If you're a teenager (or younger), yes, give it a read. If you're an adult, meh. There are worse ways to pass a rainy afternoon, but it's not a must read. It's young-adult fiction that does not hold up well for adults.
As for the movie, this is rare movie I thought could be longer. You get one hit of every major plot point--one fight with the bully in the first school, one interaction with Peter, one training battle with each team, etc.
What gets lost is why Ender thinks the way he does. In the movie, he's just born this tactical prodigy. In the book, he's a gifted kid, but we get to see how he learns to use those gifts.
And I didn't think the give-away for the final twist was that bad. Over all, I left not feeling angry for the money spent.
Arguably, we have a certain talent for importing talent... Scoring all the Jewish physicists when the Nazis drove them out, in order to build a bomb, and then scoring all the Nazi rocket scientists when the Soviets drove them out, in order to build something to deliver it with...
Playing both ends against everybody, awww yeah...
I have mod points, but I don't see the "+1 America Fark Yeah!" option.
She may or may not be the most successful Slashdot submitter of all time, based on the percentage of her submissions that show up on the front page, but she is absolutely in the top 10.
If you don't have the data to determine if she is or if she is not the most successful submitter of all time, then I am skeptical you have the data to know she is in the top 10. There could be 1 person ahead of her on that list, but it's impossible there could be 10?
I know this is off topic and petty, but in a way, not so much. A common lament on/. is the poor state of writing on digital technologies, software, and development. To have such weak writing in a submission about a writer, it's a little sad.
The only way I see to "hoax-proof" a journal is to require reproduction of the results during peer review.
But don't all serious fields have that already?
No, they do not. I have never heard of a reviewer trying to reproduce the results. I have reviewed plenty of papers. I will spend about 2-4 hours reviewing something that took the author months of work. All I do is read the paper, make a recommendation, write a few paragraphs of feedback, and email it back to the journal. That's it. This is an unpaid process. There is no way I am going to put my own work on hold for several months to repeat the experiment.
Well, I hope you do better with the papers you recommend than you did with my comment. If you continue to the sentence after the one you quote, you'll see I'm talking about what happens _after_ a paper is published--other researchers attempt to reproduce the results, either directly or indirectly.
So let's not talk about neutrons, or any other subatomic particles. Except electrons... Is that an exception that one ought to memorize?
Yes, in the sense that a recipe should cover all the ingredients not to be included. That's a very philosophical questions you ask, like considering the role of silence in music.
I admit to hyperbole and the basic rules of organic chem are more extensive than I list above. (There's an excellent post elsewhere in the thread where someone points out considerations in addition to charge, such as molecular structure that might hinder movement of particles and functional groups.)
But my point is, chemistry--organic and otherwise--is not mysticism. It is not a list of facts to memorize. There are rules, and learning the application of those rules will get you through any undergraduate course. Rote memorization is just the tactic that seems to be favored by pre-med students.
Struggling with organic does not make someone a bad student, or a bad doctor, or even a bad chemist. But it also does not change the nature of organic chemistry. Learn the rules, apply them, pass the class. Nothing I've read in this thread convinces me that strategy applies to organic chem any less that it applies to other subjects.
Lest we forget, a large number of submissions from the paid journals had data that was not reproducible
I admit my eyes started to glaze over and I didn't finish reading TFS because it seemed like a lot of hand waving and busy work to no real efect, but isn't this proposal, well, a lot of hand waving and busy work to no real effect?
The only way I see to "hoax-proof" a journal is to require reproduction of the results during peer review.
But don't all serious fields have that already? Getting through the review process for publication is just the first step--not all published results are inducted into the cannon of acepted knowledge. Publication basically just puts the method and results out there to be examined by a larger audience.
Which is why publications aren't a good measuring stick--for an indivual theory or personal success. The real measure is citations. If lots of other papers are citing a paper (and not just to say they couldn't reproduce the original results) you have a better chance that paper is not a hoax. If someone has a long list of publications with many citations, that person is likely trust-worthy.
anywhere you have a dearth of electrons is positive
Except neutrons, which contain no electrons but are not positive... Is that an exception that one ought to memorize?
No. In organic chemistry you're considering atoms and molecules. Neutrons without associated protons are neither, and so are outside the scope of the course. (I could be wrong, it's been a while since I took organic, but I don't think so.)
Seriously kids, grow up. Most of us have some subject or area where we don't do as well. And almost all of us have at least one thing we do very well.
