Your summation of what I wrote is rhetorical; you're judging your own post. I didn't say what you begin with what you have me saying, which is an initial conclusion that makes the rest of your words redundant. Please reflect on this so you can understand what I'm saying, because you probably use the same circular reasoning to dismiss or complicate other difficult issues in your life you are facing. I say this to be possibly helpful, not insult you.
I'm not a troll; I live what I say as best I can. It's the moral and ethical understanding that the personal is the political. That's the entire selfless basis of people dedicated to FOSS.
I completely understand your being suspicious and assuming I'm a fake hypocrite. That's become the norm in our society to be like that. I don't want or need to convince you of anything, really, I'm just stating what I believe in and explaining why I act the way I do. We all must interpret for ourselves how to implement our ethics and morals in our lives.
Last, I believe in a variant of socialism, not communism, which I despise. There is a huge difference.
Last Last, if you have an interest in finding out if I am for real or whatever, please feel free to ask me questions. Really.
Yes, I am telling you to consider making less money in the interest of FOSS, and I apply the same ethics and morals even more stringently to myself, hopefully for the benefit of everyone.
Also, killing kittens refers to masturbation. I actually do kill kittens, as I do animal experimentation in the field of neuroscience.
No, my point is just because you want to do something, doesn't mean it should generate income for you.
If I was King I could pass a law such that everyone had to give me a penny every time they took a whiz. Telling me I shouldn't do that requires a moral and ethical argument.
Similarly, but less extreme, is the argument against CS. You've read them, I don't need to explain it all again. It boils down to just because you can do something, doesn't mean you should. It's the absence of ethics versus the presence of ethics.
So go ahead and work in the software industry. The FOSS complaint is how the greed of a few in wanting to make too much money ruins it for everyone else. The only way to do that is to do things that reduce other people's freedom, through things like patents, copyright and closed source.
as RMS says, trying to say you feel your freedom is limited because we don't want you to limit our freedoms through your actions is a pathological misinterpretation of what freedom means. Freedom to limit other people's freedom has it's own word: tyranny.
"I don't see how. I don't develop my own software and sell it. I either work for a company as an employee or consult. In both cases the licensing issues aren't under my control."
Which is exactly how the small group of people with the major financial interests in any CS company want it. That's why the FOS movement exists, because as individuals we are not allowed to act on our own ethics or morals. These CS corporations divide us and neutralize us by threatening our jobs, which threatens our apartments, our relationships, our stability, even our own identity. Some would call this slavery. I see it as a lot of people waking up and not liking where things are going, so we need to make change where we can so we don't sink into depression or disillusionment. Me? Been there, done that. I say never again, and not for anybody else if I can help it through my efforts.
I understand your question now. I can't and shouldn't speak for what Stallman or anyone else does charitably outside of coding. Maybe for them donating code is their best way of doing this, and all they have time for? And yes I think they are hypocrites if they're getting rich off of it. It's akin to demanding CS developers to sacrifice without FOSS people doing it themselves.
But I can reply to your question for one person, me. I know what charitable stuff I do these days and I'll tell you that. I help out homeless people when I am able in various ways. I loan my crappy car out if someone needs it who doesn't have one. I'm an election judge in Illinois. I help out at my church and toss a few bucks in the basket. I'm back to being a grad student so I don't make a lot of money, but I believe strongly in eschewing excess income such that when I have it, I'm going to donate it or just decline higher salaries. I don't think I'm better or special because of this, I'm just grateful to finally be at a point in my life where I have the capacity to be helpful and do these things, and this is how I'm interpreting and implementing my perspective.
I don't mean to make you apologize for making a living. I apologize for making you feel that way. We all need to make a living. We're all in this together, whether we acknowledge that or not. As such, livings should try to be made so that they promote the well-being of all, because otherwise they do the opposite. Practically, change should come slowly, so you SHOULD be wary of the FOS movement, but aren't there incremental steps you have thought of here and there, that might reduce your personal revenue slightly, but be more open?
