Just wanted to back you up with some figures on how little of an success that Microsofts Home and Entertainment division is so far (products in the division is Xbox 360; Xbox; Xbox Live; CPxG (consumer software and hardware products); and IPTV).
The total operating loss for that division for the years 2004 to 2006 is $3.084 billion (yes $3084 million) on a total revenue that was, for those years, $10.133 billion. So they have to turn that divsions average 30% operating loss into a profit and try to recoup those $3 billion. That will not be easy.
The link to the Wordpress blogg confirms it (albeit in Swedish) "...nås jag nu av informationen om att detta har lett till att en åklagare inlett förundersökning om brott." which translates to "... now I've been reached by the information that a prosecutor has begun a preliminary investigation if there has been a breech of the law".
Quote Old Testament scripture with respect to homosexuals... Then he'd be in *real* trouble.
Not quite. Just wanted to throw my 5 öre worth of facts regarding that specific type of speech. It's legal to refer to gays a "cancerous growth on the society" as one pastor did here in Sweden. So there's actually pretty much leeway when it comes to restricted speech.
...if the blog host is making reasonable good faith efforts to remove inappropriate comments and missed one, it seems morally reprehensible to hold him responsible.
Bingo. And he's not being held responsible... the problem is that the law rather untried at this point in time so the prosecutor needs to make a preliminäry investigation (in Swedish "förundersökning"). So pretty much: new law, more vigilance with the preliminary investigations until the legal situation has gelled a bit... which it does pretty fast since Sweden is Civil Law system where precedents carry much less weight than an Common Law systems because the more extended codification process in Civil Law.
And I just wanted to point out that being a prosecutor in Sweden is not an elected official but a civil servant. (Not much lawyers in politics in Sweden actually)
Some facts in the article certainly could support your hypothesis that it might be down to less stimuli while young:
The average IQ of first-born men was 103.2, they found.
Second-born men averaged 101.2, but second-born men whose older sibling died in infancy scored 102.9.
And for third-borns, the average was 100.0. But if both older siblings died young, the third-born score rose to 102.6.
Another related thing I read about (some years ago) was about that truly bilingual (using both languages at home) young children had a better ability for selecitve attention than monolingual children. Selective attention means the ability to sort out the important aspects and discard unimportant ones. Which obviously helps when you're going to form abstract concepts/thoughts.
Learning two languages must be a lot more intellectually stimulating for the children (doesn't need to be hard though)... and it would seem that it also helps developing their intellectual capabilities.
Apparently, by "acoustic coupler" they mean "telephone". Goes to show that bamboozling unsuspecting consumers with high-tech talk has been around as long as the technologies themselves!
Oh, the historyless youth of today! *dives into a lived in a shoebox on the motorway rant for 5 minutes*.;-)
Actually, the acoustic coupler is the cradle that the handset is inserted in. The microphone and speaker of the handset is then isolated from outside noise with rubber seals and have a corresponding speaker respectivly microphone. So the computer become acoustically coupled to the telephone net and not electrically. Now get off my lawn. Mumble mumble muble.
Very nice reference! I recall reading that story (quite some while ago though:). Not a zoom lens (as in Dune or in the article)... but to me it's still definitly a precursor the idea of a non-fixed liquid lens.
Are there any earlier mentions of liquid lenses before Dune? The article links seems to think he was firtst. Even if there is, it's still a pretty nice catch by Frank Herbert.
Will you look at that thing! Stilgar whispered. Paul lay beside him in a slit of rock high on the shield wall rim, eye fixed to the collector of a Fremen telescope. The oil lens was focused on a starship lighter exposed by dawn in the basin below them. The tall eastern face of the ship glistened in the flat light of the sun, but the shadow side still showed yellow portholes from glowglobes of the night.
...A popular show, in it's prime, that's currently raking in cash hands over fist for the BBC from various products and merchandising efforts...
And add profits to that from the fact that it's been sold to and premiered in (so far): Canada, Australia, South Korean, New Zealand, France, Italy, Belgium, Norway, Sweden, Portugal, Spain, Hong Kong, Russia and a slew of middle easter countries as well. Probably missed some major countries... don't know how to count BBC America though so I left it out of the "sold to" list.
