It's about freedom to choose. It's about pursuing any path that might produce societal benefit because we literally don't know how much benefit we can get from any path. I mean, you could be begging the question here. For all you know (and I'm inferring from your post, so I may be wrong about that,) the reason that adult stem cells are creating cures today may be because their research _isn't_ restricted.
Or is it that they are more concerned with the research than with actually producing something beneficial?
That's obviously just FUD. The point of doing research is because it _might_ lead to something beneficial. You don't know. You can't know until you actually _research_ it.
Anyway, it just doesn't make sense to me that scientists would be restricted in such a fashion. It's not like people would be getting abortions just to support stem cell research.
Well... she could have just thought at first that the person telling her her phone was stolen was just trying to trick her. I think that's very plausable. But now that the truth of the matter is out in the open, she obviously knows the state of the phone's theft, and what she does now to rectify the situation is how she deserves to be judged by the internet community.
Yes, stealing someone's cell phone is very wrong. Obviously it needs to be returned to its rightful owner (ie. the person who bought it.) and it's strange that the thief hasn't just admitted it and taken the cell phone over to the owner.
However, it looks to me like the young girl in the pictures may be somewhat innocent. Let's call them Mr. Army and Ms. Booty, just to make it easier (any similarity in naming between real life and the monikers is purely accidental... no really.) Mr. Army says, ostensibly, that a cabbie sold it to him. I doubt that's true. They also say that Mr. Army gave it to Ms. Booty as a present. That's probably what happened. And she got a SIM card and took some pictures and logged onto her AOL and now this guy takes her and shows her to the world as if she's a monster. The person who deserves the world's ire is the thief, Mr. Army.
He really needs to own up to the situation. If he bought it from a cabbie, he had to know it was stolen. And if he stole it himself, well... the best thing he can do now is take the phone back and apologize. Anything else is just prolonging the inevitable, and possibly getting him a larger sentence, should Mr. Shamer choose to press charges.
I feel like Ms. Booty is at least somewhat innocent. As it stands now, it would appear that she knows the phone is stolen, but obviously she's young, and judging by the fact that she has a child, probably none too bright, and easily swayed by Mr. Army's persuasion. This is a black mark on her life that will follow her around for many years to come. I'm sure she will have to endure some harsh judgement from her peers at school, and I'm not absolutely certain she deserves that.
And now that Mr. Shamer has rejected offers for free webhosting 'gone over his current provider's bandwidth cap' and put up a donation link, it amounts to little more than a cry for cash.
Here in North America we have various content distributors vehemently campaigning to outlaw "the production, import and supply of devices capable of evading or breaching technical measures of copyright protection". Considering China's well-know egregious human-rights violations (specifically their draconian policies controlling the population, ie. freedom of speech, great firewall, one child per family,) I think their decision to restrict said devices as stated can only bode well for us here. I mean, virtually anybody you talk to, whether the shotgun-toting hick, or latte-sniffing coffeeista, or H2-driving soccermom, when asked "Would you like North America to be more like China?" will answer, "My children should be free, hell no," or "Heeeeyall no!", "No, obviously. Mendicant. " (not necessarily in that order.)
So please, spread the word of China's (anti-)good works. Maybe this will help us to get the apathetic to listen. Well, at least we can hope...
The thing is, it likely doesn't matter _at all_ to Take Two that the game 'should have' gotten a higher rating. The crux of the matter here is that Jerk Thompson is lobbying for some sort of stricter rating system based on the fact that the current one is 'broken'. And this is just more fuel for the fire.
As if any rating system could be perfect anyway.
Man. What a wanker. This is really a case of 'The loudest guy says the most truth,' where JT get's to define this issue to the nation just because he's the most hyperbolically outspoken amongst the critics. And then he gets to cash in on the controversy by also heading the lawsuit against the company. Mmmmm... I hear laughter in the rain, walking hand in hand with my CONFLICT OF INTEREST. Won't somebody think of the money^Wchildren?