Yeah, I was using MicroSoft products back when it still WAS MicroSoft with the capital "S." I guess it's kind of a tribute to the old era, and also kind of a backhand jab at the airs this old switch-flipping dinosaur company has assumed.
"Now, explain to us how exactly the authors of those products would have made any money if they were licensed under the GPL."
This question has been answered ad infinitum, and no answer I can give will satisfy you. Here are a few sure to piss you off that come to mind, but I don't say them with that intention: Work in a different industry? Do embedded or industrial development? Reduce your expectations of how much you should profit? You see, FOSS isn't concerned with replacing the revenue someone might have generated through CS, it's concerned with freedom and mutual benefit for all. That's the dichotomy. CS may be a business model, but it has ethical and moral underpinnings (or lack thereof) that are counter to liberty and freedom.
*steps down from wobbly soapbox*
"... there is no difference whatsoever between Stallman calling nVidia "nVidious"... and someone from Microsoft calling the GPL "viral"."
I disagree, and already addressed this in the original post. Stallman isn't a corporation acting in self-interest at any cost, he's a guy motivated to be an advocate for freedom. Sure he's a little egotistical, but who the hell isn't in today's me-me-me-rock-star society? His originating thought is selfless.
In what sense did you mean "fundamentalist?" As in a fundamentalist Christian or Jew? Not the main point but I don't understand the connotation.
"What sort of charity work does the average "free" software advocate [FSA] do that has no anti-something involved in it?"
This is a difficult question to address meaningfully, but very relevant and I'm glad you asked. By their diametrically opposed natures, any action one side takes here is inherently anti- to the other side. Therefore, any coding a FSA does will be more-or-less anti-MS, and any app MS releases is more-or-less anti-FS. But I believe it is an error to reduce the situation to two equally-justifiable competing business models. The GPL is not a business model, it is one particular embodiment of an altriustic ethical perspective.
You say FSAs are full of hate, and you're right. Hate is wrong. We all wrongfully feel hate to those we oppose to some degree, and that must be challenged and overcome. Unfortunately, we tend to reflexively hate those things that oppress us, and that's the first step to becoming aware of the oppression and regaining our liberty and freedom.
That said, hate is just not motivation enough to go from MS-bashing to FS-developing. It takes an internalizing of the perspective I am talking about to decide to produce something for the benefit of all and at the expense of none.
In such a situation, it's a value call as to which side a person takes, but you take a side through your actions, knowingly or not. Those choices have real consequences, and I think it's every individual's responsibility to look at what those are. Before I had no problem with closed and proprietary software. But I believe that time is over, and as a society our democracy and mutual benefit are best served by FOSS.
Why are you such a zealous apologist for CS? I mean, does it have any basis other than your own personal financial gain, through your own coding or else through shared interests in CS developers, or through lobbyist-type compensation? What happened to you?
Penn and Teller went to my high school, The Cambridge School of Weston, coincidentally enough. They showed up at one point in our gym in '89 or '90 and did a little routine. It was humorous.
I'm not aware that Penn had an opinion on this issue. I'll check out what he has to say. Thanks for the ref.
Even if you personally are not altruistic in your goals, that does not mean everyone else must be similarly as self-centered and pessimistic.
That's my point, that's why you can't equate MicroSoft with RMS. Whether RMS gets some personal satisfaction from getting to trumpet and strut is largely immaterial, if it doesn't contravene what he represents: empowering all to become aware of and exercise their freedom, which is a selfless perspective. It's a perspective of inclusion originating from love.
I'm not trying to be holier-than-thou, high-and-mighty, or flakey. I just see a lot of injustice and deceit in this world, and believe movements like the FSF are not selfish like what they're advocating against, but rather thinking about the good of everyone.
How can you possibly equate anti-MicroSoft people with anti-GPL people? First of all, anti-GPL people aren't people, they're corporations. Anti-MicroSoft, pro-GPL people are actually real people, who are advocates of freedom for all, not profit for the few and slavery for the rest.
