The "so what?" is that this isn't a win for Ubuntu or Linux. The install is just so they don't have to pay for Windows.
I'd argue that it is still a win, although not as much of a win as might be hoped for.
When you couldn't get a new machine without windows and had to do your own linux installation it was clearly perceived as a win for MS, since they got paid even though we didn't want it. If Canonical is getting paid for these installs it doesn't really matter how long it is there. Also, it means better support as far as hardware compatibility, it is visible in stores so people will find out about it and some people will buy it and keep it.
Sure, it's not the same as 5% install base but it is a win.
I don't know what it is about computers but people seem to shut down whatever common sense they possess, even when they demonstrate it elsewhere.
Not just computers but any area of specialist expertise. I'm currently doing a career change and getting qualified as an arborist. You wouldn't believe the dumb-ass things people do to their trees.
A few weeks ago I helped take down an old growth tree at a universities child care center. When they cleared the block to build the center they had specifically required that tree be kept. They wanted it. Then they built a car park over the roots. How the fuck anyone could not know that laying asphalt over tree roots will stop the roots getting water and kill the tree I don't know. In a university, where you might hope there would be some smart people, nobody had thought to point out that they were killing their tree. However I encounter this kind of behavior on a daily basis.
It's not something special about computers, you only notice it because it's a field you understand. If I could look in the yards of the people on this site, I guarantee I'd find some pretty stupid shit that has been done to trees.
A few years ago, after cleaning my neighbors XP system a couple of times, I installed ubuntu on a small partition as a dual boot, for use as a recovery OS, and something to use in the meantime if XP went down.
They played around a bit, banned the kids from using ubuntu in case they stuffed it up, and started using it as their main OS. I got told a couple of months later how "ubuntu just works!" Pretty funny, I have no explanation, I don't even use ubuntu myself, but I haven't been asked to clean their system since. (This might have more to do with the wife not liking me than a problem free system).
the only way to ensure democracy electronically will be to deploy tools that allow people doing things far, far, worse than downloading music to have effective anonymity and realtime communication.
Well, since I've replied to a couple of your posts already, I'll stick my tongue in my cheek and give a couple of "solutions" to your family problems.
Try listening to your aunt talk about how the Jews are using Hollywood to brainwash society, while your Jewish mother sits awkwardly in the corner.
Your mother should say: "Yes, I'm in charge of that program. It's going fabulously well, isn't it?" She may wish to arm herself before making this comment.
Try arguing with your uncle that his daughter, your cousin, is not a "race traitor" just because she's dating a black man.
Instead of arguing with him, try agreeing. "Too right! This NEVER would have been allowed if Hitler had won." Hopefully this won't result in you being inducted into the local white supremacist group.
It's been shown in several studies that if you show a conservative evidence that they're wrong, it just makes them hold that belief even stronger.
Most people resist being told they are wrong. People also become much less capable of reason when they are in a highly emotional state. US political debate tends to be full of invective and highly emotional.
I doubt that there is even one impartial study that shows conservatives are more likely than democrats to resist evidence that they are wrong. Democrat researchers failing to convince republican subjects of the truth of democrat policy doesn't count.
How, exactly does big government help the Democrats?
Public sector workers generally vote democrat.
Republicans benefit from cutting spending
Do republicans actually cut spending or just talk about it? If anything, I'd say that republicans increase spending on contractors while democrats increase spending on public employees, but I haven't really looked into it, that's just how it tends to work in my country (although the parties have different names).
That said I'll point out that while I don't have a problem with climate science the political "solutions" seem to have much more to do with political ideology than science. I know a guy who planted some trees for future firewood supply. Environmental laws now prevent him from harvesting. He bought the land, he planted the trees, now his land has effectively been confiscated without compensation.
Could laws have been passed that respected property rights? I believe so. Would it have been obvious before it was passed that the legislation was destroying property rights? Again, I believe so. The validity of the science does not impute validity to the political solutions.
To prevent disaster from climate change, what needs to be done is the whole world must be united under me as emperor. Why do people resist so? Climate science is established fact. People who won't bow to me are lying climate change deniers.
Well then, she was in a position of trust and deceived the people under her charge in order to violate their privacy. I don't see how you can think it isn't that wrong. I guess we just disagree.
