If you're going to correct the grammar, then correct the translation as well. It should be for the public good rather than for the good of the republic since the latter indicates possession and therefore the genitive rei publicae while the publicus -a -um used in the former is adjectival and must agree in case with the object bono.
While the idea of all students on campus posessing laptops is a good general concept....replacing computer labs with a mandated purchase program is just insane. To keep down tech support costs, the univ. will have to support a VERY limited selection of laptop models and OSes. Laptops will have to be heavy desktop-replacement types to ensure enough power ("student grade" laptops just won't cut it) which will force each student to lug around a 10 lb brick in addition to books. Trust me, 10 lbs is a lot of additional weight. As far as OSes go... mandating M$ or OSX will be the default...compsci majors and other geeks who want to learn/run/experiment with linux, UNIX, OS2, BSD, or any other "alternative" system will be on their own. While they may have the skill to operate without tech support, a mandatory OS will relate directly to mandatory file formats and third party software. Hard to run Linux when you are forced to view.wmp vids for your classes - not to mention all the hardware compatibility issues, WPA problems,etc if students are limited to a particular model. Finally, the average life of a laptop (in "responsible or "not student" hands) is about 4 years. This means you'll have older laptops working with the latest models. Think Win98 running alongside 2000 or even (ugh) ME. More up to date... XP laptops for some VISTA for others. So what office format do you use? XP's.doc, or VISTA's fancy new pseudo-open thingy? Upgrade everyone? What about graduate students who's systems are >4yrs old? Make them buy a 2nd laptop? Lots of issues to be sorted out here. I guess my point is that while mandated proprietary-configuration laptops may look like a simple solution, it probably isn't a good thing in the long term. Okay, now that I've mentioned a few problems...how about some solutions?
First, if you want to mandate laptops, that's fine. It's even okay to "officially" (read: for the masses) support a single model/manufacturer. But alternative systems should be, if not supported, then not penalized. This means that file formats used throughout the university must be portable across most M$, MAC, and POSIX systems at a minimum. Some distro-generic UNIX/Linux/BSD support would be a good thing as well. If the school doesn't want to go open-source, they should at least go open-format.
Second, keep the computer labs available - especially those that are associated with engineering, graphic design, video production, compsci,and the like. Having a handful scattered around the campus for the 20% of generic students who's laptops are in the shop having the latest malware/spyware removed is another necessity.
Third, use MAC address authentication rather than WPA on the network if your univ is not forward leaning enough to provide free wifi to the surrounding community (hey, I can dream). WPA just isn't supported widely enough yet....perhaps in a couple years....
From my experience as a tech....this whole idea is one big Cluster*. I'd still like to see a little more emphasis on getting students to learn some basic computer use, however, so I suppose I must lend grudging support to this idea. Idealistically, I'd love to see laptops included with tuition, running Linux/BSD, with an open-to-the-public wifi link, but that's little more than a fantasy......
Wow.....the number of posts this topic has generated is astounding....the more so as only a small percentage actually address the article at hand. I've got a few pennies here, so let me throw in a few thoughts.
First, Rumsfeld (as much as I hate to say it) does have a point, although I doubt he looks at it the same way. The greatest strength of the terrorists and insurgents is their complete lack of a rigid bureauracy. They can adapt rapidly to fickle public awareness and a lazy, sensationalist media. Our government, on the otherhand, is incapable of this because of the very procedures we have created in the name of "efficiency". A brief example (I beg pardon for this digression) is when I went through some government training (sorry, can't say what type as I might get in trouble for criticizing the gov't) and found glaring errors and omissions in the information they were giving to students (some of it outdated over 30 years ago). I went through the bureaucratic two-step and filled out all the requisite forms to remedy this until I was told to stop submitting critiques for "questioning the course's integrity". I was told that, while my critiques (complete with citations and references) may be valid, it would take years to get even simple changes approved, evaluated, tested, re-evaluated, re-approved, and eventually implemented -- too much of an effort to be worth fighting for. I realize I have been vague here, but the changes I was fighting for were changes to a medical curriculum that was teaching information that could potentially harm patients if not remedied. To make a long story short, any "grass-roots", decentralized, or cellular movement is FAR more flexible than our rigid, over-regulated system. So Rummy is right, we do need to be able to adapt more quickly to media-driven public emotion, but, being who and what he is, will attempt to do this with further rules, regulations, and guidelines that serve exactly the opposite end.
Now, on the much debated Left/Right wing Fox/Aljazeera Good/evil secular/religious debates.... As far as politics go....no independent thinker worth his or her salt judges any individual politician solely by party association. Many independent (rightly) supported Clinton's impeachment for lying (I don't care what about...he tried to cover up) and voted (initially) for Bush because a focused effort against Afghanistan seemed warranted after 9-11. (Let's face it, focusing on a given issue is not the Dems' strong point.) It didn't take long, however, for the Bush administration overstepped its bounds and was vociferously opposed by these same people. Slashdot is rife with people pointing fingers and whining about how unfair bias is in one venue or another, but any bias reflected here is that of the readers, not some business conglomerate. No administration releases exclusive slashdot interviews or uses this site as a method to release their latest "victory" speech. Both Fox, and AlJazeera have political and economic interests that trump any obligation to print the views of all comers. Yes, Fox kisses Republican @$$, but there are plenty of other networks that lean the other way. AlJazeera is a business and has been pressured, bribed, coerced, and encouraged to bias stories from whatever group happens to be in power. To expect otherwise of a major news organization is irrational and overly idealistic. Actions DO speak louder than words, as some other posters have noted in calls for US foreign policy change, but this axiom also applies to individuals. There is a difference between dedicated spirituality and the abuse of religious symbolism to advance a political agenda. To believers of Islam the world over: the beauty of your religion and it's message of "peace" is being destroyed by these extremists. They are not religious, they are abusers of the message of the prophet and must be fought at all costs. To the righteous Christian-American "moral" majority....the terrorist attacks of 9-11 are NOT an excuse for you to start the next crusade. The rhetor
Besides, creating "incentives" to use one OS over the other has been an accepted practice for ages. It's not force if there are others "available", however impractical their use might be. If the government simply "prefers" one OS over the other, that doesn't mean that individual users can't get an "alternative" on their personal systems. So this isn't "force" or "unfair competition", it's simply the choice of the masses - as represented by the gov't. Isn't this what M$ has been telling us for the past 20 years?
I've had my share of DV's/VIP's and the like come through, and I can't recall a single time I faked working to impress them. If asked, I would list my accomplishments for the day and justify my "break". Sure I took some flak, but I wasn't fired, reprimanded, or written up. You know why? Because I made it a point to be damn good at my job. I enjoyed my work and did it well which made my supervisor, and his supervisor look good. I didn't have to defend my actions most of the time because my sup's would do it for me out of fear of losing a valuable asset. Sure I ran into the occasional political kiss@$$ who would try to hold me to the letter of the law.... it normally helped that I had read, understood, and remembered the same regulation he was throwing at me. There is usually a way to minimize the damage by manipulating the regs. Bureaucrats are easily manipulated. People who try to throw the book at you usually are trying to intimidate you and they often assume you can't read.
