Re:The Toaster as penultimate technology
on
Linux Needs Critics
·
· Score: 1
However pathetic and faltering their execution is, Microsoft and Apple have an economic motivation to listen to customer complaints and issues.
The Toaster as penultimate technology
on
Linux Needs Critics
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Yes, it's free. Nobody *has* to listen to you and that's the problem in a nutshell. Nobody gives a rat's patoot about the fact that the wondrous Ubuntu can't see my USB drives and half of my other devices. Since this will never be fixed and I don't have time or inclination to dick with solving the problem, it's back to Windows. Sorry guys. That's reality. It either works like a toaster or it's crap. No OS does this now. Windows comes closer. The Mac OS is closest to true toasterhood yet, but too expensive.
In my experience, nontechnical managers managing engineers and developers is an inevitable disaster. I know the "common knowledge" is that a competent manager can manage anything. This *myth* is promoted by professors of management, incompetent managers and guys who need to sell pop management guides. The reality is quite different. For example, HP used to be a good company. Carly took over and made it a lousy company. She was replaced by a technically competent CEO and now it's a good company again. Get the picture?
Anyone who's dumb enough to put their retirement money in stocks or thinks "the cloud" is a safe, secure, consistently available place to put their data gets exactly what they deserve.
Really guys. A little paranoia is *healthy,* OK?
I think my computer is already doing this. It keeps giving me "treats" with this thing called "The internet."
So far, it's been quiet about my hip joint pain, but that may be coming.
Because the whole system is so foolishly, utterly, totally broken that all you can do is laugh.
You want distraction? The aggregate exposure of all USA banks to derivatives is about 170 Trillion. Worldwide, we're talking Quadrillions.
Obama, the IMF, et al. They're all just rearranging the deck chairs and getting the band to play louder. The end result of this slow motion train wreck is/was inevitable. It is, to quote from the movie Titanic, "a mathematical certainty."
I think that religious people subconsciously fear that there's nothing after death.
The rest of us don't think nothingness is such a bad outcome considering the possible alternatives (e.g. being tortured for thousands of subjective years in some wierdo virtual reality by some sadistic game programmer).
Oops. Sorry. My coworker told me that someone else already thought of this one, but you get the picture.
And what did the Estonians know of this in WWII? Back then, what you knew was local, plus some radio and newspaper reports, heavily censored and controlled. What you did know with a certainty was what was done to your friends and relatives by occupying Russians. Given a choice between two devils, can you blame anyone for choosing the one who might at least free you from the one standing on your neck?
And by the way, google up how many people Stalin killed. Compared to him, Hitler was an amateur. Stalin didn't restrict himself to killing Jewish people, although he killed plenty of them too. An equal opportunity murderer was Mr. Stalin.
Agreed. Estonia had to choose between two evils in WWII. They chose the one that didn't draft their young men at 5 am with the help of thugs and dogs, and the one who didn't sent their older men to Siberia.... just because (Both incidents occurred in my family in Estonia). Nazis were no picnic, but they were better than the Russians.
And here's how:
1) There will be some critical peripheral that the distro fails to recognize automatically. Linux generally fails at the device driver recognition problem solved well... adequately by Windows.
2) Users can't run their windows apps, and the web addled, Linux fanboys who make the distro won't preconfigure Wine and put it on the application menu, or auto-start it on launch with an easy switching system.
They will once again fail to learn the lesson of IBM, which was successful not because its technology was superior, but because its technology was 100% compatible with existing, in-place technology, used by the majority of businesses (i.e. punch cards).
Most people don't give a rat's patoot about Linux. They want stuff to work as reliably and thoughtlessly as a toaster or a macintosh.
It's the *blurry* stuff, fellows. See, California politicians insisted that it be marked for your convenience.
Obviously, the blurriest items on the map will be the minds of these California politicians. Please start there, eh?
Sorry guys, but the guy with a median income of $45 a year and one or two children can't afford this, even if they lived in a house instead of an apartment (Solar isn't much good without roof space).
So all this twirling and whirling about solar power is a bunch of hooey until it either becomes a large, government-funded project that supplements existing power, or the costs per home come down to the $1000-$2000 level.
Until then, the solar geeks are wasting our time.
I'm sorry. Did you miss that?
It's MONEY!
Real money, significant money. Fair money.
NOT "Here's a $1000 dollar bonus for that great idea, kid." That's not a bonus. It's an insult. If that happens once in your organization, you'll never see another innovative idea of any worth.
FYI, that *kid* can get funding, develop the idea independently, cover the whole thing up in an offshore corporation and sell online, and the company he works for will never see a dime. If the company wants a cut, they'll have to make it easier and/or more profitable for the kid to give them the idea.
