Thanks, good post there. I dug around a bit and found this page about the PS3's supposed Linux kernel. Unfortunately it confirms what you said about the 3D functionality not being available from Linux. Also saw this exhaustive thread on the PS3 features. Much of it is speculation and I guess we'll just have to wait and see what Sony does and how much power it will eventually give to the user.
The PS3's supposed to be able to run Linux. Haven't yet come across an article showing this though. As of yet, Sony's official support page is essentially blank and the PS3's "official" Yellow Dog Linux 5.0 distro hasn't been released. Imho this ability of running your own OS and software to harness the PS3's power would be the only reason to justify its price tag. Think of what people could do with it - in fact it would be a Slashdotter's dream (if only it wasn't Sony who manufactured it..;): a gaming console that runs Linux and yes, you could even build a Beowulf cluster with these. On top of that you could run Doom, Quake, vi, Wine, Firefox, [insert cliche geek software here], you name it!
Now, where this thing really gets interesting is when people start writing emulators for the PS3, specifically XBox (360) and Wii emulators - it does sport a Cell processor running @ 3.2GHz. In the event that a bunch of dedicated fanatics conjure up an emulator that would run Wii games on the PS3 (initially sans the nunchak support, I guess) Nintendo would more or less have to sue Sony, no? Would Sony have to retract their support for open operating systems?
Given of course that Sony sticks by their word and allows other OSes to run on their new little toy, that is.
(I originally posted this into the the PS3 poll, but seeing as the PS3 could potentially run Wii games with an adequate emulator it actually fits for this "feature comparison" article as well)
My sentiments exactly. It's also quite interesting that nowadays out of all the western countries only in the US are gays politicized to such an extend. Usually gays are tolerated and treated by most politicians (and the people) in the same way other minorities are. I wonder who else would actually come up with gay topics and 'issues' if not (closet) gay people themselves who are confronted day-in and day-out with (their) 'gayness'? Goethe once said: "We are frightened by our own sins, when we see them in others." I think those Republicans mentioned (who obviously see 'being gay' as a sin) are perfect examples.
In any case, picking on minorities is a cheap shot for politicians (since they're only pissing off a fraction to gain political influence with the bulk of the population) and dwelling on such topics is always a sign that they want to deflect attention from real issues at hand. Furthermore, scapegoating minorities can lead to really bad things and should not be encouraged but fought and exposed wherever it happens.
Your overly suspicious girlfriend installed tracking software on your phone and remotely polled your locations while you were gone with her phone. Hence her automated reply to your message read: "Re: Hi honey!" "Don't bother. Since you were visiting that bitch Laura again I switched the locks. We're though."
Ok, here goes... Back in 1979 Iran, a former Windows user, finally got too pissed off about all the bugs and over night converted to using Apple Macintoshs. Microsoft saw what happened and didn't like it at all, after all back in 1953 they managed to neutralize Iran's movement towards Linux through an enormous and rather expensive FUD campaign, in order to install their Windows OS on Iran's computers (along with all its features and bugs).
Also, in 1979 Saddam became president of Iraq, he didn't like Apple Macs at all, so he too saw the Iran's Mac Revolution as a problem. MS realized this and provided Saddam with all sorts of developer tools like ASP.Net and Visual Studio so he could build his own programs and spread the use of Microsoft products throughout the Middle East. And programs he wrote. Ugly programs with bad Error handling and buffer overflows.. Yet, he used them and MS didn't really care, since it was made using their products. Microsoft also saw a big threat in the USSR where everyone ran Linux (I think it was Debian), so MS was pretty happy with Saddam back then.
In 1980 Saddam believed he had written enough programs to convince Iran that Macs are far inferiour so he started a war, obviously with the backing of the software giant Microsoft. The problem was that the Mac fanboys in Iran weren't sitting on their laurels either and wrote software in Mac OS that was just as effective as Saddam's. After eights long years of dire struggle Saddam abandoned his pursuit to convince the Iranians to revert to MS Windows.
This whole thing cost him lots and lots of money; MS products aren't cheap (even when they're on discount) and neither are MS programmers. So suddenly he saw his power threatened - what if he ran out of money to buy the updates? Thus, he came up with a plan: "We fought 8 hard years against the Mac fanboys of Iran to protect you guys from the horrors of converting to Apple Macintoshs" he said addressing the other countries in the Middle East, and pointed out that especially Kuwait profited from the war while contributing nothing, except for lending money to Iraq. "You Kuwaitis would all be Mac users now! I think it would be fair if you dropped the $30 billion we owe you, so we can rebuild over here." Kuwait refused and Saddam saw no other way than to take over Kuwait.
