I don't think their plans are working that well...
Interesting. A 6 month slide, about the same time as Idle has been up and running. Coincidence? Probably not.
Unless something is done soon about samzenpus' inability to post a professional article I'm pretty much done. No-one is stopping there being an Idle if that's what people want. All we ask is -- keep it segregated. There is plenty room on the main page for humor too, it just needs to be presented in a more skilled way.
I'm inclined to agree with some of the posters here, in that this article should be mainpageworthy -- it's just that samzenpus has screwed it up and dumbed it down in his usual way. This is easy to fix. Either fire him, or teach him to be more professional, or banish him permanently to Idle.
Some of these had minor British contributions, but are not by any stretch of the imagination British successes in their entirety. For example, penicillin was near worthless without contributions from US scientists at Pfizer. (Fleming's contribution is vastly overrated). And lets not even start on Logie Baird.
One thing the British seem to be inventing very well though is SURVEILLANCE SOCIETY.
They also invented Pop/American/etc Idol too. Something someone should be nuked for.
Just to clarify: This is the BBC. We are not "potential clients"; we have already paid the license fee. The BBC do cross-platform support because they are required to do it; they just needed a little "reminding".
It has taken them far too long to get Apple and Linux versions of this. However, at least they have finally done it. Coincidentally I tried to watch a show on the Channel 4 website today only to find it was completely impossible if you don't have a windows machine.
The DRM really has to go. The sooner the TV nets finally get it into their thick heads that all they have to do is broadcast on the web just as they do on TV, and have GLOBAL launches for shows -- reaping global advertisers at the same time -- the better it will be for all concerned. Not only will this be more profitable and convenient for everyone, fewer good shows will get canceled since the ratings stats will actually show true values, rather than small samples. It is no surprise that Channel 4 is near bankruptcy, they just don't get it.
NetworkWorld's sock puppets are working overtime for Christmas. This is at least the 3rd story in 24 hours or so to make slashdot. Sad, desperate, or what? Mind you, if you've read any of their site you'll understand why they need to spam to get readers.
Just wait until the London Olympics. We'll show the Chinese. Ha, they don't even have 5 million security cameras. Amateurs. Hadriansfirewall will kick your Greatfirewall's ass.
Comrade Gordon "the Butcher of Woolies" Brown-shirt, and Leader Jacqui "Winston" Smith will show you the way.
1. samzenpus seems not to know where the Idle section is.
2. Irrelevant photo in summary.
3. Slashdotted site for TFA, rendering article completely pointless.
Every time it's the same. Is there a way to filter stories to cut out ones from individual editors? Samzenpus' contributions are invariably poor. Did he used to work for Digg?
Yep that's very true. Facebook, like Myspace and eBay and others before them are quick to tout the "xxx million members" stats. It's NEVER true. It's pure hyperbole.
That's not active users. Many people register and never go back. Many people register several user accounts. For me, I registered a Facebook account a year or two ago, looked around and have never been back. Never will. There's nothing of value nor interest to me on Facebook. Yet they are presumably counting my id in that 140 million like I'm a satisfied, active user. I'm not.
The best thing to do is not comment on this kind of article -- other than to register protest.
I note the really lame article "The Year of 2008 In Cybercrime" from Networkworld got only 42 comments -- many of which were complaints about the low quality of Networkworld. That's the way to show the editors the failure of their new direction and their sell-out.
The slow idle-creep has to stop. If they want to have a Digg-type site then let them create a new site altogether. Call it Idle and keep it off Slashdot. The audience for Idle is NOT the same as Slashdot. At this rate someone will have to create a new site to cater for the core Slashdot audience, because it seems that Taco and the boys have stopped caring about their regular readers.
Where our spandex-clad Ballmerman can throw chairs faster than a speeding bullet. And deviate standards with a bloodcurdling "developers! developers! developers!"
Quick! To the grey Lexus! Holy blue screen of death, Ballmerman!
Working in groups is fine as long as there's relative freedom to work. The problem with institutionalized anything is that there's always more bureaucracy to suck up time away from creative progress. While status reports and performance reviews might be less in the academic world (I don't know if they are or not) than in the corporate world, I'm sure they are still a time-wasting headache.
I'm fairly sure the human race would be significantly more advanced if someone could travel back in time and assassinate Bismark. Both private and public sectors would be dramatically more productive if they didn't have to report progress, make funding proposals to the same extent, and handle human resources nonsense. This is the only reason why two guys in a garage can start a massive software company, and that same company stagnates and treads water after 8-10 years of existence.
Bureaucracy, middle managers, and human resources are the single biggest drain on human advancement.
And dear Grammar Nazis, take note that the object of language is communication. Shakespeare (perchance, fairly highly regarded for his vocabulary and poetry) made up new words and rules all the time. It's fun being creative with words.
