"We need to find a way to force utility companies to take these threats seriously"
Unfortunately about the only way to do that would be to nationalize the U.S. electrical infrastructure. And if you tried that, you're going to have over two hundred Republicans, the entire staff of Fox News, and a bunch of DINO Democrats in Congress screaming bloody murder, beating their chests, flagellating themselves, screaming "KARL MARX! KARL MARX!," and calling for the impeachment of Barack Obama for high treason.
And can he go back in time and get the newspaper to not print the story of his arrest? Or ever convince the neighbors who shunned him to forget their suspicion? Or get his employer to hire him back?
Sadly, this is one of those crimes that can and will destroy your life with even a mere *accusation*.
DO you have ANY idea how much it costs Disney to raise those clones? You're talking years on the island, learning dance moves and lipsyncing, before they're even ready for the mouseketeer phase, much less full-on popstar deployment. They can't just "thaw them out," anymore than they can just thaw out Disney himself.
It's been clear for some time now that it was only a matter of time before the feds began forcing ISP's to block controversial sites (probably with about as much "proof" of wrongdoing as we see in the infamous DMCA takedown notices). It's sad that the days of simply typing in www.thepiratebay.org or even a lot of legitimate sites' URL's and having the site just pop up are coming to an end. From now on out, it's going to be a constant fight between users and their ISP's, with the RIAA/MPAA exclusively deciding which sites we can see or not see. Of course, we/. clever types can find ways around it, but again, it will be a constant fight from now on (like homebrew on a console or jailbreaking an iPhone, it will be a constant state of we-figure-out-a-new-workaround-they-find-a-way-to-block-it). What a shame.
I still don't know why everyone acts so surprised that this administration has carried on with the exact same Intellectual property and "national security" policies of the previous one. Democrats are just as much in the pockets of Hollywood as conservatives are in the pockets of big business (meaning BOTH support oppressive IP legislation). And Obama loves his presidential power just as much as Cheney did. So why anyone ever expected things to somehow be different with this administration, I don't understand. Cheney may not have been right about many things, but he was pretty much dead on when he predicted that Obama would keep most of Bush's national security policies in place (the same ones he criticized during the campaign) once he got a taste of that power for himself.
It also doesn't surprise me that they're using a treaty to quietly push this crap through. They did the exact same thing with the DMCA. A lot of people don't realize that the DMCA was just the formal ratification of a WIPO treaty that had been debated and agreed to in secret. The powers that be know this shit would never stand the light of day with the electorate, so they quietly push it through with the kind of obscure international treaties that they know CNN, NBC, et. al. are never going to cover. By the time it actually makes it into Congress, it's already a fait accompli. The mainstream media only notices it when someone's already being prosecuted for violating it.
Because the bogeyman is a lot less scary when he's behind bars or dead. Right now, if the politicians want MORE powers, they can still point to the fact that he's running around out there plotting against us. If they caught or killed him, they could still do that to some extent (by pointing to other lesser-known terrorists) but the fear-mongering wouldn't be as effective.
When the company has so little faith in the franchise that they hand over the latest film to the assclown best known for directing the "Charlie's Angels" remake, is there any doubt it is dying?
I think the 3rd film gets an unfair bad rap. Yes, it is very different in tone than the first two films--much darker and more fatalistic. And it's set in a different timeline than the first two, it's true. But I like that someone took a different tack with it. If Mostow had just done a knockoff of the Cameron films, he would rightly be called to task for it. So he at least decided to go a different route (Screw that "Future is what we make it" optimism!). Yeah, the comedy bits were a bit overdone, but how could he have made a sequel to such a iconic film series and not have a few nods at the camera (like we're not supposed to notice that Schwarzenegger looks 20 years older and has a gut now)? I thought it was pretty good for what it was. About the only thing that I didn't like was the casting of Connor and the way they played his character like a whiny pansy (*this* is the guy that was supposed to have spent most of his life preparing for Judgement Day, really?).
Back in the early 90's, The Ben Stiller Show did a skit that I thought pretty much summed up everything that sucks about Jay Leno. The skit is set at the tryouts for the Tonight Show and Leno just gets up and starts dancing around like a stupid puppet. When someone from off camera asks him if that's supposed to be funny, he answers "Who cares, you're going to give this job to me no matter what I do, right?" That's Leno's entire career in a nutshell.
I heard a good analogy once explaining just how small the Planck length really is--and why it's so out of reach of any conceivable measurement we can even dream of:
If the nucleus of a single atom were expanded to the size of the known universe (15 billion light years across--itself an almost unimaginable distance), the Planck length would be about as long as a tall cedar tree.
I bought an Asus EEE netbook a few months back and was surprised to see that Skype was basically the only app that was installed by default. It was otherwise a pretty clean install of XP. Considering the experience I've had with other notebooks in recent years, I was pleasantly surprised. Kudos to them.
Can you imagine what this country would look like if we had treated paved roads like we have treated much of the rest of our infrastructure (i.e. only allowing private companies to build and maintain them). Does anyone honestly think we would have an interstate system today (or even standardized road signs) if we had followed that model?
Slashdot Mirror
Unfortunately about the only way to do that would be to nationalize the U.S. electrical infrastructure. And if you tried that, you're going to have over two hundred Republicans, the entire staff of Fox News, and a bunch of DINO Democrats in Congress screaming bloody murder, beating their chests, flagellating themselves, screaming "KARL MARX! KARL MARX!," and calling for the impeachment of Barack Obama for high treason.