I would LOVE to see this guy accepted as a guest on the Daily Show. To watch Mr. Stewart tear him a new one, or at the very least let him talk and let himself look like the total douche he is.
Better yet, if you began a sketch comedy show and had your first skit be the president with a bunch of pig teats being suckled by his friends, would you get a mature rating?
That what I thought all those auto-generated pseudo-text 'spam' messages were. I remember reading an article about people just randomly 'ddos'ing or 'crapflooding' usenet, but that didn't make much sense to me. Why would someone just flood the entire usenet with random meaningless junk. I mean, I can understand pyramid schemes, spamvertising, and such, but choosing to purchase hardware/hardware processing just to fill people's newsgroups with nothing? Obviously useless. So, I think you've hit the nail on the head, here. People are using usenet to communicate.
I don't know how, or with what encryption, or to what end, but it's surely effective because it's still going on...
Of course, it could just be vandalism, but the best way to act under the radar always comes with an easy excuse. Don't quote me on that. Or if you do, make sure you include something like, "The day's denizens easily descended from the rafters and Josie Apples took her place amongst the roses like dawn. Telling Neil Rethspen of its daily spoonings, there wasn't anything else that she didn't take with her. Up into the cavern they climbed, daylight creeping behind Kelly Wendel as Beth Arnold took the stand."
To be fair, I have fantasized about vigilante rule being imposed on spammers; ("... and this is for those 1.2 billion e-mails you sent about V1agr4 , and this is is for those.4 billion e-mails you sent about 'finding your s00ul mate' , and this is for those 1.4 billion e-mails you sent about vi4GGrA " etc.) however, I would say that it's really the same as any other immoral action and should be judged and prosecuted along those lines in the way that we as a society have agreed to. Just because spamming is an international crime doesn't mean it's worse than racketeering, serial murder, rape, etc. Consider your statement in a different context, as it would have been given before murder had been defined in law (and long before spamming was even a twinkle in immoral assholes' eyes):
"Subject: Kill the murderers Body: I don't think murdering will stop, or even slow down, until a murderer is seriously hurt or killed. Right now, they know there is no consequence to their actions. I'm not saying I personally advocate killing murderers, but it certainly wouldn't make me feel bad to hear about it being done. Murdering would be a lot riskier if there were an element of harm attached for the murderer."
We have a body of laws intended to deter those who would partake in these actions, it is just that the laws are currently lacking for spamming (in both definition and jurisdictional prosecution.) Basically, we need an international justice body to define and prosecute these laws. I guess the first step is to define and prosecute these laws locally, and then lobby other governments to do the same. If only we had a global body that worked towards the common good. Something that united all the nations of the world in peace and harmony and bad will towards spammers. I think I would call this body, "Nations United" or something to that effect. But I know nothing like this would ever get implemented.
Oh. So then you need your hand held to see that Microsoft is a convicted monopolist? The point of the monopoly laws is that holding and enforcing a monopoly stifles innovation by crushing competition unfairly. Therefore, a convicted monopolist is some entity that leverages their monopoly to quell innovation. To make sure you understand, given what I've stated, Microsoft is a convicted monopolist, and therefore stifles innovation. I hope that's clear and overtly obvious enough for you.
And no, 'evil' is not just 'people suffering and dying'. THAT is the most adolescent opinion expressed in any of the ancestors of your post. Evil is doing anything that _detracts_ from society (yes, it is a very nebulous and open-ended definition, but good and evil are very broad terms, so such a definition most definitely defines). If a technology that would benefit society is elbowed out of the market by your stifling/'quelling of innovation', that is most definitely detracting from society, and therefore your action is evil.
I do see your point. Don't make claims without information or facts to back them up. I must admit I do love obviously oxymoronic posts like yours (or, even better, making a grammar mistake while correcting spelling) but sometimes they grate, especially when spoken in such a haughty, self-aggrandizing tone like you've accomplished. No wonder you're posting AC.
