You know the USPS isn't exactly the greatest service in the world. You think it might have been their fault?
I just say this because my NetFlix shipments have always been extremely good and though they do sometimes get split up, I've always been astounded at how fast they turn around. I literally sent back a movie one morning only to have a new one the second morning after.
Though I hate to say it, there is plenty of software that can shrink a a dual layer disc to 4 GB so that it can fit on a standard DVD-R. I've used it in the past to back up my collection ( DVDs scratch easily and I can't afford to buy new ones). Though there usually is a sacrifice in quality, you can't really tell by looking at it (on a TV, at least a TV of the non-HD variety) and it doesn't do anything at all to the audio.
Not to say that people should be copying Netflix DVDs (or any other). I would hate to see them catch flak from the MPAA.
Sorry if that came off as a personal attack, I was just attacking the rational. A close friend of mine has a real problem with cigarette taxes and bans, and tends to rail against them when ever possible. I suppose it must of rubbed off on me.
The second-hand smoke thing is not much of a justification either as you have to live with a smoker to be effected by it, and even then its kinda hard to say if the risks are very serious given how all the studies come up with different results. Now in the case of children I see the problem, but in the cases of roommates or spouses, consent is implied by the fact they have chosen to live with a smoker.
As far as joggers hurting people: ever been in an elevator with a sweaty jogger? ehhh nasty smell... (I'm just kidding around)
1) It should be noted that the largest (or second largest depending on which study you are looking at) lifestyle related health care costs come from injuries from exercise. Perhaps we should tax people trying to get in shape or stay in shape. Oh, and we can also tax fat people, because they cost us more too.
2) How do we know how much "extra" smokers cost us if we don't know what they would have died of if they hadn't smoked? Everyone dies and it will invariably cost a lot of money if they do it over any period of time. My grandfather (non-smoker) is currently slowly dying and costing medicare roughly 100,000 dollars a month in medication, hospital visits, assisted living, etc. This cost goes up constantly, and he may live for many more years to come. My other grandfather died of lung cancer several years ago. It was considerably faster and cheaper. For the record he was not a smoker, he just got lung cancer. Had he been a smoker the illness would have been considered smoking related and chalked up to the "extra cost" of smoking even though he would have gotten lung cancer anyway. Its a bit difficult to quantify the "extra cost", if there even is one.
3) Its a very bad idea to rationalize that these taxes are being used to fund treatment of ailing smokers. While the politicians may claim that is what they are for (usually they claim they are funding smoking cessation programs too), there is very little accountability and in many states the moneys are not going to either cause.
I don't know the Mich. tax rate or how much the smokes they were buying cost but I imagine they probably paid far less then $2500 for the cigs. I used to smoke and would order mine from Switzerland. They cost about $15 a carton (and still do). Compare that to New York where they cost $70-80 a carton. Someone with a pack a day habit would pay $2340 in taxes for one year (the cigarettes themselves would only cost $540).
I read in Time (I forget which issue, sorry) that the US gets a fairly low percentage of its oil from the middle east. (Europe on the other hand gets practically all of its oil from the middle east.) We wouldn't necessarily be completely screwed by losing that source of oil.
You are right though, ICBMs are not very useful in fighting terrorism. Then again that might not stop a nuclear retaliation against *someone* (I am not talking full scale assault) if you consider the sort of person that has his finger on the button. He's already been inching toward using nuke-u-lear bunker busters.
The only prerequisite for first contact in trek is warp drive.
(Entry into the Federation seems to require a world government though.)
Parent seems a bit of a wanker though, IMHO. Its a really weird bit of logic to say that a species has to arrive at a point where it no longer impacts its own biosphere before it can go off and radically impact another.
Quartz is the app that writes the Postscript that draws the screen. At least I think thats true, I really could be mistaken on this one. Quarts came out in 10.2 so I'm pretty sure its not what you suggest. I know it has a lot to do with the windowing system, but I don't think it would be the equivalent of X.
I still stand by my statement that it is inappropriate to call OS X open source as only Darwin is open source.
Not to be a prick but I believe you are wrong on all 3 points.
OS X is not open source. Darwin is open source and based on BSD. OS X is the windowing system that sits on top of Darwin (like X sits on BSD) and is not in the least bit open source. I realize that this is what you mean, but its incorrect to say OS X = Open Source. Darwin is open source and can be compiled to run on an x86 processor. OS X is not and can not be.
The are no viruses for OS X, at least to my knowledge. I remember someone once identified a possible weakness that you could get a Trojan through (though as I remember it required a lot of user idiocy to work). Apple quietly patched it a short time later.
Linux is clearly having the very legal troubles you are saying it isn't. SCO claims to own part of the code Linux is built on. I'm not really an expert on Linux, but this has been all over the news recently.
