GNAA Announces Victory over AOL GNAA Announces Victory over AOL Monday, May 17 2004, GNAA, Nigeria
"Who is the Greatest Man Alive?" - If you ask Gary Niger, he'll tell
you it is most definitely Osama Bin Laden.
The Gay Nigger Association of America (GNAA) announced today
further victory in their current program to bring about total breakdown of the
AOL customer relation system.
AOL Corporate Policy has been changed after GNAA (Gay Nigger
Association of America) special operative Gary Niger's constant abuse of
their "secret question" program designed to provide a futile illusion of
security for the mongoloids and sodomites that comprise their customer
base.
The "custom question" option, allowing users to create their own question,
has been removed following the efforts of Niger and other fearsome Gay Niggers
from the GNAA's top secret "Black Ops" divison.
With the removal of this option, trolls are now forced to use pre-approved
AOL "secret question" options when signing up for fraudlent accounts for the
purpose of downloading gay pornography and meeting up with the clandestine
"homo thug" underground.
"I don't know why it changed, exactly. Corporate HQ didn't tell us," said
Tracy, an AOL representative. "It happened two or three days ago."
Tracy was unavailable for further comment, as she was masturbating furiously
under her desk - claiming that "Ten guys were on the phone and (she) had to
take them all on."
An AOL executive, speaking under the condition of anonymnity, said the
change in policy came after widespread employee unrest, culminating in an
incident of mass sodomy taking place in the Ogden, Utah call center.
Gary Niger and other members of the GNAA "Black Ops" division continue to
use the "custom question" trolling technique with various punjabis in the
Bangalore, India call center - who haven't gotten the memo yet.
Meanwhile, GNAA Command is working on the creation of new methods of
trolling to work within the confines of this new standard, still flush with
victory.
Nick Berg's head was unavailable for comment at the time of this
release.
About America Online, Inc.
America Online, Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of subsidiary of Time
Warner Inc. Based in Dulles, Virginia, America Online is the world's leader in
interactive services, Web brands, Internet technologies and e-commerce
services.
About GNAA: GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) is the first
organization which gathers GAY NIGGERS from all over America and abroad for one
common goal - being GAY NIGGERS.
If you answered "Yes" to all of the above questions, then GNAA (GAY NIGGER
ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) might be exactly what you've been looking for!
Join GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) today, and enjoy
all the benefits of being a full-time GNAA member. GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) is the fastest-growing
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I am glad someone pointed this out, because in the end, it is only how many sales that matter. Not how many different designs they come out with or what not.. If I had 1 design that got 200 sales, and they had 100 designs that got 1 sales each, I would be more well off then they, wouldn't I?
Yeah, wow, YOU GOT ME. I like how you fail to realize the fact that the post IS STILL INSIGHTFUL. Most people obviously didn't catch it the first time around. Of course, I am taking credit for someone else's work, but since this is Slashdot you don't really OWN your comments anyway. For a more detailed explanation of the theory behind my reposting, just look here: http://www.playfullyclever.com/slashdot.html.
Please try to understand things before you criticize them and shout PLAGIARIST!
Having had XM for a few months, I can not even begin to tell how absolutely sucky broadcast radio is. I know you think you know that it sucks. I thought so to. But I just didn't realize how horrid it had become until I had a wealth of listening options in my car. Just the thought of yet another inane "radio personality" (I refuse to use the term DJ... they're not) screaching at me makes me shutter. And if I have to go somewhere in my wife's car (sans XM)... ugh.
Right now, I think they need to grow the subscriber base and I don't know as if the competition between XM and Sirius helps matters. I've heard a lot of people say that they're waiting to see which one survives before jumping on board. That's not a good thing for the long term viability of either one.. They're competing against the status quo and against "free" broadcast radio. That alone should keep rates down. I don't think the XM vs. Sirius competition really means as much.
I recently came into contact with a similar policy at a consulting firm that was concerned that top-secret information might escape through my USB watch, and made me leave it at the front desk every day. In that case, I know it was absurd overkill... but is this concern a legitimate concern? Not to skirt the question, but is this really "absurd overkill?" I'm sure that USB pens/watches/etc have been a boon to corporate espionage. With a USB storage device, you don't have to worry about burning CDs or emailing your stolen information off-site.
Having said that, I do think that some companies need to quit treating their employees like potential criminals. But if you work for a company like mine, where the data is the company's life-blood I can completely understand why they'd want to keep your USB and other storage devices (like iPods) out of their space. (thin clients would have gone a long way towards solving this problem, but that's another discussion)
The First Amendment gives you freedom of speech, not freedom from consequences. You are free to call your boss an asshole, but he is also free to fire you because of it. The government will not prosecute you for it, but they will also not protect you.
Secondly, the First Amendment applies only to government institutions. If this was a public school, maybe it would apply but a private institution is allowed to kick you out for saying things all they want.
I'm not personally familiar with Australian law, I hope someone who is will be able to give us a bit of insight. But until then, I really can't understand how the judge made this ruling. Kazaa is a data transfer protocol-a crappy one, granted, but that's all it is. Their software simply -allows- users to transfer files via that protocol. Are the makers of FTP clients now liable if an FTP user downloads copyrighted material?
As I wrote some time ago (I looked for it so I could just put the link in here but couldn't find it on SlashDot), one of the things that keeps getting left out of this debate, is the fact that because the PTO is being bombarded by thousands of patents each year it needs to computerize the way it works. The steps I see are:
1. Create a dictionary of all words used in applying for a patent. This is rather obvious because a good spell checker is needed anyway. But this goes beyond that. It allocates a unique id number to each of the document's words. This allows you to reduce the overall size of the document quite a bit. (After all, if you use a four byte word that gives you around four billion words and the largest dictionary only has a couple hundred thousand words in it.) Legal jargon usually uses more than four letters in a word and thus the document would be smaller overall.
2. A second dictionary of terms which are equal to each other. This dictionary would grow over time. Basically, things like "flashlight", "Light emitting device", "a device with a lamp in it which projects a beam", and "hand held light device" are all the same or similar. Thus, when a term which is unrecognized comes up in a document it can be added to one of the lists and from then on it is associated with that term. (And yeah, they should be able to add, remove, etc... from the list.)
