I like how considerate your post it; there's one problem with the whole theory imbued therein, which is those "loopholes" aren't accidents being abused: a great deal of them were put there as "incentives" for people to create and run corporations, and particularly to create jobs doing this. It's not perfect, but trying to "close" the "loopholes" is a good way to kill the space which they were meant to let private ingenuity fill.
p.s. I reposted this, accidentally posted anonymously; anyone know how to get some kind of admin to delete the first copy? u
Their only real competition are vendors with their own standards; they could easily patent them to death in court, nearly any current linux vendor (that leaves, hmm...Red Hat and Xandros, for the most part) that matters; the rest are (that I know of, I realize I'm limited here) free and unprofitable: volunteer efforts and such. Microsoft can't kill Debian because the code is open and everywhere; but nobody worries about Debian overtaking Microsoft in the Office Space: despite the praise for it with a bajillion packages, those are loosely integrate (if at all) packages nonetheless; they're supported in the hope someone might, maybe, possible, hopefully, start towards getting them fluidly interoperable: and with no standards...yeah right.
Am I the only one to notice here that Microsoft is one of the more liberating companies out there? They provide sure standards on a documented platform; if something's about to break you can quickly fix things from the new info made available on MSDN; unlike iPods, anyone can push their software onto any phone with an install of Windows Mobile with little (actually no) worry of censorship or prevention; unlike FOSS-infected code (I'm not talking OSS, but FOSS, i.e., the FSF-type stuff), Microsoft lets developers incorporate their database, various system libs, and all sorts of goodies into software, even completely free software; and even when they deprecate old features/libs/etc., they maintain backwards compatibility. In a real sense Microsoft is totally superior in all respects of the FSF's goals, because it's not only possible to run a bunch of free software (more free software is available to the Windows platform by far), but coders can use so many provided Microsoft components with no fear of license infection, demands, etc., they can give freely or request payment without constraint; with backwards compatibility, average Joe also has no worries that his free (or paid) software is just going to quit, and with the myriad choices crappy interfaces or fugly wares die fast--unlike in the FOSS world, where stuff lives out of necessity. : (
With Windows, totally unlike Linux, things are documented; more than that, they're documented well; more than that, there's standards; more than that, when things change, it's all documented so things can be fixed; more than that, despite changes, and though there are exceptions, software is usually backwards compatible; more than that, even when a software maker doesn't update software broken by updates, Microsoft itself has entire departments dedicated to making software on their platform work.
Oh yeah, and it doesn't all look amateurish: that's a big plus. And don't take this too personally: I'm typing from FF on Xub; I like that it's lightweight for my lil' lappy, but I'm not going to kid myself that it'll overtake the world any time soon, not in the hands of FOSS programmers and advocates; on top of all that, the GPL keeps programs from interacting with essential desktop components: on Windows any program, propriety or otherwise, can call Media Player: on Linux that's a forced GPL re-licensing or a violation for almost any player; that's just one example of too many that need to be made known; on top of it all, the Linux ecosystem isn't legal: the kernel is GPL, the desktops LGPL: the only reason they're allowed to interact is Linus, the major figurehead for being the initial kernel author and most authoritative decision-maker regarding copyright and license enforcement of that kernel says it's okay to drop non-GPL stuff on top of it: but the license makers (and the rest of us) say and know better, but can't enforce the license with regards the kernel (which they'd do in heartbeat) because he, the pragmatic not zealotous, one and not they, is the copyright holder, and the other interested developers practically follow his lead. If I were him I'd ask the FSF for a GPL exception and move to CDDL or something better (like happened with Wikipedia) and request the FSF finish-up getting TURD (sorry, I mean HURD) out the door. Heck, why even ask? First try getting the other (documented) contributors to re-license, re-license one's own share, and move on.
And I don't want to impart the impression of being totally dismissive or cynical, just really try to be stark and hit home here; perhaps get a few more people to be more realistic, considerate, and self-examining, even if it is just with regards to some silly code.
That would make sense if it weren't for the software these complainers are making available: stuff given-away (Flash, Earth, etc.) that aren't their means for getting bread and bacon: that stuff is just a necessity for the stuff they make money from, and it's not in their interest to deploy the money-makers on linux, just the freebies, (e.g. Adobe needs to be able to say they have a lot of installs--nobody else supports flash well; Google is pretty much giving-away G Earth, so different story); and who gives a dang about the free stuff in the repositories, minus codecs and the media players: nobody that matters in software space is switching to GNU money managers any time soon: it's Quickbooks and other, you know, useful tools: stuff people use as tools they're willing to pay for to have as tools to get their work for money done.
A guy like me is fine: I can tweak xubuntu into working, to nudge it into usefulness and into a state I can have bliss and stop fiddling; most people can't get past the initial install problems, and even I'm constantly peeved that I can't use Skype without wanting to shoot the Linux geeks for their idiocy about just getting basic things to work, and have to resort to more bloat by going with Skype static, and for other wares do other hacks.
The whole situation is intractable, however, because FOSS seems to be an entirely unrealistic, fanatical, zealotrous, delusional, unreasonable, mob of idealists and software worshipers who can't step-back and take some criticism, and come to understand what wiser, experience, real-life people are talking about; I know of certain CEOs (from business school lectures) who made mention they try to identify OSS lovers just so they won't have to hire and deal with them: not because they hate the work, or feel it's a threat (only FOSS zealots really buy into that, whereas the commercial world laughs at those geeky nerds who can't get anything together, much less submit to some authority to get organized for more than a week before the pissy one decides to fork).
Stuff like Linux Haters blog would be so funny if it weren't so true, and if the Linux crowd actually paid attention rather than (a) getting angry and ignoring it or (b) laughing at it, then proceeding just as they were, unphased. : (
You're talking about the U.S. quelling communism around the world, which it considered as in its interests: much of the African stuff was directed by Castro--hence why we haven't liked the guy; Communism wasn't just "let's all just get along", but an idealistic system, conveniently aimed at the dumbest and desperate for support, whereby some gained ever more power over them, and told them what to do, etc.. We all stand shocked at China's continued abuses, for instance--and that's not even the worst of it; how many millions upon millions died when Russia used the world as proxies to extend communism, and with it its power?
The U.S., of course, used much of the world as proxies too, but we did so in the interest not only of our own nation, but we also wanted freedom for those other peoples and countries, at least more than communism provides; until the Dems gave official approval to mainland China, for instance, they were still an illegal entity (dang it Clinton). The U.S. government has, effectively, for the most part, in general, intervened in the world only for what has been in its interests--and usually it tries to leave things better, at great cost to our nation (in the old days why would a conqueror rebuild its opponents? But we do). Vietnam was both assisting France, and S. Vietnam, but primarily it was for stopping communism; then, as recently, the Dems politically killed an easy war (ahem, Congress blocked our bombers from taking out the only steel factory in S. Asia, which they flew over almost weekly, and which would have direly crippled N. Korea), all to foment anger; the current President even broke the Logan Act (a fellony) before being elected to disrupt political talks in Iraq for sorting-out security issues, and more.
Communism was a hostile, not benevolent, force--often one hiding violence behind pleasantries. As a Russian fellow put it, it was old and genteel men behind paper at desks responsible for millions of deaths throughout the Asian continent. Ideas...have consequences. Communism was the terrorism of its day: the U.S. took action then, and it has recently taken action against global terrorism now--to the benefit of everyone else. If you people are so simple as to just want to complain at your miserable little lives and blame the U.S. for everything, (and I'm sure it has lots of blame too), then you could kiss off: the U.S. forces form almost all of NATA, almost the whole of the U.N. "peacekeeping" forces (which it never allows to keep anything, it seems); if we withdrew all that now 500,000,000 Europeans (and millions of other Russian neighbors) would be at the mercy of 150,000,000 Russians who are currently so dissatisfied and without morals they would happily whip their neighbors, sack their former territories, and etc.. The U.N. would be totally without any military arm to do anything; N. African terrorists would freely flow into Spain and throughout Europe; Israel would be wiped off the map, the middle east dominated by extreme Islam that would spread throughout the world.