I agree. I singled out government employees because it applies to the principal in question and there are constitutional issues in the case of government employees. I pointed that out in an earlier post which I didn't bring up in this post although it was on my mind.
Really anyone, employee or not, who deceives in order to monitor private communications is presumed to have bad intentions. Factors that I consider to differentiate a principal doing it are age, position of authority and the governmental nature of that authority. If it happened at a private school, or was done by a parent or another teenager would all be different issues.
Yeah, Facebook "creeping" seems unscrupulous, but it is much, much better than the alternatives.
It seems you don't include "not allowing nosy people to violate your privacy" among the possible alternatives.
A nosy person is a nosy person - they'll get into your business if they want to, at least Facebook keeps them across a digital divide.
It is not an immutable law of nature that nosy people are more determined and able than people who want privacy. You can oppose them. Don't just settle for the most comfortable way they can violate you.
Metaphorically all she has done is read some kids diary, yet I'm reading and commenting about it from 10,000 miles away.
I disagree. If we want to go "old fart", forget that it's facebook. She didn't just read a diary, she contacted them under false pretenses to gain access to that diary. When she contacted them, if she had done it by phone or mail pretending to be someone else or by disguising herself and approaching them people would be outraged. Don't make this out to be less serious than it is just because she used that newfangled facebook.
You seem to acknowledge the possibility of good intentions. The "just to know the current vibe" comment you were replying to IS a bad intention. Government employees who deceive in order to monitor private communications are presumed to have bad intentions. If they have good intentions, they would obtain a warrant or be open about who they are and they're doing. The deception proves bad faith.
Forget the technology, imagine she had called them or wrote a letter claiming to be someone else, or put on a disguise and approached them out of school and tried to befriend them. I don't see any grey area on this issue.
Not that wrong? As an agent of the government at best it's a 4th amendment violation, it she was aiming to take action against people who criticized her that should be a 1st amendment violation.
There seems to be no possible motivation for this behavior that isn't pretty creepy. Maybe we just have different definitions of wrong.
They are built to put a lot of people in the ground, and fast. They have been refined to do this well for the past 60 years.
Only hits count. A rapid rate of fire will not help you kill more people if you don't aim unless you are firing into a tightly packed crowd. Automatic weapons work well for groups of soldiers.
If I had a 9mm Tupperware gun, and some guy opened up with an assault rifle, I would not be trying to take him out. I would be grabbing cover and running.
Depends how close you were. If you had to cover 100 yards to get to him, sure, run away. If you are quite close you simply have to aim and fire faster at him than he does at you. If you are within lethal range for your pistol the outcome is determined by who shoots accurately first, not by any other factor. The "power" of his gun makes no difference.
The moral obligation to pay tax is entirely derived from the legal obligation to do so. There is no moral obligation to pay more tax than the government requires and it is stupid to do so. If the current tax laws allow behavior we don't like we should change the law but to demand that companies pay more than their legal obligation is absurd.
Why don't you look at the AC's reply to my question and compare it to yours before you decide who is an asshat? I asked for clarification on what he was saying and he gave it, a reasonable and rational communication.
You, on the other hand, began your post with a slightly insulting tone assuming I'd missed the posters point. I hadn't, I highlighted it with my question and had his response been different it might have led to a longer conversation. You finish it by telling me I've imagined hearing something when the text of my question makes no statement about having heard anything.
You make false assumptions, every post you make has an insult or demeaning manner and you evidently don't know what rant means? Your communication (in this case) has no intellectual or social value, so I'll stop encouraging it. By all means, feel free to post last.
The government would enforce repayment if you successfully sued. They might even charge and imprison the fraudster. Government protection isn't perfect and certainly has to be limited. Even limited, some abuse of power will occur. Without government, you'd likely be serving your local warlord right now. Yes, I know some trade would occur but it would be very limited and credit would be virtually non-existent. Yes, we need protection from government, but they aren't the only ones we need protection from. It's a balance.
Fraud is possible but charges can be laid and you can sue. With black markets you enforce your own contracts, if you can. I know there was a marijuana dealer in my home town whose wife was paid a visit by bikers who were taking over their business. They didn't offer a superior product or service at a lower price, they convinced their competition that if they didn't shut down their wife would die a horrible death.
