Another example would be Apple and Jobs. Obviously Jobs isn't the only one designing iMacs and iPhones. That's actually Jonathan Ive. But Jobs sets direction, and makes organization-wide decisions. For instance, it was largely Linus who rejected the GPLv3, from what I gather. It was Linus who made the move to git. Etc. Look at how badly Apple investors panicked purely on the basis of a rumor that Jobs had cancer.
With Linux, also consider that there are many competing corporate interests in play. IBM, for instance. In the void created by Linus's death/retirement, I could see an IBM trying to exert undue influence on the overall direction Linux takes.
I wonder if they have some sort of "plan of succession" to be used if, for instance, Linus and Andrew both died in the same plane crash. Who would take over Linus's position as benevolent dictator? Would it be a free-for-all power grab, or is there a designated successor?
This probably won't be an issue by 2012, but it will be interesting to see how linux fares when Linux and/or people like Andrew Morton are eventually forced to remove themselves from the day-to-day maintenance of the kernel. We saw what happened to ReiserFS when it lost its namesake. In that situation, it was easy to chuck ReiserFS in the trash because there were several other mature alternatives. If/when Linus dies/retires, does Linux adoption falter?
Actually, I think it's pretty reasonable that a bunch of employees weren't versed in the intricacies of California employment law. If a big company like Apple is offering you a compensation package, you just sort of assume it's compliant with local regulations. Apparently it was right on the edge of legality, hence the law suit.
I don't have a problem with the lawsuit. Apple is aware of California law. If the suit didn't have at least some merit, then they wouldn't have brought it in the first place. I just object to the notion that the employees are somehow "slaves" or "indentured servants".
Apple employees aren't slaves. Or even indentured servants. The comparison is offensive given there is real slavery going on elsewhere in the world.
Are they asked to work unreasonable hours and compensated unfairly? Maybe. But they can always quit and seek employment elsewhere. If all of Apple's talent just up and leaves, they'll either fail as a company or rectify their compensation strategy. Capitalism at work.
On the other hand, this seems like a trait that would very quickly correct itself out of the gene pool if we, as a species, were ever to lose the ability to treat it. So there's little permanent "damage".
The alternative is that we decline to treat hereditary conditions that have a reasonable chance of ending a person's life before he or she reaches reproductive maturity. Or, perhaps, just decline to subsidize the treatment of such conditions.
Most lines of reasoning that argue for eugenics from a pragmatic point of view suffer from the slippery problem, though. For instance, how much more efficient and productive would humanity be if nobody were nearsighted? Nearsightedness is clearly a hereditary trait. Is it advisable to prevent the nearsighted from reproducing? Or, if not prevent, to deter via other means?
Most slashdot posters are fiercely protective when it comes to issues of personal freedom and privacy. And yet, I suspect many would either welcome or be ambivalent towards draconian reproductive policies as long as they served a desirable eugenic end. Seems hypocritical.
If every artist followed the Radiohead model, or alternately released their songs for free at a reduced bitrate, then Radiohead wouldn't be unique. For one, they would no longer enjoy a price advantage over similar artists when competing for music consumers' dollars. But they would also suffer in a "public relations" sense. Radiohead's gesture generated a significant amount of goodwill toward the band. Among their fans, sure, but also among non-fans who just happen to want music to be free. Many of these non-fans or marginal fans may have downloaded the Radiohead album simply to reward Radiohead for taking a chance on the new distribution model.
I'm curious whether the apparent success Radiohead enjoyed is not so much due to the distribution model itself, but the fact that they're one of the few big acts to use that model.
It should also be noted that among the pantheon of artists out there, Radiohead's fan base is likely more 1) wired, 2) wealthy and 3) interested in the "politics" of music distribution than the fan base of, say, 50 cent or Carrie Underwood. If true, this would further boost the effectiveness of Radiohead's experiment beyond what an arbitrary artist could expect.
The lecture model, while conducive to transfer of simple information, loses much of the individualized challenging exercises and feedback that is a critical part of the apprenticeship model for acquiring complex problem solving skills.