Like it or not, the U.S. has a great stabilizing effect in this world. We aren't imperial--our overseas territories are usually permitted to disassociated when they want to vote for it. We leave nations we've utterly defeated rebuilt and integrated into the international community. What more can we do for you? You going to complain at that too? Come on, seriously. Next time a Hitler comes-up in Europe, should we just let him do as he wishes? Are we the last remnant of Western society with some gusto to get things done? I really hope that in the event the U.S. fell under such a dark spell that the pacifict Europeans might help, rather than let us languish. Sheesh.
Ahem, the U.S. is a Republic first, not a pure Democracy; sadly many of our own citizens don't even know that (they should leave their citizenship card at the local INS for deportation); the left in this country also seems to conveniently ignore this fact all the time for rhetorical purposes; we are a "Democratic Republic" (legally), and to be more specific, it is an indirect Democracy due to being a representative Democracy: there are layers upon layers of abstraction built into the U.S. system specifically to prevent mob rule of the hoi polloi, based on classical theory and observations that it's too easy for powers-that-be to manipulate the masses into doing their bidding, and corrupt the law; that's happening as we speak, in the U.S., because there's little that can be done when the Federal levels decide they can just ignore the limitations of their powers (almost everything our Congress implements these days, all the judicial review actions by Federal courts, etc.) and do as if powers reserved to the states are the fewest number, rather than all not enumerated (the majority of) powers.
Effectively the U.S. system is (legally) designed to maximize liberty, not greatness on the world's playing field; (legally) the U.S. is designed to provide exceptionally more individual autonomy (you can make your way to the clouds or die in the gutter) than previous entities in history; and don't think it's all amoral: the guys who hammered-out those docs were giant pushers of "moral society", "virtuous society", and whatnot, and said such things were entirely necessary to the survival of the Union they had created. Historically the U.S. has politicans who write about the necessity of "voluntary socialism" (particulalrly they stressed the importance of women in our history for being the backbone of this) as opposed to the mandated socialism of Europe, as what keeps European style tyranny (that's what it was in U.S.A. think, and continues to be, just we're civil with Europe) or worse at bay.
As for plutocracy, when has it ever not been so in the world? And where? For more than a little time before it's undone? And frankly, in the U.S. our "rich" are usually average people who work their way up into wealth in a few decades: they are teachers, doctors, plumbers, carpenters--they're not always financial people and whatnot. That's unlike practically all other places in the world. Until recently it seemed like this ability for anyone here, whether born here or abroad, with all the opportunities and avenues we've preserved for people, might remain intact: but we have a power-hungry ideology-driven Fed right now that seems to be doing everything it can to undo all that for the sake of its own goals, rather than the sake of our nation. : ( You know, I'm one of this nation's poor: I live on under $700 a month, and considering how inflated our currency is, thought that may seem a lot in the rest of the world, due to costs of living, it is not here. Yet I do that. I've figured I can do that on even less too. In the U.S., with some responsibility, you can afford a family, building wealth, supporting charity at home and abroad, and (until recently) not having to worry the government is going to try to steal all of it in the name of "the people" (i.e. their power)--so long as you don't get caught-up in materialism and consumerism.
Remember that proverb, "Man is avarice, therefore he is man"? You're not going to much escape corruption in the world, you have to effectively deal with it when possible, when you can't you lay low and live quietly doing what you can. In the U.S. it's not just a bunch of money-bags running this country, it's often heavily-funded lobbying groups representing the poor in what they think are their interests; due to Marx having affected everything, however, they often don't realize that the supposed "rich" oppressors are people living among them, right next door, doing the same work, but being wiser: often the poor in this country think the very enabling mechanisms are their
Doesn't it ever occur to Americans that Terrorists ARE interested in freedom? THEIR freedom!
The only reason people are trying to kill Americans is that they think America has been oppressing them for generations.
You don't understand the power of ideology, do you? Your comment is simplistic. The terrorists themselves surely are interested in THEIR freedom--to murder infidels and women freely. Let me be an imperialist: such "culture" is not legitimate, and any society that decides to destroy it (which the U.S. has not taken great pains to) has all the moral authority and right in such a situation.
You should have put more emphasis on the "they think" part of your comment. America gains little from either Afghanistan or Iraq--and in both the people are freer than they've been for decades; as for Saudi Arabia, that's another situation altogether--but we haven't invaded that (nobody has).
How's the "for generations" crap applicable to the U.S.? Last I checked a large portion of the Mid-east was controlled by Britain (as you mentioned). The great majority of problems in the middle east are self-inflicted both by prevailing ideologies, and the powers that sue them to keep themselves in control.
The main consideration from the West's point of view needs to be "do they let those who're different live, to go about their affairs, or do they murder them?" For most of the middle east this is not the case.
Your comment should be modded down, not up to five; the U.S. is just a convenient target to blame so that certain interests can 'rouse support and gain power; not just terrorists, e.g. Bin Laden, but also the local power, (Bin Laden is part of a royal house, but has no hope of legal ascension to its ruling seats: so he could gain power other ways, perhaps even overthrow that house--didn't work out for him (so far)). The U.S. networks with the interests in areas just as every other nation on earth does, as tragic as the results may often be; it's just near impossible to decide to go-in with moral certitude and destroy all the politicians of the place and re-install all-new players without totally alienating all there, even if one has only destroyed their oppressors.
That's the reality all nations face in trying to do what they try to do, whether good or evil; in the end it means they need to do what's in their interests to justify, at home, going abroad, and while they do it they try to make (or enable) what improvements they may. It's sad, complex, etc., but what every nation has to deal with.
"Loss Aversion" is not the issue; the lack of discipline, documentation, standardization, collaboration, consumer features, polish, and good common sense--i.e. thinking like a non-geek, non-programmer--in the FOSS community is. There is no alternative to MS, not only because of these things, but because nobody makes as much of an investment in the wider developer community than MS: they go to great lengths to make sure thousands of pieces of software important to possibly half a billion people "just work".
Then there's libs. MS is in some ways more free than GPL software; you can't call a GPL media player without GPLing your own software on a FOSS desktop, end of story. With Microsoft there are tons of libs and apps you can call freely as a developer, from entire databases to the tiniest hidden hooks in the OS: the FSF is not only seen as a bunch of ideological zealot-hippies, it imbued this ideology into a totally unpragmatic license. There's a reason that major FOSS-contributors like Sun (who knows if they will be now, we'll see) were putting a bunch of very tempting tools into the Open Source community under GPL (even LGPL) -incompatible licenses. The FSF tries doing this too, though the BSD-type community apparently has tools that match their few tempting morsels of code that might lure poor fools into GPLing code.
There are a billion little things an end-user can tell the Linux geek of what's wrong with a linux desktop for said end-user and person in general and the FOSS community, when hearing such, starts attacking said user as an idiot; when such people get involved with FOSS by reporting bugs, etc., FOSS developers usually ignore them (just look at the trackers); popular "programs" out there like Pidgin are indispensible yet the developers are developing only for themselves (that others think it's useful is fine and dandy) so that when some very interesting, possibly newly necessary, feature is needy they literally tell people "this is for the developer, requested feature is uninteresting to him, it will never happen"; when people note buginess and instabilities in such packages since it doesn't matter to the dev/s then it never gets fixed.
