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You can fuse anything together (everything above Uranium is man-made... well there was this cave in Africa that flooded thousands of years ago and there were reports of "natural" Plutonium, but that's a different story), though to get more energy out than you put into it, the atoms have to be very small, hence the use of Hydrogen, Helium and their isotopes.
The real story is how they get the Ni to absorb a neutron. It seems asinine to me that they would convert a proton into a neutron when there are so many readily available neutron sources. Given that most isotopes of Nickel are stable Chart of the Nuclides for Nickel but also Beta decays to stable Copper, Cu65. Ni63 has a cross section for thermal neutron absorption of 24 barns (best information I could find in 5 mins of searching); as a reference Uranium 235 .
What this says to me is that while it's possible, it's probably crap.
EDIT: more content added, fixed links |
In all seriousness, Obama has had this coming for a while, but I'm going to offer an explanation from my perspective as someone who works in the information security sector. Working in the military and government is about recognizing the tasks of protecting the American people. Whether that's gathering more phone call data, or securing your home router, you need to have a set and defined list for how your going to protect people. The NSA, is arguably the chief of those plans and one of the cardinal rules in security when at that level is: If your not American, you cannot be trusted. It's not that your dishonest, its not your untrustworthy, its the simple fact we cannot guarantee you will do something to the American people. Not many are aware we trusted Iraq's leaders as allies and went over their to teach them how to fight so they could drive their enemies away. Then we left. Then 9/11 happened.
To get slightly off track on the whole argument "we went there for oil" was, like what the NSA is doing currently with the phone records, something that we've been doing for years. We've always traded on the notion the opposing person understood the value for which you could sell something for, it is not our responsibility to understand the parameters of their local demographics. That is their's. We are there to do business. Nothing more. To ask and reason as high as you wanted is what we expect(ed) from them. We not once ever went over there and stole the supplies of oil, we not once went over there with intentions of doing anything other then our jobs when we got attacked: to safeguard American citizens and prevent another 9/11 from happening. Ironic since we've left with that possibility just as possible as back in 2001 and lost considerable soldiers for that dream. Many current and former soldiers actually resent the American people for that. Why? Many personal reasons, but because at the core, soldiers believe they have to do the job no one else is willing to do, which is: make absolutely sure we cannot be attacked again and to be ready when all the precautions we put in place are worked around because of the local populace.
How does that relate to the NSA? The government has always acted on the behalf of higher ethical integrity then others, it's been the primary driving principle behind why they do things.
Now, do I agree with the NSA and various political wrongdoings currently (IRS targeting specific groups, etc.)? No. Do I blame the entire organization for it? Absolutely not. That sort of general discrimination is does not help anyone and just creates a circlejerk effect. I only acknowledge what needs to be acknowledged: a number of bad apples made it up the ladder and made some bad decisions which affected more people then the typical decision. So when the NSA comes forward with this notion they aren't going to abuse that, my concern only lies with the actual employee's who have access to said information. Why? Because they are people and are capable of letting personal agenda's affect the entire organization.
The NSA's collection of data is just about that: protecting people from threats across the globe. Who's the next enemy? Who's the next nutcase to attack us? China? Russia? The lunatic leader in North Korea? Any of our "allies"? This is why a collection of data is needed.
As for the American people's data being collected, let me explain one other part of this potential issue: We all know about the Boston bombings and how the FBI just unraveled a connection between the boys and a church which had flyers available which stated, and I would not have believed it had I not read the article and seen the interview with a man shocked by said flyer stating: "Become a Jihad today". Part of me still doesn't believe its real, but then again, all the evidence and information gathering AFTER the attack revealed they were nutcases and that flyer certainly would be a contributing factor to motivating someone who is a nutcase.
Oh, but hey, freedom of religion, so we can't touch anything about that place or anyone could raise the alarm and go, "The U.S. government is infringing on our rights!" And you wonder why those of us in the security sector facepalm when the American public overreacts about data collecting. The simple truth is they don't get a choice in the matter when you work for the government in the Security Sector. National security is the only rule which is unanimously carried across the board, even if it means sacrificing people's rights to do it. If you aren't willing to sacrifice civil liberties, how much destruction do you think can happen if we maintained that standard you want: didn't collect any data, didn't review people both American and foreign, and suddenly found a nuke on our shores, planted, primed, and detonated by Jihads leaving the country with 3/4 of it reduced to rubble? People have this misinterpretation of how things are operated on and to be honest, they aren't really educated about it for a reason, which is why I'll leave it at that. It's not for me to explain. If you want to know about it, do the research.
See why the collection of data is so important? That's all the NSA is doing: collecting data. It's not acting on it. It's not looking to destroy people (unless its worthwhile like an enemy). It's not tracking every possible target in the world. Its just about collecting the data, reviewing it when it needs to be reviewed, and making a profile of, "anti-American sentiments found here, here, and here." which just says one thing: if your not willing to sound patriotic, act patriotic, and honor the spirit of the system we are governed by, then your going to get looked at funny. You don't like that? Stop doing something morally wrong. You should never feel ashamed enough to hide something, no matter how "personal" it is to you. What is the worst thing which could happen? You get rejected? Ridiculed? Spoken nasty to? One of the best saying from a marine sergeant I met, "You can honestly say your mature when you don't let someone else's words affect you to violence. Only let it motivate you to prove them wrong." and "You can say your professional, when you don't let your pride stop you from growing and understanding the fact there's many ways to do something and the more your open to new techniques, the more people you'll be able to benefit." |
No. ಠ_ಠ
I do hope either you're still young, or this was sarcasm and I missed it.
All the cool shit has been found or made by curious dreamers. Most were not looking for profit, and most did not make any.
Mathematics, arts, health, astronomy, physics, chemistery, electricity, electronics, etc...
Look at all these guys, who kept seaching for more knowledge, for more beauty, for more understanding of the world, while living and dying in misery and infamy for lots of them.
Look at the greek thinkers, more than two thousands years ago, who shaped our mathematics, physics and philosophy. Just for the sake of scientific curiosity.
Look at the 17th century biologists and astronomists, who kept searching despite the risks of being burned at the stake as heretics.
Look at Antoine Lavoisier, the father of modern chemistery, who asked for his beheading to be slightly delayed just so he could finish an experiment.
Look at those artists throughout the ages who preferred to buy crafting materials than food and shelter and whose masterpieces are now the very fondations of our culture.
Look at Tesla, left to die in filth and madness. Look at Turing, who killed himself after being chemically neutered despite his huge contribution. Without those two, personal use of electricity, and personal computers..? I don't think so. Or WAY later.
Look at all the opens-source free softwares that are way more optimized and efficient than their proprietary counterparts.
The list goes on and on and on...
> Profit is the surest way humanity has developed to deem what matters and what doesn't, anything else is pure conjecture.
How can one be so mislead and blind? In what kind of illusion does one have to live to say such silly things?
Some of the most profitable activities known to man are war, slavery and speculation.
Is that what matters the most, then? That's a pretty nasty world you live in.
(Also, by your standards, Call of Duty would be the best video game E-VER... Sight...)
Using immediate financial profit to determine the importance, relevance or interest of things is insanely silly.
Profit doesn't mean something is good. It's in fact the opposite: sometimes good things generates profit. Sometimes.
Now please do yourself a favor, and try to give this a good, long, and objective thinking.
Have a good day. :3 |
The government is fully corporate controlled, as it is one of the most corrupt governments on Earth. This isn't about freedom or management, piracy is a huge profit center for the Ukrainian Mafia, and organized crime is behind a significant percentage of corporate/business ventures in the country. If they could police the internet, they'd love to, but the internet isn't as integrated as it is in the Western world. For example, [this]( guy represents the rather cozy relationship that the Ukrainian government has with organized crime. |
Since they're built in without being "user serviceable", they do away with the locking mechanism and make them in whatever shape fits their computers. |
With crazy enough capacity, this can be put off a fair bit. For instance, I have a netbook that will give me about 8 hours of web surfing. Once the battery is "shot," it may give me 3-4 hours, which is still nice for a "laptop."
Though really, I have a Dell laptop from around 2004, and while the hot-swappable battery died after reaching 0V when I had it in storage for ages, the main battery is still pretty good overall. After using it for a couple years, I took a tech support job and saw the ordering of a few hundred laptops that use the same battery, and ended up returning dozens of them because they all had docking stations and would tend to run from 100%, to like, 97%, then be put away and topped back up to 100% (maybe 105%ish) again and again. While you don't want to drain a Li-Ion battery, you also really don't want to drain it just enough to allow it to charge then charge it again, as either will harm them. |
Not much honestly. The only reason they disclose information is if they have seriously done something bad ( illegal ), and in that case they only release relevant information. Most of these requests would be "lost" (probably stolen ) iPhones, or situations related to illegal stuff. |
Then don't post valuable information in reddit comments? With things like art you're just posting the link text so you're ok there. The big thing is probably authors posting their books or something in a comment; but honestly books are such a poor investment I doubt anyone would want to steal someones book and try to get it published.
Also TOS are not legally binding and I'm willing to bet that license would not hold up against scrutiny especially considering they didn't pay you any money for such a broad license. They also can't prove you the rights holder posted the text; and someone who has stolen your book for example cannot legally issue a license out. |
You know what website you're on, right? I'm sure a lot of people (including me) come straight to the comments to get the |
The only people taking surveys are the unhappy people.
I think there a point for every large company, no matter the industry, where all you hear is complaints; simply because there is a large enough customer base to have complaints. You don't actually hear satisfaction, because people who are happy don't complain.
It's true for:
banks
insurance companies
telephone companies
cellular companies
cable companies
internet companies
power companies
technology companies
If you listened to all the bitching about Microsoft, you'd think it was the worst company on the planet. |
This is the most common pro-patent argument but it glosses over quite a few things and is missing some key information.
>I think drugs would be the best example. Medicine is very expensive to research and test and can take years to get through regulation.
A big part of the cost of research is because of the patents themselves. Scientists aren't banging rocks together, they work with expensive materials and complex machinery. They also require salaries so that they can enjoy having things like smartphones and cars made in the last few decades. On every level patents increase those costs. The fancy widgets are patented, raising costs by wide margins, the consumer goods are patented, rasing cost of living and consequently wages, by wide margins. It all compounds on itself to dramatically raise the cost of research.
A few further notes on research, 77% of "new" drugs in America are products just different enough to circumvent patent protection on drugs that already exist. Without patents the money spent on these drugs would be spent on actually novel research or merely saved. Additionally the government accounts for 66% of biochem research funding through grants and tax benefits. Take away patents, (and all of that expensive patent litigation), and research costs would plummet while research funding in large part continued. Even if you assume research was completely unprofitable if patent removal saved 34% on costs, (and tech markups tend to be much higher than that), it would be a net profit to drug companies.
>But anyone with a PhD in chemistry could reverse engineer them in a fraction of the time. That would be years of work down the tube for anyone trying to come up with new medicines.
