I would call this a crazy conspiracy theory -- except for Dave with a V's really strange entangling of outrage, with simultaneous unending praise and desire for the product. I'm having a really hard time making sense of that part of it.
What's so hard to understand about it? Guy likes a product, tries to buy it, gets screwed around by sales/support staff.
After all, why would anybody be dealing with sales/support staff in the first place, if they didn't have an interest in the product? It's actually rather mundane, hardly some kind of intriguing mystery. I think most of us have been in a similar position before.
You need to separate worksmanship from parts' sourcing. When the overall vehicle quality was suffering from the big three, they were also doing a lot of lowest-bidder dealing for parts; making almost nothing themselves. The workers can make sure that the parts are assembled correctly, but if the parts are crap because some bean counter in an office found they could save $.43 per car by sourcing a critical bolt through a fly-by-night machine shop run in a former communist state, you can't blame the worker when said crappy bolt fails. The worker did his job, someone else fucked it up and got away with it.
Aren't the people who specified the crappy parts workers too? They are employees of the company, after all. "Workmanship" does not just apply to the assembly of the vehicle, it applies to the entire design, engineering and construction process.
If poor components were used, that's poor workmanship on behalf of the company.
The most impressive aspect to Apple's garden is the spirited defense mounted by its residents, who seem unable to acknowledge any of the very real problems involved. That blows me away on a regular basis.
Are you also blown away by the fact that most people choose to pay a mechanic to service their car, rather than doing it themselves? Do you, personally avoid all brand-name cars with their "walled garden" components and instead drive a car with Open and completely modular components?
I'm also interested in why you think that people who choose Apple products are unaware of the disadvantages. To continue the car analogy, even the most inexperienced of car owners are aware that they are paying extra to have someone service their car.
I think you have it backwards. It's not that people are unaware of the disadvantages of the "walled garden" but more that you seem to be unaware of the advantages, such as the frolicking women, the protection from harsh wind and sun, and the pleasant pond with water lilies to while away the hours reading great literature beside.
The USA Constitution does not enfranchise "groups of people" only the individual.
Umm, groups of people are composed of individuals. Therefore, groups of people are covered. Also, you are wrong, because right at the beginning of the US Constitution it says "We, the people." It doesn't say "I, the person." The very idea of the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution is to liberate Americans as a group of people.
Institutions (religious, corporate, cults, groups...) are not provided any rights/freedoms
Again, this is wrong. What do you think freedom of religion and freedom of association are there for?
The spin-law today protected global corporate interest from bankruptcy, failure, and divestiture, but did little pro/post-actively to prevent the devastating impact upon the People.
Wait, didn't you start by arguing that there is no enfranchisement of groups? Yet here you are talking about the enfranchisement of a group called "The People."
Moreover, you have completely avoided the question and gone on an irrelevant tangent. What is the exact definition of net neutrality? If my definition differs from yours, does that mean I support "Net-Nepotism" as you put it, and am therefore an enemy of the People?
If you do not fully agree with Net-Neutrality, then you support the Corporate Welfare State and Net-Nepotism.
That depends. What is the definition of "Net-Neutrality"? This is something which there is little agreement on. Everybody's definition seems to be different.
Corporate, religious, or special interest control of access to content, information, news media is un-American and conflicts with The USA Constitutional freedom to speak, practice a religion, obtain information on science, weapons and/or art.
I don't think so. Freedom of speech and religion supposedly guarantees that different groups of people with different beliefs are able to control what they say and what information they choose to distribute. The "free market" that is supposedly the basis of capitalism allows corporations to control what information they distribute.
The Constitution's guarantee of freedom of speech is about government censorship, not that of private parties. Don't misunderstand me - I'm in favor of the general principle of "net neutrality," but you don't do the argument justice by making such broad, over-reaching statements
I think they mean "importantly," as in "the powers that be are recognizing the power of this tool for organizing protest, and are taking steps to counteract it rather than simply ignoring it."
If that was the intended meaning, it still strikes me as fairly narcissistic. "Hey, my favorite social networking service has been validated by government recognition!"
This is also why it's "news for nerds" rather than "geopolitics for wonks" (or "shit you really, really need to know for Egyptians," lest we gloss over the actual human element of the story).
