Think about the effect this technology could have on overenthusiastic eight year olds. It would encourage dancing around and screaming like Klingons all day and night.
There would be numerous broken windows and furniture, it'd be impossible to get any sleep and maybe even a couple of bodies lying in the garbage given enough time. (It is an empty shell - dispose of it as you see fit.)
That aside, I think it's quite a cool idea. Consider how much poor, defenceless hardware that would be saved by this!:)
Since the following file types -- listed by file extension -- can execute malicious code, they are disabled in e-mail messages if the Outlook® 98/2000 E-mail Security Update is installed. As a protection from potential viruses, users are restricted from accessing these attachments from within Outlook. Users that would like to distribute the attachments on this list can post them to file shares, intranets, online hard drives, community Web site (such as http://communities.msn.com/filecabinets ).
Corporate drones learn kludges incredibly easily when someone tries to put a barrier in the way of how they're used to doing things.
In this case I can see so many company employees getting around it by simply renaming the files on each end.
I find all these "personal" pages on the web are a major irritant, as they seldom contain useful information, and they clog up the search engines with non-relavent crap, by polluting the search space.
Really I think you should be blaming the search engines for that, not the web itself. It's the search engines who index it, after all.
The most convenient way to fix this problem would simply be for all your favourite sites to use meta information properly. This is exactly what it was designed for. Unfortunately there are too many lazy designers around that don't bother to implement it properly, so it's no wonder that search engines have trouble indexing and promoting it appropriately. Most geocities users who don't update their homepage for a year won't know or care about how to use meta info effectively, and it would quite easily demote their pages by default.
I don't want to sound too boring but one of the best things about the net in its (mostly) unregulated state today is it's openness and how it lets information be distributed so easily. Sometimes this information is unreliable but the same mechanism can't prevent open debate about the same information, either.
Personal homepages are simply documents that somebody has placed on a server indirectly attached via a network to your own. If you don't like them, disconnect your computer from that network. If you want a censored system, then by all means design it, patent it, and only sell the rights to the people you want to use it.
Please don't let the subject fool you. I'm not suggesting that linux be simplified.:)
I've been trying to move to Linux for the last several years and had a couple of loose attempts at converting to it, mostly thrown off by a lack of resources.
In the last couple of months I've made a much more serious attempt to switch to linux and with a lot more success. One of the most annoying problems though is simplicity. It's not to do with wanting simplicity. If Linux was simple (and limited) then I wouldn't want to use it anyway. But it doesn't really succeed well (IMHO) in making things easy for new users either.
There are some cool GUI tools like linuxconf[ig] that help a bit, but they don't make it simpler as much as they throw options from zillions of scattered configuration files on the screen at once. For someone who already knows what every obscure detail means it's probably ok. On the other hand simply making something a GUI doesn't necessarily make it easier to understand. At the most, doing this removes the need to hunt down what configuration file needs editing. From the other side. it hides a lot of the more useful options among ten times as many options that most people will hardly ever need.
What would be much nicer for a learning curve is if all the mostly advanced things were hidden until someone is ready to learn about them. While trying to learn things I'd really benefit from being able to hide all the krud that I don't care about right now.
This is probably why Windows is so much easier to learn. The problem with Windows though is that it makes it very hard (if it's possible at all) to turn the advanced stuff on.
Two checkboxes saying "this can" or "this can NOT" be quoted in a different medium. Have the boxes unchecked by default.
I'm not sure what box you're saying should be unchecked by default since it could be done with only one, but I think that it should default to 'can be quoted in a different medium' unless a user specifically says otherwise.
It's far more likely that people who don't want their comments quoted would say no than people who don't care would bother to say yes.
I agree with nearly everything you've said, except this:
If the law changes to make software manufacturers liable then software would become too expensive for us all.
If software manufacturers were liable, I think it's more likely that companies would do a lot more in-house development.
This is almost definitely a step back just as long as they didn't share progress with each other, but it's not entirely going back to pen and paper.
how to determine the perfect game of chess
on
Solving Chess?
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· Score: 4
I propose we chain a thousand monkies to chess boards to play each other for all eternity, constantly monitoring every move using highly sophistocated tracking equipment.
Given enough time this method will undoubtedly determine the perfect game of chess.
