Rule 1 of effective propaganda is telling the truth. At least most of the time. There is nothing that really beats that, when it comes to convincing people.
Wrong. Rule #1 of effective propaganda is telling people what they like to hear. And it's not a truth.
In Norht America, every mobile phone user is charged for every incoming call's airtime, an unimaginable concept most everywhere else (imagine having to pay for incoming long-distance calls to your home phone number, for example...)
Well, you can see the same things in Russia -- some rate plans charge mobile user, but other plans (with higher monthly pay) provide incoming calls for free. Usually Russian mobile providers offer "free incoming calls" plans. So what's the problem if you pay for incoming calls, but pay almost nothing monthly or pay fixed sum every month and have incoming calls for free?
Usually bare/Linux PCs is more expensive because they are spyware-less. Manufacturers accept money from spyware people to preinstall all that junk. Symbiosis.
Ok, a bit overstated, but I'm serious. Of all the pictures you take, how many actually _need_ to be printed? I'd say those few you want to hang on a wall, or put in a frame. For most people that is a precious few photographs per year; if nothing else, the amount of wall space and kindly relatives to foist the prints off to is very limited.
Well, you think so right now. But fast forward 50 years ahead, no digital copies and what? No photos except few that you liked? Look it other way -- we see one or two vintage photos and wish that we could see more, even if they aren't perfect, but we can't. The same applies to your photos. Entropy will eat your digital copy one way or another, but printed photos will stay in the album.
Why rebuild it. It WILL happen again. Spend the money to relocate the people and I would happily watch my tax money being spent.
It will happen if you will CONTINUE BUILDING LEVEES LIKE THAT! I was shocked when I saw photos -- the walls were very thin, almost nonexistant. Good levee wall has to be at least 15 meters tall with highway atop it, able to carry heavy equipment in case of levee failure. And don't say "expensive", recently we saw some expensive events...
Yandex search engine -- http://www.yandex.ru/ -- always brings better results in Russian web. They search only russian nets and domains and this lets them index everything in Russian. Google will never enter this niche and local search engines will be always better than universal system.
Mass transit, in most regions of the country, is much slower than a personal automobile. Our area has a decent mass-transit system, but the effective speed is half that of an automobile due to frequent stops, schedule intervals, and the walk to/from the bus stop. Speed has a quadratic effect: a 2X increase the average speed means 4X the number of possible employers within given maximum commuting time.
Actually mass transit in Moscow is faster than driving a car right now -- during rush hours it's 100% true -- and day hours are rush hours, all of them. Of couse if you have to drive only a few blocks you'll be faster in the car (that's why I own a car in Moscow -- I drive only 20 minutes from my house to the office) but I won't use it if I have to cross the city during any work day, I'll head for subway.
Well, I personally think the REB1100 got it right in UI, but getting books for it is a pain. It's even harder to add user content, which I think is important, I originally bought mine to read fan fiction.
Strange that nobody made a GPRS-capable e-book. It's quite possible today to make a e-book like REB1100 but with GSM/GPRS module and download interface. There are billions of $$ floating on the ringtone market and the same amount could be made in e-book market, just make it easy to download on the reader itself and charge cellular provider like they do with ringtones and various SMS services.
Where did I get that passport? Another poster said it better than I can, but the gist is I got a copy of my birth certificate, and then send in a couple photos. I then have a passport in your name.
Ugh. It's not that easy in Russia. You get your passport when you turn 16 years old (and you can't live here without passport at all without serious problems) and since then your card with your photo and other information is stored in the nearest to your home passport department (usually it's a part of the local police station). You can't do this many times because they will issue passport only in the passport department responsible for your house/flat. When you turn 30 or 45 you have to change the passport (during Soviet days they only glued new photos onto extra photo pages, but today they replace the passport issuing a new one). And no, you can't provide a COPY of your birth certificate, you have to provide the certificate itself. So it's one-time procedure and only if you are young. Later you always have a paper trail to restore your passport if you lost it, it's a messy procedure but it works. And if you came here from another country and got russian citizenship then your passport was issued by immigration authority.
This system is a heritage of the old Soviet Union, -- it's very difficult to pose as someone else when authorities check passport, because your photo is stored on your card in the passport department. Of couse forgery happens, but it's neither easy nor cheap, the almost only way to get false passport is to bribe people in the passport department.
It looks like the only real identification solution in U.S. is to tell the customer to walk into the bank and compare his face with his photo stored in the database.
