I'm not sure how this really threatens ebay financially. They don't have much for banner ads, and I think most of there revenue comes from the charges for listing your product on their pages. How does this "parasite" comapny make money from ebay? Do they have banner ads? Charge people to view the data? The only thing I can think of is banner ads, as it's pretty hard to charge for a limited increase in "information value" (whatever you call it) over something you can get for free somewhere else in a similar form.
Has this ever been ruled upon in the courts before? I don't know of any cases, I'd be interested in any that might have been. What worries me is that ebay seems to think that linking = cracking (cracking being the word they used). If this is all they have to file a lawsuit I don't think they'll win, but you never know. That goes right to the issue of the legality of links we've been seeing the past few weeks. Stories like this support my theory that capitalism is incompatible with the "information age", but thats a whole seperate issue.
We're not in any position to argue morals? Are you a fatalist? We better try, otherwise there isn't going to be anything left. Technology doesn't respect morals OR life. You're arguing to use it for moral reasons anyway, as in improving the conditions of life on the planet.
I don't quite understand your argument when you say the human race is not special, is in no position to have morals, and are dumb in general, yet you argue for moral use of this.
I would hope that is the case (ignoring prior art) but I would think the judge would have come right out and said it. Who knows though, it's too bad the article didn't go further in depth. Damn mainstream media...
While this is great there decision wasn't one of "prior art" as much as it was:
U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker on Tuesday upheld a challenge by Promega Corp., which argued that scientists got the important patent in 1990 by misrepresenting their experiments and falsely claiming advances over previous discoveries.
So it sounds to me like it was more for scientific technical reasons. It also sounds like there is another company that could come forward and gets patents like this one. What do you guys think? Same interpretation?
If it is the way I think it is, there really hasn't been any breakthrough...
Scientists don't really have any training based on morailty. Generally they do what they do for science sake. We don't have many conservative leaders, by conservative I mean asking what affect this technology will have 10 generations from now. You can't exactly extrapolate out that far, but I think you know what i mean. People who might have insights in this area are probably religious leaders and philosophers.
If they actually have the ability to create even the most basic life forms, this is INCREDIBLY huge with ramifications beyond anything I can image. It won't be long before we can create complex organisms if this turns out to be true. Look at how quickly computers developed over the past 50 years. Amazing.
Our society has no mechanisms (institutions) to handle something like this. It's more like "if it makes money, go for it". Of course we do have laws limiting some harmful activities, but the church is the closest thing we have to a "moral" institution, regardless of what you think of them.
They should be consulting philosophers as well as a number of religious leaders. IMO, our society isn't ready for this, just like we aren't ready for genetic engineering. Given how our society acts twords most of it's population, the ability to do harm is too high.
Religious leaders would probably be against it, but they would probably also so that this isn't creating life. You can't "manufacture" a soul would probably be their argument.
Good article, I like his approach. It will be interesting to see if his company can maintain that style of business as it grows and when he retires. All businesses over time seem to add on beurocratic layers and stagnate, stifiling engenuity.
Re:Not all stupid, not all true
on
Dumb Laws
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· Score: 2
I would have liked the web site to have contained references to the law texts. That would have made it much more trustworthy. How many of the laws mentioned, I wonder, are nothing more than urban legends?
Most of them are probably true. They're basically old laws that aren't relavent today. Most of them probably did have some good reason some years ago, you pointed out one that still is relavent. A lot of them were also a way to oppress certain groups, like no anal sex, to opress gays, or to push a certain "moral" agenda at any rate.
Yeah, I had a book like this too. I recognized a few of the laws for my state, it's illegal to sleep naked or have oral sex. I did a few searches on amazon like "silly laws" and came up with a few hits. I'd guess the web authors probably used books already written for most of their material...I sure wouldn't want to wade through millions of pages of laws when the research has already been done.
Unless people start freaking out about "unnatural" modifications, of course. I am a little worried about that laws that will start to happen when this tech gets more advanced - it's very, very, very primitive right now - how about when you could get enhanced vision? Or strain-free screens to read off of? (via a direct digital connection!)
There is reason to be worried. Since our society isn't going to do away with money anytime soon, and this stuff isn't free, this could just further polarize society. Don't have those optic enhancers? Sorry, you can't be a pilot. Don't have those memory enhancers? Sorry, you can't be a scientist. We DO need very specific laws on this because the potential for misuse is so big. Our government is still clueless on the "information age", much less all the new advancements in biotech.