Now this went too far for MS who saw a very lucrative and loyal customer in Kuwait so they went in personally with their MCSE certified programmers and fought back Saddam's guys - way back to Baghdad. There they stopped and, I guess for old times sake, let him continue be president though from now on with only 640KB of RAM per PC and under constant surveillance.
They installed Webcams all over Iraq. Obviously Saddam didn't like that one bit and started throwing stones at the cams while cheering when he knocked one down. He did that every once in a while, when he got bored running programs with such a limited amount of RAM. Everybody was playing Doom while he had to resort to Nibbles.
Fast forward to today: now we have all sorts of people fighting each other in Iraq. There are hordes of Mac fanboys running around on the streets causing havoc and violently opposing anyone they see as Micro
I always wonder who pays to "undo" the damage caused by tankers breaking apart because maintenance is one of those things that apparently can be ignored to cut costs. Every time we hear about oil spills in the news we're presented with those nasty pictures of dying seabirds etc. yet we never hear who is responsible for it, neither do we hear about anyone who takes or even whether someone is made responsible for this. And all the while the people running the oil companies make billions, increase their profits and couldn't care less.
The most recent one was the one near the Philippines, now people will have to work on the site for years to separate the oil from the water and soil while the whole ecosystem in the area and beyond suffers. Who is responsible? Good question...
One of the biggest disasters happened 1991 near the north Italian coast where a tanker loaded with 1 million (!) barrels of crude oil sank. The billionaire Stelios Haji-Ioannou, owner of the shipping company was charged but later acquitted! The French and Italian coastlines would have people working to clean up the mess for the coming 12 years.
Ultimately, it seems, it is the coming generations that "pay" for our carelessness.
I always loved the multi-language facet of Wikipedia, especially in the context of archeology and linguistics. If I'm unsure about the accuracy of a fact given (unsourced) or whether it's been tampered with I just click on one of the language links, preferably one with a broad user (moderator) base. In general the German or French ones are quite good, though for specific matters other languages may be better. I found that in many political matters the German version was less prone to astroturfing and the like and often the information about controversial subjects is presented in a more clean-cut way (I believe due to their guidelines being a bit more restrictive).
It also helps with problems arising from inaccurate transliteration/translation. Although there is a trend towards representing the correct IPA transliteration with non-English words (e.g. how "Iraq is supposed to be pronounced) there are still many examples where the reader is presented with a very bad transliteration. Hovering the mouse over the corresponding language link and looking at the status bar will yield a better understanding about the word and how it's supposed to be pronounced (unless you can't read the alphabet/characters).
Wikipedia is a great place to brush up on (passive) language skills, even dead languages like Latin or classical Chinese.
All propaganda is based on deception and lies but also on truth. E.g. stating that Hitler was an insane person bent on subjugating all "minor races" is rather close to the truth and thus fighting him is a good thing, whereas stating that Saddam was sitting there with his Al Quaeda buddies just plotting an imminent attack using anthrax, sarin, mustard gas, a dirty bomb and/or a real nucilar bomb to kill US citizens is a bad form of propaganda especially when it leaves its perpetrators open for attack once it is discovered that the amount of truth was quite.. eh.. tiny.
In war the truth dies first (e.g. the bombing of AlJazeera HQ in Baghdad, described as a bastion of independent journalism in the Middle East before the war, then all of a sudden vilified as 'propaganda news network #1' - how ironic), so propaganda is one of the strongest weapons to strengthen the will of your own troops and to demoralize those of the enemy. However, the approach this administration took might have worked if the war had only taken a few weeks and they had been "greeted as liberators (tm)", but they had absolutely no idea what they were really up against. Unfortunately that was foreseeable, though not for this circle of people who had been drinking the Koolaid for too long and never learned to see things from other people's perspectives (or at least listen to their advice).
Those who complain about Unix (or rather Linux) configs are usually not admins or geeks. People who twiddle around with Servers will either know what to do in the respective OS or find the answer through the net or a book without complaining.