I'm sorry, but you may NOT try and just equate the two and expect to not be corrected. You imply the same moral and ethical depravity inherent to the actions of a company like MicroSoft, to RMS and the movement he helps represent. They have fundamentally different motivations and goals. One is based on pursuing self-interest by any means necessary, the other for cooperatively universal benefit at the expense of none. And by none I mean people, not pseudo-corporal business entities.
I personally am an adherent to something akin to the RMS philosophy. I believe information wants to be free, and that patents and copyrights should be gradually phased out.
That said, the facts show that Transmeta decided to play by the rules and compete in the chip business. The facts also show that they received the standard treatment from one of the two biggest technology monopolists of our age, Intel (our friend M$ being the other). Intel has a long history of anti-competitive illegal abuse of their dominant position in the marketplace.
We know this through contracts with distributors and partners that have been periodically leaked and reported on, as well as a mountain of articles detailing their abusive platform tie-ins and deceptive marketing techniques. A look at the current antitrust case brought by AMD alone is damning. Separately, each piece of the puzzle isn't blatantly illegal, but that's the game monopolists (and the mafia) play; it's hard to prove collusion and/or conspiracy.
If Transmets had never successfully fabbed a chip, or had never found a major distribution partner, you could rightfully call them a troll. The important point is that even if this was the case, Intel still stole their technology and called it their own, and is liable for massive patent violations.
But that's not the case. Transmeta tried, made a pretty damn good go of it, and was squashed. I think the only part of this in dispute is if Transmeta could bring an antitrust case like AMD against Intel as well. I wish they would, because without companies like AMD and Transmeta, today we'd be paying $2000 for a (t)Itanic clocked at 300MHz or so with no backwards (32-bit) compatibility, power saving, or other performance innovations. Instead we get to pay $100-$200 for a multi-GHz chip with all these features.
If our laws mean anything, Intel should be ground up into a fine powder and cast into the sea.
I'm getting bothered by the proliferation on/. of these blatant market research phishing expeditions masquerading as innocent user-submitted questions.
Either the editorial team is snoozing and not checking the source thoroughly enough, or else they are aware of it and must be receiving some sort of benefit. Either way it makes me uneasy and I am offended by such deceptive misuse of the community.
For anyone who doubts my conclusions, just read one or two day's worth of fark.com. You will see links with very similar wording and tone, asking about very similar subjects that are aimed at the same demographic.
Stop lying, and just SAY you're doing market research. I wonder if it's wire fraud to not do so.
Google's move makes sense from a strategically defensive point of view. They don't want Microsoft or Yahoo to purchase YouTube, because that would give them a huge immediate advantage in terms of userbase.
As companies like Yahoo and Microsoft are built upon the "lock-em-in" strategy, that could effectively nullify Google's "out-innovate-and-perform" strategy which otherwise would slowly beat YouTube by attrition.
Therefore, it makes sense for Google to purchase YouTube purely for the immediate userbase. Otherwise, it might take a few years for the "lock-em-in" ploy to start deteriorating, which would just set the entire industry back in terms of actual benefit and usability of the internet for video-on-demand.
And yes, I do imply a certain degree of benevolence on the part of Google. Even though their accountants may say the deal isn't financially necessary or beneficial in the long run, I think they'd rather just not have to deal with yet another multi-year dismantling of another defective-by-design competitor in yet another sector.
Is it just me? I was agreeing with this guy, but then every single one of the shows he listed were awful in my opinion. I mean AWFUL and not worth watching whatsoever.
I like: 24, The Wire, The Shield, Venture Bros, Prison Break, The Office, Stargate (both), Battlestar Galactica, The Dead Zone, Blade the Series, Weeds, My Name is Earl, and some of the Law & Orders, some of the CSI's, but not CSI Miami, that sucks worst of all.
Just my opinion, but it was striking to me how diametrically opposed our preferences were. Deperate Housewives???
Question: "Why would you ever code an app from scratch again?"
Answer: In order to avoid bloat, stability, performance, and security issues from using modules that are overly-used, overly-general and/or don't exactly meet your spec but are "close enough."