So organic chemistry isn't your thing? Fine, but that doesn't make it some black art that's all rote memorization or a weed-out course that's designed to make you fail. It's just not your thing. Go do something else.
Take inorganic chem, then tell us how much memorization there is for organic.
I absolutely suck at memorization, so what I did was learn the why of the reaction - which generally was just geometry based (which part of the electron cloud was physically easiest to access - ie steric hinderance); charge based (which atom most 'wanted' the electrons') and energy based (which configurations would be energetically stable with minimum strain and best sharing of electrons).
For my O-chem final - my brain almost completely forgot all of the standard reactions, but I was able to reconstruct reactions and what reactants and environments I needed based on what I wanted the molecule to do; and derive what products to expect based on the above method.
Thank you! Someone gets it. There are a few simple rules to organic chemistry. Knowing and applying those seems so much easier than memorization of all the possible reactions that could come up.
I was one of the people that found ochem easy, but pchem quite difficult.
That surprises me. P-chem is the place to learn the basis of the rules you apply in o-chem. I never understood why some schools don't have students take p-chem before o-chem.
I started out doing a chemistry degree and this was my biggest complaint (I don't know if it was specifically with organic but I think so). There are the rules then there are exceptions to the rules and then there are exceptions to the exceptions. After I dropped out (for unrelated reasons), when I went back, it was for a physics degree and I was much more comfortable with that. Reason, not rote learning.
Congratulations on your Nobel prize! Chemistry is the application of physics to atoms and molecules. If you've found exceptions to the rules of physics as we understand them, surely such a discovery would win you many prizes and much fame.
Chemistry, particularly organic, requires very little rote memorization. Electrons are negatively charged. Any where you have extra electrons is negative, anywhere you have a dearth of electrons is positive. Like charges repel, differing charges attract.
There, 3 sentences. That's all the rote learning you need for organic. The rest is just application.
Sometimes, if a student has really good math skills, they can slide through physics, but you can't do that in orgo," says McCarty
1) Orgo? WTF? There is no course in the chemistry curriculum called "orgo". It's o-chem, or organic, or organic chemistry, if you're not into the whole brevity thing. There is no orgo.
2) "You can do blah in physics, but you can't do that in o-chem???" Please, deity, make sure this person never becomes a doctor. Or a parent.
Chemistry is not magic. It is not random. It is not subject to the whims of mystical forces. The atoms and molecules one studies in o-chem are governed by the rules of physics. Those rules are described in the language of math. It's like saying knowing English will help you read plays, but it won't help you with Shakespeare.
If you have the background, and are good at math, then pchem is easy. But orgo is just lots and lots of memorization.
What is this I don't even know. I expect that sort of attitude from someone who hasn't taken p-chem, but you should know better. Especially if you take p-chem before o-chem.
As for memorization, I somehow managed to get through organic without it. Even before years of/. and fark wrapped my fragile little mind my memory was shiat. In high school trig there were a bunch of equations we were supposed to memorize--sin2a, cos(a+b), cos(a-b), that sort of stuff. Well, like I said, my memory was shiat. Turns out, if you remember the definitions of sin, cos, and tan, all those other equations and identities can be derived.
So that's what I did. I memorized those 3 definitions, and derived everything else as needed during the exam.
Organic is the same way. Sure, you could get through by rote memorized of a list of facts and statements without bothering with understanding. But the same could be said of just about any course or class.
But it's a lot easier (or it was for me at least) to remember a small set of simple rules, and then apply them. Of course, that requires a step beyond rote memorization to some actual understanding of those rules to know how and when to apply them. So where do you get those rules and that understanding?
Take p-chem. Take p-chem first, and then o-chem. O-chem is just an application of the rules you'll learn in p-chem. O-chem requires no more memorization then any other college course (and perhaps less).
It's all about charges--electrons are negative, hydrogen ions are positive. Like charges repel, different charges attract. If you have a positive charge, that's where your electrons will go. If you have a negative charge, that's where your hydrogen will go. Draw arrows as needed.
I mean, OK, we all know that electronic devices have a truncated lifespan... but when you go to buy a plasma TV, they make a point to tell you it will only work for about 50,000 hours, after which you have to go buy a brand new one. Hence the reason all the flat panels I own (which were bought before LED TV prices started to come down) are LCD and not plasma.
