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Comment: Re:The best part of the article is at the bottom (Score 1) 555

I love that idea. Posting on websites is all good and well but nowhere near as visible as it needs to be.

Another option is to require them to prefix all statements in either houses (or whatever they call them in the U.S) with disclosure of all donations of a certain amount received during their current term. "This statement brought to you by .

Comment: Re:The best part of the article is at the bottom (Score 1) 555

Small government is like freedom of religion. Just as freedom of religion is often freedom for a specific religion, small government obviously doesn't apply when it'd hinder one's business interests.

I wonder why they haven't banned the Internet? Surely the scourge of freely available Internet delivered news is as much a threat to publishers and paperboys as Tesla is to the car dealership cartel?

Comment: Re:A bit late (Score 1) 133

Exactly. I never understood why they bother to lock the phones in the first place. If you have a 2 year contract, they have your money already for that long. Locking the phone doesn't gain them anything. If you want to unlock your phone and go somewhere else, they just get free money out of you since now they don't have to provide you any service.

Locking the phone prevents users using third-party SIMs for cheaper international and/or data rates. For example, O2 in the UK posts a rate of £6 (around $9) per megabyte when roaming in the U.S. It'd be way cheaper to buy a pre-paid SIM, one of which I looked at offers 500GB of data over seven days for just $25.

It's one of a few reasons that I'm never again entering in to a long-term contract with a carrier. I don't want a gimped phone, and I definitely don't want to be tied to a carrier for anything more than six months at a time. Seems more sensible to swallow the initial costs of purchasing a phone in exchange for this flexibility.

Comment: Re:why not ban capitalism? (Score 1) 353

by MysteriousPreacher (#43642361) Attached to: Paul's Call To Abolish the TSA, One Year Later

Hey Joe,

I ask myself this multiple times a day every day. Occam's razor, right? Still, if you are right, then many people on Slashdot are wrong because I agree with a number of regular posters on here.

Yeah, and also separating the important from stuff that annoys you but ultimately isn't a big deal. I'm annoyed when people use cell phones in restaurants. That's more my issue though, not something that really needs to change.

This is probably one of the two most relevant things you've mentioned. I probably do have some sort of problem. What's very interesting is that I've taught classes in the past and they love the way I teach. Why can I teach a class but not always help someone see something that I do? I suspect the answer is because I see things in a way others do not and therefore it requires a lengthy explanation. (I've been accused multiple times of taking too long to explain something.) People don't like lengthy. They want short. Is that my problem or theirs? Is this reply lengthy? Or is it thorough? Will anyone read it?

think we have a fair bit in common. I'm also prone to overly lengthy explanations. It's been a serious issue both at work, where senior managers lose interest in my otherwise useful ideas, and in relationships where sometimes simple is more emotionally satisfying to hear. It doesn't mean dumbed down - it's more about context and ensuring the message isn't lost in the details. I love rambling on about my designs and theories. Luckily I have a boss and colleagues who've helped me reign this in a bit.

It's probably because of where I was raised. If I didn't have that attitude growing up, I'd be dead. My neighborhood was not a nice place to be. Remember all those horrible things that happened in New Orleans during Katrina? Looting? Rioting? Murder? None of it surprised me. It was happening before Katrina. It still happens today. One of my many friends who still lives in New Orleans was beaten a couple of weeks ago by a neighbor. She will have months of facial reconstructive surgery. She lost part of her ear in the attack.
What's interesting is that despite the "world versus me" attitude, I also have a huge inner drive to make the world better. A lot of times, though, the world doesn't want to get better. That is frustrating. Very frustrating. Ironically, it feeds the "world versus me" attitude... which then fuels the drive to make the world better. It's a vicious cycle I have a hard time keeping in check. Living in New Orleans was killing me. Literally. It was eating me from the inside out because I could not change a city that bad. It was a good thing I left. It saved my life. I admire those that still live there and are able to do so without it hurting them too badly... although I always wonder how true that is?

Ouch, sorry to hear about your friend. Definitely a stand needs to be taken in some situations. I'm ashamed by the times I've out if cowardice sat by while disgusting things have happened. In some cases the right thing is to against the world - it's how change happens. I suppose it's about choosing battles. By bring mindful of perspective you can do the right thing without going mad tilting at windmills.

Something I think is important is to have that understanding of shades of grey, as you indeed do. None of us are saints. At a minimum, we're not going too badly if we try to avoid shitting on our fellow man. There will however be times when you have to put go atomic on someone, and if you have a good conscious, you'll always regret it even if it was necessary. I used to have a lot of anger issues when I was younger, and then became a recluse because it was scary to lose control that way. With a great deal of reflection and good friends I think I've a better balance than I've ever enjoyed in the past.