I could be wrong but unless there's been a sudden increase of spacecraft visiting asteroids, I think there are only about 3 asteroids that we have any close up pictures of.
Because there's so much space between them, we know almost nothing detailed about the asteroid belt except what other missions have scooped up in flyby's and with the exception of Galileo zooming past Ida and Gaspra, and (very recently) Cassini flying past 2685 Masursky. Neither of them were intended or to look specifically at the asteroid belt.
I'm not qualified to say what scientific benefit it could offer or if anyone should spend any money on it, but generally knowing more about what's in the asteroid belt could help a lot towards working out how the Solar System began. Theres only so much information you can get from a few fuzzy photographs.
A Europa probe would expand our knowledge of our solar system and perhaps uncover clues to the development of life
Plans for a couple of missions to Europa are underway.
That's interesting handing a bill for health problems to the oil companies. Can I send computer monitor companies a bill for all the childrens' eyeglasses in the developed world?
Possibly not but if you might get away with sending a bill for your healthcare to tobacco companies.
Okay, so tobacco companies allegedly lied to consumers which is a big reason why they're so liable. I'm not sure if most major polluting corporations lie, but it seems like a similar type of problem to me at least.
What are the chances that they will ever be held accountable for the negative externalities they're currently placing on society (including more than the immediate region such as the country they reside in) if they're not already?
there's something not quite right about this
on
ArsDigita University
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· Score: 1
intended to provide the equivalent of four years' worth of CompSci in a single, 6-day-a-week, 12-hour-a-day year.
This just seems weird. It's as if they're targeting the wrong market of people. Most people I know who are good at computer science have nowhere near that sort of work ethic, at least not in any sort of schedule.
CS is very theory based, but the whole point behind it is to apply it practically sooner or later. (Usually sooner.) There doesn't seem to be enough time for anything except learning and applying somebody else's rules, and it probably won't help with getting decent experienece in actually making stupid mistakes.
It's good to have people around who can be heavily committed to something, but (IMHO) they're often only half the equation of getting a decent product. Sometimes good ideas can only come from getting a chance to sit back and forget about everything for a while.
Good luck to them though and I'll be really interested in how this turns out.
Also there are a few mirrors around (and yeah, some of them have already been pointed out). Links to places where all four versions of the trailer are being mirrored can be found here.
Slashdot Mirror
There's lots of specific information for this campaign at http://www.anybrowser.org/campaign/
Think about the effect this technology could have on overenthusiastic eight year olds. It would encourage dancing around and screaming like Klingons all day and night.
There would be numerous broken windows and furniture, it'd be impossible to get any sleep and maybe even a couple of bodies lying in the garbage given enough time. (It is an empty shell - dispose of it as you see fit.)
That aside, I think it's quite a cool idea. Consider how much poor, defenceless hardware that would be saved by this! :)
From Microsoft:
Corporate drones learn kludges incredibly easily when someone tries to put a barrier in the way of how they're used to doing things.
In this case I can see so many company employees getting around it by simply renaming the files on each end.
I find all these "personal" pages on the web are a major irritant, as they seldom contain useful information, and they clog up the search engines with non-relavent crap, by polluting the search space.
Really I think you should be blaming the search engines for that, not the web itself. It's the search engines who index it, after all.
The most convenient way to fix this problem would simply be for all your favourite sites to use meta information properly. This is exactly what it was designed for. Unfortunately there are too many lazy designers around that don't bother to implement it properly, so it's no wonder that search engines have trouble indexing and promoting it appropriately. Most geocities users who don't update their homepage for a year won't know or care about how to use meta info effectively, and it would quite easily demote their pages by default.
I don't want to sound too boring but one of the best things about the net in its (mostly) unregulated state today is it's openness and how it lets information be distributed so easily. Sometimes this information is unreliable but the same mechanism can't prevent open debate about the same information, either.
Personal homepages are simply documents that somebody has placed on a server indirectly attached via a network to your own. If you don't like them, disconnect your computer from that network. If you want a censored system, then by all means design it, patent it, and only sell the rights to the people you want to use it.
Please don't let the subject fool you. I'm not suggesting that linux be simplified. :)
I've been trying to move to Linux for the last several years and had a couple of loose attempts at converting to it, mostly thrown off by a lack of resources.