I've been using Linux for 5+ years, when I get a new computer I remove Windows, and the one thing I can count on is that it not only won't just work, but that it probably never will just work, even commercial software for it, (try getting Skype to ever live up to their promise to contact you in 48 hours about issues); I'm just personally okay so long as I can find little tweaks (e.g. with Skype I change settings to one audio device, and then switch back for the rest of the desktop post call); sometimes I can't. The only thing that keeps me off windows is the price of antivirus and firewall software: but if Linux were more popular so that it was a bigger target (and those who think "secure by design" are idiots, I know plenty of people who can own a Linux box quite quickly if it hasn't been secured by an expert) I'd definitely jump ship back to Windows in a heartbeat.
To sum up: to be Loss Aversion requires getting actual gains over what is lost: this is not the case with Linux for almost any general end-user out there. With Windows, and even trial-ware on Windows, they can expect professional, intentional, refined software that "just works"; with Linux they can expect half-hearted undocumented poorly implemented junk from nerdy volunteer developers, nerds to attack them when they give criticism, buggy, ugly interfaces and packages, regressions chalked-up to hardware manufacturers and MS (get it or not: THEY DON'T CARE), no real support, no easy, consumer-oriented, security, and about a million other things to list that I don't want to waste the time on listing.
You know, I'm really saddened these days (and I'm not saying this is you, just using your words here without other context of your mind as an example) how it is that government is used as a vehicle to drive interests, rather than sticking to the proscribed constitutionalism and operating within that framework, actually amending when considered (and only when considered as a matter of utmost caution) absolutely necessary (usually it hasn't been done with utmost caution--look at how the 16th has made our Federal government into a giant ready to crush any dissent and turn us into soft or really tyranny in the near future if it isn't put back in its box--yes, I'm talking U.S. here). I remember one persona non grata of congress talking about how he'd stand-up and tell congress repeatedly "you know we have no power to even debate this legislation", and they'd just go on with their interests. Either party, despite rhetoric, seems disinterested in any "rule of law", because that concept requires we all be submitted, providing a good framework and sort of "fairness" that we play by the same rules, rather than the modern "living constitutionalism" and other bull that plays word-games for politicians to try doing whatever they want. : (
Anyway, I agree with your statement.
Hmm... Why shouldn't either of these impose restrictions on how you use THEIR resources? Schools will, first of all, impose restrictions because the public ones are required to: and I'm not sure parents are actually opposed to this--the libraries, etc., (which are usually required to have them) have them because of parental outrage about kids using it for porn: I would rather they actually impose nothing and just, perhaps, notify parents by e-mail when the kid logs-in using the new members-only gateway so many public libraries are installing to inform parents what's up (you know, let the parents talk to their kids about [insert something here]) rather than letting government use "the kids" as a pretext to expand their powers ominously all the time.
It's like the warranties: companies everywhere provide them in packages with items sold requiring registration, knowing that most people probably won't take advantage of them: "the path of least resistance"; even in areas of liberty and freedom (like England's opt-out list) most people are just so darn lazy they won't do such things...that is, like you, going to the "opt out" list.
This way at least there's a chance somebody will actually decide to see an add; it's not a bad idea--and fair; rather than wholesale disable a site's sources of revenue, it's like with VCRs (and then later, TIVO): someone is able to pre-record and play-back later, only the VCRs weren't heavily used because weren't as convenient and couldn't record all day: TIVO lowered resistance and suddenly more people did what was possible (though more difficult) with VCRs for years; in all three of these advertising cases , VCR, TIVO, Adblock, in each the advertisers and channels they flow through complain only when it's made easy for people: it's easy, but one-more-step (for each url) [each time], to go to the host file and block advertisement urls, but that "one more step" is actually several, and not presented at convenience, (and people screw it up); in this case it's a good compromise, one step per opportunity (not several) and all the work is done for the user, easy, (yeah or nay), and a record is kept (if I'm to believe someone above) whether or not to present a dialog again. : D
If you don't like it, adventurous as you are with the whitelist features available, just look for a way in there to turn it off permanently: likely to be there, but unlikely a user is going to go searching for it (if we're talking about Mom and Grandma).
Church goers I know have moral objections to Apple, over, you'd be surprised, things like this. They often think of Apple as a stiffling, greedy, arrogant, lying, nasty little entity and often refuse to buy from it.
I'm not saying this is always the case, nor dogmatized about, just saying that's a commonality among people I know and know of.
On the other hand, having a company with some sense and having some ability to ensure things are made in such a way people would actually want to use them makes sense, see here for continued thought, http://apple.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1220281&cid=27805087
On the other hand, I've seen very few nerds (read, programmers) that have any sense of what people, rather than machines, want and think like: seriously. Even the ones who know this weakness often still don't get why in general people don't want to think in heuristics, developing artificial machine-like "perfectly logical" language. I know CEOs who hire people who understand technology and people, who are good communicators, but strive to ensure they're not developers, just to smack their developers and say "stop trying to do ten things, JUST MAKE A FRICKIN' BUTTON". These types find devs to be idiots with people, with little common sense about things like interfaces; not everyone is technical: Slashdot's community hates MS, perhaps, but all those I know do everything they desperately can to avoid things like Linux like the plague: it's ugly, backwards, unusable, the user-friendly version (/Ubuntus) are now buggy and becoming just as slow as MS anyways (and why aren't there any linuxes as functional, with GUIs, and easy to use, demanding as much or little hardware, and as fast as Win 2000? In general people LOVE Win 2000 still). The FOSS community just doesn't have a frickin' clue, and those who try leading it who do...are non grata. FOSS's idea of computer freedom is code--Joe the Plumber's is "click the.exe, don't have anything to worry about regarding a config file or fixing the stupidly obvious should-be-there bug due to some left-out lib or broken API, DRM, whatever, (not even understanding those terms), and get to work unimpeded with a familar interface and workflow". That's why people pay exhorbitant fees for MS Office: with integration they get *#)* done; that's why they pay the way they do for Adobe, for...you name it on PCs. Like the recent commentator somewhere one here "why would you want vendor lock-in" which someone pointed-out "when you use FOSS you're still relying on somebody", and in a sense you're locked-in: if you haven't spent years learning code, who gives if it's FOSS? Last time I checked FOSS is no more likely or reliable to fix problems and bugs anyways--they're not purviewed to devs working on the next iteration of the spinny cube.
And you know what? I use Linux: *buntu user for years. Have liked it, but it's starting to get waaay too time-consuming to coax the dang box into working with it. More regressions, even slower, no quality controls...I also met one of the former *buntu loco team heads, a programmer, and he quit the promotory efforts: "they're idiots, they don't get it 'just needs to work'", at least the nerds he was involved with: guys like Mark seem to understand--but the devs are another story. Why is it, for instance, that when NTFS is shut-down improperly either on MS or Linux so that Linux says "it's locked, I refuse to do anything", that the devs don't go (like the rest of us), "well duh, use the built-in FUSE to change the affected variable". Do they even think they should actually do the work of making the system fix its crap? NOOOOO. Everyone knows the answer will be "boot into Windows and shut-down the device properly". What if I'm not using Windows, I'm using Linux, and the external HD, to be compatible, has NTFS for portability, Hmm??? This and a billion other things are, just, just obvious: and one knows this when they have a bunch of specifically written-up error messages addressing these kinds of things. If you have a specific error message for some problem that's obviously something you should fix, you're not doing a very good job. Anyway, except for the language, the Linux Hater's blog is recommended to all: sadly the Linux community takes a look and laughs at it, "great criticism", then ignores it...