3. The program should have already scanned all previous patents and created the above two dictionaries. Then when a new patent comes through (since they have to be submitted electronically now anyways) it is passed through the program which determines how closely a given document comes to other patents. Note that this is different from "are the sentences the same" or "are the sentences in the same order". The program should not care what order anything appears in - just do a search like Google and find how many words are the same or similar (remember they could replace all words of "flashlight" with "hand held light emitting device" via word processor).
3a. Since the patent system is divided up into various areas (ie: Games, Construction, etc...) the program should scan across all boundaries to ensure that something from one area is not now being patented in another area.
3b. All entries should be listed (just like with Google) in a descending order of revelance. So a patent which was given out in, say 1816 (The Stirling Engine) isn't re-patented as "The Audacious Engine" simply because all of the places where it says "Engine" in the orginal patent are replaced by "a non-internal combustion device".
4. All applied for patents should be kept on file so they too can be checked against. Notes on why the patent was denied should also be kept on file so they can be referred back to.
People may say we can't do this. Google has to handle over a billion web pages yet it can do it in a matter of a few seconds. There are only a couple million patents. The PTO should be able to handle this really easily. Hire the guys from Google to set things up. (And no - I don't work for Google.)
As for graphical pictures showing how something works - it depends. There are software packages which can compare one item/picture to another but all it would take is to accidentally send the picture reversed, rotated slightly so it looks different, use different colors, shades, shadows, etc.... You can look for similarities but that is about it.
In any event - it is nice that the powers that be are trying to fix the problem (or at least suggest changes) but it would be more realistic to try to automate the whole process so the patents can be throw out faster and faster. Which is why both good and bad patents are needed and both should have their own set of dictionaries. You need the bad patents in there as a way to say "Hey! Here are examples of why you can't have a patent!" Further, the bad patents could be used just like the good ones to show how someone tried once before to get something passed. And just like the good search informa
If this is just an organization and editing program, then how is this any different than iPhoto?
RAW workflow. Apple is calling this "the first of its kind" in that it can work directly on RAW images, but that's not true. I'm not sure if the parent poster really knew what he was talking about or not, but from looking through the features this has on Apple's web site, it does seem that Picasa 2.1 does pretty much the exact same things, and Picasa is free.
(There are probably things that Apple doesn't mention that people like me would consider pretty important, but I can only go by what's on their web site right now. I'm interested to learn more, as a real Photoshop-level app that can work straight on RAW files might be enough to get me to finally switch to Mac.)
It is highly desirable to work directly on RAW files, which as Apple says is "non-destructive", i.e. all of your original sensor data is still there. This is not the case when working with RAW files in Photoshop, which have to be rasterized even before they're actually opened. You can make basic adjustments in Adobe Camera RAW before the file is opened but to do real retouching, you have to rasterize and open in Photoshop itself.
Picasa will let you do editing and retouching on the RAW file, then export it after you've edited. But Picasa's tools are pretty basic. Apple might offer more, but under their "all the tools you need" sidebar on the web site, they just list the same stuff Picasa does and that even Adobe Camera RAW will mostly do. The real questions for me are:
a) does Aperture support layers? b) does Aperture have a clone tool/healing brush/patch tool? These are the tools I use most often for actual retouching. c) does Aperture support 16 bit images? (My guess is it would pretty much have to in order to truly support RAW, but I don't think they specifically say it does anywhere.)
If the answers to all of these questions are "yes", I'm tempted. If the answers to any one out of the three are "no", then it's really a worthless app if you've got Picasa, and especially if you've already got a combination of Picasa and Photoshop. (So you can use Picasa for images that need only light retouching, and Photoshop for the heavy stuff that Aperture wouldn't be suited for either.)
Of course, both Apple and Adobe will probably improve their products to compete with each other as time goes on. I would love to see true RAW support in Photoshop itself and I would love to see more features in Aperture. Adobe has had no real serious competition in pro image editing for a good while up to now.
If you had any idea what you were talking about, you would know that I wasn't talking about physical inventory. When you scan an item and it goes into the cash register the price is recorded and the item is recorded. At the end of the day, not only do they check that money in register equals total of prices, but they also look to see which items were sold below the ticket price. Sometimes cashiers have to make a judgement if an item is damaged and this would be cleared, but in this case there would be no such clearing. This system is to prevent cashiers from say, ringing up fake discounts for their friends.
So actually, this kid would be caught quite readily.
Before arguing with someone who has ACTUAL experience in an environment, make sure you know what you're talking about.
Perhaps you've never worked at such a fine retail establishment as Target, but as someone who has I will tell you that the cashier was most likely not stupid, he just simply didn't care. He doesn't get a bonus for catching theives like the guy with the $4.99 iPod, and after ringing up thousands for purchases for hours on end, day after day, he probably just got tired and didn't really notice the iPod ringing up cheap. Personally I never paid attention to what items were being purchased or what the computer said they cost. I just ran them over the scanner and gave change like the cash register told me to.
That being said, if this guy had any brains, he would have gone to a different store. At the end of the day, inventory gets taken and if items sold don't match up to cash in registers, there's a problem. His scheme could have (not definately, but there is a chance) been discovered, and then it would have been a simple matter of looking at the security tapes and seeing who the offender is. We had a similar incidence like this at our store when a woman rode a $500 bike out of the store while the security guard was one lunch brake (yeah, great security practices there huh?). We pulled the tapes and saw who it was, and sure enough, the same woman comes in a week later trying to shoplift stuff by putting it in her backpack. She was arrested in short order and we got the bike back soon enough too.
Just goes to show people don't become criminals because they're smart.
I realize the parent poster was trying to be funny but it doesn't change the fact that (IMO) most Americans think our economy is completely built around serving them and that all Indians are tech support people for Dell. Not only is this incorrect but it is insulting and I just took advantage of this topic to let off steam.
P.S. - Maybe some day you'll develop the ability to realize when someone is trying to make a point and you'll listen instead of criticizing.