Adam Smith did not promote the dissolution of government as far as I know. If you think that's what a free market is then you can keep it. I do think I get too much government interference, but I wouldn't swap that for a "system" where I had to live in fear that my business competition might kill me, or could defraud me with no legal repercussion.
In a free market you are free to do business, not rob and kill people. Any large scale free market is dependent on conditions provided by government. Most people don't consider restrictions on lying and violence for profit to be onerous.
Logic? My mistake, I thought we were talking about American politics. If [YOUR SIDE] is the Democrats or Republicans, I'd say you are busy punching more holes in the hull.
That's a perspective from a non-citizen, judging by your constitution and the actions of both parties when in power. The propaganda, the currency manipulation, the open sale of political influence in your country make something like the "Fair Tax" small scale in the race to sink the ship.
It's not that I'm missing it, I'm questioning whether it would actually do it worse to a significant degree. The ultra rich line their pockets at their leisure right now. The middle class is being destroyed right now. Unless you've got an idea to stop that, if you are going to support the sinking of the ship, don't expect too much congratulations for not supporting someone who, according to you, would have sunk it a bit faster.
It is all a bunch of feel-good nonsense designed to distract from the core objective of anything that remotely resembles a Fair Tax: to pillage the middle class and line the pockets of the rich.
Are you claiming that now, without a Fair Tax, the middle class are not being pillaged and the pockets of the rich are not being lined? I'm not an American and don't know the merits or otherwise of this tax proposal, but I'm curious what you think is in place now that will prevent the pillaging of the middle class and prevent the pockets of the rich being lined?
As an Australian with no political affiliation for any US party, I would say Republicans and Democrats vote to violate your rights sometimes in different ways. I personally find with our parties here that I do not really find either of the ways the LNP and Labor parties violate our rights to be preferable to the other.
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The "so what?" is that this isn't a win for Ubuntu or Linux. The install is just so they don't have to pay for Windows.
I'd argue that it is still a win, although not as much of a win as might be hoped for.
When you couldn't get a new machine without windows and had to do your own linux installation it was clearly perceived as a win for MS, since they got paid even though we didn't want it. If Canonical is getting paid for these installs it doesn't really matter how long it is there. Also, it means better support as far as hardware compatibility, it is visible in stores so people will find out about it and some people will buy it and keep it.
Sure, it's not the same as 5% install base but it is a win.
I don't know what it is about computers but people seem to shut down whatever common sense they possess, even when they demonstrate it elsewhere.
Not just computers but any area of specialist expertise. I'm currently doing a career change and getting qualified as an arborist. You wouldn't believe the dumb-ass things people do to their trees.
A few weeks ago I helped take down an old growth tree at a universities child care center. When they cleared the block to build the center they had specifically required that tree be kept. They wanted it. Then they built a car park over the roots. How the fuck anyone could not know that laying asphalt over tree roots will stop the roots getting water and kill the tree I don't know. In a university, where you might hope there would be some smart people, nobody had thought to point out that they were killing their tree. However I encounter this kind of behavior on a daily basis.
It's not something special about computers, you only notice it because it's a field you understand. If I could look in the yards of the people on this site, I guarantee I'd find some pretty stupid shit that has been done to trees.
A few years ago, after cleaning my neighbors XP system a couple of times, I installed ubuntu on a small partition as a dual boot, for use as a recovery OS, and something to use in the meantime if XP went down.
They played around a bit, banned the kids from using ubuntu in case they stuffed it up, and started using it as their main OS. I got told a couple of months later how "ubuntu just works!" Pretty funny, I have no explanation, I don't even use ubuntu myself, but I haven't been asked to clean their system since. (This might have more to do with the wife not liking me than a problem free system).
An election.
the only way to ensure democracy electronically will be to deploy tools that allow people doing things far, far, worse than downloading music to have effective anonymity and realtime communication.
Lobbyists! Is there no way to stop them?
Try listening to your aunt talk about how the Jews are using Hollywood to brainwash society, while your Jewish mother sits awkwardly in the corner.