I don't know. With Microsoft at least we're dealing with one entity: in the event it is needed the government can go to Microsoft and say "hey, we need you to support your older formats better so we can ensure they're accessible and/or move them to newer ones"; there's someone definite to deal with, entrenched so they're strong to a great extent (and not likely going anywhere), with all the incentive in the world to ensure they please such requests (which when governments request something of Microsoft, request not sue, then Microsoft usually complies).
With ODF there's standards, yes, but compliance of implementation is optional; there's no one in particular fully responsible for ensuring that compliance--there's no enforcement; people balked, for instance, at Microsoft's stipulation that anyone implementing their Open XML comply completely as a means to ensure nobody could, but that's not a totally fair representation: it's a good way to ensure actual interoperability, and if it makes it difficult on others then it's convenient for them. In the event Microsoft did sue some competitor for failure they at least have the reasonsable defense that as they understood it they were compliant, and that Microsoft overzealously prosecuted (just like with the GPL if you violate but don't realize it, but state reasonably that as you understood it you were compliant, but due to things vague your were mistaken and will correct it, it is a defense: even the FSF zealots recognize and understand this: in real ways I prefer MS, however, over the FSF, because with MS you can incentivize and be pragmatic, realistic; with FSF it's moaning, 'everyone, quick, switch LGPL to GPL, you really should, help our zealotry!!!"; they're not realistic or sensible on such things--even arguing with Linus that Linux as is is illegal because LGPL libs sit atop a GPL kernel, and they'd prosecute everyone if they could).
Anyway, the above is just food for thought, not dogmatism. Anyone with better thought or who can extend it, or critique reasonably, or whatever, is welcome to. Cheers! : )
I think you're missing the point. Most people aren't just sub-literature (technologically) compared to Slashdotters; most people don't even seem to understand when the tiniest thing goes wrong that they can Google an answer or go to "help" on the menubar or through the Start--> avenue. Most people seem not even to understand when a browser doesn't pop-up a window regarding a download that they should check their download folder (such that at work someone keeps clicking links furiously so that we find a ton of copies), if they even realize what a folder is. People are idiots when it comes to technology: Microsoft doesn't just understand this, but unlike linux crowds, they don't mock you for it. Also knowing this, the barest appearance of activation schemes is enough to deter most people, and that's the point.
Inequality is not an evil, suggesting it is by the shear ignorance is. I'm far below the poverty level, making only a few thousand a year, and rent is over half my income, but still have money leftover for food and to bank: and I'm making some basic investments for a business start-up. Meanwhile most that I know making at-poverty-line or greater sums per year cry their eyes out for being poor while they spend eight hours at work, ten in front of the tubes, and eat pre-packaged everything.
Newsflash to the West (not just Americans), you don't have a right to the sold "quality of life". You don't have a right to even eat--if you don't work; that doesn't mean I or others won't feed you (that's our decision, though I'd prefer feeding the truly needy, sick, maimed, etc.). With the west truly creating little to no actual wealth, per typical individual or household, it's no wonder that inequalities are increasing between those who don't, and those who do: and this is no commendation of the IP-elite and media moguls who sell rights and air, (though I'm not against that, either).
Use your resources wisely--time is one of those. Going back just before the world war, people worked practically constantly just to survive. A little further than that and that's just a fact of life that almost everyone would find unusual that anyone would think otherwise.
Of course people when placed under water for a short amount of time, say a couple of minutes, will attempt to breath normally. This of course fails because humans are too stupid to stop breathing.
Breathing is controlled by your brainstem: it is unrelated to your thought or intellect, and out of your control. Of course one can override it temporarily, but the signals from gas levels will indicate to the brainstem to override your override. That's why massive damage to the head can occur, yet the vital functions of the body may remain functional a while so long as the brainstem is intact. This is a design feature for your well-being. : ) No hold-breath suicides for you! (Suffocationg works, sure, but not breath holding).
Properly, in America it is MM/DD/YYYY, but for FORMAL and important docs (such as, see below, the 4th of July), one writes DD/MM/YYYY to match antiquated docs' style. And personally, I'm with those who like YYYY/MM/DD for order on computers (for the sake of sorting). : )
In America we say things like "March 29th 2009" so we don't have to speak obstusely (i.e., the extra "the", nd/th/[whatever] (after the number), "of", etc. words). And no offense or anything: again, in formal docs I actually prefer DD/MM/YYYY, but that is when it is written with words, not with the numerical numbers/numbers/numbers form.
Yes, free will is allowed in the same sentence as lures, and they are not propositionally counter to one another, nor do their use in conjunction violate any logical standpoint. What about advertising, flirts, and hookers? All try to lure people in: in any case you are accountable for your own actions.
Back in the Cold war Cuba was directed troops in communist insurrections around the world: everything from Asian countries to former British colonies had U.S. troops inside trying to halt the advance of that ideology, and Castro often directed the troops personally that were trying to overthrow these governments.
He also helped set-up the elements in South American that are, today, destabilizing it: in the U.S. we're getting immigrants from South America who are WALKING through Mexico (entering Mexico illegally is an automatic felony, and police and populace alike there are known to commonly just beat, rob, and rape anyone who does so, and leave them for dead) if they have to, and these aren't poor people down on their luck, they're lower to upper middle class affluents escaping places like Venezuela, which have put a lot of propaganda about how all is great, but which have made anyone who isn't dirt-poor into their national scapegoats to legislate tyranny in the name of "the people". (And note, this is the great thing about the U.S., I was privelaged to get great learning about Mexico because my instructor in Spanish was Mexican: and I'm around Mexicans all the time!!)
Castro is just nuts in the eyes of the U.S.: the Russia has declassified that they removed the nukes because Fidel is such an extremist that he actually wanted to use them!
At any rate, the U.S. gets all those fleeing Cuba because of how horrid it is for the good dirty internal information that Castro & Co. don't want to get out: so it has its reasons for fully disliking that horrible government. Unfortunately there are elements here who think it's great, and actually believe that the staged-for-propaganda high-end hospitals that only rich Americans, Europeans, and favored Cubans get to use are actually the norm of their supposedly wonderful and enlightened universal system of healthcare (yeah right), among other propaganda.
English does not phoneticize its alphabets because it is so dialectical and because there are so many accents around the world: if you want several thousand varying spelling systems with a total disconnect from historical literature, rather than slightly varying spellings that cannot be mistaken between regions and no worry about the present or future generations will continue to be able to read the historical and previously written literature, go ahead.
Those who think it is superior to combine the oral and literary languageS of a language haven't thought too carefully about all the detials, the above of which is relatively minor; regional Spanish is a mess precisely because it's phonetic, with lots of propensity for populations to spell things however: and it's a language very tenuously holding onto the designation of "language" rather than "languages", requiring academies intercooperating between the nations to keep it from diverging [more]; this isn't just due to poverty, but party to its phonetic spelling system.
The British Empire spread English internationally; and these days the U.S. is getting more interested in learning other languages...while the rest of the world is eager to learn English; its eagerness to do so mystifies us as much as your pissiness at us for a craze we're not responsible for.
Perhaps it could be from the fact the world thinks the U.S. is rich, therefore cater to its tourists: but those are mostly the small niche of the U.S. population, well-to-do, or barely-rich to rich demographics which like to travel a lot. But that's as much every European country as America.
Anyway, I'm currently studying ancient languages, have studied Spanish, and plan to start French, Portuguese, German, and Italian. : )
So please don't complain to us as if we're pushing English, when it's a world defacto international language, the seeds as such being established long ago by Britain, not the U.S..