Every TV has a limited life span. The number you quote is only relevant after your flat panel displays last 17 years. (50,000 hours at 8 hours/day.)
Most of it is born. If you don't believe it's genetic try training a dog or elephant or chimp to do higher math. You can try for years or decades if you want. They like to say there's very little genetic difference between a chimp and a human, but that small difference makes a big difference in certain things
Not a good analogy. Take the opposable thumb. Genetics explains the difference between thumbs on humans and not-thumbs on dogs or elephants, but it doesn't explain most cases of humans missing a thumb.
Just because genetics might explain the difference in capacity for abstract math in humans and chimps or dog doesn't mean it explains the varriance among humans.
Why is it "maths" in British English, but "math" in American English? In America, it's "mathematics," "physics," "electronics," etc. Only "math" is singular.
I guess you never studied chemistry or biology. Or would that be chems and bios?
Its ready NOW. The tech is ready, the people are ready, the politicians and business is NOT ready.
I doubt it. The tech may be ready, the people implementing that tech are certainly not ready.
About 30% of my searches on Google return a "You searched for A, did you mean B" result. In about half of those instances, I actually get "You searched for A, here are the results for B." So with a Google car, I'm more likely to arrive at the destination safely, but about 15% of the time it will not be the destination I requested, but some other location based on some SW engineer assuming I don't know where I want to go.
I have a couple podcasts I save up for when I travel. In some cases I have months of episodes queued up for a long trip. A couple years ago iTunes started silently unsubscribing those podcasts. I guess the assumption is anything I don't listen to often is something I'll never listen to again. Recently it's even done that for podcasts I listen to weekly and don't store many back episodes. So with an Apple iCar, I'm more likely to arrive at the destination safely, but only at destinations anticipated by the engineers at Apple. And one day I'll try to visit my mother, and the display in the iCar will say it's been so long since I visited, the car assumed she was dead and deleted her address and route to her house.
I don't doubt the tech, I question the people the behind the tech. The reason Google returns results for something other than what I searched for isn't a technical issue. The reason iTunes seemingly randomly unsubscribes me from podcasts is not a technical issue.
For Google, I love the "did you mean B" options when I search for A. But give me the choice to search for B, don't just return results for B. For iTunes, I'm fine with a dialog box, "You haven't played this podcast for a while, still want to subscribe," but don't just silently unsubscribe, especially if it's going to happen for podcasts I do listen to often.
To expand on those insights, the answer to the titular question is, why should the people in government be different from every other person in the (short) history of big web launches?
Has there ever been a web site on this scale--government or corporate--that did not have the same level of issues in the begining?
Yes, there are successful, functioning large web sites. And every one either 1) went through a lot of issues to become functioning, or 2) started as a small, functioning web site and features were added slowly.
It's the second point that stands out in my mind. If you're in business, you can start small. Small in terms of the features you offer and small in terms of the number of concurrent people your site can handle. Your site can grow as you add features. You can reengineer and add capacity as your customer base grows.
With government, there is the assumption you need to start at the end, with a feature-rich platform ready to handle hundreds of millions of users. Facebook started with a few thousand dollars, not hundreds of millions, but Facebook also started with a customer base of a few thousand and not hundreds of millions.
Love it or hate it, government isn't magic. It's an association of people, and it shouldn't be expected to do things other associations of people have never been able to do.
Yes, there is a reasonable number of hours each day most folks can dedicate to mentally strenuous tasks, just as there's a limit to physical activity, but if you were getting your job done in the standard 8 hrs/day, 40 hrs/wk, this wouldn't be an issue.
That said, there are plenty of work places that are flexible with back office folks who aren't answering phones or otherwise directly interacting with customers.
If your boss is micromanaging your time rather than focusing on your work, either your work needs to get better or you need to find a different boss.
Here's the basic paradox: Suppose Bob may have committed a crime, and Alice is known not to be an accomplice but appears to have been a witness. If the courts ask both Bob and Alice the same question -- "Did Bob do it?" -- and both of them refuse to answer, then Bob's right to remain silent is protected under the Fifth Amendment, but Alice can be sent to jail -- despite the fact that Bob may have been guilty, but Alice is innocent!
There's so much wrong with that quote. There's only one crime mentioned in this scenario--the one Bob is accused of. By saying Alice can be sent to jail, the implication is she will be convicted of the crime Bob may have committed.
