Like moving from offices to an open floor plan. But the CEO didn't like the part about parting with/his/ office for a cubical in the middle of the floor.
But the corporate culture and fun loving atmosphere were a huge boon to working there. Nerf gun wars, Segway races, RC vehicle battles, M:tG lunches, board game nights, LAN parties, etc... were regular occurrences. Things like the City Scour (a company wide off-site team based scavenger hunt) which took months of planning and research, and gave the whole company a chance to get out of the office and have some fun, the holiday party in the winter and the family picnic in the summer weren't some little shindig. The holiday party was held at some of the premiere conference facilities in the area, typically included a full casino, video arcade, and a short movie competition. The movies that would compete were written, directed, and starred by employees, the company funded the cost of bringing in the videographers and their editing.
Quarterly release parties included free beer (assorted microbrews, not a cheap MGD keg), h'ordeuvres, and a wall of fame picture for the release heroes.
The summer picnic was similarly a big deal. Bouncy houses, temp tattoos, spin painting, corn holing, a huge banquet spread... all at one of the nicest golf courses in the area.
Basically, the CEO was a dick, but he was a dick that knew the importance of employee moral, and he put people in positions to ensure that even when things were hard, employees had opportunities to unwind, relax, and do something fun.
Having a dedicated staff to driving the culture of your company can have a huge impact and pay massive dividends in retention, employee satisfaction, and willingness to go the extra mile.
One of my previous employers had an employee that started out as a receptionist. She always decorated for the holidays, and she was super social, so she organized extra circular activities. Bowling leagues, wine tastings, etc... She was also tasked with organizing our holiday party, summer picnic, office Olympics, city scour scavenger hunt, and tons of other ideas she helped build in the company.
Eventually, it became clear that these tasks took too much time for her to also be the receptionist, so the CEO created a new position for her to focus on the corporate culture, events, and social media.
Best decision he made. She wasn't a cheer leader running around in a short skirt, but her efforts to make the company a fun place to work were way more impactful than any executive direction.
My example was a hyperbole to demonstrate how international headquarters are used to avoid local regulations. Microsoft has been guilty of this many times over. They expatriate US revenues to avoid paying taxes on it, they expatriate R&D and patents to avoid US export controls, etc...
Also, do you realize that that staff represents less than 1% of Microsoft's personnel, right?
If the US is going after EU citizen data that is held on servers in the EU, that is communicated over networks that exist in the EU, then yeah, I'm fully on board, the US can get bent.
But if Microsoft is saying "We're not going to comply with the US because we're an Irish company" they're full of shit.
So if I make a business, and I HQ it out of Ireland, but I don't have anything but a PO Box and tax filings in Ireland. My servers are in the US. My staff is in the US. I am in the US. My revenue is generated in the US. My customers are in the US. My packaging and distribution is in the US, etc...
Then I should be exempt from US laws?
It would take some more digging, but giving the clearly biased summary, I'd wager there is more to this than just the Federal government trying to run roughshod over Irish law.
The F18 and F16 kick the F-35's ass at air-to-air fighting and to some extent bombing, but in this case the A-10 Warthog is a air-to-ground close combat support fighter. Something the F18 and F16s are not well suited for.
The F-35 has a VSTOL configuration, which might make it more maneuverable allowing for better control at low speeds.
The problem remains though, if the F-35 isn't as effective as an Apache in close combat support, and can't bring the firepower of an A-10 for heavier air-ground support, then the only argument for it would be that it could be close to as effective, but have a longer/faster range. That is what I hope we find out in this exercise.
The other thing to consider is the price tag on a new Apache and A-10 combined is ~$50 mil. The cheapest variant of the F35 is ~$100 mil.
Actually, no, not really - people like me go out to the country to get away from it, not continue to be burdened by it.
I'm so glad that you fat cats from the city can come out and exploit my country side to "get away from it".
How about rather than screwing those of us who live in the country, you just turn off your phone, disconnect the cable, and take some personal responsibility for your own choices, rather than foisting them onto those of us who live here.
You pay cash for your sweaters and gyros. Farmers pay in blood and sweat.
