The fact you write a short post on Slashdot means you have nothing better to fill your boring life with?...and what about you?
I think you are comparing apples to bulldozers here. I spend an average of probably 10 minutes a day (sometimes a bit more, many days I don't check the site) reading and replying on Slashdot, which hardly constitutes trying to make a "second life" out of anything. Afterall, this is News, and Stuff That Matters in the real world (not to be confused with MTV's poorly-named Real World), right?
The only "disturbing" issue surrounding Second Life is how seriously some people take it. Last time I checked, it was a freaking fake world consisting of people's made up identities and false realities. In First Life, we call it a "game", and it is "played" by unadventurous, delusional game addicts who have nothing else with which to fill their boring real lives.
Now we have lawsuits alleging gamers don't play fair? Jeepers...
I will use my karma bonus and bump your post. It is really quite sad that it took so long for someone to point out these obvious facts.
My thanks to you both! As I scrolled down through the replies, I was beginning to wonder if I was the only one who cringed repeatedly while trying to read Vinit's claims. Poor proofreading and incorrect use of punctuation are pet peeves of mine, but the lack of citation and authority were equally annoying. I'm glad I didn't have to comment first, as someone would certainly have torn me apart for trolling or unnecessary flaming.
Absolutely right. After your machine has been off for an hour almost all the oil has drained back into the pan, so it isn't lubricating the engine like it should be. You're better off letting it idle over your lunch hour.
Yes, if you think about it for 5 seconds, this may be true for cars but isn't for computers. Power supplies are either on or off, and I doubt starting up is any different than just being on, so why not shut it off? I also don't see why a hard drive wouldn't do better being off for a while and running at 0 rpm than running constantly at whatever rpm it runs at. Same for motherboards: why would keeping them hot possibly be better than letting them cool off for an hour?
As mentioned, the only reason you should leave a car running rather than turning it off for a few minutes is that there is less than ideal lubrication at startup (less true with horizontal engines that place the cylinders right at the bottom of the engine). Diesel engines need to be hot to run well too, but this just doesn't translate to computers. I've heard that turning on a fluorescent bulb takes an hour off of its operating life (unlike incandescent bulbs that are either on or off with no startup shock), though I don't know how true that is.
Found some... with some digging. Peace, Tropic and Blubuntu.
WTF? Thanks for the links. When I heard that Ubuntu was not going to include some of the contributions from the community, I began to wonder what Ubuntu was really all about then anyway....until I read on and saw what the material in question is. There's a big flap about THAT!?!? Jiminy Christmas, so what???? I'll still probably continue to try new Ubuntu distros (and promptly dump them because they don't seem to like my hardware, ever) since the lack of some boring, mediocre wallpaper and minor eye candy won't phase me a bit.
This may be news, I suppose, but it hardly matters.
Ad technology that is.
The best part is you cannot leave the stadium until you buy at least $100 worth of advertised product, but you get to do it with your cellphone! Yay, how cool! Go Cisco!
People really still drag themselves to a stadium through all that traffic when HDTV exists?
Last time I checked, HDTV in my living room can't duplicate the amazing feeling of a ballpark. I say screw the over-commercialization of baseball, but I still love going to a ballgame (sometimes alone, so I can really watch the game, and I even keep scor once in a while, though I don't go home to my my mom's basement afterward, sorry), and having history happen right in front of me. If you're actually at the game, you can avoid looking at ads by watching the game!
If I had to choose between either baseball or the internet being allowed to survive a nuclear cage match, I'd have a hard time deciding. Besides, even though HDTV is becoming common, I still don't have an ABHCD (Authentic Ballpark Hotdog Cooker and Dispenser).
GNUcash is undoubtedly a fine application, and one I wish more people would consider using. Though it does most everything quite well, very few banks and accountants support it fully. Some (many) of us are stuck using Quickbooks because it has become so standard. To its credit, Quickbooks works well for most of us, but it would be nice to have a viable free (or even more reasonably-priced) alternative.