I belive you are right. But there are at least two differing ways a court can arrive to their conclusion: 1) the law based on the EU directive is found to be sufficently clear (and correctly implementing the directive) which allows the local court to deliver a decision in the case or 2) there are some uncertainties surrounding the issue at hand which prompts the court to refer the issue (not the case itself) to the European Court of Justice. Reasons for such a referal might be unclear parts of a directive (scope etc). The ECJ will then send back a clarification to be used when deciding the case.
In this case I don't know if there was any referal to the ECJ or not but I would make a not too bold guess that in cases where there has been a referal it counts more or less as a direct precedence for any nation and otherwise not.
According to the last article copper cable fetches around $4/lbs here when you sell it to a junkyard. Fast transaction, jobs made by strapped for cash small time thiefs that has no real connections is what I'm guessing... wherever in the world it happens.
Will this have any effect at all on the problems brought on by massive powergrid fluctuations (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_North_America_bl ackout ). A cascading failure happened because the power grid didn't work well in what you could call "island operation mode" (i.e. local powerstations being effectivly isolated into their own "island" by separating them from the full grid).
I suspect that should someone really hit the grid they would most likely take down some of the major trunk lines out in open country which are much more accessible than any in-city line.
Word of advice to those who blog about corporate enterprises... if you get a notice from a company threatening suit for whatever you said, take it seriously and get some legal advice...
Yeah... like checking if the legal notice actually applies to your jurisdiction. EU laws don't apply to the US and US laws don't apply the the EU.
I'm pretty certain it is in most countries (I'm certain it is in the US and in Sweden... see my earlier post in this thread). Think of it in this way: any part with sufficent originality in a movie is copyrightable. So you have copyright restrictions on using anything from the musical score, still pictures and dialogue etc.
Next you need to think about what would happen if a derivative work in form of translation wouldn't need permission from the copyright holder: I could translated Harry Potter into swedish and sell copies as I saw fit since JK Rowlings wouldn't have anything to say about it...
I would think that most countries classify translation as an derivative work. And surely the dialogue in a movie must be copyrightable. Only reason it hasn't happend in the US might be that foreign movies aren't as popular in the US and that MPAA mainly cares about homegrown material.
The following part of USC 17 Chapter 1 seems pretty clear to me (my emphasis):
A "derivative work" is a work based upon one or more preexisting works, such as a translation, musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted. A work consisting of editorial revisions, annotations, elaborations, or other modifications which, as a whole, represent an original work of authorship, is a "derivative work".
A library isn't always a public lending library. Another type of libarary that could actually might have use for this type of storage solutions (not necessarily exactly this one) is what I would call historical research libraries. Their function is to protect the material and at the same time make it more accessible to people. It's not unusual for these libraries to have a serious digitizing projects so that the originals don't have to be disturbed (especially if they are physically deteriorated). Just the other week I heard a radio program about one of those digitizing projects.. they create digital material on a terabyte scale every week. They also used some pretty hefty scanners there... their newest machinge could scan one loose page into a high resolution image per second. I suspect that machine cost £9000 or perhaps more.
Thank you for informing fellow slashdotters about the bizarrness of the Finnish languge. Part of it is because it's pretty much an agglutinative language (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agglutination). Some examples from that wikipedia page:
For example, the Finnish word talossanikin means "in my house, too". Derivation can also be quite complex. For example, Finnish epäjärjestelmällisyys has the root järki "logos", and consists of negative-"logos"-causative-frequentative-nominaliz er-adessive-"related to"-"property", and means "the property of being unsystematic", "unsystematicalness". The word has lots of stem changes, so Finnish is not the best example for an agglutinative language.
So even if it has agglutination it compounds things by stem changes as well. Thanks to the agglutinative property it has 15 (yes fifteen) noun cases... language freaks can study them at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_language_noun _cases
b) Governments today produce fundamentally different documents than 100 years ag
or
or c) Quality of documentation shipped with products keeps increasing and really need such a complex format to express
Government agencies, just like all other organisations, do produce fundamentally different documents compared with even relativly close historical times.
Just because someone wants to play with a complex layout doesn't mean they need it to do their job...
It's more a question of predictable layout than one about complex layout. And one thing you can get a handle on with a proper document format is people playing around with the layout. Documents in any sufficently large organisation, commercial or not, needs to be standardized for structure. If you have templates it's easier to enforce that. Of course could argue that you can add meta information requirements to any html on the side, so to speak. But then you start getting an ad hoc structure with each major user because there is no standard for what to do. So you end up with a somewhat easier to parse structure but that requires intimate knowledge about the organisation using the application instead of the application itself - the document format. Of course that can be considered a good thing - if you want job security.