I switched and have been happy as a puppy. Let's go through the list:
1) The old theme was already too bulky. The LittleFox theme I installed in its place upgraded without a hitch.
2) If you don't like the feature, you can turn it off..
3) The old Options box was "confusing, poorly designed, and illogically hid important features" too - it's just a matter of getting used to it.
4) I have more than a dozen extensions installed. Seeing as I had upgrade problems in the past (even from 1.5xx -> 1.5yy) - which usually were resolved within days - I was a bit anxious, but alas, all extensions immediately had updated version (except for one I played with myself, obviously); two I had to reinstall manually, the rest upgraded automatically
5) FF1.5x hogged up 200-300 MB on my system. Now is only hogs up around 100MB. In any case, why would a bug 'carried over' be a reason 'not' to upgrade?
6),7),8) didn't happen on my box. CPU hogging actually went down.
9) Webpages (e.g. Protopage or Google homepage) or dedicated software handle RSS feeds far better than 2.0 or 1.5. Both implementations suck - why revert if there are much better alternatives?
The thing that bothered me the most with 1.5x was the memory leak and the accompanying CPU hogging. Both issues virtually disappeared since I upgraded to FF2.0.
I'm pretty sure the Daily Show team (and Comedy Central) had no problem with the free advertising they got on Youtube (check out this interview). E.g. the famed "Jon Stewart on Crossfire" clip only had such an impact (actually leading to the show's cancellation) because it was available on the net viewable by anyone who missed it. As for Jon's stance on filesharing I'll just give you a quote from his Oscar's presentation (I'd like to link to the youtube clip, but, well..): "If there is anyone out there involved in illegal movie piracy - don't do it! Take a good look at these people [points at the Hollywood stars in the audience], these are the people you are stealing from. LOOK AT THEM! Face what you've done! There are women here who could barely afford enough gown to cover their breasts."
What a weak move by the DMCA. They don't care for the shows success. Obviously they had other motives for doing this..
Hehe, maybe they will hire Peter Griffin who will recite the names of all 50000 people in less than a quarter of a second, though it may sound just like a loud yelp to the untrained ear..
Or they will have a screen at the end in which each participant is represented by a pixel; and best of all everyone will get to chose which color they want to be, all for just 25.. - they should have gone for 24.99 GBP...
Sorry for being cynical, but I had high hopes after reading the title. A Creative Commons movie is a great idea, but somehow I don't have a good feeling about this project. Let's hope that in a year or so they'll prove me wrong.
Yea, I gasped when I read that in their FAQ. They want to get 50000 people into the project, which in turn will provide them with the 1 million GBP budget to make this movie..
As I understand you'll pay 25 GBP (that's 37.29 Euros, 46.93 US$ or 2360.40 Afghanistan Afghanis) to be part of a swarm of people producing a movie that everyone will eventually more or less agree on?!
If you like to open many tabs in a window you might have noticed the annoying scroll button that will pop up. To avoid this set browser.tabs.tabMinWidth to something low like 20. This will reduce the size the tabs will shrink to and thus will increase the amount of tabs admitted before "overflowing" and invoking the scroll buttons.
You can further tweak the UI by editing userChrome.css in your profile's chrome subdirectory. E.g. the following code gets rid of the default icon in the tabs next to the title saving some of the valuable tab space:
/* Kill only default tabbrowser icons (no site icon) */ .tabbrowser-tabs *|tab:not([image]).tab-icon { display : none !important; }
My WinXP system gives me identical sizes (5,900,416 bytes) for the RC3 and the version I got today from the bittorrent link up there yet the MD5 sums differ:
So I crosschecked the EXEs' and DLLs' MD5s of the installations and they checked out (i.e. were identical). I believe the discrepancy between the installation files are due to the digital signatures' different timestamps. RC3's sig is timestamped "Monday, October 16, 2006 11:59:20 PM" whereas the final release is "Monday, October 23, 2006 4:19:44 PM". The firefox installations themselves are identical as far as I could see.
Strange though, since they seem to be so concerned about their bandwidth, that they haven't announced that people with RC3 don't need to upgrade. They should also promote the bittorrent link - I got the release faster than any mirror could have done, without the hazzle of clicking through the webpages and decide which mirror would be best.
I think they are a bit pissed off because they were planning a big party or something for the great new 2.0 release for tomorrow. And now everyone beat them to the punch.
