I didn't even have to lie; I repeatedly told him I was running Linux, so I didn't have a Windows button. He thought I was an idiot, kept on trying to explain how to bring up the Windows control panel so that I could see the "error messages".
This guy was probably making minimum wage and probably thought it was a legit business he was employed by. Believe or not, most non-techies I know (and a few who think they're technologically literate) never even heard of Linux until I told them about it! Often when I had my last notebook (haven't installed Linux on the new one yet) at the bar, almost every time at least one person would ask "what version of Windows is that?
They're always amazed when I tell them it's free and doesn't need antivirus and show them the things it can do that Windows can't.
I took an undergrad psychology class in the '70s (it was either that or sociology), and the instructor once said something similar to what you just wrote (he also said there wasn't a psychologist alive that there wasn't another psychologist calling him a gold-studded liar).
Like we haven't had porn and games since Ugg and his brother scrawled dirty pictures on the cave wall and played "hit the target with this rock."
This is as bad as the patent office. "But this is different! It's on a COMPUTER!!!"
Instead of expanding into space, a quite possible future for sentient races is to move into a virtual reality. Merged with machines and living underground, the human race could withstand catastrophic asteroid strikes and last until the sun expands to a red giant
Dude, that journal is FICTION! Being able to "merge with machines" is a fantasy that is likely to never happen, and even if it some day becomes possible, that some day is a lot farther into the future than domed cities on Mars.
Besides, you do know what the current theory of where the moon came from is, right? If an object the size of Mars hits Earth, there's not going to be anything but lava. Nothing and nobody will survive.
Only when a machine can come up with and hold a conversation on new topics, while being able to tie the discussion history back to earlier statements so that the whole conversation "holds together" will be able to "fool" people. Because at that point, it won't be "fooling" anyone -- it will actually be thinking.
No, it will stil be smoke and mirrors. Magicians are pretty clever at making impossible things appear to happen, tricking a human into believing a machine is sentient is no different. Look up "Chinese room".
I had the same thing happen to me. Well, not the whole site, but the most people landed on when they were doing a search.
What's funny was, mine wasn't a commercial site (I didn't even run ad banners) and all I wanted was credit and a link!
You mention changing the backgroud image, many of the bozos plagairizing me didn't change anything but the name on the copyright notice to their own.
Re:It's not just specialization, there is also fea
on
Where's HAL 9000?
·
· Score: 3, Informative
I'm not. AI is to real intelligence what margarine is to butter - it's artificial. It isn't real. You're never going to get a Turing computer to actually think, although some future chemical or something machine may.
However, you could get to the point where intelligence was simulated well enough that it appeard to be sentient.
Which leads to what I fear, that people like those in PETA will start a "machine rights" movement, where it may be illegal for me to shut off a machine I built myself!
Luckily, I'm not likely to live long enough to see it. Some of you might, though.
The Indians were aborigines, without firearms or horses until the Europeans came. The Chinese had a developed nation for thousands of years; they were the ones who invented gunpowder. The Indians didn't stand a chance against the Europeans, the Europeans didn't stand a chance against the Chinese.
I'm sure I'll get modded down to oblivion over this
You're an AC and started at zero. You're already in oblivion territory. How long have you worked for Norton?
anecdotal evidence of performance problems you did not root cause, but can quickly blame on AV due to a history of bad performance and the high likelihood that a commercial AV product was probably installed at some point.
First hand observation isn't anecdotal. When a machine runs like molasses and perks up when and only when Norton is removed, how can it be anything BUT Norton?
experiences with 5+ year old AV software
Nope, the last run-in I had with Norton was on a laptop with an updated copy of Norton.
a general dislike for software that's designed for non-geeks
Avast, FreeAVG, and others I've installed on people's Windows computers are pretty much like Norton or McAfee in terms of UI.
bias against commercial software and marketing techniques
Maybe, but that bias doesn't make your shitty software work any better. You should be ashamed to work for a company that sells an overpriced product that needs a subscription that is head and shoulders BELOW the free offerings.
