So the 'leaked emails' are from Macron. Or actually from Putin. Or from american far-right idiots. Or from canadese dito's. Or from the icelandic secret service, fucking up everybody just for the fun of it (my favorite).

But to know right from wrong I don't need Macrons personal views, or those of Trump, or Putin or whoever finds himself in the eye of a personal media shitstorm.

Paai

As arguments go, this is pretty weak...

But who is the "us" you mention, who want the means of production? Do you mean the good old worldwide conspiracy of communists and jews? Or Jezuits? Or freemasons? Take your pick.

Paai

My friend, some of the most successful countries in the world have a large seasoning of socialism. But regardless the system you live in, there alway will be people who know how to play the system. They become obscenely rich. Typically you see them in the capitalistic countries, although we have our share of them in Holland (the king and his family, to name a few).

Now in Europe, this generally is balanced by various socialistic structures to keep the people from the poverty line. In the USA I have observed that this is not the case. Therefore I fear that the USA is in more danger of a bloody revolution like in 18-th century France. Only time can tell.

Paai

Socialism is just one of the ingredients of a working society. Too much, and you get communism (in the USA socialism is often confused with communism). Not enough, and you live in a country like the USA, where you can lose everything you have through no fault of your own or get shot in the streets over ten dollars.

Or perhaps socialism is like, say pasta and capitalism is like potatoes. You can make a good and healthy dish of either, if you add the right vegetables and condiments, and you can mess up both if you add sewage to the mix.

  I am glad that I do not live in a communistic state and I am also glad that I do not live in the USA.

Paai
 

I have always been an avid reader - but for some reason only books that I owned. Libraries didn't work for me. And I never threw away a book. So in my houses always a seizable room was reserved as a private library and book storage.
Five years ago I weaned myself away from the paper book. Then I sought (and found) om internet the ebook equivalents and gave away the paper copies. So within a few years I had an empty room here my library once existed. When I moved into a new house, it could be smaller - and cheaper - than earlier houses. I can read in bed without my wife complaining about the light staying on.

Yes, as far as I am concerned, the ereader is the best thing since sliced bread. BTW: I am 69 and it is nice to be able to adjust stuff like fonts and fontsize.

Paai

It is enlightening in itself how the book and the movie both are very, very good, how the movie follows the book much better than most movies do, and at the same time carries a totally different message.

Heinlein is very convincing in his fascistoid meritocracy. Paul Verhoeven is equally convincing in the rejection of that philosophy. I am very glad to have read/watched both.

Paai

don't be stupid. a^2=b^2+c^2 does not care whether you carry your genitals inside or out.

Paai

Here is the thing: I have been teaching CS at a dutch university for thirty years. On our university, CS was obligatory, even for humanities students (which I think is a very good thing). About 80% of our students were women. Some of my best students were women, doing PhD trajects with heavy math, computers and statistics. No gender differences there.

But... and this is a big but... most of the female students just could not be bothered. They enrolled at the university because they were intelligent but ALSO wanted an occupation indoors without heavy lifting. And they were not above using their attributes to get a pass. It is not because I am male: my female collegues in the STEM department had the same experience (it is the Netherlands I am talking about - grin).

So all girls out there: stop whining about unequal opportunities. Do your assignments just like the boys. If you don't like maths or CS, just skip it - but don't expect to compete seriously in the world outside, without using your attributes, that is.

I *like* your attributes and they keep the world turning. But it is not maths.

Paai

Who are you and what are you using your PC for?

I started in 1979 on an Apple II, graduated to CP/M and then MS-DOS. In 1991 I decided to try that newfangled Linux thing and never looked back. The important thing, however, was that I was driven by my needs; in 1991 my need was a Unix clone that could run an certain program. I then found that an Unix environment suited my other needs of that time much better: LaTeX/BibTeX was superior to MS-Word for writing my thesis, the command line and the Unix tools supported the experiments I needed to run so much better than MS-DOS, X was smoother even in 1991 as MS-Windows or the Mac... where should I stop?

So if you use your PC for writing 'simple' texts, internet and games, Ubuntu or Mint will serve your needs as well as Microsoft or Apple, but certainly not better. If at any point you need to get off the trodden path, the power of the Unix environment will get you forward regardless of the Unix flavour you use. Heck! An Macbook wil work in that case!

Paai

The creator of the 'Android operating system'? You can of course debate what exactly is an operating system, but as far as I am concerned 'uname' does have some say in it. 'Android' is just a load of complicated crap on top of the linux system... And Java... O, my God, Java...

Paai

I like the position of this article directly below the exposition of the CIA hacks...

Paai

In short: the World Domination that our Great Leader predicted some twenty years ago, has come true...

Paai
 

Yes, I can see how you can apply different algoritms to get an optimal distribution of the ads over the passing cars.

Sounds reasonable... But do you *know* that they use this strategy or is it an educated guess?

Call me stupid, but when there is lively traffic, the billboards are in full view of several cars at a time. So the update may be slow, so that e.g., ten or twenty cars see the same advertisement that is triggered by the first car? Or does every car get its own advertisement, so that you see a constantly flickering of different ads?

Paai