Maybe Rob meant to write that no-one other than Katz would claim him to be geek.:-)
Maybe what Rob meant to say was that in this particular articleJon...
Jon has never pretended to be a geek? Come on, Rob
on
Geeks in Rolling Stone
·
· Score: 1
Open mouth, insert foot.
I like some of Katz's stuff and read every article he posts to slashdot. I still find an occassional news bit on slashdot that I haven't already seen on Yahoo! or News Now, so I continue frequenting this place (despite the recently implemented 'free-in-my-face-auto-scoring-of-Perens-posts').
This time, I'm gonna try not to make Rob cry... but, sheesh. Jon has never pretended to be a geek?
They're doing it to gain industry acceptance [...] it seems that in this case there isn't even a pretense of them trying to get feedback about the code from regular developers. This is just PR.
I couldn't agree more with this sentiment. This is simply a media spin. We've seen them do this a hundred times before. Likewise, I agree completely with the other comments about 'embrace and extend'. This is jut another MS ploy to maintain their control of public mindset.
They're obviously losing the battle for OS stability. Their credibility in the server market is costing them millions marketing dollars just to stay in the game. This strategy (open sourcing) only makes sense in The MS Way. They didn't want anything to do with the internet until they saw someone else making inroads. Same thing here. They'd never have considered open sourcing anything, if someone else (Linux, et al) weren't already showing a benefit from it.
Resistance is futile. Your distinctiveness will be added to our own.
I question the sensibility of anyone who fails to see this.
I have my threshold set to 3+ and todays top-"quality" postings are nothing but a low-quality chit-chat between the selected few. - The Slashdot Elite.
I was contemplating a reply to the 'late posting' thread, but stumbled into this one, which echoed my sentiment about all of Bruce Perens' posts being included in almost every threshold setting, simply because he now has a default score of 4.
Wake up, Rob. Default scores are ruining all the effort you've put into making moderation work.
One of the most enlightened things I've ever seen you post. I only wish you had stopped right there, because this idea...
and the posting form should have an option if I'd like to self-moderate it to a 1, 2, or 3, rather than wait for a moderator to come along and do it for me.
... simply nauseated me at the thought of you being able to pump up your initial score any time you feel like ripping ESR or RMS a new bunghole (no matter how polite, literate, and diplomatic you may try to be, this is what a lot of us see from you).
The way it's set up now, I feel as if I should never post unless it's golden prose:-)
Another brainstorm, Bruce. Roll with it!
Rob,
After watching the debate over this new moderation system, I confidently commend you on making a huge step in the right direction. However, giving Bruce a default of 4 insults my intelligence when I'm trying to get the top less-than-100 posts from a lengthy (250+) thread. By setting my threshold to the lowest number that will return under 100 posts, I'm assuming I'll get the best of the best, only to discover that every one of Bruce's posts is in there, regardless of how read-worthy it may be. And I certainly don't want him to be able to go into a tirade and quit another nonprofit organization with a self-moderated score.
Is this a flame? No. Of course not. It's an expression of the sentiment of a great number of slashdot posters and readers (check a few past threads to verify it). Quality posts come from a myriad of people. I was dumbfounded to see 'I'm sick and tired of hearing about Kevin Mitnick' scored down to -1, when it was the main sentiment of about 60 percent of the posts that followed.
IMHO, things were just beginning to work to the benefit of all of slashdot's readership... right up to the point where you started doling out default scores. Now, I'm back to having to sift through unearned high-scoring posts to find the good stuff.
Let's see... IIRC, MS compared (under oath and for the record) the download times of two 'comparably equipped machines' in the downloading and installation of MSIE vs. Navigator: The IE machine was running WinXX with a 56k modem and the Navigator machine was running Win3.1 with a 28.8 modem.
Also IIRC, they later compared a 'feltonized' machine vs. a 'non-feltonized' one to demonstrate poorer performance by the feltonized one. After it was proven that their demo of the 'feltonization' was a conglomerate of snippets from several different machines, they requested and were allowed to redo the test under the supervision of the DOJ attorneys. They redid the test, alright. But they didn't allow the DOJ into the room until *after* all of the 'feltonizing' had been done on two identical laptop PCs. Then they claimed they couldn't reliably demonstrate the decreased performance on the 'feltonized' PC because of the unreliability of the connection speeds of the two different machines.
It seems to me, this is just another PR stunt by MS to prove that they know how to lie in impressive ways. If they're not going to run SQL7 on the same hardware, they've failed the scalability test from the outset, plus they've given themselves a scapegoat for when they fail to perform within the.01 capability: i.e., Oracle had the advantage with the more expensive hardware.