I am a upper-middle class white male born-in-the-USA who believes strongly in the rule of law and voting.
Iran is fine. I respect their president, much more than the government of Israel's, and have no problem with them pursuing nuclear power. It is not for us to say no, or Israel.
People like us need to speak up now, and damn the culture of fear that has made us keep our mouths shut and ignore our morals and ethics. I for one am done with allowing my silence to be used as tacit approval for immoral policies that I do not support. McCarthyism is dead, and I will not allow myself to contribute to it's rebirth any more.
I feel the same about Venezuela. I have a lot of hope for what is going on there. Why is it that what I read about and evaluate to be ethically and morally sound countries tend to be regarded as our enemies?
I just weirded out my colleague by throwing up my arms and proclaiming an exuberant "Yay! I have found my kindred!"
For years, I have removed the caps lock key from every keyboard I use. The frequency of my typing errors related to grazing the caps lock key is such that my productivity is significantly lowered with it remaining. Backing up and correcting after my text would go aLL CAPS ONCE I NARROWLY MISSED THE 'A' KEY seemed like an unavoidable consequence until I allowed myself to think it permissible to physically deface my keyboard. I thought i would miss the caps lock key too, but I quickly found that I didn't.
Why did this work for me, but not most of the typing world? The reason is that I have huge hands and big fingers. I can palm a basketball easy. If I try to touch-type, my fingers are ALL still touching, and my error rate both goes way up as a result, AND my fingers and wrists begin to ache! Therefore I have perfected the art of four-finger-plus-thumb touch typing. I can do it fast, and the size of my hand enables me to have my pinky on the shift key while typing away as long as I need to, thereby eliminating my need for the caps lock key.
So I don't advocate eliminating the caps lock key altogether, most people can't type the way I do because their hands aren't big enough. But if you look at MY keyboard at work, home, and on my notebook, now you know why that caps lock key is gone and stored away in my desk drawer.
Stability is an issue, as some people have commented here. I myself can't imagine how you can realistically balance what is essentially a pencil on its sharpened point for any length of time, especially with batteries draining away. The robot must look like some sort of drunk date, listing to and fro with some rather large amplitude.
If it isn't in there already, how about some sort of flywheel/gyro (axis of rotation vertical, along robot chassis) built into the robot, at a height in the chassis that globally minimizes the effective lever distance any lateral force it may receive along its height? All that inertia would do a lot towards keeping the thing upright, just like a top. With good bearings you would drain very little, and it could even be used as a method to rotate the whole robot quite quickly, albeit in one direction unless you have some sort of intermediating transmission, by having a variable clutch to transfer some of the angular force from the flywheel to the chassis.
Hey, you could even make the flywheel out of materials so it also works like one of those static energy storage devices. Here is a somewhat decent link to a patent for one, but it's been covered on our beloved Slashdot before here, here, and here.
This would give you a combination source of both electrical and direct mechanical energy for the robot to do with as it would. Theoretically, it could even be the primary power source, eliminating the need for heavy and expensive batteries, but the flywheel would have to spin really fast to store enough energy, and wouldn't have a way to spin back up during quiescent moments.
By the way, the robot building (and fighting!) community explored and exploited such dynamics thoroughly, spinners anyone?
as someone who relies on just such a method to determine if I am picking up nerve activity or not, I nod in agreement. But, it's worth a try, not a separate grant, or even an entire project.
I don't mean to be rude, but you shouldn't attempt to rebut someone unless you know what you're talking about. The criticism I was leveling at their work was specifically aimed at comparing their method of "mapping to musical tones," to being conceptually little more than changing the sampling rate.
Actually I should have gone further, and pointed out how it's actually very destructive to the original data due to it being a convolution with many presumptive kernels (and therefore NOT smoothing).
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Slashdot Mirror
Your summation of what I wrote is rhetorical; you're judging your own post. I didn't say what you begin with what you have me saying, which is an initial conclusion that makes the rest of your words redundant. Please reflect on this so you can understand what I'm saying, because you probably use the same circular reasoning to dismiss or complicate other difficult issues in your life you are facing. I say this to be possibly helpful, not insult you.