If you look at the technical side of what a company like Symantec is doing these days in the AV space with behavior analysis, reputation data, intrusion prevention and so forth (http://www.symantec.com/theme.jsp?themeid=star), I think most of you would be very surprised with how cutting edge the AV products are (both Enterprise and Consumer, which share the same core technology), how quickly it installs, how small the resource footprint is, and how quickly it goes to the background (http://www.passmark.com/tpsreport12). I can't defend the pop-up offers and whatnot, but for the most part, these aren't the shitty products they used to be
Its amazing to me how many people are so paranoid about their pirated shit that they FEAR the FBI doing what it's supposed to do because it might be turned against their pirate p0rn collection and Jay Zee rips.
I think everyone is paranoid about the FBI because almost everyone has a friend or family member that smoked pot.
I have a solution. Stop prosecuting people for ripping shit and tell the makers of digital shit to figure out another business model but don't look to law enforcement to prop them up. No more law enforcement resources or court resources dedicated to prosecuting RIAA suits and such like. Just fucking deal with it.
I'd like to see that, too, but I doubt we'll ever see it.
Why was this happening from an otherwise excellent program? Single Core CPU trying to run multithreaded code I suspect (yes, multithreaded code actually SLOWS DOWN due to overheads it has, on 1 core systems).
It's simple: Microsoft makes money on every non-Apple computer sold. If they can slow your old box down enough to frustrate you, you'll buy a new computer and they've sold another copy of Windows.
I suspect this is why Windows runs slower and slower as the machine ages. I suspect it's engineered to, just to make you buy a new PC!
Back when I upgraded from 98 to XP, I'd just done a wipe and reinstall of 98 a week before installing XP (got XP because I stupidly forgot to check to see if I had driver disks for hardware and none of the drivers were available on the internet for 98, only XP). One of the installation screens bragged that XP was faster than 98. Well, it was faster than 98 was before I reinstalled 98, but actually a little slower than the freshly installed 98.
You think that's bad, one friend's computer I looked at was running Norton AND McAffee (on Vista!). Of course, each program considered the other one a virus and they were fighting. I had to boot it from a Linux CD to to anything. After I got rid of the two AV programs I was surprised at how snappy it was, after hearing about how dog-slow Vista was. It ran fine with Avast.
I've never seen that one before, congratulations! However, it just says (5). You have to click the 5 to see that every single moderator modded you "underrated".
How did you guys manage to hypnotise the moderators? Hey, moderators, could you mail me some cash?
Hell if I know, except that they're Microsoft and very little they do makes sense to me, except for the user-hostile things that make them more money, like making it difficult to make a Windows network work without the most expensive copy of Windows they have on one of the machines. Ironically, Linux on one of them makes it at least possible.
My government is out of my control. Corporations determine what's legal and what's not, my vote is pretty much meaningles. That's why half the population doesn't even bother to vote, they realise that it's a waste of time and why I almost always vote third party ("none of the above").
The population in the projects down here in New Orleans it permanent...same people, generations of families...welfare mothers and families, often with no jobs...
Sorry, I don't buy that they eventually get cut off....you have people there living off the social teet for a lifetime, in a vicious circle that breeds new generations living the same bad dream.
You know these people personally, do you? You work for a social service agency, do you?
Recipients (with few exceptions) must work as soon as they are job ready or no later than two years after coming on assistance. Single parents are required to participate in work activities for at least 30 hours per week. Two-parent families must participate in work activities 35 or 55 hours a week, depending upon circumstances. Failure to participate in work requirements can result in a reduction or termination of benefits to the family. States, in fiscal year 2004, have to ensure that 50 percent of all families and 90 percent of two-parent families are participating in work activities. If a state meets these goals without restricting eligibility, it can receive a caseload reduction credit. This credit reduces the minimum participation rates the state must achieve to continue receiving federal funding. While states are given more flexibility in the design and implementation of public assistance, they must do so within various provisions of the law: [17]
provide assistance to needy families so that children may be cared for in their own homes or in the homes of relatives; end the dependence of needy parents on government benefits by promoting job preparation, work, and marriage; prevent and reduce the incidence of out-of-wedlock pregnancies and establish annual numerical goals for preventing and reducing the incidence of these pregnancies; and encourage the formation and maintenance of two-parent families.
