s/elitist/ostensibly smarter than me/g
I love meeting people who are smarter than me. That's when my personal policy of listening much more than speaking really pays off. If I meet such a person who is also emotionally mature enough to be humble and modest, that's better still.
With respect to racism, this paragraph is exactly what I believed before I matured as a person. Before I grew enough to deal with the reality that racism isn't actually over, and to face the fact that I was actually part of the problem. Before I realized the futility and irony and sheer awfulness of wagging my finger at anyone willing to brand racist opinions as racist, "helpfully" explaining that their concerns weren't really real.
Real bigotry and prejudice does still exist, sadly. Note that I never once denied that. What I said was that the specific word "racist" has lost all meaning. It lost all meaning because a lot of knee-jerk types with no skill at argumentation found it politically useful to brand everything they dislike as "racist". For example, lots of people who disagreed with President Obama have been called "racist" simply because they thought a different policy would work better, despite showing no actual prejudice.
Speaking of growing up, one sign that someone has done so is their ability to fully understand and calmly respond to something instead of instantly getting offended and emotional. You tell me I need to grow up and you lecture me about life and you throw in a gratuitous "fuck you" because you thought I was denying the existence of all racism. Re-read my post (god damn do I get tired of asking volatile people to do that...). Not once did I say that. My prior comment was about the word "racism" not the existence of racism.
I'm glad you had a personal transformation concerning bigotry and prejudice. Perhaps now you will recognize a need to make another transformation concerning actually understanding what you read before making knee-jerk reactions to it. It'll definitely reduce your stress levels, if you are in need of a self-centered reason to give it a try. If you really want to be a grown man or a grown woman, you can write a new post admitting that your failure to control your emotions blinded you to what I said despite your obvious intellectual capability of understanding it.
However here, at least, Slashdot is a little more progressive than some sites in providing a transcript.
Hypothetically speaking...
Yes, just as some rapists are a little more progressive because they put on a condom before jamming their dick up your ass.
The fundamentals of the situation remain unchanged.
Every time I rant about this somewhere (except maybe here https://plus.google.com/+Micha... ) people complain that I'm being "elitist" for wanting to read things that are basically text instead of listening to someone else do it.
"Elitist" has become what the word "racist" has become: originally it referred to something important that should be understood and resisted. Now it just means "I have decided I don't like what you said, but I can't find any fault with it. Rather than admit my dislike of it is irrational and should be changed, I'll just call you names now."
Lots of childish people waste their energy hating reality, leading them to resent anyone who is mature enough to spend that energy looking for better ways of dealing with reality. The contrast embarasses them. Since these small-minded people are resistant to change and growth, they perform variuos mental gymnastics to convince themselves this is your fault. After all, they could go on pretending that everyone agreed with them
Is there any analysis that shows the rewards of big data are not meeting the risk (ie dismantling the intrinsic built-in trust of a civilised society and the govts we elect to serve us)?
A more cynical person might suggest that dismantling the trust is the reward some people seek. Divide and conquer is an old, venerable tactic used by both current and would-be tyrants everywhere.
And yet strangely, the technique and how to recognize it is not taught as a regular part of every school's history or civics class.
In a less dysfunctional society where at least a few important things are not run by sociopaths, "Divide and Conquer" (perhaps taught by reading some Julius Caesar), "Propaganda Techniques", and "Logical Fallacies" would be mandatory courses for every human being.
If you don't like shiney, then there's always the console. For everyone else who likes desktops for stuff like videos or web browsing, annoyances like tearing is a distraction, like a 3 year old throwing a temper tantrum. Tearing was an issue fixed back in the 90s.
I've used X11 and later Xorg for about the last 15 years. I've never had issues with tearing or any other visual artifacts. Back in the day I certainly had a real good time with modelines (fun!) but I've never had problems with tearing.
Am I the only one who hears complaints like this and scratches his head wondering what the fuss is all about? Lots of these mysterious complaints have never happened to me. I don't believe you are being dishonest, I just would like a more in-depth explanation about what problem you had, what solutions you tried that didn't work, and what you think the working solution would or should be.
The trick would be in differentiating the covert tracking, surveillance and reporting that something like FinFisher does for nefarious purposes from the "normal" covert tracking, surveillance and reporting that many smart phone apps do for commercial purposes.