Alice may be charged with obstruction of justice or contempt of court. The statement, "but Alice is innocent!" is too much to take seriously. Just because Bob, and not Alice, may have committed the initial crime, there's no reason to assume Alice cannot commit a different crime during the investigation of Bob.
But my main complaint is, where is the paradox? There is none. There may be injustice. There may be logical inconsistencies in the legal system. There may be historical anachronisms which do not make sense in the modern world. But none of these things are paradoxes. Something isn't a paradox just because it "sounds crazy."
I know it's cliché to complain about the declining standards of/. stories, but this is even worse than Bennett's last "article."
My best guess is "Bennett Haselton" is a computer program designed to write inane OpEd articles. Rather than the ravings of someone with the barest familiarity with the US Constitution and the English language, these articles are actually work of bleeding-edge artificial intelligence in the form of a troll bot.
In regards to both the funny and flamebait mods: this is not a case of the usual Jenny-McCarthy vaccines-cause-autism derp (though there is some of that in this case).
This church teaches faith and prayer as an alternative to man-made medicine. By their own standards, they got sick because their faith in god was inadequate.
I suppose they should be praised for showing some sense rather than doubling-down and going with something like, we got measles because there are gays in the military.
I'm reminded of the joke, a man lives in an area that is getting washed out by a flood. Sheriff comes by in a truck to drive the man to higher ground. Man refuses to go, says god will save him. Later the water is coming in the front door, and a boat comes by. Man refuses to go, says god will save him. Later, the man is on the roof as the house is being submerged, and a helicopter comes by. Man refuses to go, says god will save him.
Man drowns, goes to meet god. "God, why didn't you save me?" God:"Well, I sent a truck, a boat, a helicopter..."
So anyway, god sent a measles vaccine to save me. Obviously (by the teachings of this church) god chose not to save them.
Slashdot Mirror
go read the book! It's good.
If you're a teenager (or younger), yes, give it a read. If you're an adult, meh. There are worse ways to pass a rainy afternoon, but it's not a must read. It's young-adult fiction that does not hold up well for adults.
As for the movie, this is rare movie I thought could be longer. You get one hit of every major plot point--one fight with the bully in the first school, one interaction with Peter, one training battle with each team, etc.
What gets lost is why Ender thinks the way he does. In the movie, he's just born this tactical prodigy. In the book, he's a gifted kid, but we get to see how he learns to use those gifts.
And I didn't think the give-away for the final twist was that bad. Over all, I left not feeling angry for the money spent.
Arguably, we have a certain talent for importing talent... Scoring all the Jewish physicists when the Nazis drove them out, in order to build a bomb, and then scoring all the Nazi rocket scientists when the Soviets drove them out, in order to build something to deliver it with...
Playing both ends against everybody, awww yeah...
I have mod points, but I don't see the "+1 America Fark Yeah!" option.
"Charlize Theron NSFW"
I keep clicking on those words, but nothing happens :(
She may or may not be the most successful Slashdot submitter of all time, based on the percentage of her submissions that show up on the front page, but she is absolutely in the top 10.
If you don't have the data to determine if she is or if she is not the most successful submitter of all time, then I am skeptical you have the data to know she is in the top 10. There could be 1 person ahead of her on that list, but it's impossible there could be 10?
I know this is off topic and petty, but in a way, not so much. A common lament on /. is the poor state of writing on digital technologies, software, and development. To have such weak writing in a submission about a writer, it's a little sad.
The only way I see to "hoax-proof" a journal is to require reproduction of the results during peer review.
But don't all serious fields have that already?
No, they do not. I have never heard of a reviewer trying to reproduce the results. I have reviewed plenty of papers. I will spend about 2-4 hours reviewing something that took the author months of work. All I do is read the paper, make a recommendation, write a few paragraphs of feedback, and email it back to the journal. That's it. This is an unpaid process. There is no way I am going to put my own work on hold for several months to repeat the experiment.
Well, I hope you do better with the papers you recommend than you did with my comment. If you continue to the sentence after the one you quote, you'll see I'm talking about what happens _after_ a paper is published--other researchers attempt to reproduce the results, either directly or indirectly.
So let's not talk about neutrons, or any other subatomic particles. Except electrons... Is that an exception that one ought to memorize?
Yes, in the sense that a recipe should cover all the ingredients not to be included. That's a very philosophical questions you ask, like considering the role of silence in music.
