If they "hear" on the same spectrum that we "see" then just change the words, because to us they "see" but call it "hear". These words just label our senses, they don't define them. We label one way the sensors set to receive the "visible light" electromagnetic spectrum, they label it different. Big deal.
Unless the label change also implies that the "audible electromagnetic spectrum sensors" don't dominate their senses as ours, it hardly matters what label gets used.
I live in Brazil, and we also suffer a lot with bad traffic and road accidents caused, in my opinion, by bad drivers in the millions who get their driving license too easily. When you drive a five passengers vehicle weighting 1,5 Tons at 110 km/h, you should have the equivalent of a permission to carry loaded weapons to the mall. Harder tests and more restrictive licenses would hurt the economy everywhere and present a culture shock to the USA, but in the end those with licenses could drive on safer roads. Plus all the bonuses of less vehicles, less traffic, less pollution...
Oh, and the slow driver on the left lane here drives at an irritant above legal/below maximum speed like 65 km/h on a 80 km/h, further enhancing the chaotic traffic.
I think even Ethan Hunt knew that as a cover up story for his "boring real job". Maybe the mathematicians solved the mystery of Maxis' pathfinding mechanism! One can only hope the guys at Maxis don't get all inspired and make the traffic simulation even messier.
I agree, cars lacking the right warning devices don't help the driver to decide how hard to brake. I also think that an obligatory proximity detector warning if you've got, say, less than two seconds clearance from the car in your front, and making extra warnings as the car got closer, would help a lot. Complicated, I know, but not that much.
That's why there are companies who think a minor bug fix, or a small development, changing fonts or simple features, reconfiguring servers, restoring backups etc is something that doesn't need testing, concentration, at least little bit of planning and basic things like version control. So that's quite common in the industry: customers who think they are getting their product for less money because they can force every change as an emergency. They don't realize they are making development more expensive with hacks and constant build, tests and deploys overhead. Simple concepts from lean methodologies like Scrum should be taught to anyone who plans to spend more than someone's monthly wage on software. Everyone can benefit from a healthier development cycle and software will come out better and cheaper. But there are some clients learning to get the benefits of a constant release cycle and, as the poster said, they are getting the beta development cycles for free.
I was thinking about a joke on my subject on the lines of "people only know how to buy tech on Civ", but it's less important and I'll leave it on the jokes backlog.
Indeed, these are sad days when you hit the big bad red round button and "Would you like to turn off, reset, logoff, standby, hibernate, finish installing updates and turn off, change your password, get help or cancel?" shows for about four seconds while you keep the button pressed and the motherboard recognizes you as a hard off maniac.
And about the article... if this is the place for news for nerds, this kind of article is the stuff that matters!
You just need to find one single planetary system complex enough, some basic axioms, a lot of spare mathematicians and Hari Seldon to come up with a solution for predicting the unpredictable, as long as the unpredictable isn't the Mule.
The "cool digital media lady" went down the IT section and asked:
- Hey, could you install some MediaWikis with capacity to five thousands access per minute by friday? I read it's super simple and light, just as Web 2.0 is supposed to be, so it should be very easy to do!
And the "boring IT guys" replied:
- You know we can't, we need to deal with all other emergency priorities you set last week about mail and the new Vista boxes. Besides, it's simple to install in one single machine for amateur use, it's complicated to prepare it for the security and load we'll need.
- You IT guys can't deal with changes. You complicate everything. I'll have a smart consultant friend to come over, install it for a few thousand bucks and hand the maintenance over to you.
- Gahhh...
Weeks later, she gave an interview boasting her boldness in "bypassing IT to get Web 2.0 technologies to the group's end users":
- IT started to realize it was happening without them anyway. They weren't interested until they started to get multiple requests from around the business. Eventually, they came on board.
The "boring IT guys" couldn't be interviewed. They were overwhelmed by client's support requests of system configurations, security alarms, the same old email problems and configuring tens of new servers with load balancing.
Next on "The Daily Buzzword Bugle", the folksonomy is being slowed down by the users.
