Re:Application programming is a dying paradigm
on
Ford To Move To Linux
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· Score: 1
Ah, I see, so, you use one particular web-based application that's buggy and sucks, therefore ALL web-based applications will be buggy and suck? This is basically what you're saying.
This is the important part -- it's not enough to simply not shop at a store or not buy a company's products. They have to know WHY you're not doing it, otherwise they won't know what they need to change.
Imagine if even a third of the adults in America (around 70 million people) sent one snail-mail letter a week to a company of their choice, explaining why they don't buy their products or services. That could be a powerful force for change.
Of course, the big hurdle is that people have to be aware of the fact that companies do bad things in the first place...
you would imagine that 2004 would look pretty different than it does today
I would have been surprised that 2004 looks so much like 2003, since that's the year we're actually living in.:)
Companies were not driven by the all mighty dollar.
I'm guessing you weren't around from 1940-1960, either. Companies were just as driven by the Almighty Dollar back then; it's just that they had a different method of going about it (brand identity vs. individual product survival). Except that's not quite true: companies today still do rely on brand identity. Loss leaders still exist. So what are you babbling about, again?
I saw the aftermath of an SUV vs. economy car accident at the corner of Western and Franklin here in Los Angeles. The economy car was barely sticking into the intersection, and its front end was pretty badly crumpled, but the passenger compartment looked fine.
On the other hand, the SUV was UPSIDE-DOWN, and the front end of the passenger compartment had caved in completely. Whoops.
You really want to get to the root of the issue? Who elected the government? That's right: the people. If we're going to address the root cause, let's figure out how to get the people to elect a better goverment.
The richest people in America don't pay anything like 70% of their money to the government. Neither do the poor. Neither does ANYONE. The U.S. has some of the lowest tax rates of any first-world country. Where do you get a figure like 70%? I paid MAYBE 25% of my total income to the government last year, including income taxes, sales tax, gas taxes (which are not nearly high enough), etc.
Start tossing MS execs into jail and fine the company, the same as would be done to anyone else who broke those laws.
The functional problem with this idea is that it's often difficult to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that, in a vast corporate environment, this or that individual person was responsible for the decision to do such-and-such that ended up breaking a law. Often times, realistically, a variety of people are collectively responsible, but no one person can be reasonably held individually responsible. (This is an inherent flaw in corporations, which is why the military -- where the stakes are typically far higher -- has such a rigid chain of command. But then, such rigid hierarchies don't necessarily lend themselves to civilian environments...)
Not to mention the fact that large corporations invariably have hordes of lawyers whose sole job is to obfuscate the situation so badly that it's hard for a court to place blame. And in Microsoft's case, just when we were getting to the point that we COULD do these things, Bush became President, and basically told the DoJ to back off. So while Microsoft IS a convicted monopolist, they are essentially not suffering at all for their crimes.
Not so with storage sites full of waste-filled drums.
What, this is the only way to store nuclear waste is in leaky steel drums? Like we can't encase it in lead-lined glass, or any of the other numerous (safer) methods of storing toxic waste? Come on, let's be a little MORE reactionary and sarcastic, huh?
I agree with your post in general, although I had to point out one fallacy (at least, one that I recognized):
Wind power is unsteady and kills birds.
This,
this, and this indicate otherwise. The statement that "Wind power...kills birds" presumably means "Wind power kills quite a lot of birds." No one would argue that wind turbines have killed a nonzero number of birds in the past, but the kill rate for wind turbines seems vastly dwarfed by the kill rates for other man-made structures... like regular buildings. Bird deaths, as far as anyone can tell, are not a significant side-effect of wind turbines.
It's like waiting for the 1957 Chevy to come out with bigger tailfins.
Yeah, but once the Japanese started to make inroads into the American car market, a lot of things changed. Also, once people realized that huge clouds of toxic pollution hovering over our cities was a bad thing, some more things changed. Now people are realizing that exploding dead reptiles maybe aren't an ideal fuel source, and more things are changing.
And come on, "Soon, computing will stall out too"? Like the only advances in computing have to do with fabrication technology? Like there's not an absurd amount of room for improvement in software design, coding, development processes, etc.?
But the question is, *should* you have an expectation of privacy in such a place? It is public land, after all. Even if you expect privacy, some random hiker could come walking up on you unnoticed. Are they violating your privacy, even though they have as much right to be there as you do?
Ford was the Republican "fall guy" of the whole indicent and doesn't ever really get the credit he deserves for simply filling the chair after what Nixon and Co pulled. He's also dead.
FYI, Gerald Ford's not dead yet. Sure, he's 90 years old, but he's not dead.
8-bit Theater. Remember Fighter, Thief, Red Mage, and Black Mage from Final Fantasy? Well, they're the main characters in this strip. Archives go back a year or two. Rather entertaining.
d+pad covers the goings-on at a video game store. The artwork is pretty crude, but if you're into the gaming world at all, you'll enjoy it.
Goats is a VERY disturbing strip. The early artwork was a lot less refined than it is now, but how can you go wrong with a strip that involves overclocked lemons and a Satanic chicken named Diablo?
PvP is a strip about a fictional gaming magazine. Sometimes crass and goofy, but often hilarious (go to any geek gathering and see how many people laugh when you shout "Panda attack!"). I know I'd subscribe to any magazine that had a 300-year-old blue troll as an intern.