Take care.
I'm not a troll; I live what I say as best I can. It's the moral and ethical understanding that the personal is the political. That's the entire selfless basis of people dedicated to FOSS.
I completely understand your being suspicious and assuming I'm a fake hypocrite. That's become the norm in our society to be like that. I don't want or need to convince you of anything, really, I'm just stating what I believe in and explaining why I act the way I do. We all must interpret for ourselves how to implement our ethics and morals in our lives.
Last, I believe in a variant of socialism, not communism, which I despise. There is a huge difference.
Last Last, if you have an interest in finding out if I am for real or whatever, please feel free to ask me questions. Really.
Yes, I am telling you to consider making less money in the interest of FOSS, and I apply the same ethics and morals even more stringently to myself, hopefully for the benefit of everyone.
Also, killing kittens refers to masturbation.
I actually do kill kittens, as I do animal experimentation in the field of neuroscience.
No, my point is just because you want to do something, doesn't mean it should generate income for you.
If I was King I could pass a law such that everyone had to give me a penny every time they took a whiz. Telling me I shouldn't do that requires a moral and ethical argument.
Similarly, but less extreme, is the argument against CS. You've read them, I don't need to explain it all again. It boils down to just because you can do something, doesn't mean you should. It's the absence of ethics versus the presence of ethics.
So go ahead and work in the software industry. The FOSS complaint is how the greed of a few in wanting to make too much money ruins it for everyone else. The only way to do that is to do things that reduce other people's freedom, through things like patents, copyright and closed source.
as RMS says, trying to say you feel your freedom is limited because we don't want you to limit our freedoms through your actions is a pathological misinterpretation of what freedom means. Freedom to limit other people's freedom has it's own word: tyranny.
"I don't see how. I don't develop my own software and sell it. I either work for a company as an employee or consult. In both cases the licensing issues aren't under my control."
Which is exactly how the small group of people with the major financial interests in any CS company want it. That's why the FOS movement exists, because as individuals we are not allowed to act on our own ethics or morals. These CS corporations divide us and neutralize us by threatening our jobs, which threatens our apartments, our relationships, our stability, even our own identity. Some would call this slavery. I see it as a lot of people waking up and not liking where things are going, so we need to make change where we can so we don't sink into depression or disillusionment. Me? Been there, done that. I say never again, and not for anybody else if I can help it through my efforts.
I understand your question now. I can't and shouldn't speak for what Stallman or anyone else does charitably outside of coding. Maybe for them donating code is their best way of doing this, and all they have time for? And yes I think they are hypocrites if they're getting rich off of it. It's akin to demanding CS developers to sacrifice without FOSS people doing it themselves.
But I can reply to your question for one person, me. I know what charitable stuff I do these days and I'll tell you that. I help out homeless people when I am able in various ways. I loan my crappy car out if someone needs it who doesn't have one. I'm an election judge in Illinois. I help out at my church and toss a few bucks in the basket. I'm back to being a grad student so I don't make a lot of money, but I believe strongly in eschewing excess income such that when I have it, I'm going to donate it or just decline higher salaries. I don't think I'm better or special because of this, I'm just grateful to finally be at a point in my life where I have the capacity to be helpful and do these things, and this is how I'm interpreting and implementing my perspective.
I don't mean to make you apologize for making a living. I apologize for making you feel that way. We all need to make a living. We're all in this together, whether we acknowledge that or not. As such, livings should try to be made so that they promote the well-being of all, because otherwise they do the opposite. Practically, change should come slowly, so you SHOULD be wary of the FOS movement, but aren't there incremental steps you have thought of here and there, that might reduce your personal revenue slightly, but be more open?
Yeah, I was using MicroSoft products back when it still WAS MicroSoft with the capital "S." I guess it's kind of a tribute to the old era, and also kind of a backhand jab at the airs this old switch-flipping dinosaur company has assumed.