I think the "stuff that matters" part of the slogan leaves plenty of room for reporting on issues without having to work in some lame "tech" angle. After all, aren't political wonks just as much nerds as the gadget/internet enthusiasts? Nerds come in many stripes.
With 3D movies you should be allowed to focus on any element you want,
In 2D movies you don't get to look at what the film-maker has excluded from a shot. Why should 3D movies be any different?
Is that in the past movies have used tricks like focusing in a particular screen element in order to get you to pay attention to it
That's kind of what film-making is. The selective framing of elements. It's what a film-maker chooses to show or not show that is the art of it. That's why they are movies and not interactive environments.
The only solution would be to film with a very wide field of view so that your focus point is essentially infinity.
That's a fairly ridiculous argument. It's the same as arguing that 2D film-makers shouldn't use telephoto lenses for cinematic effect, or to selectively frame objects. That all films should be like those early films which were essentially a fixed camera pointed at a stage play.
Even if they were to follow your rule, they still have to choose which angle and how far away from things they film them. Film-making is not about presenting some sort of objective reality, or ideal vision-field. It is art and entertainment.
Personally, some of my favorite parts of Avatar was when they did play with focus and other effects in subtle ways, also things like translucency and textured layers. Much of that would have been lost if they had used your proposed rules.
Most importantly, twitter has been blocked by many national carriers."
Those are some pretty odd priorities. I would have thought "tens of thousands protesting" is a little more important than some online service being blocked.
News just in: Asteroid about to impact Earth, extinction event imminent, but more disturbingly, I can't log in to Slashdot!"
For many of us the pros of Facebook as an all in one communications hub for friends and relatives definitely outweigh the cons.
You don't have access to email? You can have all that without giving anything to Starbucks and other random companies.
So, I don't get why you'd choose to be the bitch of these corporations, when you can have the benefits of modern communication technology without doing that.
The stage has been set for a turning point in human society. Governments and the Powers-that-Be will fight the process, but they will be overcome, at last, by Justice.
Not to jump on anyone's nerd rage too early in the process, but according to Facebook's terms and conditions (easily found via a Google search, but here's a direct link: http://www.facebook.com/terms.php [facebook.com]) you do explicitly allow them to use your profile picture in advertising by using their service. Read point 10 - it directly states that you give that permission.
Well, yes. The curious thing is why anybody would agree to this in the first place.
It's not even new - I saw friends pictures appearing in "friend finder" ads long ago, and figured out how to opt out. All that's changing is they're going to sell that service to 3rd parties now.
You saw this happening and continued to use the service?
But Terms of Service aren't magical spells. They still have to hold up to legal scrutiny. This one fails in a dozen different ways, but the key point is that the person who uploads the "IP" does not necessarily have the RIGHT to sublicense it to Facebook, even if they were aware of the terms and agreed to them.
Right, but doesn't that mean that the subject of the lawsuit would then not be Starbook or Facebucks with their deep pockets, but rather an individual Facebucks user, most likely one of your friends, acquaintances or co-workers? Kind of makes the "I'll sue you for millions!!!" picture a little bit different.
The popular belief these days is that everyone is allowed to a have 'democratic' opinion on any subject regardless if they have any clue [wikipedia.org] as to what they are talking about.
No more do we look up, listen to and expect people with expertise to give us the benefit of their experience. Rather we shun 'experts' with their 'facts', since surely that sort of commitment to their field has made them biased and unreliable sources.
While that may be a very accurate description of Slashdot circa 2011, I don't think the rest of the world, by and large, is as gullible as Slashdot.
Slashdot Mirror
What's so hard to understand about it? Guy likes a product, tries to buy it, gets screwed around by sales/support staff.
After all, why would anybody be dealing with sales/support staff in the first place, if they didn't have an interest in the product? It's actually rather mundane, hardly some kind of intriguing mystery. I think most of us have been in a similar position before.
Who was it that made violent threats against his child? I haven't seen any evidence for this claim.
And the minimum is $0. I understand the terminology just fine.
Which had nothing to do with sexism.