Umm....hate to barge in on this totally irrational dicussion, but archaeology has done quite a bit for "our" "culture". Athenian democracy and Latin republicanism would not have inspired the founding fathers of the US if archaeologists, historians, and the like hadn't reconstructed this information after the rest of the European world tried to destroy it during the dark ages. The whole point of researching the past is so we have the opportunity (even if we're too thick to act on it) of preventing the repetition of mistakes made by our predecessors. Shame we'd rather wave our respective religious banners and deny that anything "outside" our faith could possibly be beneficial.
The amazing thing here is not that fetal cells (and their corresponding DNA) migrate througout the mother's body. After all, both mother and fetus share a circulatory system. The amazing thing is that these cells "linger for decades". After the baby is born, there should no longer be a source of the offspring's genetic material in the mother. As the prenatally produced cells die, they should not replenish without a fetus in utero. If, as this sensationalist article suggests, cells with fetal DNA exist in the mother for years, then one of two circumstances has taken place. First, these cells do not die for decades. This is unlikely, but theoretically possible. More likely is the second hypothesis, which is that fetal stem cells have migrated into the mother's body, implanted, and begun to reproduce. Depending on the type of stem cell, only certain "derivative" cells should be produced. (This explains why mom doesn't grow new body parts.) This would explain the autoimmune theory since blood cells have a higher statistical likelihood of being circulated in the mom's body. Further research should be done as to the types of fetal cells in the mother, the origins and life-expectancies of these cells, and the point in fetal development in which parent and child begin to share cells. Either way, the interesting thing is the presence of these cells long after the child's birth - not the existance of fetal cells in the mother in the first place.
As stated in other posts, Google's focus is SEARCH. So why an OS and why linux? I can think of several reasons. First, MS is trying desperately to encroach on Google's search dominance. Regardless of your opinion of their probability of success, they can cause a great deal of harm to Google just by competing (to say nothing of the litigation that is sure to come out of it). MS gets most of their revenue from the desktop market, and they are using this money to fund their invasion of Google's turf. By "legitimizing" linux with the Google name (and any other intra-corporate agreements Google uses to promote their OS) Google is able to cut the legs off MS's financing machine and gets their biggest rival to go on the defensive. By using linux, Google is building on something that many people have heard of, and the free (as in beer) release of the OS ensures rapid encroachment onto MS's market share. Second, there will be ads, but they won't affect us. Google knows the importance of staying friendly with the techie community. By releasing their OS under the GPL, they make the "geeks" happy with fresh code for their favorite distro and the ability to modify Goobuntu to eliminate ads. Grandma and Grandpa, however, along with most computer users, won't want to bother with these modifications, giving Google a great increase in advertisement dissemination. Unlike AOL, Google knows that unobtrusive advertising is less likely to be rebelled against en masse. (Besides, how many users still use AOL ads nonwithstanding?) So the geeks and corporations get to protect privacy and tweak and tune to their hearts content, but the other 90% of society gets added to google's ad base. As far as a SETI-style use of spare processor cycles....I doubt it will be a "standard" part of the OS, but I certainly could see one of Google's developers setting something like this up on casual Friday! Long story short, it won't kill MS overnight, but it will put Redmond on the defensive. They'll actually have to be innovative on Vista++ just to maintain whatever remnant of the market they're left with after Goobuntu's release. Google doesn't want to be evil, but that doesn't mean they can't show a little business acumen. Google tends to release things that benefit both the public and their own interests at the same time. I see no reason to expect otherwise from a Google/Linux OS.
Not kidding. Rhetorical device appealing to said jockey's opinions of themselves in an effort to encourange some synapse firing that might mimic rational thought. And there ARE a handful of intelligent people on/. if you sift out the chaff.
Bravo! So far you've come the closest to the underlying issues of obesity. I just want to mention a few more of the complexities that this discussion seems to have overlooked.
First, as mentioned above we all have different metabolic rates (the rate at which we "burn" fuel to make energy). Further, any given individual burns different substances (proteins, simple carbs, complex carbs, etc.) at different rates and/or converts them to fat for storage at different rates. Genetic differences, metabolic differences, rate of adaptation to lifestyle change, etc, all vary according to the individual, so there is no mass "cure" for "obesity". Since each of these factors affects a given individual to a different degree, this also means there is no one "cause" for obesity. This is not an "excuse" however. Most people, fat or thin, do not take care of their bodies. While some gain weight, others get elevated levels of cholesterol, high blood pressure, and many other disorders.
Now don't start spewing statistics at me about the rates of diabetes or hypertension in the "obese" community being higher than "normal". While many of these statistics are valid, they do not tell the whole story. Until very recently, the medical community has had a very skewed definition of "overweight", which, to the layman, is too often synonymous with "obese". Over/underweight and "obese" are often defined in terms of BMI (weight/height squared). This formula does not take into account physiological differences such as bone structure ("big-boned" stems from a legitimate critique of the "obese" definition), muscle mass, etc. This is analagous to a marathon runner being diagnosed with bradycardia (slow heart rate) because they are in "too good" a shape. The model used to find the "normal" or "average" range is flawed.
The medical community is (slowly) realizing this and is moving toward measurements of %body fat using (relatively) new technology that measures fat content with electrical resistance. With this modified definition, people formerly lumped together as "obese" can be classified according to a more accurate measure. There are the "truly obese" who have abnormally high levels of subcutaneous fat tissue, due to lifestyle choice, genetics, physiologic makeup, or any combination of the three. There are the "falsely accused obese" who are short and muscular, with an "abnormally high" BMI, who are otherwise in excellent shape. There are many many other "variations" each of which should be categorized and "treated" differently.
Rather than lumping all of these unique conditons together (as "possessed" people were in ages past), we should show our education and "scientific" mindsets by discussing "obesity" in a rational manner rather than regurgitating the same sorry rhetoric that runs rampant in the popular press. While I realize that most slashdot readers are not health professionals, many of you ARE scientists or have some science-based training. It is amazing to me how such a "logical" set of people can be as willfully ignorant as the rest of the populace who let "popular" emotion trump reason. (There is a scattering of truly insightful comments here, and I pray that the authors of the same forgive my mass classification of slashdot readers.) I do not expect everybody here to be "educated" in every subject, but I certainly hope that there exists a subset of the "general" population that can display an enlightened perspective even on topics that they are not "experts" in. I guess the old saw that "individuals are smart, people are stupid" is true regardless of the population in question. Would make an interesting socio-behavioural study...... Anyway, let's set the example here and show how slashdot's collective mind can discuss (and perhaps reach some new conclusions about) topics that are "summarized" in the press. Let's be "thinking heads" rather than "talking heads"./rant.
