see the logistics of how it would all work.
Slashdot Mirror
that's all fine and good, but she'll never be able to have a credit card again, buy a house, buy a car, or send her children to college on loans. I could go a lot of places and not pay for my goods or services, if I wasn't arrested, I could just keep refusing to pay. That doesn't mean I'd ever be allowed to shop there ever again.
The Good Reverend
I was more frightened to learn I could type in said "1337 5p34k" without thinking about it. 3 and e are pretty close on the qwerty, ya know...
The Good Reverend
rob gets moderated up? hmmm.. ;)
anyway..."Bill's Main Street Foreign Car Repair." is great for a store, but "www.billsmainstreetforeigncarrepair.com" isn't too good. Names need to be short and rememberable, hence the proliferation of useless, unassociated names.
The Good Reverend
In my time as a market researcher, I've had to wade through company name after name, a whole lotta "com"s and "tech"s and 'solution"s. They don't stand out to me; they sound like everyone else. Since most normal english words are gone, you don't want a huge company name that describes what you do if customers have to type it in ("www.mikesconsultingcompany.com" ain't gonna get you hits"). The solution, in my eyes, is to come up with something people will remember. Although that's the point with the "com"s and "tech"s, everyone's doing it, so it really doesn't stand out. To me, yahoo! and amazon made me think. What the hell do they mean? What do they have to do with onlne directories and books, respectivly? Nothing. That's the point. They were chosen because they'd be remembered. Yes, they're silly. Yes, they're not descriptive. And yes, you remember them.
The Good Reverend
quixtar: 69 points on a triple word score (forgoing any double letter scores, of course) plus 50 for using all 7 letters. That's my kind of word!
;)
funny, offtopic, what's the difference?
The Good Reverend
etoys? Why is it lame? Yes, I'm kinda tired of the "e"ing of the world, but if I'm Joe webnewbie is online, and looking to buy toys for his kid, "etoys.com" is the one of the first guesses he'd make. (after toys.com, and toysrus.com). It's just smart business.
The Good Reverend
Of course, there isn't much chance of Microsoft ever doing such a thing...
I'd bet that they already have. It's sitting on a shelf somewhere, or maybe being used on the inside. Will they ever release it? Who knows? If I was in Microsoft Marketing, and I was interested to see if it would be well received by reading a publication like slashdot, a known linux hangout, I'd be scared to even bring up the issue (with how MS is treated here). I sure as hell would use it, not because I like MS, but because my work involved a lot of browsing on the web, and Netscape, my perfered browser, can't handle a damn thing without falling apart. I'm under the assumption that IE 5.x for linux exists in Redmond, but may never exist for us.
The Good Reverend
Jupiter is what, 20 G's? and this thing is around 80?
.63 -J in mass. That would make it almost 13 Gs. Still too much and too hot for life as we know it, but a hell of a find regardless!
I was under the impression (from earlier articles) that the planet was 4-J in size, but only
The Good Reverend
An unrelated question: can they use the same technique to search for moons of that planet?
Theoretically it could be, but the light reflecting from the moons would be SO minimal that it's unlikly. Maybe someday a tecnique similar to the one used to identify most planets (how they affect their star) could be used on a moon to planet scale, but that's a ways off too.
The Good Reverend
I remember reading books on astronomy when I was growing up; there are 9 planets, many moons, and they're all in our solar system. Scientists think there are probably other planets out there, but they can't be sure.
The books I was reading, in class and outside, were written in the late 80s and early 90s. An now, 10 years later, we've discovered scores of planets, and even seen light from one of them! It's amazing! I remember being angry to hear that funding for space travel/exploration was being cut every year; I could never say why I knew we needed to continue this research, but I just knew we did. We HAVE to go to Mars. We HAVE to send out more deep space probes. We HAVE to go back to the moon.
We're explorers. We always have been. These findings of planets have made it to the late night talk show monologue jokes, Comedy Central's The Daily Show, and most major media outlets. There's interest again. I just hope we keep it up and make sure we don't stop exploring because "there's better things we could be doing with our money"
The Good Reverend
All programmers? Please. There are a good deal of geeks of all sorts that believe computers will someday have levels of emotion, intelligence, consciousness, etc. as we enjoy as humans.
No, they do not need, nor will they will ever need, morality or spirituality.
That's quite a claim. In my expirence, the word "never", especially when applied to technology, is a dangerous thing to say.
The Good Reverend
Some studies have shown that hospital patients who are prayed for will statistically do better than patients who are not prayed for
Probably true. However, any positive energy release (a prayer, a wish, a spell, all names for the same thing) will tend to do that. I tend to believe it has a lot to do with us being human, and having the associated bioelectric energy, and I doubt computers (at this stage of the game, anyway) will have any similar power.
The Good Reverend
I'm betting the easiest way for all of us to live to see the next odd day will be digitally. Call me a geek, but with changes and advances in both cybernetics and computing power (and the structure of computing), we'll be able to become cybernetic, then finnaly get rid of the wetware all together. Ray Kurzweil's "The Age Of Spiritual Machines" is a great book with great explainations.