More importnantly, do we really want to turn ourselves in into the borg? This sounds silly now, but there isn't much discussion into the future. New tech? If it makes us money, go for it!! Damn the consequences!:(
I generally stray away from Katz-bashing, but in this case he basically just summed up (or almost plagerized) the huge discussion here on Teusday night, I think it was. Around 800 posts. One of the best discussions I've seen here, as far as what I like to see.
In that discussion, most posters didn't overplay the importance of technology/internet in this issue. But indeed, as you say, Katz couldn't resist, and thats unfortunate.
Of course communications technology was an integral part of compaines ability to grow from small and local to international and controling incredible amounts of capital and resources. But that technology isn't directly related to the issue today.
The internet wasn't the catylist for this demonstration, the fact that the WTO can be accurately described (in my opinion) as evil was enough to get "apethetic" Americans back out in the streets and demanding rights for everyone.
The internet does have incredible potential for being a catylist for social change. Unfortunatly right now the internet for most people is chatting on AOL and buying stuff at *.com. Technology can't change this, the people have to want to change. Katz needs to review what technology can and can't do. Hopefully this protest really is the start of a new movement. But this is about the people, not the technology.
In the short term (at least) this is obviously a Good Thing. Perhaps this points to slow waning of government power. Since the WTO is mostly a collective unit of corporations, this agreement shouldn't be suprising. It's more money that we'll have to spend at the Big Corporation's new e-commerce web site. It almosts reminds me of the situation in cryptonomicon, where the main characters basically discovered that the governments were "scared shitless" by the data vault because it could affect their ability to collect taxes. I'm not saying typical governments are going away, but this is a very small step twords a powershift in favor of corporations.
Ya know, that's a very hypocritical statement, considering that you agreed with the original poster - you are making broad judgements based on a stereotype. I am a Republican, and very much a Christian. I do not see the problem with the rich getting richer - hard work should be rewarded... if you believe otherwise you might feel more at home in China. But, I don't believe the poor should be poorer, nor should we trash the earth.
People having a somewhat more comfortable lifestyle because they work hard is one thing, Bill gates having as much money as the poorest 50 countries in the world combined is quite another. There is no reason for him to have 90 billion when people starve, whether or not the starving are lazy.
China is more polarized than the US, the wealth is concentrated in just a few hands, the government. Thats the direction we're going, but the money is going to corporations here instead.
The poor shouldn't be poorer...well, heck, lets just make everyone rich. I think you're actually agreeing with me here and don't realize it.
Now, you may or may not agree with this stance. But I do not view it as hateful or bigoted. I view people engaged in homosexual relationships the same as I view someone engaged in an adulterous or premarital sex relationship - they are a sinner, yes, but we ALL are...we all need forgiveness, and NO ONE can stand blameless in front of God without Christ.
So basically you're agreeing with me again, we have no right to be judgemental when we're all sinners. In the lutheran church, women can't become ministers. How many people belong to the Lutheran church?
At my church, women have a hard time being allowed to even usher.
Perhaps, Hemos, you should concentrate on articles that are more than marketing and advertising for companies. This remind me of the that trillion-giga-tera bit rounter from lucent that big comapnies couldn't even afford at this point and all those AT&T commercials a few year back with Tom Sellic(sp?) telling us how they were going to make heaven on earth with their technology. Lets have some articles with technical backing and insight.
I'd rather talk about offtopic-topics like the WTO discussion the other day. Now that was interesting...around 800 posts!
Which is why I beleive in seperation of church and state. The bible states this I beleive, here is my buchered version: "Let what is God's be God's and what is Herod's be Herod's."
The problem is that if society is to survive there has to be some ethical standard in politics or humans aren't going to be around a whole lot longer, given what we can do with our technology. I think ethics is a politically correct word for morals. So whose morals will we use? There isnt anything close to a majority in the world as far as what the moral basis might be. And what makes the majority correct? I know I'm bordering on relativism here, but it seems almost impossible to me that the human race will ever reach some sort of consensus or even "agree to disagree". Because of this I think we've already sealed our fate, although I try to work for something better than this outcome.
They're different degrees of sterotyping. I've actually studied this beyond what they say on the evening news. My comment was short so I can't particalulary prove this. I was "bitching" about people who have a knee-jerk reaction whenever the word "christian" is spoken.
Nice. I've been wanting to write a comment like this for a while. I'm much more left wing than right, but as a "beleiver in God" and somewhat of a christian, I have a few conservative views. I like your list of things that you don't beleive. I think a lot of christians (actually most that I know) would agree with what you say. Unfortunatly for most who get their information about religion from the evening news, all they see is the crazy abortion clinic bomber and the politician spouting off lies while claiming to be a christian.
