We ARE ALREADY PAYING THEM more. If they stopped advertising for more cutomers, and put that money into infratructure, instead of advertising for MORE BANDWIDTH DRAIN, they would have spare cash to upgrade their infrastructure to deliver what they are promising in their advertisements.
It's still better than the bullshit you get from CompUSA.
I remember cussing out the manager of the Concord, CA, store, Kathy Chambers, for beign a complete retard when she tried to charge me $169 for installing a Mass Storage Device, instead of the $69 for a Hard Drive, despite the fact the hard drive I was trying to get installed was sold by them as a HARD DRIVE, and even had HARD DRIVE printed on the box. Two different prices for the same thing, just different terminology.
I could tell CompUSA horror stories *AD NAUSEUM*, but that would be somewhat offtopic.
Anyways, its good that New York is finally holding companies responsible for the hell they put customers through. EA Arts is another example of a company that flagrantly goes out of its way to avoid fixing problems caused by them (selling games where the online software is our of date, and then forcing you to call bakc and download numerous patches that don't work, making their customer service number hard to find, etc.). However, New York sould be taking care of it's own people before suing anybody for bad service. Seeing as how taxpayers pay for city services, getting service from New York, or any city/state/county, *HAS* to be harder than getting service from Dell.
This is why I build my own computers, and avoid cheaper, pre-build boxes:
Pros:
1) You get everything you want: No preloaded or promotional crap, unnecessary drivers, installation discs (My mother's HP has 8 'recovery' discs. Funny, Windows fits on 1). 2) Higher-quality parts: If I get a cheap part, it's because I decided to buy it in favor of another component, instead of making everything cheap for lower manufacturing costs. 3) Better performing parts: More efficient heatsinks, more durable power supplies, etc. 4) Somewhat better service: If you are a system builder, chances are you know alot more that Mrs. Smith the soccer mom, and aren't calling because you can't plug in the mouse. If I'm calling AMD about an OEM processor, chances are I know enough of what I'm doing to not waste time over something mundane. 5) Each component is chosen individually: I can get the video card/CPU/RAM/OS/HDD/audio card, video cars, mouse, case, keyboard, motherboard, warranty plan, and monitor that I WANT, and not letting some bluetooth sporting, ankle-biting, minimum-wage Support Tech tell me what *he* thinks is best for my needs ('needs' = 'wants' diguised as 'needs'). 6) Upgradable parts: Was told by HP I needed to buy *their* HDD if I wanted it to work in their box. Said "screw you", went to Fry's and bought a new drive with 3 times the capacity. Works fine. Any non-tech minded person would have believed them and gotten swindled. HDDs may be replaceable with any other brand, but other parts, such as CPU/RAM/audio/video cards probably won't work correctly if you upgrade them yourself. 7) Your choice of OS: Any of the Linux daughters or Windows. 8) Can be fixed yourself without voiding the warranty. 9) No ads, product tie-ins, 'lock-ins', or integrated promotional software.
Cons: 1) Usually *much* more expensive: Either cheaper for a small fileserver or more expensive for a high-end gaming rig. 2) Usually more driver discs to keep track of: Can be remedied by making 1 CD/DVD with all your drivers on it.
They are already banning fires in fireplaces in my area. Some guy claims that our need for free heat is debilitiating to him, and claims that fireplace smoke is the cause of his dog's fatal lung cancer.
Now, if the Fireplace Nazis catch smoke coming out of your fireplace, you have to take a class and pay a small fine. *NO, I AM NOT KIDDING*.
Oh, smoking in your backyard and barbeques are also illegal in a town close to me. Bonfires have been illegal for a long time in our area, and people at my college are already going classroom-to-classroom posting big obnoxious flyers telling people to stop wearing perfume for them.
Isn't it great how a single whiny brat can make everybody else change their innocent ways just to suit their own desires?
So, I guess we should ban ALL stupid people, simply because being around them causes a very small group of us to experience 'serious' medical problems (HEY!.....Psychotic episodes, debilitating headaches, hypertension, and elevated heart rates are a *VERY* SERIOUS matter!).
Someone ought to stand up against these truly stupid people and slap them to death with their own SLAPP suits.
I'M HYPERSENSITIVE TO IDIOTS AND I KNOW MY RIGHTS!
Oh good! Something even MORE SENSITIVE, and thus MORE SUBJECT TO FALSE POSITIVES!
Now, Big Brother will have reason to pull you aside because they found:
1) Ammonium nitrate (from fertilizer residue on your golf clubs, shoes, clothes, and anything that ame into contact with equipemnt or fertilized ground) 2) Nitroglycerin (from hand lotions, creams, and medication) 3) Nitrocellulose (unburned powder residue from anybody who shoots or hunts) 4) Phosphorous (residue from matches) 5) Hydrocarbons (from gasoline/diesel if you filled your car up before arriving at the airport) 6) PETN (From heart medication) 7) Glycerine (from hand lotions/creams/makeup)
Considering all the false positives and not a single positive, this product is pretty much useless, except for collaring people who ARE NOT terrorists. Even more so, what about the people who don't know what the ingredients in their personal product are?