If the grammar, spelling or sentence structure makes a passage unintelligible, then it's sometimes fine to point that out. Otherwise... shut the fuck up. Go bully people on Wikipedia like you normally do -- there you'll be very welcome.
It's valid, ironic criticism of Wikipedia. All too often people -- who should know better -- quote Wikipedia for some proof of something here on Slashdot. Of all people, slashdotters should know that wikipedia is often an unreliable source of information, and that the link they've quoted can be easily changed after it's posted.
The "citation needed" is also an ironic criticism of the deletionist, book-burning nazi-pedants who appear to make up a significant core of the wikipedia admins. And yes, it IS possible to have it both ways -- a reliable source without the nazi-pedant zealotry. It just that this is not the direction wikipedia chooses to go in. Thus, it's the worst of both issues -- unreliable and exclusionist.
Long may this meme continue, or at least until there are significant changes in the way Wikipedia is run.
And someday kids will wonder why it's called "YouTube" when they've only ever watched it on a thin, flat LCD screen....
They may already not be very familiar with cathode ray tubes. But never fear... Ted Stephens "a series of tubes" should last for a very, very, very long time. At least here, if nowhere else.
Is Twitter worth millions? Last I heard they were having a hard time figuring out how to make any money...
Worth? No. Neither is Facebook. They are only worth something to the executives who run those sites -- IF they get bought by some foolish large corporation. It was foolish to buy them 2 years ago, and it would be certifiably insane to do so in the current economic climate. These sites are only a means to advertise to a specific (gullible, obviously) demographic. They are just billboards in cyberspace. A way of leading the easily-led to one place to be advertised at. Since fewer people are consuming right now and global ad-spend is down, the value of these sites is dropping. I'd be astonished if they will last much longer.
Twitter is a bad idea, badly marketed (viral spam essentially), badly implemented, and at the wrong time. They may have to wait until Dot.com III to make any money. Given the instability of their site, I doubt they'll be around then.
Slashdot Mirror
Interesting. A 6 month slide, about the same time as Idle has been up and running. Coincidence? Probably not.
Unless something is done soon about samzenpus' inability to post a professional article I'm pretty much done. No-one is stopping there being an Idle if that's what people want. All we ask is -- keep it segregated. There is plenty room on the main page for humor too, it just needs to be presented in a more skilled way.
I'm inclined to agree with some of the posters here, in that this article should be mainpageworthy -- it's just that samzenpus has screwed it up and dumbed it down in his usual way. This is easy to fix. Either fire him, or teach him to be more professional, or banish him permanently to Idle.
"Sea Me We 3 and 4"
Sounds like two girls one cup. I suspect radical feminist sabotage this time.
Some of these had minor British contributions, but are not by any stretch of the imagination British successes in their entirety. For example, penicillin was near worthless without contributions from US scientists at Pfizer. (Fleming's contribution is vastly overrated). And lets not even start on Logie Baird.
One thing the British seem to be inventing very well though is SURVEILLANCE SOCIETY.
They also invented Pop/American/etc Idol too. Something someone should be nuked for.
It has taken them far too long to get Apple and Linux versions of this. However, at least they have finally done it. Coincidentally I tried to watch a show on the Channel 4 website today only to find it was completely impossible if you don't have a windows machine.
The DRM really has to go. The sooner the TV nets finally get it into their thick heads that all they have to do is broadcast on the web just as they do on TV, and have GLOBAL launches for shows -- reaping global advertisers at the same time -- the better it will be for all concerned. Not only will this be more profitable and convenient for everyone, fewer good shows will get canceled since the ratings stats will actually show true values, rather than small samples. It is no surprise that Channel 4 is near bankruptcy, they just don't get it.
Actually, worse. You get NetworkWorld... AGAIN.
NetworkWorld's sock puppets are working overtime for Christmas. This is at least the 3rd story in 24 hours or so to make slashdot. Sad, desperate, or what? Mind you, if you've read any of their site you'll understand why they need to spam to get readers.
This story was on the BBC months ago by the way.
Can it run linux?
Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these
Can it run vista?
Less space that a (real live) nomad -- lame.
Just wait until the London Olympics. We'll show the Chinese. Ha, they don't even have 5 million security cameras. Amateurs. Hadriansfirewall will kick your Greatfirewall's ass.
Comrade Gordon "the Butcher of Woolies" Brown-shirt, and Leader Jacqui "Winston" Smith will show you the way.
Another samzenpus classic article.
1. samzenpus seems not to know where the Idle section is.
2. Irrelevant photo in summary.
3. Slashdotted site for TFA, rendering article completely pointless.
Every time it's the same. Is there a way to filter stories to cut out ones from individual editors? Samzenpus' contributions are invariably poor. Did he used to work for Digg?
