Why? because you don't like peopl eworking for you who like to make inflamatory posts on slashdot?
The better real answer of course is... this is why workers need unions.
A job may not be a right, but I do believe that there should be limits to how much one can profit on the backs of others without giving back.
You want to call me a parasite forcalling for unions? I look at companies where people are expected to work like slaves, and have no protections against having their pay slashed, or benefits cut, or just be tossed out in the street like yesterdays garbage, while the CEO and upper management live like kings, and I know who the parasites are.
I think that a job is a contract, and that that contract should have certain terms just implicit within it. Simple reasonability here. If they want you to be available 24 hours a day, then they should provide some means by which to contact you. Its that simple.
My job does it for me, and I would lik eto think that I have enough self respect that if they stopped, I would tell them to go screw themselves and start looking for a new job at the very least.
Now I admit, I have been a bit spoiled by working with and for people who treat employees like human beings, pay them fair wages, and believe in giving them the tools they need to do their job right. These are minimums. Frankly, if a company can't do that, then maybe they just shouldn't be in buisness at all?
I have no sympathy for companies... they get special protections from the government, limited liability and all that. In return, I have no problem with requiring them to do things, like respect their workers and fairly bargain with them collectivly.
My advice here is simple and it relates directly to the difference in those expectations.
CONTACT A LABOR LAWYER NOW. Get a consultation, see who will just talk to you. Talk now.
That or start looking for a new job (or both).
Basically they hired you annd expect you to provide 24x7 service. Now they are taking away the very tool they gave you to enable you to provide that service, and expecting you to maintain that level of service?
Thats a big change in expectations. They are basically adding a new requirement to your job. You were hired or placed in your current position with 2 expectations 1) you would provide coverage and be available for coverage in off hours and 2) that your employer would provide you with a means for being contacted and doing that work.
Can they change that requirement and then fire you for not meeting it? I don't know. Maybe they can, maybe they can't. IANAL.
Secondly remember strength in numbers. I recomend highly talking with fellow employees about this and not going it alone... impress upon them how heinous it is, and that together, you don't have to put up with it. (what are they going to do? fire everyone?)
Of course depending on what state your in they may have to take it back.
Here in MA we do have some consumer protection laws that basically say unless its a clearance sale, they MUST accept returns within a reasonable period of time.
So what did you do at that point? Cancel the sale immediatly? Demand a different PS2? "Because this one has been dropped"?
Buy the service plan and then make sure it needed service every other week?
Where it lay dormant for many years, until the early 70s when a friend sent Shulgin a copy of that patent, and Shulgin, noting its similarity to MDA, which was being used at the time by psychotherepists (and was all the rage with them), decided to make some MDMA.
Soon it was MDMA that was all the rage in the psychothereputic community, and had replaced MDA pretty effectivly.
(Of course right around that time LSD had been used in some practices since the 1950s, before it got associated with anti-government hippies and demonized, back when Carey grant could be shown on the cover of a major magazine proclaiming to have used LSD over 100 times)
So yah, he didn't invent MDMA (though he did invent quite a few), but he did help in the rediscovery of it.
True but its often lumped into the same catagory, whether appropriatly or not.
Its often found in similar scenes, and even Shulgin himself had quite a hand in the rediscovery of MDMA. Both of which also share in common that they came first through experimentation in the psycothereputic community before they made it into more wide spread use.
I wholeheartedly agree that these are great books, and I think that before anyone forms an opinion about people who use psychedelics based on those idiot kids that eat too much E and go to parties and get themselves in trouble, that they should read these books.
The portions that are available for free, while wonderful for their own reasons, pale in comparison to the first half of the books. That is the story.
These books are the "true story" (names changes etc in an attempt to avoid prosecution which worked well enough to keep the shulgins free, but not enough to save Sasha's Schedule 1 chemicals license as the opening of tihkal tells) of a chemist and psycopharmacologist.
This man has invented drugs that later hit the street. He is so well respected in the community, that his job is a consultant. The DEA often brings him in to testify as an expert witness on chemistry and drugs. He is the real deal.
More than that he is personally amazing. I saw him speak at MIT last year, and for an 80 year old man (or just about hes what 79 or so?) he is vibrant and totally with it. If I am half as with it as he is when I am 70, I will be thankful for how I ended up.