How could someone, especially your average Jane Doe who most likely does not realize that her hand cream contains nitroglycerin? How about the cranky guy who doesn't realize he has ammonium Nitrate on his clothes that rubbed off on him from his dog who rolled around on someone's freshly fertilized lawn? How about the guy taking PETN or nitroglycerine for heart problems? Does he need to be a pharmacist as well as a chemist to know that it's the same stuff used in bombs? What about the guy who filled up his car on the way to the airport and has diesel or gasoline fuel residue on his hands? What if you are an avid rifleman? Does the presense of nitrocellulose on your hands/shirt/pants make you a suspected terrorist? They truly and honestly won't be able to explain these things, because they don't know that virtually every product used in daily life can potentially have some "explosive" (when used in pure quantities) ingredient that those overzealous, jackbooted customs "agents" are itching to collar you for.
This product has a *VERY* limited market, and by limited I mean only flights originating from certain, suspect Middle Eastern Countries. Using it in the Civilized World, it serves no more purpose than to give Big Brother enough "Probable Cause" to ruin your day, if not your life.
I'd like to see the numbers of False Positives compared to TRUE POSITIVES.
This crap is no more use than as an expensive can of Cheez Whiz.
"I'll send my business card to the BIA offering to teach their computers social skills and maybe some assertive training to say "NO" to unauthorized access. Reply to This"
-Remember, this is a Government Agency you are offering services to. Chances are, they'll take you up on the offer. If you enter into talks with them, be sure to give a highball, yet believeable price, and use lots of buzzwords (paradigm shift, proactive, forward-thinking, etc. etc. etc.)
If I were the head of Take-Two, I'd have fun in my next edition of Grand Theft Auto.....
I'd immortalize Jack Thompson, and that other idiot Devin Moore, in my video game by making them the most useless, idiotic, and retarded babbling simps in the entire game.....
Personally, I'd try to be as insulting as possible:
1) Avatars are monkeys wearing diapers. 2) Babble incoherently, with coherent excerpts of their statements mixed in among the babble. 3) If naked, give them *VERY* small johnsons. 4) Make them "bosses" in the game, ones that like to hump parking meters and small animals. 5) Refer to them by their actual, real-life names.
and last but not least.....
Include a copy of the letter, with pictures of both morons, in all game cases. Maybe even include a coupon for flagrantly insulting anti-Thompson and anti-Moore merchandise.
Yes. They aren't supposed to be posting stuff like that. They are suposed to be concentrating on killing th enemy, not cinematography. If a soldier (fellow Marine, Sairlor, Army, or Airman) is posting footage, ten he is obviosly in violation of orders, because he was filming instead of being on patrol/guard/etc. Any soldier caught posting vidoe footage without express permission should be severely punished for disobeying orders. If a soldier is looking through a viewfinder instead of looking for enemies and potential threats, then they are obviously putting their fellow soldiers in harm's way, by concentrating on filming rather than their mission.
The obvious exception to this are combat journalists, whose job is to be filming combat.
You cannot film *and* be on guard/patrol/mission at the same time.
So, in a nutshell, if they are *not* film/videos shot by combat journalists in the course of executing an order to film by their commander, then yes, I think they should be taken down. You are supposd to be fighting for the United States, *NOT* personal bragging rights.
Technically, this means anybody, especially electricians, who have been around an electric spark, or arc, can file suit for mesothelioma. Seeing as how nanotubes can be formed from sparks and arcing, thid opens up a figurative buffet for Ambulance Chasers, a.k.a. personal injury lawyers.
Slimebags, notably James Sokolove, are going to be all over this like a pack of dogs on a three-legged cat.
As much as I am for knowing the effects of certain substances and such, I wish researchers would keep this stuff under wraps so Ambulance Chasers like Douchebag Sokolove wouldn't be able to lne their grubby pockets with millions of dollars in bogus settlements (read: extortion).
As an American, I'm tempted to go to the U.K. and recieve the same type of summons, too. Then, after I have enough of them to wallpaper my room, I'd return to the United States and dare those Stalinist Brits to come and get me. I guarentee there would be *pleny* of outrage to go around, if not lead.
Scientologists claim that Scientology is just as much a religion as any other religion. I say he difference between the two is you don't have to pay thousands of dollars for spiritual enlightenment with the other religions. Religions shouldn't be allowed to charge for religious or spiritual guidence/help/enlightenment. When you start charging money, it stops being a religion and becomes a business.