Speaking of that, I'd like to add something to your list, which I'm not sure you'd agree with:
Republicans (and politicians in general) who claim to be christians ARE NOT. Howver this boils down to what you define as a christian, and republicans don't fit the bill in my eyes. They promote a world where the rich get richer, the poor gets poorer, and the health of the earth declines. What happened to being humble and the golden rule?
Even from a religious point of view I don't think Katz' mainstream type-opinions of it are totally unfouned, even if they do lack a firm knowledge of the subject. Religion (here I refer to christians, as in catholics and protestants) has gotten away from the golden rule, loving your neighbor as yourself, etc, and become a very judgemental entity. Particularly its treatment of gays and women. The church still does a lot of good work, but I don't go to church anymore because of reasons like the ones above. I could probably find a church that fits my views if I looked hard enough, however.
As far as y2k, there aren't many religious people who really think y2k is the apocalype (I know some that wouldn't mind, however). My aunt is a pentacostal (the most extreme right wing branch of christianity that I know of) and she doesn't think anything will happen. I've seen left-leaning magazines that state that all christians think y2k is the end, which is totally unfounded. Propeganda comes from everywhere.
While I don't like the patent or this lawsuit for obvious reasons, I'm not a big fan of one-click purchasing. It's impulse buying at it's worst.
I don't think I'll stop shopping at amazon though, their prices are simply too good on a lot of books. Pretty much any company that is large enough tries these kind of B.S. lawsuits all the time. Barnes and Noble isn't any better than amazon. If I were a Good Person I'd probably shop at a locally owned bookstore and be happy about spending a few extra bucks.
I'm not so sure how being able to make that decision is helping the people. Thats almost like saying you aren't free unless you can sell yourself into slavery, there isn't much benefit there. Hormote treated beef is of dubious value, and unless the price is lower than untreated beef, it can only be of neutral value, or bad if it causes health problems that are yet unknown. I don't live in Europe obviously but I was under the impression that the people didn't want the meat anyway. The WTO still went around the government's wishes and imposed it's own antidemocratic ruling.
People need to realize that the large majority of protesters aren't protesting against globaliztion, they're protesting against unequal labor rights. The WTO wants you to beleive that the protesters seek reactionary protectionist measures along the lines of Pat Buchanan's beliefs. This simply isn't true.
As long as there are unequal labor rights, corporations can use this as leverage at the bargaining table. "Accept these concessions or we'll shit all your jobs to the Phillipines where we can pay them 10% as much." This opportunity for corporations puts downward pressure on the middle class. This is what the protesters are afraid of, as far as the labor rights issue goes.
As far as this being a 3rd world issue, you're partly right, but everyone can help. In a lot of these 3rd world countries in the WTO you'll be jailed or maybe even shot if you speak out against the WTO and the government decision to be a member. This is an american issue as well however, becasue of the possibility of the gap between the rich and poor widening even more.
Keep in mind that the WTO really IS a form of global government because it can bypass laws of any member country! Countries can leave, but that keeps them out of the international trade loop.
Keep this in mind:
Globalization can be a Good Thing, but NOT with the WTO as the method. It is not designed to help the average person any way you look at it, it only benefits corporations and renders them unaccountable. Everything I've read about it points to this, and any benefits it gives us are outweighed by its problems. This is a step backwards politically.
The WTO doesn't particularly support unions, and they are undermined anyway by the competition created between factory workers in different countries. A company can say to a union "accept these concessions or we'll take all these jobs to another country where we can pay them 10% as much."
This is why the AFL-CIO has so many members there protesting right now. But I agree with most of the rest of your comments.
I am a bit suprised to see this on slashdot, but since it's here I have a few things to say:)
I posted this link earlier on the "cyber-sit in story" or whatever it was called. I'll warn you this time that it is a very left-wing site, but don't worry, it won't kill you. In fact, you might learn something. It's a good addition to mainstream coverage that doesn't talk about the WTO at a particularly intellectual level.
I didn't think so many people would end up protesting. This is good because it gives the issue LOTS of attention. As usual the media has overblown the violence, looks like a few bonfires and some broken windows. But it looks like its getting a lot uglier. It's been mostly peaceful from what I've seen other than blocking traffic and enterance to the event. Hopefully people from Seattle will keep us up to date.
The WTO applies to the computer and sofware industry the same as it does to every other industry. The WTO is, in my opinion, a government by and for corporations. They don't have any accountabilty to the public. They can overturn laws in any member country that are deemed unfair to competition. The most common example I have seen is that countries in Europe were cited by the WTO for not allowing the sale of American beef products because the cows were treated with hormones. CNN.com has a few other examples in their coverage.