...I wonder why government documents need such a complex standard? On the server side, the data will be anyway stored in a relational database. So what is wrong with plain HTML on client side (and some trivial spreadsheet format when needed)? It's not like government forms are a beauty of design art?
Because government forms are just a small subset of government documents. Think of all documents going between, out from and into government agencies. Every system they buy will demand that the documentation be delivered in ODF, all reports commissioned by or issued by the government will be ODF etc.
Plain html just isn't good enough for real documents with typsetting-like information - just see how different browsers renders the same page.
I went to a school that was built in the early 1800s and had some really high ceilings on the top floor... about 15 feet high. The doors were made of massive wood and 8 feet high. This prompted some creativity in the students and there was a teacher that was usually a bit late so they unhinged the inwards opening door, put it back so that it was just held by the handle lock. Teacher enters and door falls down with a really really major bang as it went down. Teaching staff was not amused by students apparent creativty.
Let me be the first to congratulate you to your personal ultimate contribution to research! But how empty will your life not be when you have past your prime.;-)
Jokes aside, maybe not everyone realises that in some areas amateurs can actually make useful scientific contributions, especially when it comes to field work. I'm guessing that the ones that have the best chanes of doing something useful are amateur botanists and entymolgists. Other examples might be ornithologists and herpetologists.
So what use could these sigthings serve? To find and map unknown habitats of waning species, mapping habitat migrations of both pests and non-pests, perhaps even to discover a new species (most likely for entymologists but still a cool thing).
Sorry I don't believe you unless you can provide some referense. Universities doesn't even expel students who cheat.
Now, if you're talking about a "folkhögshola" and not a "högskola" that is a totally different ball of yarn. "Högskola" -> University, "Folkhögskola" -> Folk High School (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folk_high_school......But they have nothing to do with swedish universities.
Except perhaps that many of them offer preparatory courses for those who lack qualifications to apply to the university. Most of those who take the preparatory classes are adult (ordinary) high school dropouts etc.
I'm guessing because they actually don't have any major clue about how the web works and go "Hey, there's the url... uh.. some numbers ahead... bet that isn't anything important though". Of course the.bank would cut out some phising but calling it foolproof is naive considering this example.
The example url is from a phishing mail targeting Nordea.se (on of the largest swedish banks) that hit swedish mail adresses early this year.
Slashdot Mirror
Just wanted to back you up with some figures on how little of an success that Microsofts Home and Entertainment division is so far (products in the division is Xbox 360; Xbox; Xbox Live; CPxG (consumer software and hardware products); and IPTV).
a rDetail.asp?CIK=789019&FID=1193125-06-180008&SID=0 6-00
The total operating loss for that division for the years 2004 to 2006 is $3.084 billion (yes $3084 million) on a total revenue that was, for those years, $10.133 billion. So they have to turn that divsions average 30% operating loss into a profit and try to recoup those $3 billion. That will not be easy.
Source Microsofts 10-K filed with the SEC:http://microsoft.shareholder.com/redesign/Edg
You mean bones like the skull show in the very same photogallery as the artist's rendering? http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/06/ph otogalleries/giant-penguins/index.html
The link to the Wordpress blogg confirms it (albeit in Swedish) "...nås jag nu av informationen om att detta har lett till att en åklagare inlett förundersökning om brott." which translates to "... now I've been reached by the information that a prosecutor has begun a preliminary investigation if there has been a breech of the law".
An english language site of swedish news is thelocal.se also has it at http://www.thelocal.se/7674/20070621/.
And no, politicians do not have immunity while in office here in Sweden (thank god). I belive the King has some limited immunity but that's about it.
And I just wanted to point out that being a prosecutor in Sweden is not an elected official but a civil servant. (Not much lawyers in politics in Sweden actually)
Actually, the acoustic coupler is the cradle that the handset is inserted in. The microphone and speaker of the handset is then isolated from outside noise with rubber seals and have a corresponding speaker respectivly microphone. So the computer become acoustically coupled to the telephone net and not electrically. Now get off my lawn. Mumble mumble muble.