Not exactly what many people would expect from a person who has had the experiences he has.
The thing all those whiney "vehicles are dangerous" people forget is, that this is part of a delicate balance of death that keeps our populations in check. Its a good thing. Death is necissary for life, really, its actually good.
Realise thsoe humans have no natural predators, 20,000 is nothing. Theres plenty more being made. We arn't running out anytime soon.
Actually I don't see any slippery slope at all. I am saying, quite factually, that the entirety of police authority rests on the threat of legally sanctioned violence.
Are we going to split hairs over the definition of violence?
The entire concept of arrest is part of the due process for legalized violence.
Police officer places you under arrest and brings you to the station. This means you can go willfully with him, or he can subdo you and bring you. How is subdueing you NOT a form of violence? If you resist his attempt to bring you in, he may use whatever force is needed to bring you in or, if your resistance puts him or anyone else in danger, to kill you.
It is that threat of escalation to violence that is the very foundation of their powers. It always has been, and always will be.
I am not saying that is wrong. I am not saying that shouldn't be. I am saying that we should always be mindful of that. Is this right for stealing? Yes, I think it is. Is this right for a person suspected of murder? Yes, I can live with that.
Is this right for a person who says "I would rather not identify myself". I don't think so.
Of course.... I don't see why this was needed at all...
You see I don't know about other states, but I know that in my state, in order to get a drivers license, you sign a paper that agrees to abide by traffic laws and that you agree to show that drivers license to the police when they stop you for whatever reason.
Essentially, its already breech of contract if you don't.
What does it mean when the supreme court says that you have no right to anonymity. Or rather that you have no right to refuse to identify yourself when asked by a police officer?
Well... they are saying that yes indeed a police officer can arrest you for not identifying yourself. Essentially, a police officer, an agent of the government, can use the threat of arrest, and even arrest itself to compel a person to identify themseleves.
Fundamentally, every law is founded on the threat of violence. What does it mean to say that stealing is illegal? It means that if you are caught stealing, the governmets thugs, the police, are going to take you away, by force, bring you before a judge, and if he finds you did it (yes I am simplifying the whole jury process etc... the details of how guilt is found isn't relevant) then they are going to punish you.
So when the supreme court rules that you have no right to not identify yourself, they are ruling that the state has every right to use some measure of the violence at their disposal against you if you refuse to identify yourself.
This is the formal, offical government approved, way of saying "You better not do that, or we are going to kmake you sorry"
its true... but you would think that they are more likely to find out about this before cops ever airs, say like when he doesn't show up for work, or even from the local newspaper police blotter... which he certainly doesn't have to consent to.
never said anything like that. All I said is that I don't understand why a person wouldn't sign. Never said they should be compelled to or that people don't learn from their mistakes.
Pretty shitty straw man, nice try though. Keep up the good work.
So if you are holding back from people and trying to hide the fact that you were a dumbass one night and did something so monumentally stupid that you got yourself on Cops, then you might have something to lose?
What is it that you might have to lose there? I just don't get it. Maybe if you are that guy that when he trips over something the first thing he does is think "whew good thing nobody saw that" then sure, you might have something to lose.... in your twisted little world anyway.
Why not? I mean... they are caught. its not like it matters at that point. If you have been arrested, then whether or not you sign isn;t going to affect the court case, its all going on your record anyway...
why not sign? Ya really don't have anything to lose.
It could be a vast rightwing conspiracy... which is why they chose clear channel. Because they were a good old chum that could be counted on to fold when it was needed for them to fold...
They pay up some pittance (which is nothing compared to clear channels assets or debt), and in return the right wing conspiracy (to which they are a part) gets what it wants, and clear channel gets what they want - namely the FCC now has a nice case to hold up when they go after clear channels competitors...
Lets not forget that both of those rich whirte millionaires are from families in the northeast (yes folks, the slight southern twang Bush has is one he learned in college by all accounts),
and both of those families go back to European Aristocracy, and even have common relatives. Look up their family trees sometime... if I remember right, Bush is a direct line decendant of one o fthe Henrys (Henry VI ? I forget) and I Kerry, one of the Louis... Louis IIX if memory serves.