In any case thanks to seeders and of course thanks to the developers for years of dedication and hard work.
Back in 2004 computer programmer Clint Curtis testified under oath that he had been asked by a congressman to write software that would make it possible to rig elections. He quite blandly states that "anyone" (with the expertise) could write software to rig elections, because the system has not been secured in any way.
The difference between Youtube and Napster is that Youtube's 'homemade videos' are far more attractive than e.g. the 'homemade music' of Napster. Additionally Youtube features the preview picture combined with the commenting/rating system to judge whether the video is really something you'd like to watch before wasting time on it.
Many homemade videos get tons of hits/high ratings such as Ask a Ninja - hilarious guy. Furthermore there are the 'video-bloggish' entries, i.e. documentaries that wouldn't be aired through mainstream channels or direct coverage of current events, both of which wouldn't be possible on a audio-only medium. So it's possible to find footage of the war in Iraq that due to self-censorship no news channel would broadcast. An example would be a documentary (warning: graphic!) of the use of white phosphorus in Fallujah.
Since the "wiped off the map" phrase is used so often I think it should be noted that the phrase appears to be mistranslated, yet is being repeated over and over. Rhethoric like this is not that unusual in such a volatile region. Just have a look at Israel's chief of staff Dan Halutz, who said "if the [two] soldiers are not returned, we will turn Lebanon's clock back 20 years" or Richard Armitage stating the US would bomb Pakistan back to the stone age if it didn't comply.
if technology eventually permits we will actually rewrite our own genetic code to suit our whims.
But that's exactly the point: at one point in the future gene technology will enable paying (read: rich) people to modify the genetic code of their children before they are born. The genes responsible for "stupidity", small stature or any other sort of perceived "deficiency" will be deactivated or replaced. And why would this new cast of Eloi want to inbreed with the less attractive Morlocks whose gene pool was not subjected to the "tweaking"? Additionally these rich Eloi will obviously also have superior technology and will be able to keep the Morlocks far away. It sounds plausible to me.
Maybe a bit later in time the Eloi will split in the way that you describe, creating Waterworld-Kevin-Costners and the like, but the Morlock gene pool will remain virtually unchanged.
Indeed the Rogue Squadron series looks pretty good (for Gamecube games), definitely better than the original "X-Wing" (which had a very "crude" Death Star trench run, but that was way back somewhere in the 1800s).
Now, the greatest thing with the technology nowadays would be to port it back to the PC, and create something like a MMORPFS (..flight simulator) where real human squadrons could (virtually) sit together and define the objectives and strategies before the battle and then when in battle do some cool team-based maneuvers etc. Just picture a battle with dozens (hundreds?) of fighters and huge spaceships piloted by other humans that can talk to you through the comm link. Now add a nice AI with its own squadron tactics and we have something that really recreates the epic battles we've seen in the movies.
Yea, I remember the Dig, it had Robert Patrick, the T1000, voicing the protagonist and he'd done a magnificent job. The great atmosphere was underlined by a beautiful soundtrack by Michael Land and stunning visuals, not to mention the epic story. "Full Throttle" was also a cool game and the "X-Wing/TIE Fighter" simulator franchise just begs for a revival (maybe one that resembles the movies' dynamics better, i.e. short fast bursts instead of the slow endless "phat phat phat phat.."). A game with the Death Star trench run in full 3D high res textures shader model 3 splendor (and in which Han shoots first) - now that would be a game that would do the Lucasarts legacy justice.
True, kissing up to the oil corporations looked like it made sense and obviously benefited certain people including the president himself. Yet we have to see it in context: the "ally" in Iraq, namely anti-islamist Saddam Hussein was strongly supported by the west, especially when he started war with Iran. The Iranians didn't like that the CIA installed a corrupt pro-western government in 1953 - that ultimately lead to the Revolution of 1979, which might have been an indication of what should be expected if one messes around a bit too much in other countries.
But no, the Reagan administration thought Saddam was a puppet that could be controlled just like Shah Pahlavi of Iran while at the same time they were confident that he, unlike the Shah, would maintain control over his subjects (which also explains the disregard for the means he used to do just that, e.g. the gassing of the kurds). The fallacy of this approach and its fruits can be seen today in the violent deaths of dozens of people every day in that very region.