"Because the project is being outsourced to the United States."
SIGH
I live in India. All Indians don't work for US outsourcing tech companies. In fact, a very small minority of us do. And we did have money before the 'west' started 'infusing money' into our 'economy'. And most people dont give a fuck about outsourcing. Most people aren't even aware of the outsourcing inudstry. And outsourcing hasn't made IT workers rich - it has just put them in the upper middle class. And the poor, lower class, lower middle class, middle class, upper middle class and the rich existed in almost the same percentages as now, before IBM created the first PC. Outsourcing is a microscopic part of our economic history.
Or, if you just want to stay in your dream, before the outsourcing industry graced us, we were all snake-charmers riding elephants and we had never seen money or a calculator.
Anyone think of the instances where going above the speed limit is necessary - traffic issues, defensive driving, emergencies? This program seems like it would put more hassle than anything. If you are in a hurry, you shouldn't speed (that is right) - but if there is an emergency, or if you are avoiding a traffic accident, going above the speed limit is basically needed. I think more thought should be put into this program first before they force these sort of regulations without any exceptions. Think of not being able to do a manuever to avoid an accident because your car limits you.
Plus, everyone's seen school buses with their regulators, going 60mph on the highway. No one wants to be like them.
I am glad to see sun going in to an open source direction, but how long will it last this time?
When Solaris 8 source was released, it was not exaclty open source, and did not last long at all.
I think that Sun is schizophrenic wrt open source - one minute they love it, the next it is stealing jobs or doomed to fail or whatever. Also, I remember to get ahold of the solaris 8 source you had to sign a contract and couldn't do anything other than look at the code - no local changes, certainly no distribution or discussion with anyone (even within my company) who had not signed the contract. I wound checking their libc source a couple times to verify 2.6/2.8 compatibility of some software and that is about it. That license made it nearly useless.
Wind, Hydro, Nuclear... great for electricity but does nothing about Gas and Oil.
Until electric cars become efficient enough to run all day on a single charge with half a day of stored energy still available, petrol is the energy source we need to replace.
I'm betting on Biodiesel. It's still more expensive to refine than crude oil but that gap is closing fast. With current subsidies you can actually buy biodiesel for cheaper than Gasoline...
From the beginning, people have played with language both for entertainment and to improve communications. Once written language developed, it was inevitable that humans would begin playing word games.
While there is certainly more to puzzle history than the traditional crossword, this extremely popular word game is worthy of special attention. The crossword evolved from a long line of word games, from the simplest riddle or pun to the cryptic crosswords and acrostics, which delight so many puzzle solvers today. Some of the earliest evidence of crossword-like word play dates from the first century A.D.
THE WORD SQUARE The earliest precursor to the crossword is the word square. A word square consists of a group of words, all equal in length, arranged to form the same words across and down. The first known word square, called the Sator Square, is carved in stone and dates from the first century A.D. in Pompeii.
R O T A S O P E R A T E N E T A R E P O S A T O R
This particular square, which can be read four ways (left to right, right to left, top to bottom, and bottom to top), is often translated as "Arepo, the sower, watches over his works." (Its significance is unknown.)
Another early word square is the Moschion stele, circa A.D. 300; it is actually part crossword, part cryptogram, and part word seek. In the stele, Moschion, an Egyptian, is honoring Osiris (Egyptian god of the underworld) with this monument, which contains words and messages that can be read in different directions. One message on the stele is "Moschion to Osiris, for the treatment which cured his foot." In other words, a thank-you note! Word squares continued in this manner for centuries.
In the mid-1800's, the clue was introduced, although it was not a consistent feature. In fact, such clues were not "definitions" in the modern sense, but rather riddles. In 1875, St. Nicholas magazine ran a puzzle with a small grid in which, for the first time, the Across answers were different from the Down answers.
CROSSWORDS In December 1913, Arthur Wynne took the idea of different Across and Down answers a step further, creating a diamond-shaped "word-cross" for the Sunday "Fun" section of the New York World. Wynne had created anagrams, riddles, rebuses, and word squares for the newspaper, but the word-cross was different. He added clues to the concept of the word square, borrowing from the acrostic, a popular puzzle of the day. The readers loved Wynne's new game (generally recognized as the first crossword) and soon were clamoring for more.
The New York World continued to publish crosswords (the name changed from word-cross within a month of the first publication) for ten years without real competition. Then, in April 1924, Simon & Schuster, an upstart publishing company, decided to publish an all-crosswords book. They hired Margaret Petherbridge (later Farrar) and other editors from the New York World to compile and edit the book. Since it was a risky proposition, Simon & Schuster did not put its name on the book as publisher. Instead, they used the moniker Plaza Publishing. When the 3,900 copies in the first printing quickly sold out, Simon & Schuster knew they had a winner. By the end of the year, they had four books on the best-seller list, and the name Simon & Schuster appeared on the book along with Plaza Publishing.
CROSSWORDS IN THE NEWS The success of the Simon & Schuster book made crosswords big news in 1924 and throughout the rest of the decade. University professors gave their opinions on the educational and health benefits, as well as the potential "risks" (gasp!) of solving crosswords. Solving competitions cropped up. One Cleveland woman claimed her husband's obsession with crosswords led to their divorce. Dictionary sales soared, and libraries limited the usage of dictionaries. Black and white clothing and jewelry became the rage.
Even Broadway musicals featured
I hope our youth likes giving away it's rights
on
The MySpace Generation
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
Hope you like giving away your hard-earned works for free to Fox.
From the TOS: By posting Content on any public area of MySpace.com, you automatically grant as well as represent and warrant that you have the right to grant to MySpace.com, an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, fully paid, worldwide license to use, copy, perform, display, and distribute such information and content to MySpace.com and that MySpace.com has the right to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, such information and content, and to grant and authorize sublicenses of the foregoing.
Probably Not! (Here's why). The general trick if you are going for maximum profit is to first sue a small company, and get a successful precident. It costs you less to fight the action against a smaller company, and improves your chances of getting the really big money later by giving you some already recorded findings that the court will generally accept and not let your opponent delay over. Taking on Opera (for example), first, and Microsoft second or later makes more sense if it's all about the cash.