Minimum wage jobs are for kids in school to make some extra money
Kids don't need the money. If an adult can't get a job, it's just wrong to hire a kid instead. I worked as a teen, but the economy was a hell of a lot better in 1968.
If you're too stupid or shortsighted to try to excel and learn something in school, I have to pay for your bad educational and vocational choices?
Not my choices, I've been working for almost half a century. You take a kid born to an alcoholic teenager (which causes mental retardation) who has no father, whose mother has no work history, you expect that kid to make anything of himself? Is it his fault that his mother drank him stupid? Is it his fault that he wasn't brought up right?
There is one form of welfare I absolutely hate, and that's welfare for the rich. Farming subsidies, oil subsidies, grants to Kodak and IBM, a minimum wage so low that I have to suppliment the workers at McDonald's with LINK cards, that is all welfare for the rich, and it's an abomination.
The economy's no longer in free-fall, unemployment is starting to go down (yes, partly because some just slipped off the rolls rather than becoming employed), the Iraq war is over, the Afghan war is winding down, gasoline is a buck cheaper than when he took office (yes, that has little to do with him), housing foreclosures are down.
Look how long it took us to come back after the mess it took Coolige and Hoover to make. Imaging how bad things would be now under someone as bad as Carter. Like I said, he's by no means a great President, but he's better than most I've seen.
Er, you might want to read a few comments in this thread, I think you'll find many of them educational. Your comment is completely wrong, and I'd explain it but others have already.
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I didn't even have to lie; I repeatedly told him I was running Linux, so I didn't have a Windows button. He thought I was an idiot, kept on trying to explain how to bring up the Windows control panel so that I could see the "error messages".
This guy was probably making minimum wage and probably thought it was a legit business he was employed by. Believe or not, most non-techies I know (and a few who think they're technologically literate) never even heard of Linux until I told them about it! Often when I had my last notebook (haven't installed Linux on the new one yet) at the bar, almost every time at least one person would ask "what version of Windows is that?
They're always amazed when I tell them it's free and doesn't need antivirus and show them the things it can do that Windows can't.
I took an undergrad psychology class in the '70s (it was either that or sociology), and the instructor once said something similar to what you just wrote (he also said there wasn't a psychologist alive that there wasn't another psychologist calling him a gold-studded liar).
Like we haven't had porn and games since Ugg and his brother scrawled dirty pictures on the cave wall and played "hit the target with this rock."
This is as bad as the patent office. "But this is different! It's on a COMPUTER!!!"
Instead of expanding into space, a quite possible future for sentient races is to move into a virtual reality. Merged with machines and living underground, the human race could withstand catastrophic asteroid strikes and last until the sun expands to a red giant
Dude, that journal is FICTION! Being able to "merge with machines" is a fantasy that is likely to never happen, and even if it some day becomes possible, that some day is a lot farther into the future than domed cities on Mars.
Besides, you do know what the current theory of where the moon came from is, right? If an object the size of Mars hits Earth, there's not going to be anything but lava. Nothing and nobody will survive.
Only when a machine can come up with and hold a conversation on new topics, while being able to tie the discussion history back to earlier statements so that the whole conversation "holds together" will be able to "fool" people. Because at that point, it won't be "fooling" anyone -- it will actually be thinking.
No, it will stil be smoke and mirrors. Magicians are pretty clever at making impossible things appear to happen, tricking a human into believing a machine is sentient is no different. Look up "Chinese room".
I had the same thing happen to me. Well, not the whole site, but the most people landed on when they were doing a search.
What's funny was, mine wasn't a commercial site (I didn't even run ad banners) and all I wanted was credit and a link!
You mention changing the backgroud image, many of the bozos plagairizing me didn't change anything but the name on the copyright notice to their own.
I'm not. AI is to real intelligence what margarine is to butter - it's artificial. It isn't real. You're never going to get a Turing computer to actually think, although some future chemical or something machine may.
However, you could get to the point where intelligence was simulated well enough that it appeard to be sentient.
Which leads to what I fear, that people like those in PETA will start a "machine rights" movement, where it may be illegal for me to shut off a machine I built myself!
