Let's face it. When graduates get out into the "real word", they'll be sitting through presentations by their managers and peers that are just as bad, if not worse (ever see a presentation where a research type includes tables so big that you couldn't read them on screen from the front row with a telescope?). Just think of it as practical life experience. They'll be ready for the workplace!
In classical reasoning, there's a difference between Intelligence and Wisdon. Intelligence roughly translates to intellectual capacity, whereas Wisdom represents the ability to make good choices given the knowledge you have, the experience you've gained, and the factors presented to you. Thus, using All in the Family as an example, we could say that Archie clearly had more Intelligence than Edith, but Edith clearly had more Wisdom.
I guess the AD&D rulebooks had it right after all, by have Intelligence and Wisdom as separate stats.
That was my preference, but there are some cases where you have no choice but to carry the data on the device, or on removable medaia that most users carry with the device (regardless of policy). Our users often worked in rural areas where Internet connections were not always available. When visiting the sites we oversaw, policy matters often kept our staff from connecting their laptops to the company networks where they were working. Cellular modems helped some (not at all in some areas where there was no data coverage--more than 5 miles off the Interstate in some rurual areas), but most of the tools they used for their jobs required data be imported into a client-side application, and that data needed to be preserved until the work process was done. Then there were their work documents themselves, which would also be considered sensitive data. They could just box up and ship boatloads of documents back to the main office and do more of the work from there, but transporting pacakges carries its own set of risks.
So, in an ideal world, no sensitive data on laptops would be ideal, but the real world and the ideal world often do not intersect.
I worked for a quasi-governmental agency for a number of years. Although we adopted disk encryption, our primary defense was the one you describe: you don't go anywhere without your laptop. That's right--not left in the conference room over lunch, or even unattended in the airport bathrooms. I still can't believe how many brain donors set their laptop bags down near the entrance or the sink and then go do their business. It's either in the stall, over your shoulder, or on the floor against your legs. They were even told not to leave them in their cars if they stopped at the grocery store on the way home (we had one stolen that way during a "3 minute" stop). We even had some good training videos that showed how quickly someone could swap laptop bags (for so long, most of them looked alike), or pop open the bag and replace the laptop with a phone book in under 30 seconds while a speaker was busy talking to guests after a presentation.
In addition, there were reports that had to be filled out to inform management if a laptop was lost or stolen. There were disclosures to the entities that were supervised. The consequences of losing a laptop were so painful that no one wanted to lose one.
I worked in a large, quasi-governmental agency for more than nine years. Almost every printout we received included URLs, either in the body of the text or in footnotes/endnotes. Seeing URLS in email messages was even more common. I agree that re-printing reports or doucments that were not properly proofread in the first place is likely the more obvious issue, but I still believe that the author of our web addressing system has a much broader picture in his mind as to the absolute extent of the use of URLs in documentation.
Viewed as isolated snippets of text, they likely don't cause many page breaks, but I think the guy understood just how prevalent they are and just how many documents are out there that include URLS. It goes to the law of large numbers just the way spammers do--it's being printed so often that it is likely causing some line breaks and page breaks (not to mention the toner being used), and, when taken in aggregate, it likely does become a huge amount. Just think of those micro-rounding transactions from Office Space...
I believe the supplies were to be expedition supplies, rather than evacuation supplies, and those would have had water and food, but probably only enough for a five day expedition team of 5-8 persons.
The bizzare mixture of people that are on the ship did seem contrive, yet it also seemed plausible. After all, the base came under attack during a political visit, and the survivors are only those who made it to the gate room (though, from the sound of the reports on Earth, very few were lost and only 80 were MIA--about as many as made it through the gate). Such visits often bring an enterage of extra people along for the ride (I'm surprised we didn't have any chroniclers or archivists along). For those who followed the other two SG shows, the other beuraucratic types had been trying to exert civillian oversight and control over the Stargate program for many years. It makes sense that they were now in a place to have more "useless" people among the refugees.
There were two primary things that bugged me about the pilot (apart from the sex scene that did nothing to support the plot and was a lame way to show character relationships):
if the ship had a video drone system and the game geek was using it to record his perceived final hours, why didn't anyone think of trying to play back the ship's own video or other logs?
in SG-Atlantis, in order to activate most Ancient tecnology, at least the first time, it needed to be handled by someone with the Ancient genetic marker. They may have decided to drop that bit to lower the tech content, or they may be operating under the premise that all SG team members now must receive the genetic marker via injection before going through a gate. That leaves you to wonder about the boy genius...