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I like how considerate your post it; there's one problem with the whole theory imbued therein, which is those "loopholes" aren't accidents being abused: a great deal of them were put there as "incentives" for people to create and run corporations, and particularly to create jobs doing this. It's not perfect, but trying to "close" the "loopholes" is a good way to kill the space which they were meant to let private ingenuity fill.
p.s. I reposted this, accidentally posted anonymously; anyone know how to get some kind of admin to delete the first copy? u
Their only real competition are vendors with their own standards; they could easily patent them to death in court, nearly any current linux vendor (that leaves, hmm...Red Hat and Xandros, for the most part) that matters; the rest are (that I know of, I realize I'm limited here) free and unprofitable: volunteer efforts and such. Microsoft can't kill Debian because the code is open and everywhere; but nobody worries about Debian overtaking Microsoft in the Office Space: despite the praise for it with a bajillion packages, those are loosely integrate (if at all) packages nonetheless; they're supported in the hope someone might, maybe, possible, hopefully, start towards getting them fluidly interoperable: and with no standards...yeah right.
Am I the only one to notice here that Microsoft is one of the more liberating companies out there? They provide sure standards on a documented platform; if something's about to break you can quickly fix things from the new info made available on MSDN; unlike iPods, anyone can push their software onto any phone with an install of Windows Mobile with little (actually no) worry of censorship or prevention; unlike FOSS-infected code (I'm not talking OSS, but FOSS, i.e., the FSF-type stuff), Microsoft lets developers incorporate their database, various system libs, and all sorts of goodies into software, even completely free software; and even when they deprecate old features/libs/etc., they maintain backwards compatibility. In a real sense Microsoft is totally superior in all respects of the FSF's goals, because it's not only possible to run a bunch of free software (more free software is available to the Windows platform by far), but coders can use so many provided Microsoft components with no fear of license infection, demands, etc., they can give freely or request payment without constraint; with backwards compatibility, average Joe also has no worries that his free (or paid) software is just going to quit, and with the myriad choices crappy interfaces or fugly wares die fast--unlike in the FOSS world, where stuff lives out of necessity. : (
With Windows, totally unlike Linux, things are documented; more than that, they're documented well; more than that, there's standards; more than that, when things change, it's all documented so things can be fixed; more than that, despite changes, and though there are exceptions, software is usually backwards compatible; more than that, even when a software maker doesn't update software broken by updates, Microsoft itself has entire departments dedicated to making software on their platform work.
Oh yeah, and it doesn't all look amateurish: that's a big plus. And don't take this too personally: I'm typing from FF on Xub; I like that it's lightweight for my lil' lappy, but I'm not going to kid myself that it'll overtake the world any time soon, not in the hands of FOSS programmers and advocates; on top of all that, the GPL keeps programs from interacting with essential desktop components: on Windows any program, propriety or otherwise, can call Media Player: on Linux that's a forced GPL re-licensing or a violation for almost any player; that's just one example of too many that need to be made known; on top of it all, the Linux ecosystem isn't legal: the kernel is GPL, the desktops LGPL: the only reason they're allowed to interact is Linus, the major figurehead for being the initial kernel author and most authoritative decision-maker regarding copyright and license enforcement of that kernel says it's okay to drop non-GPL stuff on top of it: but the license makers (and the rest of us) say and know better, but can't enforce the license with regards the kernel (which they'd do in heartbeat) because he, the pragmatic not zealotous, one and not they, is the copyright holder, and the other interested developers practically follow his lead. If I were him I'd ask the FSF for a GPL exception and move to CDDL or something better (like happened with Wikipedia) and request the FSF finish-up getting TURD (sorry, I mean HURD) out the door. Heck, why even ask? First try getting the other (documented) contributors to re-license, re-license one's own share, and move on.
And I don't want to impart the impression of being totally dismissive or cynical, just really try to be stark and hit home here; perhaps get a few more people to be more realistic, considerate, and self-examining, even if it is just with regards to some silly code.
That would make sense if it weren't for the software these complainers are making available: stuff given-away (Flash, Earth, etc.) that aren't their means for getting bread and bacon: that stuff is just a necessity for the stuff they make money from, and it's not in their interest to deploy the money-makers on linux, just the freebies, (e.g. Adobe needs to be able to say they have a lot of installs--nobody else supports flash well; Google is pretty much giving-away G Earth, so different story); and who gives a dang about the free stuff in the repositories, minus codecs and the media players: nobody that matters in software space is switching to GNU money managers any time soon: it's Quickbooks and other, you know, useful tools: stuff people use as tools they're willing to pay for to have as tools to get their work for money done.
A guy like me is fine: I can tweak xubuntu into working, to nudge it into usefulness and into a state I can have bliss and stop fiddling; most people can't get past the initial install problems, and even I'm constantly peeved that I can't use Skype without wanting to shoot the Linux geeks for their idiocy about just getting basic things to work, and have to resort to more bloat by going with Skype static, and for other wares do other hacks.
The whole situation is intractable, however, because FOSS seems to be an entirely unrealistic, fanatical, zealotrous, delusional, unreasonable, mob of idealists and software worshipers who can't step-back and take some criticism, and come to understand what wiser, experience, real-life people are talking about; I know of certain CEOs (from business school lectures) who made mention they try to identify OSS lovers just so they won't have to hire and deal with them: not because they hate the work, or feel it's a threat (only FOSS zealots really buy into that, whereas the commercial world laughs at those geeky nerds who can't get anything together, much less submit to some authority to get organized for more than a week before the pissy one decides to fork).
Stuff like Linux Haters blog would be so funny if it weren't so true, and if the Linux crowd actually paid attention rather than (a) getting angry and ignoring it or (b) laughing at it, then proceeding just as they were, unphased. : (
You're talking about the U.S. quelling communism around the world, which it considered as in its interests: much of the African stuff was directed by Castro--hence why we haven't liked the guy; Communism wasn't just "let's all just get along", but an idealistic system, conveniently aimed at the dumbest and desperate for support, whereby some gained ever more power over them, and told them what to do, etc.. We all stand shocked at China's continued abuses, for instance--and that's not even the worst of it; how many millions upon millions died when Russia used the world as proxies to extend communism, and with it its power?
The U.S., of course, used much of the world as proxies too, but we did so in the interest not only of our own nation, but we also wanted freedom for those other peoples and countries, at least more than communism provides; until the Dems gave official approval to mainland China, for instance, they were still an illegal entity (dang it Clinton). The U.S. government has, effectively, for the most part, in general, intervened in the world only for what has been in its interests--and usually it tries to leave things better, at great cost to our nation (in the old days why would a conqueror rebuild its opponents? But we do). Vietnam was both assisting France, and S. Vietnam, but primarily it was for stopping communism; then, as recently, the Dems politically killed an easy war (ahem, Congress blocked our bombers from taking out the only steel factory in S. Asia, which they flew over almost weekly, and which would have direly crippled N. Korea), all to foment anger; the current President even broke the Logan Act (a fellony) before being elected to disrupt political talks in Iraq for sorting-out security issues, and more.
Communism was a hostile, not benevolent, force--often one hiding violence behind pleasantries. As a Russian fellow put it, it was old and genteel men behind paper at desks responsible for millions of deaths throughout the Asian continent. Ideas...have consequences. Communism was the terrorism of its day: the U.S. took action then, and it has recently taken action against global terrorism now--to the benefit of everyone else. If you people are so simple as to just want to complain at your miserable little lives and blame the U.S. for everything, (and I'm sure it has lots of blame too), then you could kiss off: the U.S. forces form almost all of NATA, almost the whole of the U.N. "peacekeeping" forces (which it never allows to keep anything, it seems); if we withdrew all that now 500,000,000 Europeans (and millions of other Russian neighbors) would be at the mercy of 150,000,000 Russians who are currently so dissatisfied and without morals they would happily whip their neighbors, sack their former territories, and etc.. The U.N. would be totally without any military arm to do anything; N. African terrorists would freely flow into Spain and throughout Europe; Israel would be wiped off the map, the middle east dominated by extreme Islam that would spread throughout the world.
