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User: BForrester

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  1. Rumors and whisperings on Struggling University of Phoenix Lays Off 900 · · Score: 1

    I don't want to defame UoP, so I'll say that I've heard from a large number of sources that this institution has come to represent everything wrong with for-profit education, i.e. complete lack of quality in offerings leading to useless certifications, watered-down assessments so that "everyone passes," and shady applications and loan-mongering to skim the most revenue possible from unaware students.

    Now that community and mainstream colleges are legitimately coming on board with better online offerings, it couldn't be that UoP is being squeezed out by the competition? ...or so I've heard.

  2. Re:What is normal and how many were born? on More Than 40% of US Honeybee Colonies Died In a 12-Month Period Ending In April · · Score: 1

    Using your "human" analogy, human colonies survive for thousands of years. Damascus, Syria is over 6,000 years old. If human colonies started dying out, you'd notice.

    Like, for example, Damascus, Syria.

  3. Re:What else will Cameraphones ruin? on YouTube Video of Racist Chant Results In Fraternity Closure · · Score: 1

    When was the last time that discriminatory or hateful lyrics kept you out of a job, or denied you a promotion, or barred your access to a function, or subjected you to unreasonable enforcement? You have the right to play the us vs. them card as soon as you're in a situation of inequitable power distribution and it actually means something to your way of life or standard of living, not just, and I'm not saying that they legitimately don't -- "the things that those other people do bother/offend me."

    The purveyors of rap music don't have the influence to discriminate in any meaningful sense. The white majority does.

  4. Re:What else will Cameraphones ruin? on YouTube Video of Racist Chant Results In Fraternity Closure · · Score: 2

    When they say it, it's art. When anyone else says the exact same thing, it's a hate crime.

    You can't play the us and them card both ways. That's kind of like saying the problem with unarmed blacks being shot by white police is that the police aren't shooting enough unarmed whites to compensate. Discriminatory rants are reprehensible, and any record company or educational institution that wants to distance themselves from conduct that paints the whole group as uneducated, crass, and antiquated is constitutionally allowed to do so.

    In the meantime, get back to me when you have trouble being accepted into the institution or club of your choice because you don't align with the majority race or creed au jour. Hatred is a different thing altogether when it is condoned or enforced by the power-holding majority.

  5. Re:Government spending money on anything is terrib on Drones Cost $28,000 Per Arrest, On Average · · Score: 1

    The lost "War on Poverty", which we've been fighting for the last 50 years, has cost us — inflation-adjusted — $22 trillion or, roughly three times more than all actual wars combined since founding of the Republic

    Anyone who thinks that the US has spent less than 7 trillion dollars on war, total, and adjusted for inflation, is cherry-picking from a very conservative data set. No wonder the linked article doesn't give a citation for that figure.

  6. Re:Fuck. on The Disastrous Privacy Consequences of Canada's Anti-Terrorism Bill · · Score: 4, Funny

    Yeah, cause somebody cares about you "threatening" to move to Canada.

    Excuse me, but yes we do, thank you very much.

    Sincerely,

    Canadians.

  7. Re:Obviously didn't work so well... on Snowden Documents: CSE Tracks Millions of Downloads Daily · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Collect everything means that all your intelligence is hidden by piles and piles of cat memes.

    If you RTFA, Canada's intelligence agency says in their document that they need to find the needle "terrorist files" in a haystack of downloaded episodes of Glee. They literally make that reference.

  8. Re:the whole things an editor if you're brave enou on Text Editor Created In Minecraft · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I agree entirely with the sentiment, but there is a massive psychological difference between virtual problems and real ones.

    With virtual problems, the rules are known and consistent, and the only potential barrier to success is the limitations of the user's abilities. If the user can accurately assess their own skill level, they can know if the problem is solvable, and possibly the time frame in which this can be done.

    Big, real problems are awash in variables far beyond the control of any one person. They may not be solvable given current restraints. Many of the "best" governments in the world, led by the most educated and intelligent people, and backed with enormous budgets are undercut by the chaos of global economics, damaged by misinformation and false intelligence, aggravated by the stupidity of other actors, and in turn conduct their own activities that damage the prospects of peace, or health and security for all.

    I might commit my life to a cure for cancer or world peace, and thus squander the next 60 years away because the world, as a majority, is not ready for those things. The Sudoku puzzle, on the other hand, I can solve before I finish breakfast.

  9. Re:Developing Story on AirAsia Flight Goes Missing Between Indonesia and Singapore · · Score: 1

    All of the examples you've given here are relevant, pressing issues, but they aren't news.

  10. Re:Turtle art on White House Touts Obama's 1-Liner as 2014 Tech Highlight · · Score: 1

    Clinton could have used LOGO's turtle to draw the first presidential digital dick pic

    I'd think that a LOGO rendition of President Nixon would actually be pretty impressive.