You seem a thoughtful decent person. I hate seeing good people ground down by this world.

Comment: Re:I wrote a CFF renderer in C# (Score 1) 77

No worries, you simply have to accept the fact that kiddies these days don't get it unless there's at least a LOL, lololol, or Omg LMAO in the sentence. ;-)

Indeed, old chap. In the future, anyone not employing at least one LOL variant every six words will be considered emotionally dead. Obituaries and formal declarations of war will be interesting.

Comment: Re:why not ban capitalism? (Score 2) 353

by MysteriousPreacher (#43634113) Attached to: Paul's Call To Abolish the TSA, One Year Later

I'll be frank:

1) Are you in fact right? Could there be a reason why the world at large rejects your views?

2) Are you presenting your ideas in an attractive way? Maybe ask some of these people to provide you with some feedback?

3) Is this more about you than the world? Maybe get some counselling before this "world versus me" mentality becomes intractable.

4) Learn to be less bothered by the mundane and the things out of your control.

You really want to be careful to avoid this "Mr. Nice Guy" thing. The mention of good people being turned bad smells of psychosis or at least only in the last line of a long post did you in any way acknowledge possible faults on your side. Realistically with so many push backs it's probably you, not the world that has a problem. Really, talk to a counsellor or a good friend. Viewing the world as you do is ruinous and ultimately leads to misanthropic fuelled self-isolation.

Comment: Re:After reading the summary... (Score 2) 153

by MysteriousPreacher (#43633951) Attached to: Redditors (and Popehat) Versus a Bus Company

Troll
Noun

1. Any comment that isn't complimentary.

For example:

cousinloving44: This is dumb. You're dumb. Everything is dumb!
hpoirot: Oh Cointreau mon sherry. Perhaps it is you who are the dumbo, no?
cousinloving44: OMG TROLL!

Dictionary of Modern Internet English, edited by Frosty Piss.

Comment: Re:Major source of privacy loss (Score 2) 205

by MysteriousPreacher (#43575027) Attached to: Google Releases Glass Kernel Source Code

I find it strange that there wasn't a huge outcry when Microsoft release the Kinect, a device that always has a camera on inside your house. Personally, I trust Microsoft a lot less than I trust Google.

The Kinect is only affecting the homes of people who choose to install the things. Glass is designed to be worn on the go. That's probably why Glass is seen as being more controversial and invasive.

Comment: Re:Belief system (Score 1) 931

I'd grant that uneducated people, which would be a majority during the Middle Ages, could well have thought the world is flat. The best consensus we have right now is that a spherical Earth was more commonly accepted by educated people. If anything people have incorrectly accused the Church if fostering the myth if a flat earth.

On the Bob and Alice example, we'd start with a hypothesis stating that prayer prevents cancer. The first step is to establish if people who pray are less affected by cancer, and work from there. Assuming the prayer group is indeed significantly less afflicted, the next step is to understand why? Barring a mechanism to account for this, science could at least establish that there is indeed an observable phenomenon. Whether that could be ascribed to divine intervention is debatable. Barring any naturalistic explanation, the honest answer is we don't know.

I don't think science is anti-religion, nor should it be. Science can be used to test some claims, but cannot prove or disprove all religious beliefs. I can argue that Yahweh, as described in the Bible, is internally inconsistent. That doesn't mean that a god doesn't exist. Science changes, but not for experiential reasons. It changes because of evidence and theories that have greater explanatory use than the ones they replace.

To close, I don't agree with ridiculing religious people. Some religious beliefs are plain silly, no doubt about that, and that needs to be addressed if one would be intellectually honest. I see many Catholic rituals as being little different to shamans waving animal bone fetishes to ward off evil. Doesn't mean I can't respect Catholics. I used to be a Catholic, and still count many as friends.

Comment: Re:Forcing strong passwords in the first place. (Score 1) 211

by MysteriousPreacher (#43573303) Attached to: Mitigating Password Re-Use From the Other End

A good backup regimen would mitigate corruption of keychains.

Although it's true that cracking the keychain would open the door, that would at least require a cracker to get access to the keychain. If stored locally this wouldn't be a trivial thing. In terms of return on investment it would be expensive to do for anything but attempts on individual users. Most attacks are done in bulk on specific services.

I use very strong passwords on accounts where I register payment details, and a *very* strong password on my keychain. It's not invulnerable but it would be very difficult to break.

Mother is the invention of necessity.

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