The Good Reverend
A friend has a keyboard that actually has a single key labeled "alt-control-delete". I wish I could find one; I understand they were made for the ubernewbie. Rumor has it that it also has an "any" key. Shouldn't there be a test or something to weed out those users out? Goodness.
The Good Reverend
They *really* spy on you when you're there. Cameras *ALL* over the rides, people watching your almost every move.
True. But one of the most important things to disney and it's theme parks is being "family friendly". It sucks that you can't wear your "eat the homeless" shirt. Oh well. Disney theme parks are private. You probably wouldn't be allowed in a lot of resturants, gov't buildings, courtrooms, etc. with it either. If they want to stop paying customers, it's their decision.
As for cameras, yeah, there's a lot of them. But from working at Anaheim's Disneyland, I've seen a lot of things people do just because they want to get away with something at "The happiest place on Earth". Disney would be stupid not to have cameras everywhere.
The Good Reverend
If the NSA wants to listen in on Ham Radio or Air Trafic control or CB. They have just as much right to do so as You or I do.
Indeed. I just wanted to note that I doubt the NSA cares what I say. I don't think they listen to my radio show, I don't think they record it, I doubt they even know it exists. The notion that someone (or some machine, even), somewhere is monitoring everything is absurd.
The Good Reverend
Organizations (like the NSA) that operate on the perception of power have it in their best interest to spread disinformation about themselves
/. wouldn't exist at all, "for the good of the people". The whole thing reeks of conspiracy theory much more than it reeks of collected world governments spying on me.
Hell yeah. If Echelon/NSA/Big Brother/your neighbors/that telco truck outside was as powerful/all-knowing/influencial as x-files fanatics/the paranoid would like you to believe, we wouldn't know about them. They'd be in charge of the media, and open forums like
I bet some radio broadcasts are monitored. I bet some international email might be too. But to think ALL transmitions are filtered is silly. Does the NSA listen to my weekly radio show? Are the emails I send from my work box to my home box filtered? Are some 8 year old kid's walkie talkie convesations recorded somewhere? I'd bet no to all of those.
I seriously doubt that anyone cares that much about me. I have no doubt that the gov't has it's hands in some evesdropping, I'd be scared if they didn't. I don't believe, however, that I have too much to worry about.
The Good Reverend
The BBC article, as well as the Wired piece mention Austrailia, the US, and Britain, but no others. Are other countries involved? How wide spread? I've heard everything from "some radio communications" to "all email, phone, fax, and other communication". I've also heard from paranoid friends that they're being listened to right now. I'm also pretty sure there's no "good" sources out there with "true" information, because no one outside the NSA/other national equivilants knows. Where should the interested individuals go for info?
;)
In the meantime, wave KILL BOMB WACO GUN ECHELON hello to the NSA
The Good Reverend
It seems to me that newer isn't always better
From everything I've heard, read about, and drempt of, this is far better. Silicon chip makers aren't going under today, chances are the existing companies will have a large stake in the new technologies. Nanotechnology is the next step, and I find it vey unlikely that it will just be some "useless, new" technology no one will care about. IMHO, we're in the beginning stages of a major paradigm shift, starting with the microcomputer revolution of the late 70s to the PC explosion of the mid/late nineties, and the shift ending (and new paradigm beginning) with the AI and nano revolution of the 2020s-2030s. That's judt my guesses, we have a few years yet =)
The Good Reverend
I don't see it happening with anything short of a programming miracle. Computers operate solely on logic. It'd take a hell of a lot of work to get anything resembling a real "personality" running on a box that only processes 1s and 0s.
Take a look at Eliezer S. Yudkowsky's remarks about the Singularity as well as Ray Kurweil's "The Age Of Spiritual Machines". Both give detailed, smart looks at the coming revolutions in computing, including AI and the "computer personalities" discussed here.
The Good Reverend
maybe it's better if the MTV flock of sheep is misinformed.
It's never better for someone to be misinformed. I don't know about anyone else, but I'd rather see the most minds possible on the thinking side of the fence.
The Good Reverend
what about alchahol? The best code is always written when drunk or sleep deprived buzzing on caffine
I think this is like saying you do your best work when you're under a deadline...there's a good possibility you've never worked any other way. I do my best coding when I'm awake/well fed/chemical free...
The Good Reverend
Anyway, the point is that this is basically marketing, and designed to grab the USA public and make them watch advertisements.
We've had this for a while, and so have you, no matter where you live. It's called "Television"
The Good Reverend
I have a feeling contestants have a better chance of dying from too much partying on The Real World than they do here. It's a "deserted" island, with camera crews, emergency supplies, and most likely a doctor. They won't let anyone starve, it's illegal and bad for ratings.
The Good Reverend
"Surviving" this game isn't about not kicking the bucket, it's about getting voted off. If Joe Contestant gets a snakebite, I'm sure a doctor is somewhere near. Joe Contestant doesn't lose because he got a snakebite, he'll lose if he can't/doesn't work well with the others, for whatever that's worth. As to spoonfeeding: Who cares if this is mindless entertainment? It will no doubt be interesting, talked about, and fun to see the logistics of how it would all work.
The Good Reverend