Like it or not, the U.S. has a great stabilizing effect in this world. We aren't imperial--our overseas territories are usually permitted to disassociated when they want to vote for it. We leave nations we've utterly defeated rebuilt and integrated into the international community. What more can we do for you? You going to complain at that too? Come on, seriously. Next time a Hitler comes-up in Europe, should we just let him do as he wishes? Are we the last remnant of Western society with some gusto to get things done? I really hope that in the event the U.S. fell under such a dark spell that the pacifict Europeans might help, rather than let us languish. Sheesh.
Ahem, the U.S. is a Republic first, not a pure Democracy; sadly many of our own citizens don't even know that (they should leave their citizenship card at the local INS for deportation); the left in this country also seems to conveniently ignore this fact all the time for rhetorical purposes; we are a "Democratic Republic" (legally), and to be more specific, it is an indirect Democracy due to being a representative Democracy: there are layers upon layers of abstraction built into the U.S. system specifically to prevent mob rule of the hoi polloi, based on classical theory and observations that it's too easy for powers-that-be to manipulate the masses into doing their bidding, and corrupt the law; that's happening as we speak, in the U.S., because there's little that can be done when the Federal levels decide they can just ignore the limitations of their powers (almost everything our Congress implements these days, all the judicial review actions by Federal courts, etc.) and do as if powers reserved to the states are the fewest number, rather than all not enumerated (the majority of) powers.
Effectively the U.S. system is (legally) designed to maximize liberty, not greatness on the world's playing field; (legally) the U.S. is designed to provide exceptionally more individual autonomy (you can make your way to the clouds or die in the gutter) than previous entities in history; and don't think it's all amoral: the guys who hammered-out those docs were giant pushers of "moral society", "virtuous society", and whatnot, and said such things were entirely necessary to the survival of the Union they had created. Historically the U.S. has politicans who write about the necessity of "voluntary socialism" (particulalrly they stressed the importance of women in our history for being the backbone of this) as opposed to the mandated socialism of Europe, as what keeps European style tyranny (that's what it was in U.S.A. think, and continues to be, just we're civil with Europe) or worse at bay.
As for plutocracy, when has it ever not been so in the world? And where? For more than a little time before it's undone? And frankly, in the U.S. our "rich" are usually average people who work their way up into wealth in a few decades: they are teachers, doctors, plumbers, carpenters--they're not always financial people and whatnot. That's unlike practically all other places in the world. Until recently it seemed like this ability for anyone here, whether born here or abroad, with all the opportunities and avenues we've preserved for people, might remain intact: but we have a power-hungry ideology-driven Fed right now that seems to be doing everything it can to undo all that for the sake of its own goals, rather than the sake of our nation. : ( You know, I'm one of this nation's poor: I live on under $700 a month, and considering how inflated our currency is, thought that may seem a lot in the rest of the world, due to costs of living, it is not here. Yet I do that. I've figured I can do that on even less too. In the U.S., with some responsibility, you can afford a family, building wealth, supporting charity at home and abroad, and (until recently) not having to worry the government is going to try to steal all of it in the name of "the people" (i.e. their power)--so long as you don't get caught-up in materialism and consumerism.
Remember that proverb, "Man is avarice, therefore he is man"? You're not going to much escape corruption in the world, you have to effectively deal with it when possible, when you can't you lay low and live quietly doing what you can. In the U.S. it's not just a bunch of money-bags running this country, it's often heavily-funded lobbying groups representing the poor in what they think are their interests; due to Marx having affected everything, however, they often don't realize that the supposed "rich" oppressors are people living among them, right next door, doing the same work, but being wiser: often the poor in this country think the very enabling mechanisms are their
Doesn't it ever occur to Americans that Terrorists ARE interested in freedom? THEIR freedom!
The only reason people are trying to kill Americans is that they think America has been oppressing them for generations.
You don't understand the power of ideology, do you? Your comment is simplistic. The terrorists themselves surely are interested in THEIR freedom--to murder infidels and women freely. Let me be an imperialist: such "culture" is not legitimate, and any society that decides to destroy it (which the U.S. has not taken great pains to) has all the moral authority and right in such a situation.
You should have put more emphasis on the "they think" part of your comment. America gains little from either Afghanistan or Iraq--and in both the people are freer than they've been for decades; as for Saudi Arabia, that's another situation altogether--but we haven't invaded that (nobody has).
How's the "for generations" crap applicable to the U.S.? Last I checked a large portion of the Mid-east was controlled by Britain (as you mentioned). The great majority of problems in the middle east are self-inflicted both by prevailing ideologies, and the powers that sue them to keep themselves in control.
The main consideration from the West's point of view needs to be "do they let those who're different live, to go about their affairs, or do they murder them?" For most of the middle east this is not the case.
Your comment should be modded down, not up to five; the U.S. is just a convenient target to blame so that certain interests can 'rouse support and gain power; not just terrorists, e.g. Bin Laden, but also the local power, (Bin Laden is part of a royal house, but has no hope of legal ascension to its ruling seats: so he could gain power other ways, perhaps even overthrow that house--didn't work out for him (so far)). The U.S. networks with the interests in areas just as every other nation on earth does, as tragic as the results may often be; it's just near impossible to decide to go-in with moral certitude and destroy all the politicians of the place and re-install all-new players without totally alienating all there, even if one has only destroyed their oppressors.
That's the reality all nations face in trying to do what they try to do, whether good or evil; in the end it means they need to do what's in their interests to justify, at home, going abroad, and while they do it they try to make (or enable) what improvements they may. It's sad, complex, etc., but what every nation has to deal with.
"Loss Aversion" is not the issue; the lack of discipline, documentation, standardization, collaboration, consumer features, polish, and good common sense--i.e. thinking like a non-geek, non-programmer--in the FOSS community is. There is no alternative to MS, not only because of these things, but because nobody makes as much of an investment in the wider developer community than MS: they go to great lengths to make sure thousands of pieces of software important to possibly half a billion people "just work".
Then there's libs. MS is in some ways more free than GPL software; you can't call a GPL media player without GPLing your own software on a FOSS desktop, end of story. With Microsoft there are tons of libs and apps you can call freely as a developer, from entire databases to the tiniest hidden hooks in the OS: the FSF is not only seen as a bunch of ideological zealot-hippies, it imbued this ideology into a totally unpragmatic license. There's a reason that major FOSS-contributors like Sun (who knows if they will be now, we'll see) were putting a bunch of very tempting tools into the Open Source community under GPL (even LGPL) -incompatible licenses. The FSF tries doing this too, though the BSD-type community apparently has tools that match their few tempting morsels of code that might lure poor fools into GPLing code.
There are a billion little things an end-user can tell the Linux geek of what's wrong with a linux desktop for said end-user and person in general and the FOSS community, when hearing such, starts attacking said user as an idiot; when such people get involved with FOSS by reporting bugs, etc., FOSS developers usually ignore them (just look at the trackers); popular "programs" out there like Pidgin are indispensible yet the developers are developing only for themselves (that others think it's useful is fine and dandy) so that when some very interesting, possibly newly necessary, feature is needy they literally tell people "this is for the developer, requested feature is uninteresting to him, it will never happen"; when people note buginess and instabilities in such packages since it doesn't matter to the dev/s then it never gets fixed.
