When you say "accept this BS" what exactly do you expect us to do?
Complain to the security people? Oh yeh, that will help. I saw some guy threatened with getting booted from his flight because he showed a tiny bit of attitude and used the word "terrorist". These security people love the power that's fallen in their laps.
Complain to the airlines? They'll just say it's the fault of government. Complain to government? "It's for your safety". I wrote to my MP about complaining about the proposal to put safety barriers at railway stations and got a long "that's nice, go away now" letter as a response. I won't vote for her, of course, but it won't make a bit of difference.
I think the best protest is really just not to fly, but unfortunately this isn't always an option.
I think it's impressive that in just a few decades, flying has grown from an enjoyable and exciting activity to a dignity sucking scramble to get through it without hitting anybody.
Oh well, at least it's good for the environment that way:)
Luckily, the policy positions of the UK government do not entirely represent the UK, otherwise I'd completely agree with you.
Outside of the spineless lap-dogs in the government, we still have art, music, comedy and other culture that is very much independent of the United States (although, of course, influenced by US culture) and still worth something.
I may not be very proud of my government but I am (occasionally) proud of the citizens of the UK.
In a previous University job, I was responsible for a server that got hacked. It was entirely my fault for installing services carelessly but even so, they were really good about it. Instead of bollocking me or cutting off my privileges, they told me exactly what to do to clean the machine along with some really useful documentation to prevent it from happening again.
Their attitude seemed to that at a University, you need flexibility to get stuff done so bad things are bound to happen occasionally. This outbreak of common sense gave me a big boost in confidence in University sysadmins.
It's not just security
on
The Pragmatic CSO
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· Score: 4, Insightful
This idea of people focussing on their own job role to the detriment of the overall organisation is very common.
Finance people think hours filling in expenses claims over £30 lunches, support who won't let you install a vital and harmless piece of software because it's against regulations, managers who call so many status report meetings it's impossible to get any real work done... this kind of stuff happens all the time.
A lot of people are self important, narrow minded and don't see the big picture. In other news, water is wet.
Compromise is obviously important, although in this case it's rather one sided.
However, what Obama has done is to harness the power of a progressive base in order to get the nomination and then within 6 weeks of securing that nomination, take a number of positions that would have enraged that base support during the race.
If this kind of "bipartisanship" was so important to him, why didn't we see it while he was being holier than thou about "change" and calling Hilary Clinton a corrupt pawn of the establishment?
Whenever they talk about these human genome projects (including the guys who can sequence it in a matter of weeks) I always wonder whose genome they're talking about. How long before this become a privacy issue?
Amen, brother. Don't even get me started on not carrying 100ml of fluid or taking my shoes off at the security gate. Forget Loose-Change style "Bush did it" conspiracy theories, Al Qaeda is probably a puppet of the security companies.
The standard narrative for Dem caving is that they fear for their electability or whatever. It's also possible that they just believe what they vote for.
This reminds me of what I started doing AI and we spent ages fussing over the definition of "intelligence".
I asked my dad, who is an engineer, about it and he said: "who cares as long as it's doing something useful."
I know, I know, we might get better leverage from new apps with a big paradigm shift and massive restructuring, but as long as what we're using still fulfills requirements, there needs to be a very strong argument for messing with it.
Maybe we could set up an exchange program. Ship Wal-Mart consumer drones from the UK (yes, we have quite a few) to the US in exchange for your middle class eccentrics.
I have a friend who worked in IT in the UK. He got sick of it and went to work on a ranch in rural Australia. I'm willing to bet there are quite a few farmers in rural Australia who would kill to work in IT in the UK.
1. Set up exchanges for people who think the grass is greener. 2. They get to find out if they're right. 3. ??? 4. Profit!
I had to spend several hours slacking on BoingBoing and Digg instead. I even laughed heartily at a joke that involved a guy giving himself "deadfecesguy" as a nickname. Who do I sue for mental distress?
I would have thought that technically, the DOJ can kick Wikipedia's ass on this one, if they were serious enough about it. Are we going to reach the stage where Wikipedia has to roll over or find some kind of safe haven for its servers, a la Pirate Bay?
Maybe there's a market for some small country to become a haven for unpopular websites - I kind of internet equivalent of the Cayman Islands or Monte Carlo.
Of course, if Wikipedia did have to do that, the first amendment is basically busted.
Using a list of common tasks to test a piece of software is simple, brilliant, and done all too infrequently. I can't count the number of times I've been using an application and can't work out how to do something that hundreds of other people must also want to do, and yet the developer has not made this task obvious.
Open source tools often suffer from this because they are so proud of their features. I remember trying to burn a data CD under Linux 3 or 4 years ago and the tool I was using did not make it at all obvious how I drag files into the workspace and then burn them. It did, however, make the SCSI options for me CD drive immediately available.
Web pages often suffer because they are style over substance. Yes, it looks very pretty, but how do I buy stuff? Well done for having text on the front page that tells me how "obsessed by quality" you are, but where is the contact address so I can ask you questions about your product?