Overall, it seems interesting enough to pull me back again, but we'll have to see how well it maintains my interest. As to the person who questioned the premise of the inmanned, unarmed (or poorly armed) ship that was bouncing between galaxies, it does seem to be something that would fit the mythology of the Ancients as presented in the other shows. If the Ancients presumably seeded life across multiple galaxies, they might have used a ship like the one in the show to do some automatic (manned or unmanned) journeys to find suitable sites. It's possible that, when the ship was fully operational, that even things like the drones could have been dispatched automatically to check and record conditions. Then, if the ship's programming was set (or got switched to autopilot during a crisis) to travel through a number of galxies in a circuit, it might have cycled back through Pegasus Galaxy, where Atlantis could have called it home to load up with a crew. It obviously did support a crew at one point, so they will probably find some means of affecting repairs and making food on-board. My guess for the first season plot progression is that it will include the following elements:
discovery that, if repaired, the ship's shields can prevent the venting problems
That the ship might possibly be able to self-repair, if well-powered
the need for augmenting,repairing, recharging, and/or replacing the power system will be a significant arc
They will encounter some people groups planted by the Ancients in other galaxies
The concept of returning to the Milky Way will become a veritable quest for the Holy Grail
The one thing that will be interesting about this show is if and how they could introduce a common enemy or villian (apart from an internal one). Since it seems they will be spending only 12 hours at a time in each location (each galaxy?), that would make it hard to have a series-long common enemy (e.g., Goa'uld, Wraith), unless they use the most overused sci-fi plot device of them all: they just disturbed a super-advanced race that is now aware of their presence and will follow them at all costs because they want to get back to the source of the meat buffet (e.g., Wraith, Borg). I'm also interested in learning more about Rush. It seems he already has alterior motives.
I genuinely liked the series. It seemed to get a little tired around season 4 (or was it 5), but then picked up again. Overall, it was highly entertaining, at least to this viewer and his family.
You could start watching without finishing. In time, there will likely be references made to "tip the hat" to the orginal SG-1 and Atlantis fans. If you like SG-1 and have the time, keep watching. I felt things got better in seasons 6-8 again, but the series ending was a bit too much of a hurry for me. I really enjoyed Atlantis and was disappointed that it was axed so early. I felt it could have gone another four seasons without resorting to yet another new enemy-there were many threads that could have yet been wrapped up.
Micello or anyone else, I think they'll run into trouble with some management companies for places like malls and large office buildings who will view such maps as security threats. In reality, it could be a real benefit for business (the first time I had to navigate the Minneapolis Skyway system, it took me an extra 30 minutes to find the place I was seeking), but I just don't know that the property managers will see it that way.
Just one point in reply--on "drugging" kids. I have ten kids, six of whom are boys, and five of those boys are in school this year. We've seen plenty of the "boys will be boys" behavior from four of the five. One, however, has had constant problems to a tenth degree of magnitude of that of his brothers. He had sensory integration disorder as a child (in his case, he was over sensitive to tactile stimulii, but things like spinning him round 100 times wouldn't get him dizzy), which was helped with therapy. As he got older, however, and as struggles increased (both at home and in school), we took him in to be evaulated by a pediatric psychiatrist (no, we didn't realize there was such a specialty until we got the appointment, either).
The long and short of it? He has ADHD but without the typical hyperactivity component. Did we choose to medicate him? Yes, but only after carefully consulting with a number of specialists, and we have switched his medications numerous time to try to find the right formulation. There's a common perception out there that these kids get put on sedatives--that's not true. Kids with ADHD are typically prescribed stimulants that help their higher nervous system functions to be better able to execute control. We would not accept any medication that would sedate our child, or put him in any form of mild stupor. As we've switched meds, we've stayed in close contact with his teachers, to make sure he is not "drugged out" all day.
