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User: tranquilidad

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  1. The author of an email that cc's their boss should be more worried about the boss's perception than whether the coworker feels less trusted. Copying the boss on an email is often an attempt to create a CYA moment with, "Well, I told you about it," or a passive-aggressive way to tell on a co-worker without taking responsibility or a way of telling a co-worker, "You better do what I'm asking or mommy/daddy are going to come after you."

    I used to get copied on stuff all the time and finally told those reporting to me, "Don't copy me on an email unless you expect me to take an action. If I need to be informed about something then send me a direct email with an explanation of why I need to know about it." For some, the directive didn't take until I started taking action based solely on the content of their email.

  2. I started programming in COBOL in 1978. I spent a decade or so on IBM mainframes with COBOL and 370 assembler.

    I never referred to anything as a COBOL file. There were many types of file and database structures on IBM mainframes. While many simple systems used fixed record formats it wasn't nearly always the case.

    The FILE section of a COBOL program allowed for varying record sizes:

    FD file-name
    RECORD IS VARYING IN SIZE FROM small-size TO large-size DEPENDING ON size-variable.

    WORKING-STORAGE SECTION.
    77 size-variable PIC 9(5).

    The language also allows for the redefinition of record layouts so the type of data and what is to be done with it can be determined at run-time.

  3. Re:hold it - which humble people? on If Humble People Make the Best Leaders, Why Do We Fall for Charismatic Narcissists? (hbr.org) · · Score: 1

    Rex Tillerson, former CEO of Exxon/Mobil, the 7th largest corporation in the world. Now Secretary of State of the United States.

    He started as a production engineer and worked his way up.

    Don't confuse the leaders of companies with founders. I think you'll find more narcissists among the founders of companies than of the non-founding leaders.

  4. Formula For Disaster on Student Loan Debt Has Nearly Tripled (npr.org) · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Let's tell everyone they need college in order to be successful, but let's not be specific about what kind of college will get you success; after all a basket weaving degree is just as valuable as an engineering degree.

    Let's tell them that college is so important that we'll make government-guaranteed loans available to be sure they can afford that critical degree.

    We'll add to the mix the natural market reaction of increasing prices as more money is made available to pay for the product.

    Then we can all act surprised as loan loads increase, the feel good degrees don't allow one to make payments causing the ability to pay those loans to decrease resulting in a requisite government-bailout for everyone who got a student loan to pay for a degree that has no value.

    If you think a degree is going to have a positive economic value for you then you make the investment to get the degree. If that means working two jobs and taking 6 years to get a degree then so be it, you can make the economic decision to do that. If the economic numbers don't make sense for you then don't go to college to get a degree.

    The whole story line about college being better for you economically is based on a mis-understood or mis-applied correlation: people who went to college earned more than people who didn't. That headline is based on the overall group. A more interesting question would be what is the net cost of college by degree-type. A student who spends $50,000 for a worthless degree will be overshadowed by someone who spends $50,000 for a degree ultimately worth millions. The average of the degrees is higher than those who have no college but the value is still close to zero for the person with the worthless degree and $50,000 in student loans.

    That $50,000 degree worth millions isn't because of the degree. It's because of the application of the knowledge attained with the degree by a person driven enough to use that knowledge in a way that creates market value.

  5. This will fix the privacy issue on Net Neutrality Is Trump's Next Target, Administration Says (fiercetelecom.com) · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The reason the privacy regulations were put in place by Obama was because the net neutrality rules put in place eliminated the FTC's purview over selling user data.

    Once the FCC declared the ISPs as common carriers, the FTC's ability to regulate the ISPs went out the window. Because Google and Facebook aren't common carriers the FTC's regulations regarding selling data still apply to them.

    If Trump is successful in rolling back the common carrier definition, which gave us "net neutrality", then the FTC's previous regulations preventing the sale of private information will be back in place.

    You can see more detail about AT&T v. FTC which outlines the problem.

  6. Re:Where's the news? on A Lawsuit Over Costco Golf Balls Shows Why We Can't Have Nice Things For Cheap (qz.com) · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm a decent golfer, about a 9 handicap, and I can tell you that for an amateur like me the newer golf balls make a significant difference. I probably can't tell the difference between a Titleist Pro V1 and a Kirkland Signature but I can most definitely tell a difference between a 2017 ball and one from 1997.

  7. Re:Where's the news? on A Lawsuit Over Costco Golf Balls Shows Why We Can't Have Nice Things For Cheap (qz.com) · · Score: 4, Informative

    It looks like Titleist has 44 patents on their Pro V1 golf balls. These patents range from design to materials to manufacturing.

    For example, the first patent in the list, 6013330, relates to UV curable inks and their application onto spherical surfaces such as golf balls. Reading the first page of the patent may give you a sense of the complexity of high-speed, production printing on a curved surface in a durable manner.