Luckily, I'm not likely to live long enough to see it. Some of you might, though.
huh? Did I miss the kool-aid?
No, you missed the WOOOOSH, Dr. Cooper.
The Indians were aborigines, without firearms or horses until the Europeans came. The Chinese had a developed nation for thousands of years; they were the ones who invented gunpowder. The Indians didn't stand a chance against the Europeans, the Europeans didn't stand a chance against the Chinese.
I'm sure I'll get modded down to oblivion over this
You're an AC and started at zero. You're already in oblivion territory. How long have you worked for Norton?
anecdotal evidence of performance problems you did not root cause, but can quickly blame on AV due to a history of bad performance and the high likelihood that a commercial AV product was probably installed at some point.
First hand observation isn't anecdotal. When a machine runs like molasses and perks up when and only when Norton is removed, how can it be anything BUT Norton?
experiences with 5+ year old AV software
Nope, the last run-in I had with Norton was on a laptop with an updated copy of Norton.
a general dislike for software that's designed for non-geeks
Avast, FreeAVG, and others I've installed on people's Windows computers are pretty much like Norton or McAfee in terms of UI.
bias against commercial software and marketing techniques
Maybe, but that bias doesn't make your shitty software work any better. You should be ashamed to work for a company that sells an overpriced product that needs a subscription that is head and shoulders BELOW the free offerings.
If you look at the technical side of what a company like Symantec is doing these days in the AV space with behavior analysis, reputation data, intrusion prevention and so forth (http://www.symantec.com/theme.jsp?themeid=star), I think most of you would be very surprised with how cutting edge the AV products are (both Enterprise and Consumer, which share the same core technology), how quickly it installs, how small the resource footprint is, and how quickly it goes to the background (http://www.passmark.com/tpsreport12). I can't defend the pop-up offers and whatnot, but for the most part, these aren't the shitty products they used to be
Oh, you're in marketing. Carry on shilling, then.
Its amazing to me how many people are so paranoid about their pirated shit that they FEAR the FBI doing what it's supposed to do because it might be turned against their pirate p0rn collection and Jay Zee rips.
I think everyone is paranoid about the FBI because almost everyone has a friend or family member that smoked pot.
I have a solution. Stop prosecuting people for ripping shit and tell the makers of digital shit to figure out another business model but don't look to law enforcement to prop them up. No more law enforcement resources or court resources dedicated to prosecuting RIAA suits and such like. Just fucking deal with it.
I'd like to see that, too, but I doubt we'll ever see it.
Why was this happening from an otherwise excellent program? Single Core CPU trying to run multithreaded code I suspect (yes, multithreaded code actually SLOWS DOWN due to overheads it has, on 1 core systems).
It's simple: Microsoft makes money on every non-Apple computer sold. If they can slow your old box down enough to frustrate you, you'll buy a new computer and they've sold another copy of Windows.
I suspect this is why Windows runs slower and slower as the machine ages. I suspect it's engineered to, just to make you buy a new PC!
Back when I upgraded from 98 to XP, I'd just done a wipe and reinstall of 98 a week before installing XP (got XP because I stupidly forgot to check to see if I had driver disks for hardware and none of the drivers were available on the internet for 98, only XP). One of the installation screens bragged that XP was faster than 98. Well, it was faster than 98 was before I reinstalled 98, but actually a little slower than the freshly installed 98.
The best free AV is Linux.
Illegal != wrong
wrong != illegal
So, how many languages do YOU speak?
You think that's bad, one friend's computer I looked at was running Norton AND McAffee (on Vista!). Of course, each program considered the other one a virus and they were fighting. I had to boot it from a Linux CD to to anything. After I got rid of the two AV programs I was surprised at how snappy it was, after hearing about how dog-slow Vista was. It ran fine with Avast.
I've never seen that one before, congratulations! However, it just says (5). You have to click the 5 to see that every single moderator modded you "underrated".
How did you guys manage to hypnotise the moderators? Hey, moderators, could you mail me some cash?
Damn, it didn't work :(
Why the fuck would they INTEGRATE it?