I wonder if Rob's new-and-improved/. is recording the addresses of those 'MS is superior' posts (for possible later exposure of MS munchkins for what they are).
All of the 'get a clue' posts need to take your own advice. I come here for news (as do most others), and I find it embarrassingly irresponsible of Rob, knowing the effect a slashdot post can have on another site, to contribute to an already existing problem.
It's one thing when the linux counter *asks* him to post and then gets/.-ed off the net, but its entirely another when someone writes in and says 'hey, this site that I have no association with is having problems' and then Rob posts it here so that 10,000 teenaged idiots can bring the site to its knees during its already existent instability.
As for you people who 'just don't get it', maybe Rob will one day add salt to one of your net wounds by handing your URL over to the 10,000's of readers who come here. With any luck, it'll melt your overclocked CPU and get you out of our hair for a few days.
The linux counter site didn't go down from the slashdot effect today.
In fact, it didn't go down at all today.
Anyone could have discovered (as I did) through a bit of patience (i.e., open link in new window, then wait), it is working as intended. In fact, I registered myself and my machine while the rest of you were gloating over having (NOT) taken the site down. (I got dragged away from computers for several hours today, so was unable to post this until just now, thus the long delay).
Here's the information from their website (which you too can read online at their *completely functional, working* site).
BEGIN QUOTE
The Linux Counter is a project that has been running since 1993, with the chief aim of letting people tell the world "I use Linux".
It is currently running on a 66 MHz Pentium machine, which at the time of Slashdot had 32 Mbytes of RAM. It is located in Norway, and its connection to the outside world is through a 256 Kbit/second leased line. Its timezone is European (MET, +0100), six hours ahead of the US East Coast, nine hours ahead of California.
The counter keeps rather extensive graphs of its operation, including hourly summaries of the number of visitors, the number of operations done, and the number of Web pages served. The pictures were striking enough that I thought it a Good Thing to preserve them for posterity; the running stats are always available.
[graph removed] This image shows the basic phases of a Slashdotting:
1.Confusion 2.Reconfiguration 3.Return to normality
What happened about 1 minute after the article went up was that a hundred people tried registering, the counter tried to satisfy them, and the machine went into trashing.
Each registration operation requires a Perl script, which has about a 2-Mbyte footprint. You can imagine the result of trying to run 150 of those at the same time.
The solution was to change Apache's "MaxClients" config variable to approximately 1/2 of the Mbytes that could be used for scripts - 12 in this case; the true value was achieved shortly after midnight. (The "factory" default is 150). After getting another 16 Mbytes of RAM, I've since increased it to 20, but at that time (12 noon on the 24th), the Slashdot wave was mostly over, so I don't know if this value is truly safe.
END QUOTE
The simple fact of the matter is: He made the necessary adjustments to weather this storm and succeeded. Slashdot DIDN'T take down the site.
So, to Rob and the rest of you who just *assumed* you had downed the site: I guess you guys have a lot to learn about going to sites that have adapted to your effect (sigh).
I recently returned to college (it's been 6 years since I got my B.A.) to pick up an Associate in Computer Science (nice thing about continuing education: the overall course load becomes smaller - I only need 15 credit hours to complete this program). As I was selecting which classes to take, I was stymied by the number of CS courses which had 'Microsoft' in the fscking COURSE TITLE - better than half!!! And that's not the half of of it!!! When I went into the course description of the ones that weren't MS-titled, most of these too had some sort of general Microsoft requirement (Intro to Operating Systems was basically a coverup for 'How to use Windows 98').
I carefully selected two (the only two I was presently eligible for) courses which contained no immediate references to MS: 1) C Programming, and 2) Web Development and Design.
It turns out (and I didn't find this out until the course syllabus was rewritten by the instructor during the first week of class) that the latter (Web Dev. and Design) was a coverup for 'Microsoft Front Page'.
I found this out today. I've already emailed the instructor and my advisor that I'll be withdrawing from this class. Also, I sent email to my C instructor requesting immediate confirmation that Linux/gcc is an accepted platform for his course. If it is not, I'll be withdrawing from it, as well... and I'll post a message here debunking this 'University' as just another MS Sales Outlet.
Anyone out there know of a University which offers online coursework and degree programs? It's already looking like I won't be able to find the 15 credit hours necessary to complete a degree program at this one without having to pay a 'Gates Tax'.
Slashdot Mirror
Maybe Rob meant to write that no-one other than Katz would claim him to be geek. :-)
...
Maybe what Rob meant to say was that in this particular article Jon
Open mouth, insert foot.