I've been using Linux for 5+ years, when I get a new computer I remove Windows, and the one thing I can count on is that it not only won't just work, but that it probably never will just work, even commercial software for it, (try getting Skype to ever live up to their promise to contact you in 48 hours about issues); I'm just personally okay so long as I can find little tweaks (e.g. with Skype I change settings to one audio device, and then switch back for the rest of the desktop post call); sometimes I can't. The only thing that keeps me off windows is the price of antivirus and firewall software: but if Linux were more popular so that it was a bigger target (and those who think "secure by design" are idiots, I know plenty of people who can own a Linux box quite quickly if it hasn't been secured by an expert) I'd definitely jump ship back to Windows in a heartbeat.
To sum up: to be Loss Aversion requires getting actual gains over what is lost: this is not the case with Linux for almost any general end-user out there. With Windows, and even trial-ware on Windows, they can expect professional, intentional, refined software that "just works"; with Linux they can expect half-hearted undocumented poorly implemented junk from nerdy volunteer developers, nerds to attack them when they give criticism, buggy, ugly interfaces and packages, regressions chalked-up to hardware manufacturers and MS (get it or not: THEY DON'T CARE), no real support, no easy, consumer-oriented, security, and about a million other things to list that I don't want to waste the time on listing.
OH! Okay! : ) Sorry 'bout that, I didn't realize! Silly me.
You know, I'm really saddened these days (and I'm not saying this is you, just using your words here without other context of your mind as an example) how it is that government is used as a vehicle to drive interests, rather than sticking to the proscribed constitutionalism and operating within that framework, actually amending when considered (and only when considered as a matter of utmost caution) absolutely necessary (usually it hasn't been done with utmost caution--look at how the 16th has made our Federal government into a giant ready to crush any dissent and turn us into soft or really tyranny in the near future if it isn't put back in its box--yes, I'm talking U.S. here). I remember one persona non grata of congress talking about how he'd stand-up and tell congress repeatedly "you know we have no power to even debate this legislation", and they'd just go on with their interests. Either party, despite rhetoric, seems disinterested in any "rule of law", because that concept requires we all be submitted, providing a good framework and sort of "fairness" that we play by the same rules, rather than the modern "living constitutionalism" and other bull that plays word-games for politicians to try doing whatever they want. : ( Anyway, I agree with your statement.
Hmm... Why shouldn't either of these impose restrictions on how you use THEIR resources? Schools will, first of all, impose restrictions because the public ones are required to: and I'm not sure parents are actually opposed to this--the libraries, etc., (which are usually required to have them) have them because of parental outrage about kids using it for porn: I would rather they actually impose nothing and just, perhaps, notify parents by e-mail when the kid logs-in using the new members-only gateway so many public libraries are installing to inform parents what's up (you know, let the parents talk to their kids about [insert something here]) rather than letting government use "the kids" as a pretext to expand their powers ominously all the time.
It's like the warranties: companies everywhere provide them in packages with items sold requiring registration, knowing that most people probably won't take advantage of them: "the path of least resistance"; even in areas of liberty and freedom (like England's opt-out list) most people are just so darn lazy they won't do such things...that is, like you, going to the "opt out" list.
This way at least there's a chance somebody will actually decide to see an add; it's not a bad idea--and fair; rather than wholesale disable a site's sources of revenue, it's like with VCRs (and then later, TIVO): someone is able to pre-record and play-back later, only the VCRs weren't heavily used because weren't as convenient and couldn't record all day: TIVO lowered resistance and suddenly more people did what was possible (though more difficult) with VCRs for years; in all three of these advertising cases , VCR, TIVO, Adblock, in each the advertisers and channels they flow through complain only when it's made easy for people: it's easy, but one-more-step (for each url) [each time], to go to the host file and block advertisement urls, but that "one more step" is actually several, and not presented at convenience, (and people screw it up); in this case it's a good compromise, one step per opportunity (not several) and all the work is done for the user, easy, (yeah or nay), and a record is kept (if I'm to believe someone above) whether or not to present a dialog again. : D
If you don't like it, adventurous as you are with the whitelist features available, just look for a way in there to turn it off permanently: likely to be there, but unlikely a user is going to go searching for it (if we're talking about Mom and Grandma).
All cordiality to you.
Church goers I know have moral objections to Apple, over, you'd be surprised, things like this. They often think of Apple as a stiffling, greedy, arrogant, lying, nasty little entity and often refuse to buy from it. I'm not saying this is always the case, nor dogmatized about, just saying that's a commonality among people I know and know of. On the other hand, having a company with some sense and having some ability to ensure things are made in such a way people would actually want to use them makes sense, see here for continued thought, http://apple.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1220281&cid=27805087
On the other hand, I've seen very few nerds (read, programmers) that have any sense of what people, rather than machines, want and think like: seriously. Even the ones who know this weakness often still don't get why in general people don't want to think in heuristics, developing artificial machine-like "perfectly logical" language. I know CEOs who hire people who understand technology and people, who are good communicators, but strive to ensure they're not developers, just to smack their developers and say "stop trying to do ten things, JUST MAKE A FRICKIN' BUTTON". These types find devs to be idiots with people, with little common sense about things like interfaces; not everyone is technical: Slashdot's community hates MS, perhaps, but all those I know do everything they desperately can to avoid things like Linux like the plague: it's ugly, backwards, unusable, the user-friendly version (/Ubuntus) are now buggy and becoming just as slow as MS anyways (and why aren't there any linuxes as functional, with GUIs, and easy to use, demanding as much or little hardware, and as fast as Win 2000? In general people LOVE Win 2000 still). The FOSS community just doesn't have a frickin' clue, and those who try leading it who do...are non grata. FOSS's idea of computer freedom is code--Joe the Plumber's is "click the .exe, don't have anything to worry about regarding a config file or fixing the stupidly obvious should-be-there bug due to some left-out lib or broken API, DRM, whatever, (not even understanding those terms), and get to work unimpeded with a familar interface and workflow". That's why people pay exhorbitant fees for MS Office: with integration they get *#)* done; that's why they pay the way they do for Adobe, for...you name it on PCs. Like the recent commentator somewhere one here "why would you want vendor lock-in" which someone pointed-out "when you use FOSS you're still relying on somebody", and in a sense you're locked-in: if you haven't spent years learning code, who gives if it's FOSS? Last time I checked FOSS is no more likely or reliable to fix problems and bugs anyways--they're not purviewed to devs working on the next iteration of the spinny cube.
And you know what? I use Linux: *buntu user for years. Have liked it, but it's starting to get waaay too time-consuming to coax the dang box into working with it. More regressions, even slower, no quality controls...I also met one of the former *buntu loco team heads, a programmer, and he quit the promotory efforts: "they're idiots, they don't get it 'just needs to work'", at least the nerds he was involved with: guys like Mark seem to understand--but the devs are another story. Why is it, for instance, that when NTFS is shut-down improperly either on MS or Linux so that Linux says "it's locked, I refuse to do anything", that the devs don't go (like the rest of us), "well duh, use the built-in FUSE to change the affected variable". Do they even think they should actually do the work of making the system fix its crap? NOOOOO. Everyone knows the answer will be "boot into Windows and shut-down the device properly". What if I'm not using Windows, I'm using Linux, and the external HD, to be compatible, has NTFS for portability, Hmm??? This and a billion other things are, just, just obvious: and one knows this when they have a bunch of specifically written-up error messages addressing these kinds of things. If you have a specific error message for some problem that's obviously something you should fix, you're not doing a very good job. Anyway, except for the language, the Linux Hater's blog is recommended to all: sadly the Linux community takes a look and laughs at it, "great criticism", then ignores it...