Hell if I know, except that they're Microsoft and very little they do makes sense to me, except for the user-hostile things that make them more money, like making it difficult to make a Windows network work without the most expensive copy of Windows they have on one of the machines. Ironically, Linux on one of them makes it at least possible.
I found it interesting that Honda named their crude huamiform robot "Asimo".
I wonder if one of the dishes is named "Reel Big Fish" and another one "Pietasters"?
Of course they are. The C&C operators don't want someone else to take over their botnets!
My government is out of my control. Corporations determine what's legal and what's not, my vote is pretty much meaningles. That's why half the population doesn't even bother to vote, they realise that it's a waste of time and why I almost always vote third party ("none of the above").
As to "lock and load," I'm a pacifist.
The population in the projects down here in New Orleans it permanent...same people, generations of families...welfare mothers and families, often with no jobs...
Sorry, I don't buy that they eventually get cut off....you have people there living off the social teet for a lifetime, in a vicious circle that breeds new generations living the same bad dream.
You know these people personally, do you? You work for a social service agency, do you?
PRWORA replaced AFDC with TANF and ended entitlement to cash assistance for low-income families, meaning that eligible families may be denied aid even if they are eligible. Under TANF, states have broad discretion to determine who is eligible for benefits and services. In general states must use funds to serve families with children, with the only exceptions related to efforts to reduce non-marital childbearing and promote marriage. States cannot use TANF funds to assist most legal immigrants until they have been in the country for at least 5 years. TANF sets forth the following work requirements in order to qualify for benefits [16]:
Recipients (with few exceptions) must work as soon as they are job ready or no later than two years after coming on assistance.
Single parents are required to participate in work activities for at least 30 hours per week. Two-parent families must participate in work activities 35 or 55 hours a week, depending upon circumstances.
Failure to participate in work requirements can result in a reduction or termination of benefits to the family.
States, in fiscal year 2004, have to ensure that 50 percent of all families and 90 percent of two-parent families are participating in work activities. If a state meets these goals without restricting eligibility, it can receive a caseload reduction credit. This credit reduces the minimum participation rates the state must achieve to continue receiving federal funding.
While states are given more flexibility in the design and implementation of public assistance, they must do so within various provisions of the law: [17]
provide assistance to needy families so that children may be cared for in their own homes or in the homes of relatives;
end the dependence of needy parents on government benefits by promoting job preparation, work, and marriage;
prevent and reduce the incidence of out-of-wedlock pregnancies and establish annual numerical goals for preventing and reducing the incidence of these pregnancies; and
encourage the formation and maintenance of two-parent families.
Minimum wage jobs are for kids in school to make some extra money
Kids don't need the money. If an adult can't get a job, it's just wrong to hire a kid instead. I worked as a teen, but the economy was a hell of a lot better in 1968.
If you're too stupid or shortsighted to try to excel and learn something in school, I have to pay for your bad educational and vocational choices?
Not my choices, I've been working for almost half a century. You take a kid born to an alcoholic teenager (which causes mental retardation) who has no father, whose mother has no work history, you expect that kid to make anything of himself? Is it his fault that his mother drank him stupid? Is it his fault that he wasn't brought up right?
There is one form of welfare I absolutely hate, and that's welfare for the rich. Farming subsidies, oil subsidies, grants to Kodak and IBM, a minimum wage so low that I have to suppliment the workers at McDonald's with LINK cards, that is all welfare for the rich, and it's an abomination.
The economy's no longer in free-fall, unemployment is starting to go down (yes, partly because some just slipped off the rolls rather than becoming employed), the Iraq war is over, the Afghan war is winding down, gasoline is a buck cheaper than when he took office (yes, that has little to do with him), housing foreclosures are down.
Look how long it took us to come back after the mess it took Coolige and Hoover to make. Imaging how bad things would be now under someone as bad as Carter. Like I said, he's by no means a great President, but he's better than most I've seen.
In order to make money you need to be significantly better than the laymen that do it for free for their own enjoyment.
You mean like Milli Vanilli?
Er, you might want to read a few comments in this thread, I think you'll find many of them educational. Your comment is completely wrong, and I'd explain it but others have already.
There's an opinion piece in today's Illinois Times about that very subject.