-Steve
Re:No! I use CapsLock as my "ESC" key
on
Is Caps Lock Dead?
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· Score: 1
Of course, keeping your hands on the home row is likely to speed the demise of your wrists unless you get one of those weird funky keyboards.
I on the other hand learned to type naturally... you know by just doing it and letting my hands and wrists move in whatever way made the most sense. Now I touch type but without ever putting my wrists in bad positions.
Hence.. if you value your wrists, never take a typing class.
I have a focus FK-2001, the best keyboard ever made since the IBM keyboard of power. Its got basically the same layout, but updated to the standards of the late 90s.
It clicks and feels like a keyboard should. And reliable? Each key can be disassembled right down to the real metal contacts with little more than a screwdriver (not that I have ever needed to do so).
Above the board and below the key caps, is a metal spill gaurd that shunts liquids away from the key mechanisms and down to the bottom of the case, where they can do no harm.
I had some nice conversations with a guy in the air gaurd... ya know... the guy that has the dubious honor of having almost pulled a gun on a general because the idiots in the unmarked air craft (don't you love how we talk about the iraqis disguoising people as civilians when we move our generals around in unmarked civilian looking planes) didn't get proper clearance for the runway he was on when transporting said general around.
Anyway... he was pretty soon out of training and we were talking about police and how they do their jobs. One rule he did tell me "doesn't matter what he did, if he turns to flee and is running away, you can not shoot him."
Thats right... if a person takes of running, you call for backup and/or give chase. That sone reason cops work in teams. one gives chase, the other calls for backup, and then gives chase.
Another interesting thing... if a cop gets in a fight with someone, his partners first job is NOT to defend him. His partners first job is to call for backup. THEN and ONLY then should he jump in.
Anyway, plain and simple. If the suspect runs and you shoot him in the back, thats murder.
I am more systems than network and one thing missing here...
I have been told that WEP isn't worth the trouble, and I generally agree. The net is a hostile place anyway... you just plain shouldn't be transmitting sensitive data unencrypted.
You shouldn't be relying on routers to do your encryption. Use ssh, use https. End of story.
Me? I leave WEP turned off, and lock to mac address. Then take care of the rest properly. I am connected to a box on the net all day long. Frankly, I don't give a shit if some guy in a van can watch me reload slashdot all day long. He isn't getting at my credit card information or my useful paswords. The worst he can do is post a nasty message on slashdot or use up a few of my subscription page loads.
All that said..another service... slashdot should offer ssl to people with subscriptions. Afterall, I paid for the page loads, if someone sniffed my password or cookie, then they they could use my subscription on my dime. Not cool. (then again, given that they could maybe cost me $10 in the course of a year, I don't care that much, I probably lose more than that in gas while my car idles at red lights over the course of the year)
Well its easy. Other operations don't have easy heat signatures that you can see from fucking space (ok, little hyperbole there). They don't run up huge electric bills. Overall, harder to catch.
Also a largish heroin or coke operation is more likely to have automatic weapons, or just be plain paying off the cops. A house growing pot... you are maybe talking about a few hundred plants... large operation would be a huge feild.
All your base... in streings of IR LEDs... thats the way to go.
I always wanted to put a sign with IR LEDs on the roof for when the police were using their IR cameras to look for people growing plants in their houses. (something like "Stop wasting my tax dollars")
Then the supreme court went and ruled they need a warrent for that shit... took all the fun out of my day.
I wanna second the bike thing. I just rode a bike for the first time in 8 years and I had totally forgotten how much I used to love it. I supose I hadn't totally forgotten, I have been riding a motorcycle around for 3 years now but, still... self propelled vehicles are nice.
I want to lose weight, and I realised, I live close enough to work to bike, why not save the wear and tear on the motor vehicles, and just bike in every day. So I grabbed an old bike my sister isn't using, got it ready to go (still need to adjust the derailers but it works as is)
I think next time my sister and I ride, I will take the bike with the back seat for her kid, that way I can get the extra extrcise.
The one problem is bad weather. I suppose I could put on my motorcycle raingear (a downpour never stopped me from riding that bike), but when you are peddling, extra gear sucks!
And of course nature has conspired to keep me off the new way into work for the past few days... when will the sun come out again?
