Well, it can but we've had a few underlying hardware issues make our servers unavailable. From san hiccups which flip systems into read-only mode for /var to a recent issue where a VM was configured as Fault Tolerant and it was VMotioned to a different system and connectivity was lost. Turns out the MAC changed, maybe during a VMWare update, and apparently because the VMs were FT, the MAC didn't change so became unavailable until we powered down the VM to recover.

There have been enough issues that we won't put Mission Critical systems on VMWare.

[John]

Mine was 10 or 11%. I did have alimony take a good 30% of my net though.

[John]

You probably should stop reading her mail.

[John]

Yep, tinnitus here as well. Too much time spent in data centers and firing weapons in the military. A portable device plugged into my almost 20 year old stereo works just fine for me.

[John]

How is a study on middle and high school students in Israel relevant to elementary students in the US?

[John]

I guess it would depend on where you got the ad from. One of the forums I frequent has locally hosted, forum topic specific ads. There are vendors who pay for those spots and they're not blocked by the ad blocker. If you were doing that, someone would have to add your ads to the blocker filter for them to be filtered out.

The concern I have lies with the malware that's occasionally injected. I run the ad blocker so I'm not vulnerable.

I will note that I make it a point to not click on ads, even on that forum, all that's happening is I'm getting an impression of the subject of the ad and no click-through revenue goes to you.

[John]

The worst part is when I was in the military back in the 70's, you were instructed to mark your personal gear. Either etched or written. My gaming books from back then all have my SSN written on the inside cover with my full name should it get lost.

[John]

Got me. Not my job to figure out your business model. I have several sites I've built for personal and use by others. None of them are generating money but that's not why I put them up. Should I start getting a bunch of traffic, I'd have to flip on some sort of nagging system and a request for voluntary payment then if it wasn't helping, install a block for mandatory payment. That would have people either pay to stay or go elsewhere and it won't be costing me money any more.

What makes the information on your site valuable enough that you think you should be paid for it?

[John]

The problem is the bulk of their workforce are contractors. And all that's needed (from experience) is "be gone by Wednesday".

[John]

Couple of interesting bits from when I contracted there.

1. The requirement of 1 systems admin for every 15 servers. Where I'm working now we have 5 admins and 825 servers but automation and virtualization reduces the complexity.

2. IBM was extremely silo'd. As I remember there were some 12 different teams to work on the 100 or so servers we were managing. From backups to security checks to monitoring to the application folks.

[John]

Yea, I had to take a 3 week furlough about 8 months after I started contracting for them. And it took 6 months before I could log in to the servers due to security checks.

[John]

Last time I worked at IBM, there appeared to be no rhyme or reason as to why someone was picked to depart. It appeared to be a game of duck duck goose. I was sitting at my desk and someone I didn't recognize (not our manager) came in and told the guy across from me he was to be out by Wednesday. Much of our group was outsourced to India and I was given an opportunity to move from being a Unix admin to being a Web site programmer, a data center builder, or another Unix admin contract working on different systems. I spent my own money to take a relevant class and moved to the new contract. On the new contract, the admin who was our interface to the customer was let go with 3 days warning so we had to scramble to get the information she had on the customer.

Since it seemed random to me and others, we started looking and moved on. If there's no apparent way of showing your value, that you are just a cog in a big machine, then why stay?

[John]

There are paywalled sites that seem to be doing well enough. If your site is worth something, why not charge for access? If it's worth something to me, something more than a free site that I can adblock, then I'll pay for access. I've done it in the past.

Until accessing your ad infested site (and I use 'infested' on purpose) guarantees I won't get some malware or other drive by load of poo, I will block ads.

[John]

Sorry, as long as ad companies occasionally accept ads by malware companies, I'll keep running ad blocking software.

[John]

Probably coding something, playing guitar, or cooking steaks depending on when the game is on and where I am at the time. My girlfriend does pay attention to some football. She's from Philly so occasionally wants to know how her team is doing. She may have the game on.

And it's not 'cultivated disinterest'. I didn't grow up with sports interest in the house so I didn't have to cultivate it. I'm simply not interested. I know how it's played, I know where most teams are located, I even know who some of the players are. I have a TV but pretty much only watch DVDs. I do like MotoGP but not much beyond reading about it and catching the occasional show. You can get a lot of the same "social aspect" by watch TV shows like Walking Dead, Arrow, Flash, True Blood, Twilight. It depends on what part of the social contract you're trying to fulfill. As a pretty heavily leaning Introvert, even going to a bar with my friends for an hour or so gives me a headache.

[John]