I admit to hyperbole and the basic rules of organic chem are more extensive than I list above. (There's an excellent post elsewhere in the thread where someone points out considerations in addition to charge, such as molecular structure that might hinder movement of particles and functional groups.)
But my point is, chemistry--organic and otherwise--is not mysticism. It is not a list of facts to memorize. There are rules, and learning the application of those rules will get you through any undergraduate course. Rote memorization is just the tactic that seems to be favored by pre-med students.
Struggling with organic does not make someone a bad student, or a bad doctor, or even a bad chemist. But it also does not change the nature of organic chemistry. Learn the rules, apply them, pass the class. Nothing I've read in this thread convinces me that strategy applies to organic chem any less that it applies to other subjects.
Lest we forget, a large number of submissions from the paid journals had data that was not reproducible
I admit my eyes started to glaze over and I didn't finish reading TFS because it seemed like a lot of hand waving and busy work to no real efect, but isn't this proposal, well, a lot of hand waving and busy work to no real effect?
The only way I see to "hoax-proof" a journal is to require reproduction of the results during peer review.
But don't all serious fields have that already? Getting through the review process for publication is just the first step--not all published results are inducted into the cannon of acepted knowledge. Publication basically just puts the method and results out there to be examined by a larger audience.
Which is why publications aren't a good measuring stick--for an indivual theory or personal success. The real measure is citations. If lots of other papers are citing a paper (and not just to say they couldn't reproduce the original results) you have a better chance that paper is not a hoax. If someone has a long list of publications with many citations, that person is likely trust-worthy.
anywhere you have a dearth of electrons is positive
Except neutrons, which contain no electrons but are not positive... Is that an exception that one ought to memorize?
No. In organic chemistry you're considering atoms and molecules. Neutrons without associated protons are neither, and so are outside the scope of the course. (I could be wrong, it's been a while since I took organic, but I don't think so.)
*pout*
Seriously kids, grow up. Most of us have some subject or area where we don't do as well. And almost all of us have at least one thing we do very well.
So organic chemistry isn't your thing? Fine, but that doesn't make it some black art that's all rote memorization or a weed-out course that's designed to make you fail. It's just not your thing. Go do something else.
Take inorganic chem, then tell us how much memorization there is for organic.
I absolutely suck at memorization, so what I did was learn the why of the reaction - which generally was just geometry based (which part of the electron cloud was physically easiest to access - ie steric hinderance); charge based (which atom most 'wanted' the electrons') and energy based (which configurations would be energetically stable with minimum strain and best sharing of electrons).
For my O-chem final - my brain almost completely forgot all of the standard reactions, but I was able to reconstruct reactions and what reactants and environments I needed based on what I wanted the molecule to do; and derive what products to expect based on the above method.
Thank you! Someone gets it. There are a few simple rules to organic chemistry. Knowing and applying those seems so much easier than memorization of all the possible reactions that could come up.
I was one of the people that found ochem easy, but pchem quite difficult.
That surprises me. P-chem is the place to learn the basis of the rules you apply in o-chem. I never understood why some schools don't have students take p-chem before o-chem.
I started out doing a chemistry degree and this was my biggest complaint (I don't know if it was specifically with organic but I think so). There are the rules then there are exceptions to the rules and then there are exceptions to the exceptions. After I dropped out (for unrelated reasons), when I went back, it was for a physics degree and I was much more comfortable with that. Reason, not rote learning.
Congratulations on your Nobel prize! Chemistry is the application of physics to atoms and molecules. If you've found exceptions to the rules of physics as we understand them, surely such a discovery would win you many prizes and much fame.
Chemistry, particularly organic, requires very little rote memorization. Electrons are negatively charged. Any where you have extra electrons is negative, anywhere you have a dearth of electrons is positive. Like charges repel, differing charges attract.
There, 3 sentences. That's all the rote learning you need for organic. The rest is just application.
Wrong. Wrong. wrong.
Sometimes, if a student has really good math skills, they can slide through physics, but you can't do that in orgo," says McCarty
1) Orgo? WTF? There is no course in the chemistry curriculum called "orgo". It's o-chem, or organic, or organic chemistry, if you're not into the whole brevity thing. There is no orgo.
2) "You can do blah in physics, but you can't do that in o-chem???" Please, deity, make sure this person never becomes a doctor. Or a parent.