You pay in taxes, taxes which are used to subsidize farms because when you buy a sweater or gyro, you're not paying a fair market value. Because farming is inconsistent, a bad year, or a good year of the wrong crop will get a farmer foreclosed. At the end of the day, most farmers scrap by until someone bigger makes them a retirement option.
It's also a case of opportune costs. If you chose not to subsidize rural broadband, you will in effect subsidize other industries. If I can't remote into the office, I drive in, which means that you will be subsidizing the fuel industry through higher demand. If I can't send emails of videos and high res images it means subsidizing the printing industry. And so on.
All it does is shift costs from one industry to another, typically from more efficient to less, meaning less efficient GDP and slower economic growth.
Is it really so hard for you to cough up a couple of pennies a year to promote economic growth and to increase the likelihood that country kids can have access to the same educational opportunities that your kids have access to?
I live on a sheep farm. You wear anything with wool in it? Ever eat a gyro?
Well guess what, I'm paying for your chosen lifestyle. You're welcome.
Right now I have a 1.2 mbps connection, but we're in the process of building our new larger farm, where I can't even get that. My choices are literally dialup or satellite. Satellite would work acceptably for the farm's needs. As long as we can communicate with the vets and buyers, which means piping high res images and videos around, and keeping our marketing going, we can get by.
But in addition to the farm, I supervise software developers, which means working remote, off hours, and overnight support calls. And VPNs and Satellites work together like water and oil.
So yeah, this is kind of a big deal to a lot of us country folks. Just because some rich asshole wants a McMansion out in the country doesn't mean everyone who lives off the beaten path is a douche or bumpkin.
Absolutely, but only one of these people is being investigated for it.
If it's against the law, but we only ever enforce the law targeting individuals based on political reasoning, then the law should be changed or the enforcement should be changed.
Either hold everyone to the same standard and initiate investigations into Powell, Rice, and the entire Bush administration, or change the law such that cabinet level officials have the power to disclose/store non-impactful classified information as they see fit to execute the duties of their office.
"law" may also be the incorrect term here. IIRC, classification rules are maintained by executive order, not by the congress. Could be wrong on that, but I don't have time to look it up at the moment.
Fascism doesn't necessitate the government takeover of corporations. In fact, if you look at the fascist nations in the past you see that Fascism and Corporatism go hand in hand. The only difference is if you are in a corporation that is aligned with the dictator, or not. With those in the 'not' category likely on a short list to a ride at the gallows.
In popular use, fascism is associated with the right-wing growth of government, where as communism is associated with left-wing growth of government. Public schools, welfare, socialized healthcare are all associated with communism. Patriotism, the military industrial complex, views of racial superiority are all associated with fascism.
Communism, in theory, is the exact opposite of Fascism. There is no central authority in communism. There is no dictator, there are no CEOs, there are no gentry, there is only the commune.
The problem with communism, much like libertarianism is in the act of implementing it. Any "true" communism or libertarian utopia implementation would immediately create a power void. That power void would be filled in very short order, and typically by the person or party you would absolutely least like to be in it.
In both cases, power consolidates. In communism with the state, in libertarianism with the corporations, to the point that eventually, both systems will either collapse or result in some form of absolute central control (quite likely fascism).
Both systems can work fine in very small communities, where a small number of close-knit people who all respect and trust each other can get by. But as soon as they are applied to a larger group, they fall apart.
It's understandable that you are unaware of the century of history and nuance that have occurred in the development of communism and fascism, but if you stop listening to Glen Beck and pick up a book, you may learn something:)
Powel: I started using it [the private email server] in order to get everybody to use it, so we could be a 21st century institution and not a 19th century.
But I retained none of those e-mails and we are working with the State Department to see if thereâ(TM)s anything else they want to discuss with me about those e-mails.
STEPHANOPOULOS: So they wantâ¦
POWELL: (INAUDIBLE) have a stack of them.
STEPHANOPOULOS: â" theyâ(TM)ve asked you to turn them over, but you donâ(TM)t have them, is that it?
POWELL: I donâ(TM)t have any â" I donâ(TM)t have any to turn over. I did not keep a cache of them. I did not print them off. I do not have thousands of pages somewhere in my personal files.
And, in fact, a lot of the e-mails that came out of my personal account went into the State Department system. They were addressed to State Department employees and the State.gov domain. But I donâ(TM)t know if the servers the State Department captured those or not.