It was a tough choice to make (not only giving our child a label, but opting to use meds), but it was a choice made for the benefit of our child. I'll be the first to tell you that meds are overprescribed to a lot of kids who don't really need them, but just ask you to remember that some kids, like my son, do need them to function well. I know that they will help him, because I started taking stimulants for ADHD as an adult. I never imagined that I could have such a condition (I pictured kids would could never stay on task or would daydream constantly--I learned that hyperfocusing is a common symptom, and that above average intelligence can mask {compensate for} the condition so that it often goes undetected in such cases), but learned how much better I could be at controlling my task management and other executive functions when taking my meds.
Just an FYI--yes, you can pay them online now. We've not written checks for bills for years, and we've had a Dell account for a long time now. I remember when they couldn't take online payments. The real reason is that their billing and payment system is necessarily separate from their build and buy system. It may seem odd, but there were still some banks that were just setting up online banking options a couple of years ago. Heck, the bank my employer uses for my healthcare spending account (the bank they tell me I must use if I want their matching contributions) still has an online banking service that only shows the balance based on the previous day's end-of-day balance.
I would never work with their phone sales people. I always build and buy online. If I do have a question, I chat with a sales rep, and so far they have not steered me wrong. Of course, the average consumer (one with little tech knowledge) is probably more likely to call in. Dell is shooting itself in the foot if it allows morons and buffoons to handle their sales calls.
In reality, studies have shown that most adults who learned the cursive script adapt it to their own style. Most people who still write long-hand write with a combination of cursive and printed block letters (e.g. a block letter "A" followed by cursive script). To me, the issue is not the demise of cursive per se, but rather the decline of legible handwriting, cursive or block letters, as a whole.
My eldest child is almost 16, and as each has gone through their elementary years, teachers have de-emphisized fine motor development and good penmanship. I have two children, in particular, who write in a barely legible chicken scratch (which is sometimes even unreadable to them). While many comments note that keyboarding and online form completion is on the rise, we're not there yet, and there will always likely be some situations when handwritten language skills will be necessary.
First and foremost, since we have not completed the transition to a paperless society yet, there are still many examples of forms that need to be filled in manually, from job applications to travel expense reimbursements. Join a large civic organization, and they might yet require you to fill out an application that makes copies in triplicate, for various offices or levels of the organization. Hit someone's car in a parking lot? You leave a handwritten note since most cars don't have the driver's eddress emblazoned on the sides (and don't get started on crappy handwriting keeping you from needing to pay for the damages--yeah, you left the note but nobobody called...).
Then there's the scenario most people forget about: when the power goes out. Sure, laptops and portable devices will have battery life, but they won't last indefinately. Also, have you ever been in a restaurant or a retail store when the power went out? What happened? Likely one of two things happened (if it lasted more than a few moments): they either asked everyone to leave their merchandise and leave the store, or they manually tallied orderd by writing down the items and totalling the purchase. I worked retail for years, and we woudl always write out physical slips if we lost power. These were later entered into the POS system once power was restored. It took longer, but it was better than losing all sales during those hours.
In the end, I don't care if my kids can write only block letters or cursive script, but I do want them to be able to write legibly. I also believe they should be getting regular instruction in touch-typing, even in the earliest grades (where games would teach the keyboard layout). [On a related note, if we are going to teach touch typing, perhaps it's time to reconsider returning to the DVORAK layout.] Keyboarding skills are absolutely necessary for the future, but kids should still know how to write things out on paper for those times when technology is not an option.
If they fixed it, that's great, though I've seen nothing verifying that fact. The fact that they had reintroduced a problem that was eliminated years ago just shows (IMO) that they are being sloppy. The last thing I want to deploy here is an OS that is open to old vulnerabilities.
If you have a link pointing to anything that shows they fixed the issue in the RTM release, I'd be glad to review it.
And with Windows 7 returning us to the age of malformed-packet-inducable-BSOD, I'm doing everything I can to maintain XP as our platform over the next 2-3 years, including a final round of PC purchases with XP downgrade rights in place.
How about ceasing to overregulate home chemistry sets (which now really do little more than allow kids to see color changing tricks), and allowing for private citizens to once again be citizen-scientists without the fear of drawing the suspicion of the DHS (Look! He's got a lab in his garage! He must be a terrorist!) or the DEA (Look! He's got a lab in his garage! He must be a making meth!). Heck, I'd love to set up a hydroponic tomato garden in my basement so I can have tomatoes during the winter in Minnesota, but I don't want to risk being booked on having "drug-growing equipment" (Look! He's got them plant lights in his basement! He must be growing pot!)
