No, it's not. It's like saying having a large amount of nitrogen-rich fertilizer is suspicious, but some people have a legitimate use for fertilizer, so we should have a few cubic yards of fertilizer delivered to everyone's house so everyone is equally suspicious.
Or for a more direct comparison, some people use P2P client to download stuff they shouldn't download. Some people use P2P to download perfectly legal, sharable material. To help prevent the latter group from getting confused with the former, we'll make P2P clients part of every OS.
The fallacy is this: "everyone else is doing it" is not a legal defense. If a P2P client installed on my computer is presented in court as evidence that I downloaded some illegal material, citing numbers on the number P2P client installation does not help my case. As far as the court knows, those people are making illegal downloads as well.
Perhaps a car analogy would be better. If you drive along with the flow of traffic, you are less likely to get pulled over for speeding. But if you do get a ticket, I doubt saying the cars around you were going just as fast would be an effective defense.
The interesting part is not the next model Play Station won't have an optical drive, it's that it won't have a hard drive.
All content will be streaming. If you stop paying, you stop playing.
Music is heading in the same direction. It's not that in some far away date in the future the DRM servers might go down and you won't be able to authenticate your files.
You won't have files--music, games, movies, books. All will be provided live as a service. Stop paying the monthly change, or can't connect/authenticate to the mother ship, then no content for you.
Don't pick your research area based on profitability or popularity. There are always "hot" areas of research but these things are usually cyclic. Pick something interesting that excites you, and that you can spend the next 4 (or 5 or 6 or 7) years working on.
I agree 110%, and will only add:
If you need/. to help you pick your major, I suggest working on the phrase, "would you like fries with that?" Or perhaps, "welcome to Costso, I love you."
I've always wondered why email servers don't use database servers to store the email.
They do. They just don't expose their inner database.
Also, with SQL access, the could be many plugins for your mail client that would increase the value of the product.
And this is why. Your email server vendor does not want to hear from you when your 3rd party plugin has made your email database FUBAR. Or when some hotshot admin unleashes a cascade of table scans and no one can get their email.
Seriously. Have you even known off-the-shelf app with a database where the vendor said, "don't go in to the database, do all your work through the app" and customers actually listened and did not go in to the database?
In this case, the "I want this computer to last for 15 years" implicitly means they don't want to do scheduled maintenance. They want it to sit there and run, like the previous machine. They don't want a PC in the way you or I think of a PC, they want an appliance that just works. That being the case, We NEED to look at reliability centred design, rather than maintenance.
But at what cost?
For example, if I wanted to buy a car to last 15 years of regular use, I could find many suitable candidates. Many cars on the market, available at a reasonable price, will last 15 years with proper regular maintenance.
Even accounting for the cost of maintenance over 15 years, this is a reasonable request.
On the other hand, if I wanted a car to last 15 years of regular use with no maintenance other than fuel, that is a much different request. Brakes that last 15 years, tires that last 15 years, belts and hoses that last 15 years--the cost of these things will be exponentially higher than buying regular off the shelf parts and replacing them over time.
Even if one time I had that one car that went 15 years with no maintenance, it would be unreasonably expensive to meet that requirement.
We're not talking about NASA. We're not building computers for nuclear subs or deep space probes.
Maybe this guy did buy a computer in 1994 and it lasted 15 years. But that does not make it reasonable to expect every computer to be as reliable.
The golfer who gets a hole in one on her first shot shouldn't expect to get a hole in one on every shot. This guy shouldn't expect every computer to last 15 years without maintenance.
Rather than fearing judgement or beset by regrets, perhaps pious folks have led for the most part satisifying lives, and that's why they want to keep on living.
Then we had to expand our list of countries to include UK also... imagine the shock when he realised that UK ZIP code (Postal Codes), can look like "EC13 1XY".
I'm surprised you didn't have issues with zip codes before that point. Nobody noticed the 4 digit zip codes when the leading zeroes got lost?
Assuming the firewall is at the network edge, you can't just turn it off for one application. And when you enable scripting, you can not enable scripting by site. (NoScript isn't on IE...) You use a condom every time you have sex. You don't take it off for the girls that look clean.
Wow, you could not be more wrong. Yes, wear a condom every time, but if the girl is so skanky you feel the need to double bag it, how about you just don't have sex with that girl?
Just installing IE does not mean you have to go around to every pr0n and warez site you can find trying to get infected.
Oh, by the way, you CAN enable scripting by site. (Well, I can.) In IE you can set the default security to no script (or whatever you like), and then add trusted sites to a lower security setting.
Oh, and that's built in functionality of IE. NoScript not needed.
So what's the trouble with installing IE, and just using it for the one trusted site when it's needed?
Again, how exactly does who I know affect how competent I am at my job?
It isn't just knowing, it's establishing a relationship. And that is where a service like LinkedIn can be of use to potential employers--if they can figure out the extent of the relationship.