Very nice reference! I recall reading that story (quite some while ago though :). Not a zoom lens (as in Dune or in the article)... but to me it's still definitly a precursor the idea of a non-fixed liquid lens.
I belive you are right. But there are at least two differing ways a court can arrive to their conclusion: 1) the law based on the EU directive is found to be sufficently clear (and correctly implementing the directive) which allows the local court to deliver a decision in the case or 2) there are some uncertainties surrounding the issue at hand which prompts the court to refer the issue (not the case itself) to the European Court of Justice. Reasons for such a referal might be unclear parts of a directive (scope etc). The ECJ will then send back a clarification to be used when deciding the case.
In this case I don't know if there was any referal to the ECJ or not but I would make a not too bold guess that in cases where there has been a referal it counts more or less as a direct precedence for any nation and otherwise not.
I think it would. It's not as easy to sell a high tech gadget as some raw materials. With the rising price of copper worldwide I think there has been a definite increase in copper related heists everywhere. Even here in Sweden they steal copper roofings, power cables for trams and trains (for those who know swedish http://www.gp.se/gp/jsp/Crosslink.jsp?d=113&a=3161 42 and http://www.nwt.se/ArticlePages/200704/05/200704050 55436_NWT825/20070405055436_NWT825.dbp.asp)
According to the last article copper cable fetches around $4/lbs here when you sell it to a junkyard. Fast transaction, jobs made by strapped for cash small time thiefs that has no real connections is what I'm guessing... wherever in the world it happens.
Will this have any effect at all on the problems brought on by massive powergrid fluctuations (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_North_America_bl ackout ). A cascading failure happened because the power grid didn't work well in what you could call "island operation mode" (i.e. local powerstations being effectivly isolated into their own "island" by separating them from the full grid).
I suspect that should someone really hit the grid they would most likely take down some of the major trunk lines out in open country which are much more accessible than any in-city line.
Any legal notice still needs to be issued within respective jurisdiction. Otherwise it carries no legal weight.
I'm pretty certain it is in most countries (I'm certain it is in the US and in Sweden... see my earlier post in this thread). Think of it in this way: any part with sufficent originality in a movie is copyrightable. So you have copyright restrictions on using anything from the musical score, still pictures and dialogue etc.
Next you need to think about what would happen if a derivative work in form of translation wouldn't need permission from the copyright holder: I could translated Harry Potter into swedish and sell copies as I saw fit since JK Rowlings wouldn't have anything to say about it...
The following part of USC 17 Chapter 1 seems pretty clear to me (my emphasis): USC 17 Chapter 1:http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17
A library isn't always a public lending library. Another type of libarary that could actually might have use for this type of storage solutions (not necessarily exactly this one) is what I would call historical research libraries. Their function is to protect the material and at the same time make it more accessible to people. It's not unusual for these libraries to have a serious digitizing projects so that the originals don't have to be disturbed (especially if they are physically deteriorated). Just the other week I heard a radio program about one of those digitizing projects.. they create digital material on a terabyte scale every week. They also used some pretty hefty scanners there... their newest machinge could scan one loose page into a high resolution image per second. I suspect that machine cost £9000 or perhaps more.
Plain html just isn't good enough for real documents with typsetting-like information - just see how different browsers renders the same page.
...kind of. :)
I went to a school that was built in the early 1800s and had some really high ceilings on the top floor... about 15 feet high. The doors were made of massive wood and 8 feet high. This prompted some creativity in the students and there was a teacher that was usually a bit late so they unhinged the inwards opening door, put it back so that it was just held by the handle lock. Teacher enters and door falls down with a really really major bang as it went down. Teaching staff was not amused by students apparent creativty.
Let me be the first to congratulate you to your personal ultimate contribution to research! But how empty will your life not be when you have past your prime. ;-)
Jokes aside, maybe not everyone realises that in some areas amateurs can actually make useful scientific contributions, especially when it comes to field work. I'm guessing that the ones that have the best chanes of doing something useful are amateur botanists and entymolgists. Other examples might be ornithologists and herpetologists.
So what use could these sigthings serve? To find and map unknown habitats of waning species, mapping habitat migrations of both pests and non-pests, perhaps even to discover a new species (most likely for entymologists but still a cool thing).
The example url is from a phishing mail targeting Nordea.se (on of the largest swedish banks) that hit swedish mail adresses early this year.