The Bible, Koran, and Talmud aren't copyrighted, even though they could be, and are freely available to anyone. Yet, the "freedom-loving" (read: freedom-fucking) Scientologists charge HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of dollars just to look at their "Holy Texts" (read: sci-fi alien circle-jerk), charge HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS to practice Scientology (without being subject to their abuse), and charge HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS to gain "spiritual enlightenment". Plus, as much as people love to bash mainstream religion, none of the mainstream religions practise mind-control, brainwashing, blackmail, slander, libel, or lawsuit abuse.
The charge that this poor kid got hit with could *easily* be challenged and won on Human Rights grounds.
Politicians prefer unarmed peasants. Scientologists prefer just the politicians.
Don't get me wrong, by no means am I putting down the Robyn Williams mentioned in the article. I'd never do that.
I just had a funny mental image of the hyperactive comedian Robin Williams interviewing a scientist about this sort of thing. If you've ever seen his routines, you'd know what I mean.....
"According to a new study by CareerBuilder.com, 34 percent of IT workers say they have gained more than ten pounds in their current jobs. And 16 percent say they've gained at least twice that. The culprits seem to be the stressful-yet-sedentary nature of tech work coupled with our famously poor eating habits."
-I think that extra 10 lbs is upper-arm muscle, thanks to a few hi-def pix of Capt. Janeway and Seven-Of-Nine.
To save time, and make sure he didn't miss the kickoff with his buddies down at Cosmic Ray's Space Bar, Father Time swept the other half of the now-missing matter under the rug, so Mother Nature wouldn't find it.
Good to know the airheads at YouTue have their priotities in order:
They'll remove videos that are alleged to be copyrighted, or critical of Scientology at the drop of a hat, but they'll refuse to remove videos of terrorists killing other people.
Using magnets to turn off parts of the brain has been around for DECADES.
We just watched a video about this VERY SAME THING in psych class a month and a half ago - A magnetic pulse was used to turn off the speech center of a subjects brain while they counted from one to ten and recited a series of words.
"If you can't deliver it, don't advertise it. If you won't spend money on your infrastructure, then don't complain that you can't deliver it".
The problem is obvious: ISPs are spending more and more money advertising services they can't (or can barely) deliver (further depleting the amound of bandwidth available per customer), INSTEAD of upgrading and maintaining infrastructure to support the needs of their current consumers. Insteadt, they spend massive amounts of money advertising a service, and when the customer holds them to task and asks them to provide it, the ISPs claim that they can't, since their current customers have "gobbled up" all the available bandwidth, and their isn't enough left for them to deliver the service promised.
There really *is* a bandwidth shortage, but whose fault is it?
A) Users using the service they paid for and were promised?
or
B) ISPs who want to advertise instead of upgrading infrastructure to deliver what was/is promised to new and current customers?
"As said Murphy, 'robots can provide not only a sense of being a 'buddy' by playing soothing music or providing other entertainment, the robot also can be the audio and video link between survivor and family."
-Yeah. Like I relly want to listen to a robot sing "Feelngs" why my family watches me spend the day getting shot at. Real good.
Yeah...ending cheap oil was a very good thing.....along with the resulting:
1) High food prices. 2) High price of going ANYWHERE but home. (Work, school, dentist, doctor, etc.) 3) Inability to keep mortgage payments due to the fact people spent the rest of their money on food and fuel. 4) People losing their homes because they defaulted due to the fact there was no money left, after paying for food and fuel, to pay the mortgage/rent. 5) Prohibitive costs of heating during the winter. 6) Higher electricity prices, due to the price of fuel going up. 7) Higher transportation costs, due to the price of fuel going up. 8) Higher cost of living, due to EVERYTHING going up, becuase the price of fuel went up.
So, yeah.....if you are an idiot, ending a century of cheap oil prices was a good thing.
"Words that end in "-tion" in English end in -tie in Dutch, like traditie, natie, and discriminatie. The -tie ending is pronounced "tsee", and -atie pronounced "ah-tsee", so natie (or anything ending in -natie) sounds a lot like "not see". I hope you don't get worked up about "feminazi" and "grammar nazi" too."
-Seeing as how the entire post was in English, I'm pretty sure I didn't mistaken any of it for Dutch. Also, the word ended in -zi, not -tie, and it was typed, so the way the word is audibly interpreted in the post is irrelevent as it was typed and not pronounced..
"Don't universities receiving state or federal funding have to make typewriters for the blind available?"
-Probably, but they can't read the typing made by my standard typewriter.
"Most CAPTCHAs that I have seen in the wild are implemented poorly in a manner that discriminates against blind and hard-of-sight users. Universities cannot require the use of such poorly-implemented CAPTCHAs or they will risk losing any state or federal funding that they receive."