And most â" they were all unclassified and most of them, I think, are pretty benign, so Iâ(TM)m not terribly concerned even if they were able to recover them.
Seriously, this is record of fact. Powell openly admitted to using a private email server, that he 'thinks' most or all of the emails were unclassified, and that he doesn't think that any that may have been classified were impactful.
Rice has not openly admitted it, but she was on the Bush admin's private web server and there were records that she "occasionally" used the official state department email system.
Politically speaking, Clinton's mistake was to keep a backup of the emails. Security speaking, this whole thing has been a wank fest for over a decade. At least Kerry started getting it cleaned up.
Yup, from Rice and Powell the procedures were to wipe the server and delete all records of the emails so that they wouldn't be included in any records retention or available for inspection.
If Clinton had followed the standing procedures, none of this would have happened.;)
-Rick
PS: Don't take this as defense of Hillary. It's offense at the cherry picked nature of this witch hunt.
I don't think that word means what you think it means.
If they were in favor of the 'evil corporations' taking over everything, paying for their bad decisions, wiping their noses/butts for them, they would be stupid fascist.
If they were in favor of the government doing the same, they would be stupid communists.
These two words, "fascist" and "communist" have very distinct meanings. I would recommend learning the difference between them as calling a commie a fascist makes you look like a dolt.
It's a non-existent risk for us in our current global status. But if the USD and EUR collapsed and China/Russia both looked at it as an opportunity to make massive land grabs, it could be an approach.
It's also an approach we have taken in part in our invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. It wasn't until after we had "won" that we realized that in order to establish order we needed a local government, not a parking lot with a bunch of refugees.
We've seen this approach used in multiple wars in Africa, and within the latest internal conflicts in Syria.
Most likely though, the country that would be most likely to take such an approach against us, is us. If a civil war were to break out, we would be the most likely to engage in absolute destruction of ourselves.
Fair point, the Swiss did in 1932 order their army to quell a strike/protest through the use of force resulting in 60 some injuries and a dozen+ deaths.
Since then, they were activated internally for WWII, and not again since. They've also time and time again had their funding, size, and mission scope cut.
So the long game won. Had the populous turned 1932 into a civil war, far more people would be dead and they would be in a radically different situation now. Had modern media been available in 1932, they would have been condemned by the world over (except for by the fascist and anti-union folks perhaps).
So yeah, I stand by my statement. A camera phone is vastly more powerful today than a gun. Groups like Anonymous have a far greater impact than the militias that showed up at the Bundy Ranch.
Same here, having my calendar available with out having to dig out my phone and switch apps would be awesome.
Even better if I can get it as a cuff attachment rather than a watch. If I can put this on my shirt cuff, use the battery/processor like a cuff link, that would be awesome!
It isn't a matter of level of arms, it's a matter of intent.
For a invading force that does not care about the existing populace or infrastructure, an opposition force with small arms is going to be impotent. The entire populous can be wiped out, so there's no need for significant boots on the ground. Small arms fire erupts? drop a couple tons of explosives in the area and call it good.
For an invasion or occupying force that needs to maintain order and control of the local populous and infrastructure, small arms play a role, but I'd argue that good urban combat, sabotage, and a long game of disruption and politics is the only way to win the war. A few guys with guns can get mowed down with impunity, a few hundred peaceful protesters getting mowed down with impunity will have catastrophic results for the offending government.
Companies could relocate out, but entrepreneurs would abound!
Think about how amazing it would be if you could tell "the man" to go to hell, and go out and start your own company with your own ideas and initiative. Knowing that in the years it's going to take to build a market segment large enough to become significantly profitable that you, your spouse, and your children will all have their education covered, their medical expenses covered, and enough money to cover your mortgage and food.
I would have gone independent long ago if I had such a solid safety net.
Slashdot Mirror
Hah, yeah, there was some of that too.
Like moving from offices to an open floor plan. But the CEO didn't like the part about parting with /his/ office for a cubical in the middle of the floor.