If you are interested in LSD, it has been studied. Remember it was discovered in the 30s and not made illegal until the late 60s or early 70s (I forget exactly).
I HIGHLY recomend "LSD Psychotherepy" by Stanislav Groff MD. It is THE work on the subject and a very aproachable book overall. It talks extensivly about his clinical work with LSD over the years and what techniques have found good results.
The overall process falls somewhere between ancient shamanic ritual and modern psychoterepy (and in a way, uses both). It is not seen as a treatment in and of itself so much as a part of a larger treatment plan involving more traditional counseling before and after the experience(s).
From my own LSD experiences I can see the value. LSD is not an escapists drug. I have seen people try to use it that way, and it can do that for a while. However, if you are fundamentally not happy, you can expect very difficult experiences. LSD will cause your inner world to project outward into your perceptions. If you emotionally feel like shit, then with LSD you will quite likely find yourself in a world of shit.
One of the more fascinating effects was noted with schizophrenia. Its been noted that often schizophrenics who are having an episode will "get worst before they get better". LSD experiences tend to make the episode get worst faster, but also, lessen the overall average length of the episode. (really read the book. Dr Groff is the authority)
As for flashbacks, they are normal. ANyone who says they have never had one either doesn't understand them, or is really abnormal. Ever felt deja-vu? guess what? Same thing. Flashbacks can be much more intense or vivid, but thats rare.
Now on topic again... I have seen people go through several psychotic breaks. Some drug related, some not so much. In all cases its been similar, but not in a way I can easily describe. Its an odd skill that you pick up from seeing people that you care about go through delusions. A way of relating to them and even helping them when you can (even if that means just steering them away from trouble long enough for them to get a grip or not get arrested)
You realise that knowing they are having a delusion doesn't really make the delusion any less real. You have to know that it IS real for them, and you have to respect that reality.
As for being on the other end, I don't know. I have philisophical problems with anti-psychotic drugs, and never mind their side effects (look at the side effects for thorazine sometime... it can (rearely) cause a permanent parkinsons syndrome after even a single dose!)
This is one of the reasons I liked Brillient mind. Wonderful movie and great story. He came to a realisation that alot of people don't get. The mind is very trainable. Just as a person can be trained to stop at a red light at 3 am on deserted city streets waiting for that green, just as a person can be trained to see the world in such black and white terms that they could blow themselves up with a crowd of their "enemys", so can a mind be trained to pay attention to things or see things that it would normally ignore.(or ignore things that it would normally see)
Thats the funny thing about lsd too. Many of the odd effects are just things that you stop ignoring. Like the little trails in your vision, or the faint echo of your voice off the walls, or the feeling of various parts of your body that you normally wouldn't be paying attention to.
Its just a matter of remembering, as long as you cankeep yourself healthy and alie and socialize with outher people to a level thats satisfactory for your own happiness, it doesn't matter how many deamons are running around or how many songs inanimate objects sing... its only a mental disorder if its causing a problem for you.
The hard part is learning to not let it cause a problem. As a friend of mine once said "sure after you have done as much acid as I have you might startto see ghost images in mirrors and all sorts of weird disturbances, but eventually you get used to them" (if we could only all be so calm about it, I think we would have less problems with people overall)
However it does further the intentions of advertisers.... namely to help convince people that advertising actually does something.
Remember, when your consumers are not your customers, and your product is comepletely intangible, you have to somehow justify your existance and convince executives that paying you is a legitimate buisness expense.
Thus you need to come out with wonkey statistics like how many eyeballs viewed the vapid nonsense that you are putting out.
I say fight advertising at every turn, delete it, remove it, deride people just for even viewing it or listenin got it whenever possible. Frankly I do whatever possible to never even have an ad pass my eyes or ears. I choose CDs and NPR over commercial radio. I choose dvds over commercial TV. I choose popup blockers and limited choice cookies acceptance over unique ids and innundation with ads.
Fuck advertisers, I say lets drive their entire buisness model into the ground.
Slashdot Mirror
Why? because you don't like peopl eworking for you who like to make inflamatory posts on slashdot?
The better real answer of course is... this is why workers need unions.