So anything that the blind can't see or use is discriminating against them? So I guess car manufacturers, camera manufacturers, telescope, and binocular manufacturers are in violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act? Does the fact I refused to teach a blind person how to shoot a shoot a rifle or let them handle a gun make me an "anti-blind discriminazi"?
Just because something can't be used by a blind person DOES NOT mean that it is discriminatory against them.
For someone to discriminate against someone else, they have to make the concious descision to intentionally and purposely make something inaccessable or unavailable to someone for a specific reason. If something is simply unaccessible, by either chance or mistake, that is NOT discrimination. If an elevator is taken down for routine maintenance, or it breaks, and people have to use the stairs, it the building owner discriminating against people who can't walk? Nope. Just an unfortunate set of circumstances. One that will be remedied as soon as it can, but still NOT discrimination.
Call it harsh, but making it slightly more inconvenient for a blind person to use p2p by using a CAPTCHA is far better than allowing anybody, either wired or wireless, to use the University's network willy nilly. If the blind needed to use p2p, they are more than capable of taking an extra 15 minutes out of their day to call the IT department and explain how they can't use a CAPTCHA. All they need to say is: "I'm blind and can't see the CAPTCHA. Can you let me use a different method?". Is that really just too damn difficult?. God forbid the 15 minute inconvenience.
BTW, nice post title. So I guess everything that can be percieved as 'negative' is racist/discriminatory/bigoted/uneducated/right-wing/conservative/elitist/capitalist/Nazi/Fascist? Wow.....your attempt to characterize people who want a CAPTCHA as being "anti-blind" and "disciminazi" (Discriminating Nazi?) made you look more like an idiot, rather than someone who anybody should bother to listen to. Go play your political nutjob cards somewhere else. Every time someone poses this cookie-cutter "discrimination"-this, "discrimination"-that junk, the only thing it helps is to reduce the number of people who care.
I guess you should start working on legislation to ban my "anti-blind discriminazi" typewriter.
Comparing the Exxon Valdez case to the McDonalds case is a pretty bad comparison.
In the Exxon Valdez case, Exxon was liable for the pilot, who was piloting an oil tanker while drunk. Exxon did not allow the captain to pilot the ship while drunk (the pilot decided to anyways), but they were accountable for his actions, since he was an Exxon employee, on the clock, and engaging in a business operation at the time of the incident. In no way did Exxon permit a drunk captain to pilot the ship, but they were liable in that they are accountable for the actions of their employees while on official business.
McDonald's DID NOT scald someone- The lady SCALDED HERSELF. In the McDonald's case, it was the fault of the truly stupid lady who tried to drive while trying to drink a cup of hot coffee. She should have been doing NOTHING more than focusing on driving while the car was moving, and not drinking. This is the same as fat people who sue fast food businesses because they are fat, when it is the fault of the lard-ass shoving a Double Quarter-Pounder With Cheese and fries down his or her own throat (McDonald's isn't forcing them to eat junk- the idiots CHOOSE to by ordering it, paying for it, and eating it).
"The Roberts Supreme Court will do *anything* to get their corporate masters off the hook. One of the things they are trying to do is severely limit the damages a corporation can face when it royally fucks up. One way is to protect their corporate buddies is to limit punitive damages to less than 10x the statutory damages. They don't want a company loosing their shirt like McDonalds after scalding someone."
Again, the lady SCALDED HERSELF. If McDonald's had thrown hot coffe onto her, the you could correctly say "McDonald's scalded her". But, they didn't: She scalded herself by accidentally spilling coffee into her lap when she tried to drink a CUP OF *HOT* COFFEE WHILE TRYING TO DRIVE AT THE SAME TIME. Furthermore, there was a public outrage of the outcome of the first trial in the lady's favor, as the public saw this as a clear-cut case of lawsuit abuse. He multi-million dollar "pain and suffering" award was almost eliminated on appeal, as the judge correctly saw the incident was definitely her fault. This case is infamous because virtually everybody, except for those who abuse lawsuits, holds this case as a prime example of lawsuit abuse and rewarding stupidity on behalf of the "victim".
Getting companies off the hook in these types of cases is become an inversely abusive practice- Companies that SHOULD be held liable aren't (Exxon), and companies that SHOULD NOT be held liable are (McDonald's).
The case law should be: If *YOU* do something stupid, it's *YOUR* fault, (i.e., Exxon, stupid lady with coffee) regardless if you were the one to suffer for the action(s).
Slashdot Mirror
We ARE ALREADY PAYING THEM more. If they stopped advertising for more cutomers, and put that money into infratructure, instead of advertising for MORE BANDWIDTH DRAIN, they would have spare cash to upgrade their infrastructure to deliver what they are promising in their advertisements.
It's still better than the bullshit you get from CompUSA.