If you forgot your passport you have to show up in person in bank and provide passport for identification. Of couse it's uncomfortable somewhat, but it's a good guarantee against social engineering. This policy is easy to implement. I don't understand why american banks did not implement this yet...
I cant believe that banks in US are stupid enough to let anything done without authentication. Here is Russia banks either ask you for a special password that you provide for phone communications or ask you to dial TPIN (telephone pin, which is different from PIN) before you get connected to human operator.
Coincidentally, I bet you'd find it "progress" if I told you that the cost of the hamburger since then has gone down from a month's sallary to a week's sallary. Sure, there are a handful of millionaires here and there, the vast majority of whom earned their wealth by "stealing" the property and industries that the government abandoned after instituting a more free market. But for the VAST majority of Russians, which I'm assuming is something like 98% of the population, none of these "cheap" chain stores are any more affordable to them than a night at the Opera is to you.
It looks like you left Russia long, long ago. Your statement is just false today. I lived in the Soviet Union too and live in Russia now and I see the changes. Today anybody can afford going to McDonalds. It would cost about 200 roubles (about $7) on average. For example, monthly salary of Moscow subway cashier (VERY underpaid staff) is 9000 roubles (roughly $300) per month. Today nobody is going to work in Moscow for less than $400/month. Average secretary earns this amount. Average sysadmin salary is about $1k/month. CCIE earns about $3k/month.
Better than QT? Hahahha. Have you ever even used the libraries you are talking about?
Yes, I did. And wxWindows's built-in HTML renderer saved me a lot of time (no, I did not have time to embed something like gecko and I did not want to turn executable into humongous download).
Just stick your usb into my infected computer and get your key infected too. This worked fine in pre-internet days with diskettes, so we'll see some new worms with this capability -- quite dangerous, because there are many networks that cannot upgrade their windows for various reasons like running legacy software but firewalled or simply disconnected from the internet.
Remember wxWindows, excellent library (better than QT IMHO)? It existed for a very long time, but Microsoft recently forced them to rename to wxWidgets.
I had to drag out of depression. I did not care about anything and eventually I ignored failing brakes on my car. Luckily they failed completely on the empty road and I found doctor to solve this problem. It's VERY easy to blame chemicals in your blood instead of your own wrong perceptions of the world. "The piano has been drinking... not me. Not me. Not me."
If your mind is scared, your adrenaline level is increased. Disease too? Are you going to inject something to counter adrenaline instead of using logic or emotions to calm down your software?
The same happnes with depression, to treat it properly you have to find the problem in human software. These changes in blood only reflect the situation in the mind.
Depression is not a disease. It's a state of mind and it's a natural defense against problems in human software, not hardware. If you stimulate someone who has depression (it's possible to do with drugs today without jolting brains with electricity) most probably your patient will end up killing himself. Lack of activity works as a safeguard against doing something that will kill you while you are inadequate. So what's the purpose of stimulating people? Increasing suicide rates among them 500% at once and saving insurance company expenses?..
With big computers, the goal is different: MORE functionality, MORE power, MORE stuff... more more more! Palm focuses on less: less features, less code, etc. For the consumer this means fewer bugs, less complication, and the delivery of a small, fast, and tight PIM (as far as I'm concerned any function beyond this is superfluous for a palm pilot) and a few extra nifty apps to help you from day to day.
In theory you are right, but this method is not going to work if you want to run some else's applications (and you will because most likely default applications won't suit you). If one application can take out whole system then the system is badly designed. You can use DOS as well -- just make a task switcher! The only way to beat them is unix-like system that can run palm applications and kill them if they go postal. My friend bought Treo 650 and now he curses every day as it reboots constantly for no reason. PalmOS is a dead end.
Unfortunately it's way too late to compete with Microsoft, they will make their pocket operating system stable and robust as they did with windows xp at last. And even if you succeed in creating superpocketOS you won't have enough third party applications around.
Socialism can be a wonderful thing , unfortunately too many Americans have the Words of Mcarthy and Hover etc. ground into their minds constantly comparing socialism to communism to the sudo communesque regimes of last century.
It's really scary that SO many people believe that socialism could be something good. Nope. Soviet union failed exactly because it was socialist state, not because of communist ideology (nobody cared about communist ideas after 1960s). Socialism inevitably leads to uniformity and lack of productivity. That's what is going in the U.S. and Europe lately, every shift towards socialism is accompanied with increase in "political correctness" and stripping rights from people. Step by step. And in the end socialism will lead into total stagnation...