Software libraries suffer when they are more interested in recruiting developers than serving users. I remember trying to use a Perl tool that required a specific module. The web page for the module had a great deal of links about writing applications using that module but nowhere on the whole page did it tell me how to download and install the module so it could be used with an existing application.
When designing any piece of software think: what will this be mostly used for? Does it make it easy to do that?
I was at a (molecular biology) conference once where a guy was talking about pouring connexin proteins onto damaged skin. This promotes communication, which apparently speeds up the healing process.
This was all well and good but then he said that he was funded by the Navy and "of course they have quite a lot of people with damaged skin at the moment - teehee!"
Possibly the most bad taste "joke" I have ever heard at a conference.
Like most other human beings, I love the Toy Story movies but seriously: can't you come up with a new idea?
I was saying only recently that it was only a matter of time before Pixar worried that they were losing it and grabbed desperately for their most successful franchise and here they've done it already.
I think it's a kind of prisoner's dilemma. In their eyes, they have a better chance of making a succe$$ful product if they make a Toy Story movie, even if the movie itself blows. Their reasoning is that whether the movie is good or not, they do better.
However, If they make a sucky Toy Story film, they cheapen the franchise, making the other Toy Story films somehow less to the viewing public and damaging their credibility - everybody loses.
I definitely enjoy the original Star Wars films less now that Lucas has taken a big dump on the Star Wars Universe with the execrable prequels - I'd rather he had never made them.
Advertising is a typical example of something that provides economic benefit at the expense of the mental (spiritual?) well-being of the populous. Most adverts I see on TV use people's fears and insecurities to convince them to buy products they really don't need. The worst examples are cosmetics ("Because you're worth it!") and electronic goods (do you *really* need a 1080p TV? The latest fancy phone? You do, otherwise other people will laugh at you).
Of course, these adverts stimulate spending and provide revenue for the TV companies, but these days they make me so mad I hardly watch commercial TV. I would far rather pay £110 a year and watch the advertising-free BBC.
I seem to remember reading somewhere (can't find it now) that Nepal banned billboard advertising because they decided that the reduction in happiness caused by these adverts was not worth the positive economic effects. I applaud this approach.
Is government about generating wealth or generating happiness?
Slashdot Mirror
When you say "accept this BS" what exactly do you expect us to do?
Complain to the security people? Oh yeh, that will help. I saw some guy threatened with getting booted from his flight because he showed a tiny bit of attitude and used the word "terrorist". These security people love the power that's fallen in their laps.
Complain to the airlines? They'll just say it's the fault of government. Complain to government? "It's for your safety". I wrote to my MP about complaining about the proposal to put safety barriers at railway stations and got a long "that's nice, go away now" letter as a response. I won't vote for her, of course, but it won't make a bit of difference.
I think the best protest is really just not to fly, but unfortunately this isn't always an option.
I think it's impressive that in just a few decades, flying has grown from an enjoyable and exciting activity to a dignity sucking scramble to get through it without hitting anybody.
Oh well, at least it's good for the environment that way :)
Luckily, the policy positions of the UK government do not entirely represent the UK, otherwise I'd completely agree with you.
Outside of the spineless lap-dogs in the government, we still have art, music, comedy and other culture that is very much independent of the United States (although, of course, influenced by US culture) and still worth something.
I may not be very proud of my government but I am (occasionally) proud of the citizens of the UK.
In a previous University job, I was responsible for a server that got hacked. It was entirely my fault for installing services carelessly but even so, they were really good about it. Instead of bollocking me or cutting off my privileges, they told me exactly what to do to clean the machine along with some really useful documentation to prevent it from happening again.
Their attitude seemed to that at a University, you need flexibility to get stuff done so bad things are bound to happen occasionally. This outbreak of common sense gave me a big boost in confidence in University sysadmins.
This idea of people focussing on their own job role to the detriment of the overall organisation is very common.
Finance people think hours filling in expenses claims over £30 lunches, support who won't let you install a vital and harmless piece of software because it's against regulations, managers who call so many status report meetings it's impossible to get any real work done... this kind of stuff happens all the time.
A lot of people are self important, narrow minded and don't see the big picture. In other news, water is wet.
They're just jealous because their videos aren't as good as those done by amateurs.
Compromise is obviously important, although in this case it's rather one sided.
However, what Obama has done is to harness the power of a progressive base in order to get the nomination and then within 6 weeks of securing that nomination, take a number of positions that would have enraged that base support during the race.
If this kind of "bipartisanship" was so important to him, why didn't we see it while he was being holier than thou about "change" and calling Hilary Clinton a corrupt pawn of the establishment?
Why compromise?
It's not just FISA, there's also the death penalty for child rapists (is that "progressive"?), pulling out of public financing, and even being inflammatory on abortion despite being pro-choice in the past.
I think I agree with the Huffington Post. Is this the guy everybody got excited about?
Whenever they talk about these human genome projects (including the guys who can sequence it in a matter of weeks) I always wonder whose genome they're talking about. How long before this become a privacy issue?