This myth is the most common one in defense of patents. It completely ignores supply chains, production times, marketing, brand recognition, and the first-mover advantage. Even if you hand complete notes to your competitor the day you start selling your new wonderpill they still have to secure the materials, mass produce, and ship. While that's happening you have a complete monopoly. They also have to market their product, which often costs more than the research did. The drug industry spends 50% more on marketing than they do on research. Worst-case scenario your competitor has a product out months after you with generic stigma having spent massive amounts of money on production and more importantly marketing. Once they are on the market brand-recognition is still going to give you market dominance. You don't get 20 years of monopoly but you get indefinite market dominance and a variable monopoly period alongside your incredibly reduced research costs from the lack of patents.
>And of course there is no way to go back in time to prove this.
Would data from the 1960s to the 1983 count? Italy did not allow drug patents until 1978. From 1961-1980 9.28% of all novel drugs invented in the world were developed in Italy. During 1980-1983 that dropped to 7.5%.
[Source]( |
Re: paragraphs 1 and 2 - you overlook the fact that there are numerous possible solutions to a problem. The fact that one way of solving it is patented doesn't foreclose all the other options.
Re: paragraph 3 - it's a pointless discussion. Read the Federalist papers or move to a country with no patent protections and report back. I'm not interested in hypotheticals or anecdotal evidence.
Re: paragraph 4 - I'm not talking about the Dow. I know for a fact that US companies (at least in the past) have avoided doing business in China due to lack of IP protections - or do business with the assumption that everything will be stolen - because I have had such conversations with chief IP counsel to that effect. As to the factors you list, I will simply note that the US is not known for low labor costs, low regulatory costs, or low taxes - the US is probably at or near the top of the world leaders in all those.
Re: paragraph 5 - again, you are talking about anecdotal opinions of a few people in a small niche of technology? A lot of those "tech worker" have a personal opinion against patents, just like RW nuts have personal opinions against gay marriage, abortions, etc. They would all be out of jobs if patents didn't exist and their work could be copied for a fraction of the price by someone with lower overhead.
EDIT - |
You can, actually.
Let's say that i invented the PDF format. It's useful, universal, and i have the only code that can read/write it. In doing so, i solved a number of problems that had never been conquered before. I never release the code, and i rake in licensing money from some form of monetization scheme.
Then you come along, and reverse-engineer the format. You recognize some formulas in the output of my PDF writer, and realize how i solved the "insurmountable" problems that kept everyone else from building this kind of technology. You build your own PDF reader and writer, using the output of what my process does, and sell it for a tenth the price. But your reader is a crippled wreck compared to mine, and eventually leads to incompatibilities between the "real" PDF, and your PDF.
With copyright, i can't retaliate, because you didn't copy any of my code. You never had access. But with patent, the invention is similar enough to be a ripoff, and can be marked as such. |
Dammit. I'm in DC and we charge about that much. |
It is good once it has matured, it's good if it's architected to be that way to begin with, it's good if it's a good match between program compute weight and thin-client ability. It's bad if you're trying to catch up, run heavy programs in a light environment and push a system design in a way it wasn't meant to go. |
There is validity on both sides as far as I'm concerned.
On Verizon's side the "read behind the lines" excuse is that since they aren't peering directly with them (aka mob-shakedown Comcast) they can claim latency on the CDN Netflix is using. While this is most likely accurate, what they FAIL to address is that the bottleneck is likely on VERIZON's side for not upgrading their endpoint links with aforementioned CDN's. Why would they? It costs them and they're looking for their customers to subsidize the cost as the Comcast ones did.
On Netflix's side, they're more transparent, although there could be the potential they're fucking with their numbers (audit anyone?). That said, it's likely they can't deliver the shit they want to their customers for exactly the same reason the Comcast deal went down. In short, Verizon has WAY more clout than Netflix when it comes to delivering content to their end users and they're trying to monopolize on that as Comcast did. |
Comcast user here who has gone through this nightmare. The problem is, the casual (read "not very technical") user will not have an easy time finding how to disable this. For one, it is activated the moment you set up the modem. I am an IT tech and I happen to live down the street from an Xfinity, pole-mounted, hotspot. I could get it from my house with a weak signal. When I install the modem I think all is fine. Until the next day. I'm adding my work laptop and since I've gone into the settings and have disabled broadcasting of my SSID, I have to enter things manually. I have an app on my laptop that automatically sweeps wifi channels, gives me SSIDs (if available) and MAC addresses. At first I notice something and think "Wow, Comcast must have improved service to the pole! Look at how strong the signal is now!". But then, when I look at the mac address, it becomes clear that that is coming from my house since it matches the number from my box. To verify this, I pull the plug on the modem and sure enough, the signal drops and mac address changes and I'm barely connecting to the pole-mounted hotspot.
So I go online and do research and at first am infuriated when I read articles telling me how Comcast is opting people in to this service without their consent. Then I manage to find directions, buried in some Comcast support page that direct me through a series of pages I have to log into to get to where the opt out SHOULD be. But it's not there. Long story short, I spend the next MONTH calling Comcast, yelling louder and louder, after tech after tech disables to hotspot for me, promising that it will not come back on again, only to have it come back on. At some point during all this, Comcast put the option back on the website so people could opt out, but even though I selected it, it would disable for less than 24 hours and come back on again. It was only after threatening to take the box back to the local Comcast center and making a scene did I get forwarded over to a "local" engineer (same state). He helped me bridge the modem and I had to go back to using my old Netgear connected into the Comcast modem for wifi in my home. If it wasn't for the fact that I will be moving to a non-Comcast area in about three months, I would just go out any buy my own modem. |
I've had the same thing over the last 6 months - off and on. Turns out (so they say) that there's substation infrastructure issues in my area.
Here's what worked for me - contacting customer service (local stores are best) and be adamant that you're seeing high packet loss, and you need a tech to come out. They'll interface with local techs (if you called the 1800) and send someone out. Don't get mad at them, just emphasize how frustrating it is, and how it's unacceptable that the service you pay for doesn't work.
Second - contact your local city council. Although Comcast isn't regulated in my area, the council was able to contact Comcast on my behalf and expedite the process. 30 minutes after a local tech stopped by, I got a call from the regional tech supervisor, who ran packet loss tests on all Comcast customers in my complex. Lo and behold, the issue was with their infra. The problem was fixed 2 hours later.
Lastly - ask for refunds! I've never encountered a situation where the 1800 rep was unable to give me a partial refund for days that the service was down or partially down. This is a prorated amount based on your monthly bill, but you have to ask for it! Comcast won't offer to give you a discount for nothing! |
No, it's really complicated. It was a trend that Barack Obama set (you never HAD to go public, most just did because it looked good and is more of a sure thing, plus there were caps on company donations so the side that would have benefited most from it stayed away) to start private financing.
The rest of the decisions were made by the Supreme Court, deciding that limiting donations by companies is a violation of the first amendment (coorporations are people and that whole fiasco) |
one-year-old-account
Because of course this is my first account.
> Reddit has always been wary of self-promotional content.
And the algorithm, not money, was supposed to fix that.
Now instead of the algorithm sorting out spam from potentially valuable content, money will do the job instead.
Read my posting history to learn a little bit about who I am. The |
I live in Europe and I have:
A tax on blank media (hard disks, SD cards, phones...) that fund the movie industry. I'm funding the artists and I don't even get anything in return. It should be illegal.
DRM on most medias which means that I cannot backup my movies and music which is a legal right. It's illegal.
Most foreign movies that I want to see are not legally available.
The |
I live in Europe France
You gain the right to make backups and transfer your media to other mediums.
DRM isn't illegal in the EU. If you are referring to Mulholland Drive case, the ban was specific to a movie not indicating explicit enough that the DVDs had DRM.
Importation is a legal way to get foreign movies. |
You gain the right to make backups
The law says I can make backups. It's the law, not a stupid "gain."
> If you are referring to Mulholland Drive case
No. I'm refering to ALL the DRM included in ALL the DVDs and Blurays, some protected audio CDs that do not properly play in the car, and most software with any kind of DRM.
> Importation is a legal way to get foreign movies.
No. You're legally forbidden to use and/or watch a DVD from another region. If I want to watch Japanese movies, I'm lucky because I'm in the same zone. But it changed with Bluray and it's forbidden right now. Import may be legal, watching is still illegal. |
I went to the music store to buy a physical CD for christmas. It's a new album release and this artist gets plenty of radio time (thought not all of her songs are radio friendly).
I went to the music store and tried to find a physical copy of the disc. The person I'm giving it to already has the music on her phone, I just wanted to give the gift of a CD of that music.
Left empty handed. Wasn't under 'new albums', wasn't under 'rap/hip hop' or 'pop/rock' so I left without buying anything. I couldn't even find the CD I was looking for. |
Consider the fact that only one artist in 2014 (Taylor Swift) has made a platinum certified record. That means shes sold over 1 million records. Until November, 2014 was the first year to have zero platinum certified records since the billboard things inception.
Why? Because she's the only one putting out original music that is consistent in quality for a whole album.
Now a days, producers pick generic likeable people that can cater to the masses. They cookie cut melodies, template drum beats and music packages (808s and harps and shit) so we wind up hearing the same fucking song on the radio for an entire decade.
The music industry is no longer a free market and since artists aren't incentivized to make a badass album to sell they just target trying to make a "hit" which is inevitable shit, because on average preteens and teens drive album sales. That's one reason the only other record to sell more than a million copies this year was the Frozen soundtrack. |
I wouldn't be surprised if they would run afoul of laws regarding some forms of speculative investing.
I can't recall exactly what the rules are but there is a reason why kickstarter is NOT investing. Investing in this way has a minimum that means you cant have exactly what you are asking for.
I did a quick search and found this [Slate]( article that goes into things a bit. Here is a link the the [HN discussion]( |
I'm sorry that you don't see anything wrong with sleeping your way to a better career. I'm sorry you don't find it morally reprehensible for someone to file a vindictive lawsuit when sleeping their way to the top fails them. I'm sorry that you have a problem with the advocation of society punishing something which is morally reprehensible but for which the law does not provide a remedy because it does not meet the level of criminal, despite its disruption of many lives. Her behavior is petty, vindictive, and should not be condoned in the slightest. were a man to do something similar he would be publicly ostracized. I'm advocating the shaming of people who act this shitty and think it's OK. |
Gamergate is a bunch of people pissed off because a fairly talentless "developer" was fucking some jackass at Kotaku, along with perhaps up to 4 or 5 other people, to rate her shitty game highly so it'd sell. While she had a boyfriend who also worked in the gaming industry, in some capacity.
It all came to light when he exposed her on his blog or some other website.
Then all gamers got up in arms because they think "gaming journalism" is somehow above all this kind of shit that's been going on for books and movies and television for decades...