Please think before you post next time (though that should be obvious...)
So then the fact that Nikon's encryption effectively bars firms smaller than Adobe from making software to process their images is moot? No. The main point of that paragraph was not that there was an outcry from Adobe, that by encrypting their RAW data, smaller software companies that don't have the clout or money to court Nikon are, through the DMCA, prevented from competing for the Nikon post-photo-processing market.
Perhaps instead of trying to 'beat the rush' you should instead spend the extra time thinking up a more trenchant, less spurious argument.
It's not quite as simple as that because the gold farmers are also paying to play the game. Them paying their subscription fees to farm are offsetting the lost subscription fees the farmees would have payed.
Though, that's probably not a perfect translation of fees. A gold farmer is likely to be better at acquiring gold that a non-farmer, having 'practiced' (read: is experienced with botting... (; ) As well, a farmer's monthly subscription fees may not be as much as those payed by the population who is likely to purchase gold. To use a tired stereotype, a Chinese gold farmer likely pays much less for a monthly subscription than an American, simply due to the 'economic standard of living' of the area they live in. (That might be incorrect, I really don't know what pricing scheme Blizzard/OtherCompany has)
Also, since purchasing gold must enhance the in-game experience (otherwise what value is the gold), those who purchase gold are probably more likely to stay than they would have been.
That's not to say I'm on the side of the gold farmers... just saying that the closed system that you're examining doesn't directly affect the subscription rates as much as you've stated.
Of course, if we open the system to take into account the broader population, and look at player satisfaction levels, we'd probably definately see a deficit there, as gold farming is looked upon (rightfully, I believe) as economically destructive. People have the perception that gold farming makes the time they're spending playing the game seem less worthy, and that, I think, would have the greatest detriment on subscription rates/the MMORPG company's bottom line. Measures like these, then, are the perfect salve for the company's economy, both in-game and out.
"equal to the force felt by a quarter with more than three cars piled on top of it." I'm unfamiliar with how much three cars weigh. Could anybody give me this metric in Libraries Of Congress? Or maybe 3.5" Disks Stacked End To End? I'm sure that would clear up the confusion.
So then the fact that Opera has the same functionality without a massive memory footprint is negligable? I use, and love, FF, but the memory usage is absurd compared to Opera. It might not be leaked memory, but it's certainly bad programming.
This is just as much a 'force field' as I have a 'force field' around my body, centered roughly around my arms and facing in my forward direction that prevents balls and objects of various sizes from hitting my body. When I have successfully deflected or nullified an incoming ballistic, I call it "Cephalically-Activated Technology Creating a Haven from Incoming Non-explosive Grenades". And it's been patented, so I'll expect royalties when you use my 'force field' to protect yourself.
I trust all information leaked from Apple, especially on the day before April 1st, about an April 1st announcement.
But really, what a great use of an April Fools it is, to have the entire industry waiting on the tips of their baited breath to hear Apple state that they will allow Windows on their boxen. Remember, this is Apple, the wizards of spin (ie. advertising, mindshare, etc...).
And, just for the record, when Apple employees go to buy the best mp3 player / computer / hifi they can, they buy Jack Bauer brand. (;
XCP1 and XCP Red technology is being used by all four of the major Record Labels for the protection of pre release music on internal CDRs. Albums from some of the best known artists have been successfully copy protected in this way to reduce the occurrence of leaks prior to release.
Does this mean that there are MORE CDs out there from three other major companies that are utilizing this abhorrent, reviled technology?!? Who are these other three 'major Record Labels'? Where are their public apologies? Certainly they've got it coming if they've decided to 'see whether Sony comes out on top' instead of being open, forthright, and apologetic. Having kept quiet through this whole debacle and not informing their users surely means they're even more at risk for litigation.
Of course, since 1st4$ is located in the UK, the possibility exists that they may be UK 'major Record Labels' which are smaller than their North American equivalents.
