Slashdot Quote

by martin-boundary

Is this an invasion of privacy? I don’t think so.

Think of it this way: Do you carry a hidden tape recorder in your pocket so that you can record all your conversations with your friends and colleagues, just because the weird guy down the street is paying you 10 bucks a week to let him listen in on anything he likes? Would you consider that acceptable behaviour from any of your friends and colleagues?

See, the problem is that my privacy is none of your business. I don’t care what you think is acceptable to me. Speak for yourself.

If a surfer visits your site, they have a certain expectation of viewing your content. Now you’ve decided to share that two-way communication with a hidden third party, who offers you a service (so far so good) in exchange for access to the visitors (that’s the problem). Your visitors have not entered into any relationship with the third party, and are not getting any service from them. So why are you letting them get milked?

Slashdot Quote

by creimer

The Rebel Alliance steals the plans to the Death Star. Darth Vader blows up a planet. People get scared that their planet is next. You don’t need to be a Jedi to figure that one out.

by Abreu

To be completely fair, Vader did not blow up Alderaan, Tarkin was responsible for that little example of state terrorism…

Vader did not voice any objection to the plan, though

by MadnessASAP

Wait… So whose the terrorist here again?

by creimer

Ewoks.

Slashdot Quote

by kripkenstein

“I’m looking for a well written and researched piece that can tell me why TPB and other such sites are good for society, not some crap “I just want stuff for free” argument.“

Will, IMHO the arguments are pretty straightforward:

• TPB is just linking to material. They don’t host it. Yes, they ‘make it easier to infringe’, but the line between what TPB is doing and what e.g. the roads are doing (helping bank robbers get away, the horror!) is one of degree, and more importantly, it isn’t clear where the line is – or if one can be drawn. Yet the court drew the line, and the consequences will be felt in many other areas, to society’s detriment.
• Many support TPB because they are against ‘intellectual property’. You say you make money from that, so obviously you are going to believe it is a worthwhile concept. Yet, it is a very troubling and damaging one. This is particularly evident with patents, but is also present with copyright law.

Solution to Transplant Rejection Found?

http://www.examiner.com/x-1242-Science-News-Examiner~y2009m4d7-New-discovery-may-end-transplant-rejection

Apparently this is working on rats right now. Basically, they are calming the T cells, which usually swarm transplant organs and trigger the body’s immune system to protect itself from foreign tissue.

Slashdot Quote

by bitt3n

If you’ve got even an ounce of willpower, you can quit too.

I was once addicted to willpower. Then I went cold turkey and caved in to every craving, and now I feel much better.

Slashdot Quote

by digitig

It also raises the question of whether you should write England or UK. I was taught to write England as a child, but UK seems to be common these days.

“England” and “UK” are different things. And “Great Britain” is different again. The most general designation is “UK”, or, to give it its full designation, “The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland”, from which you’ll be able to work out that “UK” includes Northern Ireland, “Great Britain” is the rest of the country. Great Britain is, in turn made up of England, Scotland and Wales. Calling somebody from Scotland “English” is likely to go down about as well as calling somebody from the deep south of the USA a “Yankee”.

England and Wales have a common legal system; Scotland and Northern Ireland each has its own legal system. So when talking about legal matters, it’s best to be specific and say “England”, “Scotland” or whatever. When referring to the country, it’s “UK”. The term “Great Britain” seems only to exist to piss off the Irish, as, for instance, when we refer to our Olympic team as “Team GB” thereby ignoring the Northern Irish contribution.

Slashdot Quote

by ControversialMatt

What the heck is a Jackalope?

by Spazztastic

A mix between a Jackolantern and an Antelope.

by mrdoogee

Wrong! It’s a mix between Hugh Jackman and a Cantaloupe.

by Em Emalb

Wrong again!

Its a mix between Jack Nicholson and….your mom.

New to Linux? How to Install ‘Stuff’

I’ve dabbled with Linux on and off and never stuck to it, mainly because my games don’t usually run well, if at all, on any flavor I’ve tried.

I’ve tried Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Redhat, Fedora, Suse (paid for versions 7, 8, and 10, even), OpenSuse, and a few others, and the one thing I keep having difficulty with: Installing something I want/stumble across online that isn’t in the default package manager.

Today on Slashdot, I found the following:

by Thelasko

Reading this page [psychocats.net] is required material for people switching to Ubuntu.

The linked page covers searching for and installing programs for Ubuntu (I assume the process is somewhat similar for other versions of Linux) using both available packages from the repository, as well as installing with an alternative application to convert files packaged for other versions of Linux to Ubuntu-usable versions (the app is called Alien).

Finally, near the end of the page is a link to YouTube videos of installation tutorials, and some other useful links.

iPhone 3G white screen of death – solution!

I’ve had this 3G iPhone for a month now, and just pulled it out of my pocket to see a solid white screen. This is interesting at first because I have it locked and password protected, and know I have a half-full battery.

A quick press of the Sleep button shuts it down, but another quick press simply goes back to the white screen. WTF?

So I jump on Google and run a quick scan for “iPhone 3G white screen” and get some discouraging hits like “hope you made a backup since the fix is swapping the phone for a new one”. Well that’s crap.

A modified search yields people claiming every trick in the book being used, still to no avail…

So I decide to try myself. After a few random button combo attempts I found it!

- First, press and hold the HOME button.
- Second, press and hold the UP volume button as well.
- Third, with those still held, press and hold the SLEEP button.

After 5 or 6 seconds it displayed the black screen with the chrome Apple logo. About 15 to 20 seconds after that it booted into my password login. Once I entered the code, the phone operated normally.

This entry was sent from the iPhone immediately after the above steps were performed.

Good luck and I hope this solution works for you.

(edit 1/6/09 – fixed some typos, the tags, and some grammar)

Test post

This is a test.