So they the Social Justice Warriors of the world united and try to shame the gamers into submission for attacking Grrl Power and actually calling a piece of shit, a piece of shit (Zoe Quinn, the girl who was fucking people to get good reviews).
So then it just degenerated into a bunch of "MUH-SOOJ-EN-EEE!!!!" rhetoric from the SWJs and a bunch of... honestly, who-fucking-knows-what from the "gamers", and then shit got really crazy, as it often does when the Internet and the uninitiated poke the Hive of 4chan... |
Ha! There is far too much content already in the public domain to ever consume it all. Although copyrights should be shortened (another discussion).
I have more books, games, movies, shows, magazines and music on my shelves (both physical and digital) then I will finish in my lifetime.
Plus the consumption of media is a pretty low priority past time, when there is so much else to fill ones time with. |
This is going to be one of those downvoted to oblivion comments, but here goes.
Is it not enough for you people for these websites to be free? Most websites are not these financial giants that you can just use with AdBlock and they don't suffer. My web company has had several hundred people made redundant in recent years, and it's because online content is not a particularly profitable business. And they get their money from banner ads, most of which are totally unobtrusive. Sure, complain about the autoplaying ads, but these aren't very common. Meanwhile, people are trying to create stuff for you to enjoy, and you're just ripping them off. |
Pretty much. Maybe society was superficial before the internet, but the stuff we have nowadays takes superficial and narcissism to whole new levels. You have waves of brainless zombies taking narcissistic self-portraits , I'm sorry, selfies and of other petty objects and/or occurrences in their lives and then glorifying them to make themselves seem like some kind of social butterfly faux-celebrity-cum-model-cum-socialite.
Talking about serious things or negative things is shunned, and anyone who does that is labeled as a "negative individual, probably with some kind of problem, why can't he/she just behave like a NORMAL person and have a PERFECT life like everyone else here on social media?". A place like Reddit does have its flaws but at least the focus of gathering "Fake Internet Points" is on content (and jokes and memes) instead of one's own person.
Social media (especially those with photos; something like Twitter isn't as bad, something that's purely image-centered like Instagram is a cesspool of this stuff) leads people to belief that only happy thoughts and a perfect, eventful life are "normal", and that problems, serious discussions and other things that have generally led to the progress of mankind in the past [XXX] centuries are too "heavy" and "well, only a minority of people have problems; everyone else's life is perfect. So evidently, you, the person with the problems, must BE the problem if you're the only one talking this serious shit".
In the past, these happy people with their perfect lives would have been criticized as delusional narcissists. But today with social media, they're idolized as icons, role models, etc what have you . I'm not saying that the occasional brag isn't okay - it's just something human to boast - talking about that new job or glamorous event you went to once in a while is alright. But posting (on a daily basis) "inspirational and uplifting" quotes coupled with photos of yourself in your A) outfit of the day, B) working out at the gym and/or C) at [some random BS event and balling] with [XYZ my friends crew] is just fake. You would think the people doing this are teenagers or something, but most of them are freaking 20-30 year olds or older. It's ridiculously fake and dumb.
You know it gets over-the-top when individuals talk about the "bad day" they had and deliberately put a Fox News style spin on it to convert their bad day "well I got mugged while meeting my girlfriend who announced she was breaking up with me, and then I returned home and found all my ramen was expired and the building's pipes burst so I've no water supply" into sunshine and rainbows "but every blow I take only makes me stronger and I will rise up again and triumph and bla bla bla bullfuckinghorseshit". |
The whole point of the 5.56 round was that the US Army didn't see a need in long range sharpshooting any more. Considering most conflicts, including Iraq, are primarily urban and close range, this thinking is correct.
However the article is all confused. the AK fires 7.62x39 while the SVD fires a full rifle round which is 7.64x54. The AK round is no more effective with the same effective range as the 5.56 round. |
With regards to the "second part" I'd have to say I was most impressed with [William Grey Walter's]( turtle.
I don't tend to think about it as "think like humans" which some people have criticized (even within this post) as being egotistical.
I like to think about it as robot or creature with a known set of directives that performs actions beyond what it was basically designed for. With the turtles, a few basic sensors and rudimentary 1940's programming technology created complex enough actions that some observers might think turtles had become self-aware.
While in hindsight, all the actions may be technically explained, they were unknown until the robot/creature exhibited them. |
Very nice. They're such a useless ISP. I had them for about two months. It was great for a while, then suddenly I was getting dialup-like speeds in the evenings. They gave me the runaround for a week before telling me that my slow speeds were due to throttling and all I could do about it was to use less of my "unlimited" plan. I was using 80-90GB/month up to that point which I don't think is at all unreasonable. |
My belief is that Itunes gave people the option to avoid purchasing all the filler (crappy songs) the filled out every CD. Suddenly instead of paying $16 for a CD, when all you wanted were 2 songs (essentially $8 per hit) you were able to get the them for a dollar a pop.
Shortly after itunes came out, music labels were trying to convince apple to let them sell some songs for more than a dollar. The trade off was that they'd discount the filler to below a dollar. Apple said no, and ended up looking good in the process. |
Blame the music companies.
When CDs came out, the COGS was ~$4 each vs $.50 for tapes or LPs.
CD prices were double the price for tapes. Music companies made big profits as CD demand for new music and people upgrading to CD quality drove sales.
As CD COGS fell to $.50, the music companies did not adjust their pricing, they were greedy. And their customers left for MP3s. Lower quality product, but free. There always were people who copied music from friends, but technology made it easier.
Sony must be the biggest idiots in the industry. They invented the portable player category, had one of the largest music labels, made PCs, and were totally smoked in digital music. |
for whatever reason, possibly the same as I'm getting downvoted for
You're getting downvoted for making a wild claim that is counterintuitive and failing to back it up.
And speaking of backing it up, the article you linked to doesn't do a very good job of that. Off the top of my head, here are some of the things I took issue with:
It begins by saying, more or less, that Europeans get more done than Americans, in less work hours. Then throughout the article, not a single country other than Germany is cited as an example to back up this claim. So the author picked what is one of, if not the most productive European country, with a notoriously high work ethic, and extrapolated that to all of Europe and attributed it to their work-life balance laws rather than, say, their work ethic. You then extrapolated that single example even further to argue that countries that are work-life balance friendly are more productive than those who aren't. Call me a cinic, but I'd like to see productivity for all the other European countries thrown into the mix before allowing for that kind of conclusion, especially considering the criticism that Germans have been leveling at some of their Eropean counterparts as being lazy.
And speaking of numbers, not a single one was cited in this article to back up the claim that Germans produce a similar or superior output to that of Americans. The author makes the claim many times but does not provide a single source to support it. Tell me how productivity is being measured, show me what those productivity numbers are for America and Germany (and preferably some other countries as well), and a source I can turn to to verify your claim. As far as I know, this article is nothing more than the author's opinion, based on his anecdotal observation in a single company in Germany, that he is then extrapolating to all of Germany and Europe as a whole.
Then there's this brilliant piece of logic:
> Geoghegan believes Germans understate their work hours, and Americans overstate work hours. Yet both countries are getting roughly the same amount of work done. This means that Germans are actually doing more, while working less.
Umm, wrong. If Germans are understating their hours and Americans are overstating their hours, then Germans are in reality less productive than they are stating and Americans are more productive than they are stating. |
Frankly, they're not that smart, and they're not that stupid. You're ascribing to them a convoluted scheme which would be fairly impossible to do. In reality, the reason the IPs are logged and the location info gathered is to prevent fake petitions with robot signatures, thus ensuring that the petitions are actually credible and not being manufactured. This is the kind of thing that Google may be able to do with their resources, but even then, so what? |
Hosted in Ashburn, VA" .
As a web host & supplier of VPS / hosting services, this is why all of my servers are in the EU now after spending two months migrating them. 5+ servers moved to Europe because I saw this coming. All hostnames are now Lithuanian.
Best bet is 1984hosting.com in Iceland which has the best freedom of speech rights due to Icelandic legislation, but for a larger provider, just not feasible. |
what I just posted to facebook I 'm as mad as hell!
Has anyone tried using anything served by Megaupload today? If you can't it's because the United States government has unsealed an indictment for copyright infringement a day after the blackout demonstration. The grandstanding and shows of force by both sides appear to be over. This is a tangible example of how United States law affects you, and your ability to share your original content and copy and share content you find interesting online. This is certainly an attack on your online abilities if not your real world freedoms and exactly the type of activity yesterday's blackout was designed to draw attention to. To be clear, this not only affected Megaupload's ability to share files that certain parties claim to have ownership of, but their entire and online presence was removed- "disappeared"- from the worldwide internet, affecting all it's users who pay to upload and distribute their own content all over the world, because of laws of a country the Hong-Kong based company is not subject to. Additionally this will have little to no affect on sharing - or to use the word of the day "piracy"- as there are literally hundreds of alternatives to Megaupload.
If you do not wish to get angry or listen to me on a soapbox stop reading now.
Bradley Manning, Julian Assange, and a host of others have previously been affected by the unjust application of US and international law now you are if you use these services. I do not use Megaupload but I do use youtube and other sites that operate in a way not dissimilar to Megaupload, and this is where I am choosing to draw the line and say to all of you, my friends, that there are nobler pursuits than watching the latest episode or movie or listening to the latest song at risk here. The current internet is our frontier and refuge, it is simultaneously anonymous and more personal than any other aspect of your life. It contains more knowledge than you will ever know you could ever know and it has just started showing the power of knowledge. It is a new status quo and the current status quo will be replaced by it. Unless actions like these are allowed to continue. It is a worldwide revolution unlike any other that has come before in that it seeks to unify not rebel. It is making communication and empathy and real understanding possible at the same time that it makes populist protest and action possible and easier than ever, while holding accountable those who seek to profit from the unrest. Tyrants have fallen as they always must in no small part due to the influence of the internet and oppression has been made impossible to maintain wherever the people have been given access to the full capabilities of the web. It Has only been 20 or so years! The ferocity and speed with which this network has changed the world and the way we conduct our day to day lives is in my opinion unprecedented in history, and yet governments are seeking to stanch this vital resource in the name of protecting profits for archaic media interests. I do not believe that could be the only reason lawmakers have for attacking what makes the internet great. I will not waste time speculating with what other motives for censorship and control can be but I will tell you that it makes me mad, very mad, and if you are not as mad as hell you should be! |
Thomas Jefferson]( said it better than I know how to say it.