You make an excellent point. Still, it would tarnish the message the MPAA is releasing in that the "public" wouldn't see the MPAA as a bastion of anti-piracy. So while your argument makes logical sense, I think that ego and irrational behavior will prevail and MPAA won't plead guilty if this comes to trial. The message of a a double-standard established by a "guilty" plea would resonate in the public domain to such an extent that, at a minimum, awareness of copyright law undesired by the MPAA would trickle into the public view and cause enough public animosity to change laws. Of course, we'd need a decent little news team to sensationalize the message, but hey, it's happened before!
The lack of medical knowledge displayed on these pages is astounding. Stick to computers. In the ER, it doesn't matter if you'll "lose energy", "suffer frostbite", or contract any other condition. The first law of the ER is to keep you alive. This is exemplified by the ABC (Airway, breathing, circulation) mnemonic taught to every emergency medic from physicians down to the lowly first responder. I can defibrillate your heart all day (with WAY less than an 90% success rate) but it doesn't matter a damn if you don't have a patent airway. Controlled hypothermia works because it stops the compensatory reactions in your body that may cause more harm than good - in particular, it slows your heartrate and constricts your blood vessels to prevent you from losing all your blood. You can't do a whole lot to somebody who's bled white. Hypothermia works in nature, because, when it occurs quickly enough, it stops the bloodstream from circulating heat right out of the body and it slows cellular metabolism enough to prevent the buildup of toxic wastes. It's the buildup of toxins that will kill you long before the lack of oxygen. Controlled hypothermia can postpone the body's attempts to heal itself until conditions are more conducive to success. This is an incredible medical achievement and one that has the potential to save thousands of lives.
Of course, they will (surprise!) find "indicators" of "links" to "suspected" terrorist "connections" as they analyze the search results. You don't really think this is about pornography do you? In the Bush administration everything is about "terrorism." I fully expect this information to be turned over to the FBI and HSA nominally to save children from "perversion", but these agencies would only be doing their jobs if they "happened" to find homeland-security (a.k.a. "for the fatherland") sensitive information in the results. That, my friend, is why they won't just perform their own search.
I'm not a Buddhist, but I feel some of your logic may be flawed. First, the existence of an inpersonal force does not preclude the "ability to reason, remember, etc". The argument could be made that since I, incarnated, have these abilities, it is reasonable to extend these abilities into my percieved projection of myself after death. As far as omni-presence, interest in justice, and all that jazz goes: none of these things are "needed" for a "system" of reincarnation to exist. "Inpersonal" indicates that the driving force behind further learning comes from within. The system would function just as well with a self-assessment of one's life-abilities that is balanced by "insurmountable" challenges and difficulties faced if reincarnating as a "too advanced" being. Enlightenment doesn't get easier as one progresses; it gets harder. Buddhism is about seeking personal truth. I feel it is somewhat lacking in "pure altruism", and can be a little heavy on ceremony and symbolism, but that is an entirely different discussion. The point is, your arguement is flawed. First find the box, then try to look outside it.
The correct question is, "Why are voters allowing this?" I hate to be redundant, but every post I make here has something to do with PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY. Strange how we love to complain, tell everybody how we'd fix things, rant on our blogs about how bad things are, and post our "solutions" on slashdot. Notice that nowhere in that list do we do anything more than ADVOCATE change. Sorry folks, but spouting off isn't enough. The whole "bearing witness" concept, while useful, is insufficient. There is only ONE way to make things better. Gandhi said it best, "Be the change you wish to see in the world." That means get off your duff and do things differently! Voting "against" is a start, but it's not constructive. If you want to build a better nation, then you have to do it from the bottom up. Every decent government the world has come up with originated with a populist, grass-roots movement. What a pity the people lose interest so quickly and relinquish the power to an "elite" few. Baaaaa.... Remember, "They're more what you'd call 'guidelines' than actual rules."
I can't believe we're arguing about the validity of biasing article choice on spammers because there might be a "cool link" in there. If you want to share links, use del.icio.us. Slashdot is a news site, and this discussion should be about the articles - not the links. I kinda like the idea of a submission (as opposed to approval) cap. Spammers are the bane of the internet and to justify their existence because they might link to an interesting site 1 out of 1000 times is infantile. A submission cap would make slashdot useless to spammers. "Normal" users, the "nerds" for whom this site is supposed to be, would ensure that there are plenty of interesting links submitted. Besides, I'm willing to guess that only a small percentage of links submitted are approved anyway. If you want cool links, then it makes sense to limit redundant submissions with a cap in order to ensure a greater diversity of links from a corresponding diverse pool of authors and an associated increase in the odds of a "cool link" being chosen. An alternative to a cap that may be more in line with the community spirit is to allow users to ignore articles by user name in the manner of banning a spammer on IM. This wouldn't resolve the problem of bias due to redundancy, but it is a viable middle ground.
"Western" democracy is relatively young, as are many developments in firearm technology that have rendered previous weapons obsolete. The methhead wouldn't be much of a threat with a 300 year old flintlock single-shot pistol. We keep trying to instill "western democracy" in "developing" nations, with varying degrees of success. Situations in these countries could be used as examples of "failure" as could post WWI Germany, early 20th century Spain, and Argentina. There are others, but these are the first that come to mind. There is empirical evidence, therefore, not that "gun control leads to oppression", but that government polarization and extremism resulting in restrictive and invasive over-regulation limits freedom to such a degree that "democracy" cannot survive. Democracy does not mean everything is equitable and "safe" all the time with good 'ol Big Bro watching your back. It means a messy, flexible, fluid society that encourages cooperation and individuality by sacrificing imposed conformity and the associated illusions of security.
First, I would prefer not to choose between extremes, but as elected officials tend to have extremely polar viewpoints, it is nearly impossible to "vote" for middle ground. The best we can do is keep alternating extremes in an effort to restore reason and balance. Second, I agree that a grenade launcher in the hands of a hallucinating addict is a bad idea, but I ALSO think that the precedent set by imposing a "blanket ban" on anything, without regard to circumstance, can cause an equal amount of damage. While, in this circumstance, the ban appears reasonable, what about situations where oppressed people have NO recourse to defense? While an armed populace cannot "defeat" a modern army, they can cause an enormous amount of havoc and make themselves heard around the world. Or perhaps it would be better to ensure just the military and criminal extremists have weapons so they can duke it out a' la Falluja while the "decent law abiding citizens" can't even defend their families. I don't advocate Somalia-like anarchy, but I fear an East German-like state even more. I can fight one crazy guy with a grenade launcher. I can't fight an army or a nation-state. Finally, my "unavoidable consequence" has been borne out again and again in nations that have "guaranteed" certain freedoms for their people. As far back as the Roman republic there were "rights", "freedoms", and elected officials to protect them. Rome still turned into an authoritarian state that was finally destroyed by the very anarchy you seem to be so against. I'm not a libertarian and don't agree with them on many many points, but I think that this "death by a thousand cuts" that is whittling away at "freedom" will eventually cause a much larger backlash that is more destructive than anything a meth-head with a grenade launcher could do.