Well.....Don't forget were talking about small claims court, which is meant to be a simple means of dispute resolution and remedy that is available for ordinary people, generally without a lawyer. The suit would be based on a law (or laws), someone breaking the law, and the filer wanting to recover damages as allowed by the law. So while this "guide" may provide a basic framework as to what is needed to sue, it also clearly states that you need to prepare your case thoroughly. It isn't like the poster said "Take what I typed here, fill in the blanks with the names of random people, go to the court house, and profit!"
Or, if you like it that way, you're right, but that's completely not applicable here. It's just that signal - still in digital form - is received by another app, that's all.
So the signal is "intercepted" in its original digital format, before ever passing throughan D/A converter, and is not actually taken through the sound card? Perhaps there was some confusion or an ambiguity taken the wrong way? That would eliminate the other person's argument here, if I'm not mistaken. I'm no expert here, I'm just trying to comprehend how this analog hole stuff works.
And on the other hand, look at the bottom of the list... 10 nations with 0 imprisonments per 100,000 people!? How can that be? I am surprised to see Cuba, UAE, and Egypt there, I think of those as civilized nations. Do they have high execution rates? Do they just chop off your hand and set your free? Or do they simply let everybody run wild?
Please, don't mistake the misrepresentations and poor reporting of other quetionable nations as exoneration of American problems. Anything that Cuba, UAE, and Egypt self-report should be taken with a grain of salt, unless their figures are backed-up by outside organizations. Hitler claimed he did nothing wrong, but that certainly doesn't mean the Holocaust didn't happen. The US is obviously an egregious offender as far as unwarranted and overly exuberant incarcerations are concerned, but it is not alone.
While I agree that violent crimes should be punished severely, deterrence is unlikely to work, because deterrence assumes that the attacker considers the consequences of his actions. More often than not, this is just not the case, especially under influence.
The above point is very important in any debate of deterrence and crime. However, I always like to add that the certainty (or uncertainty) of apprehension is also important but usually overlooked. The penalty for running through a stop sign could be life imprisonment, but if a hardass knows there are no cops around, he'll barrell through that intersection as if it weren't there, every time. And just think about this: most violent criminals know what they are doing is wrong, but they assume that they are clever and will get away with it, since many crimes do go unsolved.
The theory of deterrence only works if the certainty of apprehension is high. Here in the US, and in other areas to varrying degrees, the certainty of apprehension is low, and MANY crimes go unsolved, which effectually encourages bad guys and opportunistic criminals to continue their assault on society.
Do any of you actually believe we are close to being able to produce one of these monsters? I am guessing we are still thirty years away from the appropriate tech.
It looks like the tech is there, really, but there is no commercial backing for it, and without money it is a no-go. Current tech can probably produce carbon nanotubes appropriate for this kind of project, but it would be VERY expensive, and no government is willing to pay for it, so it won't happen within the next 20 years (or more). Lots of great, forward-thinking science projects are technologically feasible today (like a manned Mars mission, a space elevator, an infrastructure to support hydrogen power, a moon base, a sustainable fusion reactor, etc.), but economics and the unwillingness to devote the needed resources for something new and unproven prevent them from seeing the light of day. We COULD do these things if we, as a society, really wanted to.
Travel to other star systems? Not possible right now. But travel to Mars? How bad do you (we) want it?
Heh... I think the entirety of the Internet is illiterate. Compared to YouTube, Slashdot is actually rather good. If usage patterns on the Internet are indicative of a larger trend, we, as a species, are screwed.
I second that! Civilization (not Sid Meier's) is heading down the wrong tracks. Why, in my day, we learned how to spell and how to type and prooofread and about grammar structure and proper use of punctuation and how to really communicate. We didn't have text messaging and camera-phones, IMs, or fancy $300 shoes. We wrote elegant letters and gave them to the friendly postman, and our shoes were made of wood and only came in one size. But we didn't care! We waited weeks to hear back from our friends in exotic and distant lands, like Chicago, or the next county, and at the end of the day our feet were bloody stumps. We didn't know any better, and we loved it.
got2go +1 iz on my lawn lol (I am "Laughing OnLine", if your are Matt Drudge) cya
Ironically enough, AnyDVD itself uses some decent copy protection to prevent people from copying it without paying.