> It has been pretended by some, (and in England especially,) that inventors have a natural and exclusive right to their inventions, and not merely for their own lives, but inheritable to their heirs. But while it is a moot question whether the origin of any kind of property is derived from nature at all, it would be singular to admit a natural and even an hereditary right to inventors. It is agreed by those who have seriously considered the subject, that no individual has, of natural right, a separate property in an acre of land, for instance. By an universal law, indeed, whatever, whether fixed or movable, belongs to all men equally and in common, is the property for the moment of him who occupies it, but when he relinquishes the occupation, the property goes with it. Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the progress of society. It would be curious then, if an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual brain, could, of natural right, be claimed in exclusive and stable property. If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property. Society may give an exclusive right to the profits arising from them, as an encouragement to men to pursue ideas which may produce utility, but this may or may not be done, according to the will and convenience of the society, without claim or complaint from anybody. Accordingly, it is a fact, as far as I am informed, that England was, until we copied her, the only country on earth which ever, by a general law, gave a legal right to the exclusive use of an idea. In some other countries it is sometimes done, in a great case, and by a special and personal act, but, generally speaking, other nations have thought that these monopolies produce more embarrassment than advantage to society; and it may be observed that the nations which refuse monopolies of invention, are as fruitful as England in new and useful devices. |
Yeah but who does the stage show production next time? Sometimes companies don't have anything to negotiate with except the hard work they plan on doing and so they'll take a big hit for this event in hopes of a good relationship with...Universal. I heard the woman who puts together the VIP lounge/bar/dining area at the Sundance Film Festival talk about the first year she put it together. She had some experience as a wedding planner and was kicking ass and managed through some trickery to get in contact with the people who plan Sundance, but she had virtually nothing to negotiate with. So what she did was do it for a price that was so low it wouldn't be conceivable to entertain celebrities for such a cost and have it go well and injected her own capital (namely, almost all her companies money) to make it successful. I can't remember the numbers, but I believe she threw something like 15-20k of her own money. could have been more (50 max), don't think it was much less though. She rocked the event and now she does it every year, with a huge budget because they know they can rely on her (she flies all the staff from LA: doormen, drivers, security guards, chefs, bartenders, waitresses, etc). |
I've read the full indictment now. There is a serious criminal case that has a huge pile of evidence against the Defendants. I would encourage you all to read the Indictment that was filed JANUARY 5th, 2012 ([here's the link](
The timing with SOPA is unfortunate, but they have been working on this case for MORE THAN A YEAR. This case appears to fall within all current laws, mostly much older Criminal Copyright Infringement laws from the 60's. However I'm not a lawyer or an expert in law, I simply read all 72 pages of the Indictment.
The problem here is that they are hosting the actual FILES of UNITED STATES copyrighted works in the UNITED STATES with full knowledge (beyond a reasonable doubt) of said works while PAYING people who have uploaded the most viewed instances of several of them, to the ends of encouraging that activity so that THEY can make more money. The Evidence Exhibits of their first count (Conspiracy to Commit Racketeering), show's literally dozens of emails of the Defendants openly discussing the copyrighted works of certain uploaders who they were paying rewards to. They also have several emails of the Defendants requesting their Chief Technology Officer to search the MU Database and give them links to known copyrighted material for personal purposes.
One of the big problems they have to defend is their file storage system, when they got a DMCA notice for a particular LINK they would only take down the link and not the file it was associated with. This left all other links to the offending file active. If they had stored each copy of the offending work separately this probably wouldn't have been such an easy case to prosecute.
The bank accounts and money transfers for the defendants literally add up to more than 100 (HUNDRED) Million dollars that have been made in part on United States Copyrighted Material hosted in the United States. This is why they are able to extradite in this case. If I made $100 Million running a prostitution ring in Germany while living and being a citizen in America, Germany would be able to extradite me too.
After the Criminal Counts is the list of personal property that would be subject to forfeiture underneath the laws of Criminal Copyright Infringement. These guys have more than a baker's dozen of Merc AMG's, here's some highlights from the list:
2010 Maserati GranCabrio, VIN ZAMKM45B000051328, License PlateNo. “M-FB 212” or “DH-GC 470”, registered to FINN BATATO;
2010 Mercedes-Benz S65 AMG L, VIN WDD2211792A324354, LicensePlate No. “CEO”;
2008 Rolls-Royce Phantom Drop Head Coupe, VINSCA2D68096UH07049; License Plate No. “GOD”;
Artwork, Predator Statue;
I'm completely opposed to censoring the web , but there is definitely CRIMINAL conduct outlined in this particular Indictment, whether it's true or not will be decided by the court.
There is still a CRIMINAL level of copyright infringement which almost everyone doesn't engage in. However, should people be allowed to walk away with $70 Million when it can be proven that most of it came willingly and knowingly from copyrighted works of others? |
At least, each country in UE is responsible for his own laws, and there is not hundreds millions of people fucked in the same bill.
Then, still in UE, some countries already had to face this try to dominate the web, and representatives weren't like All VS 1.
That's why texts have been reformulated and consequences don't even affect you daily browsing. |
Good questions. Now you're getting into semantics, and for me that brings up morality. There are many things that are morally wrong, but not prohibited by law. There are many things that are prohibited by law that aren't morally wrong. In my mind laws are a guideline with the intent to keep order and justice. In practicality for many things they do, other times they fail miserably. Also a law that isn't enforced should be revisited. I personally try to stick with morality (which for some is subjective). I feel breaking laws is immoral in most cases.
Why are you downloading files with random names in the first place? If you realize you'd downloaded something illegal you can always delete it after the fact.
I agree. Companies need to get with the times. If they're not with the time wouldn't they fail? My thought is they should and will given enough time. I suggest personally boycotting products that have limitations (like DRM). Many people have a too big to fail mindset. Well those that are big have more assets to keep them afloat, or lobby congress, to try to change the system, as they see their failing. They also have enough money to shift business models to a more current (with the times) model, but they seem to chose the former.
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." -George Bernard Shaw
These big companies are being unreasonable, and if we let them they'll adapt the world to their old failing business model. We can't stay silent, we can't stay inactive, unless we want this to happen. I just don't think piracy is helping, it's only giving them more reason to believe their system worked and that they just have to stop piracy to make it give them the profits they used to get. |
I think that, while it sucks, we should have seen this coming from a mile away. Clearly Megauploads was engaged in, while not direct piracy, turning its head away from blatant acts of piracy under its very nose. Megavideo is mostly pirated tv shows. And Icefilms, a very blatant pirate site, is very clearly linked to megauploads. The mere fact that icefilms has been mentioned in this thread shows something about the situation. The fact that an investigation led to an indictment shows that clearly this is serious business and there's probably/definitely some wrong doing that we're currently not privy to. So before everyone is like "OMG GOVERNMENT Y U SUCK?!", I think we need to step back and wait for the details. A federal indictment has to have facts to back it up. And the closure of the website makes sense since an indictment usually means seizure of all evidence so that no tampering can be done to it (this happens in major drug busts, we don't just go to people and be all like "yo, you're indicted, but I'm not going to seize your stuff so maybe you can hide it")
The blackout yesterday was awesome but then for the very same people to follow up the next day by supporting a website that IS probably a major force in permitting piracy is a pretty black mark on our principles |
At first thought I agree with you. But then I thought of it another way.
Lets say I knowingly had a house full of crack cocaine and distributed it to people who visited, but I raise a Godly family in that house. If the cops raided my house I'd probably be fined enough to lose my house. MegaUploads lost their house.
MegaUploads distributed illegal products. Any fine, if too small, would have led them to continue their illegal activity, because it would have still have been profitable. A fine big enough to stop them from the illegal activity would have shut them down. Should it matter that their house/business is bigger than mine? Should only the poor pay for their crimes?
Maybe a better example, a millionaire and a speeding ticket. The millionaire can easily pay a speeding ticket, so they keep speeding. No matter how many tickets they get for speeding it won't stop them. The only way to stop a millionaire from speeding is to take their license. The Fed essentially took MegaUpload's license. Should the rich be able to get away with crime, because they can afford to pay when they're caught?
If there is logic in my argument please point it out. I'm just shooting from the hip and writing as I think.
edit: fixed a little of the wording |
In an effort to get people to use IE Microsoft blinds you with info that no but a college level computer student could understand (or redditors), and smothers you with graphs and superfluous facts. |
My personal take on this issue. I am glad that the writer began his article by taking a look at how HBo limits access to it's content. The fact that I don't have cable means the only means I have to access this content legally is to wait for it on DVD or Itunes or wherever. Its important to understand I would gladly pay HBO a reasonable fee for access to its online programming, but to do so means buy 10's of billions of hours of crap tv and that I get access to the shows they air these ads during is small consolationg. So really its ten's of billion's of hours times two, or is it squared? Regardless, I think you get the point. No cable means no HBO.
Here's the thing though. I might at some point own the DVD's of Game of Thrones. Given that I believe temporal linearity is mostly an affect of Human perception rather than a state that the universe exists in, why should my enjoyment of these scrumptious content nuggets by limited to some future purchase date? I know there is room for doubt, I might not own these DVD's either. But when in doubt forgiveness over permission and I'm more likely to purchase these having seen them and know that they are awesome. |
3 months ago my girlfriend and I were really cash strapped. It killed me as a father to do it to my 5 year old who loves watching cartoons after playing outside all day. But, i had no choice. I had to cancel the cable tv.
I was running the bill way too high. as a soccer fan and the fact that I have 2 big ass LCD's i felt required almost to have HD and HD dvr with the HBO and Showtime stuff.
Anywho, we had to lose it all. we got basic internet.
We grabbed another PS3 because my girlfriend loves videos games like i do. for some reason we got the idea to move the second LCD into the living room along side one another and play right next to each other.
Then, we hooked our laptops up to the TV's to use as big monitors. Now, we use netflix and hulu plus. we read all our news and watch all t.v. from our choice. we finished all of the breaking bads and all the weeds episodes and started watching more documentaries than ever regarding history and science.
when it's night time and my son wants to watch a cartoon he has more available options than he did vs the crap on cartoon network and nickelodeon.
We used to spend 160.00 a month on cable tv and internet. Now, we spend 28.99 on 2 megs of internet and i can tell you now, being unplugged for 3 months has changed my life.
I'll never go back to media controlled television again. I control what i watch now and it's so much better.
oh, and because of all the "nice" sites on the internet, i can watch more movies than i ever did before and a hell of a lot more soccer from a few "nice" sites too.
If you haven't already, you should ditch cable tv.
Don't even get Apple TV or Roku. spend an extra hundred dollars on a cheap laptop, hook it up to your TV and you have 10000 more options than cable box or roku or apple tv. |
Actually, not. Someone actually read more than the article: |
I hope that this hasen't been mentioned before or is completely OT from the conversation, but the fact of the matter is that cable isn't going to go away (at least not anytime soon). I know that a lot of us are waiting patiently for the demise of Big, Bad Ol' Mr. Comcast (for those of you who have it) but yet still want the big guys to provide us with high production value and quality content like GoT or Dexter for that matter.
The thing is that we don't have to stand idly by and let the cable companies and big networks dictate what we watch and how much we pay for it. The fact of the matter is that we have access to a lot of free content that is arguably high in production value and has staying power to stand the test of time (or at least I think so).
Gentlemen, I present to you: YouTube.
