At my Geophysics institute, we have a guy who just finished his Ph.D. in his 40's. Another guy in his 60's has already retired from a full and exciting life and is working on his second Ph.D. in an entirely different subject matter.
Age does not matter in my line of Ph.D. work.
Couldn't Kaspersky Labs just post a Gauss detection tool or instructions to determine if your computer has been compromised, then just ask people/companies with infected machines to come forward and contact them? I'm sure the people who Gauss is targeting are probably paranoid of CIA and Mossad plots against them, but if they're infected with Gauss, they probably are already a victim of a CIA or Mossad plot to get them. They're already screwed, so it certainly couldn't hurt much more to trust Kaspersky.
I do get a feeling that the government tax dollars will go straight to equipping a Chinese factory, however. Nearly all high tech industries are set up such that US does the research and Asia does the manufacturing and reaps the profits.
That's because when everyone wins, it's not a competition.
In SASUKE, the trials are near-impossible. More often than not, nobody wins. It is not a competition against yourself, it is a competition against the challenge of the obstacle course. If multiple people win (never happened, but is always possible), it would be celebrated (and the next season's obstacles would probably be harder). If nobody wins, that's OK, too. But certainly there is never a time that everybody wins.
And I would argue that if everyone wins, it encourages people to be lazy. If one person wins, it gives that person an ego and makes the losers disinterested. If nobody wins (because it is hard), or if winning is equally available to all but is incredibly difficult (a la SASUKE), it encourages people to try harder. On that note, isn't that the American spirit? That everyone has an equal opportunity to rise to the top, proportional to your efforts, and there is no zero-sum game?
Piracy is a matter of cost and convenience. Piracy is always free, but sometimes it's incredibly inconvenient. Sometimes it's even risky. Purchasing should always have the advantage in quality and convenience. So in the long run, content providers should always win. But sometimes they screw it up and make piracy attractive. And it's often easier for content producers to blame piracy for their woes than to address the problem of piracy offering a better experience.
If purchasing the game is much easier than pirating and the cost isn't obscene, everyone, except for those who get a thrill out of "being bad" and pirating, will purchase the game.
If pirating the game is easier than purchasing it (e.g., cd-keys, DRM, online installation verification, limited copies in retail stores)--and it's free, well, few would pay for it.
For example, Steam is wildly successful because it's so, so easy, prices are good, and sales are frequent. You never have to worry about finding the game at your local retailer, prices are always competitive, and you can play your game wherever and on whatever computer you want at any time. The music industry has been wildly unsuccessful combating piracy because piracy is easy and gives you DRM-free music, whereas purchasing has often been expensive and/or gives you DRM-laden music. The anime industry is also one where in many cases fansubs are higher quality than the official product, and piracy is easy. Which would you choose: 1.) paying $20 for 4 episodes with a lower quality translation whitewashed for kids and old, unformatted DVD subtitles, or 2.) freely pirating an entire season with better-formatted subtitles, sing-a-long, bilingual, animated intro lyrics, a higher quality translation written by devoted fans, and cultural notes for those times when it is necessary?
I think the assumption is that, despite the religious fanaticism and/or grandiose visions of world conquest of some leaders, those in possession of nuclear weapons are actually motivated by self-interest and self-preservation.
I think a lot of our European friends continue to underestimate the size of the US. There are over 160 million utility poles in the US. The distance from Seattle to Miami is like the distance between London and Tehran. Changing all of those poles to steel or moving the lines underground is unnecessary. Powerlines are underground where they need to be--newer residential neighborhoods, newer towns, and downtowns of most cities--and they are above ground elsewhere. The reliability of power is already great. Big cities don't have power outages. Suburbs may have rare power outages from severe storms a couple times a year. It also depends on your area. Trees in Miami are stronger against wind than trees in Virginia, for instance. And though people in the US typically don't want powerlines running to their house (and most people don't have them unless they're in a 60 year old house), nobody cares if there are lines running down the road.
Additionally, to those saying that "Europe doesn't have power outages, even in storms," I think you fail to understand the power of storms in the US, and I think you glob the whole US together as a single place. There's not going to be a power outage in a city from gale-force winds, but there may be in the suburbs. I'm a grad student, and I see the international students routinely just sitting upstairs doing their work when the tornado sirens go off. No matter what I do, I cannot drive into their heads the power of severe storms, here. I've been told that they thought tornadoes were kind of like in the Wizard of Oz. They're not. Europe is no stranger to high winds and strong low pressure systems, but the US gets storms of these strength routinely. Hundreds, maybe thousands of supercell thunderstorms of these strength hit the US every year. They pop up along or in front of huge cold front systems that come through. It usually happens where the cold, Canadian air and the warm, moist Gulf of Mexico air meet--in the Midwest and South--and the Midwest and South are thusly well-equipped to handle them. The Gulf states are also well-equipped to handle hurricanes. The states on the east coast are not as equipped for handling these kinds of disasters because they do not need to be. Likewise, Alabama is not as well-equipped to handle snow as New York might be.
Almost the only way to immigrate (outside of political asylum) is through the arduous and exploitative higher education route.
Huh?
1. Get a job in a company that is willing to sponsor you for an H1-B.
2. Once in the country and working, apply for a green card as soon as possible.
3. Get your green card, wait 5 years, and apply for citizenship.
It's very lengthy, I agree; much more so than other countries that are lucrative from an immigration perspective (e.g. Canada and Australia). But not impossible.
I have never talked to a foreign national who has graduated and found a job that hasn't run into all of the following problems.