Look at it this way, why does a manager generally make more than the workers under the manager? Because the worker 'knows' the one manager, but the manager 'knows' all the workers under him. The larger network means more power to effect the organization.
Put another way, no matter how good you are at your job, you can get more done (and make more $ for your employer) if you can get other people (hopefully lesser paid people) to do your job for you. No matter how many widgets you can make in an hour, a team of people with you behind them with a whip can make more.
And that is how your connection to other people will make you more valuable to an employer.
Personally, I'd welcome the day when main-stream media outlets die and the only news you get comes from people like you and me, who have are not constrained by our bosses and do not have to be biased in favour of any one entity.
Oh lord no! Have you read the comments around here lately? No offense to people like you and me, but I'd prefer to get my news from people who know what they are talking about.
The rest of this comment has me very confused. You think an organization 100% dependant on advertising for income will be less constrained than one getting income directly from readers?
When you pay for news, you are the customer. When your news is advertiser supported, you are the product being served to the customers, the advertisers. How does that get you back to receiving your public opinion?
Nowhere do they explain what extra value they're adding that will make people pay. Instead, they think that if they put up a paywall, people will magically pay
And where do these stories come from? Who pays the reporters? Who keeps the servers running to deliver these stories?
Forget the "extra value," what about the existing value? And if people won't pay for news on the web, then the services should keep providing news for free? I don't think it's a case of they expect people to magically pay if they put up a paywall, it's that they know people won't pay if they don't, no magic required.
Seriously, is this guy running for d-bag of the year? The world does not owe you free content. If the people who, you know, actually work for a living, want to get paid, then so be it. If you refuse to pay, you weren't doing them any good reading their content for free, so they won't miss you when you when you're gone.
Slashdot Mirror
An interesting proposition.
No, it's not. It's like saying having a large amount of nitrogen-rich fertilizer is suspicious, but some people have a legitimate use for fertilizer, so we should have a few cubic yards of fertilizer delivered to everyone's house so everyone is equally suspicious.
Or for a more direct comparison, some people use P2P client to download stuff they shouldn't download. Some people use P2P to download perfectly legal, sharable material. To help prevent the latter group from getting confused with the former, we'll make P2P clients part of every OS.
The fallacy is this: "everyone else is doing it" is not a legal defense. If a P2P client installed on my computer is presented in court as evidence that I downloaded some illegal material, citing numbers on the number P2P client installation does not help my case. As far as the court knows, those people are making illegal downloads as well.
Perhaps a car analogy would be better. If you drive along with the flow of traffic, you are less likely to get pulled over for speeding. But if you do get a ticket, I doubt saying the cars around you were going just as fast would be an effective defense.
Seems to me this would be a good job for small robot vessels, built cheap and disposable.
You really haven't been paying attention, have you?
Cheap and disposable is what caused the issue in the first place.
Profit!
Incidentally, does anyone know a (preferably cheap) way to deal with that?
Yes.
Go two feet outside your door.
When metric is the law, no more pints of beer.
Does anyone ever even use those garbage options? Page them? wtf?
And are there any cell phones left out there without caller ID? Don't they already have my number in the missed calls log?
That works, until they stop selling CDs. Didn't you read this same story when it ran yesterday?
http://games.slashdot.org/story/09/07/29/1558219/The-Downsides-to-Digital-Distribution
The interesting part is not the next model Play Station won't have an optical drive, it's that it won't have a hard drive.
All content will be streaming. If you stop paying, you stop playing.
Music is heading in the same direction. It's not that in some far away date in the future the DRM servers might go down and you won't be able to authenticate your files.
You won't have files--music, games, movies, books. All will be provided live as a service. Stop paying the monthly change, or can't connect/authenticate to the mother ship, then no content for you.
But just give me time to reload.
Bah! Why play Bong Hero when you could smoke a real bong?
--fueled by grass. Now get off mine.
What's the problem?
There's no privacy issues. If the translators don't speak english, they won't learn any secrets.
It's not a bug; it's a feature.
How is geometry taught as engineering?
Geometry without axiom/theorem/proof isn't engineering, it's just drawing shapes.
...went something like this.
"I don't recognize that number on the caller ID"
If I don't know you, or your number is hidden to caller ID, I don't answer the phone.
Will they accept homosexuals?
Or is "deviant sexual behavior" only acceptable when done as part of an "enhanced interrogation"?
Who thinks this is shocking.
We need water. Would you be shocked to find a lack of water can be deadly?
Why would anyone be shocked to find lack of sleep can kill?
I agree 110%, and will only add:
If you need /. to help you pick your major, I suggest working on the phrase, "would you like fries with that?" Or perhaps, "welcome to Costso, I love you."
I've always wondered why email servers don't use database servers to store the email.