For a publicly traded company, this is even more plausable. Winning a small decision that seems to forshadow a bigger win can really drive up the price of stock without costing much at all to implement.
The chief reason people are concerned that this lawsuit might be the first of a series is probably SCO's lawsuits. After all, SCO avoided going after smaller fry first and went for IBM. However: 1. That doesn't seem to be working too well, and other companies are at least as likely on observing it to avoid the strategy as imitate it. 2. There's no indicators that Eolas has been secretly coached in this strategy, backed by (say) the veiled resources of the powerful Lynx Megacorporation in an attempt to regain browser dominance for Eolas's hidden puppeteer.
1689--Spanish-German explorer Santa Claus discovers the North Pole, and establishes a small base camp.
1691--Because of harsh and meager living conditions, Claus' crew abandons him.
1692--Claus is rescued by the Viking ship Hvorfor. He returns to Europe, bringing some items along with him from the North Pole. He finds he is able to sell them quite easily, making a small profit.
1703--Claus saves up enough money to buy a small ship and crew, and returns to the North Pole. Upon arriving, he finds his base camp, half-buried but still intact.
1704--Claus returns to Europe with a shipload of North Pole artifacts, and is successful in selling them. He makes enough profit to increase his crew, and buys building materials to expand his polar base.
1705--Claus returns again to the North Pole, and builds quarters for him and his crew, and sets up the Polar Exports Company.
1716--After six shiploads of exports, the European market is flooded with polar artifacts, as well as the phony ones making charlatans rich. Seeing this decline, Claus decides to invest his money by starting a toy company in his native Germany.
1720--Claus Toys becomes the largest toy company in Germany, but only because of Claus' underhanded business dealings. (It was also rumored that Claus was dealing with enemy countries as well). Competitors urged government officials to begin an investigation.
1721--Enough evidence is found, and charges are drawn up against the Claus Toys Company. Claus himself refuses to release his records.
1722--The German Supreme Court finds Claus guilty of tax evasion and of treason. When news of this breaks, Claus' employees all turn against him and his company.
1723--Claus is exiled to Sicily, and shortly before leaving, he absconds with all of the company's funds.
1724--A search party is sent to the Mediterranean to recover the funds, however, Claus hears of this ahead of time, and he and his Sicilian wife flee for their lives. (Some say he went into Northern Africa, but it is generally assumed that this was only a ruse to lure the searchers off course. He is believed to have returned to his North Pole base).
1725--Claus II is born en route to the North Pole.
1725-1734--The Claus' lay low at the North Pole. Claus teaches his son the arts of toy making and business dealings.
1735--Rumor has it that Claus has hired Scandinavian builders to construct a castle for him at the North Pole, making use of almost half of the company funds.
1739--The castle is finished, and is one of the largest in the world. Claus II reaches his fifteenth birthday, and in the same year, Claus' wife dies, accidentally falling from a balcony in one of the castle's great halls.
1740--Claus, mourning his wife, becomes increasingly ill.
1745--Santa Claus II becomes of age, and begins taking care of the castle and of his sick father.
1747--Using the remaining company funds, Claus II builds a small city around the castle to attract workers and craftsmen.
1748--Word of the North Pole settlement reaches Europe. The Elves of Eastern Europe, quickly becoming political outcasts and striving for a better life, begin immigrating in waves to the North Pole.
1753--All the elves have left Eastern Europe and have become firmly established at the North Pole. Claus II begins his father's toy company once again, with an estimated 30,000 elves employed. Claus I dies, at age 89.
1755--The North Pole officially becomes a nation, and Claus II and his wife take the throne. The toy business continues to flourish, and the elves enjoy prosperity. Claus III is born.
1757--The great stables are built, and scientists are secretly hired by Claus II to begin an ambitious project--that of breeding and training reindeer to fly.
1773--The flying reindeer are achieved and become Claus II and III's major form of transportation.
1774--A mutant reindeer, named Rudolf, is born whose nose emits light. He b
For some time I've thought the future of automotive fuel lies in biodiesel rather than hydrogen. Hydrogen is just very hard to work with because of its low energy density and the fact it is normally a gas. Generation, transportation, storage and utilization all face large challenges. For biodiesel, all the steps except generation are already solved and the infrastructure in place, and the generation problems do not seem large. (Even without the existing infrastructure, I suspect biodiesel wins economically.)
Generation from algae is particularly promising, as it doesn't require arable land, and can use salt water.
I am a high school student, so I believe I am qualified to answer you.
First, be forwarned. I don't mean to sound cynical, but there is not a whole lot that has to do with science and technology that would excite most students. Even if it does, a lot of people are too scared of being called a "nerd" or a "geek" and thereby having their social status for the rest of the four years ruined to show that excitement.
There are, however, some. I don't think that a robotics competition is a good idea, however. I don't know about most schools, but at mine there are not a lot of people interested in robotics. Besides, it would take a lot of work, and a lot of the most brilliant people are inherently lazy.
I think the programming fair was a great idea, however. Every time I write a program to do the simplest thing on my TI-83+ graphing calculator (such as convert celsius to fahrenheit for instance) people gape at me with awe and amazement and ask, how did you DO that? This includes jocks, socialites, and various other groups of people who would normally not be caught dead showing an interest in the "nerdy" fields of computers or technology.
If you put on a programming fair, you are not going to be able to teach anyone computer programming in a day, but you will spark their interest. Give away a few CDs with C tutorials on them or something, and maybe, just maybe, a few kids will try them out.
Also, expect the bit-head population to turn out in force at your fair. You can even put some of them to good use, having them help the newbies who have no idea what's going on.
In conclusion, programming fair=good, robotics competition=bad.
Slashdot Mirror
LOL OMGWTFBBQ?!
LOL @ EDITORS WAT A DUPE!!!!!11111111111
GNNA 4EVAR!!!!!!!!111111111111111
I PWN U NOOBS LIEK HARD RITE
www.playfullyclever.com
google = teh win0rs
fuck t3h micro$oft
long live teh stallmantor
n fuck u lameness filter
GNAA Announces Victory over AOL
Monday, May 17 2004, GNAA, Nigeria
"Who is the Greatest Man Alive?" - If you ask Gary Niger, he'll tell you it is most definitely Osama Bin Laden.