I like some of Katz's stuff and read every article he posts to slashdot. I still find an occassional news bit on slashdot that I haven't already seen on Yahoo! or News Now, so I continue frequenting this place (despite the recently implemented 'free-in-my-face-auto-scoring-of-Perens-posts').
This time, I'm gonna try not to make Rob cry... but, sheesh. Jon has never pretended to be a geek?
give *Rob=clue
They're doing it to gain industry acceptance [...] it seems that in this case there isn't even a pretense of them trying to get feedback about the code from regular developers. This is just PR.
I couldn't agree more with this sentiment. This is simply a media spin. We've seen them do this a hundred times before. Likewise, I agree completely with the other comments about 'embrace and extend'. This is jut another MS ploy to maintain their control of public mindset.
They're obviously losing the battle for OS stability. Their credibility in the server market is costing them millions marketing dollars just to stay in the game. This strategy (open sourcing) only makes sense in The MS Way. They didn't want anything to do with the internet until they saw someone else making inroads. Same thing here. They'd never have considered open sourcing anything, if someone else (Linux, et al) weren't already showing a benefit from it.
Resistance is futile. Your distinctiveness will be added to our own.
I question the sensibility of anyone who fails to see this.
I have my threshold set to 3+ and todays top-"quality" postings are nothing but a low-quality chit-chat between the selected few. - The Slashdot Elite.
I was contemplating a reply to the 'late posting' thread, but stumbled into this one, which echoed my sentiment about all of Bruce Perens' posts being included in almost every threshold setting, simply because he now has a default score of 4.
Wake up, Rob. Default scores are ruining all the effort you've put into making moderation work.
Not everything I write is a 4,
...
:-)
One of the most enlightened things I've ever seen you post. I only wish you had stopped right there, because this idea
and the posting form should have an option if I'd like to self-moderate it to a 1, 2, or 3, rather than wait for a moderator to come along and do it for me.
... simply nauseated me at the thought of you being able to pump up your initial score any time you feel like ripping ESR or RMS a new bunghole (no matter how polite, literate, and diplomatic you may try to be, this is what a lot of us see from you).
The way it's set up now, I feel as if I should never post unless it's golden prose
Another brainstorm, Bruce. Roll with it!
Rob,
After watching the debate over this new moderation system, I confidently commend you on making a huge step in the right direction. However, giving Bruce a default of 4 insults my intelligence when I'm trying to get the top less-than-100 posts from a lengthy (250+) thread. By setting my threshold to the lowest number that will return under 100 posts, I'm assuming I'll get the best of the best, only to discover that every one of Bruce's posts is in there, regardless of how read-worthy it may be. And I certainly don't want him to be able to go into a tirade and quit another nonprofit organization with a self-moderated score.
Is this a flame? No. Of course not. It's an expression of the sentiment of a great number of slashdot posters and readers (check a few past threads to verify it). Quality posts come from a myriad of people. I was dumbfounded to see 'I'm sick and tired of hearing about Kevin Mitnick' scored down to -1, when it was the main sentiment of about 60 percent of the posts that followed.
IMHO, things were just beginning to work to the benefit of all of slashdot's readership... right up to the point where you started doling out default scores. Now, I'm back to having to sift through unearned high-scoring posts to find the good stuff.
'nuff said.
Let's see... IIRC, MS compared (under oath and for the record) the download times of two 'comparably equipped machines' in the downloading and installation of MSIE vs. Navigator: The IE machine was running WinXX with a 56k modem and the Navigator machine was running Win3.1 with a 28.8 modem.
.01 capability: i.e., Oracle had the advantage with the more expensive hardware.
/. is recording the addresses of those 'MS is superior' posts (for possible later exposure of MS munchkins for what they are).
Also IIRC, they later compared a 'feltonized' machine vs. a 'non-feltonized' one to demonstrate poorer performance by the feltonized one. After it was proven that their demo of the 'feltonization' was a conglomerate of snippets from several different machines, they requested and were allowed to redo the test under the supervision of the DOJ attorneys. They redid the test, alright. But they didn't allow the DOJ into the room until *after* all of the 'feltonizing' had been done on two identical laptop PCs. Then they claimed they couldn't reliably demonstrate the decreased performance on the 'feltonized' PC because of the unreliability of the connection speeds of the two different machines.
It seems to me, this is just another PR stunt by MS to prove that they know how to lie in impressive ways. If they're not going to run SQL7 on the same hardware, they've failed the scalability test from the outset, plus they've given themselves a scapegoat for when they fail to perform within the
I wonder if Rob's new-and-improved
At least someone saw my intention.