This assumes that "complex problem solving skills" are something that can be effectively "taught". My anecdotal experience is that by the time students arrive at university, their possession (or lack) of "complex problem solving skills" is already largely fixed, and isn't likely to change significantly.
It sounded like you were painting their "statistical illusion" comment as ludicrous simply because of the large sample size.
As a side note, another interesting explanation for the fact that there are more female SAT takers is the phenomenon Harvard Pres. Larry Summers got in trouble for pointing out. Basically, IQ and ability among men is less tightly clustered around the mean than for women. Both groups have a similar mean, but if you go several standard deviations out, in either direction, the men will outnumber the women.
So then, if students below a certain level of ability simply elect not to take the SAT, that group is going to have a larger number of males than females.
Coding should be taught as a means to an end, not as an end unto itself. That end being the expression of abstract ideas. Get the kid excited about an idea that requires coding in order to express, or test out.
When I was in high school, there were two side projects I worked on that really piqued my interest. One was a "contest" of sorts I got into with another kid, where we tried to see who could develop the fastest sorting algorithm. At the time, neither of us realized that this wasn't a particularly fruitful area of investigation. I extended my coding ability not for its own sake, but because it was necessary to express (and optimize) the algorithms I was coming up with.
The other project was a tool for designing autos in Steve Jackson's "Car Wars" table-top game. So there was a problem, and I was attempting to leverage the computer to create a solution. I didn't learn to code because coding is inherently satisfying; I learned to code because creating elegant solutions to interesting problems is inherently satisfying.
I work exclusively with PostgreSQL (8.2) at work. That said, having read this post, I'd very much like to have the "scheduled events" and "log to tables" features. Haven't researched it heavily, but does Postgres have anything resembling either of those?
I never said he wasn't free to do exactly that. The original article, however, bemoans the fact that there is no independent review board that's to determine what gets blocked and what doesn't. That's what I objected to.
If there is no rival provider in your area trying to one-up Cox by offering unfiltered content, then the market has spoken. You are in the minority. If everyone in your immediate vicinity were like you, ripe to move onto any other carrier who offered unfiltered content, then most likely someone would move in and capitalize on that potential profit.
Your current living situation is apparently attractive enough to you for other reasons (location, cost, etc.) that the lack of unfiltered internet content is not sufficient motivation for you to move. Given that, why should Cox bother to offer you unfiltered content? You're not going anywhere, and you're clearly not willing to go without net connectivity altogether. That's the way the cookie crumbles. Sorry.
this sets an awful precedent in that the ISPs can point out that it's ok for them to block "objectionable" content where they get to define what's objectionable without any review.
Why would they need review? These are private entities. As long as they don't violate whatever contracts they have with their customers, they're free to block whatever they want. If you don't appreciate that a particular ISP blocks particular content, then don't become a customer of that ISP.
Or how about cue some common sense? If I'm on your private property, I have no fucking rights over you or your property. It's your private property. You have the right to control who can be on it, or use it.
Yes and no. For instance, some types of private property are considered public accommodations by Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Restaurants, hotels, etc. As such, the owners of these properties cannot discriminate on the basis of race, religion or national origin. So in the general case it is not true with regard to your personal property that, "You have the right to control who can be on it, or use it."
In this particular case, though, I doubt Flickr qualifies as a public accommodation. Also, from what I can tell, there is no speech issue here since the constitutional protection of speech only prohibits congress (and, by extension, lesser govt. entities such as states) from prohibiting speech, not private entities. It's ridiculous that someone would conflate Flickr's removal of this photo as violating their constitutional rights. Now, it's quite possible that the removal violated Flickr's terms of service...in which case a lawsuit may be in order.
If not, then rig your pages to include an IMG tag with a randomly generated file name prefaced by a constant prefix. The random portion should thwart browser caching, and the constant prefix should allow you easily grep through a log file to count the number of times these were loaded. Configure your server to rewrite all requests for images with that prefix to a 1-pixel transparent image so that "real" clients don't see a "broken image" icon.