I remember cussing out the manager of the Concord, CA, store, Kathy Chambers, for beign a complete retard when she tried to charge me $169 for installing a Mass Storage Device, instead of the $69 for a Hard Drive, despite the fact the hard drive I was trying to get installed was sold by them as a HARD DRIVE, and even had HARD DRIVE printed on the box. Two different prices for the same thing, just different terminology.
I could tell CompUSA horror stories *AD NAUSEUM*, but that would be somewhat offtopic.
Anyways, its good that New York is finally holding companies responsible for the hell they put customers through. EA Arts is another example of a company that flagrantly goes out of its way to avoid fixing problems caused by them (selling games where the online software is our of date, and then forcing you to call bakc and download numerous patches that don't work, making their customer service number hard to find, etc.). However, New York sould be taking care of it's own people before suing anybody for bad service. Seeing as how taxpayers pay for city services, getting service from New York, or any city/state/county, *HAS* to be harder than getting service from Dell.
This is why I build my own computers, and avoid cheaper, pre-build boxes:
Pros:
1) You get everything you want: No preloaded or promotional crap, unnecessary drivers, installation discs (My mother's HP has 8 'recovery' discs. Funny, Windows fits on 1).
2) Higher-quality parts: If I get a cheap part, it's because I decided to buy it in favor of another component, instead of making everything cheap for lower manufacturing costs.
3) Better performing parts: More efficient heatsinks, more durable power supplies, etc.
4) Somewhat better service: If you are a system builder, chances are you know alot more that Mrs. Smith the soccer mom, and aren't calling because you can't plug in the mouse. If I'm calling AMD about an OEM processor, chances are I know enough of what I'm doing to not waste time over something mundane.
5) Each component is chosen individually: I can get the video card/CPU/RAM/OS/HDD/audio card, video cars, mouse, case, keyboard, motherboard, warranty plan, and monitor that I WANT, and not letting some bluetooth sporting, ankle-biting, minimum-wage Support Tech tell me what *he* thinks is best for my needs ('needs' = 'wants' diguised as 'needs').
6) Upgradable parts: Was told by HP I needed to buy *their* HDD if I wanted it to work in their box. Said "screw you", went to Fry's and bought a new drive with 3 times the capacity. Works fine. Any non-tech minded person would have believed them and gotten swindled. HDDs may be replaceable with any other brand, but other parts, such as CPU/RAM/audio/video cards probably won't work correctly if you upgrade them yourself.
7) Your choice of OS: Any of the Linux daughters or Windows.
8) Can be fixed yourself without voiding the warranty.
9) No ads, product tie-ins, 'lock-ins', or integrated promotional software.
Cons:
1) Usually *much* more expensive: Either cheaper for a small fileserver or more expensive for a high-end gaming rig.
2) Usually more driver discs to keep track of: Can be remedied by making 1 CD/DVD with all your drivers on it.
They are already banning fires in fireplaces in my area. Some guy claims that our need for free heat is debilitiating to him, and claims that fireplace smoke is the cause of his dog's fatal lung cancer.
Now, if the Fireplace Nazis catch smoke coming out of your fireplace, you have to take a class and pay a small fine. *NO, I AM NOT KIDDING*.
Oh, smoking in your backyard and barbeques are also illegal in a town close to me. Bonfires have been illegal for a long time in our area, and people at my college are already going classroom-to-classroom posting big obnoxious flyers telling people to stop wearing perfume for them.
Isn't it great how a single whiny brat can make everybody else change their innocent ways just to suit their own desires?
BTW, I am allergic to stupid people:
When I am around stupid people, I get:
1) Hypertension.
2) Dibilitating headaches.
3) Irritability.
4) Anxious.
5) Elevated heart rate.
6) Jittery.
7) Brief psychotic episodes.
So, I guess we should ban ALL stupid people, simply because being around them causes a very small group of us to experience 'serious' medical problems (HEY!.....Psychotic episodes, debilitating headaches, hypertension, and elevated heart rates are a *VERY* SERIOUS matter!).
Someone ought to stand up against these truly stupid people and slap them to death with their own SLAPP suits.
I'M HYPERSENSITIVE TO IDIOTS AND I KNOW MY RIGHTS!
Oh good! Something even MORE SENSITIVE, and thus MORE SUBJECT TO FALSE POSITIVES!
Now, Big Brother will have reason to pull you aside because they found:
1) Ammonium nitrate (from fertilizer residue on your golf clubs, shoes, clothes, and anything that ame into contact with equipemnt or fertilized ground)
2) Nitroglycerin (from hand lotions, creams, and medication)
3) Nitrocellulose (unburned powder residue from anybody who shoots or hunts)
4) Phosphorous (residue from matches)
5) Hydrocarbons (from gasoline/diesel if you filled your car up before arriving at the airport)
6) PETN (From heart medication)
7) Glycerine (from hand lotions/creams/makeup)
Considering all the false positives and not a single positive, this product is pretty much useless, except for collaring people who ARE NOT terrorists. Even more so, what about the people who don't know what the ingredients in their personal product are?