I don't know. With Microsoft at least we're dealing with one entity: in the event it is needed the government can go to Microsoft and say "hey, we need you to support your older formats better so we can ensure they're accessible and/or move them to newer ones"; there's someone definite to deal with, entrenched so they're strong to a great extent (and not likely going anywhere), with all the incentive in the world to ensure they please such requests (which when governments request something of Microsoft, request not sue, then Microsoft usually complies).
With ODF there's standards, yes, but compliance of implementation is optional; there's no one in particular fully responsible for ensuring that compliance--there's no enforcement; people balked, for instance, at Microsoft's stipulation that anyone implementing their Open XML comply completely as a means to ensure nobody could, but that's not a totally fair representation: it's a good way to ensure actual interoperability, and if it makes it difficult on others then it's convenient for them. In the event Microsoft did sue some competitor for failure they at least have the reasonsable defense that as they understood it they were compliant, and that Microsoft overzealously prosecuted (just like with the GPL if you violate but don't realize it, but state reasonably that as you understood it you were compliant, but due to things vague your were mistaken and will correct it, it is a defense: even the FSF zealots recognize and understand this: in real ways I prefer MS, however, over the FSF, because with MS you can incentivize and be pragmatic, realistic; with FSF it's moaning, 'everyone, quick, switch LGPL to GPL, you really should, help our zealotry!!!"; they're not realistic or sensible on such things--even arguing with Linus that Linux as is is illegal because LGPL libs sit atop a GPL kernel, and they'd prosecute everyone if they could).
Anyway, the above is just food for thought, not dogmatism. Anyone with better thought or who can extend it, or critique reasonably, or whatever, is welcome to. Cheers! : )
I think you're missing the point. Most people aren't just sub-literature (technologically) compared to Slashdotters; most people don't even seem to understand when the tiniest thing goes wrong that they can Google an answer or go to "help" on the menubar or through the Start--> avenue. Most people seem not even to understand when a browser doesn't pop-up a window regarding a download that they should check their download folder (such that at work someone keeps clicking links furiously so that we find a ton of copies), if they even realize what a folder is. People are idiots when it comes to technology: Microsoft doesn't just understand this, but unlike linux crowds, they don't mock you for it. Also knowing this, the barest appearance of activation schemes is enough to deter most people, and that's the point.
Inequality is not an evil, suggesting it is by the shear ignorance is. I'm far below the poverty level, making only a few thousand a year, and rent is over half my income, but still have money leftover for food and to bank: and I'm making some basic investments for a business start-up. Meanwhile most that I know making at-poverty-line or greater sums per year cry their eyes out for being poor while they spend eight hours at work, ten in front of the tubes, and eat pre-packaged everything. Newsflash to the West (not just Americans), you don't have a right to the sold "quality of life". You don't have a right to even eat--if you don't work; that doesn't mean I or others won't feed you (that's our decision, though I'd prefer feeding the truly needy, sick, maimed, etc.). With the west truly creating little to no actual wealth, per typical individual or household, it's no wonder that inequalities are increasing between those who don't, and those who do: and this is no commendation of the IP-elite and media moguls who sell rights and air, (though I'm not against that, either). Use your resources wisely--time is one of those. Going back just before the world war, people worked practically constantly just to survive. A little further than that and that's just a fact of life that almost everyone would find unusual that anyone would think otherwise.
Breathing is controlled by your brainstem: it is unrelated to your thought or intellect, and out of your control. Of course one can override it temporarily, but the signals from gas levels will indicate to the brainstem to override your override. That's why massive damage to the head can occur, yet the vital functions of the body may remain functional a while so long as the brainstem is intact. This is a design feature for your well-being. : ) No hold-breath suicides for you! (Suffocationg works, sure, but not breath holding).
Properly, in America it is MM/DD/YYYY, but for FORMAL and important docs (such as, see below, the 4th of July), one writes DD/MM/YYYY to match antiquated docs' style. And personally, I'm with those who like YYYY/MM/DD for order on computers (for the sake of sorting). : ) In America we say things like "March 29th 2009" so we don't have to speak obstusely (i.e., the extra "the", nd/th/[whatever] (after the number), "of", etc. words). And no offense or anything: again, in formal docs I actually prefer DD/MM/YYYY, but that is when it is written with words, not with the numerical numbers/numbers/numbers form.
Yes, free will is allowed in the same sentence as lures, and they are not propositionally counter to one another, nor do their use in conjunction violate any logical standpoint. What about advertising, flirts, and hookers? All try to lure people in: in any case you are accountable for your own actions.
Back in the Cold war Cuba was directed troops in communist insurrections around the world: everything from Asian countries to former British colonies had U.S. troops inside trying to halt the advance of that ideology, and Castro often directed the troops personally that were trying to overthrow these governments.
He also helped set-up the elements in South American that are, today, destabilizing it: in the U.S. we're getting immigrants from South America who are WALKING through Mexico (entering Mexico illegally is an automatic felony, and police and populace alike there are known to commonly just beat, rob, and rape anyone who does so, and leave them for dead) if they have to, and these aren't poor people down on their luck, they're lower to upper middle class affluents escaping places like Venezuela, which have put a lot of propaganda about how all is great, but which have made anyone who isn't dirt-poor into their national scapegoats to legislate tyranny in the name of "the people". (And note, this is the great thing about the U.S., I was privelaged to get great learning about Mexico because my instructor in Spanish was Mexican: and I'm around Mexicans all the time!!)
Castro is just nuts in the eyes of the U.S.: the Russia has declassified that they removed the nukes because Fidel is such an extremist that he actually wanted to use them!
At any rate, the U.S. gets all those fleeing Cuba because of how horrid it is for the good dirty internal information that Castro & Co. don't want to get out: so it has its reasons for fully disliking that horrible government. Unfortunately there are elements here who think it's great, and actually believe that the staged-for-propaganda high-end hospitals that only rich Americans, Europeans, and favored Cubans get to use are actually the norm of their supposedly wonderful and enlightened universal system of healthcare (yeah right), among other propaganda.
...and the slashdot effect strikes again...
Whether the "a' proceeds "of" or "Evanescence", you really require an "an"! : )
English does not phoneticize its alphabets because it is so dialectical and because there are so many accents around the world: if you want several thousand varying spelling systems with a total disconnect from historical literature, rather than slightly varying spellings that cannot be mistaken between regions and no worry about the present or future generations will continue to be able to read the historical and previously written literature, go ahead. Those who think it is superior to combine the oral and literary languageS of a language haven't thought too carefully about all the detials, the above of which is relatively minor; regional Spanish is a mess precisely because it's phonetic, with lots of propensity for populations to spell things however: and it's a language very tenuously holding onto the designation of "language" rather than "languages", requiring academies intercooperating between the nations to keep it from diverging [more]; this isn't just due to poverty, but party to its phonetic spelling system.
The British Empire spread English internationally; and these days the U.S. is getting more interested in learning other languages...while the rest of the world is eager to learn English; its eagerness to do so mystifies us as much as your pissiness at us for a craze we're not responsible for. Perhaps it could be from the fact the world thinks the U.S. is rich, therefore cater to its tourists: but those are mostly the small niche of the U.S. population, well-to-do, or barely-rich to rich demographics which like to travel a lot. But that's as much every European country as America. Anyway, I'm currently studying ancient languages, have studied Spanish, and plan to start French, Portuguese, German, and Italian. : ) So please don't complain to us as if we're pushing English, when it's a world defacto international language, the seeds as such being established long ago by Britain, not the U.S..