Chemistry is not magic. It is not random. It is not subject to the whims of mystical forces. The atoms and molecules one studies in o-chem are governed by the rules of physics. Those rules are described in the language of math. It's like saying knowing English will help you read plays, but it won't help you with Shakespeare.
If you have the background, and are good at math, then pchem is easy. But orgo is just lots and lots of memorization.
What is this I don't even know. I expect that sort of attitude from someone who hasn't taken p-chem, but you should know better. Especially if you take p-chem before o-chem.
As for memorization, I somehow managed to get through organic without it. Even before years of /. and fark wrapped my fragile little mind my memory was shiat. In high school trig there were a bunch of equations we were supposed to memorize--sin2a, cos(a+b), cos(a-b), that sort of stuff. Well, like I said, my memory was shiat. Turns out, if you remember the definitions of sin, cos, and tan, all those other equations and identities can be derived.
So that's what I did. I memorized those 3 definitions, and derived everything else as needed during the exam.
Organic is the same way. Sure, you could get through by rote memorized of a list of facts and statements without bothering with understanding. But the same could be said of just about any course or class.
But it's a lot easier (or it was for me at least) to remember a small set of simple rules, and then apply them. Of course, that requires a step beyond rote memorization to some actual understanding of those rules to know how and when to apply them. So where do you get those rules and that understanding?
Take p-chem. Take p-chem first, and then o-chem. O-chem is just an application of the rules you'll learn in p-chem. O-chem requires no more memorization then any other college course (and perhaps less).
It's all about charges--electrons are negative, hydrogen ions are positive. Like charges repel, different charges attract. If you have a positive charge, that's where your electrons will go. If you have a negative charge, that's where your hydrogen will go. Draw arrows as needed.
I mean, OK, we all know that electronic devices have a truncated lifespan... but when you go to buy a plasma TV, they make a point to tell you it will only work for about 50,000 hours, after which you have to go buy a brand new one. Hence the reason all the flat panels I own (which were bought before LED TV prices started to come down) are LCD and not plasma.
Every TV has a limited life span. The number you quote is only relevant after your flat panel displays last 17 years. (50,000 hours at 8 hours/day.)
Just imagine when this same company, instead of driving your browser, is driving your car and deciding where you go.
Most of it is born. If you don't believe it's genetic try training a dog or elephant or chimp to do higher math. You can try for years or decades if you want. They like to say there's very little genetic difference between a chimp and a human, but that small difference makes a big difference in certain things
Not a good analogy. Take the opposable thumb. Genetics explains the difference between thumbs on humans and not-thumbs on dogs or elephants, but it doesn't explain most cases of humans missing a thumb.
Just because genetics might explain the difference in capacity for abstract math in humans and chimps or dog doesn't mean it explains the varriance among humans.
Why is it "maths" in British English, but "math" in American English? In America, it's "mathematics," "physics," "electronics," etc. Only "math" is singular.
I guess you never studied chemistry or biology. Or would that be chems and bios?
Its ready NOW. The tech is ready, the people are ready, the politicians and business is NOT ready.
I doubt it. The tech may be ready, the people implementing that tech are certainly not ready.
About 30% of my searches on Google return a "You searched for A, did you mean B" result. In about half of those instances, I actually get "You searched for A, here are the results for B." So with a Google car, I'm more likely to arrive at the destination safely, but about 15% of the time it will not be the destination I requested, but some other location based on some SW engineer assuming I don't know where I want to go.
I have a couple podcasts I save up for when I travel. In some cases I have months of episodes queued up for a long trip. A couple years ago iTunes started silently unsubscribing those podcasts. I guess the assumption is anything I don't listen to often is something I'll never listen to again. Recently it's even done that for podcasts I listen to weekly and don't store many back episodes. So with an Apple iCar, I'm more likely to arrive at the destination safely, but only at destinations anticipated by the engineers at Apple. And one day I'll try to visit my mother, and the display in the iCar will say it's been so long since I visited, the car assumed she was dead and deleted her address and route to her house.
I don't doubt the tech, I question the people the behind the tech. The reason Google returns results for something other than what I searched for isn't a technical issue. The reason iTunes seemingly randomly unsubscribes me from podcasts is not a technical issue.
For Google, I love the "did you mean B" options when I search for A. But give me the choice to search for B, don't just return results for B. For iTunes, I'm fine with a dialog box, "You haven't played this podcast for a while, still want to subscribe," but don't just silently unsubscribe, especially if it's going to happen for podcasts I do listen to often.