Now I know you're all about to say: "Screw you man, YouTube is for stupid cat videos and MW3 gameplay footage, not for episodic television" and to a point, yes I can agree. But here's the thing, it used to be not too long ago that we as consumers didn't have access to some of the high end production gear that most studios had which limited a lot of us creatively. However, now with the advent of DSLR cameras and other high end video gear being sold for pennies on the dollar (in comparison to it's "PRO" gear counterparts) WE ...yes WE can create content that rivals that of what we see on the big networks with just a little knowledge of how things work in production and post-production (which most of those tutorials and knowledge can easily be obtained by doing a google search).
However, this does cause a little bit of a problem down the road and it relates solely to attention span, which none of us have for internet content. Statistics have shown that most people that watch internet content click off a video longer than 10 minutes (and in most cases 3 minutes). I, myself tried to change that by starting my own 10 minute web series on YouTube [(Shameless Plug: Harmelody TV)]( and after 2 seasons/years of trying to ween the collective community off of "2 minute content", we decided yesterday to stop producing said videos and focus on creating shorter form content. It was a heartbreaking day in the office to say the least.
But what I'm trying to say is that it doesn't have to be this way. We don't have raise our middle finger at the networks and say "Give us more content that we don't want to pay for". WE can make our own. WE have access to the gear, WE have access to the same computers the big guys do, WE can change the future of video and television. I know, getting a little preachy here, but you get the point.
I know I'm most likely going to get downvoted for this rant, but you all know I'm right.
In closing, I don't remember who I heard this from but I remember I read a quote once that said "If you want to change the future, you gotta start sometime and you gotta start somewhere" which has always stayed with me. I've always also been a big fan of a quote from the great Emmet Brown which was: "The future is whatever you make it, so make it a good one." |
I don't agree with this whole everyone should code mentality coming out lately.
The whole point of coding is making things that other people can use. Why should everyone know coding? It only kills the purpose of choosing use friendly software.
Why do you think Apple is so successful? They make stuff more user friendly than anyone and people pay through their butts to get it.
People are naturally lazy and will pay to have someone else do something than to do it them self.
I'm not saying you shouldn't get into coding if that's what you are interested in, no I encourage you to do so. But forcing everyone to learn to code from first grade isn't the direction we should go, there's more things kids can do than code when they grow up and get jobs, so why should we try to force them to do so? |
Mmmn, nah. As a programmer and former teacher, I can't see this working unless things are at a very basic level (such as a visual language used by manipulating picture objects on the screen, for example - if so, this is a good thing to teach logic and critical thinking skills from a young age, but hardly practical). Even at the most basic level, actually programming anything requires math skills that are beyond the reach of the average first grader. 6th graders would have more of a chance at being effective at it.
I personally began when I was 8 or 9, using QBasic and writing simple text based games from a book. While it was a useful exercise, I don't feel I was ready to jump into "real" programming until some years later. Consider that I was someone with a natural interest and not having it forced upon me. From a teaching point of view, this is really tough to justify in purely practical terms - where on earth are you going to get several thousand qualified teachers who know how to code at a level that makes them effective at teaching it?
Programming is an excellent way to teach logic skills and develop the ability to think outside of the box, so some level of education at school regarding it is really great - I'm just not sure that the present craze about everyone needing to learn it is really justified (Take a look at the [Mayor of New York and his decision to start learning to code.](
What on earth is someone like that going to do with that knowledge? One would think (hope?) that he doesn't have time to sit there fiddling aroudn with optimising database access times for the city of New York's archives. More coders out there and more code in general isn't really a good thing - programming is about finding solutions, and if the solutions made by bad coders cause more problems, then it's obviously not a great idea. |
I sent it to my grandfather in law who was a head cryptographer at the NSA a number of decades ago. I'll let you know what he comes up with!
Update: This is the response that I got. "My primitive hand techniques probably wouldn't do much if the pros can't break the code. I imagine NSA could do a lot, but even there it is hard to crack a one-time code without knowing something about the context." |
I'll try this one. It's not about how it feels on your hand or pocket. The s3 is and always will be slightly awkward to hold due to the large screen. Now that I have had the large screen awhile the I phone screen just looks tiny.
The big difference is in the operating system. Android and ios have very similar capabilites, but apple locks everything down. My gf has ios and I have android. She wanted her texts to come from me as blue, like with her iphone using friends. Sure no problem let's just see... Oh.... You have to jailbreak to do that.
The learning curve in Android is higher, but that is because it doesn't force everyone to use their stuff. Their stock keyboard is crap. Get SwiftKey. Problem solved. Don't like their email app? Plenty of choices. I can't tell you how long it took to get Gmail to work with my old iphone.
Then there is Tasker, an app that is very difficult to understand at first, but it can do so much. I set it to respond to a text that said certain things certain ways. My girlfriend can get my location by texting me and it returns my coordinates. I also set an auto text to remind my sister to do something once per day at random times (and random texts!). I can use Tasker to look at my calendar and know when I am working and silence the phone.
Sorry about the rant. The iphone is a great phone and feels great in your hands too. I just like the extra abilities that android allows for. |
Because they cant sell you XP every 2 years can they? So they make a new OS and fix everything that's not broken and stop supporting the old one which was a perfectly fine OS, so you have to buy the new "improved" one. |
I tend to agree with him, just because this is the direction M$ is urging you to go (Metro instead of jump-to-desktop). I don't have a problem with people pissed at OS developers for trying to force them to use something they don't like.
I've seen all the "yeah, but download extension A, B, and C, change the settings here, here, and there. Then be sure every time you start up you click here to bypass into this other view, and there you have it. No more UI confusion!". Sorry, but that is kind of a lot of B.S. If you want my money for your OS, and you've basically dictated for the past 15+ years how I've needed to interact with you, don't all of the sudden throw most of the UI conventions out the window. Imagine you bought a car that goes 200 MPH, goes 0-60 in 4.2 seconds, only needs to be serviced once every 24 months, and has all the features you could ever want in a form that you've been familiar with for over a decade. Now the next year the dealership talks you into trading in your old car for a new one. You get in your "New" car and everything is changed. You have issues because everything seems different and you can't even drive or stop the car because of the confusing new controls, and you get frustrated. The dealer says "Aha! But we can fix that! Just get these few after-market accessories installed, then we'll have our mechanic make a few tweaks to the car. Then every time you want to start the car, just enter through the trunk, and it'll be almost identical the your old car." And you say "Well, then why go through all the hassle, why not just use my old car?" To which the dealer replies "There's lots of reasons! This new car can go 205mph, goes from 0-60 in 4.1 seconds, only needs servicing every 27 months, and...well, it's the only type of car we sell anymore."
I know most everyone could learn to use this OS. I know if forced to use it consistently, 15 years from now people would cry if you removed Metro from their world.
My problem is this:
Time is money
People are stupid (and everywhere looking for help)
Stupid people are scared and confused by change
Helping stupid people causes stress (which only time and/or money can fix)
If every one of the people I know that refer to me as "their computer guy" need a bunch of help to learn how to do the most basic of things (which I've already invested a SHITLOAD of time into the past 20 years teaching people), then I will either go crazy or tell people I will not help them. When they ask why, I will honestly say because I hate Win8. Not just because I personally think 1/2 the UI is completely fucked, but because it is completely different/alien/confusing TO THEM. If I can't just say "do X, then click Y, and finally close Z" and have them do it, I'm going back to teaching them How-To-Use-A-Computer 101. I lived through that hell once as computers came from the unknown to ubiquity, I refuse to do it again to appease the glue-sniffing marketing/executive/design staff at Microsoft that gave Win8 the thumbs up to be released. |
The issue isn't subterfuge in regard to the pricing/sale deadline. Also, a grand opening sale would be the first contact with a company. This isn't our first rodeo with Microsoft. MS has had several opportunities to provide this same offer in every previous version of Windows. They have not, because they didn't need to, and that has hurt them to some degree in the past in regard to new version adoption (See Vista, and ME). They have also managed to produce a pattern of poorly performing operating systems AFTER producing ones that are considered at the very least adequate to a majority of users at the time. How is it, that after so long in this business, they are now choosing to temporarily discount the product JUST after launch. Why would they plan in advance to provide a limited time discount on upgrading for this one lone OS product when they have never done that in history (to my knowledge)? I believe the answer is that they knew this was going to be a problem OS, and they cast their bets on what amounts to a gimmick sale to expedite adoption rate artificially. If this iteration of Windows was truly awesome, then why so much "meh" from the community?
Arguably, this sounds pretty damn similar to the "meh" that Vista caused on its arrival. The big difference is that Vista performed like shit when it came out. If Win8 works better, that's great. If nobody wants to use it despite that fact, that's not so great... for MS, not us. For that reason, I am pretty sure this one will be a bust, whether it is better or not. So far, the only thing I've been able to confirm from interacting with Win8 is that it's different, which doesn't equate to better. It may also be worth noting that there appears to be a trend with alterations made from version to version ending up the most complained about parts of Windows releases, especially when it is a system that impacts end-users over more experienced operators (Vista UAC as an example).
For those reasons, I can't see it taking off, and I do see this as an act of desperation to try and at least get better sales performance within the first year. So far, I would say that isn't necessarily happening based on the sales results released so far. I am also convinced that the discount was a gimmick, and an attempt to force their market to comply with their expectations. So, the OS is on sale, ends on Jan 31st. We'll see what the numbers look like after that. I'm pretty sure the already somewhat lackluster sales will not improve when the price goes up. |
So here's a fun story. I'm still on my family's mobile plan and we've been off contract for over 8 years now. Despite me having a smartphone (NEXUS 4) we do not have a data plan.
My dad bought my mom a cheap Android 2.0 phone a few years back. It shipped from China. After a month or so we started suddenly noticing data chargers, and since we were not signed up on 3G networks it was pulling it off the old-school data network. After calling AT&T and blocking data-access to this phone he started tinkering with the phone. Turned out it wasn't an app but a background process that was hard to track down. It was sending information somewhere, somehow. We don't know what information and how much. Would have been interesting to do a "wireshark-like" test on it, but that wasn't our primary concern at the time. Upon disabling the background process it almost shut down the phone temporarily, or at least crippled it. |
I did state it was "overly complicated", and just because I didn't waste my time with it and you did doesn't make you special. |
I was messaged four times on facebook from friends to apply for Mars One and ended up giving a professor grade lecture (at 20 years old) to show that this program/scam is garbage from stem to stern and despite my impeccable will to go to the Red planet is firm... I wouldn't touch Mars One with a 10 foot pole.
Besides, $128 million covers the rocket and payload fairing.. What about the actual spacecraft or cargo? That might cost more than the actual rocket in terms of R&D and materials.
Sure they don't need to create a lander by using Red Dragon, but they still need to design the interior which is going to take resources, human factors, engineering and interior design to make the colony as much as a home feeling as possible. It's the apex of interior architecture.
