Ni bu nung shuo hun duo wun. Ni yo google translate

If I was your manager and you talked up this expensive proprietary product and it crashed and burned AND made me look bad, you're not going to be sticking around too long.

Your job, everyone's job, is to make your boss look good.

Your boss wants to use up his entire budget, and deliver a working solution as promised. There doesn't have to be any connection between those two. I think that the gpp was proposing that you help chose a proprietary system which would burn up the budget, and that you use you spare time to set up a F/OSS system which would work.

When the proprietary system fails, put the free one on to cover the gap. Now that it's working, it's pretty hard to argue that it can't do the job. Your boss has used the money, he's gotten the kickbacks from the salesmen, he's delivered a solution, you've made him look good. As long as he gets to take credit for everything, you'll be sticking around.

Since you know that they went out of their way to NOT restart, I would guess that they have had bad experiences with critical windows updates, and weren't going to be part of the experiment.

Those are your knowledgeable users, who read and understood your message.

... if we program what we know into a simulation, the simulation will be based on what we know!
... programed "Life" into a computer. ... until you actually run the program, you would never have expected the results!

A simulation can tell you things you didn't realize you knew, but it can't tell you things you actually didn't know.

All argument by analogy leads you astray as soon as the anaolgy breaks down.

When you run the game of Life, you learn about the behavior of the cells on the game board under the rules you put into the simulation. You learn all the things which are implicit in the rules, but not obvious to you. Since you make up all the rules, there is no underlying reality with hidden rules which can make reality differ from your simulation.

Running a simulation can let you see that reality differs from the results of your model. From that you can infer that there are rules in reality that didn't make it into your model.

SLASHDOT CAMP 2007 - BOOK NOW!!!

Hey Slashboteers! Are you finishing university? *STILL* unemployed after the dot com layoffs? Desperately trying to get a LAMP cluster to perform better than an IBM Model 55 running Vista? Well, have we got the answer for you! Chief Executive Officer Rob Malda and SS Officer Michael Sims invite you to join them at the Black River Public School in Holland, Michigan from the 1st November 2007 for the "/. 10th Anniversary Slashbot Camp." Three full days of pony rides, Linux coding and male bonding. Special Appearances by NAMBLA Grand Wizard Katz with his partner Wai Tu Yung.

Activities include:

• Bouncy 'CowboyNeal' Castle - Pick a cheek and jump, bitch!
• Salami Slam - Jon Katz's unusual variation of naked leapfrog.
• Creative Writing - Roland Piquepaille's short course on CTRL-C and CTRL-V.
• Anime Association - Sit around with CmdrTaco and watch Anime with no subtitles or dubbing and pretend to know what's going on. Free Juice.
• Advanced Kernel Hacking - Workshop on changing kprintf() messages and then re-compiling to make it look like you're l337. Hosted by Alan Cox.
• Stealing Code for the Lulz - Presented by Jiri Slaby and the SFLC.
• Masters of Perl - Jamie shows you how NOT to code by demonstrating the latest version of CSS Slashcode.
• Delusional Paranoia 101 - How to quote 1984 and Franklin for your YRO posts.
• The Great Penguin Push - Instructional piece on cramming penguin plush toys into tight spaces.
• DivX for the C64 - Featuring our guest speaker "Junis".

Tickets are US$125 each, and the event lasts for three days. For more information, or to book a place, contact CmdrTaco

Terms & Conditions:
Spaces are limited to how many people we can lock in a basement. Camp is open to males aged between 12 and 19. No soap is allowed on the premises. CmdrTaco's Jubei cabinet is not to be used as a simulated coffin for sex games without his involvement. KDawson's 5w Creative speakers must not be turned up to eleven.

This idea is only useful if students are actually learning how to solve problems. The best way to learn is to have a plan.

Too many times people with an interest in hacking get together for the sake of "learning" but there is no focus. It becomes random experimentation with no order or direction.

A group like this should compare what they are doing to government or corporate standards for security. Such standards can be found on the CIA website, and guidelines for DCOM security are considered an industry standard.

Hacker meetups such as 2600 can be a great thing, but if there is no focus then it becomes a waste of time.

I would like to see a focus group like this fix more things than it breaks. Is that too much to ask?