... but I think you'll find a whole lot of opposition to government processes to check competence and capability and to restrict ownership to those who pass the tests.

Now imagine a proposal that such tests be used to validate voting rights. If you fail the test, you cannot vote.

There would be a massive uproar.

"gun fondlers"

Troll... Didn't read beyond that point.

That post is currently mod'ed +5 insightful.

Moderation +4
70% Insightful
20% Interesting
10% Troll

Which indicates a problem with having a discussion on this issue. Some people do not see that language as offensive or trolling. They believe it to be "insightful".

if gun fondlers ...

And I'm sure that you believe yourself to be a rational person.

Yet you could not stop yourself from including denigrating language in a post complaining about the behaviour of others.

Don't feed the trolls?

I'd agree with not engaging them. At least not the trolls we have today.

But mod'ing them down? I like that. It means I don't have to wade through hundreds of trash messages to find anything worth reading.

And a clarification. "Troll" is NOT the same as "I have a different opinion".

For developers, it's skills like big data, cloud computing, and HTML5.

Buzz word, buzzword, markup language.

As a result, we do find that we face a shortage of older, more seasoned developers. And it's not because we don't want older candidates. It's often because the older candidates haven't successfully modernized their developer skills.

I find it difficult to believe that a developer would NOT be able to pick up HTML5 in a weekend.

Use "the cloud" and in addition to the LAN you need connectivity between your LAN and where ever the server might actually be.

And if you've ever had to work with vendors when there's an outage you will know how bad that is.

Even with a single vendor the discussion usually goes like this:

Are you sure it isn't YOUR equipment?
We don't service YOUR equipment.
No one else is having a problem.
We aren't showing any problems on your line.
Have you tried rebooting your CSU/DSY and/or router?

Once you add a second and third vendor (the "cloud" vendor and whomever they use for their connectivity) you'll end up with a mass of denials.

It doesn't matter that your business is down for a day. They'll be happy to refund you one day of the cost of their service.

And once it FINALLY comes back up everyone involved will deny that any changes / repairs were performed on THEIR network.

First off, who cares what "Curtis Peterson says"?

Person who works for company producing X says everyone needs X.

If I move to "the cloud" then I have the ADDITIONAL worries of:

1. YOUR connection going down.
2. MY connection going down.
3. Getting access to YOUR facility to troubleshoot a problem. Physical / remote / whatever. Why isn't that server booting?
4. SOMEONE ELSE at your facility annoying the government so that the FBI / CIA / NSA / whatever takes ALL the servers.
5. How do I know that what I legally have to keep private really is private?
6. What happens to my systems when all of your CxO's decide that they need more yachts so they jack up the pricing?

Fuck you, Curtis Peterson. RingCentral is the LAST place I'd put my data. You don't even understand why people are avoiding "the cloud" but you're happy to make up stupid insults to describe them.

My question is do they take out the Chinese backdoors or do they leave those in with the NSA backdoors?

That doesn't matter. We now know that the NSA has backdoors in them. We highly suspect that the Chinese also have backdoors in them.

The question is how long it will take the other nations to start their own chip fabrication plants and build their own routers / switches / etc.

Since nothing from us can be trusted (even by us) then they should be building their own stuff which they can trust more than our stuff.

I've read before that converting many stop signs to yield signs, even for cars, would save all sorts of energy without significant increases in accidents.

I think that all depends upon the traffic pattern at that time at that stop. One stop light where I used to live would convert to flashing yellow at 10pm and back to a stop light at 5am.

With a bicycle it's all about energy conservation.

I don't agree. And with traffic laws it is all about predictability.

Everyone involved needs to have the same understanding of who has the right of way and why.

As such, I typically have much longer to assess an intersection before I reach it, my stopping distance is extremely short, but if you make me stop it extends the time I'll be in the intersection when I DO cross significantly.

So?

There are only a couple of factors in play:
1. Do all the drivers / cyclists / pedestrians have the same understanding of who has the right of way and in what order?

2. Do all the drivers / cyclists / pedestrians have the same understanding of whether the intersection is "clear" for them?

If I'm allowed to use a stop sign as a yield, I'll attempt to time my passage such that I'll cross near my maximum speed, clearing the intersection expediently.

And that is the problem. You are no longer predictable to the other drivers / cyclists / pedestrians. You might stop or you might not stop.

Being through quicker reduces the chances I'll be involved in an accident there.

No it doesn't. The same as it does not make it safer for pedestrians to run across the intersection just because they're on a crosswalk.

Whether it is safer depends upon whether the other drivers / cyclists / pedestrians know where you are and have the same understanding of who has the right of way in what order.

The ONLY way that this change should have any positive change is if a driver would NOT have seen you when you were stopped BUT was far enough away that you could cross BEFORE he entered the intersection. In which case YOU need to work on YOUR visibility.

Not only that but from the summary:

How often have you sat at your desk browsing the internet instead of being productive? If your company is such that you can aggregate that lost time across a bunch of workers, you could probably reduce the headcount significantly if everybody just stayed on task all the time.

Even if I was focused 100% for an 8 hour day that still wouldn't account for problems happening AFTER work.

Or to put it another way, why aren't fire fighters putting out fires 8 hours a day and then taking 16 hours off (not accounting for lunch and breaks).

Things do not happen on an orderly schedule. Tasks do not perfectly fit the time available.

And who says that browsing the Internet is not helping me be more productive?

This guy seems to have the assembly line mentality. If only the workers would stay focused we could speed up the assembly line by 15%.

If you give something free will and the ability to comprehend itself then you can expect it to stop following your rules if you do not give it opportunity. The solution is to not build machines that are so complex that they have free will. Make a machine do a specific job as a tool and this won't ever be a problem.

I think that that depends upon the writer. It's easy to construct a story where the "slavery" is bad even if the "slaves" don't have free will. Depending upon what the writer wants to portray. Such as an over reliance on tech making us "less human" (decadent) than if we relied more upon ourselves and our families and neighbours. That was a recurring theme in Magnus, Robot figher.

Sometimes the robots are the slaves.

Sometimes the artificial intelligences are our overlords.

It all depends upon what story the writer wants to tell. Fear technology or fear human impulses.

Maybe read the book? Even the top negative review seems to give weight to his claim:

No. None of them do. Most of them repeat the information about being mugged.

But there isn't a single one of those that specifies HOW he is a "genius" of any kind.

Can he look at a formula and intuitively draw it?
Can he look at a drawing and intuitively give the formula for it?

The simplest question on his "genius" is still unanswered. WHAT does he do that is "genius" level? HOW is it "genius" level?

Seconded.

There are 24 paragraphs in the first link. The ONLY mention of ANYTHING about his mathematical "ability" is in paragraph 9.

He started sketching circles made of overlapping triangles, which helped him understand the concept of pi, the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter.

That's a "savant"? How many kids in high school understand pi?

After his injury, Padgett was drawing complex geometric shapes, but he didn't have the formal training to understand the equations they represented.Again, how many high school kids have doodled like that?

And "FORMAL training"? Isn't part of being a savant NOT needing formal training? You discover the concepts on your own based upon your ability to intuit the relationships.

Srinivasa Ramanujan was a savant.

"Microsoft gave us a 98% discount in exchange for this article."

Possibly. But there's enough weasel-room to reach his claims without that.

1. Lock-in: If his systems are already running MS software (which they probably are) is the cost of data migration counted against MS or is it counted against any alternative?

2. Hiring/Training: Is his office paying for training and certification OR is his office REQUIRING that anyone applying ALREADY have certification.

3. Discounts: Once you have 1 & 2, is Microsoft offering discounts just big enough to come in under the cost of migration?