THANKS for letting me know there are nude photos of you on the internet -- and where to find them! YOU are a font of information and those of us who never even knew this site existed are thankful you are too stupid to realize you just made yourself even more of a search topic. And your lawsuit will fail.

Congrats! :)

While specialization for humans is becoming more and more of the "norm," I think Heinlein said it best:

"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."
-- Robert Heinlein, Time Enough for Love

So, in that context, yes -- every normal human should, in some fashion, be able to program a computer or a web app or what have you. I believe you should always seek to bring the knowledge and abilities of those around you UP to your level and if they exceed you, great, hopefully they will return the favor. Idealist, aren't I?

George himself broke so much canon, or "retold" it, that it is not even funny. I've gone back and watched the original trilogy many times (I own them on laserdisc), to keep it fresh in memory so when I get into discussions about original vs prequels I'm not looking back with nostalgia.

Here is one great example:
Yoda: Size matters not. Look at me. Judge me by my size, do you? Hmm? Hmm. And well you should not. For my ally is the Force, and a powerful ally it is. Life creates it, makes it grow. Its energy surrounds us and binds us. Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter. You must feel the Force around you; here, between you, me, the tree, the rock, everywhere, yes. Even between the land and the ship.

vs

Qui-Gon Jinn: Midi-chlorians are a microscopic life form that resides within all living cells.
and
Qui-Gon Jinn: Without the midi-chlorians, life could not exist, and we would have no knowledge of the Force. They continually speak to us, telling us the will of the Force. When you learn to quiet your mind, you'll hear them speaking to you.

Complete and total turn around. The Force is now administered through a third party to let the Jedi/Sith know what to do - the will of the Force? *gags* *pukes* That is exactly opposite of what Yoda tells Luke - in that LIFE creates the Force. Quo-Gon says without midi-chlorians life could not exist and that you must "hear" the midi-chlorians speak to you. If that was the case, why didn't Yoda explain that to Luke? Because it was some retconning bullshit Lucas came up with to give life to his god-complex character.

There are many, many other examples of complete "WTF?" moments between original and prequel.

Which is why I was taught gun safety at a young age - as well as a healthy respect for ALL life. Birds, deer, rabbits, squirrel, fish, and so on. Most of all, human life. Never point a gun at another human unless you mean to kill them. There is no such thing as "playing" when it comes to a gun. I had that respect drilled into me.

So will my child. And their child. And on until the sun we revolve around burns out. From the moment I believe they can tell the difference between life and death, they will be taught. Before that, they'll be taught to never touch any weapon in the house. Reinforced with a belt on their ass if that is what it takes when/if they don't believe dear old dad.

Which is part of the problem with a lot of society today (not just Americans) -- people aren't disciplining their children from a young age and we get what we have now: the whiny entitled society of spoiled fucks. That is a completely separate conversation, though.

That's the only "safe" thing I need on a gun. I know the risks of my gun being taken away from me during a break-in/robbery/assault or anything else that a criminal can perpetrate against me and mine.

The ONLY thing I want to have to deal with or worry about is "Did I flip the safety off?" Most guns are purely mechanical in nature and I see no reason to introduce electronics into making them "safe," do you? Let's add in additional points of failure into what should be a mechanical object that needs to JUST WORK.

This falls under the "Just because we can do a thing, should we do a thing?" category. For fuck's sake, leave guns alone. If you don't like them, feel you don't need them, or just don't understand them then please sit quietly in the corner while those of us that do defend your life, liberty, and pursuit of whatever the hell you want to do.

And remember one thing: Criminals are criminals BECAUSE THEY DON'T FOLLOW THE LAWS ALREADY. One more isn't going to make them change their mind. Removing guns from the hands of (mentally stable) citizen's is absolutely not the answer. It is a path to disarmament, oppression of the people, and a new class of slavery. Read your history.

First, let me be clear -- I'm not a big fan of this idea, but after looking at the problem from multiple angles this idea keeps coming up as the best way to spur competition and end the debate on network neutrality.