Uh, how is it possible to have a lower limit on prices than $0?
Last time I checked, vending machines aren't particularly portable, so I'm not sure why it's being called a "mobile hotspot."
Given how they handled the whole sexism scandal, if I were running a PR firm I'd stay away from Penny Arcade.
What sexism scandal?
You need to separate worksmanship from parts' sourcing. When the overall vehicle quality was suffering from the big three, they were also doing a lot of lowest-bidder dealing for parts; making almost nothing themselves. The workers can make sure that the parts are assembled correctly, but if the parts are crap because some bean counter in an office found they could save $.43 per car by sourcing a critical bolt through a fly-by-night machine shop run in a former communist state, you can't blame the worker when said crappy bolt fails. The worker did his job, someone else fucked it up and got away with it.
Aren't the people who specified the crappy parts workers too? They are employees of the company, after all. "Workmanship" does not just apply to the assembly of the vehicle, it applies to the entire design, engineering and construction process.
If poor components were used, that's poor workmanship on behalf of the company.
The most impressive aspect to Apple's garden is the spirited defense mounted by its residents, who seem unable to acknowledge any of the very real problems involved. That blows me away on a regular basis.
Are you also blown away by the fact that most people choose to pay a mechanic to service their car, rather than doing it themselves? Do you, personally avoid all brand-name cars with their "walled garden" components and instead drive a car with Open and completely modular components?
I'm also interested in why you think that people who choose Apple products are unaware of the disadvantages. To continue the car analogy, even the most inexperienced of car owners are aware that they are paying extra to have someone service their car.
I think you have it backwards. It's not that people are unaware of the disadvantages of the "walled garden" but more that you seem to be unaware of the advantages, such as the frolicking women, the protection from harsh wind and sun, and the pleasant pond with water lilies to while away the hours reading great literature beside.
The USA Constitution does not enfranchise "groups of people" only the individual.
Umm, groups of people are composed of individuals. Therefore, groups of people are covered. Also, you are wrong, because right at the beginning of the US Constitution it says "We, the people." It doesn't say "I, the person." The very idea of the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution is to liberate Americans as a group of people.
Institutions (religious, corporate, cults, groups...) are not provided any rights/freedoms
Again, this is wrong. What do you think freedom of religion and freedom of association are there for?
The spin-law today protected global corporate interest from bankruptcy, failure, and divestiture, but did little pro/post-actively to prevent the devastating impact upon the People.
Wait, didn't you start by arguing that there is no enfranchisement of groups? Yet here you are talking about the enfranchisement of a group called "The People."
Moreover, you have completely avoided the question and gone on an irrelevant tangent. What is the exact definition of net neutrality? If my definition differs from yours, does that mean I support "Net-Nepotism" as you put it, and am therefore an enemy of the People?
If you do not fully agree with Net-Neutrality, then you support the Corporate Welfare State and Net-Nepotism.
That depends. What is the definition of "Net-Neutrality"? This is something which there is little agreement on. Everybody's definition seems to be different.
Corporate, religious, or special interest control of access to content, information, news media is un-American and conflicts with The USA Constitutional freedom to speak, practice a religion, obtain information on science, weapons and/or art.
I don't think so. Freedom of speech and religion supposedly guarantees that different groups of people with different beliefs are able to control what they say and what information they choose to distribute. The "free market" that is supposedly the basis of capitalism allows corporations to control what information they distribute.
The Constitution's guarantee of freedom of speech is about government censorship, not that of private parties. Don't misunderstand me - I'm in favor of the general principle of "net neutrality," but you don't do the argument justice by making such broad, over-reaching statements
We smashed the NAZIs,
North American Zebra Incorporated? Yeah, they really got what was coming to them.
I think they mean "importantly," as in "the powers that be are recognizing the power of this tool for organizing protest, and are taking steps to counteract it rather than simply ignoring it."
If that was the intended meaning, it still strikes me as fairly narcissistic. "Hey, my favorite social networking service has been validated by government recognition!"
This is also why it's "news for nerds" rather than "geopolitics for wonks" (or "shit you really, really need to know for Egyptians," lest we gloss over the actual human element of the story).