I live long enough to remember socialist times of Soviet Union. It wasn't bad as emigrants describe (to justify their actions) but it was really DULL existance with all authorities enforcing dullnes everywhere.
Everyone imagine Soviet Union as Empire of Evil where slaves worked hard to earn tiny piece of bread. Nope. After WWII quality of life rose up considerably, there was no serious repressions and it was VERY, VERY EASY to make a decent living IF you comply with rules (and these rules weren't that draconian either, actually it's the only one rule -- be average and don't stick out).
Damn! It's a big problem and it would be a 1. godsend for scum to catch legitimate domains and 2. lots of unnececary expenses.
For example many russian characters look like english, but they aren't. So there are many words that could be spelled both in cyrillic and english, and now suppose you see an url printed in paper journal "http://www.poca.ru" -- what's that? "Dew" in russian and I have to type this in cyrillic or just an abbreviation and should be typed with english letters? As result sites with well known english names will be forced to spend bucks to register all alikes in other languages, and if they don't there is a lot of space for cheating.
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Wrong. Rule #1 of effective propaganda is telling people what they like to hear. And it's not a truth.
Well, you can see the same things in Russia -- some rate plans charge mobile user, but other plans (with higher monthly pay) provide incoming calls for free. Usually Russian mobile providers offer "free incoming calls" plans. So what's the problem if you pay for incoming calls, but pay almost nothing monthly or pay fixed sum every month and have incoming calls for free?
Because remake is a good business plan. Small risk. Guaranteed profit. Who cares about content?
Usually bare/Linux PCs is more expensive because they are spyware-less. Manufacturers accept money from spyware people to preinstall all that junk. Symbiosis.
Well, you think so right now. But fast forward 50 years ahead, no digital copies and what? No photos except few that you liked? Look it other way -- we see one or two vintage photos and wish that we could see more, even if they aren't perfect, but we can't. The same applies to your photos. Entropy will eat your digital copy one way or another, but printed photos will stay in the album.
Anybody?
It will happen if you will CONTINUE BUILDING LEVEES LIKE THAT! I was shocked when I saw photos -- the walls were very thin, almost nonexistant. Good levee wall has to be at least 15 meters tall with highway atop it, able to carry heavy equipment in case of levee failure. And don't say "expensive", recently we saw some expensive events...
Yandex search engine -- http://www.yandex.ru/ -- always brings better results in Russian web. They search only russian nets and domains and this lets them index everything in Russian. Google will never enter this niche and local search engines will be always better than universal system.
Actually mass transit in Moscow is faster than driving a car right now -- during rush hours it's 100% true -- and day hours are rush hours, all of them. Of couse if you have to drive only a few blocks you'll be faster in the car (that's why I own a car in Moscow -- I drive only 20 minutes from my house to the office) but I won't use it if I have to cross the city during any work day, I'll head for subway.
Strange that nobody made a GPRS-capable e-book. It's quite possible today to make a e-book like REB1100 but with GSM/GPRS module and download interface. There are billions of $$ floating on the ringtone market and the same amount could be made in e-book market, just make it easy to download on the reader itself and charge cellular provider like they do with ringtones and various SMS services.
The future of tank's anti-missile defense. Robotic arm that sweeps grenades and missiles away...
Ugh. It's not that easy in Russia. You get your passport when you turn 16 years old (and you can't live here without passport at all without serious problems) and since then your card with your photo and other information is stored in the nearest to your home passport department (usually it's a part of the local police station). You can't do this many times because they will issue passport only in the passport department responsible for your house/flat. When you turn 30 or 45 you have to change the passport (during Soviet days they only glued new photos onto extra photo pages, but today they replace the passport issuing a new one). And no, you can't provide a COPY of your birth certificate, you have to provide the certificate itself. So it's one-time procedure and only if you are young. Later you always have a paper trail to restore your passport if you lost it, it's a messy procedure but it works. And if you came here from another country and got russian citizenship then your passport was issued by immigration authority.
This system is a heritage of the old Soviet Union, -- it's very difficult to pose as someone else when authorities check passport, because your photo is stored on your card in the passport department. Of couse forgery happens, but it's neither easy nor cheap, the almost only way to get false passport is to bribe people in the passport department. It looks like the only real identification solution in U.S. is to tell the customer to walk into the bank and compare his face with his photo stored in the database.
If you forgot your passport you have to show up in person in bank and provide passport for identification. Of couse it's uncomfortable somewhat, but it's a good guarantee against social engineering. This policy is easy to implement. I don't understand why american banks did not implement this yet...