/.-ed off the net, but its entirely another when someone writes in and says 'hey, this site that I have no association with is having problems' and then Rob posts it here so that 10,000 teenaged idiots can bring the site to its knees during its already existent instability.
All of the 'get a clue' posts need to take your own advice. I come here for news (as do most others), and I find it embarrassingly irresponsible of Rob, knowing the effect a slashdot post can have on another site, to contribute to an already existing problem.
It's one thing when the linux counter *asks* him to post and then gets
As for you people who 'just don't get it', maybe Rob will one day add salt to one of your net wounds by handing your URL over to the 10,000's of readers who come here. With any luck, it'll melt your overclocked CPU and get you out of our hair for a few days.
I don't mind using my nickname to point out when Rob has (yet AGAIN) done something lamebrained.
He panicked and whimpered over the possibility of libelous AC rumor-posts, then goes and does something like this voluntarily.
I'll bet he chases fire engines and ambulances in RL, too...
(I'll also bet this post gets scored extremely low for pointing out Rob's blunderous stupidity.)
... okay... congrats. (;
Rob or somebody sitting there... PLEASE upload the 'jokes' from that slide! We want to know what everyone was laughing about!
The linux counter site didn't go down from the slashdot effect today.
In fact, it didn't go down at all today.
Anyone could have discovered (as I did) through a bit of patience (i.e., open link in new window, then wait), it is working as intended. In fact, I registered myself and my machine while the rest of you were gloating over having (NOT) taken the site down. (I got dragged away from computers for several hours today, so was unable to post this until just now, thus the long delay).
Here's the information from their website (which you too can read online at their *completely functional, working* site).
BEGIN QUOTE
The Linux Counter is a project that has been running since 1993, with the chief aim of letting people tell the world "I use Linux".
It is currently running on a 66 MHz Pentium machine, which at the time of Slashdot had 32 Mbytes of RAM. It is located in Norway, and its connection to the outside world is through a 256 Kbit/second leased line. Its timezone is European (MET, +0100), six hours ahead of the US East Coast, nine hours ahead of California.
The counter keeps rather extensive graphs of its operation, including hourly summaries of the number of visitors, the number of operations done, and the number of Web pages served. The pictures were striking enough that I thought it a Good Thing to preserve them for posterity; the running stats are always available.
[graph removed] This image shows the basic phases of a Slashdotting:
1.Confusion
2.Reconfiguration
3.Return to normality
What happened about 1 minute after the article went up was that a hundred people tried registering, the counter tried to satisfy them, and the machine went into trashing.
Each registration operation requires a Perl script, which has about a 2-Mbyte footprint. You can imagine the result of trying to run 150 of those at the same time.
The solution was to change Apache's "MaxClients" config variable to approximately 1/2 of the Mbytes that could be used for scripts - 12 in this case; the true value was achieved shortly after midnight. (The "factory" default is 150). After getting another 16 Mbytes of RAM, I've since increased it to 20, but at that time (12 noon on the 24th), the Slashdot wave was mostly over, so I don't know if this value is truly safe.
END QUOTE
The simple fact of the matter is: He made the necessary adjustments to weather this storm and succeeded. Slashdot DIDN'T take down the site.
So, to Rob and the rest of you who just *assumed* you had downed the site: I guess you guys have a lot to learn about going to sites that have adapted to your effect (sigh).
I recently returned to college (it's been 6 years since I got my B.A.) to pick up an Associate in Computer Science (nice thing about continuing education: the overall course load becomes smaller - I only need 15 credit hours to complete this program). As I was selecting which classes to take, I was stymied by the number of CS courses which had 'Microsoft' in the fscking COURSE TITLE - better than half!!! And that's not the half of of it!!! When I went into the course description of the ones that weren't MS-titled, most of these too had some sort of general Microsoft requirement (Intro to Operating Systems was basically a coverup for 'How to use Windows 98').
I carefully selected two (the only two I was presently eligible for) courses which contained no immediate references to MS: 1) C Programming, and 2) Web Development and Design.
It turns out (and I didn't find this out until the course syllabus was rewritten by the instructor during the first week of class) that the latter (Web Dev. and Design) was a coverup for 'Microsoft Front Page'.
I found this out today. I've already emailed the instructor and my advisor that I'll be withdrawing from this class. Also, I sent email to my C instructor requesting immediate confirmation that Linux/gcc is an accepted platform for his course. If it is not, I'll be withdrawing from it, as well... and I'll post a message here debunking this 'University' as just another MS Sales Outlet.
Anyone out there know of a University which offers online coursework and degree programs? It's already looking like I won't be able to find the 15 credit hours necessary to complete a degree program at this one without having to pay a 'Gates Tax'.