New world problems.

You think I agreed to be in the 'Googleverse', but no. I went to college. They require I use their email account for school-related information, and sometime in the last two years they switched over to the 'Googleverse'.

Originally, there were a number of excellent create-your-own themes, and most everything was pretty bare bones. I like that, considering I grew up in the pre-commerce Internet. There weren't a lot of fancy web 2.0 windows all over the place, it was just simple text. Things loaded quickly, and didn't develop memory leaks all over the place.

Now, all of those (imho) wonderful options? Gone. I'm not asking for the freedom to create the ideal solution for me, but I really get tired of getting sold a product, only to have it disappear in six months or a year.

Does that mean that every user needs to fall into the 'new' design that Google came up with? I'd prefer to believe that choice is a perfectly valid option in our society.

In fact, people still *do* have choice, unfortunately. Lets remember that Google isn't necessarily the only game in town.

(Sure, its generally the best in town, but perhaps is time for someone to set up an email server that filters through Google first, and ignores their 'user-friendly' ruleset?)

Are you kidding? This is how dice is selling marketing on /. nowadays .. put up a phony "ask slashdot" question, and put the shill at the top of the queue.

Common sense doesn't necessarily mean that it is scientifically true. Plenty of these scientific studies simply verify things that we 'know' to be true.

Plenty of these scientific studies reveal things we 'know' to be true are actually false. Stop being an idiot - there's so *many* other things to attack this study about.

Look at their assumptions! How exactly can they make any reliable statement about rural environments when their study was done in an urban environment?
How can they make any reliable statement about the average city when their study was done in one of the worst cities for traffic congestion in the US?

You know, I keep seeing how corporations keep pushing CISPA related bills through the government.

How about the people push a similar bill through the government, only this time, we mandate some sort of corporate responsibility for firewall security, and protection of consumer-related personal information?

I'm downright tired of companies engaging in the act of demographic siphoning behavior under the guise of a "free" service.

The funny part is that's by design. Our American society cares more about protecting the right to make mistakes and the belief in second chances than it does in any right to privacy or integrity.
Congrats, and welcome to the queue. If you'd like to dispute this society, please press star, and an operator will be with you .. eventually.

My hard drive is 100% full.
I keep my collectors edition of 0's and 1's on it! I keep meaning to organize them someday just so I know how much its worth, I swear!

I went through that type of system for a Chemistry class. After class, the entire class would wander down to the computer lab and do the homework together. We'd get a question, find the [book] answer, then have each person try to obtain the correct [computer-identified] solution on the first try, trying various syntax adjustments each time. Of the three chances we got, someone usually got the right syntax before everyone had failed the question the second time.

Best benefit? Getting a group of people in the same place to research, debate, and agree on a single answer, then be open-minded and organized enough to shape the solution to fit the constraints given.

I can't believe anyone would bother posting an RFC on FTL communications. Seriously, when this comes to occur .. why doesn't the future simply publish the RFC?! At least they'll be able to narrate the proper standards to ensure a seamless transition.

The things I see here is not that he changed, it's that the intent of the photo changed.

To wit: The first picture? "I gathered every item with a microchip."
The second picture? "This is what I use in my life now."

Does that actually mean that he doesn't have those things any more, or that he just doesn't use them any more? That seems pretty darn unclear. If it *is* that he doesn't have them anymore, then props to him. I don't have enough time in my life to purge all the old tech and convert the pertinent info to my new storage systems.
Not only that, but technology is not just about the microchip - if he has improved his kitchen from the el-cheapo microwave to a built-in convection oven, or whatever - has he truly reduced his microchip count by one? I think not. Did he push his fridge into the shot? No. I'd lay odds if he's redone his kitchen to accommodate a new oven he likely has a pretty nice fridge too (which could easily have a microchip).

I improved my own home recently, and put electronic thermostats in that enabled me to reduce my energy consumption (and my heating bill) by 30%. Should things like that count? Absolutely.

Are you a troll? Lets go back to that 'reading comprehension' piece you mentioned.

So .. he is taking a third year course at a public university.
Students are asked to post their homework as blogs online that will be graded, presumably by the professor.
This is an online course that could be either a program requirement (doubtful), an elective (possible), or [what I consider to be] one of those self-help educational classes.
The OP has no idea what grades are given for this assignment, does not mention when in the class it is given, how much weight it carries in the class, and based on this asks, "is the bar being lowered".

From what I can tell, I would venture the guess that if the students in that class are willing to submit crappy work, then there must be a reason. Either the assignment doesn't weigh very much toward the final grade, or the students are going to get dinged for it. There's no evidence here that instructors are part of a war on consciousness / thought as suggested. There's no evidence here that has anything to do with science, school boards, or congressmen.

Am I whining? My argument was that the article submitted by the OP was essentially a shill article - asking a question that is neither newsy, nerdsy, or relevant to anything, and is merely meant to encourage group-think in the general direction of the current owners - dice.com. I maintain that belief.

With respect to your straw-man, let me counter with my own: Before the X generation came along and turned Universities into refuges from the war, Universities served a very different purpose than they do now. They used to be an avenue for a moderately wealthy family to ensure their children would remain in their social class. Generation X turned that brought grade inflation, and the changing view on debt turned universities into a means for anyone to rise above their social class. The problem is that Universities aren't required to explain to their students precisely how to succeed, nor how to live with integrity, honesty, compassion, how to think critically, or even how to engage in a discussion without resorting to petty name-calling.

Now, since /. is essentially a blog .. look at your own post. You use run-on sentences, misspelled words, crappy grammar, and colloquialisms. You could arguably earn a pretty crappy grade in his course.

The Dice.com content generation team hasn't realized that yet.
This sounds like (judging from the tenor of the well-written "ask slashdot") another shill article along the lines of the "how to get the job interview" crap they're posting nowadays.

Dude .. that's true, but have you checked out the hot chicks at spat-ooh-laa-laa world?!

That gets us up to 8 google pages of unsecured printers. I don't think my settings are at 10k sites per page ... I could be wrong though.