I don't want to depict oil as the new "black death" because it is the raw material for many products the benefit us all. It just shouldn't be so important as to have countries wage war over it, thus every step away from oil as an energy source and towards renewable energy is a step in the right direction. - Oh, and by the way: good job Google!;)
How ironic that an 'Overbooked Benefit for Autism Education' may itself be the cause of authism.. In case you are a cat and have missed it here's a clip.
Slashdot Mirror
Thanks, good post there. I dug around a bit and found this page about the PS3's supposed Linux kernel. Unfortunately it confirms what you said about the 3D functionality not being available from Linux. Also saw this exhaustive thread on the PS3 features. Much of it is speculation and I guess we'll just have to wait and see what Sony does and how much power it will eventually give to the user.
The PS3's supposed to be able to run Linux. Haven't yet come across an article showing this though. As of yet, Sony's official support page is essentially blank and the PS3's "official" Yellow Dog Linux 5.0 distro hasn't been released. Imho this ability of running your own OS and software to harness the PS3's power would be the only reason to justify its price tag. Think of what people could do with it - in fact it would be a Slashdotter's dream (if only it wasn't Sony who manufactured it.. ;): a gaming console that runs Linux and yes, you could even build a Beowulf cluster with these. On top of that you could run Doom, Quake, vi, Wine, Firefox, [insert cliche geek software here], you name it!
Now, where this thing really gets interesting is when people start writing emulators for the PS3, specifically XBox (360) and Wii emulators - it does sport a Cell processor running @ 3.2GHz. In the event that a bunch of dedicated fanatics conjure up an emulator that would run Wii games on the PS3 (initially sans the nunchak support, I guess) Nintendo would more or less have to sue Sony, no? Would Sony have to retract their support for open operating systems?
Given of course that Sony sticks by their word and allows other OSes to run on their new little toy, that is.
(I originally posted this into the the PS3 poll, but seeing as the PS3 could potentially run Wii games with an adequate emulator it actually fits for this "feature comparison" article as well)
My sentiments exactly. It's also quite interesting that nowadays out of all the western countries only in the US are gays politicized to such an extend. Usually gays are tolerated and treated by most politicians (and the people) in the same way other minorities are. I wonder who else would actually come up with gay topics and 'issues' if not (closet) gay people themselves who are confronted day-in and day-out with (their) 'gayness'? Goethe once said: "We are frightened by our own sins, when we see them in others." I think those Republicans mentioned (who obviously see 'being gay' as a sin) are perfect examples.
In any case, picking on minorities is a cheap shot for politicians (since they're only pissing off a fraction to gain political influence with the bulk of the population) and dwelling on such topics is always a sign that they want to deflect attention from real issues at hand. Furthermore, scapegoating minorities can lead to really bad things and should not be encouraged but fought and exposed wherever it happens.
Your overly suspicious girlfriend installed tracking software on your phone and remotely polled your locations while you were gone with her phone. Hence her automated reply to your message read: "Re: Hi honey!" "Don't bother. Since you were visiting that bitch Laura again I switched the locks. We're though."
Ok, here goes... Back in 1979 Iran, a former Windows user, finally got too pissed off about all the bugs and over night converted to using Apple Macintoshs. Microsoft saw what happened and didn't like it at all, after all back in 1953 they managed to neutralize Iran's movement towards Linux through an enormous and rather expensive FUD campaign, in order to install their Windows OS on Iran's computers (along with all its features and bugs).
Also, in 1979 Saddam became president of Iraq, he didn't like Apple Macs at all, so he too saw the Iran's Mac Revolution as a problem. MS realized this and provided Saddam with all sorts of developer tools like ASP.Net and Visual Studio so he could build his own programs and spread the use of Microsoft products throughout the Middle East. And programs he wrote. Ugly programs with bad Error handling and buffer overflows.. Yet, he used them and MS didn't really care, since it was made using their products. Microsoft also saw a big threat in the USSR where everyone ran Linux (I think it was Debian), so MS was pretty happy with Saddam back then.
In 1980 Saddam believed he had written enough programs to convince Iran that Macs are far inferiour so he started a war, obviously with the backing of the software giant Microsoft. The problem was that the Mac fanboys in Iran weren't sitting on their laurels either and wrote software in Mac OS that was just as effective as Saddam's. After eights long years of dire struggle Saddam abandoned his pursuit to convince the Iranians to revert to MS Windows.