When "freedom" is the excuse for restricting thought, speech, movement, etc, but "compells" one to spout the party line - to be a "patriot" - "or else.....", then yes - freedom is slavery.
War is Peace
Invade a country that has not attacked you to "spread freedom" and "promote peace". Nuff said.
Ignorance is Strength
Pick a party, buy from the monopoly, it's someone else's responsibility. These are not the actions of the "educated". Ignorance is valued because, by deferring responsibility to someone else, it confers the illusion of security. Ignorance is bliss, ignorance is Strength.
Let's see if I'm following all this.... Timmy the meth head, because he breaks societal norms by taking drugs and ruining his own life (nothing in the parent posts indicate that he has done any direct harm to any other "citizen") automatically relinquishes all other "rights" because he is a "potential" threat to "others" (since we all carry a gun for ourselves, it's all the defenseless "others" we have to worry about). Now one arguement is that everybody has the "right" to arm themselves, educate themselves, organize and communicate among themselves, and defend themselves in whatever ("legal") way they deem fit. Of course the poor defenseless child doesn't know how to do all this.....but her parents do! And who says an old person can't fire a gun? As far as "sneaking up behind" goes, a killer can do that with or without a gun, since by "sneaking" he limits the victim's awareness of his intentions until it is too late. So far, the libertarian perspective makes sense to me....but let's look at the other extreme. Ban all guns. Only the gov't gets guns. Ban all drugs. Regulate the movement of all "suspicious" persons (to prevent "sneaking") regardless of their having committed any previous harmful act. That means set up armed "checkpoints" and ensure people have "papers" to cross boundaries. Go "preemptive" on their asses and make an example out of every person who is "statistically" more likely to become violent. Monitor all communications to ensure nobody slips through the cracks. Lock up little kids who draw pictures of soldiers. It keeps snowballing because there's always SOMEONE who manages to commit a crime, which shows that we're not "preventing" hard enough, which means we have to (so sorry!) take away a few more "freedoms" in order to protect the "freedom" of the "innocent". Destroying what you're protecting is not a good way to ensure that the "protected" object survives. Now obviously, a balance between these two perspectives would be best, but it's been made abundantly clear through historical precedent that "balance" is not something governments are good at. So if "balance" can't be regulated or imposed, then let's go for the "dispersion" method of making everybody responsible (*gasp*) for their own actions, and de-centralize to the point that we achive dynamic balances of consensus in each community.
Sooooo we're scared shitless that some fundamentalist camel-jockey is gonna hack our system, leading to all sorts of restrictive legislation, but if a mega-corporation does it in the holy name of DRM it's a non-issue? Let's make it fair - let's invade Japan....they're harboring cyber-terrorists!
Ummm...no. Personal responsibility means that when you make a choice, you stick with the consequences, repercussions, and any other thing that occurs because of that choice. If you choose, as adults, to have children, then you are dedicating yourself to 20+ years of service and self-sacrifice in order to responsibly raise them. Sorry, but the sailboat, Mercedes, and vacation in Honolulu are not "rights" by any strech of the imaginations. "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" are rights, but they are contingent on YOU, the CITIZEN, educating yourself and taking responsibility for your own destiny. You got "Life", when you were born. You can voluntarily give up that right using your right to "liberty". The same goes for "pursuit of happiness". Please note the "pursuit of". It does NOT guarantee you the right to happiness, nor should your pursuit thereof limit others rights to "liberty". To the lawmakers: keep your grubby hands to yourself, you don't have a divine mandate to govern and you've historically done a piss poor job of handling whatever responsibilities we've given you. To the voters: stop re-electing these people! Make 'em fight for their right to office! Keep kicking them out, and eventually even the politicians will get the idea that if they want power, then they have to actually THINK before they act! To the poster of the parent: It's no surprise that you, who deem a "mindless quest for wealth and posessions" a "right" have posted your comment as Anonymous Coward. So much for personal responsibility.
We all know the expression..."opinions are like ********, we all have one and they all stink." What we don't all have is the chutzpah to act on our opinions. How many of us are willing to go the extra mile and homeschool our kids? How many spend time every night teaching perspective and objectivity to our children by discussing current events and topics other than those presented on ESPN or ET? "Be the change you want to see in the world" -Gandhi. Kwitcherbellyachin and act! Start that generation of "educated" voters in your own home! Quit relying on others to do your job as a parent! Take responsibility for the world and quit saying how "somebody should do something." Discussion/= action. Destruction/= improvement. Take a page from Nike and "just do it." Make the change in your own life, and build something that will compete with these inane "public" policies./rant.
(mod me, shape me, anyway you want me - long as you read me - it's alright)
First off, no encyclopedia ever published has been unbiased and all-encompassing. They are starting points for further research and nothing more. This is why they are rarely acceptable sources when referenced in a research paper or journal. Wikipedia does a great job of helping get your research on a topic off the ground. Yes, it's flawed, inexpert, and often comprised of information from the "public consensus," but it gives you enough information to go to google or ovid, or whatever you use to find more.
Wikipedia's biggest strength is that it doesn't pretend to be omniscient. Unlike with a "legitimate" encylopedia in which all articles are written by "experts", readers instantly take wikipedia articles with a grain of salt. With a "legitimate" encylopedia, readers are often lulled into a false sense of security in the info.
Encyclopediae are like dictionaries. They can give you the "sense" of an entry and how it is usually used, but you are free to agree, disagree, use, misuse, and reinterpret the entries as you see fit. You're a fool if you rely on them as THE source of all that is truth.
Okay, my turn!
RE the U.N.
The U.N. is a political smoke and mirrors act. It is structured to give a few "enlightened" countries power (the big bad veto countries) while at the same time spouting the rhetoric of international cooperation. It's a colosseum where we can watch realpolitikal gladiators without worrying about the knife turning in our direction. Whether it should or shouldn't be this way is a separate arguement, but let's not pretend that the UN represents any kind of international consensus.
RE "the internet"
It's amazing what wisdom lies in fiction. "Control of a thing lies in the ability to destroy it" (give you three guesses). As seen in all these other posts, no country can do more than give the internet a temporary black eye and lose all credibility. No nation-state, company, or any other organization currently has or ever will have "control" of the internet.
RE ICANN
ICANN is a business. Period. The laws of economics and the trend toward globalization will rend this arguement moot in another decade. ICANN evolves too slowly, it will fade away in favor of something better - maybe "open" root servers?! (Anarchy! Anarchy! People can't be trusted with such a large project - we need big business! Who will pay my campaign fees?! Vote as you're told! umm.... hello?.....anybody listening anymore?)...........the remainder of this post was lost after TUX took over the world and the internet died from lack of governmental support.............
