Be careful there. The accumulation of wealth by both indivduals abd corporations is one of the driving forces of capitalism. It is only by accumulating capital that all of the great fee enterprise achievements of the industrial age were possible. Too a large extent, which nation was a great power was driven by the ability of a country's economy to create and amass wealth that could the be applied to what needed done.

Like it or not, that's the way the world works. All experiments to mess it with have failed (usually with a few million dead to mark the experiment). Even the PRC has had to allow more and more entrepreneurship in order to create a dynamic, growing economy.

Cheers,
Dave

The most valuable thing I got or will get from my parents is not the inheritance. It's the work ethic that made it so that what my brother and I will split really won't make that much difference to us as far savings for our retirement. Work is something that a lot of the people feeding at the public trough really ought to try.

I don't resent Mitt Romney's or Warren Buffet's or Bill Gates' money. It's theirs. The earned it. They get to dispose of it as they see fit. The tax system is what our wonderful representatives put in place. I'm all for a simple flat tax in which everyone pays the same percentage of their income but that's "unfair" so we persist in adding more loopholes and exemptions and then wonder why someone like Mitt Romney only pays half of your tax rate. I'd say the problem and soluton are clear but I'm sure you'll disagree.

Cheers,
Dave

What claim do those employees have on the business that paid them a wage that they freely accepted in return for the work they did? Or how does forfeiture of the business to the employees work in the case of my father who worked for 42 years for the same company and bought stock in that company in order to make sure there was "enough" to take care of him and my mother in their older years and to hand something down to my brother and me? He owned stock so he owned a small part of the business when he died. Does that get passed to some current employees who haven't worked there as long as he did instead of to his family? It's some of the money that now keeps my mother in a nursing home since she can't take care of herself (but she's still doing quite well for a 98 year old). Or was that not what you had in mind?

Very few companies are sole proprietorships that are wholely owned by an individual who can pass the business to his or her survivors. Most of those are quite small. Publicly traded companies are owned by both individuals and other companies. There's no one person from whom you can confiscate their estate when they die. Go find something else to bark about.

Cheers,
Dave

We need to move away from robbing one group to heap benefits on another. Instead of people being entreprenurial and industrious we seem to focus our energies on how this group, that group or some other collection of people deserves someone else's money that they have done nothing to earn except become adept at lobbying and/or painting themselves as some kind of victim.

We have set the bar far too low for taking money from someone who has earned it and giving to someone who has done nothing except cry about how they need it. I have more respect for pick pockets who use their skills to pilfer their victim's money. At least they are honest about their thievery.

Cheers,
Dave

It's all a matter of perspective: If It Ain't Broke, Don't Fix It: Ancient Computers in Use Today. Be glad they're running something written since the advent of the PC.

BTW, I'm an old Unix hacker who has moved on to Linux but the command line still rules.

Cheers,
Dave

Endorphin Rush, Dave's Insanity Sauce (and all the other Dave's sauces), Da Bomb, etc. The first time I tried Endirphin Rush, one drop was enough to get me sweating and feeling light headed so of course I bought a bottle. Love the way you can add just a drop or two to something and the head level goes up nicely.

Cheers,
Dave

I did fine when my wife had a Linux system. She decided she needed to replace her laptop and we got a "black Friday" special on a Windows 8 laptop. Now it's pretty much a daily ritual to try to figure out how Microsoft obfuscated something that was easy to find and perform under XP or 7. She can't decide whether to stick with Windows 8 because "that's what everyone will want her to know" or take the damn thing back to Windows 7 so we both be productive.

Cheers,
Dave

Any bets that it will get slashdotted when it goes live? This assumes CERN will make it accessible to the 'net in general.

Cheers,
Dave

Personal use: MS-DOS -> Windows 3.X -> OS/2 -> Linux (Red Hat 5.0 in 1998, Scientific Linux 6.4 today with some digressions to other distros but always came back to Red Hat).

Professional use: OS/370 -> CDC NOS -> DEC VMS -> HP-UX -> attempting to evade having Windows forced on me -> Linux Router Project,Red Hat, Red Hat Enterprise -> Red Hat Enterprise, SuSE Linux Enterprise Server, AIX, Solaris, HP-UX

My last two jobs were in Linux and/or Unix shops. Even managed to run Linux on my work desktop. Job hunting now and hoping I can continue to evade Microsoft products but I feel like the Borg is pursuing me (You will be assimiliated. Resistance is futile...). Loved OS/2: very stable and full featured; everything Microsoft's personal OSes were supposed to be but weren't.

Cheers,
Dave

I usually take whatever estimate I'm given and change it to the next largest unit and double it. Thus, an estimate of two hours become four days. This is still usually less than the actual time required. And don't even get me started on projecting when some task will be completed as opposed to how much effort will be required. The above alogorithm does a reasonable job at estimating effort actually requied but determining the calendar completion date is a whole different animal.

Cheers,
Dave

He could try calling Zuckerburg directly but, as a guess, FB doesn't want to set a precedent for anyone of policing their content. OTOH, making Nelson get a court order means that FB doesn't have to judge (and be put in the position of having to judge) the veracity of anyone's page. It's a slippery slope and, if they're not careful, they could be held responsible for ensuring that no one is cyber-bullying, harassing someone, spreading hate or engaging in who knows what kind of politically incorrect behavior.

Cheers,
Dave

I wonder if the cybersquatting laws are written (or interpreted) so narrowly that he couldn't hit the imposter that way. It may not be a domain name; it's his name and identity.

Cheers,
Dave

So, what does this mean for the future of fully functional, general purpose, standalone computers? 'Offline computer use frustrates the march of progress,' says Winestock. 'If offline use becomes uncommon, then the great and the good will ask: "What are [you] hiding? Are you making kiddie porn? Laundering money? Spreading hate? Do you want the terrorists to win?"'

Almost all of his examples are a complete non-sequitor. How does one launder money, spread hate, help the terrorists, etc. with a computer that is NOT connected? Likewise, does this mean that all of the people who owned computers in the pre-Internet era only owned them to do these things? And none of this follows from comparing mainframes and server farms or even has anything to do with mainframes and server farms.

Sounds more like he has a guilty conscience about doing these same things from his not connected computer and should be hauled before some secret tribunal to answer for his crimes (Oh, and just denying that this is how he came to his conclusions is just further proof that he is a lying to conceal his guilt).

How's that for a little non-sequitor inuendo?

Cheers,
Dave

I find the treeware version of Scientific American to work better for the way I read it. Deep articles outside of my area of expertise don't work for me on the computer but seem to work really well on paper. I also get "Air & Space" as treeware. Lots of eye-candy for a "plane nut" like me.

Cheers,
Dave