A few steps to stop this greed from happening, hopefully:

a) A clear, concise Bill of Internet Rights.
-- This must be done in order to alleviate a lot of the crap going on now. There should be terms that explicitly disallow government agencies from piping internet traffic through their data centers for "analysis" of anything WITHOUT A NON-SECRET COURT ORDER. If it can't stand up the light of day, it doesn't fit with principles this country was founded upon and which hundreds of thousands of men and women have died to uphold. Stop being assholes and running roughshod over the Constitution.
-- This must be done to guarantee privacy. As much as can be, anyway.
-- This must be done to guarantee that all data is treated equally with the obvious need for quality assurance. No more congesting nodes, no more content owner also owns the delivery network so it can shutout competition, no more "you pay us, again, for the bandwidth that our customer who requested your info has already paid for."

b) Nationalize the Distribution Lines
-- All copper, fiber, interconnects, and so on are nationalized.
-- A plan is put into place to guarantee (almost) everyone in the United States good data speeds (10mb/s up and down - minimum) by adding more and more fiber. I say (almost) because there are some VERY remote places where people live and it will take time (plus more money) to reach them. If 90% of the population can be served, including rural areas, then that would be great.
-- Everyone who wishes to be an ISP pays THE SAME per connection. Yes, that would mean someone in Small Town, Iowa costs the same as someone in New York to connect to the internet. The overhead of the ISP will determine what $XX.xx is added to the government mandated $YY.yy and here's the rub - customer service comes back to the forefront and actually means something because the Public will know what the $YY.yy is. Competition to gain and keep customers based on price alone should vanish as value-added services and real customer service return to the industry.
-- We have a glut of workers needing work. Teach them to lay fiber optic cable and copper if needed. Put them to work moving the United States back to the top of the chart in broadband/internet access. In this day and age it is a necessity, not a luxury. Easily as ubiquitous today as the telephone and mail were in their days.

I'm probably missing a massive hole in my theory (greed being at the top of that list), but if this was done it would foster intense competition and new ideas as one would not be held back by thinking "I will get blocked out by Company A because they have a grip on distribution of a similar idea." Freedom from the so-called content creators of today locking down sections of the internet or using their power to double and triple-dip the pockets of consumers and competitors.

And tropical fruits.

Mmmmm.

I'm pretty sure I said jack and shit about Netflix, instant upgrades, or any of the rest of your rant. Don't take my word for it, please actually read what I wrote and then get back to me when your reading comprehension is greater than your ability to punctuate and capitalize sentences correctly. Argumentum ad hominem notwithstanding.

Also, this is not because some "whiny cord cutters are now ranting mad." This is because some very wealthy corporations have bought some nice shiny congressmen and other government officials and are now trying to triple dip into the internet money stream. I proposed a way to stop that practice and, at the same time, provide greater competition which should also provide better prices for the consumers. You know, save money for those of us who don't own mega-wealthy multi-national corporations.

I realize that this is not a popular subject and, to be honest, not one I'm 100% in love with either but it would solve a lot of problems -- and keep network neutrality as a top priority while providing for competition.

Simply (or not so simply) nationalize all of the copper, fiber, other wires that make up the internet today including all interconnects - everything needed for the internet to be the internet. Write in a complete HANDS-OFF policy (no piping the internet into the NSA's back room and then piping it back out) and figure out what each connection should be worth to a) expand and upgrade the system so that everyone, even those in rural areas, could have good speed (10mb/s in both directions minimum) and b) maintain what's already in the ground/on the poles.

Once you have the above number, allow anyone with the technical ability and resources to start an ISP in a region and then they can compete on price, quality, and service. Everyone would already know that each connection will cost $XX.xx because that's what the government collects; it is the +$YY.yy for the final price that would be where things get interesting. Some regions would still have higher speeds initially, but with enough people working on upgrading the system (the new New Deal perhaps?) then speed and availability will come.

With a built in retina scanner that will positively ID you and follow your goddam eyeball....where did you look, how long, how frequently.

This is evil.

It would have been nicer if it had help from a company that isnt pure evil.

Or is there a channel for make believe and fairy tales?

If you can't control the spam like the original and former Slashdot could, then do the right thing and drop this crap (that NOBODY who visits this site wants).

Seriously, give us what we ASK for and not what you THINK we need. Don't think. We'll do that for you.

If you can't get it right, I for one will go somewhere else for my news and .. unfortunately not discussions, because no really good discussion site exists.

Like Yahoo this company no longer has any purpose other than its own continuity.

The sooner it dies, on fire in a hole, the better.

Its really sad seeing how desperately they re-image the company every few years. Its like a sad out of shape actor that had a glimpse of fame 20 years ago...still trying to prise money from the ever stiffening corpse of rejection.

...simply remove all of the screening apparatus in the airports. It is vastly just "security theatre" and does nothing but costs taxpayers time, money, and aggravation. To say nothing of the of the decline in tourism and business dollars due to the obtrusiveness.

Oh, yeah, and the total violation of basic human rights and decency with that large, gaping wound it leaves in the 4th Amendment (among others).