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Comment Re:Too late (Score 1) 480

It doesn't work that way in business.

That statement demonstrates the same sort of bone-headed mindset that's driven companies into the vendor lock-down the city of Freiburg was trying to escape from.

Do you really think Microsoft is going to blackmail world governments

Influence is delivered in many different shapes and sizes. Ironically, governments are machines that are almost universally fueled by influence. To think otherwise seems foolish.

Comment Why 13 years? (Score 1) 717

"What do Detroit, or Stuttgart, or Tokyo have waiting in the wings that will get to the Obama administration's target of 54.5 miles per gallon (mpg) by 2025?"

Detroit, Stuttgart and Tokyo already have the technology. What they lack, and to a great degree what the overwhelming majority of the population also lacks is the will. The "big secret" is to lessen the influence of big oil, both in Detrioit and Washington.

I own a car that is capable of 54.5 mpg - a 1999 VW Jetta TDI. 13 years and 305,000 miles on the odometer and it still gets me to work and back - around 600 miles a week, on 13 gallons of diesel. Yet I still hear the argument at least every other week that "diesel is more expensive than gas" and then the argument that their trusty old Chevy pickup burns (an order of magnitude more) good-n-cheap 87 octane gasoline / gasohol. This leads me to believe that we need to start making basic economics part of the educational system's core curriculum and not just an elective.

OTOH, don't confuse this for an endorsement of the Obama administration. If you want to pay more to waste more energy, the choice is yours. While Obama has been working hard to remove everyone's choices through higher energy prices, the cash for clunkers program, etc. the fact that they've given auto makers 13 years to meet a level we should already be at is evidence that big oil's influence has infiltrated both sides of the aisle to an equal degree.

This will never happen until we get serious about energy independence, and I fear it will take a global catastrophe to bring that about.

Comment Re:Salaries (Score 0) 886

You can train people skills too: you sit your problem employee down and tell him exactly what your expectations for personal behavior are, and what you need him to do differently. You be specific about what behavior is inappropriate or problematic, and tell him what you need him to do differently. If you start seeing changes in the right direction, you encourage it by telling him what he did right.

Are these encouragements in a monetary form? If not, the process of "sitting him down" has already alienated him, and he resents you.

I appreciate the role interpersonal skills plays in an office environment. All things considered, love me or hate me, they know it would take three such "socially acceptable" creatures to take my place. Given the choice, the bean counters would rather live with my "Asperger's".

Comment All politics aside... (Score 0) 1042

To distill this down to it's essence, the US federal government needs the ability to borrow money next month in order to pay the interest on the money it borrowed last month. If private individuals do that it's referred to as check kiting. If an investment company does this it's referred to as a ponzi scheme. If our federal government does this it's called business as usual.

Sadly, the only way things will ever change is if the few true fiscal conservatives in the house remain stalwart and force our government to face reality. The hard truth of the matter is quite simple, our liabilities exceed our gross national product. In business terms we're insolvent. Borrowing more with the justification of obfuscated spending cuts that will never materialize is just stacking another chair on top of an already precarious pile of furniture that we've built up over the past 30 years in hopes of poking our head above the storm clouds. Anyone who buys into the lie of "too big to fail" gets what they have coming to them. The foolishness needs to end, albeit at a tragic cost to everyone.

Comment Pathetic... (Score 1) 208

If you have a wireless access point of some sort (and what home these days doesn't?) what the hell's the point of this article? In three sentences, let me summarize it for those who don't want their precious time wasted.

Go buy a cheap NAS box sans hard drive for $40, install a cheap / spare hard drive and plug into existing router / network. Use existing backup software on your winblows machines to backup to the SMB share. Post lame article on slashdot that will irritate the technically competent.

This is slashdot, not the official Cult of Apple fanboi site. Gawd... I seriously take issue with the gay Apple logo photoshopped onto the Linksys router.

Comment Re:33% thinner, 2x faster, 500% does anyone care? (Score 1) 1118

Just off the cuff, the Barnes & Noble NOOKcolor is made in the same FoxConn sweat shop, runs android, and costs roughly half. It's not equivalent if you're comparing it to a full-on tablet with a hard drive and a full blown OS. But when held to such standards neither is the iPad I/II. It's an overgrown phone that's not a phone.

As to your other inquiry, I used the term "trend-setting" in a derogatory sense.

Color me a bigot, but every morning when I see a 3 minute segment on the national news shows covering the newest iFad, I get enraged and change the channel only to find the same thing on all the other networks. Why is this news? Who's wheels does Jobs have to grease to get so much free exposure? Luckily I can count on later that day coming here to /. and finding a fanboi thread wherein I can vent my frustrations. :-)

Ahh, that's better.

Comment Re:Apple Hate (Score 1) 1118

If by fear you mean the sight of him is frightening, then yes, quite. But let's not get carried away, more than Gates?

While I hold an appreciable amount of disdain for the man, I also have ample respect for anyone with his marketing genius. He really knows how to keep the rats coming back to press the feeder bar. Consumer lending institutions appreciate this as well. It's what feeds our economy (to the Chinese).

Image

In Case of Emergency, Please Remove Your Bra 123

An anonymous reader writes "Caught in a disaster with harmful airborne particles? You'd better hope you're wearing the Emergency Bra. Simply unsnap the bright red bra, separate the cups, and slip it over your head — one cup for you, and one for your friend. Dr. Elena Bodnar won an Ig Nobel Award for the invention last year, an annual tribute to scientific research that on the surface seems goofy but is often surprisingly practical. And now Bodnar has brought the eBra to the public; purchase one online for just $29.95."

Comment Re:This is fantastic (Score 1) 350

Amen! This is a long anticipated move that is very much appreciated. Way to go Broadcom.

Now what will it take to get you to apply the same logic to your 7400 series video SOCs. And get Realtek onboard while you're at it. You would sell product like the proverbial hotcakes...

Comment Re:Kettle calls Pot black (Score 1) 280

I can't speak for all Slashdotters, but I personally bag on Facebook because it's little more than a conglomeration of technologies we (the people with gray hair) have been using for nearly two decades. FB took the tools we developed and put a pretty interface on it all and suddenly it's the best thing to happen to the internet since Napster. Nevermind what will happen when 'everyone' adopts it as their primary storage for digital media and contacts and it goes away for lack of a sound business model. 'Fad' is an ugly label to those who've found themselves labeled so I find no fault in those who are defending their stance. I guess time will tell - I still wretch when I hear mullet jokes...

I've been invited dozens of times, and it's quite annoying to have to tell my brothers and sisters why I don't want to hassle with it just to see their photos. I simply have no desire to reconnect with people I didn't like in the first place. The people who are important to me still use a telephone (even though I wish some wouldn't). I don't need another medium upon which to ignore those I find annoying.

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