Comment Re:Dances With Smurfs. (Score 1) 870
The title of these posts is Dances with Smurfs. It is a play on the title of a movie, "Dances with Wolves". It is a movie about American Indians.
Comment Re:Dances With Smurfs. (Score 1) 870
If we based our view of humanity by only looking at the times where there was peace, it would be a biased view. This movie does exactly that. Therefore, it is biased.
Comment Re:Dances With Smurfs. (Score 1) 870
You're right, the movie hinted that there was conflict. It never actually showed any of it occurring though. This makes the native population look good.
Looking at the flip side, the goodness that the humans did, such as the school and providing jobs for their people, where only hinted at and never shown. This makes the humans look bad.
Comment Re:Dances With Smurfs. (Score 1) 870
No. I'm saying that if you want to parallel the Na'vi with American Indians, you are comparing apples with oranges.
Comment Re:Dances With Smurfs. (Score 2, Interesting) 870
Avatar wasn't just displaying a particular message. It did it in a biased and unrealistic way. For example: the Na'vi seldom, if ever, had a civil conflict in the movie that was not a direct result of the corporate occupation. One of them died of old age, but every other action that caused pain was due to sky people.
Comment Re:The simple one. (Score 1) 678
Sometimes there is a burden of intent that has to be proven out.
For example: a student violates the internet usage policy at their school and uses the "It was an accident" defense.
Comment Re:I used to read the WSJ (Score 1) 647
Riddle me this... WHY WOULD YOU WANT to be "conservative"? Why would you be resistant to change? Why would you choose not to be open-minded to the fact that your way may not be the best?
Because change doesn't always mean you are changing to something better. Especially when the reasons for the change are suspect and often hidden from the public.
Comment Has anyone actually seen him (Score 4, Interesting) 168
Most of the comments here are quite negative towards Mr. Thompson. He is actually a very impressive person. I suggest people who have decided to base their judgment of him on the company he ran watch the episode of CEO Exchange with him in it.
http://www.pbs.org/wttw/ceoexchange/episodes/ceo_jthompson.html
Comment Re:what were their intentions? (Score 1) 863
There are a lot more fun things you can do to get 20 years. I think they should get some punishment, but 20 years?
Submission + - Death Notice on Wikipedia Before Body Found (washingtonpost.com)
RobertB-DC writes: "A popular WWE wrestler's Wikipedia entry was edited to include his wife's death. 14 hours later, the bodies of Chris Benoit, his wife, and their son were found, apparent victims of a murder-suicide. Authorities want to know who updated the Wikipedia entry, since the IP address associated with the change is registered in Stamford, Connecticut, where WWE is headquartered. Of course, the incident is also a clear violation of Wikipedia's "no original research" rule."
Submission + - How do you change careers into programming?
An anonymous reader writes: I have worked in tech support for the last several years, but find myself wanting to move on to something else — programming. I've written some small programs in my limited spare time but nothing particularly impressive; just functional stuff to make my life easier. I've spent a lot of time recently working through programming books, and feel I'm ready to make the switch in my career. That said, I don't have a CS degree, and find that responses to my resume have been along the lines of "Thanks, but we aren't hiring for tech support positions." Surely someone from the slashdot crowd has been in the same position — what would you recommend?