A job may not be a right, but I do believe that there should be limits to how much one can profit on the backs of others without giving back.
You want to call me a parasite forcalling for unions? I look at companies where people are expected to work like slaves, and have no protections against having their pay slashed, or benefits cut, or just be tossed out in the street like yesterdays garbage, while the CEO and upper management live like kings, and I know who the parasites are.
I think that a job is a contract, and that that contract should have certain terms just implicit within it. Simple reasonability here. If they want you to be available 24 hours a day, then they should provide some means by which to contact you. Its that simple.
My job does it for me, and I would lik eto think that I have enough self respect that if they stopped, I would tell them to go screw themselves and start looking for a new job at the very least.
Now I admit, I have been a bit spoiled by working with and for people who treat employees like human beings, pay them fair wages, and believe in giving them the tools they need to do their job right. These are minimums. Frankly, if a company can't do that, then maybe they just shouldn't be in buisness at all?
I have no sympathy for companies... they get special protections from the government, limited liability and all that. In return, I have no problem with requiring them to do things, like respect their workers and fairly bargain with them collectivly.
-Steve
My advice here is simple and it relates directly to the difference in those expectations.
CONTACT A LABOR LAWYER NOW. Get a consultation, see who will just talk to you. Talk now.
That or start looking for a new job (or both).
Basically they hired you annd expect you to provide 24x7 service. Now they are taking away the very tool they gave you to enable you to provide that service, and expecting you to maintain that level of service?
Thats a big change in expectations. They are basically adding a new requirement to your job. You were hired or placed in your current position with 2 expectations 1) you would provide coverage and be available for coverage in off hours and 2) that your employer would provide you with a means for being contacted and doing that work.
Can they change that requirement and then fire you for not meeting it? I don't know. Maybe they can, maybe they can't. IANAL.
Secondly remember strength in numbers. I recomend highly talking with fellow employees about this and not going it alone... impress upon them how heinous it is, and that together, you don't have to put up with it. (what are they going to do? fire everyone?)
-Steve
Of course depending on what state your in they may have to take it back.
Here in MA we do have some consumer protection laws that basically say unless its a clearance sale, they MUST accept returns within a reasonable period of time.
So what did you do at that point? Cancel the sale immediatly? Demand a different PS2? "Because this one has been dropped"?
Buy the service plan and then make sure it needed service every other week?
-Steve
Where it lay dormant for many years, until the early 70s when a friend sent Shulgin a copy of that patent, and Shulgin, noting its similarity to MDA, which was being used at the time by psychotherepists (and was all the rage with them), decided to make some MDMA.
Soon it was MDMA that was all the rage in the psychothereputic community, and had replaced MDA pretty effectivly.
(Of course right around that time LSD had been used in some practices since the 1950s, before it got associated with anti-government hippies and demonized, back when Carey grant could be shown on the cover of a major magazine proclaiming to have used LSD over 100 times)
So yah, he didn't invent MDMA (though he did invent quite a few), but he did
help in the rediscovery of it.
-Steve
True but its often lumped into the same catagory, whether appropriatly or not.
Its often found in similar scenes, and even Shulgin himself had quite a hand in the rediscovery of MDMA. Both of which also share in common that they came first through experimentation in the psycothereputic community before they made it into more wide spread use.
-Steve
I wholeheartedly agree that these are great books, and I think that before anyone forms an opinion about people who use psychedelics based on those idiot kids that eat too much E and go to parties and get themselves in trouble, that they should read these books.
The portions that are available for free, while wonderful for their own reasons, pale in comparison to the first half of the books. That is the story.
These books are the "true story" (names changes etc in an attempt to avoid prosecution which worked well enough to keep the shulgins free, but not enough to save Sasha's Schedule 1 chemicals license as the opening of tihkal tells) of a chemist and psycopharmacologist.
This man has invented drugs that later hit the street. He is so well respected in the community, that his job is a consultant. The DEA often brings him in to testify as an expert witness on chemistry and drugs. He is the real deal.
More than that he is personally amazing. I saw him speak at MIT last year, and for an 80 year old man (or just about hes what 79 or so?) he is vibrant and totally with it. If I am half as with it as he is when I am 70, I will be thankful for how I ended up.
Not exactly what many people would expect from a person who has had the experiences he has.