    If you look at the patents you will notice that many of them are related to manufacturing processes. 9174088, for example, is a process for cleaning the seam created when the golf ball is molded in a way that allows the dimple pattern to be consistent across the seam.

    There are a ton of BS patents out there and some of Titleist's may fall into that category. But it's not hard to imagine a lot of complexity goes into designing and manufacturing a golf ball. The company started in 1932 because of a golfer's frustration with the then state-of-the-art golf balls.

  8. BS summary on New Bill Would Allow Employers To Demand Genetic Testing From Workers (businessinsider.com) · · Score: 3, Informative

    The linked article can't be read if an adblocker is active.

    The current state of the law:

    Employees who refuse to participate in an employer wellness program can be charged up to 50% more for employer-provided health insurance.

    If genetic testing is part of the wellness program then employees have to voluntarily authorize the genetic test. If an employee participates in the wellness program but declines included genetic testing then they can't be penalized with the higher insurance premiums.

    The new state of the law, if this bill passes:

    Employees who refuse genetic testing that is part of a wellness program can be considered non-participants in the wellness program and be charged the higher insurance premiums.

    The comment in the summary that the new bill would "...let employers see that genetic and other health information." is the current state of the law as it relates to wellness programs (Work wellness programs put employee privacy at risk). There is nothing in the new bill that suddenly decreases patient/employee privacy.

    "Mandatory" wellness programs, themselves, were controversial and lacked privacy protections when the Democrats insisted everyone participate. They're no less controversial today as the Republicans expand those wellness programs with additional components.

  9. Re:Want to Fix This? on Apple Is Moving Its Entire International iTunes Business To Ireland (billboard.com) · · Score: 2

    The Fair Tax isn't fair to everyone. It's really only helpful to those with income. In my case, for example, while I'm "retired" I don't actually get a pension. My retirement consists of a bank account full of the savings I accumulated over years of working. All that cash is what's left over after I paid income taxes on my earnings. That money I have was taxed on the way into my savings accounts.

    If a Fair Tax comes along then all savers like me will be taxed again when our money reverses direction and leaves our savings accounts. Then again, what else should I expect. Savers have been indirectly taxed to hell and back through monetary policies.

  10. Re:My public school system is great on Is The Tech Industry Driving Families Out of San Francisco? (nytimes.com) · · Score: 1

    I paid plenty of property tax under the prop 13 scheme and my taxes definitely went up significantly. They went up enough for us to decide to leave California.

    While the base assessment stays constant to the purchase price of the house, the voters increase property taxes by adding parcel fees. Parcel fees are taxes and require a 2/3 super-majority in order to pass. Including the parcel fees, which are collected with the base property tax, I saw my property tax increase well over 80% in the 10 years I owned a home in San Mateo county - just south of San Francisco.

    The final straw for us was a parcel fee to "improve the schools." Those over the age of 65 were exempt from the parcel fee but were able to vote for it; the ultimate example of voting to tax someone else. Of course, California being what it is, two years later the expansion of the tax to those previously exempt was lifted. That parcel fee for "improving the schools," by the way, including significant landscaping contracts as part of a beautification project for the city.

    This oft-repeated claim that Prop 13 limits government revenue holds no water. It would be difficult to argue that it even slows down, significantly, the rate of increase of government revenue. It simply forces the government to divide the population into groups who will vote to tax the other groups.

  11. Re:"Fact" Checkers on Facebook Is Clamping Down On Fake News, Partners With Fact Checkers To Flag Stories (slate.com) · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Forbes has a pretty good article covering Politifact's issues related to their truthiness judging.

    In 2008, Politifact rated as True Obama's claim that if you like your plan you can keep it. The Forbes article notes that the author of that truth-o-meter article didn't check with any health-care skeptics.

    In 2009, Politifact changed their rating for the claim to 1/2 true.

    In 2013, Politifact labeled it the "lie of the year."

    Politifact's 2008 rating was "widely repeated by pro-Obama reporters and pundits, and had a meaningful impact on the outcome of the election."

    So, was Politifact's wrong analysis of Obama's 2008 claims "fake news?"

    Were they lying or just being too lazy.

    When they judge Trump's claim that Obama was the founder of ISIS in the literal sense but don't rate Hillary's comment that Trump is a recruiting sergeant for ISIS at all, either literally or metaphorically, then yes, I'll claim that Politifact is lying or at least intentionally distorting the truth.

    Facebook absolutely has the right to determine what gets posted on their site and people have the right to use their product or not. The government on the other hand has no business promoting censorship of anything, including fake news. Fake news isn't new and people have a personal responsibility to explore the "truthiness" of what they read, hear and see.