I'll admit this isn't my area of expertise. Is there something I'm missing?
Basically you're looking at in house IT (installing and maintaining enterprise software applications, working an internal helpdesk, provisioning servers and/or desktop machines, etc.), customer-facing phone or email support (ick), or some sort of sales engineer (SE) position where you're just a salesperson with a technical background and in-depth product knowldge. Or you could teach high school level Computer Science or "Computer Applications" (e.g. "How to use MS Office") courses.
Check out salary.com (or similar) for what each of these would pay in your area.
If you want cheap, you're looking at East Austin or Cedar Park. Unless you mean "cheap relative to the Bay Area", in which case all of Austin is bargain basement.
As for the weather...I'm tempted to give the nod to Seattle as well. Unless you really like 3.5 months of 95+ heat. Like Austin, Seattle has mild winters, but it also has mild summers.
Don't get me wrong, I like Austin. And I don't even mind that it's surrounded by Texas. But, objectively speaking, I'm not sure it's an automatic "win" when compared to Seattle/Redmond.
If you're okay with destroying unused embryos randomly, which is typically the case when couples try in vitro, then using non-random criteria shouldn't pose any great moral dilemma. Personally, I'm not okay with either, so for me the question is mostly moot.
I've had large spreadsheets in Google docs, with multiple simultaneous editors, really bog down FireFox 2 on a 2ghz Core2. To the point of noticeably interfering with other apps I have open. This will only get worse as more companies try to implement traditionally "thick" applications (e.g. spreadsheets) inside a browser.
ADA being the Americans with Disabilities Act. In a nutshell, all "public accomodations" (such as restaurants, movie theaters, etc.) must comply with certain architectural requirements that make them accessible to the physically disabled. While there's currently no provision for non-brick-and-morter public accomodations, I could certainly see that being added. Of course it would only impact the websites of businesses with a presence in the United States, but that's still a big pool. Note that this would almost surely not cover personal websites that aren't related to any commercial activity. So the guy who hacks together a page of photos for his extended family wouldn't be affected by this legislation.
Slashdot Mirror
Another example would be Apple and Jobs. Obviously Jobs isn't the only one designing iMacs and iPhones. That's actually Jonathan Ive. But Jobs sets direction, and makes organization-wide decisions. For instance, it was largely Linus who rejected the GPLv3, from what I gather. It was Linus who made the move to git. Etc. Look at how badly Apple investors panicked purely on the basis of a rumor that Jobs had cancer.
With Linux, also consider that there are many competing corporate interests in play. IBM, for instance. In the void created by Linus's death/retirement, I could see an IBM trying to exert undue influence on the overall direction Linux takes.
I wonder if they have some sort of "plan of succession" to be used if, for instance, Linus and Andrew both died in the same plane crash. Who would take over Linus's position as benevolent dictator? Would it be a free-for-all power grab, or is there a designated successor?
This probably won't be an issue by 2012, but it will be interesting to see how linux fares when Linux and/or people like Andrew Morton are eventually forced to remove themselves from the day-to-day maintenance of the kernel. We saw what happened to ReiserFS when it lost its namesake. In that situation, it was easy to chuck ReiserFS in the trash because there were several other mature alternatives. If/when Linus dies/retires, does Linux adoption falter?
No, they're being treated like volunteers.
Actually, I think it's pretty reasonable that a bunch of employees weren't versed in the intricacies of California employment law. If a big company like Apple is offering you a compensation package, you just sort of assume it's compliant with local regulations. Apparently it was right on the edge of legality, hence the law suit.
I don't have a problem with the lawsuit. Apple is aware of California law. If the suit didn't have at least some merit, then they wouldn't have brought it in the first place. I just object to the notion that the employees are somehow "slaves" or "indentured servants".
Apple employees aren't slaves. Or even indentured servants. The comparison is offensive given there is real slavery going on elsewhere in the world.
Are they asked to work unreasonable hours and compensated unfairly? Maybe. But they can always quit and seek employment elsewhere. If all of Apple's talent just up and leaves, they'll either fail as a company or rectify their compensation strategy. Capitalism at work.