The Gay Nigger Association of America (GNAA) announced today further victory in their current program to bring about total breakdown of the AOL customer relation system.
AOL Corporate Policy has been changed after GNAA (Gay Nigger Association of America) special operative Gary Niger's constant abuse of their "secret question" program designed to provide a futile illusion of security for the mongoloids and sodomites that comprise their customer base.
The "custom question" option, allowing users to create their own question, has been removed following the efforts of Niger and other fearsome Gay Niggers from the GNAA's top secret "Black Ops" divison.
With the removal of this option, trolls are now forced to use pre-approved AOL "secret question" options when signing up for fraudlent accounts for the purpose of downloading gay pornography and meeting up with the clandestine "homo thug" underground.
"I don't know why it changed, exactly. Corporate HQ didn't tell us," said Tracy, an AOL representative. "It happened two or three days ago."
Tracy was unavailable for further comment, as she was masturbating furiously under her desk - claiming that "Ten guys were on the phone and (she) had to take them all on."
An AOL executive, speaking under the condition of anonymnity, said the change in policy came after widespread employee unrest, culminating in an incident of mass sodomy taking place in the Ogden, Utah call center.
Gary Niger and other members of the GNAA "Black Ops" division continue to use the "custom question" trolling technique with various punjabis in the Bangalore, India call center - who haven't gotten the memo yet.
Meanwhile, GNAA Command is working on the creation of new methods of trolling to work within the confines of this new standard, still flush with victory.
Nick Berg's head was unavailable for comment at the time of this release.
About America Online, Inc.
America Online, Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of subsidiary of Time Warner Inc. Based in Dulles, Virginia, America Online is the world's leader in interactive services, Web brands, Internet technologies and e-commerce services.
About GNAA:
GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) is the first organization which gathers GAY NIGGERS from all over America and abroad for one common goal - being GAY NIGGERS.
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Are you a GAY NIGGER ?
If you answered "Yes" to all of the above questions, then GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) might be exactly what you've been looking for!
Join GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) today, and enjoy all the benefits of being a full-time GNAA member.
GNAA (GAY NIGGER ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) is the fastest-growing GAY NIGGER community with THOUSANDS of members all over United States of America and the World! You, too, can be a part of GNAA if you join today!
Why not? It's quick and easy - only 3 simple steps!
I am glad someone pointed this out, because in the end, it is only how many sales that matter. Not how many different designs they come out with or what not.. If I had 1 design that got 200 sales, and they had 100 designs that got 1 sales each, I would be more well off then they, wouldn't I?
Yeah, wow, YOU GOT ME. I like how you fail to realize the fact that the post IS STILL INSIGHTFUL. Most people obviously didn't catch it the first time around. Of course, I am taking credit for someone else's work, but since this is Slashdot you don't really OWN your comments anyway. For a more detailed explanation of the theory behind my reposting, just look here: http://www.playfullyclever.com/slashdot.html.
Please try to understand things before you criticize them and shout PLAGIARIST!
Having had XM for a few months, I can not even begin to tell how absolutely sucky broadcast radio is. I know you think you know that it sucks. I thought so to. But I just didn't realize how horrid it had become until I had a wealth of listening options in my car. Just the thought of yet another inane "radio personality" (I refuse to use the term DJ... they're not) screaching at me makes me shutter. And if I have to go somewhere in my wife's car (sans XM)... ugh.
Right now, I think they need to grow the subscriber base and I don't know as if the competition between XM and Sirius helps matters. I've heard a lot of people say that they're waiting to see which one survives before jumping on board. That's not a good thing for the long term viability of either one.. They're competing against the status quo and against "free" broadcast radio. That alone should keep rates down. I don't think the XM vs. Sirius competition really means as much.
-PlayfullyClever
I recently came into contact with a similar policy at a consulting firm that was concerned that top-secret information might escape through my USB watch, and made me leave it at the front desk every day. In that case, I know it was absurd overkill ... but is this concern a legitimate concern?
Not to skirt the question, but is this really "absurd overkill?" I'm sure that USB pens/watches/etc have been a boon to corporate espionage. With a USB storage device, you don't have to worry about burning CDs or emailing your stolen information off-site.
Having said that, I do think that some companies need to quit treating their employees like potential criminals. But if you work for a company like mine, where the data is the company's life-blood I can completely understand why they'd want to keep your USB and other storage devices (like iPods) out of their space. (thin clients would have gone a long way towards solving this problem, but that's another discussion)
Okay, first of all, the US Constitution does nothing of the sort. You might want to check out http://www.usconstitution.net/constnot.html.
The First Amendment gives you freedom of speech, not freedom from consequences. You are free to call your boss an asshole, but he is also free to fire you because of it. The government will not prosecute you for it, but they will also not protect you.
Secondly, the First Amendment applies only to government institutions. If this was a public school, maybe it would apply but a private institution is allowed to kick you out for saying things all they want.
I'm not personally familiar with Australian law, I hope someone who is will be able to give us a bit of insight. But until then, I really can't understand how the judge made this ruling. Kazaa is a data transfer protocol-a crappy one, granted, but that's all it is. Their software simply -allows- users to transfer files via that protocol. Are the makers of FTP clients now liable if an FTP user downloads copyrighted material?
As I wrote some time ago (I looked for it so I could just put the link in here but couldn't find it on SlashDot), one of the things that keeps getting left out of this debate, is the fact that because the PTO is being bombarded by thousands of patents each year it needs to computerize the way it works. The steps I see are:
1. Create a dictionary of all words used in applying for a patent. This is rather obvious because a good spell checker is needed anyway. But this goes beyond that. It allocates a unique id number to each of the document's words. This allows you to reduce the overall size of the document quite a bit. (After all, if you use a four byte word that gives you around four billion words and the largest dictionary only has a couple hundred thousand words in it.) Legal jargon usually uses more than four letters in a word and thus the document would be smaller overall.