Somebody somewhere once told me that AnyDVD's own copy protection isn't too hard to defeat, and that cracked versions are available from the usual suspects, if that's what you want.
Is anyone else getting a little sick of these patent infringment stories? Its now common knowledge that you can't build anything in the United States without some IP leech suing you, so is this really even a big deal anymore?
Yes, it seems like patent-infringement lawsuits are all the rage right now, and the patent trolls are abusing the system. However, it will be interesting to see how this one shakes out. The "little guy" like Transmeta (relatively speaking) needs the protection that patents afford. I won't claim to understand all the specifics of this fight, but maybe they wouldn't have to lay-off most of their staff and grasp at straws if Intel hadn't stolen their technology? Obviously Intel would have done fine without it, but this seems like a case of a smaller, niche-market company getting completely steamrolled.
If Transmeta was already struggling (they were), surely Intel could have bought license to their technology for a very reasonable and affordable price and avoided this whole situation. I'm not particularly a fan of any chip maker, I've never owned Transmeta products or stock, and I've been happy with some of the Intel products I've used; I just want something cheap that works. The point is that our current laws protect innovators, and if Intel did in fact steal technology, they should be punished, and whether our laws need to be revised is another topic.
Have other TV shows had this kind of frenzy? Like how much would Maryann's original shorts go for?
Maryann who? I don't remember her, was that from some boring episode of Enterprise that I didn't bother to watch? Scott Bakula never did much for me, after Quantum Leap, anyway.
I love ST4 and besides the scenes with Spock trying to use "colorful metaphors," my favorite scene is when Mccoy hands Scotty the mouse who then tries to talk to the computer with it.
I still love Scotty's line: "You're still working with polymers?!?"
One thing, though, there was no mention of bars of gold-pressed latinum.
This was essentially a memorabilia auction, and as such consisted mainly of props and not metals/currency. For the current prices of metals, you may want to look to the New York Mercantile Exchange, and google for precious metals retailers. I'd give you a direct link for gold-pressed latinum, but I think my computer is acting up, as I can't seem to find a good one just now.
"Computer, what are the nearest sources of gold-pressed latinum" yields no results, for me.
"We believe we can [get to 10 GB] with an accelerator less than a meter long
That's great, I guess, but my Seagate gets to 160 GB, and it is much less than a meter long. So: hard drives are better than accelerators when it comes to storing data? And I'd wager that HD's require a LOT less power to operate, though I admit to not having RTFA yet.
I'm all sypathetic for cancer sufferers of course, but I have to say I'm personally much more interested in non-cancerous mammaries.
I agree with your position, but is this not slashdot? Most geeks are not too picky and will take any boobs they can get their hands on. Cancerous breasts need attention, too!
IT's funny how Slashdot will post the story, but not do the deed...
makes ya think...
...and makes you grateful that at least/. doesn't partake in dumb pseudo-movements like caring about an important topic for 1/12 of the year, flying a flag on July 4 and Flag Day (but not caring the other 363 or 364 days of the year), or pasting dumb ribbons everywhere for every cause you can think up.
Besides, the whopping "nearly 150 sites" already going pink must have gotten the word out to the entire web-viewing community by now, anyway.
Slashdot Mirror
I think you are comparing apples to bulldozers here. I spend an average of probably 10 minutes a day (sometimes a bit more, many days I don't check the site) reading and replying on Slashdot, which hardly constitutes trying to make a "second life" out of anything. Afterall, this is News, and Stuff That Matters in the real world (not to be confused with MTV's poorly-named Real World), right?
Now we have lawsuits alleging gamers don't play fair? Jeepers...
My thanks to you both! As I scrolled down through the replies, I was beginning to wonder if I was the only one who cringed repeatedly while trying to read Vinit's claims. Poor proofreading and incorrect use of punctuation are pet peeves of mine, but the lack of citation and authority were equally annoying. I'm glad I didn't have to comment first, as someone would certainly have torn me apart for trolling or unnecessary flaming.