In the last couple of months I've made a much more serious attempt to switch to linux and with a lot more success. One of the most annoying problems though is simplicity. It's not to do with wanting simplicity. If Linux was simple (and limited) then I wouldn't want to use it anyway. But it doesn't really succeed well (IMHO) in making things easy for new users either.
There are some cool GUI tools like linuxconf[ig] that help a bit, but they don't make it simpler as much as they throw options from zillions of scattered configuration files on the screen at once. For someone who already knows what every obscure detail means it's probably ok. On the other hand simply making something a GUI doesn't necessarily make it easier to understand. At the most, doing this removes the need to hunt down what configuration file needs editing. From the other side. it hides a lot of the more useful options among ten times as many options that most people will hardly ever need.
What would be much nicer for a learning curve is if all the mostly advanced things were hidden until someone is ready to learn about them. While trying to learn things I'd really benefit from being able to hide all the krud that I don't care about right now.
This is probably why Windows is so much easier to learn. The problem with Windows though is that it makes it very hard (if it's possible at all) to turn the advanced stuff on.
Two checkboxes saying "this can" or "this can NOT" be quoted in a different medium. Have the boxes unchecked by default.
I'm not sure what box you're saying should be unchecked by default since it could be done with only one, but I think that it should default to 'can be quoted in a different medium' unless a user specifically says otherwise.
It's far more likely that people who don't want their comments quoted would say no than people who don't care would bother to say yes.
I agree with nearly everything you've said, except this:
If the law changes to make software manufacturers liable then software would become too expensive for us all.
If software manufacturers were liable, I think it's more likely that companies would do a lot more in-house development.
This is almost definitely a step back just as long as they didn't share progress with each other, but it's not entirely going back to pen and paper.
I propose we chain a thousand monkies to chess boards to play each other for all eternity, constantly monitoring every move using highly sophistocated tracking equipment.
Given enough time this method will undoubtedly determine the perfect game of chess.
heh heh.
Maybe it's old news, but it reminds me of the Marshmallow Bunny Survival Tests. (Not exactly new either, but they might be new to someone.)
See:
There already exist many pictures of asteroids
um, where?
I could be wrong but unless there's been a sudden increase of spacecraft visiting asteroids, I think there are only about 3 asteroids that we have any close up pictures of.
Because there's so much space between them, we know almost nothing detailed about the asteroid belt except what other missions have scooped up in flyby's and with the exception of Galileo zooming past Ida and Gaspra, and (very recently) Cassini flying past 2685 Masursky. Neither of them were intended or to look specifically at the asteroid belt.
I'm not qualified to say what scientific benefit it could offer or if anyone should spend any money on it, but generally knowing more about what's in the asteroid belt could help a lot towards working out how the Solar System began. Theres only so much information you can get from a few fuzzy photographs.
A Europa probe would expand our knowledge of our solar system and perhaps uncover clues to the development of life
Plans for a couple of missions to Europa are underway.
There's a JPL writeup/description of the NEAR mission here.
That's interesting handing a bill for health problems to the oil companies. Can I send computer monitor companies a bill for all the childrens' eyeglasses in the developed world?
Possibly not but if you might get away with sending a bill for your healthcare to tobacco companies.
Okay, so tobacco companies allegedly lied to consumers which is a big reason why they're so liable. I'm not sure if most major polluting corporations lie, but it seems like a similar type of problem to me at least.
What are the chances that they will ever be held accountable for the negative externalities they're currently placing on society (including more than the immediate region such as the country they reside in) if they're not already?
intended to provide the equivalent of four years' worth of CompSci in a single, 6-day-a-week, 12-hour-a-day year.
This just seems weird. It's as if they're targeting the wrong market of people. Most people I know who are good at computer science have nowhere near that sort of work ethic, at least not in any sort of schedule.
CS is very theory based, but the whole point behind it is to apply it practically sooner or later. (Usually sooner.) There doesn't seem to be enough time for anything except learning and applying somebody else's rules, and it probably won't help with getting decent experienece in actually making stupid mistakes.
It's good to have people around who can be heavily committed to something, but (IMHO) they're often only half the equation of getting a decent product. Sometimes good ideas can only come from getting a chance to sit back and forget about everything for a while.
Good luck to them though and I'll be really interested in how this turns out.
Also there are a few mirrors around (and yeah, some of them have already been pointed out). Links to places where all four versions of the trailer are being mirrored can be found here.