Indeed, their problem is that enough people have decided that they did get one to work well enough, and only buy a new OS when they buy a new computer, that they are concerned about future OS sales. Computers are not getting 'better' as quickly as in the past to the view of the average user, and so there is less reason to buy a new one every few years. The ego upgrades are going for phones instead. To combat these factors, a strategy of convincing people somehow that upgrading their OS is something they do regularly for a nominal fee is indeed probably a good way to keep sucking blood from the users.

They want unemployment benefits until they find a job they like.

The programs are short, but can instill some much-needed paranoia about how things can go wrong interacting with even a simple environment:).

"SHARON PROST, Circuit Judge
SHARON PROST was appointed by President George W. Bush in 2001."
http://www.cafc.uscourts.gov/judges/sharon-prost-circuit-judge.html

"KIMBERLY A. MOORE, Circuit Judge
KIMBERLY A. MOORE was appointed by President George W. Bush in 2006."
http://www.cafc.uscourts.gov/judges/kimberly-a-moore-circuit-judge.html

"JIMMIE V. REYNA, Circuit Judge
Jimmie V. Reyna was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit by President Barack Obama in 2011."
http://www.cafc.uscourts.gov/judges/jimmie-v-reyna-circuit-judge.html

Too bad there isn't a "poster can't read" mod option.

The summary said "corporate massage day" not "corporate message day".

As someone who works at a place where they do have someone come in to do massage once a month, I think this is a great perk.

That said, if the place is small enough that folks will feel their individual contributions make a difference for the company then options are a good long term incentive.

Identifying slackers properly only works if that is what actually happens. But most layoffs seem to do things in the wrong order- you have to start with thinning management layers down which is very very hard to do right, since the very people you need to get rid of are usually the ones with the skills to do office politics well without contributing to company success. There are two reasons to start with management- first, it's much better for employee morale. Secondly, the folks you need to get rid of in management will tend to keep the wrong employees.

Everyone screws up sometimes. I'd say that if you feel you DON'T ever have to apologize for anything that's a lot worse. That sort of view is part of why we so often get only psychotics who never admit to doing anything wrong in positions of power. The decent folks admit it when they screw up, try to fix it, are attacked for having displayed a weakness, and so tend not to prosper.

Of course, to apologize is only part of making things right when you screw up. But it is an important first step.

This could also be the magic app that leads to the govt to start trying to control access to replicators.

There's a reason that I don't use the Start menu to get things done, and it's not that I'm using some other part of Windows.

Austin has a great local economy, plenty of tech, a decent state university, and plenty of things to do.

It seems to me that being faster than necessary on one piece of hardware means that, all else equal, it will be noticably better on some slower piece of hardware.

As long as the benchmark is not done with minimum system that is capable of running the game.

Some highlights I caught this year:

77s & The Violet Burning had great sets

Steve Taylor screening Blue Like Jazz and doing a Q&A.

The Choir doing all of Chase The Kangaroo for the very last show

I'm going to miss that place.

Most don't fit into the easy listening category, and are worth checking out as well done christian music in their various styles:

Daniel Amos/DA, The Lost Dogs, The Choir, The 77s/Seventy-Sevens, Rez/Ressurection Band, Glass Harp, early Sixpence None The Richer

Because they did a good job artistically (IMHO) they didn't achieve the # mentions of Jesus per song quota to get as much radio play as many of artists that wound up defining the genre for most people.

Note that in DA's case, they change musical styles (well) with the times, so pick an album from a time period you are happy with.

My various degrees were EE and Computer Engineering, but I have a CS minor. My first semester undergrad I took the CS Assemblers course before I could even take the EE courses (pre-reqs), since it looked interesting and was part of the minor.

The course was excellent. The material was good. The professor was good. The TA was (IMHO) even better than the professor. The projects were cumulative and built on other in such a way that if you wrote crappy code that was hard to re-use you'd experience why that was bad during the next project.

Most of the students were CS 3rd years. There were a few other engineering students.

A lot of people failed the class. I don't believe any were the few engineering students. Some of us blew the curve.

That was the last semester the CS department let non-CS majors take the class, and the class was removed from the minor requirements and replaced with something much easier.

This is just one data point. But if other EEs experienced similar things when taking classes on the EE/CS boundary, I can see why they would get such an attitude toward CS.

I've also had experiences of helping engineers having trouble with CS- there are plenty of people on each side who have trouble thinking like the other side. I've found being able to do both (and to borrow techniques from one side to improve designs on the other) very helpful and would prefer if there were more useful communication between the camps. But often enough the "solution" taken is like that CS department, where a wall is built instead.

"what's the point in not conforming
if it changes you"
- Five Iron Frenzy, "Marty"

I was listening to that this morning, and I think it is apropos.

Listen to what you like. Don't listen to what you don't like. Support the folks you listen to.

I actually got very bored by the Covenant series, but found the Gap series quite good. While both are harsh stories, the Gap doesn't feel as derivative. (yes, I realize the literary reasons that Covenant was written the way it was, but it didn't work for me as a good read)