But the corporate culture and fun loving atmosphere were a huge boon to working there. Nerf gun wars, Segway races, RC vehicle battles, M:tG lunches, board game nights, LAN parties, etc... were regular occurrences. Things like the City Scour (a company wide off-site team based scavenger hunt) which took months of planning and research, and gave the whole company a chance to get out of the office and have some fun, the holiday party in the winter and the family picnic in the summer weren't some little shindig. The holiday party was held at some of the premiere conference facilities in the area, typically included a full casino, video arcade, and a short movie competition. The movies that would compete were written, directed, and starred by employees, the company funded the cost of bringing in the videographers and their editing.
Quarterly release parties included free beer (assorted microbrews, not a cheap MGD keg), h'ordeuvres, and a wall of fame picture for the release heroes.
The summer picnic was similarly a big deal. Bouncy houses, temp tattoos, spin painting, corn holing, a huge banquet spread... all at one of the nicest golf courses in the area.
Basically, the CEO was a dick, but he was a dick that knew the importance of employee moral, and he put people in positions to ensure that even when things were hard, employees had opportunities to unwind, relax, and do something fun.
-Rick
... just not the execution of it.
Having a dedicated staff to driving the culture of your company can have a huge impact and pay massive dividends in retention, employee satisfaction, and willingness to go the extra mile.
One of my previous employers had an employee that started out as a receptionist. She always decorated for the holidays, and she was super social, so she organized extra circular activities. Bowling leagues, wine tastings, etc... She was also tasked with organizing our holiday party, summer picnic, office Olympics, city scour scavenger hunt, and tons of other ideas she helped build in the company.
Eventually, it became clear that these tasks took too much time for her to also be the receptionist, so the CEO created a new position for her to focus on the corporate culture, events, and social media.
Best decision he made. She wasn't a cheer leader running around in a short skirt, but her efforts to make the company a fun place to work were way more impactful than any executive direction.
-Rick
I'm curious though, is it at all similar to an individual who monetized their YouTube account?
They sign up for the YouTube service, they produce a transformative product/service, and they get paid for it.
Are successful YouTube users effectively Google employees as well?
-Rick
My example was a hyperbole to demonstrate how international headquarters are used to avoid local regulations. Microsoft has been guilty of this many times over. They expatriate US revenues to avoid paying taxes on it, they expatriate R&D and patents to avoid US export controls, etc...
Also, do you realize that that staff represents less than 1% of Microsoft's personnel, right?
If the US is going after EU citizen data that is held on servers in the EU, that is communicated over networks that exist in the EU, then yeah, I'm fully on board, the US can get bent.
But if Microsoft is saying "We're not going to comply with the US because we're an Irish company" they're full of shit.
-Rick
So if I make a business, and I HQ it out of Ireland, but I don't have anything but a PO Box and tax filings in Ireland. My servers are in the US. My staff is in the US. I am in the US. My revenue is generated in the US. My customers are in the US. My packaging and distribution is in the US, etc...
Then I should be exempt from US laws?
It would take some more digging, but giving the clearly biased summary, I'd wager there is more to this than just the Federal government trying to run roughshod over Irish law.
-Rick
I only get 1.2/0.4 for $60/mo with Frontier :(
-Rick
A person on could though stick a bunch of UHF antennas on there house and resell white-space 1.5mbps connections to their country side neighbors.
-Rick
Math is finding patterns and proving things by manipulation of symbols in a formal language.
Programming is finding patterns and proving things by manipulation of symbols in a formal language.
IMO, unless you are into true comp-sci or engineering implementation programming projects, the need for advanced math is overblown.
The article is still wrong though. The common exercise between ALL programming and math is one fundamental step:
PROOFS.
Algebra, being able to look at a problem, break it into smaller pieces, simplify, and implement. Algebraic proofs ARE programming.
-Rick
The F18 and F16 kick the F-35's ass at air-to-air fighting and to some extent bombing, but in this case the A-10 Warthog is a air-to-ground close combat support fighter. Something the F18 and F16s are not well suited for.
The F-35 has a VSTOL configuration, which might make it more maneuverable allowing for better control at low speeds.
The problem remains though, if the F-35 isn't as effective as an Apache in close combat support, and can't bring the firepower of an A-10 for heavier air-ground support, then the only argument for it would be that it could be close to as effective, but have a longer/faster range. That is what I hope we find out in this exercise.
