Well, the fundamental problem is that you're storing your data (email) on somebody else's servers. The server owners have the ability to look at it if they so choose. Google has an algorithm that looks at it and matches ads to it, but that doesn't say anything about potential less welcome things they might do to it (this goes for all such service providers).
Indeed, there's not a whole lot stopping Google or MS (MSN Hotmail) or Yahoo or lots of other companies from doing nasty things with your data, except ethics. And on the ethics front, I think Google is the least of our worries. Of course I'm not saying that I'm positive that Google won't datamine our emails once they can make boatloads of money off it, but I do think that they'll at least consider the loss of goodwill they would incur were they to start doing such things. MS, obviously, doesn't care about goodwill at all;-]
You can always host your own mail server, of course.
Google ads are not creepy. It's not like a person is reading your mail, it's just a computer program that finds words in the mail that advertisers think are interesting, and then, based on those words, selects ads to display.
Now take Slashdot, that's creepy. Your posts are actually read by real people, who post replies to it that (usually) are eerily on-topic!
Also, if the chip is inside the coin, the coin's metal should shield the chip from ever receiving or sending any signals, won't it? So it sounds bollocks to me.
Damn, you're right. It's got a Winamp icon in the Start Menu to start XMMS, and it's even got the blue E icon.
Maybe it's to make the desktop seem less strange to people used to Windows? You and I can use a new theme or switch from KDE to Gnome (and vice versa) without freaking out, but I doubt most computer users can manage that.
Still, I think this should run into legal (copyright/trademark) problems in western jurisdictions.
At least they didn't change the Open Office icon for the MS Office icon;-)
I have a problem with that license plate system too because it seems to automatically assume that everybody on the road is guilty until proven innocent. What's wrong with making the cops wait until you do something to give them probable cause before they get to start profiling you and looking for wants/warrants/etc? If he catches me speeding then he can run my plate -- but if I'm obeying the law then I don't think he has the right to be looking at me.
If the data about the licence plates of the vehicles that aren't being looked for is discarded after scanning, so only the relevant vehicles are found, would you still have objections to it? It would be the equivalent of a cop looking at people, and deciding that those people aren't on the wanted list, and forgetting about them.
Or, they host their western-facing mail servers with providers in the west - I see a lot of that, too, since many of those businesses have two separate messaging platforms for the different international audiences with whom they communicate.
So those servers aren't being abused by spammers, as their normal mail servers are? But who does receive mail from the abused servers, then? Since it's almost all spam, it seems like everybody would want to block them.
I am already disturbed to know that TV shows like Idols and Big Brother were invented here, so I don't have any delusions of my country being made up of smarter people than any other country.
Anyway, do you have sources for this statistic, or was it just made up like 84% of all statistics?
But here in The Netherlands, the school system has been changed recently to more resemble the American model, and it's been going downhill fast. Whodathunkit?
Species P has fish as its main food source. Species H comes along and catches nearly all the fish. Species P has a problem getting enough food, and diminishes in number.
I think your statistics are even more made-up, because (1) not all stores that have "book" in their description are bookstores. Not even half. You can book (verb) many things, for example (2) one bookstore per couple hundred people would never be remotely profitable.
Of course my statistic was made up, although it has its roots in experience: when I was in a city in North America several years ago, it had about one million inhabitants, and I could find only one bookstore.
Paper is made from trees that are planted explicitly for the purpose of making paper. They are re-planted after they are harvested. They don't chop down rainforests to make paper. They chop down rainforests to make Big Macs.
Also, growing trees eat up a lot of CO2, and as long as the paper isn't burned, the carbon stays put in there.
And to top it all off: paper is an incredibly useful tool, because it enables us to read and write, with few dependencies.
My philosophy is that paper that is used for some purpose, is not wasted.
There is this old technology available that can provide you with these books. It involves you entering a population center and looking around for a building that houses a so-called store (also known as shop) that sells books.
Once you enter this building, you will see many books. Once you find the books you would like to read, you can go to a "cash register" device, and hand small green pieces of paper to an employee of the store, and you get to take the books with you.
This has several advantages over the print-on-demand system described in TFA: (1) no seven minute waiting time (2) not limited to out-of-copyright books (3) a wide variety of bindings and sizes are available (usually only one variety per title) (4) you can examine and browse the books before you buy them &c.
There are also several disadvantages, each of which might or might not apply to you: (1) American cities seem to have only up to one such "book-store" per one million inhabitants. This is believed to be caused by people being badly educated and unable to read properly. (Which raises further questions about the ubiquity of safety labels on all kinds of goods, as the demographic most likely to hurt itself with simple and generally thought-to-be-safe implements is also the demographic least likely to be literate enough to comprehend said safety notices, and the most literate demographic being likely to be incensed by the inanity of these notices.) (2) the book-store might not have the book you are seeking (3) great distance between your residence and the location of the book-store might render this expedition prohibitive in terms of time investment and traveling expenses.
Seriously, when new technology is introduced, think about what it can do for you, and compare it with existing comparable technologies, and decide in which cases the advantages of the new technology are greatest, and in which cases they are negligible. You can buy well-known books such as those by Neal Stephenson from many bookstores or Amazon or other online retailers. This print-to-order machine is a good solution for very small print-runs or books with small audiences, but not for books that will sell many thousands of copies. It's simply more efficient to mass-produce them in a printing shop. Deciding how many copies to ship to each store is a different problem, but the stores can indicate their expected customer demand by ordering a specific number of copies of each title.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, he did win the Chemistry prize, so that does not bode well.
But he has stated that he doesn't care which Nobel Prize he wins: they all pay the same!
Exactly.
Well, if you don't like Starcraft 2, you can just continue to play Starcraft 1, right?