I think the WTO is an extreme form of capitalism that REALLY puts money before people. It takes control away from local governments and the people.
Globalization definately has its benefits. I think most people reading this can see them as far as the hardware and software industry, especially our trade relationship with Asian countries. I see it as a step twords global unification (well, a really small step). But when labor rights and the environment aren't put first, no one wins, and the gap between the rich and poor gets wider. I think this is why so many protesters have descended on Seattle. Corporations have gone too far this time. The establishment better be careful or the next decade could end up being a rehash of the 60's with globalization as the central issue.
At any rate it's an important issue that everyone should try to learn about.
So the FBI strongarmed a small business. Not good. People flamed the isp's other customers because he caved in. Thats fine with me. If his customers think this is a bad move on his part, and think that for some reason any other isp would act different, it's their own choice to leave. Thats the unfortunate reality for the isp's owner. Freedom of choice means freedom to be stupid and uninformed as well.
Sure, flaming isn't very mature, but is it any different than arguing in real life? Telling the average person to not flame is like asking the human race to evolve an order of magnitude beyond what we're at now. You should work for change but you have to deal with the current reality as well.
Selfishness is a root probem in our society. He put his money (and perhaps well being) in front of a right we need to stand up for. Sure this is just some silly y2k movie but the principle is the same.
"I have put my life on the line several times for [free speech] and all the freedoms guaranteed under the US Constitution," one angry advocate wrote Wieger. "You were not given a court order. You just got scared for your mortgage and your Lexus payment and are in that light a coward."
Obviously a flame but in a way he's right as well. People in the past did fight and die for the freedoms we have today. I know this sounds preachy and holier than thou since I can't live up to the people who really did put their lives on the line. But lets not simply ignore the fact. Simply saying that "thats just the way it is" is part of the reason the world is the way it is.
Unless you're really really rich, and want to get richer. They scare me more than the US government, be cause they have the power to overrule laws of any member country that get in the way of "competition". This includes labar and environmental laws. The web page below has a number of articles on the WTO as well as photos of some of the demonstrations going on. Seattle doesn't look like a happy place at the moment.
Re:You, Me and MegaCorp Inc. all do it for profit.
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Profiling A Nation
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· Score: 2
You're definatly right when it comes to the US. There is no mainstream support for better privacy laws. Only organizations like the EFF, ACLU, and PIRG do any whistleblowing, the news doesn't cover it much, and most people don't care. Those that do are called paranoid, withness yesterday's article on quake 3.
If there is going to be some sort of "revolution" as far as privacy and civil rights for that matter it's not going to be in the US. Most of Europe has much better laws than the rest of the first world, but they're still not good enough. It won't be China either (I used to think they had a lot of potential for revolution), because the Chinese government figured out how to numb their population: they're getting them hooked on the same drug as Americans, materialism.
Most marketing information doesn't bother me that much, I don't mind getting a few computer ads once in a while. Or maybe I should say it wouldn't bother me if I knew that was the only way it was going to be used. Once it falls into the wrong hands, it could be used to jail you, discredit you, deny loan applications, any 1984 type scenarion you can think of.
I think we need to add onto the 4th amendment or at least base new laws off of it, something like this: no personal knowledge may be obtained by another party without the consent of the individual, as well as knowledge of exactly how it will be used. Anything less than this is unacceptable to me.
I've been regularly reading/posting slashdot for about 4 months now, so I'm relatively new. The SNR ratio may have gone down, thats usually safe to say when the number of users keeps going up, as well as the other side effects of popularity. There isn't much need to worry , however.
Slashdot is still WAY better than most media outlets. What do you get from mainstream media, even those that normally cover tech-related issues? You get one opinion, filtered down and censored, so they don't offend anyone. On top of that most news sources cover tabloid topics nowdays, things that don't matter at all in the grand scheme of things.
On slashdot we have an unlimited number of opinions that I can learn something from (new ideas). Posters here actually know something about computers and tech in general, most posts are better than some journalist writing for a newspaper who likes to say "windows sucks, imacs are cool".
I really like the alternative viewpoints here as well. You're not going to find arguements against capitalism or the US on CBS evening news with Dan Rather. In addition to tech related stuff, we've got politics, economics, and social issues as well (or they at least come up in the posts).
Basically the positives outweigh the negatives: you still can't have everything. Slashdot might have a bit of a "tabloid" effect like mainstream media does, but it's not nearly as bad. The bottom line for me is that I'm exposed to more opinions, and I'm challenged to think by slashdot posts more than any mainstream story ever could.