This whole thing cost him lots and lots of money; MS products aren't cheap (even when they're on discount) and neither are MS programmers. So suddenly he saw his power threatened - what if he ran out of money to buy the updates? Thus, he came up with a plan: "We fought 8 hard years against the Mac fanboys of Iran to protect you guys from the horrors of converting to Apple Macintoshs" he said addressing the other countries in the Middle East, and pointed out that especially Kuwait profited from the war while contributing nothing, except for lending money to Iraq. "You Kuwaitis would all be Mac users now! I think it would be fair if you dropped the $30 billion we owe you, so we can rebuild over here." Kuwait refused and Saddam saw no other way than to take over Kuwait.
Now this went too far for MS who saw a very lucrative and loyal customer in Kuwait so they went in personally with their MCSE certified programmers and fought back Saddam's guys - way back to Baghdad. There they stopped and, I guess for old times sake, let him continue be president though from now on with only 640KB of RAM per PC and under constant surveillance.
They installed Webcams all over Iraq. Obviously Saddam didn't like that one bit and started throwing stones at the cams while cheering when he knocked one down. He did that every once in a while, when he got bored running programs with such a limited amount of RAM. Everybody was playing Doom while he had to resort to Nibbles.
Fast forward to today: now we have all sorts of people fighting each other in Iraq. There are hordes of Mac fanboys running around on the streets causing havoc and violently opposing anyone they see as Micro
I always wonder who pays to "undo" the damage caused by tankers breaking apart because maintenance is one of those things that apparently can be ignored to cut costs. Every time we hear about oil spills in the news we're presented with those nasty pictures of dying seabirds etc. yet we never hear who is responsible for it, neither do we hear about anyone who takes or even whether someone is made responsible for this. And all the while the people running the oil companies make billions, increase their profits and couldn't care less.
The most recent one was the one near the Philippines, now people will have to work on the site for years to separate the oil from the water and soil while the whole ecosystem in the area and beyond suffers. Who is responsible? Good question...
One of the biggest disasters happened 1991 near the north Italian coast where a tanker loaded with 1 million (!) barrels of crude oil sank. The billionaire Stelios Haji-Ioannou, owner of the shipping company was charged but later acquitted! The French and Italian coastlines would have people working to clean up the mess for the coming 12 years.
Ultimately, it seems, it is the coming generations that "pay" for our carelessness.
I always loved the multi-language facet of Wikipedia, especially in the context of archeology and linguistics. If I'm unsure about the accuracy of a fact given (unsourced) or whether it's been tampered with I just click on one of the language links, preferably one with a broad user (moderator) base. In general the German or French ones are quite good, though for specific matters other languages may be better. I found that in many political matters the German version was less prone to astroturfing and the like and often the information about controversial subjects is presented in a more clean-cut way (I believe due to their guidelines being a bit more restrictive).
It also helps with problems arising from inaccurate transliteration/translation. Although there is a trend towards representing the correct IPA transliteration with non-English words (e.g. how "Iraq is supposed to be pronounced) there are still many examples where the reader is presented with a very bad transliteration. Hovering the mouse over the corresponding language link and looking at the status bar will yield a better understanding about the word and how it's supposed to be pronounced (unless you can't read the alphabet/characters).
Wikipedia is a great place to brush up on (passive) language skills, even dead languages like Latin or classical Chinese.
All propaganda is based on deception and lies but also on truth. E.g. stating that Hitler was an insane person bent on subjugating all "minor races" is rather close to the truth and thus fighting him is a good thing, whereas stating that Saddam was sitting there with his Al Quaeda buddies just plotting an imminent attack using anthrax, sarin, mustard gas, a dirty bomb and/or a real nucilar bomb to kill US citizens is a bad form of propaganda especially when it leaves its perpetrators open for attack once it is discovered that the amount of truth was quite.. eh.. tiny.
In war the truth dies first (e.g. the bombing of AlJazeera HQ in Baghdad, described as a bastion of independent journalism in the Middle East before the war, then all of a sudden vilified as 'propaganda news network #1' - how ironic), so propaganda is one of the strongest weapons to strengthen the will of your own troops and to demoralize those of the enemy. However, the approach this administration took might have worked if the war had only taken a few weeks and they had been "greeted as liberators (tm)", but they had absolutely no idea what they were really up against. Unfortunately that was foreseeable, though not for this circle of people who had been drinking the Koolaid for too long and never learned to see things from other people's perspectives (or at least listen to their advice).