It's not Fuckin Freakin, it's Feisty Fawn. It's not Green Goo, it's Gutsy Gibbon. And it sure as hell is not Hardy Humping, it's Hardy Heron. What were you expecting, you Immoral Imp?:)
You shouldn't expect the average technical decision maker in the professional market to accept three things different from what he's used to:
1 - A new (for him) operating system, no matter how well known and professional it is;
2 - A new (for him) version numbering system, no matter how logical and professional it is;
2 - A new (for him) funny sounding nickname, no matter how many well known and professional systems with funny sounding nicknames there are;
I mean, I think you can convince a person used to focus on stability to learn a new nickname ("we're upgrading all the desktops to the new Windows, which was called Longhorn") or a new version numbering system ("we're upgrading the server to Java 5, which is actually Java 1.5") or a new operating system ("we're installing a Red Hat Core on the new development sandbox server"), or maybe two out of three, at one time. But you're certainly stressing too much his sense of "let's not get ahead of ourselves" if you want him to go from Windows "I use it since when I was a kid" Vista "they know how to pick a name", a.k.a. Longhorn "those crazy MS developers" to Ubuntu "what?" 7.10 "how come?", a.k.a. Hardy Heron "now hold on a second...". And this is the point where some people would rather go on without the nickname.
And I think they really should drop the nickname when it would cause confusion rather than clarification. As long as it's not printed on the CD cover or shown on every login, the nickname is free to be used among those who are comfortable with it. Like here on Slashdot.
Civilization. The most recent available. I just wouldn't play any island scenario.
---
In old Soviet Russia, games take YOU to desert islands! And you become a funny screen saver to western capitalists...
... instead of products that really changed technology and our lives. That's why the "dawn of the personal computer" doesn't include the mouse and the hard disk.
And I'm not saying that because those crazy m... ranked Windows 95 above NES! 8)
I say we attack! We've had success in taking the Sun's satellite puppet, Pluto, from his axis of evil. Now there's evidence of a NUCLEAR THREAT against our planet. Strike first, strike hard!
I totally agree that if Google, or any other company, were to hand over IPs to a country soon all others would start requesting for similar data. However the concept of a League of Democratic Nations that could ask these data is really complicated. The judiciary and the police work in very, very different ways from country to country, even among democratic ones.
Take Brazil and USA for instance. The US justice system is relatively quick and, as far as I know, it values freedom and privacy far more than brazilian justice. Because of this the investigative police in the US is trained to work within different restrictions than in Brazil. Requests for overruling privacy rights in criminal investigation are made by brazilian investigators in situations where it wouldn't be normal elsewhere. So instead of making better investigations (like creating fake communities on Orkut or going after known friends) they take the easier path.
I won't even mention other problems of the brazilian judiciary like a common unprofessional desire for media exposition, which I think is the main reason for this specific brazilian demand (in case the reader hasn't noticed, I live in Brazil). The point here is that judiciary systems simply don't match everywhere, so a list of nations allowed to make some requests for data for investigation wouldn't help that much. I believe that if a country wants data kept in another country, it should first ask the keeper, and then ask the local justice system. There could be a specific court to handle these cases, but it would comply to local law.
If you send your money to Switzerland looking for privacy and security you would expect that demands for data about your money would be judged by the swiss justice. Well, I believe that user data works the same way. If stored in the USA it's protected by local freedom of speech and privacy rights. It could even be good for business: "keep your private data private, keep your speech free for a reasonable price".
It would be good to compare the cost of chinese and russian unmanned exploration missions to NASA's cost. If their missions turn out to be less expensive and more successful than those from the US, I think that space exploration would gain a lot with it. Cheaper missions in larger quantities, improving quality over time: that sounds like something the chinese could do better than the rest of the world right now.
--
"I, for one, welcome our new unmanned red overlords"
Slashdot Mirror
If they "hear" on the same spectrum that we "see" then just change the words, because to us they "see" but call it "hear". These words just label our senses, they don't define them. We label one way the sensors set to receive the "visible light" electromagnetic spectrum, they label it different. Big deal.