I cant believe that banks in US are stupid enough to let anything done without authentication. Here is Russia banks either ask you for a special password that you provide for phone communications or ask you to dial TPIN (telephone pin, which is different from PIN) before you get connected to human operator.
It looks like you left Russia long, long ago. Your statement is just false today. I lived in the Soviet Union too and live in Russia now and I see the changes. Today anybody can afford going to McDonalds. It would cost about 200 roubles (about $7) on average. For example, monthly salary of Moscow subway cashier (VERY underpaid staff) is 9000 roubles (roughly $300) per month. Today nobody is going to work in Moscow for less than $400/month. Average secretary earns this amount. Average sysadmin salary is about $1k/month. CCIE earns about $3k/month.
Things changed. Really.
Yes, I did. And wxWindows's built-in HTML renderer saved me a lot of time (no, I did not have time to embed something like gecko and I did not want to turn executable into humongous download).
Just stick your usb into my infected computer and get your key infected too. This worked fine in pre-internet days with diskettes, so we'll see some new worms with this capability -- quite dangerous, because there are many networks that cannot upgrade their windows for various reasons like running legacy software but firewalled or simply disconnected from the internet.
Remember wxWindows, excellent library (better than QT IMHO)? It existed for a very long time, but Microsoft recently forced them to rename to wxWidgets.
I had to drag out of depression. I did not care about anything and eventually I ignored failing brakes on my car. Luckily they failed completely on the empty road and I found doctor to solve this problem. It's VERY easy to blame chemicals in your blood instead of your own wrong perceptions of the world. "The piano has been drinking... not me. Not me. Not me."
If your mind is scared, your adrenaline level is increased. Disease too? Are you going to inject something to counter adrenaline instead of using logic or emotions to calm down your software? The same happnes with depression, to treat it properly you have to find the problem in human software. These changes in blood only reflect the situation in the mind.
Depression is not a disease. It's a state of mind and it's a natural defense against problems in human software, not hardware. If you stimulate someone who has depression (it's possible to do with drugs today without jolting brains with electricity) most probably your patient will end up killing himself. Lack of activity works as a safeguard against doing something that will kill you while you are inadequate. So what's the purpose of stimulating people? Increasing suicide rates among them 500% at once and saving insurance company expenses?..
In theory you are right, but this method is not going to work if you want to run some else's applications (and you will because most likely default applications won't suit you). If one application can take out whole system then the system is badly designed. You can use DOS as well -- just make a task switcher! The only way to beat them is unix-like system that can run palm applications and kill them if they go postal. My friend bought Treo 650 and now he curses every day as it reboots constantly for no reason. PalmOS is a dead end. Unfortunately it's way too late to compete with Microsoft, they will make their pocket operating system stable and robust as they did with windows xp at last. And even if you succeed in creating superpocketOS you won't have enough third party applications around.
The only problem is crappy NAT boxes that cost $20... If I want to hide my intranet NAT is the only right way to do it.
It's really scary that SO many people believe that socialism could be something good. Nope. Soviet union failed exactly because it was socialist state, not because of communist ideology (nobody cared about communist ideas after 1960s). Socialism inevitably leads to uniformity and lack of productivity. That's what is going in the U.S. and Europe lately, every shift towards socialism is accompanied with increase in "political correctness" and stripping rights from people. Step by step. And in the end socialism will lead into total stagnation...
I live long enough to remember socialist times of Soviet Union. It wasn't bad as emigrants describe (to justify their actions) but it was really DULL existance with all authorities enforcing dullnes everywhere.
Everyone imagine Soviet Union as Empire of Evil where slaves worked hard to earn tiny piece of bread. Nope. After WWII quality of life rose up considerably, there was no serious repressions and it was VERY, VERY EASY to make a decent living IF you comply with rules (and these rules weren't that draconian either, actually it's the only one rule -- be average and don't stick out).
Damn! It's a big problem and it would be a 1. godsend for scum to catch legitimate domains and 2. lots of unnececary expenses. For example many russian characters look like english, but they aren't. So there are many words that could be spelled both in cyrillic and english, and now suppose you see an url printed in paper journal "http://www.poca.ru" -- what's that? "Dew" in russian and I have to type this in cyrillic or just an abbreviation and should be typed with english letters? As result sites with well known english names will be forced to spend bucks to register all alikes in other languages, and if they don't there is a lot of space for cheating.