while we can argue the merits of AGW all day long that isnt what I saw here. I saw a smug son of a bitch tell an owner to go fuck himself.

No, the owner went way too far. Being an owner does not entitle you to behave like a pig.

[link] Has some relevant information.

Thanks for the link. I find it especially interesting how careful you need to be to not risk getting robbed. See this email on the bitcoin dev list for some details. Among other things, it permeates that the problems that bit MtGox haven't been solved conclusively.

Clearly, the average person on the street should stay clear of things like bitcoin, because you really have to understand the protocol and know exactly what you are doing. The folks at MtGox surely spent some thought on this, and now look at this fuckup. They are in huge trouble right now.

Do you have a right to an attorney in a constitution-free zone? Do you have any rights at all?

It might be tangentially interesting in this regard that, technically, all of britain is a constituion free zone.

Also, you do not have many rights even outside of those buildings. The UK has been steadily degenerating into a police state out of a SciFi movie.

If you tried before December 21, 2012 that was a pre-release. The 0.17.0 release was on Doomsday.

Well, I tried 0.17.0 and, heck, it managed to freeze my display. That didn't happen to me for years nor did it happen since. And lots of other things kept crashing.

Many of the themes were unmaintained, and the black one that came bundled had this gross faux-racecar aesthetics of a "pimp my ride" episode gone wrong. Well, IMO, anyway. But I didn't manage to get the others working. You could claim that it was my fault, but frankly, I don't think so. And I will not install a special distro just to use WM, because I actually work on my computer.

That said, I'll try again with 0.18.0. The promise of E is too good, even though the realization isnt (IMO).

It's not always laziness. I added outgoing filters to my routers so that it only allowed source addresses from my network. That was great at stopping DOS attacks, but as I found-out the hard way, several of my customers were sending outbound traffic with source addresses not on my network.

Interesting. What where they doing?

Oh, and it has AWD standard, and all sorts of fancy electronics to keep those gullwing doors (because that's what those are called, Elon) from whacking into stuff.

What's wrong with AWD?

The gullwing doors, however, really look like a stupid idea. Sure, they look great, but I would be surprised if they are anything but inconvenient unless you have lots of parking space.

If by "computer" you understand "general purpose / user programmable computer", then the differences are easy to explain. Neither the wi-fi card nor the smartphone have a built-in general purpose programming language/environment for the user to play with.

At least for android, downloading the sdk and running your first app on a phone is a matter of less than an hour (up to bandwidth limitations).

For the wifi card - well, it depends on your determination. It is possible to get root on the linux that runs on it, and since it has at least sh, you can program it.

Seriously - in a western society where everyone is well fed and healthy and has access to 24/7 entertainment there is nothing vital that (non health related) technology or science can add to our existence - its all toys, gadgets and gizmos that are a brief amusement until they get tossed in landfill and then we all go out and buy the next piece of crap.

That's not entirely true. There is a lot of cancer to be cured, and cured painlessly. Having a longer period of livable life would be very desirable, which includes delaying decrepitude as well as making old age more livable. There is a lot of sientific advance possible and desirable in those areas.

A piece of robot kit able to navigate a typical human dwelling would be a fantastic achievement upon which a lot could be built, not just vacuum cleaners. That said, I don't believe that you can make breakthroughs happen just by sprinkling money on scientists, especially a lump sum like this 5 million pounds.

We are contributors of stories and comments and "News for Nerds, stuff that matters".

Without us Slashdot is just another lame webscraper.

The kind of strident and petulant arrogance reflected in this and other similar comment makes me look forward to the slashcott, when all the morons like you just stay away. If you take a story this one, and substract the ant-beta vandalism from the comments, you end up with a very high level discussion forum.

And to the people suggesting usenet as an alternative: hell yeah, go ahead and have fun.

As to linkdin, I can't comment as I just joined yesterday. Looks OK. Found a few folks that I hadn't seen in years. What scared me a little is that they want me to import my address book, like that, unfiltered. But given the nature of modern employment, I see little alternative to being a member, unfortunately.

I see that as a major problem. Someone looking for a job has no choice but to engage in the dubious customs of the prospective employers. It really is a bit of good luck that the linkedin people don't abuse their power more, the way facebook does it.

...if they catch you running an illegal operation using Bitcoins, the necessary bribe to the authorities just got bigger.

Sure, and that is indeed an additional cost when doing business with bitcoins. That's what many libertarians that like bitcoin are unaware of: risk has its costs, and many people and organization have a low tollerance for risk. Especially needless risk, and few actually need bitcoin.

It is possible to outlaw cryptocurrency. It doesn't mean the state can stop it, just that it becomes very risky to use, which does diminish its use.

Speaking of libertarians. Where are all the property-is-everything, guns-and-freedom, company-defending people now? My opinion on the beta is, yes, it sucks. But do you guys really think you own this site?

While I enjoyed slashdot the way it was, I don't see any reason to pretend that the "community" only has positive attributes. The senseless vandalism of the last two days is disgusting and a case in point. Is this really the community a for profit company wants to be based uppon? After what has happened recently - why would anyone run a site with such a crazy and spiteful following?

At least that is a way to think about it. A sort of disturbing view as you could say the protagonist is actually killing his fellow marines and is the real enemy

Also, it is kind of depressing, as it means that his friends are pretty stupid by subjecting themselves to such a decimation without changing strategy.

This is OPT-IN. You only get them if you sign up for them.

Ah, thanks. With this piece of information, the UK seems only a tiny little bit less creepy than before I read your comment. It speaks volumes that the idea that in the UK something like this isn't opt-in seems entirely plausible.

It's a voluntary relationship where each side can expect the other to exploit any weakness for their own interest.

For the engineers, it is a weakness that they are peasants before they are engineers. The CEOs have an unfair advantage over them, and that advantage is not part of engineers voluntary agreement.

Why do I have to even explain this to you?

Here is a good takedown: http://www.priceplow.com/blog/... . From the link:

We find it unnerving (but not surprising) that somebody with zero background in health, fitness, or nutrition is leading a cadre of lemmings to near-certain long-term trouble.

You uh... realize that the alternative to sideing with the EU is being eaten by Russia again?

Yes, I do, and I realize that this is not good,

You don't think that Russia has any ability to sway politics and policy in Ukraine?

Where did I say they don't? But I don't think they are behind the protests, and I don't think you do, either.

Just to clarify. Whenever I think about these issues, I make a point of trying to see what is true, and not confuse this with what I would wish were true. A prosperous Ukraine as a member of the EU would be a very nice thing in my opinion. More likely, IMO less nice, would be a Ukraine that is not prosperous (and whose democracy has been lobotomized) and is a member of the EU, because, you see, the EU isn't a club of philantropists either. Much more likely, unfortunately, is that Russia keeps a tight grip on Ukraine.

What also seems likely (coold blooded, factual consideration) is that a lot of young people will get tragically ground down in a standoff whose dimensions they do not understand.

They could kick out Yanukovitch and show the future leaders that they have to respect the rights of their citizens.

Much to my regret, I see about zero chance of this actually happening.

Sometimes digging in and waiting for a better time to fight is the best you can do.