Slashdot Mirror
If you're going to correct the grammar, then correct the translation as well. It should be for the public good rather than for the good of the republic since the latter indicates possession and therefore the genitive rei publicae while the publicus -a -um used in the former is adjectival and must agree in case with the object bono.
While the idea of all students on campus posessing laptops is a good general concept....replacing computer labs with a mandated purchase program is just insane. To keep down tech support costs, the univ. will have to support a VERY limited selection of laptop models and OSes. Laptops will have to be heavy desktop-replacement types to ensure enough power ("student grade" laptops just won't cut it) which will force each student to lug around a 10 lb brick in addition to books. Trust me, 10 lbs is a lot of additional weight. As far as OSes go... mandating M$ or OSX will be the default...compsci majors and other geeks who want to learn/run/experiment with linux, UNIX, OS2, BSD, or any other "alternative" system will be on their own. While they may have the skill to operate without tech support, a mandatory OS will relate directly to mandatory file formats and third party software. Hard to run Linux when you are forced to view .wmp vids for your classes - not to mention all the hardware compatibility issues, WPA problems,etc if students are limited to a particular model. Finally, the average life of a laptop (in "responsible or "not student" hands) is about 4 years. This means you'll have older laptops working with the latest models. Think Win98 running alongside 2000 or even (ugh) ME. More up to date... XP laptops for some VISTA for others. So what office format do you use? XP's .doc, or VISTA's fancy new pseudo-open thingy? Upgrade everyone? What about graduate students who's systems are >4yrs old? Make them buy a 2nd laptop? Lots of issues to be sorted out here. I guess my point is that while mandated proprietary-configuration laptops may look like a simple solution, it probably isn't a good thing in the long term. Okay, now that I've mentioned a few problems...how about some solutions?
First, if you want to mandate laptops, that's fine. It's even okay to "officially" (read: for the masses) support a single model/manufacturer. But alternative systems should be, if not supported, then not penalized. This means that file formats used throughout the university must be portable across most M$, MAC, and POSIX systems at a minimum. Some distro-generic UNIX/Linux/BSD support would be a good thing as well. If the school doesn't want to go open-source, they should at least go open-format.
Second, keep the computer labs available - especially those that are associated with engineering, graphic design, video production, compsci,and the like. Having a handful scattered around the campus for the 20% of generic students who's laptops are in the shop having the latest malware/spyware removed is another necessity.
Third, use MAC address authentication rather than WPA on the network if your univ is not forward leaning enough to provide free wifi to the surrounding community (hey, I can dream). WPA just isn't supported widely enough yet....perhaps in a couple years....
From my experience as a tech....this whole idea is one big Cluster*. I'd still like to see a little more emphasis on getting students to learn some basic computer use, however, so I suppose I must lend grudging support to this idea. Idealistically, I'd love to see laptops included with tuition, running Linux/BSD, with an open-to-the-public wifi link, but that's little more than a fantasy......
Wow.....the number of posts this topic has generated is astounding....the more so as only a small percentage actually address the article at hand. I've got a few pennies here, so let me throw in a few thoughts.
First, Rumsfeld (as much as I hate to say it) does have a point, although I doubt he looks at it the same way. The greatest strength of the terrorists and insurgents is their complete lack of a rigid bureauracy. They can adapt rapidly to fickle public awareness and a lazy, sensationalist media. Our government, on the otherhand, is incapable of this because of the very procedures we have created in the name of "efficiency". A brief example (I beg pardon for this digression) is when I went through some government training (sorry, can't say what type as I might get in trouble for criticizing the gov't) and found glaring errors and omissions in the information they were giving to students (some of it outdated over 30 years ago). I went through the bureaucratic two-step and filled out all the requisite forms to remedy this until I was told to stop submitting critiques for "questioning the course's integrity". I was told that, while my critiques (complete with citations and references) may be valid, it would take years to get even simple changes approved, evaluated, tested, re-evaluated, re-approved, and eventually implemented -- too much of an effort to be worth fighting for. I realize I have been vague here, but the changes I was fighting for were changes to a medical curriculum that was teaching information that could potentially harm patients if not remedied. To make a long story short, any "grass-roots", decentralized, or cellular movement is FAR more flexible than our rigid, over-regulated system. So Rummy is right, we do need to be able to adapt more quickly to media-driven public emotion, but, being who and what he is, will attempt to do this with further rules, regulations, and guidelines that serve exactly the opposite end.
Now, on the much debated Left/Right wing Fox/Aljazeera Good/evil secular/religious debates.... As far as politics go....no independent thinker worth his or her salt judges any individual politician solely by party association. Many independent (rightly) supported Clinton's impeachment for lying (I don't care what about...he tried to cover up) and voted (initially) for Bush because a focused effort against Afghanistan seemed warranted after 9-11. (Let's face it, focusing on a given issue is not the Dems' strong point.) It didn't take long, however, for the Bush administration overstepped its bounds and was vociferously opposed by these same people. Slashdot is rife with people pointing fingers and whining about how unfair bias is in one venue or another, but any bias reflected here is that of the readers, not some business conglomerate. No administration releases exclusive slashdot interviews or uses this site as a method to release their latest "victory" speech. Both Fox, and AlJazeera have political and economic interests that trump any obligation to print the views of all comers. Yes, Fox kisses Republican @$$, but there are plenty of other networks that lean the other way. AlJazeera is a business and has been pressured, bribed, coerced, and encouraged to bias stories from whatever group happens to be in power. To expect otherwise of a major news organization is irrational and overly idealistic. Actions DO speak louder than words, as some other posters have noted in calls for US foreign policy change, but this axiom also applies to individuals. There is a difference between dedicated spirituality and the abuse of religious symbolism to advance a political agenda. To believers of Islam the world over: the beauty of your religion and it's message of "peace" is being destroyed by these extremists. They are not religious, they are abusers of the message of the prophet and must be fought at all costs. To the righteous Christian-American "moral" majority....the terrorist attacks of 9-11 are NOT an excuse for you to start the next crusade. The rhetor
Besides, creating "incentives" to use one OS over the other has been an accepted practice for ages. It's not force if there are others "available", however impractical their use might be. If the government simply "prefers" one OS over the other, that doesn't mean that individual users can't get an "alternative" on their personal systems. So this isn't "force" or "unfair competition", it's simply the choice of the masses - as represented by the gov't. Isn't this what M$ has been telling us for the past 20 years?
I've had my share of DV's/VIP's and the like come through, and I can't recall a single time I faked working to impress them. If asked, I would list my accomplishments for the day and justify my "break". Sure I took some flak, but I wasn't fired, reprimanded, or written up. You know why? Because I made it a point to be damn good at my job. I enjoyed my work and did it well which made my supervisor, and his supervisor look good. I didn't have to defend my actions most of the time because my sup's would do it for me out of fear of losing a valuable asset. Sure I ran into the occasional political kiss@$$ who would try to hold me to the letter of the law.... it normally helped that I had read, understood, and remembered the same regulation he was throwing at me. There is usually a way to minimize the damage by manipulating the regs. Bureaucrats are easily manipulated. People who try to throw the book at you usually are trying to intimidate you and they often assume you can't read.