I mean, it's not like Virgin has massive stores all over North America or anything...
Slashdot Mirror
That's obviously just FUD. The point of doing research is because it _might_ lead to something beneficial. You don't know. You can't know until you actually _research_ it.
Anyway, it just doesn't make sense to me that scientists would be restricted in such a fashion. It's not like people would be getting abortions just to support stem cell research.
I would love to install this... but how can you prove that it's not viri?
Lest we forget:
(o) (o)
This is their ultimate goal. Knowing everything about everybody at all times. Except for themselves, of course...
And in return, the US has chosen the rest of the world.
Well... she could have just thought at first that the person telling her her phone was stolen was just trying to trick her. I think that's very plausable. But now that the truth of the matter is out in the open, she obviously knows the state of the phone's theft, and what she does now to rectify the situation is how she deserves to be judged by the internet community.
Yes, stealing someone's cell phone is very wrong. Obviously it needs to be returned to its rightful owner (ie. the person who bought it.) and it's strange that the thief hasn't just admitted it and taken the cell phone over to the owner.
However, it looks to me like the young girl in the pictures may be somewhat innocent. Let's call them Mr. Army and Ms. Booty, just to make it easier (any similarity in naming between real life and the monikers is purely accidental... no really.) Mr. Army says, ostensibly, that a cabbie sold it to him. I doubt that's true. They also say that Mr. Army gave it to Ms. Booty as a present. That's probably what happened. And she got a SIM card and took some pictures and logged onto her AOL and now this guy takes her and shows her to the world as if she's a monster. The person who deserves the world's ire is the thief, Mr. Army.
He really needs to own up to the situation. If he bought it from a cabbie, he had to know it was stolen. And if he stole it himself, well... the best thing he can do now is take the phone back and apologize. Anything else is just prolonging the inevitable, and possibly getting him a larger sentence, should Mr. Shamer choose to press charges.
I feel like Ms. Booty is at least somewhat innocent. As it stands now, it would appear that she knows the phone is stolen, but obviously she's young, and judging by the fact that she has a child, probably none too bright, and easily swayed by Mr. Army's persuasion. This is a black mark on her life that will follow her around for many years to come. I'm sure she will have to endure some harsh judgement from her peers at school, and I'm not absolutely certain she deserves that.
And now that Mr. Shamer has rejected offers for free webhosting 'gone over his current provider's bandwidth cap' and put up a donation link, it amounts to little more than a cry for cash.
I feel sorry for everyone involved.
Here in North America we have various content distributors vehemently campaigning to outlaw "the production, import and supply of devices capable of evading or breaching technical measures of copyright protection". Considering China's well-know egregious human-rights violations (specifically their draconian policies controlling the population, ie. freedom of speech, great firewall, one child per family,) I think their decision to restrict said devices as stated can only bode well for us here. I mean, virtually anybody you talk to, whether the shotgun-toting hick, or latte-sniffing coffeeista, or H2-driving soccermom, when asked "Would you like North America to be more like China?" will answer, "My children should be free, hell no," or "Heeeeyall no!", "No, obviously. Mendicant. " (not necessarily in that order.) So please, spread the word of China's (anti-)good works. Maybe this will help us to get the apathetic to listen. Well, at least we can hope...
The thing is, it likely doesn't matter _at all_ to Take Two that the game 'should have' gotten a higher rating. The crux of the matter here is that Jerk Thompson is lobbying for some sort of stricter rating system based on the fact that the current one is 'broken'. And this is just more fuel for the fire. As if any rating system could be perfect anyway.
Fuck you, Jack Thompson!
Man. What a wanker. This is really a case of 'The loudest guy says the most truth,' where JT get's to define this issue to the nation just because he's the most hyperbolically outspoken amongst the critics. And then he gets to cash in on the controversy by also heading the lawsuit against the company. Mmmmm... I hear laughter in the rain, walking hand in hand with my CONFLICT OF INTEREST. Won't somebody think of the money^Wchildren?