On the other hand, this seems like a trait that would very quickly correct itself out of the gene pool if we, as a species, were ever to lose the ability to treat it. So there's little permanent "damage".
The alternative is that we decline to treat hereditary conditions that have a reasonable chance of ending a person's life before he or she reaches reproductive maturity. Or, perhaps, just decline to subsidize the treatment of such conditions.
Most lines of reasoning that argue for eugenics from a pragmatic point of view suffer from the slippery problem, though. For instance, how much more efficient and productive would humanity be if nobody were nearsighted? Nearsightedness is clearly a hereditary trait. Is it advisable to prevent the nearsighted from reproducing? Or, if not prevent, to deter via other means?
Most slashdot posters are fiercely protective when it comes to issues of personal freedom and privacy. And yet, I suspect many would either welcome or be ambivalent towards draconian reproductive policies as long as they served a desirable eugenic end. Seems hypocritical.
If every artist followed the Radiohead model, or alternately released their songs for free at a reduced bitrate, then Radiohead wouldn't be unique. For one, they would no longer enjoy a price advantage over similar artists when competing for music consumers' dollars. But they would also suffer in a "public relations" sense. Radiohead's gesture generated a significant amount of goodwill toward the band. Among their fans, sure, but also among non-fans who just happen to want music to be free. Many of these non-fans or marginal fans may have downloaded the Radiohead album simply to reward Radiohead for taking a chance on the new distribution model.
I'm curious whether the apparent success Radiohead enjoyed is not so much due to the distribution model itself, but the fact that they're one of the few big acts to use that model.
It should also be noted that among the pantheon of artists out there, Radiohead's fan base is likely more 1) wired, 2) wealthy and 3) interested in the "politics" of music distribution than the fan base of, say, 50 cent or Carrie Underwood. If true, this would further boost the effectiveness of Radiohead's experiment beyond what an arbitrary artist could expect.
From the article:
This assumes that "complex problem solving skills" are something that can be effectively "taught". My anecdotal experience is that by the time students arrive at university, their possession (or lack) of "complex problem solving skills" is already largely fixed, and isn't likely to change significantly.
It sounded like you were painting their "statistical illusion" comment as ludicrous simply because of the large sample size.
As a side note, another interesting explanation for the fact that there are more female SAT takers is the phenomenon Harvard Pres. Larry Summers got in trouble for pointing out. Basically, IQ and ability among men is less tightly clustered around the mean than for women. Both groups have a similar mean, but if you go several standard deviations out, in either direction, the men will outnumber the women.
So then, if students below a certain level of ability simply elect not to take the SAT, that group is going to have a larger number of males than females.
Put down the stats book and work on your reading comprehension.
Coding should be taught as a means to an end, not as an end unto itself. That end being the expression of abstract ideas. Get the kid excited about an idea that requires coding in order to express, or test out.
When I was in high school, there were two side projects I worked on that really piqued my interest. One was a "contest" of sorts I got into with another kid, where we tried to see who could develop the fastest sorting algorithm. At the time, neither of us realized that this wasn't a particularly fruitful area of investigation. I extended my coding ability not for its own sake, but because it was necessary to express (and optimize) the algorithms I was coming up with.
The other project was a tool for designing autos in Steve Jackson's "Car Wars" table-top game. So there was a problem, and I was attempting to leverage the computer to create a solution. I didn't learn to code because coding is inherently satisfying; I learned to code because creating elegant solutions to interesting problems is inherently satisfying.
I work exclusively with PostgreSQL (8.2) at work. That said, having read this post, I'd very much like to have the "scheduled events" and "log to tables" features. Haven't researched it heavily, but does Postgres have anything resembling either of those?
I never said he wasn't free to do exactly that. The original article, however, bemoans the fact that there is no independent review board that's to determine what gets blocked and what doesn't. That's what I objected to.