... and someone from Microsoft calling the GPL "viral"."
"Now, explain to us how exactly the authors of those products would have made any money if they were licensed under the GPL."
This question has been answered ad infinitum, and no answer I can give will satisfy you. Here are a few sure to piss you off that come to mind, but I don't say them with that intention: Work in a different industry? Do embedded or industrial development? Reduce your expectations of how much you should profit? You see, FOSS isn't concerned with replacing the revenue someone might have generated through CS, it's concerned with freedom and mutual benefit for all. That's the dichotomy. CS may be a business model, but it has ethical and moral underpinnings (or lack thereof) that are counter to liberty and freedom.
*steps down from wobbly soapbox*
"... there is no difference whatsoever between Stallman calling nVidia "nVidious"
I disagree, and already addressed this in the original post. Stallman isn't a corporation acting in self-interest at any cost, he's a guy motivated to be an advocate for freedom. Sure he's a little egotistical, but who the hell isn't in today's me-me-me-rock-star society? His originating thought is selfless.
In what sense did you mean "fundamentalist?" As in a fundamentalist Christian or Jew? Not the main point but I don't understand the connotation.
"What sort of charity work does the average "free" software advocate [FSA] do that has no anti-something involved in it?"
This is a difficult question to address meaningfully, but very relevant and I'm glad you asked. By their diametrically opposed natures, any action one side takes here is inherently anti- to the other side. Therefore, any coding a FSA does will be more-or-less anti-MS, and any app MS releases is more-or-less anti-FS. But I believe it is an error to reduce the situation to two equally-justifiable competing business models. The GPL is not a business model, it is one particular embodiment of an altriustic ethical perspective.
You say FSAs are full of hate, and you're right. Hate is wrong. We all wrongfully feel hate to those we oppose to some degree, and that must be challenged and overcome. Unfortunately, we tend to reflexively hate those things that oppress us, and that's the first step to becoming aware of the oppression and regaining our liberty and freedom.
That said, hate is just not motivation enough to go from MS-bashing to FS-developing. It takes an internalizing of the perspective I am talking about to decide to produce something for the benefit of all and at the expense of none.
In such a situation, it's a value call as to which side a person takes, but you take a side through your actions, knowingly or not. Those choices have real consequences, and I think it's every individual's responsibility to look at what those are. Before I had no problem with closed and proprietary software. But I believe that time is over, and as a society our democracy and mutual benefit are best served by FOSS.
Why are you such a zealous apologist for CS? I mean, does it have any basis other than your own personal financial gain, through your own coding or else through shared interests in CS developers, or through lobbyist-type compensation? What happened to you?
Penn and Teller went to my high school, The Cambridge School of Weston, coincidentally enough. They showed up at one point in our gym in '89 or '90 and did a little routine. It was humorous.
I'm not aware that Penn had an opinion on this issue. I'll check out what he has to say. Thanks for the ref.
Even if you personally are not altruistic in your goals, that does not mean everyone else must be similarly as self-centered and pessimistic.
That's my point, that's why you can't equate MicroSoft with RMS. Whether RMS gets some personal satisfaction from getting to trumpet and strut is largely immaterial, if it doesn't contravene what he represents: empowering all to become aware of and exercise their freedom, which is a selfless perspective. It's a perspective of inclusion originating from love.
I'm not trying to be holier-than-thou, high-and-mighty, or flakey. I just see a lot of injustice and deceit in this world, and believe movements like the FSF are not selfish like what they're advocating against, but rather thinking about the good of everyone.
Don't you see that?
How can you possibly equate anti-MicroSoft people with anti-GPL people? First of all, anti-GPL people aren't people, they're corporations. Anti-MicroSoft, pro-GPL people are actually real people, who are advocates of freedom for all, not profit for the few and slavery for the rest.