Amen, brother. Don't even get me started on not carrying 100ml of fluid or taking my shoes off at the security gate. Forget Loose-Change style "Bush did it" conspiracy theories, Al Qaeda is probably a puppet of the security companies.
Does this also apply if you want to use three consecutive characters from an associated press story?
The standard narrative for Dem caving is that they fear for their electability or whatever. It's also possible that they just believe what they vote for.
This reminds me of what I started doing AI and we spent ages fussing over the definition of "intelligence".
I asked my dad, who is an engineer, about it and he said: "who cares as long as it's doing something useful."
I know, I know, we might get better leverage from new apps with a big paradigm shift and massive restructuring, but as long as what we're using still fulfills requirements, there needs to be a very strong argument for messing with it.
Gone are the days when IT security testing firms are looking for Unix expertise. Now they're looking for actors.
Maybe we could set up an exchange program. Ship Wal-Mart consumer drones from the UK (yes, we have quite a few) to the US in exchange for your middle class eccentrics.
I have a friend who worked in IT in the UK. He got sick of it and went to work on a ranch in rural Australia. I'm willing to bet there are quite a few farmers in rural Australia who would kill to work in IT in the UK.
1. Set up exchanges for people who think the grass is greener.
2. They get to find out if they're right.
3. ???
4. Profit!
Did anyone *not* think that?
I had to spend several hours slacking on BoingBoing and Digg instead. I even laughed heartily at a joke that involved a guy giving himself "deadfecesguy" as a nickname. Who do I sue for mental distress?
I would have thought that technically, the DOJ can kick Wikipedia's ass on this one, if they were serious enough about it. Are we going to reach the stage where Wikipedia has to roll over or find some kind of safe haven for its servers, a la Pirate Bay?
Maybe there's a market for some small country to become a haven for unpopular websites - I kind of internet equivalent of the Cayman Islands or Monte Carlo.
Of course, if Wikipedia did have to do that, the first amendment is basically busted.
Or so it says here. This seems a bit odd to me.
Is cramming MacOS onto a wholly unsuitable machine the new version of doing the same thing with Linux?
I want a dock on my watch and my microwave to make that *DNNGGG!* noise when I open the door.
Using a list of common tasks to test a piece of software is simple, brilliant, and done all too infrequently. I can't count the number of times I've been using an application and can't work out how to do something that hundreds of other people must also want to do, and yet the developer has not made this task obvious.
Open source tools often suffer from this because they are so proud of their features. I remember trying to burn a data CD under Linux 3 or 4 years ago and the tool I was using did not make it at all obvious how I drag files into the workspace and then burn them. It did, however, make the SCSI options for me CD drive immediately available.
Web pages often suffer because they are style over substance. Yes, it looks very pretty, but how do I buy stuff? Well done for having text on the front page that tells me how "obsessed by quality" you are, but where is the contact address so I can ask you questions about your product?
Software libraries suffer when they are more interested in recruiting developers than serving users. I remember trying to use a Perl tool that required a specific module. The web page for the module had a great deal of links about writing applications using that module but nowhere on the whole page did it tell me how to download and install the module so it could be used with an existing application.
When designing any piece of software think: what will this be mostly used for? Does it make it easy to do that?
I was at a (molecular biology) conference once where a guy was talking about pouring connexin proteins onto damaged skin. This promotes communication, which apparently speeds up the healing process.
This was all well and good but then he said that he was funded by the Navy and "of course they have quite a lot of people with damaged skin at the moment - teehee!"
Possibly the most bad taste "joke" I have ever heard at a conference.
Sorry, I was referring to the wider story here.
Like most other human beings, I love the Toy Story movies but seriously: can't you come up with a new idea?
I was saying only recently that it was only a matter of time before Pixar worried that they were losing it and grabbed desperately for their most successful franchise and here they've done it already.
I think it's a kind of prisoner's dilemma. In their eyes, they have a better chance of making a succe$$ful product if they make a Toy Story movie, even if the movie itself blows. Their reasoning is that whether the movie is good or not, they do better.
However, If they make a sucky Toy Story film, they cheapen the franchise, making the other Toy Story films somehow less to the viewing public and damaging their credibility - everybody loses.
I definitely enjoy the original Star Wars films less now that Lucas has taken a big dump on the Star Wars Universe with the execrable prequels - I'd rather he had never made them.
Advertising is a typical example of something that provides economic benefit at the expense of the mental (spiritual?) well-being of the populous. Most adverts I see on TV use people's fears and insecurities to convince them to buy products they really don't need. The worst examples are cosmetics ("Because you're worth it!") and electronic goods (do you *really* need a 1080p TV? The latest fancy phone? You do, otherwise other people will laugh at you).
Of course, these adverts stimulate spending and provide revenue for the TV companies, but these days they make me so mad I hardly watch commercial TV. I would far rather pay £110 a year and watch the advertising-free BBC.
I seem to remember reading somewhere (can't find it now) that Nepal banned billboard advertising because they decided that the reduction in happiness caused by these adverts was not worth the positive economic effects. I applaud this approach.
Is government about generating wealth or generating happiness?
Peter