Personally I hope all media evolves into a more "populist" form like slashdot someday.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm not sure how this really threatens ebay financially. They don't have much for banner ads, and I think most of there revenue comes from the charges for listing your product on their pages. How does this "parasite" comapny make money from ebay? Do they have banner ads? Charge people to view the data? The only thing I can think of is banner ads, as it's pretty hard to charge for a limited increase in "information value" (whatever you call it) over something you can get for free somewhere else in a similar form.
Has this ever been ruled upon in the courts before? I don't know of any cases, I'd be interested in any that might have been. What worries me is that ebay seems to think that linking = cracking (cracking being the word they used). If this is all they have to file a lawsuit I don't think they'll win, but you never know. That goes right to the issue of the legality of links we've been seeing the past few weeks. Stories like this support my theory that capitalism is incompatible with the "information age", but thats a whole seperate issue.
We're not in any position to argue morals? Are you a fatalist? We better try, otherwise there isn't going to be anything left. Technology doesn't respect morals OR life. You're arguing to use it for moral reasons anyway, as in improving the conditions of life on the planet.
I don't quite understand your argument when you say the human race is not special, is in no position to have morals, and are dumb in general, yet you argue for moral use of this.
I would hope that is the case (ignoring prior art) but I would think the judge would have come right out and said it. Who knows though, it's too bad the article didn't go further in depth. Damn mainstream media...
While this is great there decision wasn't one of "prior art" as much as it was:
U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker on Tuesday upheld a challenge by
Promega Corp., which argued that scientists got the important patent in
1990 by misrepresenting their experiments and falsely claiming advances
over previous discoveries.
So it sounds to me like it was more for scientific technical reasons. It also sounds like there is another company that could come forward and gets patents like this one. What do you guys think? Same interpretation?
If it is the way I think it is, there really hasn't been any breakthrough...
Scientists don't really have any training based on morailty. Generally they do what they do for science sake. We don't have many conservative leaders, by conservative I mean asking what affect this technology will have 10 generations from now. You can't exactly extrapolate out that far, but I think you know what i mean. People who might have insights in this area are probably religious leaders and philosophers.
If they actually have the ability to create even the most basic life forms, this is INCREDIBLY huge with ramifications beyond anything I can image. It won't be long before we can create complex organisms if this turns out to be true. Look at how quickly computers developed over the past 50 years. Amazing.
Our society has no mechanisms (institutions) to handle something like this. It's more like "if it makes money, go for it". Of course we do have laws limiting some harmful activities, but the church is the closest thing we have to a "moral" institution, regardless of what you think of them.
They should be consulting philosophers as well as a number of religious leaders. IMO, our society isn't ready for this, just like we aren't ready for genetic engineering. Given how our society acts twords most of it's population, the ability to do harm is too high.
Religious leaders would probably be against it, but they would probably also so that this isn't creating life. You can't "manufacture" a soul would probably be their argument.
Good article, I like his approach. It will be interesting to see if his company can maintain that style of business as it grows and when he retires. All businesses over time seem to add on beurocratic layers and stagnate, stifiling engenuity.
I would have liked the web site to have contained references to the law texts. That would have made it much more trustworthy. How many of the laws mentioned, I wonder, are nothing more than urban legends?
Most of them are probably true. They're basically old laws that aren't relavent today. Most of them probably did have some good reason some years ago, you pointed out one that still is relavent. A lot of them were also a way to oppress certain groups, like no anal sex, to opress gays, or to push a certain "moral" agenda at any rate.
Yeah, I had a book like this too. I recognized a few of the laws for my state, it's illegal to sleep naked or have oral sex. I did a few searches on amazon like "silly laws" and came up with a few hits. I'd guess the web authors probably used books already written for most of their material...I sure wouldn't want to wade through millions of pages of laws when the research has already been done.
Unless people start freaking out about "unnatural" modifications, of course. I am a little worried about that laws that will start to happen when this tech gets more advanced - it's very, very, very primitive right now - how about when you could get enhanced vision? Or strain-free screens to read off of? (via a direct digital connection!)
:(
There is reason to be worried. Since our society isn't going to do away with money anytime soon, and this stuff isn't free, this could just further polarize society. Don't have those optic enhancers? Sorry, you can't be a pilot. Don't have those memory enhancers? Sorry, you can't be a scientist. We DO need very specific laws on this because the potential for misuse is so big. Our government is still clueless on the "information age", much less all the new advancements in biotech.
More importnantly, do we really want to turn ourselves in into the borg? This sounds silly now, but there isn't much discussion into the future. New tech? If it makes us money, go for it!! Damn the consequences!