-Steve
Ya but we still have a stable population.....
The thing all those whiney "vehicles are dangerous" people forget is, that this is part of a delicate balance of death that keeps our populations in check. Its a good thing. Death is necissary for life, really, its actually good.
Realise thsoe humans have no natural predators, 20,000 is nothing. Theres plenty more being made. We arn't running out anytime soon.
-Steve
Actually I don't see any slippery slope at all. I am saying, quite factually, that the entirety of police authority rests on the threat of legally sanctioned violence.
Are we going to split hairs over the definition of violence?
The entire concept of arrest is part of the due process for legalized violence.
Police officer places you under arrest and brings you to the station. This means you can go willfully with him, or he can subdo you and bring you. How is subdueing you NOT a form of violence? If you resist his attempt to bring you in, he may use whatever force is needed to bring you in or, if your resistance puts him or anyone else in danger, to kill you.
It is that threat of escalation to violence that is the very foundation of their powers. It always has been, and always will be.
I am not saying that is wrong. I am not saying that shouldn't be. I am saying that we should always be mindful of that. Is this right for stealing? Yes, I think it is. Is this right for a person suspected of murder? Yes, I can live with that.
Is this right for a person who says "I would rather not identify myself". I don't think so.
-Steve
Of course.... I don't see why this was needed at all...
You see I don't know about other states, but I know that in my state, in order to get a drivers license, you sign a paper that agrees to abide by traffic laws and that you agree to show that drivers license to the police when they stop you for whatever reason.
Essentially, its already breech of contract if you don't.
-Steve
Actually no, I don't think it is.
What does it mean when the supreme court says that you have no right to anonymity. Or rather that you have no right to refuse to identify yourself when asked by a police officer?
Well... they are saying that yes indeed a police officer can arrest you for not identifying yourself. Essentially, a police officer, an agent of the government, can use the threat of arrest, and even arrest itself to compel a person to identify themseleves.
Fundamentally, every law is founded on the threat of violence. What does it mean to say that stealing is illegal? It means that if you are caught stealing, the governmets thugs, the police, are going to take you away, by force, bring you before a judge, and if he finds you did it (yes I am simplifying the whole jury process etc... the details of how guilt is found isn't relevant) then they are going to punish you.
So when the supreme court rules that you have no right to not identify yourself, they are ruling that the state has every right to use some measure of the violence at their disposal against you if you refuse to identify yourself.
This is the formal, offical government approved, way of saying "You better not do that, or we are going to kmake you sorry"
-Steve
its true... but you would think that they are more likely to find out about this before cops ever airs, say like when he doesn't show up for work, or even from the local newspaper police blotter... which he certainly doesn't have to consent to.
never said anything like that. All I said is that I don't understand why a person wouldn't sign. Never said they should be compelled to or that people don't learn from their mistakes.
Pretty shitty straw man, nice try though. Keep up the good work.
-Steve
So if you are holding back from people and trying to hide the fact that you were a dumbass one night and did something so monumentally stupid that you got yourself on Cops, then you might have something to lose?
What is it that you might have to lose there? I just don't get it. Maybe if you are that guy that when he trips over something the first thing he does is think "whew good thing nobody saw that" then sure, you might have something to lose.... in your twisted little world anyway.
-Steve
Why not? I mean... they are caught. its not like it matters at that point. If you have been arrested, then whether or not you sign isn;t going to affect the court case, its all going on your record anyway...
why not sign? Ya really don't have anything to lose.
-Steve
The two are not mutually exclusive.
It could be a vast rightwing conspiracy... which is why they chose clear channel. Because they were a good old chum that could be counted on to fold when it was needed for them to fold...
They pay up some pittance (which is nothing compared to clear channels assets or debt), and in return the right wing conspiracy (to which they are a part) gets what it wants, and clear channel gets what they want - namely the FCC now has a nice case to hold up when they go after clear channels competitors...
and the conspiracy rolls on....
-Steve
Lets not forget that both of those rich whirte millionaires are from families in the northeast (yes folks, the slight southern twang Bush has is one he learned in college by all accounts),
and both of those families go back to European Aristocracy, and even have common relatives. Look up their family trees sometime... if I remember right, Bush is a direct line decendant of one o fthe Henrys (Henry VI ? I forget) and I Kerry, one of the Louis... Louis IIX if memory serves.