Yes, if you think about it for 5 seconds, this may be true for cars but isn't for computers. Power supplies are either on or off, and I doubt starting up is any different than just being on, so why not shut it off? I also don't see why a hard drive wouldn't do better being off for a while and running at 0 rpm than running constantly at whatever rpm it runs at. Same for motherboards: why would keeping them hot possibly be better than letting them cool off for an hour?
As mentioned, the only reason you should leave a car running rather than turning it off for a few minutes is that there is less than ideal lubrication at startup (less true with horizontal engines that place the cylinders right at the bottom of the engine). Diesel engines need to be hot to run well too, but this just doesn't translate to computers. I've heard that turning on a fluorescent bulb takes an hour off of its operating life (unlike incandescent bulbs that are either on or off with no startup shock), though I don't know how true that is.
More than he'll ever know about, unless he decides to come home early some Tuesday! (sorry, just kidding)
True, but we are also pretty far removed from the earliest mammals.
WTF? Thanks for the links. When I heard that Ubuntu was not going to include some of the contributions from the community, I began to wonder what Ubuntu was really all about then anyway....until I read on and saw what the material in question is. There's a big flap about THAT!?!? Jiminy Christmas, so what???? I'll still probably continue to try new Ubuntu distros (and promptly dump them because they don't seem to like my hardware, ever) since the lack of some boring, mediocre wallpaper and minor eye candy won't phase me a bit.
This may be news, I suppose, but it hardly matters.
Last time I checked, HDTV in my living room can't duplicate the amazing feeling of a ballpark. I say screw the over-commercialization of baseball, but I still love going to a ballgame (sometimes alone, so I can really watch the game, and I even keep scor once in a while, though I don't go home to my my mom's basement afterward, sorry), and having history happen right in front of me. If you're actually at the game, you can avoid looking at ads by watching the game!
If I had to choose between either baseball or the internet being allowed to survive a nuclear cage match, I'd have a hard time deciding. Besides, even though HDTV is becoming common, I still don't have an ABHCD (Authentic Ballpark Hotdog Cooker and Dispenser).
GNUcash is undoubtedly a fine application, and one I wish more people would consider using. Though it does most everything quite well, very few banks and accountants support it fully. Some (many) of us are stuck using Quickbooks because it has become so standard. To its credit, Quickbooks works well for most of us, but it would be nice to have a viable free (or even more reasonably-priced) alternative.
Well.....Don't forget were talking about small claims court, which is meant to be a simple means of dispute resolution and remedy that is available for ordinary people, generally without a lawyer. The suit would be based on a law (or laws), someone breaking the law, and the filer wanting to recover damages as allowed by the law. So while this "guide" may provide a basic framework as to what is needed to sue, it also clearly states that you need to prepare your case thoroughly. It isn't like the poster said "Take what I typed here, fill in the blanks with the names of random people, go to the court house, and profit!"
So the signal is "intercepted" in its original digital format, before ever passing throughan D/A converter, and is not actually taken through the sound card? Perhaps there was some confusion or an ambiguity taken the wrong way? That would eliminate the other person's argument here, if I'm not mistaken. I'm no expert here, I'm just trying to comprehend how this analog hole stuff works.
Please, don't mistake the misrepresentations and poor reporting of other quetionable nations as exoneration of American problems. Anything that Cuba, UAE, and Egypt self-report should be taken with a grain of salt, unless their figures are backed-up by outside organizations. Hitler claimed he did nothing wrong, but that certainly doesn't mean the Holocaust didn't happen. The US is obviously an egregious offender as far as unwarranted and overly exuberant incarcerations are concerned, but it is not alone.
The above point is very important in any debate of deterrence and crime. However, I always like to add that the certainty (or uncertainty) of apprehension is also important but usually overlooked. The penalty for running through a stop sign could be life imprisonment, but if a hardass knows there are no cops around, he'll barrell through that intersection as if it weren't there, every time. And just think about this: most violent criminals know what they are doing is wrong, but they assume that they are clever and will get away with it, since many crimes do go unsolved.