Those who complain about Unix (or rather Linux) configs are usually not admins or geeks. People who twiddle around with Servers will either know what to do in the respective OS or find the answer through the net or a book without complaining.
I switched and have been happy as a puppy. Let's go through the list:
1) The old theme was already too bulky. The LittleFox theme I installed in its place upgraded without a hitch.
2) If you don't like the feature, you can turn it off..
3) The old Options box was "confusing, poorly designed, and illogically hid important features" too - it's just a matter of getting used to it.
4) I have more than a dozen extensions installed. Seeing as I had upgrade problems in the past (even from 1.5xx -> 1.5yy) - which usually were resolved within days - I was a bit anxious, but alas, all extensions immediately had updated version (except for one I played with myself, obviously); two I had to reinstall manually, the rest upgraded automatically
5) FF1.5x hogged up 200-300 MB on my system. Now is only hogs up around 100MB. In any case, why would a bug 'carried over' be a reason 'not' to upgrade?
6),7),8) didn't happen on my box. CPU hogging actually went down.
9) Webpages (e.g. Protopage or Google homepage) or dedicated software handle RSS feeds far better than 2.0 or 1.5. Both implementations suck - why revert if there are much better alternatives?
The thing that bothered me the most with 1.5x was the memory leak and the accompanying CPU hogging. Both issues virtually disappeared since I upgraded to FF2.0.
I'm pretty sure the Daily Show team (and Comedy Central) had no problem with the free advertising they got on Youtube (check out this interview). E.g. the famed "Jon Stewart on Crossfire" clip only had such an impact (actually leading to the show's cancellation) because it was available on the net viewable by anyone who missed it. As for Jon's stance on filesharing I'll just give you a quote from his Oscar's presentation (I'd like to link to the youtube clip, but, well..): "If there is anyone out there involved in illegal movie piracy - don't do it! Take a good look at these people [points at the Hollywood stars in the audience], these are the people you are stealing from. LOOK AT THEM! Face what you've done! There are women here who could barely afford enough gown to cover their breasts."
What a weak move by the DMCA. They don't care for the shows success. Obviously they had other motives for doing this..
Here's a clip with Bush talking about how he uses the Google. He also elaborates about why he doesn't email. :)
..there's a little bastard in all of us, no? ;)
Hehe, maybe they will hire Peter Griffin who will recite the names of all 50000 people in less than a quarter of a second, though it may sound just like a loud yelp to the untrained ear..
Or they will have a screen at the end in which each participant is represented by a pixel; and best of all everyone will get to chose which color they want to be, all for just 25.. - they should have gone for 24.99 GBP...
Sorry for being cynical, but I had high hopes after reading the title. A Creative Commons movie is a great idea, but somehow I don't have a good feeling about this project. Let's hope that in a year or so they'll prove me wrong.
Yea, I gasped when I read that in their FAQ. They want to get 50000 people into the project, which in turn will provide them with the 1 million GBP budget to make this movie..
As I understand you'll pay 25 GBP (that's 37.29 Euros, 46.93 US$ or 2360.40 Afghanistan Afghanis) to be part of a swarm of people producing a movie that everyone will eventually more or less agree on?!
You can further tweak the UI by editing userChrome.css in your profile's chrome subdirectory. E.g. the following code gets rid of the default icon in the tabs next to the title saving some of the valuable tab space:
Strange though, since they seem to be so concerned about their bandwidth, that they haven't announced that people with RC3 don't need to upgrade. They should also promote the bittorrent link - I got the release faster than any mirror could have done, without the hazzle of clicking through the webpages and decide which mirror would be best.
I think they are a bit pissed off because they were planning a big party or something for the great new 2.0 release for tomorrow. And now everyone beat them to the punch.
In any case thanks to seeders and of course thanks to the developers for years of dedication and hard work.
Back in 2004 computer programmer Clint Curtis testified under oath that he had been asked by a congressman to write software that would make it possible to rig elections. He quite blandly states that "anyone" (with the expertise) could write software to rig elections, because the system has not been secured in any way.