If there is no rival provider in your area trying to one-up Cox by offering unfiltered content, then the market has spoken. You are in the minority. If everyone in your immediate vicinity were like you, ripe to move onto any other carrier who offered unfiltered content, then most likely someone would move in and capitalize on that potential profit.
Your current living situation is apparently attractive enough to you for other reasons (location, cost, etc.) that the lack of unfiltered internet content is not sufficient motivation for you to move. Given that, why should Cox bother to offer you unfiltered content? You're not going anywhere, and you're clearly not willing to go without net connectivity altogether. That's the way the cookie crumbles. Sorry.
Why would they need review? These are private entities. As long as they don't violate whatever contracts they have with their customers, they're free to block whatever they want. If you don't appreciate that a particular ISP blocks particular content, then don't become a customer of that ISP.
Yes and no. For instance, some types of private property are considered public accommodations by Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Restaurants, hotels, etc. As such, the owners of these properties cannot discriminate on the basis of race, religion or national origin. So in the general case it is not true with regard to your personal property that, "You have the right to control who can be on it, or use it."
In this particular case, though, I doubt Flickr qualifies as a public accommodation. Also, from what I can tell, there is no speech issue here since the constitutional protection of speech only prohibits congress (and, by extension, lesser govt. entities such as states) from prohibiting speech, not private entities. It's ridiculous that someone would conflate Flickr's removal of this photo as violating their constitutional rights. Now, it's quite possible that the removal violated Flickr's terms of service...in which case a lawsuit may be in order.
...to all the people whining about how Reiser was "wronged" during the trial and was innocent all along?
If not, then rig your pages to include an IMG tag with a randomly generated file name prefaced by a constant prefix. The random portion should thwart browser caching, and the constant prefix should allow you easily grep through a log file to count the number of times these were loaded. Configure your server to rewrite all requests for images with that prefix to a 1-pixel transparent image so that "real" clients don't see a "broken image" icon.
I'll admit this isn't my area of expertise. Is there something I'm missing?
Oh yeah. I forgot "Software Testing" and "Tech Writing".
Basically you're looking at in house IT (installing and maintaining enterprise software applications, working an internal helpdesk, provisioning servers and/or desktop machines, etc.), customer-facing phone or email support (ick), or some sort of sales engineer (SE) position where you're just a salesperson with a technical background and in-depth product knowldge. Or you could teach high school level Computer Science or "Computer Applications" (e.g. "How to use MS Office") courses.
Check out salary.com (or similar) for what each of these would pay in your area.
If you want cheap, you're looking at East Austin or Cedar Park. Unless you mean "cheap relative to the Bay Area", in which case all of Austin is bargain basement.
As for the weather...I'm tempted to give the nod to Seattle as well. Unless you really like 3.5 months of 95+ heat. Like Austin, Seattle has mild winters, but it also has mild summers.
Don't get me wrong, I like Austin. And I don't even mind that it's surrounded by Texas. But, objectively speaking, I'm not sure it's an automatic "win" when compared to Seattle/Redmond.
If you're okay with destroying unused embryos randomly, which is typically the case when couples try in vitro, then using non-random criteria shouldn't pose any great moral dilemma. Personally, I'm not okay with either, so for me the question is mostly moot.
I've had large spreadsheets in Google docs, with multiple simultaneous editors, really bog down FireFox 2 on a 2ghz Core2. To the point of noticeably interfering with other apps I have open. This will only get worse as more companies try to implement traditionally "thick" applications (e.g. spreadsheets) inside a browser.
ADA being the Americans with Disabilities Act. In a nutshell, all "public accomodations" (such as restaurants, movie theaters, etc.) must comply with certain architectural requirements that make them accessible to the physically disabled. While there's currently no provision for non-brick-and-morter public accomodations, I could certainly see that being added. Of course it would only impact the websites of businesses with a presence in the United States, but that's still a big pool. Note that this would almost surely not cover personal websites that aren't related to any commercial activity. So the guy who hacks together a page of photos for his extended family wouldn't be affected by this legislation.
http://www.ada.gov/cguide.htm#anchor62335