... hopefully I'm not wrong on all three points too.
Yeah ditto here. My friends all fall into 2 catagories: poor as dirt or the type that will walk into a Bestbuy and walk out with the newest, smallest Viao as an "impulse buy". Both are considering the mini, the first because they can afford it and its actually a beautiful piece of equipment, and the second because "hey why not, then I will have both".
I actually am considering getting a mini, even though I already have a PB. I a server to sit in the courner with my ST:TNG collection on it and serve it to my laptop wirelessly. The mini seems like it would do this nicely and if I compressed everything I could get DS9 on it too.
Maybe not 200k, but consider how expensive it would be to change thier policy. They would have to compile a list of all trademarks (in France, but probably in all countries in order for a company to not just go to France and sue them) and thats just so you could make a policy for no Trademarks in AdWords. If they wanted a company to be able to advertise using its own trademark (which most companies would demand) they would have to establish a fool proof automated system capable of verifying that the company's ownership of the trademarks. The mind reels at the potential expense of such a system.
Add to that that Google doesn't really need a French office. I have no idea why a company like Google would have European offices and subject themselves to all those additional regulations. Its not hard to hire someone in the US to translate the page into French.
Google has an office in Paris and probably assets in French banks, otherwise they could just ignore the ruling.
Honestly I don't understand why google feels the need to have offices all over the world. It seems to me that it only increases liability without allowing them to make more money. After all, by the nature of the medium they already do business with all contries without being subject to thier laws (unless the country blocks their site, which is pretty unlikely for something like this).
I'm sure there is a reason that they have them, anyone know what it is?
No spamming is now specifically LEGAL in the United States thanks to the CAN SPAM bill. You just can't do things like fake reply-to lines and you have to give an opt-out method; there are a few other regulations too that don't come to mind.
The Nigerian thing and viral spam has always been illegal as they constitute fraud and vandalism (repectively). But they aren't usually described as spam and won't ever be effected by legislation or probably anything else other than email filters.
Has anyone else noticed how Apple seems to almost be responding directly to the complaints of/.res lately? They just need to give a 2 button mouse option to confirm my theory...
It should be pointed out that ephedrine is deemed safe enough to be available both over the counter and by prescription. Ephedrine is just processed ephedra. The biggest difference is that the "herbal" part is dispensed with and what is left is just ephedrine hcl (the active compound in ephedra). Though IANAD it seems that the only difference is that you are theoretically getting a more standardized dose (though the dosage doesn't seem to vary too wildly in most ephedra based products, really).
Anyway the reason that ephedra is "unsafe" is just that the people abusing it were taking hundreds of mg instead of tens, a problem not solved by making the dosage per capsule slightly more regular. Either way you still have to take 10 pills instead of 1 or 2.
As far as pseudo-ephedrine goes, the potential for an overdose is similar to ephedrine. In fact a guy I knew back in high-school overdosed on pseudo. He just took a box of Sudephed (to get high) and wound up in the emergency room. If the intent is to achieve the "high" produced by any drug of that family pseudo-ephedrine is actually more dangerous because it has less of a stimulant effect then ephedrine but a similar toxicity; in other words you have to take more to achieve the same effect and are more prone to poison yourself.
It might also be pointed out that a low to moderate dose of dextro-amphetamine will produce the same result while being "safe" enough to prescribe to a small child. Though really I'm being a bit cynical here.
Nothing like 128-bit encryption transparently implemented in the OS -thanks Apple. (For ripping off an open source project and making a somewhat stable implementation [not a small feat actually]).
I store ALL my data on the DESKTOP in semi-randomly named files (to the point that they all overlap into a seemingly bottomless pit of stacked icons). I NEED a search tool.
Oh... and does anyone know how to bring your desktop background to the foreground? I can't see the nice green fields anymore;-)
Does anyone know what effect unsecured wifi networks are having on John Doe lawsuits? It seems to me it should be very shaky legal ground for the RIAA to sue someone if their neighbor could very easily be the one doing the copyright infringement.
I used to live in a high-rise in manhattan where there were at any given time 10-15 findable wifi networks, and usually the majority of them were unsecured. Even in the suburbs houses are usually close enough together to share connections (maybe not in new $400k housing developments, but generally if you have that sort of money you aren't going to be stealing music but instead buying it because it is faster and easier).
I would imagine there would be some sort of media outrage if the RIAA could sue John Doe Laptop-user just because he didn't secure his network, or even worse know that he could secure it (after all Real Men don't RTFM).
Slashdot Mirror
You know the USPS isn't exactly the greatest service in the world. You think it might have been their fault?
....I've never seen Netflix ship on Sat.