Your mother should say: "Yes, I'm in charge of that program. It's going fabulously well, isn't it?" She may wish to arm herself before making this comment.
Try arguing with your uncle that his daughter, your cousin, is not a "race traitor" just because she's dating a black man.
Instead of arguing with him, try agreeing. "Too right! This NEVER would have been allowed if Hitler had won." Hopefully this won't result in you being inducted into the local white supremacist group.
You'll probably enjoy Natalie Tran's video response to a racist rant: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivkw27k9J0c
It's been shown in several studies that if you show a conservative evidence that they're wrong, it just makes them hold that belief even stronger.
Most people resist being told they are wrong. People also become much less capable of reason when they are in a highly emotional state. US political debate tends to be full of invective and highly emotional.
I doubt that there is even one impartial study that shows conservatives are more likely than democrats to resist evidence that they are wrong. Democrat researchers failing to convince republican subjects of the truth of democrat policy doesn't count.
How, exactly does big government help the Democrats?
Public sector workers generally vote democrat.
Republicans benefit from cutting spending
Do republicans actually cut spending or just talk about it? If anything, I'd say that republicans increase spending on contractors while democrats increase spending on public employees, but I haven't really looked into it, that's just how it tends to work in my country (although the parties have different names).
That said I'll point out that while I don't have a problem with climate science the political "solutions" seem to have much more to do with political ideology than science. I know a guy who planted some trees for future firewood supply. Environmental laws now prevent him from harvesting. He bought the land, he planted the trees, now his land has effectively been confiscated without compensation.
Could laws have been passed that respected property rights? I believe so. Would it have been obvious before it was passed that the legislation was destroying property rights? Again, I believe so. The validity of the science does not impute validity to the political solutions.
To prevent disaster from climate change, what needs to be done is the whole world must be united under me as emperor. Why do people resist so? Climate science is established fact. People who won't bow to me are lying climate change deniers.
Well then, she was in a position of trust and deceived the people under her charge in order to violate their privacy. I don't see how you can think it isn't that wrong. I guess we just disagree.
Nonsense. The government can not legally punish you for protected speech. Such as in this case, criticism of a government official.
I agree. I singled out government employees because it applies to the principal in question and there are constitutional issues in the case of government employees. I pointed that out in an earlier post which I didn't bring up in this post although it was on my mind.
Really anyone, employee or not, who deceives in order to monitor private communications is presumed to have bad intentions. Factors that I consider to differentiate a principal doing it are age, position of authority and the governmental nature of that authority. If it happened at a private school, or was done by a parent or another teenager would all be different issues.
Yeah, Facebook "creeping" seems unscrupulous, but it is much, much better than the alternatives.
It seems you don't include "not allowing nosy people to violate your privacy" among the possible alternatives.
A nosy person is a nosy person - they'll get into your business if they want to, at least Facebook keeps them across a digital divide.
It is not an immutable law of nature that nosy people are more determined and able than people who want privacy. You can oppose them. Don't just settle for the most comfortable way they can violate you.
Metaphorically all she has done is read some kids diary, yet I'm reading and commenting about it from 10,000 miles away.
I disagree. If we want to go "old fart", forget that it's facebook. She didn't just read a diary, she contacted them under false pretenses to gain access to that diary. When she contacted them, if she had done it by phone or mail pretending to be someone else or by disguising herself and approaching them people would be outraged. Don't make this out to be less serious than it is just because she used that newfangled facebook.
You seem to acknowledge the possibility of good intentions. The "just to know the current vibe" comment you were replying to IS a bad intention. Government employees who deceive in order to monitor private communications are presumed to have bad intentions. If they have good intentions, they would obtain a warrant or be open about who they are and they're doing. The deception proves bad faith.
Forget the technology, imagine she had called them or wrote a letter claiming to be someone else, or put on a disguise and approached them out of school and tried to befriend them. I don't see any grey area on this issue.
Not that wrong? As an agent of the government at best it's a 4th amendment violation, it she was aiming to take action against people who criticized her that should be a 1st amendment violation.
There seems to be no possible motivation for this behavior that isn't pretty creepy. Maybe we just have different definitions of wrong.