And, of course, Sluggy Freelance. Best. Webcomic. Ever. But you really have to go all the way back to the beginning of the archives. There's years of great stuff in there. (Worship Bun-bun!)
I know that no day is complete without reading all my webcomics... which is really easy using bookmarked tabs in Mozilla. I just click on one bookmark, and the browser opens up a dozen separate tabs with all my comics loaded.
When I saw the phrase "U.S. Funds Anonymizer" the first thing I thought of was money laundering... after all, that's what a funds anonymizer would do. I gotta get me one of those.
Your math is off. IPv6 provides roughly 6.7x10^19 IP addresses per square centimeter of space on Earth. (Assuming Earth has about 500 million square km of surface area.)
I mean, I can't go to the lot and get another car because mine is destroyed in a fire.
The obvious difference is that if you download a copy of the CD, you haven't deprived anyone the use of the data you've downloaded. If you take another car, you have deprived that car's use to anyone else. (Similarly, if you copy a song from Bob, you can still both listen to it simultaneously. If you take Bob's car, you can't both drive it at once.)
The word you're looking for is "cromulent.":) Further, "viri" is not commonly used. Certainly nobody can stop you from saying "viri" (or even "virii") instead of the far most common form ("viruses"), but we're going to consider you undereducated as long as you do.
Re:They aren't so worried about $5 synthetics
on
Diamonds & the RIAA
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· Score: 1
I read the article a couple months ago, on a previous diamonds-related topic on Slashdot. I wasn't saying it wasn't relevant; all I said was that the $1.5 billion of Israeli-held diamonds might not be there any longer, and so might not be a worry to De Beers any more.
Slashdot Mirror
Ah, I see, so, you use one particular web-based application that's buggy and sucks, therefore ALL web-based applications will be buggy and suck? This is basically what you're saying.
Imagine if even a third of the adults in America (around 70 million people) sent one snail-mail letter a week to a company of their choice, explaining why they don't buy their products or services. That could be a powerful force for change.
Of course, the big hurdle is that people have to be aware of the fact that companies do bad things in the first place...
I saw the aftermath of an SUV vs. economy car accident at the corner of Western and Franklin here in Los Angeles. The economy car was barely sticking into the intersection, and its front end was pretty badly crumpled, but the passenger compartment looked fine.
On the other hand, the SUV was UPSIDE-DOWN, and the front end of the passenger compartment had caved in completely. Whoops.
We're number one! We're number one! Woo! Party!
Er... wait, what? Is this a good thing?
You really want to get to the root of the issue? Who elected the government? That's right: the people. If we're going to address the root cause, let's figure out how to get the people to elect a better goverment.
The richest people in America don't pay anything like 70% of their money to the government. Neither do the poor. Neither does ANYONE. The U.S. has some of the lowest tax rates of any first-world country. Where do you get a figure like 70%? I paid MAYBE 25% of my total income to the government last year, including income taxes, sales tax, gas taxes (which are not nearly high enough), etc.
Not to mention the fact that large corporations invariably have hordes of lawyers whose sole job is to obfuscate the situation so badly that it's hard for a court to place blame. And in Microsoft's case, just when we were getting to the point that we COULD do these things, Bush became President, and basically told the DoJ to back off. So while Microsoft IS a convicted monopolist, they are essentially not suffering at all for their crimes.
And come on, "Soon, computing will stall out too"? Like the only advances in computing have to do with fabrication technology? Like there's not an absurd amount of room for improvement in software design, coding, development processes, etc.?
But the question is, *should* you have an expectation of privacy in such a place? It is public land, after all. Even if you expect privacy, some random hiker could come walking up on you unnoticed. Are they violating your privacy, even though they have as much right to be there as you do?
8-bit Theater. Remember Fighter, Thief, Red Mage, and Black Mage from Final Fantasy? Well, they're the main characters in this strip. Archives go back a year or two. Rather entertaining.
d+pad covers the goings-on at a video game store. The artwork is pretty crude, but if you're into the gaming world at all, you'll enjoy it.
Goats is a VERY disturbing strip. The early artwork was a lot less refined than it is now, but how can you go wrong with a strip that involves overclocked lemons and a Satanic chicken named Diablo?
PvP is a strip about a fictional gaming magazine. Sometimes crass and goofy, but often hilarious (go to any geek gathering and see how many people laugh when you shout "Panda attack!"). I know I'd subscribe to any magazine that had a 300-year-old blue troll as an intern.
And, of course, Sluggy Freelance. Best. Webcomic. Ever. But you really have to go all the way back to the beginning of the archives. There's years of great stuff in there. (Worship Bun-bun!)
I know that no day is complete without reading all my webcomics... which is really easy using bookmarked tabs in Mozilla. I just click on one bookmark, and the browser opens up a dozen separate tabs with all my comics loaded.
When I saw the phrase "U.S. Funds Anonymizer" the first thing I thought of was money laundering... after all, that's what a funds anonymizer would do. I gotta get me one of those.
Your math is off. IPv6 provides roughly 6.7x10^19 IP addresses per square centimeter of space on Earth. (Assuming Earth has about 500 million square km of surface area.)
I read the article a couple months ago, on a previous diamonds-related topic on Slashdot. I wasn't saying it wasn't relevant; all I said was that the $1.5 billion of Israeli-held diamonds might not be there any longer, and so might not be a worry to De Beers any more.