2. A second dictionary of terms which are equal to each other. This dictionary would grow over time. Basically, things like "flashlight", "Light emitting device", "a device with a lamp in it which projects a beam", and "hand held light device" are all the same or similar. Thus, when a term which is unrecognized comes up in a document it can be added to one of the lists and from then on it is associated with that term. (And yeah, they should be able to add, remove, etc... from the list.)
3. The program should have already scanned all previous patents and created the above two dictionaries. Then when a new patent comes through (since they have to be submitted electronically now anyways) it is passed through the program which determines how closely a given document comes to other patents. Note that this is different from "are the sentences the same" or "are the sentences in the same order". The program should not care what order anything appears in - just do a search like Google and find how many words are the same or similar (remember they could replace all words of "flashlight" with "hand held light emitting device" via word processor).
3a. Since the patent system is divided up into various areas (ie: Games, Construction, etc...) the program should scan across all boundaries to ensure that something from one area is not now being patented in another area.
3b. All entries should be listed (just like with Google) in a descending order of revelance. So a patent which was given out in, say 1816 (The Stirling Engine) isn't re-patented as "The Audacious Engine" simply because all of the places where it says "Engine" in the orginal patent are replaced by "a non-internal combustion device".
4. All applied for patents should be kept on file so they too can be checked against. Notes on why the patent was denied should also be kept on file so they can be referred back to.
People may say we can't do this. Google has to handle over a billion web pages yet it can do it in a matter of a few seconds. There are only a couple million patents. The PTO should be able to handle this really easily. Hire the guys from Google to set things up. (And no - I don't work for Google.)
As for graphical pictures showing how something works - it depends. There are software packages which can compare one item/picture to another but all it would take is to accidentally send the picture reversed, rotated slightly so it looks different, use different colors, shades, shadows, etc.... You can look for similarities but that is about it.
In any event - it is nice that the powers that be are trying to fix the problem (or at least suggest changes) but it would be more realistic to try to automate the whole process so the patents can be throw out faster and faster. Which is why both good and bad patents are needed and both should have their own set of dictionaries. You need the bad patents in there as a way to say "Hey! Here are examples of why you can't have a patent!" Further, the bad patents could be used just like the good ones to show how someone tried once before to get something passed. And just like the good search informa
If this is just an organization and editing program, then how is this any different than iPhoto?
RAW workflow. Apple is calling this "the first of its kind" in that it can work directly on RAW images, but that's not true. I'm not sure if the parent poster really knew what he was talking about or not, but from looking through the features this has on Apple's web site, it does seem that Picasa 2.1 does pretty much the exact same things, and Picasa is free.
(There are probably things that Apple doesn't mention that people like me would consider pretty important, but I can only go by what's on their web site right now. I'm interested to learn more, as a real Photoshop-level app that can work straight on RAW files might be enough to get me to finally switch to Mac.)
It is highly desirable to work directly on RAW files, which as Apple says is "non-destructive", i.e. all of your original sensor data is still there. This is not the case when working with RAW files in Photoshop, which have to be rasterized even before they're actually opened. You can make basic adjustments in Adobe Camera RAW before the file is opened but to do real retouching, you have to rasterize and open in Photoshop itself.
Picasa will let you do editing and retouching on the RAW file, then export it after you've edited. But Picasa's tools are pretty basic. Apple might offer more, but under their "all the tools you need" sidebar on the web site, they just list the same stuff Picasa does and that even Adobe Camera RAW will mostly do. The real questions for me are:
a) does Aperture support layers?
b) does Aperture have a clone tool/healing brush/patch tool? These are the tools I use most often for actual retouching.
c) does Aperture support 16 bit images? (My guess is it would pretty much have to in order to truly support RAW, but I don't think they specifically say it does anywhere.)
If the answers to all of these questions are "yes", I'm tempted. If the answers to any one out of the three are "no", then it's really a worthless app if you've got Picasa, and especially if you've already got a combination of Picasa and Photoshop. (So you can use Picasa for images that need only light retouching, and Photoshop for the heavy stuff that Aperture wouldn't be suited for either.)
Of course, both Apple and Adobe will probably improve their products to compete with each other as time goes on. I would love to see true RAW support in Photoshop itself and I would love to see more features in Aperture. Adobe has had no real serious competition in pro image editing for a good while up to now.
...does it run Linux?
If you had any idea what you were talking about, you would know that I wasn't talking about physical inventory. When you scan an item and it goes into the cash register the price is recorded and the item is recorded. At the end of the day, not only do they check that money in register equals total of prices, but they also look to see which items were sold below the ticket price. Sometimes cashiers have to make a judgement if an item is damaged and this would be cleared, but in this case there would be no such clearing. This system is to prevent cashiers from say, ringing up fake discounts for their friends.
So actually, this kid would be caught quite readily.
Before arguing with someone who has ACTUAL experience in an environment, make sure you know what you're talking about.
Perhaps you've never worked at such a fine retail establishment as Target, but as someone who has I will tell you that the cashier was most likely not stupid, he just simply didn't care. He doesn't get a bonus for catching theives like the guy with the $4.99 iPod, and after ringing up thousands for purchases for hours on end, day after day, he probably just got tired and didn't really notice the iPod ringing up cheap. Personally I never paid attention to what items were being purchased or what the computer said they cost. I just ran them over the scanner and gave change like the cash register told me to.
That being said, if this guy had any brains, he would have gone to a different store. At the end of the day, inventory gets taken and if items sold don't match up to cash in registers, there's a problem. His scheme could have (not definately, but there is a chance) been discovered, and then it would have been a simple matter of looking at the security tapes and seeing who the offender is. We had a similar incidence like this at our store when a woman rode a $500 bike out of the store while the security guard was one lunch brake (yeah, great security practices there huh?). We pulled the tapes and saw who it was, and sure enough, the same woman comes in a week later trying to shoplift stuff by putting it in her backpack. She was arrested in short order and we got the bike back soon enough too.
Just goes to show people don't become criminals because they're smart.