Umm....hate to barge in on this totally irrational dicussion, but archaeology has done quite a bit for "our" "culture". Athenian democracy and Latin republicanism would not have inspired the founding fathers of the US if archaeologists, historians, and the like hadn't reconstructed this information after the rest of the European world tried to destroy it during the dark ages. The whole point of researching the past is so we have the opportunity (even if we're too thick to act on it) of preventing the repetition of mistakes made by our predecessors. Shame we'd rather wave our respective religious banners and deny that anything "outside" our faith could possibly be beneficial.
The amazing thing here is not that fetal cells (and their corresponding DNA) migrate througout the mother's body. After all, both mother and fetus share a circulatory system. The amazing thing is that these cells "linger for decades". After the baby is born, there should no longer be a source of the offspring's genetic material in the mother. As the prenatally produced cells die, they should not replenish without a fetus in utero. If, as this sensationalist article suggests, cells with fetal DNA exist in the mother for years, then one of two circumstances has taken place. First, these cells do not die for decades. This is unlikely, but theoretically possible. More likely is the second hypothesis, which is that fetal stem cells have migrated into the mother's body, implanted, and begun to reproduce. Depending on the type of stem cell, only certain "derivative" cells should be produced. (This explains why mom doesn't grow new body parts.) This would explain the autoimmune theory since blood cells have a higher statistical likelihood of being circulated in the mom's body. Further research should be done as to the types of fetal cells in the mother, the origins and life-expectancies of these cells, and the point in fetal development in which parent and child begin to share cells. Either way, the interesting thing is the presence of these cells long after the child's birth - not the existance of fetal cells in the mother in the first place.
As stated in other posts, Google's focus is SEARCH. So why an OS and why linux? I can think of several reasons. First, MS is trying desperately to encroach on Google's search dominance. Regardless of your opinion of their probability of success, they can cause a great deal of harm to Google just by competing (to say nothing of the litigation that is sure to come out of it). MS gets most of their revenue from the desktop market, and they are using this money to fund their invasion of Google's turf. By "legitimizing" linux with the Google name (and any other intra-corporate agreements Google uses to promote their OS) Google is able to cut the legs off MS's financing machine and gets their biggest rival to go on the defensive. By using linux, Google is building on something that many people have heard of, and the free (as in beer) release of the OS ensures rapid encroachment onto MS's market share. Second, there will be ads, but they won't affect us. Google knows the importance of staying friendly with the techie community. By releasing their OS under the GPL, they make the "geeks" happy with fresh code for their favorite distro and the ability to modify Goobuntu to eliminate ads. Grandma and Grandpa, however, along with most computer users, won't want to bother with these modifications, giving Google a great increase in advertisement dissemination. Unlike AOL, Google knows that unobtrusive advertising is less likely to be rebelled against en masse. (Besides, how many users still use AOL ads nonwithstanding?) So the geeks and corporations get to protect privacy and tweak and tune to their hearts content, but the other 90% of society gets added to google's ad base. As far as a SETI-style use of spare processor cycles....I doubt it will be a "standard" part of the OS, but I certainly could see one of Google's developers setting something like this up on casual Friday! Long story short, it won't kill MS overnight, but it will put Redmond on the defensive. They'll actually have to be innovative on Vista++ just to maintain whatever remnant of the market they're left with after Goobuntu's release. Google doesn't want to be evil, but that doesn't mean they can't show a little business acumen. Google tends to release things that benefit both the public and their own interests at the same time. I see no reason to expect otherwise from a Google/Linux OS.
Not kidding. Rhetorical device appealing to said jockey's opinions of themselves in an effort to encourange some synapse firing that might mimic rational thought. And there ARE a handful of intelligent people on /. if you sift out the chaff.
Bravo! So far you've come the closest to the underlying issues of obesity. I just want to mention a few more of the complexities that this discussion seems to have overlooked.
/rant.
First, as mentioned above we all have different metabolic rates (the rate at which we "burn" fuel to make energy). Further, any given individual burns different substances (proteins, simple carbs, complex carbs, etc.) at different rates and/or converts them to fat for storage at different rates. Genetic differences, metabolic differences, rate of adaptation to lifestyle change, etc, all vary according to the individual, so there is no mass "cure" for "obesity". Since each of these factors affects a given individual to a different degree, this also means there is no one "cause" for obesity. This is not an "excuse" however. Most people, fat or thin, do not take care of their bodies. While some gain weight, others get elevated levels of cholesterol, high blood pressure, and many other disorders.
Now don't start spewing statistics at me about the rates of diabetes or hypertension in the "obese" community being higher than "normal". While many of these statistics are valid, they do not tell the whole story. Until very recently, the medical community has had a very skewed definition of "overweight", which, to the layman, is too often synonymous with "obese". Over/underweight and "obese" are often defined in terms of BMI (weight/height squared). This formula does not take into account physiological differences such as bone structure ("big-boned" stems from a legitimate critique of the "obese" definition), muscle mass, etc. This is analagous to a marathon runner being diagnosed with bradycardia (slow heart rate) because they are in "too good" a shape. The model used to find the "normal" or "average" range is flawed.
The medical community is (slowly) realizing this and is moving toward measurements of %body fat using (relatively) new technology that measures fat content with electrical resistance. With this modified definition, people formerly lumped together as "obese" can be classified according to a more accurate measure. There are the "truly obese" who have abnormally high levels of subcutaneous fat tissue, due to lifestyle choice, genetics, physiologic makeup, or any combination of the three. There are the "falsely accused obese" who are short and muscular, with an "abnormally high" BMI, who are otherwise in excellent shape. There are many many other "variations" each of which should be categorized and "treated" differently.
Rather than lumping all of these unique conditons together (as "possessed" people were in ages past), we should show our education and "scientific" mindsets by discussing "obesity" in a rational manner rather than regurgitating the same sorry rhetoric that runs rampant in the popular press. While I realize that most slashdot readers are not health professionals, many of you ARE scientists or have some science-based training. It is amazing to me how such a "logical" set of people can be as willfully ignorant as the rest of the populace who let "popular" emotion trump reason. (There is a scattering of truly insightful comments here, and I pray that the authors of the same forgive my mass classification of slashdot readers.) I do not expect everybody here to be "educated" in every subject, but I certainly hope that there exists a subset of the "general" population that can display an enlightened perspective even on topics that they are not "experts" in. I guess the old saw that "individuals are smart, people are stupid" is true regardless of the population in question. Would make an interesting socio-behavioural study...... Anyway, let's set the example here and show how slashdot's collective mind can discuss (and perhaps reach some new conclusions about) topics that are "summarized" in the press. Let's be "thinking heads" rather than "talking heads".