How could someone, especially your average Jane Doe who most likely does not realize that her hand cream contains nitroglycerin? How about the cranky guy who doesn't realize he has ammonium Nitrate on his clothes that rubbed off on him from his dog who rolled around on someone's freshly fertilized lawn? How about the guy taking PETN or nitroglycerine for heart problems? Does he need to be a pharmacist as well as a chemist to know that it's the same stuff used in bombs? What about the guy who filled up his car on the way to the airport and has diesel or gasoline fuel residue on his hands? What if you are an avid rifleman? Does the presense of nitrocellulose on your hands/shirt/pants make you a suspected terrorist? They truly and honestly won't be able to explain these things, because they don't know that virtually every product used in daily life can potentially have some "explosive" (when used in pure quantities) ingredient that those overzealous, jackbooted customs "agents" are itching to collar you for.
This product has a *VERY* limited market, and by limited I mean only flights originating from certain, suspect Middle Eastern Countries. Using it in the Civilized World, it serves no more purpose than to give Big Brother enough "Probable Cause" to ruin your day, if not your life.
I'd like to see the numbers of False Positives compared to TRUE POSITIVES.
This crap is no more use than as an expensive can of Cheez Whiz.
Desperation is a stinky cologne.
"I'll send my business card to the BIA offering to teach their computers social skills and maybe some assertive training to say "NO" to unauthorized access.
Reply to This"
-Remember, this is a Government Agency you are offering services to. Chances are, they'll take you up on the offer. If you enter into talks with them, be sure to give a highball, yet believeable price, and use lots of buzzwords (paradigm shift, proactive, forward-thinking, etc. etc. etc.)
If I were the head of Take-Two, I'd have fun in my next edition of Grand Theft Auto.....
I'd immortalize Jack Thompson, and that other idiot Devin Moore, in my video game by making them the most useless, idiotic, and retarded babbling simps in the entire game.....
Personally, I'd try to be as insulting as possible:
1) Avatars are monkeys wearing diapers.
2) Babble incoherently, with coherent excerpts of their statements mixed in among the babble.
3) If naked, give them *VERY* small johnsons.
4) Make them "bosses" in the game, ones that like to hump parking meters and small animals.
5) Refer to them by their actual, real-life names.
and last but not least.....
Include a copy of the letter, with pictures of both morons, in all game cases. Maybe even include a coupon for flagrantly insulting anti-Thompson and anti-Moore merchandise.
Revenge is a bitch. Especially when it's legal.
Yes. They aren't supposed to be posting stuff like that. They are suposed to be concentrating on killing th enemy, not cinematography. If a soldier (fellow Marine, Sairlor, Army, or Airman) is posting footage, ten he is obviosly in violation of orders, because he was filming instead of being on patrol/guard/etc. Any soldier caught posting vidoe footage without express permission should be severely punished for disobeying orders. If a soldier is looking through a viewfinder instead of looking for enemies and potential threats, then they are obviously putting their fellow soldiers in harm's way, by concentrating on filming rather than their mission.
The obvious exception to this are combat journalists, whose job is to be filming combat.
You cannot film *and* be on guard/patrol/mission at the same time.
So, in a nutshell, if they are *not* film/videos shot by combat journalists in the course of executing an order to film by their commander, then yes, I think they should be taken down. You are supposd to be fighting for the United States, *NOT* personal bragging rights.
Technically, this means anybody, especially electricians, who have been around an electric spark, or arc, can file suit for mesothelioma. Seeing as how nanotubes can be formed from sparks and arcing, thid opens up a figurative buffet for Ambulance Chasers, a.k.a. personal injury lawyers.
Slimebags, notably James Sokolove, are going to be all over this like a pack of dogs on a three-legged cat.
As much as I am for knowing the effects of certain substances and such, I wish researchers would keep this stuff under wraps so Ambulance Chasers like Douchebag Sokolove wouldn't be able to lne their grubby pockets with millions of dollars in bogus settlements (read: extortion).
As an American, I'm tempted to go to the U.K. and recieve the same type of summons, too. Then, after I have enough of them to wallpaper my room, I'd return to the United States and dare those Stalinist Brits to come and get me. I guarentee there would be *pleny* of outrage to go around, if not lead.
Scientologists claim that Scientology is just as much a religion as any other religion. I say he difference between the two is you don't have to pay thousands of dollars for spiritual enlightenment with the other religions. Religions shouldn't be allowed to charge for religious or spiritual guidence/help/enlightenment. When you start charging money, it stops being a religion and becomes a business.