-Steve
Of course, keeping your hands on the home row is likely to speed the demise of your wrists unless you get one of those weird funky keyboards.
I on the other hand learned to type naturally... you know by just doing it and letting my hands and wrists move in whatever way made the most sense. Now I touch type but without ever putting my wrists in bad positions.
Hence.. if you value your wrists, never take a typing class.
-Steve
Worst than that for me...
I have a focus FK-2001, the best keyboard ever made since the IBM keyboard of power. Its got basically the same layout, but updated to the standards of the late 90s.
It clicks and feels like a keyboard should. And reliable? Each key can be disassembled right down to the real metal contacts with little more than a screwdriver (not that I have ever needed to do so).
Above the board and below the key caps, is a metal spill gaurd that shunts liquids away from the key mechanisms and down to the bottom of the case, where they can do no harm.
-Steve
While admittedly funny....
I had some nice conversations with a guy in the air gaurd... ya know... the guy that has the dubious honor of having almost pulled a gun on a general because the idiots in the unmarked air craft (don't you love how we talk about the iraqis disguoising people as civilians when we move our generals around in unmarked civilian looking planes) didn't get proper clearance for the runway he was on when transporting said general around.
Anyway... he was pretty soon out of training and we were talking about police and how they do their jobs. One rule he did tell me "doesn't matter what he did, if he turns to flee and is running away, you can not shoot him."
Thats right... if a person takes of running, you call for backup and/or give chase. That sone reason cops work in teams. one gives chase, the other calls for backup, and then gives chase.
Another interesting thing... if a cop gets in a fight with someone, his partners first job is NOT to defend him. His partners first job is to call for backup. THEN and ONLY then should he jump in.
Anyway, plain and simple. If the suspect runs and you shoot him in the back, thats murder.
-Steve
I am more systems than network and one thing missing here...
I have been told that WEP isn't worth the trouble, and I generally agree. The net is a hostile place anyway... you just plain shouldn't be transmitting sensitive data unencrypted.
You shouldn't be relying on routers to do your encryption. Use ssh, use https. End of story.
Me? I leave WEP turned off, and lock to mac address. Then take care of the rest properly. I am connected to a box on the net all day long. Frankly, I don't give a shit if some guy in a van can watch me reload slashdot all day long. He isn't
getting at my credit card information or my useful paswords. The worst he can do
is post a nasty message on slashdot or use up a few of my subscription page loads.
All that said..another service... slashdot should offer ssl to people with subscriptions. Afterall, I paid for the page loads, if someone sniffed my password or cookie, then they they could use my subscription on my dime.
Not cool. (then again, given that they could maybe cost me $10 in the course
of a year, I don't care that much, I probably lose more than that in gas while my car idles at red lights over the course of the year)
-Steve
Well its easy. Other operations don't have easy heat signatures that you can see from fucking space (ok, little hyperbole there). They don't run up huge electric bills. Overall, harder to catch.
Also a largish heroin or coke operation is more likely to have automatic weapons, or just be plain paying off the cops. A house growing pot... you are maybe talking about a few hundred plants... large operation would be a huge feild.
Sure they have money but...
-Steve
All your base... in streings of IR LEDs... thats the way to go.
I always wanted to put a sign with IR LEDs on the roof for when the police were using their IR cameras to look for people growing plants in their houses.
(something like "Stop wasting my tax dollars")
Then the supreme court went and ruled they need a warrent for that shit... took all the fun out of my day.
-Steve
I wanna second the bike thing. I just rode a bike for the first time in 8 years and I had totally forgotten how much I used to love it. I supose I hadn't totally forgotten, I have been riding a motorcycle around for 3 years now but, still...
self propelled vehicles are nice.
I want to lose weight, and I realised, I live close enough to work to bike, why not save the wear and tear on the motor vehicles, and just bike in every day.
So I grabbed an old bike my sister isn't using, got it ready to go (still need to adjust the derailers but it works as is)
I think next time my sister and I ride, I will take the bike with the back seat for her kid, that way I can get the extra extrcise.