And to also make sure the pre-fabricated colony interior is good for spaceflight and habitation on the red planet. And haven't they considered that they need to create the Earth-to-Mars spacecraft as well? That needs to house 4 people with food and supplies? And that's straight out. NASA has already crunched numbers that you need tons and tons of water and food to survive a chemical-rocket conventional trip to the red planet.
On top of micro gravity and cosmic radiation, you need a genuine spaceship able to sustain humans for months at a time and to vault over the food, and microgravity, and radiation issues.
On a good note, the ISS as a lab and test bed has mastered water recycle treatment. But you need a lot of water to be able to continue cycling for food, showering here and there, and hydration. |
Everybody gets swept away without ever knowing how these things actually work. Another classic case of sensationalism in journalism.
All they're reporting on is the MAPP program which has been in place for years. All vetted members of the defensive security industry get advanced warning on vulnerabilities that exist so that they can ready patches, signatures, etc... for their products so that when Microsoft releases the fix for patch Tuesday, vendors are not scrambling to build detection methods. This keeps people safe from script-kiddies who exploit the gap that exists between the time the vulnerability is announced and the time that the patch can be applied to systems. |
Three charts are incomplete and the commentary laughable. The reality is that most of those 'smart phones' they were making a killing off were S60 pieces of shit that only sold because they were much cheaper than Apple and Android sucked. No one I know liked them, but most people had them, especially outside the US where until 2009 you couldn't even buy an iPhone.
The huge drop lines up nicely with the release of the first decent Android phones at the same price point as Nokia's crap. The only non windows phone they released that was even close to competing with Android or iOS was the N9 which was released after they'd already signed the partnership with Microsoft and agreed win phone would be the flagship in exchange for enough money to keep the lights on. That's right their first actual smart phone was second half 2011, and they wouldn't have made even that if they hadn't canned QT and symbian ( the event the article claims is what killed them).
Nokia was a market leader not because they were the best, but because everyone else sucked worse. By the time they even had an entry in the race they'd run out of money. |
The better question is if the pay out from Microsoft to be exclusively WP was more than they would have earned if they went Android as well. People talk about Nokia using WP being unique but Samsung, HTC, and others used both platforms so it wasn't like Nokia had anything special. In fact remember when Nokia got screwed releasing the Lumia 900 only to have Microsoft dead end it around release time? |
Nokia has been slowly dying for years. Gone are the heady pioneering days of the 90's, and what remains is a shadow of its former self. Its true that Microsoft acquires a bunch of patents... eclipsed patents that is, and as usual with all American companies, they will outsource, redistribute and stack rank the business into the ground. Which is a process that Elop has started. Nokias global market share has NOTHING to do with the western smartphone market, but more to do with the 400m cheap miniaturised versions of the Nokia 1100 "Brick" that they sell across Asia. Following the replacement of the Symbian system, Nokia's smartphone sales figures, which had previously increased, collapsed dramatically. From the beginning of 2011 until 2013, Nokia fell from its position as the world's largest smartphone vendor to assume the status of tenth largest. |
More precisely Nokia, had a fantastic hardware division and a software division which had been destroyed by management incompetence.
Aside from missing out on what Apple discovered people really wanted in smart phones, they were simultaneously pouring money into three different UI systems and two different Operating Systems. This meant that even though the hardware was great, the phones sucked and they were haemorrhaging money and market share.
Microsoft on the other hand had a quite reasonable if a bit feature limited Mobile OS and no hardware division to speak of. So you see you have an OS looking for a phone and a phone looking for an OS.
Microsoft decided to fund Nokia as a partner instead of buying them and the two of them gave Windows Mobile a shot, the phones were good, the OS was slightly better than iOS from three versions ago, but they didn't really sell, so Nokia was going to be sold so Microsoft bought it. |
Yeah.... That's a really shitty source.
It was $13.25 when Elop took over, and it was $3.90 yesterday, so roughly 75% down. But, look at it closer, and the price was $39.19 2 years prior almost to the day.
In the 2 years prior to Elop, the stock had plunged from $39 to $13, which is huge. Any sane person would realize that Elop, or Gates or Jobs or anyone else you can name, couldn't come in and magically reverse that trend immediately. It was going to continue that trend but the key was to limit the bleeding and reorganize for the future. It hit a low of $2.27, and has been a nice climb up from that.
I can't believe the amount of people here that believe Nokia was in fine shape before Elop, and that had he not come over that everything would still be fine. |
I will preface with this- I hate driving and only hate it due to getting jerked around by insurance companies, being hit by multiple unfit and uninsured drivers, and am currently bleeding 60% of my menial paychecks in commuting costs. Take this with a grain of salt but its time someone said it.
Lets be honest: in the United States, of all the every day things we engage in, utilize and depend on, driving as our main mode of transportation and commuting for work is statistically one of the most dangerous and risky things we do each day. We put ourselves and anyone else on the road at risk whenever we pull out of our driveways, merge onto the highways and go through a traffic light. Car accidents and deaths by car accidents remain one of the highest and most common causes of injury or death in this country.
And yes while I do understand that millions of people depend on this billion dollar industry as a means of income, I'm not insensitive to that, but it is time that we recognize and accept new technology as a means of literally saving many millions of lives down the road (pun very much intended). We as a society love to fear monger and sensationalize things that are bad for our health and that put us at high risk for injury and death: cigarettes, fast food, drugs, alcohol, becoming a victim of crime, gun ownership/access to weapons..
But here we all are, very blatantly ignoring the elephant in the room, or more likely our driveways all in the means of protecting a capitalistic interest. These massive, metal, multiple ton death machines that we entrust our teenagers with, something considered so "risky" that you are legally required to pay exorbitant amounts of insurance in order to use it, runs our lives. We have become highly dependent on them for our day to day lives here and literally flush billions away per year on fuel, upkeep, insurance and financing for these ridiculous things. We've built all our modern urban and suburban infrastructures entirely around driving and its time to admit to ourselves that this is no longer a sustainable model. When tobacco companies were being villianized for selling a risky product, no one flipped out about their industry collapsing and them losing jobs and company values plummeting, "serves them right for peddling cancer knowingly!". But here is an industry that we KNOW for a fact doesn't do our lungs any favors, cars in the volume we've got them are bad for the environment and people are in fatal accidents literally every hour, by the time I've typed this I'm sure there has been at least 1 fatal accident happen.
Enough of my ranting. My |
So my original comment was correcting someone about "if it is in a hotel then the WAP won't let devices see each other" which is objectively false. My comments about encrypted packets were merely to drive the point home. If you're using WiFi, I can see your traffic, even if it is encrypted, open, radius auth, doesn't matter. It is a radio and therefore another radio can receive it. Period.
The chips only support open networks like hotels and coffee shops, which usually use a WiFi gateway that auths a user on a portal web page. The traffic itself is cleartext, but the auth doesn't matter to these attacks, it's not trying to join a network, merely get a remote machine in the vicinity to download a payload from somewhere. |
Actually, if you want a serious answer, hotels target either private travelers or businesspeople because businesspeople want to keep away from private travelers as much as possible.
For example, you can pay for a clear card, pay for united lounge, pay for first class + boarding priority, and have a car (not a taxi) pick you up at both ends. This means you're moving through the airport fairly insulated from the private travelers who are loud, might be sick, are distracted and moving slowly, and so on. Different security lines, private waiting area with free* food, no boarding line, and so on.
If travelers like this are your clientele, you're going to greet them at the door with a bellman and get them straight to their room through your massive, empty lobby and large front desk with no wait. Adding $15 so that they have an exclusive, higher speed wifi to call in to a video meeting is just par for the course.
*"free" after you've payed the yearly membership fee |
User data
Instabridge may collect and store data from the User, including but not limited to Facebook profile name and picture, Facebook friends, e-mail address, the phone number You may have registered with Instabridge, phone numbers from Your address book that are registered with Instabridge, data on and login credentials to routers and Wi-Fi networks, geographical location of the network, etc. Any data collected and/or stored by Us may be used to provide and improve the Service, develop new products and services, analyse Your use of and personalise the Service, as well as for statistical, marketing and other commercial purposes. |
All my software collects anonymous usage statistics. i'd like to know:
how often you sort columns
which columns
which direction
how long the sort takes
how often you use instant search
how long the instant search text is
how long instant search took
how many times you clicked Search , verses pressed F5 to refresh the scren
how many times you clicked the New User toolbar button, verses pressing Ctrl+N , verses clicking New User from the context menu
how many times the hash list has a cache miss
how many times the lock-free initialization had a false create
how many times you actually visit the control panel
how many times you change the Status search criteria
how long it takes to print the receipt to the receipt printer
how many times you run from a terminal services session
how many times you run in High Contrast mode
how many times you run in less than x768 resolution
Anonymous usage statistics are useful for improving the product, and not worthy of unchecked paranoia.
Edit : And for the real tin-foil hatters, drop to a command like and search for *.sqm :
C:\>dir *.sqm /s
Total Files Listed:
11 File(s) 14,198 bytes
SQM (or Software Quality Metrics, pronounced "squim" ) is Microsoft's internal name for the business term Customer Experience Improvement Program .
Nearly every Microsoft product (as well as Chrome), collect anonymous usage statistics (which means nothing personally identifiable) in order to see how people use, or how the product behaves, in the real world.
It's useful to know that a handful of users actually do customize their Windows fonts, and that a handful actually do use high-dpi mode. |
Kind of a lengthy explanation, but I'm including some details that may make it more clear to people that don't have as much experience with this sort of thing.
Background Facts/Info
Netflix and content providers have to pay for internet access in order to provide their services (some people don't seem to know this). These circuits are dedicated (not best effort) and cost a lot more money than residential connections.
ISPs have peering agreements with each other that basically provide connection to customers on each other's networks. This is essential for the internet to work, since otherwise you'd have to be on network with a specific ISP to use service from a company that only had that ISP. These connections are usually free of fees since they are mutually beneficial to both parties and the load usually averages out pretty well.
The Problem
Netflix breaks the averages with peering agreements. The bandwidth consumption becomes very lopsided going from one network to the other, and so the costs for hardware increase massively while no additional income is being made. Netflix accounts for between 30 and 50 percent of internet traffic on average every evening, which is why this is a huge problem.
Comcast and Verizon were probably not providing direct access for Netflix, thus being on the really short end of the lopsided peering agreement.
Proposed Solution
Comcast and Verizon are essentially asking that they be able to provide internet access directly to Netflix so that streams would originate on network for their customers, which reduces network load for them, gets them money, and would probably speed up connections for a lot of people.
Other Notes
Other smaller video streaming and bandwidth consuming services whether it be Hulu, Crackle, porn sites, Dropbox, etc probably get averaged out between ISPs pretty well for that peering traffic, Netflix is just a massive exception.