I generally stray away from Katz-bashing, but in this case he basically just summed up (or almost plagerized) the huge discussion here on Teusday night, I think it was. Around 800 posts. One of the best discussions I've seen here, as far as what I like to see.
In that discussion, most posters didn't overplay the importance of technology/internet in this issue. But indeed, as you say, Katz couldn't resist, and thats unfortunate.
Of course communications technology was an integral part of compaines ability to grow from small and local to international and controling incredible amounts of capital and resources. But that technology isn't directly related to the issue today.
The internet wasn't the catylist for this demonstration, the fact that the WTO can be accurately described (in my opinion) as evil was enough to get "apethetic" Americans back out in the streets and demanding rights for everyone.
The internet does have incredible potential for being a catylist for social change. Unfortunatly right now the internet for most people is chatting on AOL and buying stuff at *.com. Technology can't change this, the people have to want to change. Katz needs to review what technology can and can't do. Hopefully this protest really is the start of a new movement. But this is about the people, not the technology.
In the short term (at least) this is obviously a Good Thing. Perhaps this points to slow waning of government power. Since the WTO is mostly a collective unit of corporations, this agreement shouldn't be suprising. It's more money that we'll have to spend at the Big Corporation's new e-commerce web site. It almosts reminds me of the situation in cryptonomicon, where the main characters basically discovered that the governments were "scared shitless" by the data vault because it could affect their ability to collect taxes. I'm not saying typical governments are going away, but this is a very small step twords a powershift in favor of corporations.
Ya know, that's a very hypocritical statement, considering that you agreed with the original poster - you are making broad judgements based on a stereotype. I am a Republican, and very much a Christian. I do not see the problem with the rich getting richer - hard work should be rewarded... if you believe otherwise you might feel more at home in China. But, I don't believe the poor should be poorer, nor should we trash the earth.
People having a somewhat more comfortable lifestyle because they work hard is one thing, Bill gates having as much money as the poorest 50 countries in the world combined is quite another. There is no reason for him to have 90 billion when people starve, whether or not the starving are lazy.
China is more polarized than the US, the wealth is concentrated in just a few hands, the government. Thats the direction we're going, but the money is going to corporations here instead.
The poor shouldn't be poorer...well, heck, lets just make everyone rich. I think you're actually agreeing with me here and don't realize it.
Now, you may or may not agree with this stance. But I do not view it as hateful or bigoted. I view people engaged in homosexual relationships the same as I view someone engaged in an adulterous or premarital sex relationship - they are a sinner, yes, but we ALL are...we all need forgiveness, and NO ONE can stand blameless in front of God without Christ.
So basically you're agreeing with me again, we have no right to be judgemental when we're all sinners. In the lutheran church, women can't become ministers. How many people belong to the Lutheran church?
At my church, women have a hard time being allowed to even usher.
Perhaps, Hemos, you should concentrate on articles that are more than marketing and advertising for companies. This remind me of the that trillion-giga-tera bit rounter from lucent that big comapnies couldn't even afford at this point and all those AT&T commercials a few year back with Tom Sellic(sp?) telling us how they were going to make heaven on earth with their technology. Lets have some articles with technical backing and insight.
I'd rather talk about offtopic-topics like the WTO discussion the other day. Now that was interesting...around 800 posts!
Which is why I beleive in seperation of church and state. The bible states this I beleive, here is my buchered version: "Let what is God's be God's and what is Herod's be Herod's."
The problem is that if society is to survive there has to be some ethical standard in politics or humans aren't going to be around a whole lot longer, given what we can do with our technology. I think ethics is a politically correct word for morals. So whose morals will we use? There isnt anything close to a majority in the world as far as what the moral basis might be. And what makes the majority correct? I know I'm bordering on relativism here, but it seems almost impossible to me that the human race will ever reach some sort of consensus or even "agree to disagree". Because of this I think we've already sealed our fate, although I try to work for something better than this outcome.
They're different degrees of sterotyping. I've actually studied this beyond what they say on the evening news. My comment was short so I can't particalulary prove this. I was "bitching" about people who have a knee-jerk reaction whenever the word "christian" is spoken.
Nice. I've been wanting to write a comment like this for a while. I'm much more left wing than right, but as a "beleiver in God" and somewhat of a christian, I have a few conservative views. I like your list of things that you don't beleive. I think a lot of christians (actually most that I know) would agree with what you say. Unfortunatly for most who get their information about religion from the evening news, all they see is the crazy abortion clinic bomber and the politician spouting off lies while claiming to be a christian.