The Bible, Koran, and Talmud aren't copyrighted, even though they could be, and are freely available to anyone. Yet, the "freedom-loving" (read: freedom-fucking) Scientologists charge HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of dollars just to look at their "Holy Texts" (read: sci-fi alien circle-jerk), charge HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS to practice Scientology (without being subject to their abuse), and charge HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS to gain "spiritual enlightenment". Plus, as much as people love to bash mainstream religion, none of the mainstream religions practise mind-control, brainwashing, blackmail, slander, libel, or lawsuit abuse.
The charge that this poor kid got hit with could *easily* be challenged and won on Human Rights grounds.
Politicians prefer unarmed peasants. Scientologists prefer just the politicians.
Don't get me wrong, by no means am I putting down the Robyn Williams mentioned in the article. I'd never do that.
I just had a funny mental image of the hyperactive comedian Robin Williams interviewing a scientist about this sort of thing. If you've ever seen his routines, you'd know what I mean.....
That'll be more than enough for me to power my time-traveling DeLorean, which only needs 1.21 gigawatts.....
Now I can use the plutonium for other fun projects!
Every hypochondriac's wet dream come true.
"According to a new study by CareerBuilder.com, 34 percent of IT workers say they have gained more than ten pounds in their current jobs. And 16 percent say they've gained at least twice that. The culprits seem to be the stressful-yet-sedentary nature of tech work coupled with our famously poor eating habits."
-I think that extra 10 lbs is upper-arm muscle, thanks to a few hi-def pix of Capt. Janeway and Seven-Of-Nine.
To save time, and make sure he didn't miss the kickoff with his buddies down at Cosmic Ray's Space Bar, Father Time swept the other half of the now-missing matter under the rug, so Mother Nature wouldn't find it.
Good to know the airheads at YouTue have their priotities in order:
They'll remove videos that are alleged to be copyrighted, or critical of Scientology at the drop of a hat, but they'll refuse to remove videos of terrorists killing other people.
Way to go, YouBoob.
Would that be a bowel movement?
"Robyn Williams discussing the results with the lead scientists".
-Please, oh please, let that be a misspelling of the Robin Williams I know.
Using magnets to turn off parts of the brain has been around for DECADES.
We just watched a video about this VERY SAME THING in psych class a month and a half ago - A magnetic pulse was used to turn off the speech center of a subjects brain while they counted from one to ten and recited a series of words.
NOTHING NEW.
The REAL message to ISP's should be:
"If you can't deliver it, don't advertise it. If you won't spend money on your infrastructure, then don't complain that you can't deliver it".
The problem is obvious: ISPs are spending more and more money advertising services they can't (or can barely) deliver (further depleting the amound of bandwidth available per customer), INSTEAD of upgrading and maintaining infrastructure to support the needs of their current consumers. Insteadt, they spend massive amounts of money advertising a service, and when the customer holds them to task and asks them to provide it, the ISPs claim that they can't, since their current customers have "gobbled up" all the available bandwidth, and their isn't enough left for them to deliver the service promised.
There really *is* a bandwidth shortage, but whose fault is it?
A) Users using the service they paid for and were promised?
or
B) ISPs who want to advertise instead of upgrading infrastructure to deliver what was/is promised to new and current customers?
"As said Murphy, 'robots can provide not only a sense of being a 'buddy' by playing soothing music or providing other entertainment, the robot also can be the audio and video link between survivor and family."
-Yeah. Like I relly want to listen to a robot sing "Feelngs" why my family watches me spend the day getting shot at. Real good.
Yeah...ending cheap oil was a very good thing.....along with the resulting:
1) High food prices.
2) High price of going ANYWHERE but home. (Work, school, dentist, doctor, etc.)
3) Inability to keep mortgage payments due to the fact people spent the rest of their money on food and fuel.
4) People losing their homes because they defaulted due to the fact there was no money left, after paying for food and fuel, to pay the mortgage/rent.
5) Prohibitive costs of heating during the winter.
6) Higher electricity prices, due to the price of fuel going up.
7) Higher transportation costs, due to the price of fuel going up.
8) Higher cost of living, due to EVERYTHING going up, becuase the price of fuel went up.
So, yeah.....if you are an idiot, ending a century of cheap oil prices was a good thing.
"Words that end in "-tion" in English end in -tie in Dutch, like traditie, natie, and discriminatie. The -tie ending is pronounced "tsee", and -atie pronounced "ah-tsee", so natie (or anything ending in -natie) sounds a lot like "not see". I hope you don't get worked up about "feminazi" and "grammar nazi" too."
-Seeing as how the entire post was in English, I'm pretty sure I didn't mistaken any of it for Dutch. Also, the word ended in -zi, not -tie, and it was typed, so the way the word is audibly interpreted in the post is irrelevent as it was typed and not pronounced..