Netflix doesn't really have to do this, it isn't their fault that the internet is set up this way, but they are doing it to play nice. They also probably won't incur a much larger internet access bill than they are used to, since they will likely disconnect some circuits with their existing ISPs to average it out with the ones that weren't previously participating. |
Slashdot drove me away with their bullshit. Back then it was completely controlled by the moderators.
I switched to the earliest version of reddit. After a while reddit drove me out because no one could create their own sub, and the main page.. changed.
I spent a lot of time on hacker news, and eventually returned to reddit when I got to select which subs I wanted to see. |
That's the point that I'm making... that it seems you're missing a step here. The supercomputer that is Watson uses data at it's "fingertips" to make decisions/calculations/predictions of outcome. They're not just going "Ok, Watson is now going to compile all of the data like our current computers already do, replacing them" (which is the argument you are putting forward, whether or not the words are intended that way). It's "Ok, Watson is now going to take all of the systems that are already in place and do the work of the humans by aggregating this information as they do and making "educated calculations" based on the information that's already being/has been collected." It's literally taking the place of the humans in the current process. Of course, it's only ONE lab that it's going to be doing this in; however, with cloud computing capabilities it's possible to roll this into multiple labs. |
Good question. We see this with interpretation of ECG scans. ECG scans, to put as simple as possible, gives a print out of the electrical data of the heart. It can identify some heart attacks, and many different arrhythmias. Someone built a neural network that more accurately diagnosed heart attacks that a trained cardiologist. So what happens today, is that physicians take what the machine thinks, and combines it with what they think is going on, and makes a more informed clinical decision.
With cancer data, the human genome is very large and complex, and not everyone has the same default set of sequences going around. Not only is this the case, but new data on the human genome comes out daily. It takes a ton of man power to go through this data, and identify special markers that have clinical implications. Watson is simply another tool that these scientist can use to make better informed decisions. |
As someone working in the tech industry, I'm kinda not that disheartened at the idea of moving abroad. It'd be an opportunity to experience life elsewhere in the world. |
It doesn't matter if they're allowed to "officially" because supervisors turn a blind eye to the calls being dropped. They only look at sales metrics, calls dropped while holding and package/bundle add ons per rep. Oh and don't forget how long you took a bathroom break when you were supposed to be taking calls and knocking everyone out of the queue. |
Did you ever think that maybe, JUST MAYBE, the reason the U.S. hasn't had a single major Islamic terrorist attack since 9/11 is precisely because the Department of Defence got their shit together?
They've had to contend with the retards of both the Bush and Obama administrations and yet they've been successful. I don't know if you know anyone who works for the DoD, but the three people I know who do are the most responsible intelligent people I've ever known.
Do you want the kind of bullshit here that The Netherlands, The UK, France, and other formally less stringent with their immigration policy nations have to contend with?
Well you don't have to deal with that shit because the DoD has been spying on these people and ejecting them the fuck out before they [begin beading people in the streets]( and [murdering artists]( who offend their [imaginary friend]( |
It depends. Some reps have the power to sell and make deals and others don't. That's why when you call to cancel your Internet service the first guy offers you the standard package deals. You say no and he transfers you to the cancellation department that halves your bill just because they want to keep you. Some reps have more power than others.
Or in an example that you might be more familiar with: Say you go to the supermarket and there's a "Buy 20 avocados for $5! (Or buy them at $2 each)" You don't want to buy 20 because you'll never eat them all before they go bad. So you ask the cashier if you can have 5 for $5. They say they can't help you, but they get a manager over and the manager discounts it so that it works out. |
As soon as I got my raise, my hours got cut. My checks got smaller overall. A few months after they gave me a "pay card" because they decided not to give out checks anymore. The card took about $40 in fees before I realized and switched to direct deposit. The support number put me on hold for 25 minutes before I got an answering machine. I wonder how much that company paid Staples for that opportunity to fleece us like that? |
Story time (and what put me over the falls as far as TW hatred): I had HD cable service, but was thinking about getting rid of it because I download everything now and everything on cable (save for sports) is crap or can be downloaded anyhow. So, I kept putting it off, and finally was going to do it. But on the way home from work I noticed their office where you bring the equipment to didn't have their sign on it, so they obviously moved.
Now, let me preface this by saying I know how to get information, I know how to Google search, I mean I work in web dev, you pretty much have to when you're researching how to do something in the programming world. Anyhow, I went home and looked them up online. Anything I find is only national, nothing local. The only thing that is local is for their administration offices, but it's not for equipment. So I call their national number to see if I could get the local information. After 5 minutes of punching in numbers and getting routed around, I get to one saying "transferring to local number" and...click! Did this again, and same exact result.
So now I'm highly pissed. I figure screw it, I'm driving down to the administration offices and I'll throttle someone until they tell me where I can cancel my service. So I drive across town, and lo and behold, right on the front door it says "if you have equipment, go to the local office here..." with the address. Jesus, really? All that just for that info?
Of course the drop off location was clear on the other side of town. When I got there there it wasn't open yet, but there was already a line of old fossils lined up outside like they were waiting for a Beach Boys concert, so I was extremely happy about that. By the time I finally was able to tell the service rep I want to cancel, he must have been able to tell by the look on my face I was none too happy, because he never asked "Why are you cancelling today" or tried talking me out of it - that never happens. |
37 min vid. |
I used to work at a 3rd party call center that did sales for twc and that pricing sounds about right depending on your region. They are very shady with their fine print and that price they were quoting you was probably for a slower speed of Internet. I have done so many sales for them (regrettably and I got my ass out of there ASAP) that it sounds like the quote was for their triple play, Dvr, standard Internet(10ish mbps) and phone, then 10 dollars per cable box, 5 for the modem and probably another 10 for the wireless router that they want to install (even though yours will work fine and without an equipment fee). |
Something similar happened to me about three years ago. At the time, I had the all-in-one package (phone, internet, cable), and they sent a letter saying that I could get the exact same package for nearly half the price I was currently paying per month.
I called, got dicked around for 45 minutes and they said that I didn't qualify because I was "already signed to a contract." I asked if it was common policy to taunt people by sending them letters with better prices that they're not eligible for, and they said that I should have asked what the deals were when I originally signed up.
Somehow it was my fault that I signed up for a standard package , and got a letter in the mail saying I was getting ripped off. I paid the cancellation fee on the contract and dropped down to only internet. They told me the only way I could have internet on its own was at $54.99 a month, and I went with it.
Last October, I was having a lot of problems with my connection, and called for support. I found out that I was getting their basic internet service ($29.99/month) for the $60 I was paying for two years.
I upgraded to the "ultimate" tier, and my bill only increased by ten dollars! When I asked what they were going to do to compensate me for the $25/month discrepancy, they said they couldn't do anything. I was told that I should have called regularly to ensure that my package was the best they could do for me.
It's absolutely mind-boggling that services with standard pricing require so much maintenance from my end. It's also absurd that the person on the phone tells you one thing, then it's up to you to call repeatedly to make sure the claim was accurate. I can't begin to fathom the amount of people that have been continually screwed over like I was for two years and they don't even know it happened.
I have no viable alternative for broadband in my area... It's either Roadrunner or Verizon DSL, and it's incredibly frustrating. |
You haven't dealt with corporate thinking much eh?
He has ultimate internet. Already paying for 1/2 of the targeted upgrade TWC is tempting customers to pay for.
Since he already has it, and is already paying for it, they don't stand to make any money just tacking on starter tv. They know it, and despite the misleading nature of the mailer they're going to fall back on the fact that he's already a subscriber to part of the package they're offering.
Were he a lesser package/service owner currently, yes he's eligible.
Read it again. When you upgrade to starter tv and ultimate internet. Since he's already got ultimate, he can't upgrade to it. They won't make any more money off of him. They'll refuse it every time.
This is shaping up to look like I'm defending them and I'm not. TWC, just like every other major corporation without any market competition is going to fuck him and every one of us just the way they want to, for as long as they can. |
Problem is no matter how unjustified these companies are they would rather fight you in court with more money and influence that goes far beyond what would be normal in any other field - solely to make you give up.
Sure we can file law suites but they'll just drag it out for YEARS just to prove their point, instead of just making the customer feel appreciated or even satsified with a quick and easy fix.
Since they own half our representatives they would probably never even have to take it that far when they can just grease the palms a bit more for less negative press.
I PRAY this recording trend actually grows and gains more traction.
Even less tech savvy and oblivious customers hate dealing with these notoriously shady companies. If they can see the problem on such a big scale, and with many different problems across the board, you HAVE to know these companies exist in a completely different bracket of insanity. I only hope we can push back against these companies before it's too late to make bigger strides. |
There are a few problems with this post.
One, it's trend hating on cable companies. I get that that's a big thing now, but these kinds of posts are getting a little carried away.
Also, does the letter even have OP's name on it? It might just say "Resident." If so, the offer was never intended for OP to begin with. In any case, lots of companies - not just cable companies- send out mass marketing mailings. It's not a corrupt practice. It's extremely common.
The "fine print" indicates precisely who the offer does and does not apply to. Again, this may be an annoying thing but it's not illegal. There is no fraud or falsehood here. This is another common practice of many companies.
I will agree that handling of OP's call was absolutely terrible, and it shows a blatant disregard for proper training among employees of TWC. What should have happened is that the IVR should have brought him into the sales department, who should have informed him that this is a new customer offer and then gone over any upgrade offers they might have for OP. It should have been a 5 minute call.
OP is doing the whole cable company witch hunt thing that has been en vogue lately. |
Subscription to a qualifying Time Warner Cable Triple Play package and proof of switch from previous provider required.
Greyed out.
Small text.
So shady.
But on the same page:
>Dell device offer ends 10/18/14. Subscription to a qualifying package, proof of switch from previous provider or proof of current college student enrollment required to receive a voucher for a Dell Inspiron 11 3000 Series 2-in-1
Subscription to a qualifying package (has one right?)
or
proof of switch
or
proof enrollment
?
I still don't understand.
Regardless, it should say "new customer or college" deal on the main page.
Online terms (no excuses for electronic text) need new rules: e.g. certain text size, each sentence on a new line, mandatory |
Yes, if course. We all have stories like this, that are just hilarious demonstrations about how fundamentally the blue haired set doesn't get technology. But many folks over 60 do understand the tools they're using just fine. You just don't hear stories about them.
By extension, this asinine petition makes the Reddit/Twitter/"digital native" population look like full-on retarded people. Most of us aren't. I wasn't the first to notice the separation of powers issue, I was just the one who posted the meanest most rhetorically pandering rejoinder, because I like Karma. |
His mother was American; he's naturalized. That is the only birth requirement for president and he would STILL have been qualified to run for president. Why? Because his mother was from fucking Kansas, you don't get any more American than Kansas. |
I am in the very small category with no access to wired internet, only wireless. It fucking sucks. Try downloading a one gigabyte game on steam and see how long it takes you. It takes me about 7-8 hours. I have at the maximum around 250-500 kbps internet speeds. It is very odd because I am 10 minutes outside of the suburban area of Louisville, KY. People 10 minutes away enjoy 10-25 mbps speeds while Im stuck like a fucking pleb. And dont even get me started on lag! |
Bonus Information: The [United States has more fibre than all of Europe]( What people don't realize is that the U.S. is big , and at $50,000/mi to run fiber, it's a huge money sink to get high-speed everywhere.