I just say this because my NetFlix shipments have always been extremely good and though they do sometimes get split up, I've always been astounded at how fast they turn around. I literally sent back a movie one morning only to have a new one the second morning after.
Though I hate to say it, there is plenty of software that can shrink a a dual layer disc to 4 GB so that it can fit on a standard DVD-R. I've used it in the past to back up my collection ( DVDs scratch easily and I can't afford to buy new ones). Though there usually is a sacrifice in quality, you can't really tell by looking at it (on a TV, at least a TV of the non-HD variety) and it doesn't do anything at all to the audio.
Not to say that people should be copying Netflix DVDs (or any other). I would hate to see them catch flak from the MPAA.
Sorry if that came off as a personal attack, I was just attacking the rational. A close friend of mine has a real problem with cigarette taxes and bans, and tends to rail against them when ever possible. I suppose it must of rubbed off on me.
The second-hand smoke thing is not much of a justification either as you have to live with a smoker to be effected by it, and even then its kinda hard to say if the risks are very serious given how all the studies come up with different results. Now in the case of children I see the problem, but in the cases of roommates or spouses, consent is implied by the fact they have chosen to live with a smoker.
As far as joggers hurting people: ever been in an elevator with a sweaty jogger? ehhh nasty smell... (I'm just kidding around)
1) It should be noted that the largest (or second largest depending on which study you are looking at) lifestyle related health care costs come from injuries from exercise. Perhaps we should tax people trying to get in shape or stay in shape. Oh, and we can also tax fat people, because they cost us more too.
2) How do we know how much "extra" smokers cost us if we don't know what they would have died of if they hadn't smoked? Everyone dies and it will invariably cost a lot of money if they do it over any period of time. My grandfather (non-smoker) is currently slowly dying and costing medicare roughly 100,000 dollars a month in medication, hospital visits, assisted living, etc. This cost goes up constantly, and he may live for many more years to come. My other grandfather died of lung cancer several years ago. It was considerably faster and cheaper. For the record he was not a smoker, he just got lung cancer. Had he been a smoker the illness would have been considered smoking related and chalked up to the "extra cost" of smoking even though he would have gotten lung cancer anyway. Its a bit difficult to quantify the "extra cost", if there even is one.
3) Its a very bad idea to rationalize that these taxes are being used to fund treatment of ailing smokers. While the politicians may claim that is what they are for (usually they claim they are funding smoking cessation programs too), there is very little accountability and in many states the moneys are not going to either cause.
I don't know the Mich. tax rate or how much the smokes they were buying cost but I imagine they probably paid far less then $2500 for the cigs. I used to smoke and would order mine from Switzerland. They cost about $15 a carton (and still do). Compare that to New York where they cost $70-80 a carton. Someone with a pack a day habit would pay $2340 in taxes for one year (the cigarettes themselves would only cost $540).
I'm curious, if she lived outside of the state she owed the excise taxes to, why not just ignore them? By what mechanism can they collect?
I read in Time (I forget which issue, sorry) that the US gets a fairly low percentage of its oil from the middle east. (Europe on the other hand gets practically all of its oil from the middle east.) We wouldn't necessarily be completely screwed by losing that source of oil.
You are right though, ICBMs are not very useful in fighting terrorism. Then again that might not stop a nuclear retaliation against *someone* (I am not talking full scale assault) if you consider the sort of person that has his finger on the button. He's already been inching toward using nuke-u-lear bunker busters.
The only prerequisite for first contact in trek is warp drive. (Entry into the Federation seems to require a world government though.)
Parent seems a bit of a wanker though, IMHO. Its a really weird bit of logic to say that a species has to arrive at a point where it no longer impacts its own biosphere before it can go off and radically impact another.
Quartz is the app that writes the Postscript that draws the screen. At least I think thats true, I really could be mistaken on this one. Quarts came out in 10.2 so I'm pretty sure its not what you suggest. I know it has a lot to do with the windowing system, but I don't think it would be the equivalent of X.
I still stand by my statement that it is inappropriate to call OS X open source as only Darwin is open source.
Not to be a prick but I believe you are wrong on all 3 points.
... hopefully I'm not wrong on all three points too.
OS X is not open source. Darwin is open source and based on BSD. OS X is the windowing system that sits on top of Darwin (like X sits on BSD) and is not in the least bit open source. I realize that this is what you mean, but its incorrect to say OS X = Open Source. Darwin is open source and can be compiled to run on an x86 processor. OS X is not and can not be.
The are no viruses for OS X, at least to my knowledge. I remember someone once identified a possible weakness that you could get a Trojan through (though as I remember it required a lot of user idiocy to work). Apple quietly patched it a short time later.