I mean, come on, people! In the days after 9-11, restrictions put forward governing certain incediary chemicals nearly killed the ability of model rocket hobbyists to purchase engines online or at distant hobby shops (due to proposed shipping restrictions). The model rocket and hobby industries had to lobby to make sure those changes didn't cripple a hobby that spurred the interest of many people in the fields of aerospace, aerodynamics, engineering, chemistry, and physics. Heck, let's get back to being able to order our own chemical supplies so we can make our own rocket engines!
It has even changed kitchens. My mother had a recipie that used baker's amonia as a primary ingredient (I'm assuming as a levening agent in conjunction with baking soda). As far back as the 1980s she could no longer buy it herself without registering with a pharmacist and having them order it for her (in limited quantities--you know how often cookie-bakers must have engaged in bomb-making activities). Recently, I went to a number of pharmacies, but none of them could get it for me.
When I read the Riftwar Saga during my high school years, I had no interest in reading forwards or acknowledgements. I just read the fiction. And, no, I've never visited the Wikipedia page for Feist. I'm not anybody's fanboy. While old news to you, I thought it was an interesting tidbit to add here--something of which not everyone may be aware.
BTW, Bill's knowledge was first hand. I doubt he had to read the forwards and acknowledgements.
Far worse, IMO, is that most major media outlets simply re-release Associated Press (AP) content. Very little original news reporting really goes on anymore, except in the largest stories (e.g., wars, disasters) where the topic being covered can easily be covered from multiple angles without overlap.
The main word in that last sentence is "easily". As I see it, too many media outlets want an easy way to fill their content containers (e.g., print press, websites, TV newscasts) without encouraging the kind of in-depth coverage that was once the mainstay of reporting. We need more news hounds who will go beyond the breaking headlines, the quips from public officials, and what they can quickly Google on the topic to doing real investigative journalism.
Think of it in the context of the recent kidnap recovery in California. Did any member of the press break the story that the perp was groundskeeper next door, of a lot that overlooked his little prison camp? No. That information came out after the police investigated and made the discovery.
I'm not suggesting that journalists should interfere with police investigations, or that they should have beat the police to that bit of information, but I wonder how many newspeople actually were out there trying to conduct their own investigations of this perp, and how many were just trying to be the first back to the office (or studio) with the most recent quip from an official investigator or a family member. To me, it seems as if journalism has become more like the paparazzi--simply haning out and hoping they get the best shot, or that they are first to press with some juicy new tidbit.
Okay. Enough of my ranting and raving. The post was about Google promoting micropayments for news items served up through Google News. If they can make it work, it will be a good thing, but unless news outlets go back to some old-fashioned, pavement-pounding journalism, it will soon be like a respirator on a brain dead body. No matter how much air you pump into a dead thing, it is still dead.
Splendid idea. That is definately one of the best sagas out there.
On a side note, while I was a lad working in retail books, I met Bill Fawcett, the sci-fi writer and editor. He indicated that Feist's work came out of an AD&D campaign he (Feist) DMed. Now that would have been a most awesome campaign! It makes me want to pull out my old bag of dice...
I'm sorry, in advance, for ranting and raving, but this is absolute lunacy. A web page design is copyright protected at best. What makes the central search box and a couple of buttons and nearby links a unique business process? Google's structure of algorithims, cache servers, and distributed search processing are (IMO) a patentable business process. In fact, I'd argue that there's an abundance of prior art out there against this patent. Does anyone remember the early Webcrawler page? It might not have been centered (but that's just formatting), but it had a very basic search box, a search button, and a list of category links below (from October 1996: http://web.archive.org/web/19961023234707/http://www.webcrawler.com/).
Google might have a relaxed and hip work environment, but some people in their legal and/or IP departments must be (IMO) taking some really bad trips. This is downright stupidity that does nothing to help promote meaningful patent reform unless Google uses this patent as an example of the type of schlock that is getting approved, and makes it the 'poster boy' for patent reform.
I've posted comments to proposed rules before, but I could not, for the life of me, find the proper link to let me leave comments this time around. Is it just me, or is the process for posting comments on proposed regs rediculously painful?