I would LOVE to see this guy accepted as a guest on the Daily Show. To watch Mr. Stewart tear him a new one, or at the very least let him talk and let himself look like the total douche he is.
Guh.
Better yet, if you began a sketch comedy show and had your first skit be the president with a bunch of pig teats being suckled by his friends, would you get a mature rating?
Wait... maybe that's been done before...
That what I thought all those auto-generated pseudo-text 'spam' messages were. I remember reading an article about people just randomly 'ddos'ing or 'crapflooding' usenet, but that didn't make much sense to me. Why would someone just flood the entire usenet with random meaningless junk. I mean, I can understand pyramid schemes, spamvertising, and such, but choosing to purchase hardware/hardware processing just to fill people's newsgroups with nothing? Obviously useless. So, I think you've hit the nail on the head, here. People are using usenet to communicate.
I don't know how, or with what encryption, or to what end, but it's surely effective because it's still going on...
Of course, it could just be vandalism, but the best way to act under the radar always comes with an easy excuse. Don't quote me on that. Or if you do, make sure you include something like, "The day's denizens easily descended from the rafters and Josie Apples took her place amongst the roses like dawn. Telling Neil Rethspen of its daily spoonings, there wasn't anything else that she didn't take with her. Up into the cavern they climbed, daylight creeping behind Kelly Wendel as Beth Arnold took the stand."
See you on usenet!
NON-NUDE HAIRY MAN WARNING
Just thought you might like to be warned. Also, I wanted to try out my new web 2.1 tag. Please download the browser from http://cheese.blartwendo.com/web21-demo.html . (;
To be fair, I have fantasized about vigilante rule being imposed on spammers; ("... and this is for those 1.2 billion e-mails you sent about V1agr4 , and this is is for those .4 billion e-mails you sent about 'finding your s00ul mate' , and this is for those 1.4 billion e-mails you sent about vi4GGrA " etc.) however, I would say that it's really the same as any other immoral action and should be judged and prosecuted along those lines in the way that we as a society have agreed to. Just because spamming is an international crime doesn't mean it's worse than racketeering, serial murder, rape, etc. Consider your statement in a different context, as it would have been given before murder had been defined in law (and long before spamming was even a twinkle in immoral assholes' eyes):
"Subject: Kill the murderers
Body: I don't think murdering will stop, or even slow down, until a murderer is seriously hurt or killed. Right now, they know there is no consequence to their actions. I'm not saying I personally advocate killing murderers, but it certainly wouldn't make me feel bad to hear about it being done. Murdering would be a lot riskier if there were an element of harm attached for the murderer."
We have a body of laws intended to deter those who would partake in these actions, it is just that the laws are currently lacking for spamming (in both definition and jurisdictional prosecution.) Basically, we need an international justice body to define and prosecute these laws. I guess the first step is to define and prosecute these laws locally, and then lobby other governments to do the same. If only we had a global body that worked towards the common good. Something that united all the nations of the world in peace and harmony and bad will towards spammers. I think I would call this body, "Nations United" or something to that effect. But I know nothing like this would ever get implemented.
Sigh.
Ohh noo.
Oh. So then you need your hand held to see that Microsoft is a convicted monopolist? The point of the monopoly laws is that holding and enforcing a monopoly stifles innovation by crushing competition unfairly. Therefore, a convicted monopolist is some entity that leverages their monopoly to quell innovation. To make sure you understand, given what I've stated, Microsoft is a convicted monopolist, and therefore stifles innovation. I hope that's clear and overtly obvious enough for you.
And no, 'evil' is not just 'people suffering and dying'. THAT is the most adolescent opinion expressed in any of the ancestors of your post. Evil is doing anything that _detracts_ from society (yes, it is a very nebulous and open-ended definition, but good and evil are very broad terms, so such a definition most definitely defines). If a technology that would benefit society is elbowed out of the market by your stifling/'quelling of innovation', that is most definitely detracting from society, and therefore your action is evil.