I realize the parent poster was trying to be funny but it doesn't change the fact that (IMO) most Americans think our economy is completely built around serving them and that all Indians are tech support people for Dell. Not only is this incorrect but it is insulting and I just took advantage of this topic to let off steam.
P.S. - Maybe some day you'll develop the ability to realize when someone is trying to make a point and you'll listen instead of criticizing.
"Because the project is being outsourced to the United States."
SIGH
I live in India. All Indians don't work for US outsourcing tech companies. In fact, a very small minority of us do. And we did have money before the 'west' started 'infusing money' into our 'economy'. And most people dont give a fuck about outsourcing. Most people aren't even aware of the outsourcing inudstry. And outsourcing hasn't made IT workers rich - it has just put them in the upper middle class. And the poor, lower class, lower middle class, middle class, upper middle class and the rich existed in almost the same percentages as now, before IBM created the first PC. Outsourcing is a microscopic part of our economic history.
Or, if you just want to stay in your dream, before the outsourcing industry graced us, we were all snake-charmers riding elephants and we had never seen money or a calculator.
Anyone think of the instances where going above the speed limit is necessary - traffic issues, defensive driving, emergencies? This program seems like it would put more hassle than anything. If you are in a hurry, you shouldn't speed (that is right) - but if there is an emergency, or if you are avoiding a traffic accident, going above the speed limit is basically needed. I think more thought should be put into this program first before they force these sort of regulations without any exceptions. Think of not being able to do a manuever to avoid an accident because your car limits you.
Plus, everyone's seen school buses with their regulators, going 60mph on the highway. No one wants to be like them.
I am glad to see sun going in to an open source direction, but how long will it last this time?
When Solaris 8 source was released, it was not exaclty open source, and did not last long at all.
I think that Sun is schizophrenic wrt open source - one minute they love it, the next it is stealing jobs or doomed to fail or whatever. Also, I remember to get ahold of the solaris 8 source you had to sign a contract and couldn't do anything other than look at the code - no local changes, certainly no distribution or discussion with anyone (even within my company) who had not signed the contract. I wound checking their libc source a couple times to verify 2.6/2.8 compatibility of some software and that is about it. That license made it nearly useless.
Wind, Hydro, Nuclear... great for electricity but does nothing about Gas and Oil.
Until electric cars become efficient enough to run all day on a single charge with half a day of stored energy still available, petrol is the energy source we need to replace.
I'm betting on Biodiesel. It's still more expensive to refine than crude oil but that gap is closing fast. With current subsidies you can actually buy biodiesel for cheaper than Gasoline...
From the beginning, people have played with language both for entertainment and to improve communications. Once written language developed, it was inevitable that humans would begin playing word games.
While there is certainly more to puzzle history than the traditional crossword, this extremely popular word game is worthy of special attention. The crossword evolved from a long line of word games, from the simplest riddle or pun to the cryptic crosswords and acrostics, which delight so many puzzle solvers today. Some of the earliest evidence of crossword-like word play dates from the first century A.D.
THE WORD SQUARE
The earliest precursor to the crossword is the word square. A word square consists of a group of words, all equal in length, arranged to form the same words across and down. The first known word square, called the Sator Square, is carved in stone and dates from the first century A.D. in Pompeii.
R O T A S
O P E R A
T E N E T
A R E P O
S A T O R
This particular square, which can be read four ways (left to right, right to left, top to bottom, and bottom to top), is often translated as "Arepo, the sower, watches over his works." (Its significance is unknown.)
Another early word square is the Moschion stele, circa A.D. 300; it is actually part crossword, part cryptogram, and part word seek. In the stele, Moschion, an Egyptian, is honoring Osiris (Egyptian god of the underworld) with this monument, which contains words and messages that can be read in different directions. One message on the stele is "Moschion to Osiris, for the treatment which cured his foot." In other words, a thank-you note! Word squares continued in this manner for centuries.
In the mid-1800's, the clue was introduced, although it was not a consistent feature. In fact, such clues were not "definitions" in the modern sense, but rather riddles. In 1875, St. Nicholas magazine ran a puzzle with a small grid in which, for the first time, the Across answers were different from the Down answers.
CROSSWORDS
In December 1913, Arthur Wynne took the idea of different Across and Down answers a step further, creating a diamond-shaped "word-cross" for the Sunday "Fun" section of the New York World. Wynne had created anagrams, riddles, rebuses, and word squares for the newspaper, but the word-cross was different. He added clues to the concept of the word square, borrowing from the acrostic, a popular puzzle of the day. The readers loved Wynne's new game (generally recognized as the first crossword) and soon were clamoring for more.
The New York World continued to publish crosswords (the name changed from word-cross within a month of the first publication) for ten years without real competition. Then, in April 1924, Simon & Schuster, an upstart publishing company, decided to publish an all-crosswords book. They hired Margaret Petherbridge (later Farrar) and other editors from the New York World to compile and edit the book. Since it was a risky proposition, Simon & Schuster did not put its name on the book as publisher. Instead, they used the moniker Plaza Publishing. When the 3,900 copies in the first printing quickly sold out, Simon & Schuster knew they had a winner. By the end of the year, they had four books on the best-seller list, and the name Simon & Schuster appeared on the book along with Plaza Publishing.
CROSSWORDS IN THE NEWS
The success of the Simon & Schuster book made crosswords big news in 1924 and throughout the rest of the decade. University professors gave their opinions on the educational and health benefits, as well as the potential "risks" (gasp!) of solving crosswords. Solving competitions cropped up. One Cleveland woman claimed her husband's obsession with crosswords led to their divorce. Dictionary sales soared, and libraries limited the usage of dictionaries. Black and white clothing and jewelry became the rage.
Even Broadway musicals featured
Hope you like giving away your hard-earned works for free to Fox.
From the TOS: By posting Content on any public area of MySpace.com, you automatically grant as well as represent and warrant that you have the right to grant to MySpace.com, an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, fully paid, worldwide license to use, copy, perform, display, and distribute such information and content to MySpace.com and that MySpace.com has the right to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, such information and content, and to grant and authorize sublicenses of the foregoing.