That trick is at least as unnecessary as it is difficult.
So, while what you say is correct, you're missing the point entirely.
Another point that seems to be missing from the discussion is fracking. This isn't traditional oil drilling they're talking about. Fracking wells, unlike traditional wells, come with a very sharp drop in production after only a couple of years.
Chesapeake Energyâ(TM)s (CHK) Serenity 1-3H well near Oklahoma City came in as a gusher in 2009, pumping more than 1,200 barrels of oil a day and kicking off a rush to drill that extended into Kansas. Now the well produces less than 100 barrels a day, state records show. Serenityâ(TM)s swift decline sheds light on a dirty secret of the oil boom: It may not last. Shale wells start strong and fade fast, and producers are drilling at a breakneck pace to hold output steady. In the fields, this incessant need to drill is known as the Red Queen, after the character in Through the Looking-Glass who tells Alice, âoeIt takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place.â
Low taxes on output for 4 years means the State has given up its opportunity to tax most of a fracking well's production.
This is a naked resource grab that will leave the land scarred and the frackers no where to be found once the oil disappears.
I assume you thought to reply to me because of the similarity between your scenario and the mistake GP made?
It really sounds like another instance of regulatory capture, in which the industry encourages or allows an idea to become enshrined into law that just so happens to benefit its bottom line. The fossil fuel industry is one that can bring to bear a nearly unlimited budget for things like lawyers, lobbyists, advertisers, etc. If they ignore or applaud a law, it's because it serves their interests. Otherwise you'd get a demonstration of the clout they wield. I mean, to anyone unfamiliar with this industry, "you keep the first few years' revenue, then you pay" sounds gracefully fair.
I think they are raising taxes on the oil and gas companies and not directly the oil and gas that consumers purchase.
So how do you do one without also doing the other? Or to put it another way: if you raise the taxes of all oil/gas companies, what do you think those companies are going to do next?
I don't know what school you went to but it should be nuked from orbit and your parents need to be dope slapped, twice, just to make sure. Lets seem 7 percent versus 2 percent.... Well golly, that's darn close to 5 percent. Or in your math. a rounding error. Really?
Comparing the current tax rate to the proposed tax increase is not a "rounding error" at all. It's five percent, just as you say.
Comparing the additional cost of this proposed tax increase to all the other costs involved in obtaining the fuels is what has been identified as a rounding error.
So, while what you say is correct, you're missing the point entirely. This is why context is more important than trying to show everyone how clever you are for finding the obvious "flaw" everyone else "missed". It would be wonderful to see a single Slashdot discussion where your mistake isn't repeated.
Society is not a restaurant.
That's a useless statement of the obvious until and unless you provide another definition of "fair" that you believe better applies to society. The AC at least provided a line of reasoning.
Personally I'd like to see the IRS eliminated and the Fair Tax Act implemented. The funny thing about that Act: I've never seen someone rail against it who actually understood how it works. Of course total ignorance about its most basic details didn't seem to stop such people from passionately demonizing it. Gotta love that. One could say that a notion of "fairness" includes not opposing something you aren't even slightly familiar with.
I don't know, I find it kinda sad. Aren't users supposed to be smarter than the people manipulating them?
What did you observe that led you to that conclusion? And
Perhaps the language from "across the pond" is hard for some US readers to parse. "Exploitation" meaning "use effectively"
Because as we all know, no one would ever use the fact that a word has multiple meanings to make a humorous statement. They can't possibly have done this intentionally, with full awareness of the intended meaning of the word versus the different meaning they are using in their humorous statement.
Thank God that never happens! Therefore you have done a tremendous and necessary public service by pointing this out. All of us would truly be lost without your guidance. You are to be commended, sir.
Between the repetitive memes and endless XKCD links ("obligatory" implies "redundant") on one end, and people who feel a need to spell out the obvious because they think they're so much clever than everyone else on the other (so it doesn't occur to them they might be interpreting it incorrectly), humor on Slashdot is on the decline.
So does a week long SendMail outage. Which one do you think is easier to get support for SendMail or Exchange?
I would never use Sendmail or BIND given their security history. Better tools are available.
Wrong side of history == people that do not agree with the Obama administration.
That's also a frequent definition of "racist".
Somebody ought to cross ball point pens with coat hangers so that the pens will multiply instead of disappear.