  12. It's an interesting question, the bill only applies to "form contracts" that can't be negotiated. Would this bill apply when there's a non-negotiable clause in an otherwise negotiable contract?

  13. Re:vote trump or lose your guns with just 911 on Feds Convinced Police To Use License Plate-Scanning Tech At Gun Shows (foxnews.com) · · Score: 1

    Already happened

    Secretary Clinton thinks the Heller case was decided incorrectly and implied she would appoint justices to correct that mistake. The only question decided in Heller was whether the 2nd amendment protected the right to keep an operational handgun in the home for purposes of self-defense.

  14. Bullshit, if you study English history and the Militia Act of 1661 you will start to understand why it's written the way it is.

    Anybody claiming the nobody talked that way would fail in history class. You can improve your knowledge of history by reading this paper at constitution.org.

  15. First, you can't ignore the preamble to the Bill of Rights which states that the bill of rights is a list restrictions on the government. The list of rights is not a grant of rights to individuals or an empowerment of any level of government. That's why you have language such as "shall not be infringed," or "shall pass no law."

    There's a very good article that discuses the history of the 2nd amendment and why it's worded the way it is at constitution.org. English history is quite informative on the 2nd amendment and the definition of a militia because English history was the history of the founders of the country and the authors of the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights. This document also goes over the 10 of 13 colonies that suggested wording related to the 2nd amendment regarding it as an individual right. None of the remaining three colonies provided any suggestion on the wording.

    It's interesting that you choose 1876 as the start of your period to discuss the Supreme Court's opinion regarding the 2nd amendment. That promotes ignoring the 1875 United States v. Cruikshank ruling that specifically stated that the right to keep and bear arms would exist even without the 2nd amendment. They ruled in 1875 that the 2nd amendment was a prohibition on the government from infringing on that right. More specifically, that case also addressed individuals having that right infringed.

    One of the reasons you may not see many cases regarding the 2nd amendment related to individuals is that gun control is a fairly modern mechanism designed to completely disarm the population. The law over turned in Heller wasn't passed until 1976. Can you point to another, earlier law that completely banned the ownership of handguns in the home that was challenged in court?

  16. Re:The real issue on The Ham Radio Parity Act Unanimously Passed By US House (arrl.org) · · Score: 1

    They're not entirely contracts of adhesion in the way you seem to mean. While entry to the association is non-negotiable; accept the contract or don't live here, the members of the association have the ability to change the rules of their association whenever they collectively wish to do so.

    Your example of a non-negotiable contract of adhesion seems to imply that the HOA is one side of a contractual relationship with which one can never negotiate. The reality is that it is an organization to which property members become members and, as members, can make changes to the rules of the association; or re-negotiate the contract. Some terms can be changed with simple majority votes, some changes with super majority votes and some with unanimous votes.

    A contract of adhesion isn't necessarily bad and one whose terms can be changed by the members is certainly better than one that can't be negotiated or changed such as a shrink-wrap software license.

  17. Re:Because there's no advantage on Digital Wallets Have Yet To Catch On, JPMorgan Executive Says (reuters.com) · · Score: 4, Informative

    I use an Apple watch and it's a lot more convenient. I double tap the button and wave it over the reader and I'm done.

    Using my phone would also be easier - I'd remove it from my back pocket and double tap the home button and wave it over the reader.

    For my credit card - I remove the wallet from my pocket, remove the credit card and then figure out if it's swipe or insert for the chip. If it's insert then I have to wait for the network to complete the transaction before removing the card and re-inserting it back into the wallet.

    There's no PIN for me to enter for any of the transactions. Signing requirements vary depending on the size of the transaction, the merchant and the card type.

    So, sorting on convenience and time spent for the various options: watch, phone, credit card.

  18. Re:FB should did it on Police Asked Facebook To Deactivate Woman's Account During Deadly Standoff (abc7.com) · · Score: 1

    Wrong.

    Had she been alone in that apartment you might be correct. There was a five year old child in that apartment.

    Let's go with your proposal to wait it out. She then decides there's no other way out other than to kill herself and she doesn't want her child to live in her interpretation of a screwed up world so she kills the child before offing herself.

    Wouldn't you be asking why the cops didn't forcibly enter that apartment and prevent her from kill her child?

  19. Re:FB should did it on Police Asked Facebook To Deactivate Woman's Account During Deadly Standoff (abc7.com) · · Score: 1

    It's call an inchoate crime. Soliciting and conspiracy to commit a crime can be charged as the crime as an indirect participant. I haven't read the FB posts but it is likely that both solicitation and conspiracy to commit murder were part of the conversational threads.