I think the "stuff that matters" part of the slogan leaves plenty of room for reporting on issues without having to work in some lame "tech" angle. After all, aren't political wonks just as much nerds as the gadget/internet enthusiasts? Nerds come in many stripes.
This 3D stuff is doing great getting people to buy stuff.
Is it? I don't know anybody who has bought a 3D TV. Most people I talk to are very much "meh" about the whole thing.
With 3D movies you should be allowed to focus on any element you want,
In 2D movies you don't get to look at what the film-maker has excluded from a shot. Why should 3D movies be any different?
Is that in the past movies have used tricks like focusing in a particular screen element in order to get you to pay attention to it
That's kind of what film-making is. The selective framing of elements. It's what a film-maker chooses to show or not show that is the art of it. That's why they are movies and not interactive environments.
The only solution would be to film with a very wide field of view so that your focus point is essentially infinity.
That's a fairly ridiculous argument. It's the same as arguing that 2D film-makers shouldn't use telephoto lenses for cinematic effect, or to selectively frame objects. That all films should be like those early films which were essentially a fixed camera pointed at a stage play.
Even if they were to follow your rule, they still have to choose which angle and how far away from things they film them. Film-making is not about presenting some sort of objective reality, or ideal vision-field. It is art and entertainment.
Personally, some of my favorite parts of Avatar was when they did play with focus and other effects in subtle ways, also things like translucency and textured layers. Much of that would have been lost if they had used your proposed rules.
Most importantly, twitter has been blocked by many national carriers."
Those are some pretty odd priorities. I would have thought "tens of thousands protesting" is a little more important than some online service being blocked.
News just in: Asteroid about to impact Earth, extinction event imminent, but more disturbingly, I can't log in to Slashdot!"
For many of us the pros of Facebook as an all in one communications hub for friends and relatives definitely outweigh the cons.
You don't have access to email? You can have all that without giving anything to Starbucks and other random companies.
So, I don't get why you'd choose to be the bitch of these corporations, when you can have the benefits of modern communication technology without doing that.
Bottom posting is stupid, confusing, and not practical.
Heathen! Burn the witch!!
Thou shalt friend thy neighbor as thyself
By vigorously rubbing his penis?
The stage has been set for a turning point in human society. Governments and the Powers-that-Be will fight the process, but they will be overcome, at last, by Justice.
Good luck with that.
Not to jump on anyone's nerd rage too early in the process, but according to Facebook's terms and conditions (easily found via a Google search, but here's a direct link: http://www.facebook.com/terms.php [facebook.com]) you do explicitly allow them to use your profile picture in advertising by using their service. Read point 10 - it directly states that you give that permission.
Well, yes. The curious thing is why anybody would agree to this in the first place.
It's not even new - I saw friends pictures appearing in "friend finder" ads long ago, and figured out how to opt out. All that's changing is they're going to sell that service to 3rd parties now.
You saw this happening and continued to use the service?
But Terms of Service aren't magical spells. They still have to hold up to legal scrutiny. This one fails in a dozen different ways, but the key point is that the person who uploads the "IP" does not necessarily have the RIGHT to sublicense it to Facebook, even if they were aware of the terms and agreed to them.
Right, but doesn't that mean that the subject of the lawsuit would then not be Starbook or Facebucks with their deep pockets, but rather an individual Facebucks user, most likely one of your friends, acquaintances or co-workers? Kind of makes the "I'll sue you for millions!!!" picture a little bit different.
So, your solution to this social networking bullshit... is to create yet another social network? Great thinking.
That's semantic game.
Semantics are important.
Without government there can't be corporations, because what created that entity called "corportaion" is the Law.
Uh, no. The law doesn't refer to "corporations," and they would exist without government intervention.
The popular belief these days is that everyone is allowed to a have 'democratic' opinion on any subject regardless if they have any clue [wikipedia.org] as to what they are talking about.
No more do we look up, listen to and expect people with expertise to give us the benefit of their experience. Rather we shun 'experts' with their 'facts', since surely that sort of commitment to their field has made them biased and unreliable sources.
While that may be a very accurate description of Slashdot circa 2011, I don't think the rest of the world, by and large, is as gullible as Slashdot.