I read about the comment period in the news, but the column did not provide a link to the page that would let me post comments. I went to Regulations.gov and searched on the reference numbers provided in the column, only to face pages and pages of results. Is it just incompetence (on their part *or mine*), or is their site for comments simply too Byzantine and complex? I tried searching five ways to Friday and eventually gave up. It almost seems as if they make it more complex to discourage too many people from commenting.
Slashdot Mirror
Let's face it. When graduates get out into the "real word", they'll be sitting through presentations by their managers and peers that are just as bad, if not worse (ever see a presentation where a research type includes tables so big that you couldn't read them on screen from the front row with a telescope?). Just think of it as practical life experience. They'll be ready for the workplace!
In classical reasoning, there's a difference between Intelligence and Wisdon. Intelligence roughly translates to intellectual capacity, whereas Wisdom represents the ability to make good choices given the knowledge you have, the experience you've gained, and the factors presented to you. Thus, using All in the Family as an example, we could say that Archie clearly had more Intelligence than Edith, but Edith clearly had more Wisdom.
I guess the AD&D rulebooks had it right after all, by have Intelligence and Wisdom as separate stats.
Telco Sues Municipality For Laying Their Own Fiber on Friday September 12 2008, @08:28PM http://tech.slashdot.org/story/08/09/12/2326251/Telco-Sues-Municipality-For-Laying-Their-Own-Fiber Your Rights Online: Judge Tosses Telco Suit Over City-Owned Network on Friday October 10 2008, @08:23AM http://yro.slashdot.org/story/08/10/10/1243212/Judge-Tosses-Telco-Suit-Over-City-Owned-Network Telco Appeals Minnesota City's Fiber-Optic Win on Saturday November 08 2008, @11:15AM http://yro.slashdot.org/story/08/11/08/1532237/Telco-Appeals-Minnesota-Citys-Fiber-Optic-Win
That was my preference, but there are some cases where you have no choice but to carry the data on the device, or on removable medaia that most users carry with the device (regardless of policy). Our users often worked in rural areas where Internet connections were not always available. When visiting the sites we oversaw, policy matters often kept our staff from connecting their laptops to the company networks where they were working. Cellular modems helped some (not at all in some areas where there was no data coverage--more than 5 miles off the Interstate in some rurual areas), but most of the tools they used for their jobs required data be imported into a client-side application, and that data needed to be preserved until the work process was done. Then there were their work documents themselves, which would also be considered sensitive data. They could just box up and ship boatloads of documents back to the main office and do more of the work from there, but transporting pacakges carries its own set of risks.
So, in an ideal world, no sensitive data on laptops would be ideal, but the real world and the ideal world often do not intersect.
I worked for a quasi-governmental agency for a number of years. Although we adopted disk encryption, our primary defense was the one you describe: you don't go anywhere without your laptop. That's right--not left in the conference room over lunch, or even unattended in the airport bathrooms. I still can't believe how many brain donors set their laptop bags down near the entrance or the sink and then go do their business. It's either in the stall, over your shoulder, or on the floor against your legs. They were even told not to leave them in their cars if they stopped at the grocery store on the way home (we had one stolen that way during a "3 minute" stop). We even had some good training videos that showed how quickly someone could swap laptop bags (for so long, most of them looked alike), or pop open the bag and replace the laptop with a phone book in under 30 seconds while a speaker was busy talking to guests after a presentation.
In addition, there were reports that had to be filled out to inform management if a laptop was lost or stolen. There were disclosures to the entities that were supervised. The consequences of losing a laptop were so painful that no one wanted to lose one.
I worked in a large, quasi-governmental agency for more than nine years. Almost every printout we received included URLs, either in the body of the text or in footnotes/endnotes. Seeing URLS in email messages was even more common. I agree that re-printing reports or doucments that were not properly proofread in the first place is likely the more obvious issue, but I still believe that the author of our web addressing system has a much broader picture in his mind as to the absolute extent of the use of URLs in documentation.
Viewed as isolated snippets of text, they likely don't cause many page breaks, but I think the guy understood just how prevalent they are and just how many documents are out there that include URLS. It goes to the law of large numbers just the way spammers do--it's being printed so often that it is likely causing some line breaks and page breaks (not to mention the toner being used), and, when taken in aggregate, it likely does become a huge amount. Just think of those micro-rounding transactions from Office Space...
I believe the supplies were to be expedition supplies, rather than evacuation supplies, and those would have had water and food, but probably only enough for a five day expedition team of 5-8 persons.