Yep that's very true. Facebook, like Myspace and eBay and others before them are quick to tout the "xxx million members" stats. It's NEVER true. It's pure hyperbole.
That's not active users. Many people register and never go back. Many people register several user accounts. For me, I registered a Facebook account a year or two ago, looked around and have never been back. Never will. There's nothing of value nor interest to me on Facebook. Yet they are presumably counting my id in that 140 million like I'm a satisfied, active user. I'm not.
More likely... "eX"
Agreed.
NO MORE. IDLE.
NO. MORE. STORIES. LIKE. THIS.
Please. Editors take a moment to realize you are losing all respect for your readers. This will all end in tears.
The best thing to do is not comment on this kind of article -- other than to register protest.
I note the really lame article "The Year of 2008 In Cybercrime" from Networkworld got only 42 comments -- many of which were complaints about the low quality of Networkworld. That's the way to show the editors the failure of their new direction and their sell-out.
The slow idle-creep has to stop. If they want to have a Digg-type site then let them create a new site altogether. Call it Idle and keep it off Slashdot. The audience for Idle is NOT the same as Slashdot. At this rate someone will have to create a new site to cater for the core Slashdot audience, because it seems that Taco and the boys have stopped caring about their regular readers.
Where our spandex-clad Ballmerman can throw chairs faster than a speeding bullet. And deviate standards with a bloodcurdling "developers! developers! developers!"
Quick! To the grey Lexus! Holy blue screen of death, Ballmerman!
iCrime?
Networkworld = dumbfotainment.
Editors, please banish anything from this site to Idle -- slashdot's garbage can in other words. Better still, just banish it.
No. It's Yeti. Obviously...
Working in groups is fine as long as there's relative freedom to work. The problem with institutionalized anything is that there's always more bureaucracy to suck up time away from creative progress. While status reports and performance reviews might be less in the academic world (I don't know if they are or not) than in the corporate world, I'm sure they are still a time-wasting headache.
I'm fairly sure the human race would be significantly more advanced if someone could travel back in time and assassinate Bismark. Both private and public sectors would be dramatically more productive if they didn't have to report progress, make funding proposals to the same extent, and handle human resources nonsense. This is the only reason why two guys in a garage can start a massive software company, and that same company stagnates and treads water after 8-10 years of existence.
Bureaucracy, middle managers, and human resources are the single biggest drain on human advancement.
Thank you!
And dear Grammar Nazis, take note that the object of language is communication. Shakespeare (perchance, fairly highly regarded for his vocabulary and poetry) made up new words and rules all the time. It's fun being creative with words.
If the grammar, spelling or sentence structure makes a passage unintelligible, then it's sometimes fine to point that out. Otherwise... shut the fuck up. Go bully people on Wikipedia like you normally do -- there you'll be very welcome.
Ovens?
Sounds like too many cooks were involved.
Ah, no... it's not John McCain's.
It's George W. Bush's. His brain has been in the UK all along. Occam's Razor -- it goes a long way to explaining a great deal.
It's valid, ironic criticism of Wikipedia. All too often people -- who should know better -- quote Wikipedia for some proof of something here on Slashdot. Of all people, slashdotters should know that wikipedia is often an unreliable source of information, and that the link they've quoted can be easily changed after it's posted.
The "citation needed" is also an ironic criticism of the deletionist, book-burning nazi-pedants who appear to make up a significant core of the wikipedia admins. And yes, it IS possible to have it both ways -- a reliable source without the nazi-pedant zealotry. It just that this is not the direction wikipedia chooses to go in. Thus, it's the worst of both issues -- unreliable and exclusionist.
Long may this meme continue, or at least until there are significant changes in the way Wikipedia is run.
Now the only censorship of wikipedia is done by:
1. Wikpedia admins
2. Jimbo Wales personally
3. Cabals
4. The marketing and legal teams of Corporations
5. Governments
Still, one censorer less is something I suppose.
They may already not be very familiar with cathode ray tubes. But never fear... Ted Stephens "a series of tubes" should last for a very, very, very long time. At least here, if nowhere else.
Worth? No. Neither is Facebook. They are only worth something to the executives who run those sites -- IF they get bought by some foolish large corporation. It was foolish to buy them 2 years ago, and it would be certifiably insane to do so in the current economic climate. These sites are only a means to advertise to a specific (gullible, obviously) demographic. They are just billboards in cyberspace. A way of leading the easily-led to one place to be advertised at. Since fewer people are consuming right now and global ad-spend is down, the value of these sites is dropping. I'd be astonished if they will last much longer.
Twitter is a bad idea, badly marketed (viral spam essentially), badly implemented, and at the wrong time. They may have to wait until Dot.com III to make any money. Given the instability of their site, I doubt they'll be around then.
News for nerds? Your Rights online? And this story has exactly what to do with Slashdot?
Should this be on idle? Should this not be on Digg?