  20. Re: FB should did it on Police Asked Facebook To Deactivate Woman's Account During Deadly Standoff (abc7.com) · · Score: 1

    I'm not sure why you think a knife isn't a lethal threat.

    Knife attack training video

    I agree that just because someone has a knife doesn't mean they're a threat, just as someone having a gun isn't necessarily a threat just because of the gun. Someone on their feet behaving in a threatening manner with a knife is most certainly a lethal threat, though.

  21. Re:Fuck ALL those assholes! on Invoking Orlando, Senate Republicans Set Up Vote To Expand FBI Spying (reuters.com) · · Score: 1

    It wasn't just the Democrats that tried to prevent people on the "lists" from being able to buy firearms. Cornyn also introduced a bill preventing anyone on the list, or had been on the list within the past 5 years, from buying a firearm. His bill satisfied the NRA and the ACLU's concerns by requiring the government to prove to a judge within 72 hours why the person should be permanently barred from purchasing. Harry Reid didn't like that the bill was supported by the NRA and Joe Manchin didn't like the due-process requirement. It, too, failed on a party line vote.

    There were 4 gun-control measures brought for a vote, 2 by the Democrats and 2 by the Republicans; all failed along party lines.

    "Not all Democrats are for a complete ban on guns..." While this statement is true, there are enough Democrats in positions of leadership that want to ban some sets of guns that, taken in aggregate, represents pretty much a ban on the most useful and popular guns. "Australian-style gun control," popular with both Clinton and Obama, is a ban on semi-automatic rifles and shotguns. "Assault weapon" bans are a ban on the most popular rifle in the country.

    By the way, there's significantly less regulation on operating a vehicle than in operating a firearm (treat guns like cars). There's also a lot more paperwork involved in buying a firearm than in getting a hunting license, at least for the states in which I hunt.

  22. Re:frist post on Thanks To Apple's Influence, You're Not Getting A Rifle Emoji (buzzfeed.com) · · Score: 1

    I didn't say potentially violent, I said violent. If the person has committed a violent crime then they should be locked the fuck up. If the person is mentally unstable and is a danger to others then they should be locked up.

    No one should be locked up because someone thinks they might be violent.

  23. Re:frist post on Thanks To Apple's Influence, You're Not Getting A Rifle Emoji (buzzfeed.com) · · Score: 1

    If I knew someone who was violent and fucked up, I think the best approach would be to lock them the fuck up. Why would you force everyone else to give up tools that provide some utility to them in the hopes that that would result in fewer tools being available to the violent and fucked up person?

  24. Re:The FBI getting in front of Criticism on FBI Director Comey: 'Highly Confident' Orlando Shooter Radicalized Through Internet (cbsnews.com) · · Score: 1

    We're seeing the differences between two hard-set protocols.

    Before Columbine, the standard protocol for an active shooter was to wait for force to arrive and organize before storming the building. After realizing how that protocol led to more deaths they changed the protocol to immediately enter and engage the active shooter.

    In Orlando the police confirmed that they went from an active shooter to a hostage situation and changed the engagement protocol.

    The protocol for dealing with hostage situations is still to wait until sufficient force has arrived along with a hostage negotiator. It wasn't until "negotiations" failed in Orlando that the SWAT team moved in.

    The surgeons at the trauma center said more people could have been saved had they gotten to them sooner. I fear that a well-planned attack taking advantage of known protocols would be to injure as many people as possible, "take hostages" and then use other weapons to finish what was started; e.g., us a knife to kill any injured but still surviving victims.

    I expect these protocols will be re-examined and would think that once an active shooter is engaged, no matter what happens in the mean-time, the immediate reaction will be to enter. The balance that needs to be struck relates to how much do you increase the danger to hostages and law enforcement by moving to an immediate action plan. They know that an immediate action plan is better for active shooters and, I suspect, they will discover the same for hostage situations.

    Frankly, the target's protocol for dealing with this type of situation also has to change. We call the police the first responders but, in actuality, the victims were the first responders. This individual had already killed several when he ushered the hostages into a rest room. The people in that room had to have the mind set that they were already dead until something happened and they would be better off making that happen themselves rather than waiting for the cavalry.

  25. Re:Preservation rule question on State Dept. IT Staff Told To Keep Quiet About Clinton's Server (computerworld.com) · · Score: 1

    They were required to print out paper to archive. However, from the report:

    S/ES staff have provided numerous trainings for the Office of the Secretary on records preservation responsibilities and the requirement to print and file email records. However, S/ES staff told OIG that employees in the Office of the Secretary have printed and filed such emails only sporadically.

    On the size of the Office of the Secretary, you need to include the support staff that are in some of the sub-sections. For example, the Chief of Staff isn't just a person but is an office. If the Chief of Staff has, for example, five assistants then you would need to include those people in the headcount of the Office of the Secretary.