The theory of deterrence only works if the certainty of apprehension is high. Here in the US, and in other areas to varrying degrees, the certainty of apprehension is low, and MANY crimes go unsolved, which effectually encourages bad guys and opportunistic criminals to continue their assault on society.
It looks like the tech is there, really, but there is no commercial backing for it, and without money it is a no-go. Current tech can probably produce carbon nanotubes appropriate for this kind of project, but it would be VERY expensive, and no government is willing to pay for it, so it won't happen within the next 20 years (or more). Lots of great, forward-thinking science projects are technologically feasible today (like a manned Mars mission, a space elevator, an infrastructure to support hydrogen power, a moon base, a sustainable fusion reactor, etc.), but economics and the unwillingness to devote the needed resources for something new and unproven prevent them from seeing the light of day. We COULD do these things if we, as a society, really wanted to.
Travel to other star systems? Not possible right now. But travel to Mars? How bad do you (we) want it?
I second that! Civilization (not Sid Meier's) is heading down the wrong tracks. Why, in my day, we learned how to spell and how to type and prooofread and about grammar structure and proper use of punctuation and how to really communicate. We didn't have text messaging and camera-phones, IMs, or fancy $300 shoes. We wrote elegant letters and gave them to the friendly postman, and our shoes were made of wood and only came in one size. But we didn't care! We waited weeks to hear back from our friends in exotic and distant lands, like Chicago, or the next county, and at the end of the day our feet were bloody stumps. We didn't know any better, and we loved it.
got2go +1 iz on my lawn lol (I am "Laughing OnLine", if your are Matt Drudge) cya
Where's my damn mod points when I really need them? I don't have any just now, but at least I can give the previous poster "mad props". "Hell yeah!!!
Somebody somewhere once told me that AnyDVD's own copy protection isn't too hard to defeat, and that cracked versions are available from the usual suspects, if that's what you want.
Yes, it seems like patent-infringement lawsuits are all the rage right now, and the patent trolls are abusing the system. However, it will be interesting to see how this one shakes out. The "little guy" like Transmeta (relatively speaking) needs the protection that patents afford. I won't claim to understand all the specifics of this fight, but maybe they wouldn't have to lay-off most of their staff and grasp at straws if Intel hadn't stolen their technology? Obviously Intel would have done fine without it, but this seems like a case of a smaller, niche-market company getting completely steamrolled.
If Transmeta was already struggling (they were), surely Intel could have bought license to their technology for a very reasonable and affordable price and avoided this whole situation. I'm not particularly a fan of any chip maker, I've never owned Transmeta products or stock, and I've been happy with some of the Intel products I've used; I just want something cheap that works. The point is that our current laws protect innovators, and if Intel did in fact steal technology, they should be punished, and whether our laws need to be revised is another topic.
Maryann who? I don't remember her, was that from some boring episode of Enterprise that I didn't bother to watch? Scott Bakula never did much for me, after Quantum Leap, anyway.
I still love Scotty's line: "You're still working with polymers?!?"
This was essentially a memorabilia auction, and as such consisted mainly of props and not metals/currency. For the current prices of metals, you may want to look to the New York Mercantile Exchange, and google for precious metals retailers. I'd give you a direct link for gold-pressed latinum, but I think my computer is acting up, as I can't seem to find a good one just now.
"Computer, what are the nearest sources of gold-pressed latinum" yields no results, for me.
Show me "protoid capsules"!
That's great, I guess, but my Seagate gets to 160 GB, and it is much less than a meter long. So: hard drives are better than accelerators when it comes to storing data? And I'd wager that HD's require a LOT less power to operate, though I admit to not having RTFA yet.
I agree with your position, but is this not slashdot? Most geeks are not too picky and will take any boobs they can get their hands on. Cancerous breasts need attention, too!
Besides, the whopping "nearly 150 sites" already going pink must have gotten the word out to the entire web-viewing community by now, anyway.