I do see your point. Don't make claims without information or facts to back them up. I must admit I do love obviously oxymoronic posts like yours (or, even better, making a grammar mistake while correcting spelling) but sometimes they grate, especially when spoken in such a haughty, self-aggrandizing tone like you've accomplished. No wonder you're posting AC.
Please think before you post next time (though that should be obvious...)
So then the fact that Nikon's encryption effectively bars firms smaller than Adobe from making software to process their images is moot? No. The main point of that paragraph was not that there was an outcry from Adobe, that by encrypting their RAW data, smaller software companies that don't have the clout or money to court Nikon are, through the DMCA, prevented from competing for the Nikon post-photo-processing market.
Perhaps instead of trying to 'beat the rush' you should instead spend the extra time thinking up a more trenchant, less spurious argument.
It's not quite as simple as that because the gold farmers are also paying to play the game. Them paying their subscription fees to farm are offsetting the lost subscription fees the farmees would have payed.
Though, that's probably not a perfect translation of fees. A gold farmer is likely to be better at acquiring gold that a non-farmer, having 'practiced' (read: is experienced with botting... (; ) As well, a farmer's monthly subscription fees may not be as much as those payed by the population who is likely to purchase gold. To use a tired stereotype, a Chinese gold farmer likely pays much less for a monthly subscription than an American, simply due to the 'economic standard of living' of the area they live in. (That might be incorrect, I really don't know what pricing scheme Blizzard/OtherCompany has)
Also, since purchasing gold must enhance the in-game experience (otherwise what value is the gold), those who purchase gold are probably more likely to stay than they would have been.
That's not to say I'm on the side of the gold farmers... just saying that the closed system that you're examining doesn't directly affect the subscription rates as much as you've stated.
Of course, if we open the system to take into account the broader population, and look at player satisfaction levels, we'd probably definately see a deficit there, as gold farming is looked upon (rightfully, I believe) as economically destructive. People have the perception that gold farming makes the time they're spending playing the game seem less worthy, and that, I think, would have the greatest detriment on subscription rates/the MMORPG company's bottom line. Measures like these, then, are the perfect salve for the company's economy, both in-game and out.
"equal to the force felt by a quarter with more than three cars piled on top of it."
I'm unfamiliar with how much three cars weigh. Could anybody give me this metric in Libraries Of Congress? Or maybe 3.5" Disks Stacked End To End? I'm sure that would clear up the confusion.
So then the fact that Opera has the same functionality without a massive memory footprint is negligable?
I use, and love, FF, but the memory usage is absurd compared to Opera. It might not be leaked memory, but it's certainly bad programming.
Exactly!
This is just as much a 'force field' as I have a 'force field' around my body, centered roughly around my arms and facing in my forward direction that prevents balls and objects of various sizes from hitting my body. When I have successfully deflected or nullified an incoming ballistic, I call it "Cephalically-Activated Technology Creating a Haven from Incoming Non-explosive Grenades". And it's been patented, so I'll expect royalties when you use my 'force field' to protect yourself.
. . . . . . .
I trust all information leaked from Apple, especially on the day before April 1st, about an April 1st announcement.
But really, what a great use of an April Fools it is, to have the entire industry waiting on the tips of their baited breath to hear Apple state that they will allow Windows on their boxen. Remember, this is Apple, the wizards of spin (ie. advertising, mindshare, etc...).
And, just for the record, when Apple employees go to buy the best mp3 player / computer / hifi they can, they buy Jack Bauer brand. (;
Totally OT!
... 1. Imagine a Beowulf Cluster of Insensitive Clod overlords bowing to their subjects!"
Your sig should read:
"In Soviet Russia: 3. Profit! 2.
(:
Of course, since 1st4$ is located in the UK, the possibility exists that they may be UK 'major Record Labels' which are smaller than their North American equivalents.
I mean, it's not like Virgin has massive stores all over North America or anything...
2 = 2.