I am all for the government borrowing the remaining $900 billion needed to run high-speed to everyone's home. But you would not find one republican willing to take on that much debt. Conservatives won't even accept a tax hike to provide two years of free community college.
Bonus Chatter
Google Fiber : Spent $84M to run fiber to 149k homes[^1](
$563 per home
City of Longmont, Colorado : In 1997 spent $1.62M to run 17 miles of fiber along main roads:
$95k per mile
In 2012 residents voted 66% in favor of a $45.3M bond issue to run fiber to homes.[^2](
Population of Longmont: 88,669 (2012)
FTTH cost per person: $511
FTTH cost per household (assuming 1.9 people per household): $971
Villagers of Löwenstedt, Germany : collected $3.4M to run fiber to 620 homes in 2014 [^3](
$5,312 per home
British farmers in rural Lancashire : Raised £0.5M ($762k), and need another £1.5M ($2.3M). [^4]( They believe they can get the cost for FTTH down to
£1,000 ($1,600) per home |
I've seen that linked, a lot. The interesting point, and the point that is glossed over, but it's mentioned in the piece, is that those investment tax breaks were to wire up hospitals and universities. And it was also to run fiber backbones.
Which all happened.
There is another piece, about Pennsylvania Bell, and how they ripped off taxpayers.
Except, you know, not.
If you read industry newsletters from 1995-1999, read the Pennsylnvia order to breakup Bell with their the need for regulatory tax relief in the telephone market, read the Bell updates to the commission of 1998 and the Verizon (nee Bell) update of 2000.
Short version:
they weren't given tax breaks to run fiber to customers
they weren't going to run fiber to customers
the tax breaks were because PA was forcibly breaking up Pennsylvania Bell; increasing costs and imposing costly 3rd party access
the regulatory minimum speed was 1.544 Mbit/s
DSL technology at the time (1994) had been demonstrated to reach 54 Mbps
the general consensus of the industry at the time was fiber to remote DSLAM cabinets, and broadband DSL to the house over the existing copper pair
Bell voluntarily said they could provide 45 Mbps/s
Bell upgraded their network to run fiber to their concentrators
by 1999 it was clear that, although DSL can achieve 54 Mbps, DSL wasn't going to achieve 45 Mbps for remote customers |
I try to avoid explaining Apple but since you seem actually curious here's my attempt to explain it. This is all qualified by the fact that I think it's important to understand why people like a product even if you don't like it. For example I totally get the appeal of android but it has zero appeal to me personally.
First off marketing hype: this a deeply flawed argument. Samsung spends a fortune on advertising actually quite a bit more than Apple. Every company and technology with any real marketshare does spend a considerable amount of money on marketing. The difference is how they spend it. Google spends a ton of money advertising to people that want to buy its core product ad words. I get constant mail, phone and email marketing from Google because I am in their target market, Microsoft spends a ton of money marketing to CIOs and SMB partners. The big difference is that Apple spends it's marketing budget in ways that are highly visible to regular consumers.
Similar hardware: I've used recent models of both Dell and Lenovo laptops. To me, the keyboards are horrible and the touchpad sate even worse. I am typing and using the touchpad constantly when using my laptop obviously and that difference alone will keep me buying Macs. The rest of the hardware is all a step above. For something I am going to use upward of 40 hours a week for four years, the littlest of details add up.
The build quality is worlds apart. Might not matter to some people but I like having a device I use daily look and feel high quality. MagSafe is a great example of what makes Apple Apple. Understanding that people trip over laptop power cables and finding a simple way to make that non-destructive is huge. Leading the way on display quality, having a case that doesn't fall apart, hinges that don't break easily, fans that are not as loud, first wide scale use of SSD, thinner sizes and lighter weight all ads up. PC manufacturers always quickly copy most of this but it never comes together the same way.
Speeds and Feeds: as a former speeds and feeds guy I get the mentality. But processor speed is not the biggest factor in most users lives. And since Apple is a vertical player, they can optimize OS X and iOS in ways you don't see in Windows and Android. I regularly need to performance optimize Chrome on Android in situations where Safari on iOS doesn't have an issue, even when the Android device is 'faster' and has more RAM.
Cost of hardware: in my PC days I never had a laptop last more that three years. My first Mac lasted four and a half years and retained a couple of hundred in resale value. I payed very little extra in the end by buying a Mac and the benefits far outweighed that difference.
Software: I live in a Linux on the server / Mac on the desktop world. What pushed me from the PC to world to the Mac was being tired to everything in the web development and design world being Mac only. For the first week I thought I made a mistake; a week later I couldn't believe I waited so long to switch.
I used to reboot daily or more. I now get pissed when a software update forces a reboot. I'm currently at 21 days of uptime on my MBP and probably won't reboot until an OS update forces me to.
Plus we don't live is a single device world. FaceTime, iMessage, Handoff, AirPlay and now Photos are big differences in how I use my computers that really only exist because I am fully bought into the ecosystem.
So ... The watch. No one (worth listening to) is implying that Apple is the first company with a smart watch. They weren't the first company with an MP3 player, a light laptop, a smart phone, a tablet, touch screen devices, GUIs or a mouse. But they were the first to make extremely compelling versions of those devices. Lots of people liked the idea of email and the web in your pocket but Blackberry never drew the numbers the iPhone did.
The Apple Watch is interesting because (a) it comes from a company that has repeatedly released products into a category and then redefined that category (b) if you are a user of multiple Apple products the ability for the Apple Watch to be a big change for you is greater and (c) Apple has the majority of the 'best' customers even though they don't have the majority of the market, and the watch could help them chip away at even more of the high end.
There is nothing like it on the market because Apple has a monopoly on iOS and OS X, the operating systems of the most profitable platforms. No one will be able to integrate a wearable as deeply as Apple will into iPhones, iPads and Macs.
The choice for the market most likely to buy a wearable like this is not Android Wear vs Apple Watch. It's Apple Watch vs not buying a wearable. In this early stage the market most likely to by is wealthier and/or really into consumer tech (ie not the market that runs a custom ROM on Android, which is negligible in the real world). Those customers are by a wide margin iOS users. |
Ok, this is more in depth than I wanted to go with this subject, but I guess I owe you an answer after the well written posts you have made (which I appreciate :) ).
Keep in mind that I am an engineer and as such I value cost and actual measurable details more than I do more extravagant and fancy (not exactly the term I am looking for, sorry) design. So I have an obvious biais towards this.
Here we go:
>First off marketing hype: this a deeply flawed argument.
This is actually very important (more so than you give it credit) and is not measured by actual dollar amount injected in marketing. Creating market hype and selecting a market is very important for the success of a company. Apple (wisely so) chose to create products that I describe as layman achievable luxury. They do this with the prices of their products, the specific presentation they use and obviously the aesthetics. Like an expensive wine, people will generally attach a higher quality and appreciation for things that they pay more money for (warranted or not). By pricing their products above the market average, they are able to appeal do the people willing to show off a bit of luxury and level of wealth. Apple is far from the only company that does this. But this strategy brings nothing of substantial value in terms of value/cost or technological superiority.
>To me, the keyboards are horrible and the touchpad sate even worse.
Here is my point about anecdotal evidence. You speak of two lower tier laptop brands and compare them to the higher tiered macbook is not a fair comparison.
>Leading the way on display quality, having a case that doesn't fall apart, hinges that don't break easily, fans that are not as loud, first wide scale use of SSD, thinner sizes and lighter weight all ads up. PC manufacturers always quickly copy most of this but it never comes together the same way.
Again this is all unfair and anecdotal comparisons. I've never had a laptop fall apart of break a hinge, which one of us is right? (neither, anecdotes aren't worth much). You can find laptop with similar (or better) physical characteristics and build quality, yet you imply that Apples products are the only ones.
>Cost of hardware: in my PC days I never had a laptop last more that three years. My first Mac lasted four and a half years and retained a couple of hundred in resale value. I payed very little extra in the end by buying a Mac and the benefits far outweighed that difference.
I've had an LG laptop last me 6 years before I felt I needed to change, does this invalidate your claim? No, because both our claims are anecdotal and bring nothing in terms of actual data. A study of various products and there corresponding longevity would be nice, but with the speed at which new products are churned, I doubt there would be an appeal for such things.
>I used to reboot daily or more. I now get pissed when a software update forces a reboot.
I don't know if you only used vista, but software updates (especially reboot requiring updates) are far from a daily occurrence (both with a variety of linux distros and windows). As a side note, turning off the device once in a while is really recommended for the longevity of the hardware.
>Plus we don't live is a single device world. [...] I am fully bought into the ecosystem.
This is an other major caveat. Apple products works in an Apple ecosystem. In comparison to most third-party tools out there, choosing to really on Apple means you are forced to buy Apple products (or Apple approved products). This is IMHO a great thing for ease of use for the layman, but a very restricting problem for your average techy. The more Apple products you buy, the more invested you are in the Apple ecosystem and the harder it is to get out of it. This is a great thing economically for Apple as they inherently force user (or heavily discourage them) from using their competitors products (in essence they remove some freedom of choice).
>it comes from a company that has repeatedly released products into a category and then redefined that category
Actually they have only done so recently and with three products (Ipod, Iphone and Ipad). They have also launched less than stellar product lines in the meantime, but they are often brushed aside.
>There is nothing like it on the market because Apple has a monopoly on iOS and OS X, the operating systems of the most profitable platforms. No one will be able to integrate a wearable as deeply as Apple will into iPhones, iPads and Macs.
This is true, but it does not mean much in terms of actual use or product advantage. This is good for people that are already invested in the Apply ecosystem, but not so much for others.
>The choice for the market most likely to buy a wearable like this is not Android Wear vs Apple Watch. It's Apple Watch vs not buying a wearable.
Sorry, I'm at a loss on this one. I have no idea how I could possibly confirm or deny this claim. I will point out that there are products out there that do not rely on Android wear (Pebble and the various fitness bands come to mind). |
This what worries me. We've forfeited any power we have as citizens. Our elected representatives were put there to enact our will, what we've collectively voiced as the best course for our future. They've mutated into a ruling class though, doling out edicts and laws they hold themselves above and slowly chipping away at our rights and personal freedoms. I'm basically pessimistic that this will ever change. |
When I tried 3D, it worked. I even did a recording during the beta.
Agh! I just went looking for it, and now youtube has closed my account that uploaded the video. :( |
The following explains what is going on in Firefox.
The audio is mp3 only which is a patent encumbered format thus not eligible for inclusion in Firefox. |
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