I disagree.

China is vastly militarily superior to the immediate neighbors. They don't need to do any extra spending that they are not doing already.

China is such an integral manufacturer that no one substantial will be cancelling trade. They got a massive internal market as well.

So what is the downside to acquiring more territory right now? What is Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam, Taiwan, or Brunei going to do about it? Beg the US for intervention? Considering how US relies so much on Chinese market: Good luck with that. What other superpower going to help them?

What does Poland has to do with the Cold War?! Do you mean the invasion of Poland by Germans that started the World War 2?

What does Ukraine have to do with the Cold War?

Ukraine ousted Russian-supportive leader, so Russia annexed part of Ukraine to have guaranteed control of the strategic ports in the Black Sea.

What have the West done about it: A few sanctions, but overall nothing substantial. Are they going to do anything about it?

EU: Gets 15% of their gas from Russia. They will do nothing to upset them over this land change. Come back if Russia annexes Kiev.

US: They don't give a shit about Ukraine! You honestly think US will start anything over a useless backwater like Crimean peninsula? Come back when/if Russia annexes Kiev.

Also Cold War was about ideology. There is no ideology involved in the current conflict.

Perhaps my examples are not the best. Plumbers and cabinet makers are professions that pay well eventually. The point I was trying to make that people do indeed spend their free time doing thing what they do for a job.

This is the part that I just don't understand where both you and the grandparent post got from.This whole thread is about working for pleasure ONCE the income from that activity covers the cost of living. Again the quote from the original post is: "Once you have enough money to keep food in your belly and a roof over your head". Quote from the post above that is: "Yes, I work in imaging research, trying to bring about medical imaging progress, with hopefully useful results. I'm not at all motivated by profit. I just want enough money not to starve and enough funding to pay my students and equipment." (Emphasis mine).

No one that I can see has stated in this thread that anyone works for absolute free. We do not dispute that! Your bills needs to be covered first. But beyond covering your needs, profit need not be the motivation!

For example: You have a choice to stay doing a job you love, but only covers your expenses or do what you don't like, but earn triple the amount that you need. In BOTH cases you are NOT working for free! In BOTH cases your living expenses are covered.

What this thread is about is that choosing the former is better for your quality of life than the latter. This is the interesting and complex part that is being discussed. Not simplified "Be a hippy to be happy!" nonsense that you are reading into the discussion.

Have a look at the post you replied to:

Please point to the part where you came up with "lovey dovey feel good philosophy doesn't pay the bills" from? That is an absolutely true statement. Once you have enough money to cover your needs (Needs depend very heavily on your expectations and accepted standard of living), there is no improvement to your quality of life. You do not require to be rich to have financial security to do what you love.

Absolutely!

My father is a cabinet maker. He spends all his working hours working on the factory floor and he is not rich in any sense of a word. However at home he has a shed with a work bench, wood and a hell of a lot of tools. After he comes home he makes stuff just for the pleasure of it. All our friends got custom chairs/tables/drawers/bookshelves that he built out of his own time and money just for fun and a thank you.

My grandfather was a plumber. For his whole life if any of his friends had issues in their home he would fix it up for free. I can assure you, he wasn't rich either.

There is so much more to life than money! Do you think that every single volunteer out there is rich?

Resources exist to be consumed. And consumed they will be, if not by this generation then by some future. By what right does this forgotten future seek to deny us our birthright? None I say! Let us take what is ours, chew and eat our fill.

CEO Nwabudike Morgan "The Ethics of Greed"

Where is this stereotype coming from? There is never any hesitation to get rid of developers. In my 10 years of industry experience: Developers are judged on their performance and office politics just like people of any other position less than a manager. If they do well, they are kept, else they are shown the door.

Pride in your work is based entirely on your own expectations you set for yourself. If you are unable to feel pride, YOU need to change not everyone around you.

As for degree of freedom: Developers are being paid a lot for their time. Budgets are always tight (Maybe except if you are some kind of ridiculously large company like Microsoft or Google), so there is no time for fucking around without proven justification. If you can prove that your different way will have measurable benefit to the company's income, justify it to your manager and then feel free.

This is the common issue with developers (Especially those new, fresh out of University): They see themselves as irreplaceable geniuses and want everything in the business to revolve around them.

The summary is very careful to describe the lowest performing workers as: Every team has someone who at the bottom of its bell curve: an individual who has a hard time keeping up with other team members. Based on this definition, as you replace one, you will still have the lowest performer. Just your measure criteria will be higher. Thus unless you have a team that are all clones of each other, work politics will still find the "idiot" to hold.

Thus, the measure still stands: How do you treat your lowest performers is a good judgement of the company health. Your preference of "Not worth the time/effort. Replace them with someone better." is quite destructive. By following your solution, the team will be forever stuck with overhead of training up the new guy and loss of knowledge of the rapid turnover.

Where is the downside? A person with excellent social skills and extensive social network will have no problems at all finding a job or being part of society.

It is not what you know, it's who you know.

Access has its place. Its front-end and integration with other office solutions ensure it is the best quick, light database solution for majority of small businesses.

But the emphasis is on "light". I am sure everyone has dealt with Access files that are used as whole business-tracking applications. Files that approach close to their limit of 4GB. Files that are simultaneously being used by all the users to record their timesheets in. And anytime it is suggested to move to a more proper database engine, everyone screams blood and tears because Access is all they know. It is too much risk to move to some other way, because they always done it this way.

Many slashdoters have IT background, so have dealt with this phenomenon. Unfortunately they blame the tool and not the conservative people. It is much easier to just demonize the software, rather than educate an entrenched user.

SoylentNews needs to get more of the community before entrenched Slashdot members migrate there.

It is a chicken-egg problem and it hasn't reached the breaking point.

It is the handle of a quite a prolific poster here. You can recognize his posts quite easily because of the lengths and massive amount of links.

Therefore, you have to be mentally ill to work in IT! :-)

It is very hard. I am convinced that changing the way a person thinks is one of the most challenging things in life.

What is helping me improve my social anxiety and depression is seeing a psychologist. Combination of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and medication gives me a small edge to help me cope.

I sympathize with your struggles. I hope you will find what works for you to avoid sinking deeper into that abyss.

Exactly right. Hence it is especially popular online.

Funny thing is that I have a Canadian friend that used it in a conversation. But given that guy's general political stances: It is an outlier.

When will this meme finally die?! It was never funny. Just used to point out how fucking retarded some Americans are!