You make an excellent point. Still, it would tarnish the message the MPAA is releasing in that the "public" wouldn't see the MPAA as a bastion of anti-piracy. So while your argument makes logical sense, I think that ego and irrational behavior will prevail and MPAA won't plead guilty if this comes to trial. The message of a a double-standard established by a "guilty" plea would resonate in the public domain to such an extent that, at a minimum, awareness of copyright law undesired by the MPAA would trickle into the public view and cause enough public animosity to change laws. Of course, we'd need a decent little news team to sensationalize the message, but hey, it's happened before!
The lack of medical knowledge displayed on these pages is astounding. Stick to computers. In the ER, it doesn't matter if you'll "lose energy", "suffer frostbite", or contract any other condition. The first law of the ER is to keep you alive. This is exemplified by the ABC (Airway, breathing, circulation) mnemonic taught to every emergency medic from physicians down to the lowly first responder. I can defibrillate your heart all day (with WAY less than an 90% success rate) but it doesn't matter a damn if you don't have a patent airway. Controlled hypothermia works because it stops the compensatory reactions in your body that may cause more harm than good - in particular, it slows your heartrate and constricts your blood vessels to prevent you from losing all your blood. You can't do a whole lot to somebody who's bled white. Hypothermia works in nature, because, when it occurs quickly enough, it stops the bloodstream from circulating heat right out of the body and it slows cellular metabolism enough to prevent the buildup of toxic wastes. It's the buildup of toxins that will kill you long before the lack of oxygen. Controlled hypothermia can postpone the body's attempts to heal itself until conditions are more conducive to success. This is an incredible medical achievement and one that has the potential to save thousands of lives.
Of course, they will (surprise!) find "indicators" of "links" to "suspected" terrorist "connections" as they analyze the search results. You don't really think this is about pornography do you? In the Bush administration everything is about "terrorism." I fully expect this information to be turned over to the FBI and HSA nominally to save children from "perversion", but these agencies would only be doing their jobs if they "happened" to find homeland-security (a.k.a. "for the fatherland") sensitive information in the results. That, my friend, is why they won't just perform their own search.
I'm not a Buddhist, but I feel some of your logic may be flawed. First, the existence of an inpersonal force does not preclude the "ability to reason, remember, etc". The argument could be made that since I, incarnated, have these abilities, it is reasonable to extend these abilities into my percieved projection of myself after death. As far as omni-presence, interest in justice, and all that jazz goes: none of these things are "needed" for a "system" of reincarnation to exist. "Inpersonal" indicates that the driving force behind further learning comes from within. The system would function just as well with a self-assessment of one's life-abilities that is balanced by "insurmountable" challenges and difficulties faced if reincarnating as a "too advanced" being. Enlightenment doesn't get easier as one progresses; it gets harder. Buddhism is about seeking personal truth. I feel it is somewhat lacking in "pure altruism", and can be a little heavy on ceremony and symbolism, but that is an entirely different discussion. The point is, your arguement is flawed. First find the box, then try to look outside it.
The correct question is, "Why are voters allowing this?" I hate to be redundant, but every post I make here has something to do with PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY. Strange how we love to complain, tell everybody how we'd fix things, rant on our blogs about how bad things are, and post our "solutions" on slashdot. Notice that nowhere in that list do we do anything more than ADVOCATE change. Sorry folks, but spouting off isn't enough. The whole "bearing witness" concept, while useful, is insufficient. There is only ONE way to make things better. Gandhi said it best, "Be the change you wish to see in the world." That means get off your duff and do things differently! Voting "against" is a start, but it's not constructive. If you want to build a better nation, then you have to do it from the bottom up. Every decent government the world has come up with originated with a populist, grass-roots movement. What a pity the people lose interest so quickly and relinquish the power to an "elite" few. Baaaaa.... Remember, "They're more what you'd call 'guidelines' than actual rules."
I can't believe we're arguing about the validity of biasing article choice on spammers because there might be a "cool link" in there. If you want to share links, use del.icio.us. Slashdot is a news site, and this discussion should be about the articles - not the links. I kinda like the idea of a submission (as opposed to approval) cap. Spammers are the bane of the internet and to justify their existence because they might link to an interesting site 1 out of 1000 times is infantile. A submission cap would make slashdot useless to spammers. "Normal" users, the "nerds" for whom this site is supposed to be, would ensure that there are plenty of interesting links submitted. Besides, I'm willing to guess that only a small percentage of links submitted are approved anyway. If you want cool links, then it makes sense to limit redundant submissions with a cap in order to ensure a greater diversity of links from a corresponding diverse pool of authors and an associated increase in the odds of a "cool link" being chosen. An alternative to a cap that may be more in line with the community spirit is to allow users to ignore articles by user name in the manner of banning a spammer on IM. This wouldn't resolve the problem of bias due to redundancy, but it is a viable middle ground.
"Western" democracy is relatively young, as are many developments in firearm technology that have rendered previous weapons obsolete. The methhead wouldn't be much of a threat with a 300 year old flintlock single-shot pistol. We keep trying to instill "western democracy" in "developing" nations, with varying degrees of success. Situations in these countries could be used as examples of "failure" as could post WWI Germany, early 20th century Spain, and Argentina. There are others, but these are the first that come to mind. There is empirical evidence, therefore, not that "gun control leads to oppression", but that government polarization and extremism resulting in restrictive and invasive over-regulation limits freedom to such a degree that "democracy" cannot survive. Democracy does not mean everything is equitable and "safe" all the time with good 'ol Big Bro watching your back. It means a messy, flexible, fluid society that encourages cooperation and individuality by sacrificing imposed conformity and the associated illusions of security.
First, I would prefer not to choose between extremes, but as elected officials tend to have extremely polar viewpoints, it is nearly impossible to "vote" for middle ground. The best we can do is keep alternating extremes in an effort to restore reason and balance. Second, I agree that a grenade launcher in the hands of a hallucinating addict is a bad idea, but I ALSO think that the precedent set by imposing a "blanket ban" on anything, without regard to circumstance, can cause an equal amount of damage. While, in this circumstance, the ban appears reasonable, what about situations where oppressed people have NO recourse to defense? While an armed populace cannot "defeat" a modern army, they can cause an enormous amount of havoc and make themselves heard around the world. Or perhaps it would be better to ensure just the military and criminal extremists have weapons so they can duke it out a' la Falluja while the "decent law abiding citizens" can't even defend their families. I don't advocate Somalia-like anarchy, but I fear an East German-like state even more. I can fight one crazy guy with a grenade launcher. I can't fight an army or a nation-state. Finally, my "unavoidable consequence" has been borne out again and again in nations that have "guaranteed" certain freedoms for their people. As far back as the Roman republic there were "rights", "freedoms", and elected officials to protect them. Rome still turned into an authoritarian state that was finally destroyed by the very anarchy you seem to be so against. I'm not a libertarian and don't agree with them on many many points, but I think that this "death by a thousand cuts" that is whittling away at "freedom" will eventually cause a much larger backlash that is more destructive than anything a meth-head with a grenade launcher could do.