Speaking of that, I'd like to add something to your list, which I'm not sure you'd agree with:
Republicans (and politicians in general) who claim to be christians ARE NOT. Howver this boils down to what you define as a christian, and republicans don't fit the bill in my eyes. They promote a world where the rich get richer, the poor gets poorer, and the health of the earth declines. What happened to being humble and the golden rule?
Even from a religious point of view I don't think Katz' mainstream type-opinions of it are totally unfouned, even if they do lack a firm knowledge of the subject. Religion (here I refer to christians, as in catholics and protestants) has gotten away from the golden rule, loving your neighbor as yourself, etc, and become a very judgemental entity. Particularly its treatment of gays and women. The church still does a lot of good work, but I don't go to church anymore because of reasons like the ones above. I could probably find a church that fits my views if I looked hard enough, however.
As far as y2k, there aren't many religious people who really think y2k is the apocalype (I know some that wouldn't mind, however). My aunt is a pentacostal (the most extreme right wing branch of christianity that I know of) and she doesn't think anything will happen. I've seen left-leaning magazines that state that all christians think y2k is the end, which is totally unfounded. Propeganda comes from everywhere.
While I don't like the patent or this lawsuit for obvious reasons, I'm not a big fan of one-click purchasing. It's impulse buying at it's worst.
I don't think I'll stop shopping at amazon though, their prices are simply too good on a lot of books. Pretty much any company that is large enough tries these kind of B.S. lawsuits all the time. Barnes and Noble isn't any better than amazon. If I were a Good Person I'd probably shop at a locally owned bookstore and be happy about spending a few extra bucks.
I'm not so sure how being able to make that decision is helping the people. Thats almost like saying you aren't free unless you can sell yourself into slavery, there isn't much benefit there. Hormote treated beef is of dubious value, and unless the price is lower than untreated beef, it can only be of neutral value, or bad if it causes health problems that are yet unknown. I don't live in Europe obviously but I was under the impression that the people didn't want the meat anyway. The WTO still went around the government's wishes and imposed it's own antidemocratic ruling.
People need to realize that the large majority of protesters aren't protesting against globaliztion, they're protesting against unequal labor rights. The WTO wants you to beleive that the protesters seek reactionary protectionist measures along the lines of Pat Buchanan's beliefs. This simply isn't true.
As long as there are unequal labor rights, corporations can use this as leverage at the bargaining table. "Accept these concessions or we'll shit all your jobs to the Phillipines where we can pay them 10% as much." This opportunity for corporations puts downward pressure on the middle class. This is what the protesters are afraid of, as far as the labor rights issue goes.
As far as this being a 3rd world issue, you're partly right, but everyone can help. In a lot of these 3rd world countries in the WTO you'll be jailed or maybe even shot if you speak out against the WTO and the government decision to be a member. This is an american issue as well however, becasue of the possibility of the gap between the rich and poor widening even more.
Keep in mind that the WTO really IS a form of global government because it can bypass laws of any member country! Countries can leave, but that keeps them out of the international trade loop.
Keep this in mind:
Globalization can be a Good Thing, but NOT with the WTO as the method. It is not designed to help the average person any way you look at it, it only benefits corporations and renders them unaccountable. Everything I've read about it points to this, and any benefits it gives us are outweighed by its problems. This is a step backwards politically.
The WTO doesn't particularly support unions, and they are undermined anyway by the competition created between factory workers in different countries. A company can say to a union "accept these concessions or we'll take all these jobs to another country where we can pay them 10% as much."
This is why the AFL-CIO has so many members there protesting right now. But I agree with most of the rest of your comments.
I am a bit suprised to see this on slashdot, but since it's here I have a few things to say :)
I posted this link earlier on the "cyber-sit in story" or whatever it was called. I'll warn you this time that it is a very left-wing site, but don't worry, it won't kill you. In fact, you might learn something. It's a good addition to mainstream coverage that doesn't talk about the WTO at a particularly intellectual level.
Z magazine WTO coverage
I didn't think so many people would end up protesting. This is good because it gives the issue LOTS of attention. As usual the media has overblown the violence, looks like a few bonfires and some broken windows. But it looks like its getting a lot uglier. It's been mostly peaceful from what I've seen other than blocking traffic and enterance to the event. Hopefully people from Seattle will keep us up to date.
The WTO applies to the computer and sofware industry the same as it does to every other industry. The WTO is, in my opinion, a government by and for corporations. They don't have any accountabilty to the public. They can overturn laws in any member country that are deemed unfair to competition. The most common example I have seen is that countries in Europe were cited by the WTO for not allowing the sale of American beef products because the cows were treated with hormones. CNN.com has a few other examples in their coverage.
