A few years back there was an eruption of expensive "premium short message services" that offered gullible people to provide their "Manga character name", their "hero name" and other ridiculous stuff like that - based on a hash-function that picked a name from a name library according to the hash sum over some arbitrary data (like real name, phone number or whatever) the gullible customers provided in their short message.
Now this "pick name based on hash over genes"-proposal does not sound that different - and it is similarily useless. Why would one pick some completely different random name just because of a single insignificant minor mutation?
If you honestly think that the "world out there" is "full of horror" and "monsters", you've got serious mental issues. Maybe you can help yourself by travelling the world - not in an army uniform, and not just to places where you are sent to shoot people your employer dislikes.
Maybe you would realize then that people all around the world have much better things to do then to conspire against people living in some remote country. Unless of course, they are being approached by you dropping bombs on their houses.
If you want to be scared about dangers to you life, why not calculate the probabilities of dying early from car accidents, lack of health insurance, being shot randomly by some disgruntled gunman on a rampage at home - all in relation to the risk of becoming the victim of some sinister terror plan?
And BTW: You might have noticed that there are many developed countries in the world that run nothing remotely similar to the NSA, CIA and DOD that have not seen any significant amount of attacks from foreign "monsters".
Quick, somebody make a screenshot, we've found the one single thought-to-be-extinct user that likes the beta:-)
Too bad he's not bold enough to state that under a user name...
First, let me state that I created my Slashdot account only days ago. And while did read Slashdot articles before a few times, I am by no means used to the "classic" view, so my opinion is not biased by being used to either version.
Yes, I cannot see anything that is better in the "beta".
And even the official statements on why that "redesign" is pursued do not provide a single compelling reason what the new design would actually better.
If "more accessible and shareable by a wider audience" means: "We want to lure more Facebook-zombies and other technically challenged people on our site" then let me tell it right away: That is the perfect way to get rid of everyone actually interested in science and technology. If you want to become yet another mainstream gossip page, that is the way to go.
The absolute no-go for me with regards to the beta is the JavaScript plague. I do not want my trusted computer to execute arbitrary code downloaded from the Net. And JavaScript adds no valuable information, just wastes CPU cycles and bandwidth - just as additional "pictures" do.
"Why can't we ever attempt to solve a problem in this country without having a 'War' on it?" -- Rich Thomson, talk.politics.misc