1. Small companies don't hire foreign nationals because the the paperwork and red tape for sponsoring them is arduous, and because H1-B visas are limited (and much of those are taken by technology and computer companies), they can't afford to invest time and money into somebody that may be rejected from getting a visa through no fault of their own.
2. Once you do get a job at a university or megacorporation (the most likely places to end up as a foreign national due to reason #1), you will be exploited. The process for a green card essentially restarts if you change jobs, and the employer knows that 1.) your job prospects are limited due to reason #1, 2.) you'll be deported if you can't find a job within a year, and 3.) you won't leave, anyways, because all your green card progress will have been for naught.
Rather than go through several years of being a peon working underpaid and overtime at a megacorp until you get your green card, many foreign nationals just choose to go home. They choose to go home not because they don't want to live and work in America, but because they don't want to go through all of #1 and #2 for 5 or 6 years just to get a green card.
And I, for one, do not appreciate my tax dollars going to educate foreigners which are then encouraged/forced to go back home after getting their American degree who then start companies that compete with us. IMO, when you are awarded your Masters or Ph.D. degree, they should staple a green card to it. "Here, you've been in the US long enough for us to know you're safe, you've been long enough to have a reasonable understanding of the culture, you've done enough science to have a reasonable command of the English language, and you've proven yourself to be a highly motivated and educated individual--have a Green Card, welcome to America."
The Adobe Suite and Microsoft Office.
Seriously, this is the biggest reason that most scientists use it, I believe. Also, it's pretty and I think that scientists like to look down on people (I am saying this as a grad student) and say, "Oh.. you're still using Windows? How do I use this, again... I forget, haha."
Things I very much do not like about OSX.
Immigration today is not like immigration in the 1980s. In 2012, it is very difficult, even for spouses of US citizens, to immigrate to the US. Look it up..
I challenge you--find an avenue for an educated, motivated, English-fluent Japanese citizen to come to America and work. Try it. See for yourself. It isn't possible. Hell, even if you marry a US citizen you are not allowed to be present in the US until your marriage green card is awarded, and the average wait time for that is more than FIVE YEARS !!!!
More people need to understand this view.
People will do what people want to do. You cannot stop people from doing what they will do, but you can regulate it. If you make it illegal, you will create criminals. Criminals benefit nobody (but the prison owners). You need to regulate it so that it benefits everyone.
People want alcohol. We banned it (the prohibition). People continued to drink, but they did so illegally, and crime flourished.
People want drugs. We banned it (the drug war). People continue to do drugs, but they do so illegally, and crime flourishes.
People want to immigrate to America. We made it nearly impossible over the past 30 years to do so legally. People continue to immigrate, but they do so illegally, and crime flourishes.
The bottom line is that people want to immigrate to America, and you, me, or the government be damned, they will continue to do it. You can make it illegal and create an environment for flourishing organized crime, or we can accept that there will be immigration and it cannot be stopped, and fashion laws and regulations to make that immigration positive for those of us already here (e.g., make legal immigration easy so we can get those people paying taxes).
Not all slaves were African. Slavery has existed for all people of all colors since the beginning of history. My great, great, grandparents were white, German, and slaves, for instance--in Auschwitz.
Ok, my subject is hyperbole. But anyone who has ever tried to legally immigrate or help a foreign friend try to move to the US knows that it simply isn't possible for the vast majority of people.
I will be brief and concise.
There is no "line." Illegals cannot get in the back of the "line" because the "line" does not exist.
The Green Card lottery is biased against the best countries. Ok, that's not exactly how it works in theory, but that's kind of what happens. Example: In 2012, Japan was awarded 435 visas and Nigera 6,204.
You can't come to the US just because you want to. You can't come regardless of whether or not you have the means to support yourself. You can't come regardless of your education level or English-speaking ability. You can't even come if one of your family members is already here--you must be the direct blood relative of a US citizen, a non-citizen permanent resident sibling is, for instance, not good enough (and becoming a citizen takes decades).
Almost the only way to immigrate (outside of political asylum) is through the arduous and exploitative higher education route. We, the American people, will spend hundreds of millions of our tax dollars to educate foreign students at the best universities in the world. Upon graduation from a prestigious American school with American knowledge, they either must get a job immediately (not easy in these economic times) or get out. Often times, they do get out, and they start those companies which are now out-competing us on the world stage. For instance, I challenge you to find a foreign technology company whose CEO doesn't have a Ph.D. from a California university. Now, assuming that the student is really, really dedicated to staying in the US, there are still substantial roadblocks to them staying here. Firstly, the paperwork for hiring a foreigner is insane. It's insane enough that really the only places that foreign-born U.S. graduates can work are universities, oil companies, or huge technology companies. Any smaller companies can't afford to figure out the legal mess required to figure out the visas, nor can they accept the risk that they'll hire a foreigner and their visa will be denied. The other issue is that if the foreigner doesn't keep their job, they will be deported. They have limited job prospects in the first place due to the visa and legal regulations, and the employers know it. The employers almost universally abuse these people because they know that their only chance to get a green card is to stay employed, the green card process is restarted if they change jobs, and they know that the foreigner wants a green card. So they can overwork and underpay them because they know the foreigner won't quit until they get their green card.
I have tried to figure out legal avenues for some friends in Japan. They have college degrees, speak near-perfect English, and have a passion for America and its culture. Nevertheless, we could not find a route for them to work in the US, so they remain in Japan.
Work is the crab grass in the lawn of life. -- Schulz