All the rest is pop-psych nonsense. There is no loyalty either from or to the organization. There is *nothing* but "Money talks. BS walks."
Government incompetence. Hmmm. Like social security, the monetary system or the military? How about food and drug safety? Chlorinated water or municipal water supplies?
Government can work fine. Of course, it doesn't work fine when conservatives slowly choke off the money, get the inevitable decreases in efficiency, and then proudly tout the government incompetence prior to shutting down yet another needed service to save money for their k-street corporate handlers.
Examples of where this *doesn't* happen. Sweden. Denmark. Finland. Most of the Euro zone.
"Liberal" has become a label for "something I dislike." It's been so distorted by the faux news talking heads that no longer a meaningful label.
So let's talk behavior in the real world.
If you *don't* lower the wealthy, nothing gets done for the non-wealthy. Historically, I'd have to say this is pretty accurate. Those dang socialist liberal types are the reason your food doesn't poison you, your drugs are tested, and public libraries exist. Not to mention little things like rural electrification. Think any of that would ever be done by the private sector, really? If so, I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.
But back to real world phenomenon....
Every ecology, including economic ones, develops parasites, but you can only tolerate a certain parasite load. As recent events have demonstrated, we've gone wa-a-a-a-y beyond that.
Our current parasites, (i.e. financial professionals produce nothing but the illusion of money) have become life threatening to the economy.
If they had the same risks as the rest of us (the equivalent of releasing misquitos), would the current economic unpleasantness have ever happened?
Relativism might be too much for you. This changes nothing. Morality is not testable, or verifiable. Anything you think of as "wrong" was right to someone somewhere in history, sometimes for extended periods of time. All you're saying is "I feel repulsed."
Well, OK, you're repulsed, but so what? 'm repulsed by team sports and Okra. Should we ban both tomorrow on my say so?
Community standards are what we've got. They're lousy and changeable and frequently pushed hardest by the dumbest among us (e.g. your local fundamentalist whatever..."), but there's nothing else.
Slashdot Mirror
is expanding rapidly.
However pathetic and faltering their execution is, Microsoft and Apple have an economic motivation to listen to customer complaints and issues.
Yes, it's free. Nobody *has* to listen to you and that's the problem in a nutshell. Nobody gives a rat's patoot about the fact that the wondrous Ubuntu can't see my USB drives and half of my other devices. Since this will never be fixed and I don't have time or inclination to dick with solving the problem, it's back to Windows. Sorry guys. That's reality. It either works like a toaster or it's crap. No OS does this now. Windows comes closer. The Mac OS is closest to true toasterhood yet, but too expensive.
In my experience, nontechnical managers managing engineers and developers is an inevitable disaster. I know the "common knowledge" is that a competent manager can manage anything. This *myth* is promoted by professors of management, incompetent managers and guys who need to sell pop management guides. The reality is quite different. For example, HP used to be a good company. Carly took over and made it a lousy company. She was replaced by a technically competent CEO and now it's a good company again. Get the picture?
Well, back in *my* day, we didn't even *have* ones and zeros. We only had zeros! And by golly, they didn't amount to much....
Anyone who's dumb enough to put their retirement money in stocks or thinks "the cloud" is a safe, secure, consistently available place to put their data gets exactly what they deserve. Really guys. A little paranoia is *healthy,* OK?
I think my computer is already doing this. It keeps giving me "treats" with this thing called "The internet." So far, it's been quiet about my hip joint pain, but that may be coming.
The three laws... They're more like "guidelines"
Because the whole system is so foolishly, utterly, totally broken that all you can do is laugh. You want distraction? The aggregate exposure of all USA banks to derivatives is about 170 Trillion. Worldwide, we're talking Quadrillions. Obama, the IMF, et al. They're all just rearranging the deck chairs and getting the band to play louder. The end result of this slow motion train wreck is/was inevitable. It is, to quote from the movie Titanic, "a mathematical certainty."
You're assuming you're still alive?
I think that religious people subconsciously fear that there's nothing after death. The rest of us don't think nothingness is such a bad outcome considering the possible alternatives (e.g. being tortured for thousands of subjective years in some wierdo virtual reality by some sadistic game programmer). Oops. Sorry. My coworker told me that someone else already thought of this one, but you get the picture.