They do. They just don't expose their inner database.
Also, with SQL access, the could be many plugins for your mail client that would increase the value of the product.
And this is why. Your email server vendor does not want to hear from you when your 3rd party plugin has made your email database FUBAR. Or when some hotshot admin unleashes a cascade of table scans and no one can get their email.
Seriously. Have you even known off-the-shelf app with a database where the vendor said, "don't go in to the database, do all your work through the app" and customers actually listened and did not go in to the database?
Huh?
Why does the thing need to be recalibrated at all?
I know what you're saying, in regards to Palm Pilots, but my current phone has a touch screen and hasn't been calibrated in over a year.
But at what cost? For example, if I wanted to buy a car to last 15 years of regular use, I could find many suitable candidates. Many cars on the market, available at a reasonable price, will last 15 years with proper regular maintenance. Even accounting for the cost of maintenance over 15 years, this is a reasonable request. On the other hand, if I wanted a car to last 15 years of regular use with no maintenance other than fuel, that is a much different request. Brakes that last 15 years, tires that last 15 years, belts and hoses that last 15 years--the cost of these things will be exponentially higher than buying regular off the shelf parts and replacing them over time. Even if one time I had that one car that went 15 years with no maintenance, it would be unreasonably expensive to meet that requirement. We're not talking about NASA. We're not building computers for nuclear subs or deep space probes. Maybe this guy did buy a computer in 1994 and it lasted 15 years. But that does not make it reasonable to expect every computer to be as reliable. The golfer who gets a hole in one on her first shot shouldn't expect to get a hole in one on every shot. This guy shouldn't expect every computer to last 15 years without maintenance.
Wow. A lot of dark, dark souls here on /.
Rather than fearing judgement or beset by regrets, perhaps pious folks have led for the most part satisifying lives, and that's why they want to keep on living.
Then we had to expand our list of countries to include UK also ... imagine the shock when he realised that UK ZIP code (Postal Codes), can look like "EC13 1XY".
I'm surprised you didn't have issues with zip codes before that point. Nobody noticed the 4 digit zip codes when the leading zeroes got lost?
Assuming the firewall is at the network edge, you can't just turn it off for one application. And when you enable scripting, you can not enable scripting by site. (NoScript isn't on IE...) You use a condom every time you have sex. You don't take it off for the girls that look clean.
Wow, you could not be more wrong. Yes, wear a condom every time, but if the girl is so skanky you feel the need to double bag it, how about you just don't have sex with that girl?
Just installing IE does not mean you have to go around to every pr0n and warez site you can find trying to get infected.
Oh, by the way, you CAN enable scripting by site. (Well, I can.) In IE you can set the default security to no script (or whatever you like), and then add trusted sites to a lower security setting.
Oh, and that's built in functionality of IE. NoScript not needed.
So what's the trouble with installing IE, and just using it for the one trusted site when it's needed?
Again, how exactly does who I know affect how competent I am at my job?
It isn't just knowing, it's establishing a relationship. And that is where a service like LinkedIn can be of use to potential employers--if they can figure out the extent of the relationship.
Look at it this way, why does a manager generally make more than the workers under the manager? Because the worker 'knows' the one manager, but the manager 'knows' all the workers under him. The larger network means more power to effect the organization.
Put another way, no matter how good you are at your job, you can get more done (and make more $ for your employer) if you can get other people (hopefully lesser paid people) to do your job for you. No matter how many widgets you can make in an hour, a team of people with you behind them with a whip can make more.
And that is how your connection to other people will make you more valuable to an employer.
"When you've got literally millions of reporters all out there reporting, and almost that many with decently high-end cameras taking decent photos...it sortof becomes unnecessary to throw Dan Rather on a jet."
Personally, I'd welcome the day when main-stream media outlets die and the only news you get comes from people like you and me, who have are not constrained by our bosses and do not have to be biased in favour of any one entity.
Oh lord no! Have you read the comments around here lately? No offense to people like you and me, but I'd prefer to get my news from people who know what they are talking about.
The rest of this comment has me very confused. You think an organization 100% dependant on advertising for income will be less constrained than one getting income directly from readers?
When you pay for news, you are the customer. When your news is advertiser supported, you are the product being served to the customers, the advertisers. How does that get you back to receiving your public opinion?
And where do these stories come from? Who pays the reporters? Who keeps the servers running to deliver these stories?
Forget the "extra value," what about the existing value? And if people won't pay for news on the web, then the services should keep providing news for free? I don't think it's a case of they expect people to magically pay if they put up a paywall, it's that they know people won't pay if they don't, no magic required.
Seriously, is this guy running for d-bag of the year? The world does not owe you free content. If the people who, you know, actually work for a living, want to get paid, then so be it. If you refuse to pay, you weren't doing them any good reading their content for free, so they won't miss you when you when you're gone.