Freedom is Slavery
When "freedom" is the excuse for restricting thought, speech, movement, etc, but "compells" one to spout the party line - to be a "patriot" - "or else.....", then yes - freedom is slavery.
War is Peace
Invade a country that has not attacked you to "spread freedom" and "promote peace". Nuff said.
Ignorance is Strength
Pick a party, buy from the monopoly, it's someone else's responsibility. These are not the actions of the "educated". Ignorance is valued because, by deferring responsibility to someone else, it confers the illusion of security. Ignorance is bliss, ignorance is Strength.
Let's see if I'm following all this.... Timmy the meth head, because he breaks societal norms by taking drugs and ruining his own life (nothing in the parent posts indicate that he has done any direct harm to any other "citizen") automatically relinquishes all other "rights" because he is a "potential" threat to "others" (since we all carry a gun for ourselves, it's all the defenseless "others" we have to worry about). Now one arguement is that everybody has the "right" to arm themselves, educate themselves, organize and communicate among themselves, and defend themselves in whatever ("legal") way they deem fit. Of course the poor defenseless child doesn't know how to do all this.....but her parents do! And who says an old person can't fire a gun? As far as "sneaking up behind" goes, a killer can do that with or without a gun, since by "sneaking" he limits the victim's awareness of his intentions until it is too late. So far, the libertarian perspective makes sense to me....but let's look at the other extreme. Ban all guns. Only the gov't gets guns. Ban all drugs. Regulate the movement of all "suspicious" persons (to prevent "sneaking") regardless of their having committed any previous harmful act. That means set up armed "checkpoints" and ensure people have "papers" to cross boundaries. Go "preemptive" on their asses and make an example out of every person who is "statistically" more likely to become violent. Monitor all communications to ensure nobody slips through the cracks. Lock up little kids who draw pictures of soldiers. It keeps snowballing because there's always SOMEONE who manages to commit a crime, which shows that we're not "preventing" hard enough, which means we have to (so sorry!) take away a few more "freedoms" in order to protect the "freedom" of the "innocent". Destroying what you're protecting is not a good way to ensure that the "protected" object survives. Now obviously, a balance between these two perspectives would be best, but it's been made abundantly clear through historical precedent that "balance" is not something governments are good at. So if "balance" can't be regulated or imposed, then let's go for the "dispersion" method of making everybody responsible (*gasp*) for their own actions, and de-centralize to the point that we achive dynamic balances of consensus in each community.
Sooooo we're scared shitless that some fundamentalist camel-jockey is gonna hack our system, leading to all sorts of restrictive legislation, but if a mega-corporation does it in the holy name of DRM it's a non-issue? Let's make it fair - let's invade Japan....they're harboring cyber-terrorists!
Ummm...no. Personal responsibility means that when you make a choice, you stick with the consequences, repercussions, and any other thing that occurs because of that choice. If you choose, as adults, to have children, then you are dedicating yourself to 20+ years of service and self-sacrifice in order to responsibly raise them. Sorry, but the sailboat, Mercedes, and vacation in Honolulu are not "rights" by any strech of the imaginations. "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" are rights, but they are contingent on YOU, the CITIZEN, educating yourself and taking responsibility for your own destiny. You got "Life", when you were born. You can voluntarily give up that right using your right to "liberty". The same goes for "pursuit of happiness". Please note the "pursuit of". It does NOT guarantee you the right to happiness, nor should your pursuit thereof limit others rights to "liberty". To the lawmakers: keep your grubby hands to yourself, you don't have a divine mandate to govern and you've historically done a piss poor job of handling whatever responsibilities we've given you. To the voters: stop re-electing these people! Make 'em fight for their right to office! Keep kicking them out, and eventually even the politicians will get the idea that if they want power, then they have to actually THINK before they act! To the poster of the parent: It's no surprise that you, who deem a "mindless quest for wealth and posessions" a "right" have posted your comment as Anonymous Coward. So much for personal responsibility.
We all know the expression..."opinions are like ********, we all have one and they all stink." What we don't all have is the chutzpah to act on our opinions. How many of us are willing to go the extra mile and homeschool our kids? How many spend time every night teaching perspective and objectivity to our children by discussing current events and topics other than those presented on ESPN or ET? "Be the change you want to see in the world" -Gandhi. Kwitcherbellyachin and act! Start that generation of "educated" voters in your own home! Quit relying on others to do your job as a parent! Take responsibility for the world and quit saying how "somebody should do something." Discussion /= action. Destruction /= improvement. Take a page from Nike and "just do it." Make the change in your own life, and build something that will compete with these inane "public" policies. /rant.
(mod me, shape me, anyway you want me - long as you read me - it's alright)
First off, no encyclopedia ever published has been unbiased and all-encompassing. They are starting points for further research and nothing more. This is why they are rarely acceptable sources when referenced in a research paper or journal. Wikipedia does a great job of helping get your research on a topic off the ground. Yes, it's flawed, inexpert, and often comprised of information from the "public consensus," but it gives you enough information to go to google or ovid, or whatever you use to find more. Wikipedia's biggest strength is that it doesn't pretend to be omniscient. Unlike with a "legitimate" encylopedia in which all articles are written by "experts", readers instantly take wikipedia articles with a grain of salt. With a "legitimate" encylopedia, readers are often lulled into a false sense of security in the info. Encyclopediae are like dictionaries. They can give you the "sense" of an entry and how it is usually used, but you are free to agree, disagree, use, misuse, and reinterpret the entries as you see fit. You're a fool if you rely on them as THE source of all that is truth.
Okay, my turn! RE the U.N. The U.N. is a political smoke and mirrors act. It is structured to give a few "enlightened" countries power (the big bad veto countries) while at the same time spouting the rhetoric of international cooperation. It's a colosseum where we can watch realpolitikal gladiators without worrying about the knife turning in our direction. Whether it should or shouldn't be this way is a separate arguement, but let's not pretend that the UN represents any kind of international consensus. RE "the internet" It's amazing what wisdom lies in fiction. "Control of a thing lies in the ability to destroy it" (give you three guesses). As seen in all these other posts, no country can do more than give the internet a temporary black eye and lose all credibility. No nation-state, company, or any other organization currently has or ever will have "control" of the internet. RE ICANN ICANN is a business. Period. The laws of economics and the trend toward globalization will rend this arguement moot in another decade. ICANN evolves too slowly, it will fade away in favor of something better - maybe "open" root servers?! (Anarchy! Anarchy! People can't be trusted with such a large project - we need big business! Who will pay my campaign fees?! Vote as you're told! umm.... hello?.....anybody listening anymore?) ...........the remainder of this post was lost after TUX took over the world and the internet died from lack of governmental support.............