I'm sorry, but you may NOT try and just equate the two and expect to not be corrected. You imply the same moral and ethical depravity inherent to the actions of a company like MicroSoft, to RMS and the movement he helps represent. They have fundamentally different motivations and goals. One is based on pursuing self-interest by any means necessary, the other for cooperatively universal benefit at the expense of none. And by none I mean people, not pseudo-corporal business entities.
I personally am an adherent to something akin to the RMS philosophy. I believe information wants to be free, and that patents and copyrights should be gradually phased out.
That said, the facts show that Transmeta decided to play by the rules and compete in the chip business. The facts also show that they received the standard treatment from one of the two biggest technology monopolists of our age, Intel (our friend M$ being the other). Intel has a long history of anti-competitive illegal abuse of their dominant position in the marketplace.
We know this through contracts with distributors and partners that have been periodically leaked and reported on, as well as a mountain of articles detailing their abusive platform tie-ins and deceptive marketing techniques. A look at the current antitrust case brought by AMD alone is damning. Separately, each piece of the puzzle isn't blatantly illegal, but that's the game monopolists (and the mafia) play; it's hard to prove collusion and/or conspiracy.
If Transmets had never successfully fabbed a chip, or had never found a major distribution partner, you could rightfully call them a troll. The important point is that even if this was the case, Intel still stole their technology and called it their own, and is liable for massive patent violations.
But that's not the case. Transmeta tried, made a pretty damn good go of it, and was squashed. I think the only part of this in dispute is if Transmeta could bring an antitrust case like AMD against Intel as well. I wish they would, because without companies like AMD and Transmeta, today we'd be paying $2000 for a (t)Itanic clocked at 300MHz or so with no backwards (32-bit) compatibility, power saving, or other performance innovations. Instead we get to pay $100-$200 for a multi-GHz chip with all these features.
If our laws mean anything, Intel should be ground up into a fine powder and cast into the sea.
I'm getting bothered by the proliferation on /. of these blatant market research phishing expeditions masquerading as innocent user-submitted questions.
Either the editorial team is snoozing and not checking the source thoroughly enough, or else they are aware of it and must be receiving some sort of benefit. Either way it makes me uneasy and I am offended by such deceptive misuse of the community.
For anyone who doubts my conclusions, just read one or two day's worth of fark.com. You will see links with very similar wording and tone, asking about very similar subjects that are aimed at the same demographic.
Stop lying, and just SAY you're doing market research. I wonder if it's wire fraud to not do so.
Google's move makes sense from a strategically defensive point of view. They don't want Microsoft or Yahoo to purchase YouTube, because that would give them a huge immediate advantage in terms of userbase.
As companies like Yahoo and Microsoft are built upon the "lock-em-in" strategy, that could effectively nullify Google's "out-innovate-and-perform" strategy which otherwise would slowly beat YouTube by attrition.
Therefore, it makes sense for Google to purchase YouTube purely for the immediate userbase. Otherwise, it might take a few years for the "lock-em-in" ploy to start deteriorating, which would just set the entire industry back in terms of actual benefit and usability of the internet for video-on-demand.
And yes, I do imply a certain degree of benevolence on the part of Google. Even though their accountants may say the deal isn't financially necessary or beneficial in the long run, I think they'd rather just not have to deal with yet another multi-year dismantling of another defective-by-design competitor in yet another sector.
Once again, hooray for Google!
Is it just me? I was agreeing with this guy, but then every single one of the shows he listed were awful in my opinion. I mean AWFUL and not worth watching whatsoever.
I like: 24, The Wire, The Shield, Venture Bros, Prison Break, The Office, Stargate (both), Battlestar Galactica, The Dead Zone, Blade the Series, Weeds, My Name is Earl, and some of the Law & Orders, some of the CSI's, but not CSI Miami, that sucks worst of all.
Just my opinion, but it was striking to me how diametrically opposed our preferences were. Deperate Housewives???
Personally I would not, because they are sociopaths and I am not.
However, if I was Enron or RJ Reynolds, I could find a good use for them.
Question: "Why would you ever code an app from scratch again?"