The other thing to consider is the price tag on a new Apache and A-10 combined is ~$50 mil. The cheapest variant of the F35 is ~$100 mil.
-Rick
Actually, no, not really - people like me go out to the country to get away from it, not continue to be burdened by it.
I'm so glad that you fat cats from the city can come out and exploit my country side to "get away from it".
How about rather than screwing those of us who live in the country, you just turn off your phone, disconnect the cable, and take some personal responsibility for your own choices, rather than foisting them onto those of us who live here.
-Rick
You pay cash for your sweaters and gyros. Farmers pay in blood and sweat.
You pay in taxes, taxes which are used to subsidize farms because when you buy a sweater or gyro, you're not paying a fair market value. Because farming is inconsistent, a bad year, or a good year of the wrong crop will get a farmer foreclosed. At the end of the day, most farmers scrap by until someone bigger makes them a retirement option.
It's also a case of opportune costs. If you chose not to subsidize rural broadband, you will in effect subsidize other industries. If I can't remote into the office, I drive in, which means that you will be subsidizing the fuel industry through higher demand. If I can't send emails of videos and high res images it means subsidizing the printing industry. And so on.
All it does is shift costs from one industry to another, typically from more efficient to less, meaning less efficient GDP and slower economic growth.
Is it really so hard for you to cough up a couple of pennies a year to promote economic growth and to increase the likelihood that country kids can have access to the same educational opportunities that your kids have access to?
-Rick
I live on a sheep farm. You wear anything with wool in it? Ever eat a gyro?
Well guess what, I'm paying for your chosen lifestyle. You're welcome.
Right now I have a 1.2 mbps connection, but we're in the process of building our new larger farm, where I can't even get that. My choices are literally dialup or satellite. Satellite would work acceptably for the farm's needs. As long as we can communicate with the vets and buyers, which means piping high res images and videos around, and keeping our marketing going, we can get by.
But in addition to the farm, I supervise software developers, which means working remote, off hours, and overnight support calls. And VPNs and Satellites work together like water and oil.
So yeah, this is kind of a big deal to a lot of us country folks. Just because some rich asshole wants a McMansion out in the country doesn't mean everyone who lives off the beaten path is a douche or bumpkin.
-Rick
Absolutely, but only one of these people is being investigated for it.
If it's against the law, but we only ever enforce the law targeting individuals based on political reasoning, then the law should be changed or the enforcement should be changed.
Either hold everyone to the same standard and initiate investigations into Powell, Rice, and the entire Bush administration, or change the law such that cabinet level officials have the power to disclose/store non-impactful classified information as they see fit to execute the duties of their office.
"law" may also be the incorrect term here. IIRC, classification rules are maintained by executive order, not by the congress. Could be wrong on that, but I don't have time to look it up at the moment.
-Rick
Like Clinton, it wasn't illegal at the time to host an off government network private email server for government use.
Unlike Clinton, they did a better job of destroying the evidence so that they can't be investigated for security breaches.
-Rick
Fascism doesn't necessitate the government takeover of corporations. In fact, if you look at the fascist nations in the past you see that Fascism and Corporatism go hand in hand. The only difference is if you are in a corporation that is aligned with the dictator, or not. With those in the 'not' category likely on a short list to a ride at the gallows.
In popular use, fascism is associated with the right-wing growth of government, where as communism is associated with left-wing growth of government. Public schools, welfare, socialized healthcare are all associated with communism. Patriotism, the military industrial complex, views of racial superiority are all associated with fascism.
Communism, in theory, is the exact opposite of Fascism. There is no central authority in communism. There is no dictator, there are no CEOs, there are no gentry, there is only the commune.
The problem with communism, much like libertarianism is in the act of implementing it. Any "true" communism or libertarian utopia implementation would immediately create a power void. That power void would be filled in very short order, and typically by the person or party you would absolutely least like to be in it.
In both cases, power consolidates. In communism with the state, in libertarianism with the corporations, to the point that eventually, both systems will either collapse or result in some form of absolute central control (quite likely fascism).
Both systems can work fine in very small communities, where a small number of close-knit people who all respect and trust each other can get by. But as soon as they are applied to a larger group, they fall apart.