The difference between Youtube and Napster is that Youtube's 'homemade videos' are far more attractive than e.g. the 'homemade music' of Napster. Additionally Youtube features the preview picture combined with the commenting/rating system to judge whether the video is really something you'd like to watch before wasting time on it.
Many homemade videos get tons of hits/high ratings such as Ask a Ninja - hilarious guy. Furthermore there are the 'video-bloggish' entries, i.e. documentaries that wouldn't be aired through mainstream channels or direct coverage of current events, both of which wouldn't be possible on a audio-only medium. So it's possible to find footage of the war in Iraq that due to self-censorship no news channel would broadcast. An example would be a documentary (warning: graphic!) of the use of white phosphorus in Fallujah.
Since the "wiped off the map" phrase is used so often I think it should be noted that the phrase appears to be mistranslated, yet is being repeated over and over. Rhethoric like this is not that unusual in such a volatile region. Just have a look at Israel's chief of staff Dan Halutz, who said "if the [two] soldiers are not returned, we will turn Lebanon's clock back 20 years" or Richard Armitage stating the US would bomb Pakistan back to the stone age if it didn't comply.
if technology eventually permits we will actually rewrite our own genetic code to suit our whims.
But that's exactly the point: at one point in the future gene technology will enable paying (read: rich) people to modify the genetic code of their children before they are born. The genes responsible for "stupidity", small stature or any other sort of perceived "deficiency" will be deactivated or replaced. And why would this new cast of Eloi want to inbreed with the less attractive Morlocks whose gene pool was not subjected to the "tweaking"? Additionally these rich Eloi will obviously also have superior technology and will be able to keep the Morlocks far away. It sounds plausible to me.
Maybe a bit later in time the Eloi will split in the way that you describe, creating Waterworld-Kevin-Costners and the like, but the Morlock gene pool will remain virtually unchanged.
Indeed the Rogue Squadron series looks pretty good (for Gamecube games), definitely better than the original "X-Wing" (which had a very "crude" Death Star trench run, but that was way back somewhere in the 1800s).
Now, the greatest thing with the technology nowadays would be to port it back to the PC, and create something like a MMORPFS (..flight simulator) where real human squadrons could (virtually) sit together and define the objectives and strategies before the battle and then when in battle do some cool team-based maneuvers etc. Just picture a battle with dozens (hundreds?) of fighters and huge spaceships piloted by other humans that can talk to you through the comm link. Now add a nice AI with its own squadron tactics and we have something that really recreates the epic battles we've seen in the movies.
Yea, I remember the Dig, it had Robert Patrick, the T1000, voicing the protagonist and he'd done a magnificent job. The great atmosphere was underlined by a beautiful soundtrack by Michael Land and stunning visuals, not to mention the epic story. "Full Throttle" was also a cool game and the "X-Wing/TIE Fighter" simulator franchise just begs for a revival (maybe one that resembles the movies' dynamics better, i.e. short fast bursts instead of the slow endless "phat phat phat phat.."). A game with the Death Star trench run in full 3D high res textures shader model 3 splendor (and in which Han shoots first) - now that would be a game that would do the Lucasarts legacy justice.
True, kissing up to the oil corporations looked like it made sense and obviously benefited certain people including the president himself. Yet we have to see it in context: the "ally" in Iraq, namely anti-islamist Saddam Hussein was strongly supported by the west, especially when he started war with Iran. The Iranians didn't like that the CIA installed a corrupt pro-western government in 1953 - that ultimately lead to the Revolution of 1979, which might have been an indication of what should be expected if one messes around a bit too much in other countries.
;)
But no, the Reagan administration thought Saddam was a puppet that could be controlled just like Shah Pahlavi of Iran while at the same time they were confident that he, unlike the Shah, would maintain control over his subjects (which also explains the disregard for the means he used to do just that, e.g. the gassing of the kurds). The fallacy of this approach and its fruits can be seen today in the violent deaths of dozens of people every day in that very region.
I don't want to depict oil as the new "black death" because it is the raw material for many products the benefit us all. It just shouldn't be so important as to have countries wage war over it, thus every step away from oil as an energy source and towards renewable energy is a step in the right direction. - Oh, and by the way: good job Google!
How ironic that an 'Overbooked Benefit for Autism Education' may itself be the cause of authism.. In case you are a cat and have missed it here's a clip.