Will eolas go for other browsers?
Probably Not! (Here's why).
The general trick if you are going for maximum profit is to first sue a small company, and get a successful precident. It costs you less to fight the action against a smaller company, and improves your chances of getting the really big money later by giving you some already recorded findings that the court will generally accept and not let your opponent delay over. Taking on Opera (for example), first, and Microsoft second or later makes more sense if it's all about the cash.
For a publicly traded company, this is even more plausable. Winning a small decision that seems to forshadow a bigger win can really drive up the price of stock without costing much at all to implement.
The chief reason people are concerned that this lawsuit might be the first of a series is probably SCO's lawsuits. After all, SCO avoided going after smaller fry first and went for IBM. However: 1. That doesn't seem to be working too well, and other companies are at least as likely on observing it to avoid the strategy as imitate it. 2. There's no indicators that Eolas has been secretly coached in this strategy, backed by (say) the veiled resources of the powerful Lynx Megacorporation in an attempt to regain browser dominance for Eolas's hidden puppeteer.
History of Santa Claus
1689--Spanish-German explorer Santa Claus discovers the North Pole, and establishes a small base camp.
1691--Because of harsh and meager living conditions, Claus' crew abandons him.
1692--Claus is rescued by the Viking ship Hvorfor. He returns to Europe, bringing some items along with him from the North Pole. He finds he is able to sell them quite easily, making a small profit.
1703--Claus saves up enough money to buy a small ship and crew, and returns to the North Pole. Upon arriving, he finds his base camp, half-buried but still intact.
1704--Claus returns to Europe with a shipload of North Pole artifacts, and is successful in selling them. He makes enough profit to increase his crew, and buys building materials to expand his polar base.
1705--Claus returns again to the North Pole, and builds quarters for him and his crew, and sets up the Polar Exports Company.
1716--After six shiploads of exports, the European market is flooded with polar artifacts, as well as the phony ones making charlatans rich. Seeing this decline, Claus decides to invest his money by starting a toy company in his native Germany.
1720--Claus Toys becomes the largest toy company in Germany, but only because of Claus' underhanded business dealings. (It was also rumored that Claus was dealing with enemy countries as well). Competitors urged government officials to begin an investigation.
1721--Enough evidence is found, and charges are drawn up against the Claus Toys Company. Claus himself refuses to release his records.
1722--The German Supreme Court finds Claus guilty of tax evasion and of treason. When news of this breaks, Claus' employees all turn against him and his company.
1723--Claus is exiled to Sicily, and shortly before leaving, he absconds with all of the company's funds.
1724--A search party is sent to the Mediterranean to recover the funds, however, Claus hears of this ahead of time, and he and his Sicilian wife flee for their lives. (Some say he went into Northern Africa, but it is generally assumed that this was only a ruse to lure the searchers off course. He is believed to have returned to his North Pole base).
1725--Claus II is born en route to the North Pole.
1725-1734--The Claus' lay low at the North Pole. Claus teaches his son the arts of toy making and business dealings.
1735--Rumor has it that Claus has hired Scandinavian builders to construct a castle for him at the North Pole, making use of almost half of the company funds.
1739--The castle is finished, and is one of the largest in the world. Claus II reaches his fifteenth birthday, and in the same year, Claus' wife dies, accidentally falling from a balcony in one of the castle's great halls.
1740--Claus, mourning his wife, becomes increasingly ill.
1745--Santa Claus II becomes of age, and begins taking care of the castle and of his sick father.
1747--Using the remaining company funds, Claus II builds a small city around the castle to attract workers and craftsmen.
1748--Word of the North Pole settlement reaches Europe. The Elves of Eastern Europe, quickly becoming political outcasts and striving for a better life, begin immigrating in waves to the North Pole.
1753--All the elves have left Eastern Europe and have become firmly established at the North Pole. Claus II begins his father's toy company once again, with an estimated 30,000 elves employed. Claus I dies, at age 89.
1755--The North Pole officially becomes a nation, and Claus II and his wife take the throne. The toy business continues to flourish, and the elves enjoy prosperity. Claus III is born.
1757--The great stables are built, and scientists are secretly hired by Claus II to begin an ambitious project--that of breeding and training reindeer to fly.
1773--The flying reindeer are achieved and become Claus II and III's major form of transportation.
1774--A mutant reindeer, named Rudolf, is born whose nose emits light. He b
For some time I've thought the future of automotive fuel lies in biodiesel rather than hydrogen. Hydrogen is just very hard to work with because of its low energy density and the fact it is normally a gas. Generation, transportation, storage and utilization all face large challenges.
For biodiesel, all the steps except generation are already solved and the infrastructure in place, and the generation problems do not seem large. (Even without the existing infrastructure, I suspect biodiesel wins economically.)
Generation from algae is particularly promising, as it doesn't require arable land, and can use salt water.
I am a high school student, so I believe I am qualified to answer you.
First, be forwarned. I don't mean to sound cynical, but there is not a whole lot that has to do with science and technology that would excite most students. Even if it does, a lot of people are too scared of being called a "nerd" or a "geek" and thereby having their social status for the rest of the four years ruined to show that excitement.
There are, however, some. I don't think that a robotics competition is a good idea, however. I don't know about most schools, but at mine there are not a lot of people interested in robotics. Besides, it would take a lot of work, and a lot of the most brilliant people are inherently lazy.
I think the programming fair was a great idea, however. Every time I write a program to do the simplest thing on my TI-83+ graphing calculator (such as convert celsius to fahrenheit for instance) people gape at me with awe and amazement and ask, how did you DO that? This includes jocks, socialites, and various other groups of people who would normally not be caught dead showing an interest in the "nerdy" fields of computers or technology.
If you put on a programming fair, you are not going to be able to teach anyone computer programming in a day, but you will spark their interest. Give away a few CDs with C tutorials on them or something, and maybe, just maybe, a few kids will try them out.
Also, expect the bit-head population to turn out in force at your fair. You can even put some of them to good use, having them help the newbies who have no idea what's going on.
In conclusion, programming fair=good, robotics competition=bad.