And can he go back in time and get the newspaper to not print the story of his arrest? Or ever convince the neighbors who shunned him to forget their suspicion? Or get his employer to hire him back?
Sadly, this is one of those crimes that can and will destroy your life with even a mere *accusation*.
DO you have ANY idea how much it costs Disney to raise those clones? You're talking years on the island, learning dance moves and lipsyncing, before they're even ready for the mouseketeer phase, much less full-on popstar deployment. They can't just "thaw them out," anymore than they can just thaw out Disney himself.
At first I was going to respond that Verizon execs aren't robots. Then, after some reflection, it occurred to me that I'm not so sure.
It's been clear for some time now that it was only a matter of time before the feds began forcing ISP's to block controversial sites (probably with about as much "proof" of wrongdoing as we see in the infamous DMCA takedown notices). It's sad that the days of simply typing in www.thepiratebay.org or even a lot of legitimate sites' URL's and having the site just pop up are coming to an end. From now on out, it's going to be a constant fight between users and their ISP's, with the RIAA/MPAA exclusively deciding which sites we can see or not see. Of course, we /. clever types can find ways around it, but again, it will be a constant fight from now on (like homebrew on a console or jailbreaking an iPhone, it will be a constant state of we-figure-out-a-new-workaround-they-find-a-way-to-block-it). What a shame.
LOL, I thought no one would possibly catch that. Never underestimate /.
It's still "We, the people," right?
I still don't know why everyone acts so surprised that this administration has carried on with the exact same Intellectual property and "national security" policies of the previous one. Democrats are just as much in the pockets of Hollywood as conservatives are in the pockets of big business (meaning BOTH support oppressive IP legislation). And Obama loves his presidential power just as much as Cheney did. So why anyone ever expected things to somehow be different with this administration, I don't understand. Cheney may not have been right about many things, but he was pretty much dead on when he predicted that Obama would keep most of Bush's national security policies in place (the same ones he criticized during the campaign) once he got a taste of that power for himself.
It also doesn't surprise me that they're using a treaty to quietly push this crap through. They did the exact same thing with the DMCA. A lot of people don't realize that the DMCA was just the formal ratification of a WIPO treaty that had been debated and agreed to in secret. The powers that be know this shit would never stand the light of day with the electorate, so they quietly push it through with the kind of obscure international treaties that they know CNN, NBC, et. al. are never going to cover. By the time it actually makes it into Congress, it's already a fait accompli. The mainstream media only notices it when someone's already being prosecuted for violating it.
Because the bogeyman is a lot less scary when he's behind bars or dead. Right now, if the politicians want MORE powers, they can still point to the fact that he's running around out there plotting against us. If they caught or killed him, they could still do that to some extent (by pointing to other lesser-known terrorists) but the fear-mongering wouldn't be as effective.
When the company has so little faith in the franchise that they hand over the latest film to the assclown best known for directing the "Charlie's Angels" remake, is there any doubt it is dying?
Didn't the first film indicate that Skynet had a Russian counterpart too?
Hey, American Graffiti wasn't bad. I even liked the sequel.
Dude when are you going to accept that they raped Indy? Stop suppressing the memory, people, it really happened!
I think the 3rd film gets an unfair bad rap. Yes, it is very different in tone than the first two films--much darker and more fatalistic. And it's set in a different timeline than the first two, it's true. But I like that someone took a different tack with it. If Mostow had just done a knockoff of the Cameron films, he would rightly be called to task for it. So he at least decided to go a different route (Screw that "Future is what we make it" optimism!). Yeah, the comedy bits were a bit overdone, but how could he have made a sequel to such a iconic film series and not have a few nods at the camera (like we're not supposed to notice that Schwarzenegger looks 20 years older and has a gut now)? I thought it was pretty good for what it was. About the only thing that I didn't like was the casting of Connor and the way they played his character like a whiny pansy (*this* is the guy that was supposed to have spent most of his life preparing for Judgement Day, really?).
Split it up however you like. Want to pay Ringo less? That's your call.
Back in the early 90's, The Ben Stiller Show did a skit that I thought pretty much summed up everything that sucks about Jay Leno. The skit is set at the tryouts for the Tonight Show and Leno just gets up and starts dancing around like a stupid puppet. When someone from off camera asks him if that's supposed to be funny, he answers "Who cares, you're going to give this job to me no matter what I do, right?" That's Leno's entire career in a nutshell.
I would try, but I put in a "20 Goto 10" line after it and am still waiting for the loop to finish.
You would deprive us of hundreds, if not thousands, of leaked nude photos of famous celebs just to save a little DNA?!?!? Are you insane, man????
Google Books lead me to it the page in the book where he talks about this here.
I heard a good analogy once explaining just how small the Planck length really is--and why it's so out of reach of any conceivable measurement we can even dream of:
If the nucleus of a single atom were expanded to the size of the known universe (15 billion light years across--itself an almost unimaginable distance), the Planck length would be about as long as a tall cedar tree.
I bought an Asus EEE netbook a few months back and was surprised to see that Skype was basically the only app that was installed by default. It was otherwise a pretty clean install of XP. Considering the experience I've had with other notebooks in recent years, I was pleasantly surprised. Kudos to them.
The surviving members of the Baldwin family?
There is many a slip twixt "Can" and "Actually will"--MANY a slip.
Truly, you are making with delightful humor fountain!
Can you imagine what this country would look like if we had treated paved roads like we have treated much of the rest of our infrastructure (i.e. only allowing private companies to build and maintain them). Does anyone honestly think we would have an interstate system today (or even standardized road signs) if we had followed that model?