"Don't universities receiving state or federal funding have to make typewriters for the blind available?"
-Probably, but they can't read the typing made by my standard typewriter.
"Most CAPTCHAs that I have seen in the wild are implemented poorly in a manner that discriminates against blind and hard-of-sight users. Universities cannot require the use of such poorly-implemented CAPTCHAs or they will risk losing any state or federal funding that they receive."
So anything that the blind can't see or use is discriminating against them? So I guess car manufacturers, camera manufacturers, telescope, and binocular manufacturers are in violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act? Does the fact I refused to teach a blind person how to shoot a shoot a rifle or let them handle a gun make me an "anti-blind discriminazi"?
Just because something can't be used by a blind person DOES NOT mean that it is discriminatory against them.
For someone to discriminate against someone else, they have to make the concious descision to intentionally and purposely make something inaccessable or unavailable to someone for a specific reason. If something is simply unaccessible, by either chance or mistake, that is NOT discrimination. If an elevator is taken down for routine maintenance, or it breaks, and people have to use the stairs, it the building owner discriminating against people who can't walk? Nope. Just an unfortunate set of circumstances. One that will be remedied as soon as it can, but still NOT discrimination.
Call it harsh, but making it slightly more inconvenient for a blind person to use p2p by using a CAPTCHA is far better than allowing anybody, either wired or wireless, to use the University's network willy nilly. If the blind needed to use p2p, they are more than capable of taking an extra 15 minutes out of their day to call the IT department and explain how they can't use a CAPTCHA. All they need to say is: "I'm blind and can't see the CAPTCHA. Can you let me use a different method?". Is that really just too damn difficult?. God forbid the 15 minute inconvenience.
BTW, nice post title. So I guess everything that can be percieved as 'negative' is racist/discriminatory/bigoted/uneducated/right-wing/conservative/elitist/capitalist/Nazi/Fascist? Wow.....your attempt to characterize people who want a CAPTCHA as being "anti-blind" and "disciminazi" (Discriminating Nazi?) made you look more like an idiot, rather than someone who anybody should bother to listen to. Go play your political nutjob cards somewhere else. Every time someone poses this cookie-cutter "discrimination"-this, "discrimination"-that junk, the only thing it helps is to reduce the number of people who care.
I guess you should start working on legislation to ban my "anti-blind discriminazi" typewriter.
Comparing the Exxon Valdez case to the McDonalds case is a pretty bad comparison.
In the Exxon Valdez case, Exxon was liable for the pilot, who was piloting an oil tanker while drunk. Exxon did not allow the captain to pilot the ship while drunk (the pilot decided to anyways), but they were accountable for his actions, since he was an Exxon employee, on the clock, and engaging in a business operation at the time of the incident. In no way did Exxon permit a drunk captain to pilot the ship, but they were liable in that they are accountable for the actions of their employees while on official business.
McDonald's DID NOT scald someone- The lady SCALDED HERSELF. In the McDonald's case, it was the fault of the truly stupid lady who tried to drive while trying to drink a cup of hot coffee. She should have been doing NOTHING more than focusing on driving while the car was moving, and not drinking. This is the same as fat people who sue fast food businesses because they are fat, when it is the fault of the lard-ass shoving a Double Quarter-Pounder With Cheese and fries down his or her own throat (McDonald's isn't forcing them to eat junk- the idiots CHOOSE to by ordering it, paying for it, and eating it).
"The Roberts Supreme Court will do *anything* to get their corporate masters off the hook. One of the things they are trying to do is severely limit the damages a corporation can face when it royally fucks up. One way is to protect their corporate buddies is to limit punitive damages to less than 10x the statutory damages. They don't want a company loosing their shirt like McDonalds after scalding someone."
Again, the lady SCALDED HERSELF. If McDonald's had thrown hot coffe onto her, the you could correctly say "McDonald's scalded her". But, they didn't: She scalded herself by accidentally spilling coffee into her lap when she tried to drink a CUP OF *HOT* COFFEE WHILE TRYING TO DRIVE AT THE SAME TIME. Furthermore, there was a public outrage of the outcome of the first trial in the lady's favor, as the public saw this as a clear-cut case of lawsuit abuse. He multi-million dollar "pain and suffering" award was almost eliminated on appeal, as the judge correctly saw the incident was definitely her fault. This case is infamous because virtually everybody, except for those who abuse lawsuits, holds this case as a prime example of lawsuit abuse and rewarding stupidity on behalf of the "victim".
Getting companies off the hook in these types of cases is become an inversely abusive practice- Companies that SHOULD be held liable aren't (Exxon), and companies that SHOULD NOT be held liable are (McDonald's).
The case law should be: If *YOU* do something stupid, it's *YOUR* fault, (i.e., Exxon, stupid lady with coffee) regardless if you were the one to suffer for the action(s).