I think the WTO is an extreme form of capitalism that REALLY puts money before people. It takes control away from local governments and the people.
Globalization definately has its benefits. I think most people reading this can see them as far as the hardware and software industry, especially our trade relationship with Asian countries. I see it as a step twords global unification (well, a really small step). But when labor rights and the environment aren't put first, no one wins, and the gap between the rich and poor gets wider. I think this is why so many protesters have descended on Seattle. Corporations have gone too far this time. The establishment better be careful or the next decade could end up being a rehash of the 60's with globalization as the central issue.
At any rate it's an important issue that everyone should try to learn about.
So the FBI strongarmed a small business. Not good. People flamed the isp's other customers because he caved in. Thats fine with me. If his customers think this is a bad move on his part, and think that for some reason any other isp would act different, it's their own choice to leave. Thats the unfortunate reality for the isp's owner. Freedom of choice means freedom to be stupid and uninformed as well.
Sure, flaming isn't very mature, but is it any different than arguing in real life? Telling the average person to not flame is like asking the human race to evolve an order of magnitude beyond what we're at now. You should work for change but you have to deal with the current reality as well.
Selfishness is a root probem in our society. He put his money (and perhaps well being) in front of a right we need to stand up for. Sure this is just some silly y2k movie but the principle is the same.
"I have put my life on the line several times for [free speech] and all the freedoms guaranteed under the US Constitution," one angry advocate wrote Wieger. "You were not given a court order. You just got scared for your mortgage and your Lexus payment and are in that light a coward."
Obviously a flame but in a way he's right as well. People in the past did fight and die for the freedoms we have today. I know this sounds preachy and holier than thou since I can't live up to the people who really did put their lives on the line. But lets not simply ignore the fact. Simply saying that "thats just the way it is" is part of the reason the world is the way it is.
Unless you're really really rich, and want to get richer. They scare me more than the US government, be cause they have the power to overrule laws of any member country that get in the way of "competition". This includes labar and environmental laws. The web page below has a number of articles on the WTO as well as photos of some of the demonstrations going on. Seattle doesn't look like a happy place at the moment.
b alEcon.htm
http://www.zmag.org/CrisesCurEvts/Globalism/Glo
You're definatly right when it comes to the US. There is no mainstream support for better privacy laws. Only organizations like the EFF, ACLU, and PIRG do any whistleblowing, the news doesn't cover it much, and most people don't care. Those that do are called paranoid, withness yesterday's article on quake 3.
If there is going to be some sort of "revolution" as far as privacy and civil rights for that matter it's not going to be in the US. Most of Europe has much better laws than the rest of the first world, but they're still not good enough. It won't be China either (I used to think they had a lot of potential for revolution), because the Chinese government figured out how to numb their population: they're getting them hooked on the same drug as Americans, materialism.
Most marketing information doesn't bother me that much, I don't mind getting a few computer ads once in a while. Or maybe I should say it wouldn't bother me if I knew that was the only way it was going to be used. Once it falls into the wrong hands, it could be used to jail you, discredit you, deny loan applications, any 1984 type scenarion you can think of.
I think we need to add onto the 4th amendment or at least base new laws off of it, something like this: no personal knowledge may be obtained by another party without the consent of the individual, as well as knowledge of exactly how it will be used. Anything less than this is unacceptable to me.
I've been regularly reading/posting slashdot for about 4 months now, so I'm relatively new. The SNR ratio may have gone down, thats usually safe to say when the number of users keeps going up, as well as the other side effects of popularity. There isn't much need to worry , however.
Slashdot is still WAY better than most media outlets. What do you get from mainstream media, even those that normally cover tech-related issues? You get one opinion, filtered down and censored, so they don't offend anyone. On top of that most news sources cover tabloid topics nowdays, things that don't matter at all in the grand scheme of things.
On slashdot we have an unlimited number of opinions that I can learn something from (new ideas). Posters here actually know something about computers and tech in general, most posts are better than some journalist writing for a newspaper who likes to say "windows sucks, imacs are cool".
I really like the alternative viewpoints here as well. You're not going to find arguements against capitalism or the US on CBS evening news with Dan Rather. In addition to tech related stuff, we've got politics, economics, and social issues as well (or they at least come up in the posts).
Basically the positives outweigh the negatives: you still can't have everything. Slashdot might have a bit of a "tabloid" effect like mainstream media does, but it's not nearly as bad. The bottom line for me is that I'm exposed to more opinions, and I'm challenged to think by slashdot posts more than any mainstream story ever could.
Personally I hope all media evolves into a more "populist" form like slashdot someday.