  11. Re:Semicolon on Long-Wave Radar Can Take the Stealth From Stealth Technology · · Score: 1

    Also "too," while we're at the GN thing.

  12. Re:YAY US on Canadian ISP On Disclosing Subscriber Info: Come Back With a Warrant · · Score: 1

    Dearest representatives of the corporate interests of the United States of America:

    It behooves me to request that, as we collectively drop the rears of our trousers, would you kindly bend down and kiss our asses? Only if you please, eh?

    With tender, gentlemanly affection,

    Your friendly neighbour,

    Canada

  13. Re:another language shoved down your throat on Python Bumps Off Java As Top Learning Language · · Score: 4, Insightful

    java was only "the most popular" because it was force fed to people who didn't want it.

    I don't think you understand how schools and their curriculae work. Nobody is holding a gun to the collective and independently-operated heads of CS departments to demand which language they use for beginner courses.

    Java was historically chosen because it was a safe option; used widely in industry, decent documentation and tools, it supports good programming practices, and it provides reasonably powerful options while being relatively beginner friendly. Java largely replaced C and C++, which are not beginner friendly.

  14. Re:What? on Google Acquires Curated Music Service Songza · · Score: 4, Informative

    What is Songza?

    I don't know how popular it is as a browser-based service, but it's a very popular mobile app. Particularly when linked through home media systems, it allows a user to very quickly jump to a playlist based on a desired genre, activity, or mood.

    Activities examples:

    BBQ
    Breaking Up
    Driving in the Left Lane
    Gaming
    Getting High
    Making Out
    Unwinding after work

  15. Re:Are you getting it yet? on Germany Scores First: Ends Verizon Contract Over NSA Concerns · · Score: 1

    Correct, and though you can pretend you don't know what they will be used for, if you sell military vehicles, punch-card tabulators, or cucumbers to the Nazis, you're still doing business with the Nazis.

  16. Re:In civilized countries... on Starbucks Offers Workers 2 Years of Free College · · Score: 1

    This, exactly.

    The US entry into WWII had just as much to do with incurring minimal damage as it did with ensuring that the allied nations were sufficiently depleted that they would need to lean on the US for their recovery.

    The trope that the US won WWII is ridiculous and myopic. They won the entire post-war long game.

  17. Re:In civilized countries... on Starbucks Offers Workers 2 Years of Free College · · Score: 1

    Why do people from all over the world keep coming to U.S. universities?

    See the parent post: prestige. Attendance at those institutions is one of the shiniest resume items that can be earned/bought/bartered.

    When someone tells me that they attended an Ivy League institution, I immediately think, "Wow. You must be really smart and/or rich and/or connected."

  18. Re:Sweden on Seattle Approves $15 Per Hour Minimum Wage · · Score: 1

    It *should* work both ways, if we want to be honest.

    We shouldn't draw conclusions about socialism from the USSR without considering present-day Northern Europe.
    Similarly, the recession-inducing, wealth-consolidating potentialities of capitalism do not erase the benefits of incentive and economic mobility.

    There are benefits from both systems - proven by history - available as long as there are counterbalances to the unchecked accumulation of wealth and power.

  19. Re:Sweden on Seattle Approves $15 Per Hour Minimum Wage · · Score: 1

    To be fair, representative democracy is a great first step in terms of avoiding absolute, termless power accumulation. The system just needs additional development.

    The problem with capitalism is that it just adds more layers of corporate parasites and concentrates power in the hands of unaccountable plutocrats.

  20. Re:Sweden on Seattle Approves $15 Per Hour Minimum Wage · · Score: 4, Informative

    You're confusing the term "socialist" with "greedy opportunist." The latter exists in just about every political/economic system.

    "Never judge a philosophy by its abuse."
        -- Saint Augustine

  21. Re:Self Auditing and independent auditing on Estonia Urged To Drop Internet Voting Over Security Fears · · Score: 1

    ...Online voting is pretty much demanding that some evil person runs our government.

    So... status quo?

  22. Re:well on Actual Results of Crimean Secession Vote Leaked · · Score: 1

    Exactly this. Virtually all invasions are justified, at least according to the invader.

  23. Re:Yes on College Grads Create Fake Tesla Commercial That Elon Musk Loves · · Score: 1

    Class isn't defined by heredity.
    Attaining wealth is not the same as earning it.
    Wars are rarely declared by the instigators.

  24. Re:NK has limited internet links so are the sites on S. Korea's Cyberwar Against N. Korea's Nukes · · Score: 1

    Certainly not. That's the easy part.

  25. Re:And in other news... on Majority of Young American Adults Think Astrology Is a Science · · Score: 2

    No, they think "axe" is something you do with a question.