Overall, it seems interesting enough to pull me back again, but we'll have to see how well it maintains my interest. As to the person who questioned the premise of the inmanned, unarmed (or poorly armed) ship that was bouncing between galaxies, it does seem to be something that would fit the mythology of the Ancients as presented in the other shows. If the Ancients presumably seeded life across multiple galaxies, they might have used a ship like the one in the show to do some automatic (manned or unmanned) journeys to find suitable sites. It's possible that, when the ship was fully operational, that even things like the drones could have been dispatched automatically to check and record conditions. Then, if the ship's programming was set (or got switched to autopilot during a crisis) to travel through a number of galxies in a circuit, it might have cycled back through Pegasus Galaxy, where Atlantis could have called it home to load up with a crew. It obviously did support a crew at one point, so they will probably find some means of affecting repairs and making food on-board. My guess for the first season plot progression is that it will include the following elements:
The one thing that will be interesting about this show is if and how they could introduce a common enemy or villian (apart from an internal one). Since it seems they will be spending only 12 hours at a time in each location (each galaxy?), that would make it hard to have a series-long common enemy (e.g., Goa'uld, Wraith), unless they use the most overused sci-fi plot device of them all: they just disturbed a super-advanced race that is now aware of their presence and will follow them at all costs because they want to get back to the source of the meat buffet (e.g., Wraith, Borg). I'm also interested in learning more about Rush. It seems he already has alterior motives.
I genuinely liked the series. It seemed to get a little tired around season 4 (or was it 5), but then picked up again. Overall, it was highly entertaining, at least to this viewer and his family.
You could start watching without finishing. In time, there will likely be references made to "tip the hat" to the orginal SG-1 and Atlantis fans. If you like SG-1 and have the time, keep watching. I felt things got better in seasons 6-8 again, but the series ending was a bit too much of a hurry for me. I really enjoyed Atlantis and was disappointed that it was axed so early. I felt it could have gone another four seasons without resorting to yet another new enemy-there were many threads that could have yet been wrapped up.
Micello or anyone else, I think they'll run into trouble with some management companies for places like malls and large office buildings who will view such maps as security threats. In reality, it could be a real benefit for business (the first time I had to navigate the Minneapolis Skyway system, it took me an extra 30 minutes to find the place I was seeking), but I just don't know that the property managers will see it that way.
Just one point in reply--on "drugging" kids. I have ten kids, six of whom are boys, and five of those boys are in school this year. We've seen plenty of the "boys will be boys" behavior from four of the five. One, however, has had constant problems to a tenth degree of magnitude of that of his brothers. He had sensory integration disorder as a child (in his case, he was over sensitive to tactile stimulii, but things like spinning him round 100 times wouldn't get him dizzy), which was helped with therapy. As he got older, however, and as struggles increased (both at home and in school), we took him in to be evaulated by a pediatric psychiatrist (no, we didn't realize there was such a specialty until we got the appointment, either).
The long and short of it? He has ADHD but without the typical hyperactivity component. Did we choose to medicate him? Yes, but only after carefully consulting with a number of specialists, and we have switched his medications numerous time to try to find the right formulation. There's a common perception out there that these kids get put on sedatives--that's not true. Kids with ADHD are typically prescribed stimulants that help their higher nervous system functions to be better able to execute control. We would not accept any medication that would sedate our child, or put him in any form of mild stupor. As we've switched meds, we've stayed in close contact with his teachers, to make sure he is not "drugged out" all day.
It was a tough choice to make (not only giving our child a label, but opting to use meds), but it was a choice made for the benefit of our child. I'll be the first to tell you that meds are overprescribed to a lot of kids who don't really need them, but just ask you to remember that some kids, like my son, do need them to function well. I know that they will help him, because I started taking stimulants for ADHD as an adult. I never imagined that I could have such a condition (I pictured kids would could never stay on task or would daydream constantly--I learned that hyperfocusing is a common symptom, and that above average intelligence can mask {compensate for} the condition so that it often goes undetected in such cases), but learned how much better I could be at controlling my task management and other executive functions when taking my meds.
Cheers! and best regards to you.