To expand on those insights, the answer to the titular question is, why should the people in government be different from every other person in the (short) history of big web launches?
Has there ever been a web site on this scale--government or corporate--that did not have the same level of issues in the begining?
Yes, there are successful, functioning large web sites. And every one either 1) went through a lot of issues to become functioning, or 2) started as a small, functioning web site and features were added slowly.
It's the second point that stands out in my mind. If you're in business, you can start small. Small in terms of the features you offer and small in terms of the number of concurrent people your site can handle. Your site can grow as you add features. You can reengineer and add capacity as your customer base grows.
With government, there is the assumption you need to start at the end, with a feature-rich platform ready to handle hundreds of millions of users. Facebook started with a few thousand dollars, not hundreds of millions, but Facebook also started with a customer base of a few thousand and not hundreds of millions.
Love it or hate it, government isn't magic. It's an association of people, and it shouldn't be expected to do things other associations of people have never been able to do.
Donna Dixon was a spy from the other team (and still way above Ackroyd's pay grade). Vanessa Angel was the Soviet soldier.
Account details over email and 1-2 business days?
Why not just put cash in an envelope and send USPS? At least that way you can't lost more than the cash you send.
You aren't a special little snow flake.
Yes, there is a reasonable number of hours each day most folks can dedicate to mentally strenuous tasks, just as there's a limit to physical activity, but if you were getting your job done in the standard 8 hrs/day, 40 hrs/wk, this wouldn't be an issue.
That said, there are plenty of work places that are flexible with back office folks who aren't answering phones or otherwise directly interacting with customers.
If your boss is micromanaging your time rather than focusing on your work, either your work needs to get better or you need to find a different boss.
Here's the basic paradox: Suppose Bob may have committed a crime, and Alice is known not to be an accomplice but appears to have been a witness. If the courts ask both Bob and Alice the same question -- "Did Bob do it?" -- and both of them refuse to answer, then Bob's right to remain silent is protected under the Fifth Amendment, but Alice can be sent to jail -- despite the fact that Bob may have been guilty, but Alice is innocent!
There's so much wrong with that quote. There's only one crime mentioned in this scenario--the one Bob is accused of. By saying Alice can be sent to jail, the implication is she will be convicted of the crime Bob may have committed.
Alice may be charged with obstruction of justice or contempt of court. The statement, "but Alice is innocent!" is too much to take seriously. Just because Bob, and not Alice, may have committed the initial crime, there's no reason to assume Alice cannot commit a different crime during the investigation of Bob.
But my main complaint is, where is the paradox? There is none. There may be injustice. There may be logical inconsistencies in the legal system. There may be historical anachronisms which do not make sense in the modern world. But none of these things are paradoxes. Something isn't a paradox just because it "sounds crazy."
I know it's cliché to complain about the declining standards of /. stories, but this is even worse than Bennett's last "article."
My best guess is "Bennett Haselton" is a computer program designed to write inane OpEd articles. Rather than the ravings of someone with the barest familiarity with the US Constitution and the English language, these articles are actually work of bleeding-edge artificial intelligence in the form of a troll bot.
"Does anyone else ever notice the color of Mickey?"
Did you ever notice that Mickey has a peer, Goofy, who's a dog. He also has what's obviously a slave dog - Pluto.
Obviously Pluto is the field dog. Goofy is the house dog.
In regards to both the funny and flamebait mods: this is not a case of the usual Jenny-McCarthy vaccines-cause-autism derp (though there is some of that in this case).
This church teaches faith and prayer as an alternative to man-made medicine. By their own standards, they got sick because their faith in god was inadequate.
I suppose they should be praised for showing some sense rather than doubling-down and going with something like, we got measles because there are gays in the military.
I'm reminded of the joke, a man lives in an area that is getting washed out by a flood. Sheriff comes by in a truck to drive the man to higher ground. Man refuses to go, says god will save him. Later the water is coming in the front door, and a boat comes by. Man refuses to go, says god will save him. Later, the man is on the roof as the house is being submerged, and a helicopter comes by. Man refuses to go, says god will save him.
Man drowns, goes to meet god. "God, why didn't you save me?" God:"Well, I sent a truck, a boat, a helicopter..."
So anyway, god sent a measles vaccine to save me. Obviously (by the teachings of this church) god chose not to save them.
The only logical conclusion is god hates these people.
I have no measles, so I know god loves me.