Unless the label change also implies that the "audible electromagnetic spectrum sensors" don't dominate their senses as ours, it hardly matters what label gets used.
I live in Brazil, and we also suffer a lot with bad traffic and road accidents caused, in my opinion, by bad drivers in the millions who get their driving license too easily. When you drive a five passengers vehicle weighting 1,5 Tons at 110 km/h, you should have the equivalent of a permission to carry loaded weapons to the mall. Harder tests and more restrictive licenses would hurt the economy everywhere and present a culture shock to the USA, but in the end those with licenses could drive on safer roads. Plus all the bonuses of less vehicles, less traffic, less pollution...
Oh, and the slow driver on the left lane here drives at an irritant above legal/below maximum speed like 65 km/h on a 80 km/h, further enhancing the chaotic traffic.
I think even Ethan Hunt knew that as a cover up story for his "boring real job". Maybe the mathematicians solved the mystery of Maxis' pathfinding mechanism! One can only hope the guys at Maxis don't get all inspired and make the traffic simulation even messier.
I agree, cars lacking the right warning devices don't help the driver to decide how hard to brake. I also think that an obligatory proximity detector warning if you've got, say, less than two seconds clearance from the car in your front, and making extra warnings as the car got closer, would help a lot. Complicated, I know, but not that much.
> --
> In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is ridiculed for being different.
Or being hanged for damaging the universe.
No, liquid nitrogen is the cool answer.
That's why there are companies who think a minor bug fix, or a small development, changing fonts or simple features, reconfiguring servers, restoring backups etc is something that doesn't need testing, concentration, at least little bit of planning and basic things like version control. So that's quite common in the industry: customers who think they are getting their product for less money because they can force every change as an emergency. They don't realize they are making development more expensive with hacks and constant build, tests and deploys overhead. Simple concepts from lean methodologies like Scrum should be taught to anyone who plans to spend more than someone's monthly wage on software. Everyone can benefit from a healthier development cycle and software will come out better and cheaper. But there are some clients learning to get the benefits of a constant release cycle and, as the poster said, they are getting the beta development cycles for free.
I was thinking about a joke on my subject on the lines of "people only know how to buy tech on Civ", but it's less important and I'll leave it on the jokes backlog.
Indeed, these are sad days when you hit the big bad red round button and "Would you like to turn off, reset, logoff, standby, hibernate, finish installing updates and turn off, change your password, get help or cancel?" shows for about four seconds while you keep the button pressed and the motherboard recognizes you as a hard off maniac.
And about the article... if this is the place for news for nerds, this kind of article is the stuff that matters!
welcome our new analog over CRACK new analog over CRACK new analog over CRACK new analog over CRACK new analog over CRACK...
You just need to find one single planetary system complex enough, some basic axioms, a lot of spare mathematicians and Hari Seldon to come up with a solution for predicting the unpredictable, as long as the unpredictable isn't the Mule.
The "cool digital media lady" went down the IT section and asked:
- Hey, could you install some MediaWikis with capacity to five thousands access per minute by friday? I read it's super simple and light, just as Web 2.0 is supposed to be, so it should be very easy to do!
And the "boring IT guys" replied:
- You know we can't, we need to deal with all other emergency priorities you set last week about mail and the new Vista boxes. Besides, it's simple to install in one single machine for amateur use, it's complicated to prepare it for the security and load we'll need.
- You IT guys can't deal with changes. You complicate everything. I'll have a smart consultant friend to come over, install it for a few thousand bucks and hand the maintenance over to you.
- Gahhh...
Weeks later, she gave an interview boasting her boldness in "bypassing IT to get Web 2.0 technologies to the group's end users":
- IT started to realize it was happening without them anyway. They weren't interested until they started to get multiple requests from around the business. Eventually, they came on board.
The "boring IT guys" couldn't be interviewed. They were overwhelmed by client's support requests of system configurations, security alarms, the same old email problems and configuring tens of new servers with load balancing.
Next on "The Daily Buzzword Bugle", the folksonomy is being slowed down by the users.