Linux is clearly having the very legal troubles you are saying it isn't. SCO claims to own part of the code Linux is built on. I'm not really an expert on Linux, but this has been all over the news recently.
Yeah ditto here. My friends all fall into 2 catagories: poor as dirt or the type that will walk into a Bestbuy and walk out with the newest, smallest Viao as an "impulse buy". Both are considering the mini, the first because they can afford it and its actually a beautiful piece of equipment, and the second because "hey why not, then I will have both".
I actually am considering getting a mini, even though I already have a PB. I a server to sit in the courner with my ST:TNG collection on it and serve it to my laptop wirelessly. The mini seems like it would do this nicely and if I compressed everything I could get DS9 on it too.
Not if the goal is to produce spam.
Maybe not 200k, but consider how expensive it would be to change thier policy. They would have to compile a list of all trademarks (in France, but probably in all countries in order for a company to not just go to France and sue them) and thats just so you could make a policy for no Trademarks in AdWords. If they wanted a company to be able to advertise using its own trademark (which most companies would demand) they would have to establish a fool proof automated system capable of verifying that the company's ownership of the trademarks. The mind reels at the potential expense of such a system.
Add to that that Google doesn't really need a French office. I have no idea why a company like Google would have European offices and subject themselves to all those additional regulations. Its not hard to hire someone in the US to translate the page into French.
Google has an office in Paris and probably assets in French banks, otherwise they could just ignore the ruling.
Honestly I don't understand why google feels the need to have offices all over the world. It seems to me that it only increases liability without allowing them to make more money. After all, by the nature of the medium they already do business with all contries without being subject to thier laws (unless the country blocks their site, which is pretty unlikely for something like this).
I'm sure there is a reason that they have them, anyone know what it is?
No spamming is now specifically LEGAL in the United States thanks to the CAN SPAM bill. You just can't do things like fake reply-to lines and you have to give an opt-out method; there are a few other regulations too that don't come to mind.
The Nigerian thing and viral spam has always been illegal as they constitute fraud and vandalism (repectively). But they aren't usually described as spam and won't ever be effected by legislation or probably anything else other than email filters.
Has anyone else noticed how Apple seems to almost be responding directly to the complaints of /.res lately? They just need to give a 2 button mouse option to confirm my theory...
What's AOL? Why does the internet have to be filled with incomprehensible abbreviations?!
Also, this site doesn't display right on my Web TV!
It should be pointed out that ephedrine is deemed safe enough to be available both over the counter and by prescription. Ephedrine is just processed ephedra. The biggest difference is that the "herbal" part is dispensed with and what is left is just ephedrine hcl (the active compound in ephedra). Though IANAD it seems that the only difference is that you are theoretically getting a more standardized dose (though the dosage doesn't seem to vary too wildly in most ephedra based products, really).
Anyway the reason that ephedra is "unsafe" is just that the people abusing it were taking hundreds of mg instead of tens, a problem not solved by making the dosage per capsule slightly more regular. Either way you still have to take 10 pills instead of 1 or 2.
As far as pseudo-ephedrine goes, the potential for an overdose is similar to ephedrine. In fact a guy I knew back in high-school overdosed on pseudo. He just took a box of Sudephed (to get high) and wound up in the emergency room. If the intent is to achieve the "high" produced by any drug of that family pseudo-ephedrine is actually more dangerous because it has less of a stimulant effect then ephedrine but a similar toxicity; in other words you have to take more to achieve the same effect and are more prone to poison yourself.
It might also be pointed out that a low to moderate dose of dextro-amphetamine will produce the same result while being "safe" enough to prescribe to a small child. Though really I'm being a bit cynical here.
Nothing like 128-bit encryption transparently implemented in the OS -thanks Apple. (For ripping off an open source project and making a somewhat stable implementation [not a small feat actually]).
I store ALL my data on the DESKTOP in semi-randomly named files (to the point that they all overlap into a seemingly bottomless pit of stacked icons). I NEED a search tool.
;-)
Oh... and does anyone know how to bring your desktop background to the foreground? I can't see the nice green fields anymore
Does anyone know what effect unsecured wifi networks are having on John Doe lawsuits? It seems to me it should be very shaky legal ground for the RIAA to sue someone if their neighbor could very easily be the one doing the copyright infringement.
I used to live in a high-rise in manhattan where there were at any given time 10-15 findable wifi networks, and usually the majority of them were unsecured. Even in the suburbs houses are usually close enough together to share connections (maybe not in new $400k housing developments, but generally if you have that sort of money you aren't going to be stealing music but instead buying it because it is faster and easier).
I would imagine there would be some sort of media outrage if the RIAA could sue John Doe Laptop-user just because he didn't secure his network, or even worse know that he could secure it (after all Real Men don't RTFM).