And what did the Estonians know of this in WWII? Back then, what you knew was local, plus some radio and newspaper reports, heavily censored and controlled. What you did know with a certainty was what was done to your friends and relatives by occupying Russians. Given a choice between two devils, can you blame anyone for choosing the one who might at least free you from the one standing on your neck? And by the way, google up how many people Stalin killed. Compared to him, Hitler was an amateur. Stalin didn't restrict himself to killing Jewish people, although he killed plenty of them too. An equal opportunity murderer was Mr. Stalin.
Agreed. Estonia had to choose between two evils in WWII. They chose the one that didn't draft their young men at 5 am with the help of thugs and dogs, and the one who didn't sent their older men to Siberia.... just because (Both incidents occurred in my family in Estonia). Nazis were no picnic, but they were better than the Russians.
And here's how: 1) There will be some critical peripheral that the distro fails to recognize automatically. Linux generally fails at the device driver recognition problem solved well... adequately by Windows. 2) Users can't run their windows apps, and the web addled, Linux fanboys who make the distro won't preconfigure Wine and put it on the application menu, or auto-start it on launch with an easy switching system. They will once again fail to learn the lesson of IBM, which was successful not because its technology was superior, but because its technology was 100% compatible with existing, in-place technology, used by the majority of businesses (i.e. punch cards). Most people don't give a rat's patoot about Linux. They want stuff to work as reliably and thoughtlessly as a toaster or a macintosh.
It's the *blurry* stuff, fellows. See, California politicians insisted that it be marked for your convenience. Obviously, the blurriest items on the map will be the minds of these California politicians. Please start there, eh?
Sorry guys, but the guy with a median income of $45 a year and one or two children can't afford this, even if they lived in a house instead of an apartment (Solar isn't much good without roof space). So all this twirling and whirling about solar power is a bunch of hooey until it either becomes a large, government-funded project that supplements existing power, or the costs per home come down to the $1000-$2000 level. Until then, the solar geeks are wasting our time.
I'm sorry. Did you miss that? It's MONEY! Real money, significant money. Fair money. NOT "Here's a $1000 dollar bonus for that great idea, kid." That's not a bonus. It's an insult. If that happens once in your organization, you'll never see another innovative idea of any worth. FYI, that *kid* can get funding, develop the idea independently, cover the whole thing up in an offshore corporation and sell online, and the company he works for will never see a dime. If the company wants a cut, they'll have to make it easier and/or more profitable for the kid to give them the idea. All the rest is pop-psych nonsense. There is no loyalty either from or to the organization. There is *nothing* but "Money talks. BS walks."
Government incompetence. Hmmm. Like social security, the monetary system or the military? How about food and drug safety? Chlorinated water or municipal water supplies? Government can work fine. Of course, it doesn't work fine when conservatives slowly choke off the money, get the inevitable decreases in efficiency, and then proudly tout the government incompetence prior to shutting down yet another needed service to save money for their k-street corporate handlers. Examples of where this *doesn't* happen. Sweden. Denmark. Finland. Most of the Euro zone.
Well, 9 out of 10 did.
9 out of 10 people polled couldn't tell the difference between 9 and 10.
"Liberal" has become a label for "something I dislike." It's been so distorted by the faux news talking heads that no longer a meaningful label. So let's talk behavior in the real world. If you *don't* lower the wealthy, nothing gets done for the non-wealthy. Historically, I'd have to say this is pretty accurate. Those dang socialist liberal types are the reason your food doesn't poison you, your drugs are tested, and public libraries exist. Not to mention little things like rural electrification. Think any of that would ever be done by the private sector, really? If so, I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. But back to real world phenomenon.... Every ecology, including economic ones, develops parasites, but you can only tolerate a certain parasite load. As recent events have demonstrated, we've gone wa-a-a-a-y beyond that. Our current parasites, (i.e. financial professionals produce nothing but the illusion of money) have become life threatening to the economy. If they had the same risks as the rest of us (the equivalent of releasing misquitos), would the current economic unpleasantness have ever happened?
Yes, actually.
Relativism might be too much for you. This changes nothing. Morality is not testable, or verifiable. Anything you think of as "wrong" was right to someone somewhere in history, sometimes for extended periods of time. All you're saying is "I feel repulsed." Well, OK, you're repulsed, but so what? 'm repulsed by team sports and Okra. Should we ban both tomorrow on my say so? Community standards are what we've got. They're lousy and changeable and frequently pushed hardest by the dumbest among us (e.g. your local fundamentalist whatever..."), but there's nothing else.
http://www.genesis-technologies.com/pubdetails.asp?ProductID=692036 Pretty good though. Easier to use than just about anything else.
Dang it. BACK IN MY DAY, we didn't even *have* ones and zeros. We only had zeros! and believe me, they didn't amount to much...