Have you ever seen an assault rifle in action?
Yes.
They are built to put a lot of people in the ground, and fast. They have been refined to do this well for the past 60 years.
Only hits count. A rapid rate of fire will not help you kill more people if you don't aim unless you are firing into a tightly packed crowd. Automatic weapons work well for groups of soldiers.
If I had a 9mm Tupperware gun, and some guy opened up with an assault rifle, I would not be trying to take him out. I would be grabbing cover and running.
Depends how close you were. If you had to cover 100 yards to get to him, sure, run away. If you are quite close you simply have to aim and fire faster at him than he does at you. If you are within lethal range for your pistol the outcome is determined by who shoots accurately first, not by any other factor. The "power" of his gun makes no difference.
The moral obligation to pay tax is entirely derived from the legal obligation to do so. There is no moral obligation to pay more tax than the government requires and it is stupid to do so. If the current tax laws allow behavior we don't like we should change the law but to demand that companies pay more than their legal obligation is absurd.
Why don't you look at the AC's reply to my question and compare it to yours before you decide who is an asshat? I asked for clarification on what he was saying and he gave it, a reasonable and rational communication.
You, on the other hand, began your post with a slightly insulting tone assuming I'd missed the posters point. I hadn't, I highlighted it with my question and had his response been different it might have led to a longer conversation. You finish it by telling me I've imagined hearing something when the text of my question makes no statement about having heard anything.
You make false assumptions, every post you make has an insult or demeaning manner and you evidently don't know what rant means? Your communication (in this case) has no intellectual or social value, so I'll stop encouraging it. By all means, feel free to post last.
The government would enforce repayment if you successfully sued. They might even charge and imprison the fraudster. Government protection isn't perfect and certainly has to be limited. Even limited, some abuse of power will occur. Without government, you'd likely be serving your local warlord right now. Yes, I know some trade would occur but it would be very limited and credit would be virtually non-existent. Yes, we need protection from government, but they aren't the only ones we need protection from. It's a balance.
Fraud is possible but charges can be laid and you can sue. With black markets you enforce your own contracts, if you can. I know there was a marijuana dealer in my home town whose wife was paid a visit by bikers who were taking over their business. They didn't offer a superior product or service at a lower price, they convinced their competition that if they didn't shut down their wife would die a horrible death.
Adam Smith did not promote the dissolution of government as far as I know. If you think that's what a free market is then you can keep it. I do think I get too much government interference, but I wouldn't swap that for a "system" where I had to live in fear that my business competition might kill me, or could defraud me with no legal repercussion.
In a free market you are free to do business, not rob and kill people. Any large scale free market is dependent on conditions provided by government. Most people don't consider restrictions on lying and violence for profit to be onerous.
In a free market, the government provides protection from force and fraud. Black markets are closer to feudalism than capitalism.
Logic? My mistake, I thought we were talking about American politics. If [YOUR SIDE] is the Democrats or Republicans, I'd say you are busy punching more holes in the hull.
That's a perspective from a non-citizen, judging by your constitution and the actions of both parties when in power. The propaganda, the currency manipulation, the open sale of political influence in your country make something like the "Fair Tax" small scale in the race to sink the ship.
It's not that I'm missing it, I'm questioning whether it would actually do it worse to a significant degree. The ultra rich line their pockets at their leisure right now. The middle class is being destroyed right now. Unless you've got an idea to stop that, if you are going to support the sinking of the ship, don't expect too much congratulations for not supporting someone who, according to you, would have sunk it a bit faster.
It is all a bunch of feel-good nonsense designed to distract from the core objective of anything that remotely resembles a Fair Tax: to pillage the middle class and line the pockets of the rich.
Are you claiming that now, without a Fair Tax, the middle class are not being pillaged and the pockets of the rich are not being lined? I'm not an American and don't know the merits or otherwise of this tax proposal, but I'm curious what you think is in place now that will prevent the pillaging of the middle class and prevent the pockets of the rich being lined?
As an Australian with no political affiliation for any US party, I would say Republicans and Democrats vote to violate your rights sometimes in different ways. I personally find with our parties here that I do not really find either of the ways the LNP and Labor parties violate our rights to be preferable to the other.