Just an FYI--yes, you can pay them online now. We've not written checks for bills for years, and we've had a Dell account for a long time now. I remember when they couldn't take online payments. The real reason is that their billing and payment system is necessarily separate from their build and buy system. It may seem odd, but there were still some banks that were just setting up online banking options a couple of years ago. Heck, the bank my employer uses for my healthcare spending account (the bank they tell me I must use if I want their matching contributions) still has an online banking service that only shows the balance based on the previous day's end-of-day balance.
I would never work with their phone sales people. I always build and buy online. If I do have a question, I chat with a sales rep, and so far they have not steered me wrong. Of course, the average consumer (one with little tech knowledge) is probably more likely to call in. Dell is shooting itself in the foot if it allows morons and buffoons to handle their sales calls.
In reality, studies have shown that most adults who learned the cursive script adapt it to their own style. Most people who still write long-hand write with a combination of cursive and printed block letters (e.g. a block letter "A" followed by cursive script). To me, the issue is not the demise of cursive per se, but rather the decline of legible handwriting, cursive or block letters, as a whole.
My eldest child is almost 16, and as each has gone through their elementary years, teachers have de-emphisized fine motor development and good penmanship. I have two children, in particular, who write in a barely legible chicken scratch (which is sometimes even unreadable to them). While many comments note that keyboarding and online form completion is on the rise, we're not there yet, and there will always likely be some situations when handwritten language skills will be necessary.
First and foremost, since we have not completed the transition to a paperless society yet, there are still many examples of forms that need to be filled in manually, from job applications to travel expense reimbursements. Join a large civic organization, and they might yet require you to fill out an application that makes copies in triplicate, for various offices or levels of the organization. Hit someone's car in a parking lot? You leave a handwritten note since most cars don't have the driver's eddress emblazoned on the sides (and don't get started on crappy handwriting keeping you from needing to pay for the damages--yeah, you left the note but nobobody called...).
Then there's the scenario most people forget about: when the power goes out. Sure, laptops and portable devices will have battery life, but they won't last indefinately. Also, have you ever been in a restaurant or a retail store when the power went out? What happened? Likely one of two things happened (if it lasted more than a few moments): they either asked everyone to leave their merchandise and leave the store, or they manually tallied orderd by writing down the items and totalling the purchase. I worked retail for years, and we woudl always write out physical slips if we lost power. These were later entered into the POS system once power was restored. It took longer, but it was better than losing all sales during those hours.
In the end, I don't care if my kids can write only block letters or cursive script, but I do want them to be able to write legibly. I also believe they should be getting regular instruction in touch-typing, even in the earliest grades (where games would teach the keyboard layout). [On a related note, if we are going to teach touch typing, perhaps it's time to reconsider returning to the DVORAK layout.] Keyboarding skills are absolutely necessary for the future, but kids should still know how to write things out on paper for those times when technology is not an option.
If they fixed it, that's great, though I've seen nothing verifying that fact. The fact that they had reintroduced a problem that was eliminated years ago just shows (IMO) that they are being sloppy. The last thing I want to deploy here is an OS that is open to old vulnerabilities.
If you have a link pointing to anything that shows they fixed the issue in the RTM release, I'd be glad to review it.
And with Windows 7 returning us to the age of malformed-packet-inducable-BSOD, I'm doing everything I can to maintain XP as our platform over the next 2-3 years, including a final round of PC purchases with XP downgrade rights in place.
How about ceasing to overregulate home chemistry sets (which now really do little more than allow kids to see color changing tricks), and allowing for private citizens to once again be citizen-scientists without the fear of drawing the suspicion of the DHS (Look! He's got a lab in his garage! He must be a terrorist!) or the DEA (Look! He's got a lab in his garage! He must be a making meth!). Heck, I'd love to set up a hydroponic tomato garden in my basement so I can have tomatoes during the winter in Minnesota, but I don't want to risk being booked on having "drug-growing equipment" (Look! He's got them plant lights in his basement! He must be growing pot!)
I mean, come on, people! In the days after 9-11, restrictions put forward governing certain incediary chemicals nearly killed the ability of model rocket hobbyists to purchase engines online or at distant hobby shops (due to proposed shipping restrictions). The model rocket and hobby industries had to lobby to make sure those changes didn't cripple a hobby that spurred the interest of many people in the fields of aerospace, aerodynamics, engineering, chemistry, and physics. Heck, let's get back to being able to order our own chemical supplies so we can make our own rocket engines!