The one problem is bad weather. I suppose I could put on my motorcycle raingear (a downpour never stopped me from riding that bike), but when you are peddling, extra gear sucks!
And of course nature has conspired to keep me off the new way into work for the past few days... when will the sun come out again?
-Steve
If you are interested in LSD, it has been studied. Remember it was discovered in the 30s and not made illegal until the late 60s or early 70s (I forget exactly).
I HIGHLY recomend "LSD Psychotherepy" by Stanislav Groff MD. It is THE work on the subject and a very aproachable book overall. It talks extensivly about his clinical work with LSD over the years and what techniques have found good results.
The overall process falls somewhere between ancient shamanic ritual and modern psychoterepy (and in a way, uses both). It is not seen as a treatment in and of itself so much as a part of a larger treatment plan involving more traditional counseling before and after the experience(s).
From my own LSD experiences I can see the value. LSD is not an escapists drug. I have seen people try to use it that way, and it can do that for a while. However, if you are fundamentally not happy, you can expect very difficult experiences. LSD will cause your inner world to project outward into your perceptions. If you emotionally feel like shit, then with LSD you will quite likely find yourself in a world of shit.
One of the more fascinating effects was noted with schizophrenia. Its been noted that often schizophrenics who are having an episode will "get worst before they get better". LSD experiences tend to make the episode get worst faster, but also, lessen the overall average length of the episode. (really read the book. Dr Groff is the authority)
As for flashbacks, they are normal. ANyone who says they have never had one either doesn't understand them, or is really abnormal. Ever felt deja-vu? guess what? Same thing. Flashbacks can be much more intense or vivid, but thats rare.
Now on topic again... I have seen people go through several psychotic breaks. Some drug related, some not so much. In all cases its been similar, but not in a way I can easily describe. Its an odd skill that you pick up from seeing people that you care about go through delusions. A way of relating to them and even helping them when you can (even if that means just steering them away from trouble long enough for them to get a grip or not get arrested)
You realise that knowing they are having a delusion doesn't really make the delusion any less real. You have to know that it IS real for them, and you have to respect that reality.
As for being on the other end, I don't know. I have philisophical problems with anti-psychotic drugs, and never mind their side effects (look at the side effects for thorazine sometime... it can (rearely) cause a permanent parkinsons syndrome after even a single dose!)
This is one of the reasons I liked Brillient mind. Wonderful movie and great story. He came to a realisation that alot of people don't get. The mind is very trainable. Just as a person can be trained to stop at a red light at 3 am on deserted city streets waiting for that green, just as a person can be trained to see the world in such black and white terms that they could blow themselves up with a crowd of their "enemys", so can a mind be trained to pay attention to things or see things that it would normally ignore.(or ignore things that it would normally see)
Thats the funny thing about lsd too. Many of the odd effects are just things that you stop ignoring. Like the little trails in your vision, or the faint echo of your voice off the walls, or the feeling of various parts of your body that you normally wouldn't be paying attention to.
Its just a matter of remembering, as long as you cankeep yourself healthy and alie and socialize with outher people to a level thats satisfactory for your own happiness, it doesn't matter how many deamons are running around or how many songs inanimate objects sing... its only a mental disorder if its causing a problem for you.
The hard part is learning to not let it cause a problem. As a friend of mine once said "sure after you have done as much acid as I have you might startto see ghost images in mirrors and all sorts of weird disturbances, but eventually you get used to them" (if we could only all be so calm about it, I think we would have less problems with people overall)
However it does further the intentions of advertisers.... namely to help convince people that advertising actually does something.
Remember, when your consumers are not your customers, and your product is comepletely intangible, you have to somehow justify your existance and convince executives that paying you is a legitimate buisness expense.
Thus you need to come out with wonkey statistics like how many eyeballs viewed the vapid nonsense that you are putting out.
I say fight advertising at every turn, delete it, remove it, deride people just for even viewing it or listenin got it whenever possible. Frankly I do whatever possible to never even have an ad pass my eyes or ears. I choose CDs and NPR over commercial radio. I choose dvds over commercial TV. I choose popup blockers and limited choice cookies acceptance over unique ids and innundation with ads.
Fuck advertisers, I say lets drive their entire buisness model into the ground.
-Steve