I'd change it to "Use as little technology as you need". So, use only as much technology as needed to improve learning.
It's not Fuckin Freakin, it's Feisty Fawn. :)
It's not Green Goo, it's Gutsy Gibbon.
And it sure as hell is not Hardy Humping, it's Hardy Heron.
What were you expecting, you Immoral Imp?
You shouldn't expect the average technical decision maker in the professional market to accept three things different from what he's used to:
1 - A new (for him) operating system, no matter how well known and professional it is;
2 - A new (for him) version numbering system, no matter how logical and professional it is;
2 - A new (for him) funny sounding nickname, no matter how many well known and professional systems with funny sounding nicknames there are;
I mean, I think you can convince a person used to focus on stability to learn a new nickname ("we're upgrading all the desktops to the new Windows, which was called Longhorn") or a new version numbering system ("we're upgrading the server to Java 5, which is actually Java 1.5") or a new operating system ("we're installing a Red Hat Core on the new development sandbox server"), or maybe two out of three, at one time. But you're certainly stressing too much his sense of "let's not get ahead of ourselves" if you want him to go from Windows "I use it since when I was a kid" Vista "they know how to pick a name", a.k.a. Longhorn "those crazy MS developers" to Ubuntu "what?" 7.10 "how come?", a.k.a. Hardy Heron "now hold on a second...". And this is the point where some people would rather go on without the nickname.
And I think they really should drop the nickname when it would cause confusion rather than clarification. As long as it's not printed on the CD cover or shown on every login, the nickname is free to be used among those who are comfortable with it. Like here on Slashdot.
Civilization. The most recent available. I just wouldn't play any island scenario. --- In old Soviet Russia, games take YOU to desert islands! And you become a funny screen saver to western capitalists...
... instead of products that really changed technology and our lives. That's why the "dawn of the personal computer" doesn't include the mouse and the hard disk. And I'm not saying that because those crazy m... ranked Windows 95 above NES! 8)
I say we attack! We've had success in taking the Sun's satellite puppet, Pluto, from his axis of evil. Now there's evidence of a NUCLEAR THREAT against our planet. Strike first, strike hard!
It's pretty easy to detect if there was a test or not. Just wait a couple of weeks and check it on Google Maps. Pretty simple, huh?
I totally agree that if Google, or any other company, were to hand over IPs to a country soon all others would start requesting for similar data. However the concept of a League of Democratic Nations that could ask these data is really complicated. The judiciary and the police work in very, very different ways from country to country, even among democratic ones.
Take Brazil and USA for instance. The US justice system is relatively quick and, as far as I know, it values freedom and privacy far more than brazilian justice. Because of this the investigative police in the US is trained to work within different restrictions than in Brazil. Requests for overruling privacy rights in criminal investigation are made by brazilian investigators in situations where it wouldn't be normal elsewhere. So instead of making better investigations (like creating fake communities on Orkut or going after known friends) they take the easier path.
I won't even mention other problems of the brazilian judiciary like a common unprofessional desire for media exposition, which I think is the main reason for this specific brazilian demand (in case the reader hasn't noticed, I live in Brazil). The point here is that judiciary systems simply don't match everywhere, so a list of nations allowed to make some requests for data for investigation wouldn't help that much. I believe that if a country wants data kept in another country, it should first ask the keeper, and then ask the local justice system. There could be a specific court to handle these cases, but it would comply to local law.
If you send your money to Switzerland looking for privacy and security you would expect that demands for data about your money would be judged by the swiss justice. Well, I believe that user data works the same way. If stored in the USA it's protected by local freedom of speech and privacy rights. It could even be good for business: "keep your private data private, keep your speech free for a reasonable price".
It would be good to compare the cost of chinese and russian unmanned exploration missions to NASA's cost. If their missions turn out to be less expensive and more successful than those from the US, I think that space exploration would gain a lot with it. Cheaper missions in larger quantities, improving quality over time: that sounds like something the chinese could do better than the rest of the world right now.
--
"I, for one, welcome our new unmanned red overlords"