It has even changed kitchens. My mother had a recipie that used baker's amonia as a primary ingredient (I'm assuming as a levening agent in conjunction with baking soda). As far back as the 1980s she could no longer buy it herself without registering with a pharmacist and having them order it for her (in limited quantities--you know how often cookie-bakers must have engaged in bomb-making activities). Recently, I went to a number of pharmacies, but none of them could get it for me.
When I read the Riftwar Saga during my high school years, I had no interest in reading forwards or acknowledgements. I just read the fiction. And, no, I've never visited the Wikipedia page for Feist. I'm not anybody's fanboy. While old news to you, I thought it was an interesting tidbit to add here--something of which not everyone may be aware.
BTW, Bill's knowledge was first hand. I doubt he had to read the forwards and acknowledgements.
Far worse, IMO, is that most major media outlets simply re-release Associated Press (AP) content. Very little original news reporting really goes on anymore, except in the largest stories (e.g., wars, disasters) where the topic being covered can easily be covered from multiple angles without overlap.
The main word in that last sentence is "easily". As I see it, too many media outlets want an easy way to fill their content containers (e.g., print press, websites, TV newscasts) without encouraging the kind of in-depth coverage that was once the mainstay of reporting. We need more news hounds who will go beyond the breaking headlines, the quips from public officials, and what they can quickly Google on the topic to doing real investigative journalism.
Think of it in the context of the recent kidnap recovery in California. Did any member of the press break the story that the perp was groundskeeper next door, of a lot that overlooked his little prison camp? No. That information came out after the police investigated and made the discovery.
I'm not suggesting that journalists should interfere with police investigations, or that they should have beat the police to that bit of information, but I wonder how many newspeople actually were out there trying to conduct their own investigations of this perp, and how many were just trying to be the first back to the office (or studio) with the most recent quip from an official investigator or a family member. To me, it seems as if journalism has become more like the paparazzi--simply haning out and hoping they get the best shot, or that they are first to press with some juicy new tidbit.
Okay. Enough of my ranting and raving. The post was about Google promoting micropayments for news items served up through Google News. If they can make it work, it will be a good thing, but unless news outlets go back to some old-fashioned, pavement-pounding journalism, it will soon be like a respirator on a brain dead body. No matter how much air you pump into a dead thing, it is still dead.
Splendid idea. That is definately one of the best sagas out there.
On a side note, while I was a lad working in retail books, I met Bill Fawcett, the sci-fi writer and editor. He indicated that Feist's work came out of an AD&D campaign he (Feist) DMed. Now that would have been a most awesome campaign! It makes me want to pull out my old bag of dice...
I stand corrected. I was not aware of such a distinction in the patent system.
In either case, it still seems to similar to Webcrawler and others--I believe the prior art exists.
Sorry. No troll here. I will admit to ignorance between design and utility patents. I did not even realize there was a category for design patents.
I'm sorry, in advance, for ranting and raving, but this is absolute lunacy. A web page design is copyright protected at best. What makes the central search box and a couple of buttons and nearby links a unique business process? Google's structure of algorithims, cache servers, and distributed search processing are (IMO) a patentable business process. In fact, I'd argue that there's an abundance of prior art out there against this patent. Does anyone remember the early Webcrawler page? It might not have been centered (but that's just formatting), but it had a very basic search box, a search button, and a list of category links below (from October 1996: http://web.archive.org/web/19961023234707/http://www.webcrawler.com/).
Google might have a relaxed and hip work environment, but some people in their legal and/or IP departments must be (IMO) taking some really bad trips. This is downright stupidity that does nothing to help promote meaningful patent reform unless Google uses this patent as an example of the type of schlock that is getting approved, and makes it the 'poster boy' for patent reform.
I've posted comments to proposed rules before, but I could not, for the life of me, find the proper link to let me leave comments this time around. Is it just me, or is the process for posting comments on proposed regs rediculously painful?
I read about the comment period in the news, but the column did not provide a link to the page that would let me post comments. I went to Regulations.gov and searched on the reference numbers provided in the column, only to face pages and pages of results. Is it just incompetence (on their part *or mine*), or is their site for comments simply too Byzantine and complex? I tried searching five ways to Friday and eventually gave up. It almost seems as if they make it more complex to discourage too many people from commenting.