Personally, I've moved on to Dawn of War. The orks can't shoot very well, though.
I like the way the orks build their stuff :=]
No, they are derivative themselves. Remember, service guarantees citizenship!
Apply directly to the forehead!
Apply directly to the forehead!
Apply directly to the forehead!
Well, the fundamental problem is that you're storing your data (email) on somebody else's servers. The server owners have the ability to look at it if they so choose. Google has an algorithm that looks at it and matches ads to it, but that doesn't say anything about potential less welcome things they might do to it (this goes for all such service providers).
;-]
Indeed, there's not a whole lot stopping Google or MS (MSN Hotmail) or Yahoo or lots of other companies from doing nasty things with your data, except ethics. And on the ethics front, I think Google is the least of our worries. Of course I'm not saying that I'm positive that Google won't datamine our emails once they can make boatloads of money off it, but I do think that they'll at least consider the loss of goodwill they would incur were they to start doing such things. MS, obviously, doesn't care about goodwill at all
You can always host your own mail server, of course.
Google ads are not creepy. It's not like a person is reading your mail, it's just a computer program that finds words in the mail that advertisers think are interesting, and then, based on those words, selects ads to display.
Now take Slashdot, that's creepy. Your posts are actually read by real people, who post replies to it that (usually) are eerily on-topic!
Why aren't more people solipsists?
Also, if the chip is inside the coin, the coin's metal should shield the chip from ever receiving or sending any signals, won't it? So it sounds bollocks to me.
Damn, you're right. It's got a Winamp icon in the Start Menu to start XMMS, and it's even got the blue E icon.
;-)
Maybe it's to make the desktop seem less strange to people used to Windows? You and I can use a new theme or switch from KDE to Gnome (and vice versa) without freaking out, but I doubt most computer users can manage that.
Still, I think this should run into legal (copyright/trademark) problems in western jurisdictions.
At least they didn't change the Open Office icon for the MS Office icon
If the data about the licence plates of the vehicles that aren't being looked for is discarded after scanning, so only the relevant vehicles are found, would you still have objections to it? It would be the equivalent of a cop looking at people, and deciding that those people aren't on the wanted list, and forgetting about them.
So those servers aren't being abused by spammers, as their normal mail servers are? But who does receive mail from the abused servers, then? Since it's almost all spam, it seems like everybody would want to block them.
http://www.canonical.com/
I'm afraid that, in America, that will attract a whole new class of lawsuits...
No, Daddy AC wants icecream too :-)
Maybe it's the other way round, being dumb makes you use Windows/VS?
You mean a bunch of idioten?
I am already disturbed to know that TV shows like Idols and Big Brother were invented here, so I don't have any delusions of my country being made up of smarter people than any other country.
Anyway, do you have sources for this statistic, or was it just made up like 84% of all statistics?
Yes, it definitely is.
But here in The Netherlands, the school system has been changed recently to more resemble the American model, and it's been going downhill fast. Whodathunkit?
How would that be unanticipated?
Species P has fish as its main food source.
Species H comes along and catches nearly all the fish.
Species P has a problem getting enough food, and diminishes in number.
I think your statistics are even more made-up, because (1) not all stores that have "book" in their description are bookstores. Not even half. You can book (verb) many things, for example (2) one bookstore per couple hundred people would never be remotely profitable.
Of course my statistic was made up, although it has its roots in experience: when I was in a city in North America several years ago, it had about one million inhabitants, and I could find only one bookstore.
Paper is made from trees that are planted explicitly for the purpose of making paper. They are re-planted after they are harvested. They don't chop down rainforests to make paper. They chop down rainforests to make Big Macs.
Also, growing trees eat up a lot of CO2, and as long as the paper isn't burned, the carbon stays put in there.
And to top it all off: paper is an incredibly useful tool, because it enables us to read and write, with few dependencies.
My philosophy is that paper that is used for some purpose, is not wasted.
There is this old technology available that can provide you with these books. It involves you entering a population center and looking around for a building that houses a so-called store (also known as shop) that sells books.
Once you enter this building, you will see many books. Once you find the books you would like to read, you can go to a "cash register" device, and hand small green pieces of paper to an employee of the store, and you get to take the books with you.
This has several advantages over the print-on-demand system described in TFA: (1) no seven minute waiting time (2) not limited to out-of-copyright books (3) a wide variety of bindings and sizes are available (usually only one variety per title) (4) you can examine and browse the books before you buy them &c.
There are also several disadvantages, each of which might or might not apply to you: (1) American cities seem to have only up to one such "book-store" per one million inhabitants. This is believed to be caused by people being badly educated and unable to read properly. (Which raises further questions about the ubiquity of safety labels on all kinds of goods, as the demographic most likely to hurt itself with simple and generally thought-to-be-safe implements is also the demographic least likely to be literate enough to comprehend said safety notices, and the most literate demographic being likely to be incensed by the inanity of these notices.) (2) the book-store might not have the book you are seeking (3) great distance between your residence and the location of the book-store might render this expedition prohibitive in terms of time investment and traveling expenses.
Seriously, when new technology is introduced, think about what it can do for you, and compare it with existing comparable technologies, and decide in which cases the advantages of the new technology are greatest, and in which cases they are negligible. You can buy well-known books such as those by Neal Stephenson from many bookstores or Amazon or other online retailers. This print-to-order machine is a good solution for very small print-runs or books with small audiences, but not for books that will sell many thousands of copies. It's simply more efficient to mass-produce them in a printing shop. Deciding how many copies to ship to each store is a different problem, but the stores can indicate their expected customer demand by ordering a specific number of copies of each title.
Hey, it happens to be a very entertaining field of study (and a source of cheap laser surgery)!