Answer: In order to avoid bloat, stability, performance, and security issues from using modules that are overly-used, overly-general and/or don't exactly meet your spec but are "close enough."
Best Example: Microsoft Office
strike "most influential" and it actually makes sense.
I very much agree with you.
I am a upper-middle class white male born-in-the-USA who believes strongly in the rule of law and voting.
Iran is fine. I respect their president, much more than the government of Israel's, and have no problem with them pursuing nuclear power. It is not for us to say no, or Israel.
People like us need to speak up now, and damn the culture of fear that has made us keep our mouths shut and ignore our morals and ethics. I for one am done with allowing my silence to be used as tacit approval for immoral policies that I do not support. McCarthyism is dead, and I will not allow myself to contribute to it's rebirth any more.
I feel the same about Venezuela. I have a lot of hope for what is going on there. Why is it that what I read about and evaluate to be ethically and morally sound countries tend to be regarded as our enemies?
Have you tried probiotics?
I just weirded out my colleague by throwing up my arms and proclaiming an exuberant "Yay! I have found my kindred!"
For years, I have removed the caps lock key from every keyboard I use. The frequency of my typing errors related to grazing the caps lock key is such that my productivity is significantly lowered with it remaining. Backing up and correcting after my text would go aLL CAPS ONCE I NARROWLY MISSED THE 'A' KEY seemed like an unavoidable consequence until I allowed myself to think it permissible to physically deface my keyboard. I thought i would miss the caps lock key too, but I quickly found that I didn't.
Why did this work for me, but not most of the typing world? The reason is that I have huge hands and big fingers. I can palm a basketball easy. If I try to touch-type, my fingers are ALL still touching, and my error rate both goes way up as a result, AND my fingers and wrists begin to ache! Therefore I have perfected the art of four-finger-plus-thumb touch typing. I can do it fast, and the size of my hand enables me to have my pinky on the shift key while typing away as long as I need to, thereby eliminating my need for the caps lock key.
So I don't advocate eliminating the caps lock key altogether, most people can't type the way I do because their hands aren't big enough. But if you look at MY keyboard at work, home, and on my notebook, now you know why that caps lock key is gone and stored away in my desk drawer.
Dude totally, I own stock in Intel too!
Stability is an issue, as some people have commented here. I myself can't imagine how you can realistically balance what is essentially a pencil on its sharpened point for any length of time, especially with batteries draining away. The robot must look like some sort of drunk date, listing to and fro with some rather large amplitude.
If it isn't in there already, how about some sort of flywheel/gyro (axis of rotation vertical, along robot chassis) built into the robot, at a height in the chassis that globally minimizes the effective lever distance any lateral force it may receive along its height? All that inertia would do a lot towards keeping the thing upright, just like a top. With good bearings you would drain very little, and it could even be used as a method to rotate the whole robot quite quickly, albeit in one direction unless you have some sort of intermediating transmission, by having a variable clutch to transfer some of the angular force from the flywheel to the chassis.
Hey, you could even make the flywheel out of materials so it also works like one of those static energy storage devices. Here is a somewhat decent link to a patent for one, but it's been covered on our beloved Slashdot before here, here, and here. This would give you a combination source of both electrical and direct mechanical energy for the robot to do with as it would. Theoretically, it could even be the primary power source, eliminating the need for heavy and expensive batteries, but the flywheel would have to spin really fast to store enough energy, and wouldn't have a way to spin back up during quiescent moments.
By the way, the robot building (and fighting!) community explored and exploited such dynamics thoroughly, spinners anyone?
as someone who relies on just such a method to determine if I am picking up nerve activity or not, I nod in agreement. But, it's worth a try, not a separate grant, or even an entire project.
I don't mean to be rude, but you shouldn't attempt to rebut someone unless you know what you're talking about. The criticism I was leveling at their work was specifically aimed at comparing their method of "mapping to musical tones," to being conceptually little more than changing the sampling rate.
Actually I should have gone further, and pointed out how it's actually very destructive to the original data due to it being a convolution with many presumptive kernels (and therefore NOT smoothing). .