It's understandable that you are unaware of the century of history and nuance that have occurred in the development of communism and fascism, but if you stop listening to Glen Beck and pick up a book, you may learn something :)
-Rick
From Powell's interview:
You may also have forgotten the Bush Administration's use of private email servers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Seriously, this is record of fact. Powell openly admitted to using a private email server, that he 'thinks' most or all of the emails were unclassified, and that he doesn't think that any that may have been classified were impactful.
Rice has not openly admitted it, but she was on the Bush admin's private web server and there were records that she "occasionally" used the official state department email system.
Politically speaking, Clinton's mistake was to keep a backup of the emails. Security speaking, this whole thing has been a wank fest for over a decade. At least Kerry started getting it cleaned up.
-Rick
There are procedures in place.
Yup, from Rice and Powell the procedures were to wipe the server and delete all records of the emails so that they wouldn't be included in any records retention or available for inspection.
If Clinton had followed the standing procedures, none of this would have happened. ;)
-Rick
PS: Don't take this as defense of Hillary. It's offense at the cherry picked nature of this witch hunt.
Bunch of historically illiterate fascists.
I don't think that word means what you think it means.
If they were in favor of the 'evil corporations' taking over everything, paying for their bad decisions, wiping their noses/butts for them, they would be stupid fascist.
If they were in favor of the government doing the same, they would be stupid communists.
These two words, "fascist" and "communist" have very distinct meanings. I would recommend learning the difference between them as calling a commie a fascist makes you look like a dolt.
-Rick
It's a non-existent risk for us in our current global status. But if the USD and EUR collapsed and China/Russia both looked at it as an opportunity to make massive land grabs, it could be an approach.
It's also an approach we have taken in part in our invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. It wasn't until after we had "won" that we realized that in order to establish order we needed a local government, not a parking lot with a bunch of refugees.
We've seen this approach used in multiple wars in Africa, and within the latest internal conflicts in Syria.
Most likely though, the country that would be most likely to take such an approach against us, is us. If a civil war were to break out, we would be the most likely to engage in absolute destruction of ourselves.
-Rick
Fair point, the Swiss did in 1932 order their army to quell a strike/protest through the use of force resulting in 60 some injuries and a dozen+ deaths.
Since then, they were activated internally for WWII, and not again since. They've also time and time again had their funding, size, and mission scope cut.
So the long game won. Had the populous turned 1932 into a civil war, far more people would be dead and they would be in a radically different situation now. Had modern media been available in 1932, they would have been condemned by the world over (except for by the fascist and anti-union folks perhaps).
So yeah, I stand by my statement. A camera phone is vastly more powerful today than a gun. Groups like Anonymous have a far greater impact than the militias that showed up at the Bundy Ranch.
-Rick
Same here, having my calendar available with out having to dig out my phone and switch apps would be awesome.
Even better if I can get it as a cuff attachment rather than a watch. If I can put this on my shirt cuff, use the battery/processor like a cuff link, that would be awesome!
-Rick
It isn't a matter of level of arms, it's a matter of intent.
For a invading force that does not care about the existing populace or infrastructure, an opposition force with small arms is going to be impotent. The entire populous can be wiped out, so there's no need for significant boots on the ground. Small arms fire erupts? drop a couple tons of explosives in the area and call it good.
For an invasion or occupying force that needs to maintain order and control of the local populous and infrastructure, small arms play a role, but I'd argue that good urban combat, sabotage, and a long game of disruption and politics is the only way to win the war. A few guys with guns can get mowed down with impunity, a few hundred peaceful protesters getting mowed down with impunity will have catastrophic results for the offending government.
-Rick
They could have gone with the more generic, and better sounding phrase that covers metric and imperial units:
There's no replacement for displacement.
-Rick
Companies could relocate out, but entrepreneurs would abound!
Think about how amazing it would be if you could tell "the man" to go to hell, and go out and start your own company with your own ideas and initiative. Knowing that in the years it's going to take to build a market segment large enough to become significantly profitable that you, your spouse, and your children will all have their education covered, their medical expenses covered, and enough money to cover your mortgage and food.
I would have gone independent long ago if I had such a solid safety net.
-Rick
And your characterization is part of the problem.
we give governments the power to regulate the economy back into the bronze age
Pot, meet kettle.
-Rick