Thanks! I'd forgotten about the fit-PC. I now have need for something small and miserly on power for home automation (and maybe another for an mp3 player in my car).
I thought it was a joke that these pitchmen would get their own "reality" TV show, but apparently it's true. I can't stand any of their commercials and can't hit the mute button fast enough on my TV, so I can't watch a half-hour of Billy Mays shouting at me. The psychology of selling is interesting, but I'll have to read about it rather than listen to these obnoxious people.
This wasn't imcompetence--it was thuggery. They use the same "shock and awe" tactics as the police and military--crush your opponent with overwhelming force so that everyone else will be terrified of you and cower before you. This is a deliberate tactic on their part. All federal LEOs work this way--DEA, FBI, etc.
A friend of mine once described getting a college degree as "getting your union card". A college degree doesn't indicate knowledge or experience per se, but what it does imply is that person can make a long-term commitment and complete it. A college degree is a significant investment in money, time, and effort. Lots of people don't attempt it or quit along the way, so someone that completes one demonstrates that they can complete long-term tasks.
3-4 of the best years of your life is a hefty price to pay just to demonstrate that you can do something for a long time.
This question is asked frequently and I can summarize the ensuing debate. For any benefit offered by college, or competence that it allegedly demonstrates, it can be said that:
1. college doesn't actually accomplish that in practice, and/or
2. it's not actually important in the real world, and/or
3. the same thing can be achieved faster/cheaper/more effectively through self-education/work experience, and/or
4. it is obviously not worth the staggering investment of time and money.
I rarely see tech job ads that don't qualify the education requirement with "or equivalent experience" so the people doing the hiring seem to feel the same way.
> 3-4 of the best years of your life is a hefty price to pay
Those 3-4 aren't really going to be the best unless you're in an environment with young girls, beer, drugs, and class, where you get to meet new people.
In my town, you do all that in high school. By the time you start uni, you either have peers from school or peers from outside school who you found because there were no other weird people in your school. There's nothing special going on at uni and whatever there is is perfectly accessible to everyone else.
I'd say the connections in my extended social network are 5% through high school, 1% through uni, 10% through doing random stuff and the rest through friends. That network provides me with a more or less steady supply of jobs, girlfriends, cool dudes and assorted adventures. And, it's part of the real, permanent world and not some expensive fantasy camp that you have to leave behind when the vacation's over.
Maybe things are different here, but if it works for us, it can work for anyone, and economics may soon force the matter.
If people want to hook up, get high and party, they'll make it happen wherever they are and whatever they're doing, so they might as well be doing something useful.
If all you're going to end up with at the end of uni are some good stories, you can condense the partying to 1 year of backpacking far more efficiently and cheaply. I personally believe the experience is far superior, and the lessons learnt more valuable. Depending on how you travel of course.
So imho if you're basing uni's value purely on the social aspect then it comes up way short. Instead, go travel for a year or three, figure out who you are and what you're passionate about, then get to it. You're forced to be social in both atmosphere's.
Compare a four year degree to two years of travel and two years work experience in your chosen field. Which do you think has the edge?
I remember a guy I worked for showing me his new digital watch. It was a matrix of tiny red LEDs that consumed so much current from the batteries, that the display would only light up when you pushed a button on the side of the watch. I bought one myself a year or two later.
I was there, youngster. The bong and pong were a natural pairing--get toasted and play pong for hours. Another plus: Saturday Night Live was actually fuuny back then.
yea this paper makes me think that quantum physics is bogus... even I could have made this bogus claim. IF I am not looking, shit happens, so how do I prove that I am not looking, by just peeping into it... what shit... what a scam.. now I feel that neone can be a quantum physicist !!
The mystery is how it can be so confusing, and how measurement and entanglement can be so mysterious, while at the same time, it can be so accurate a predictive theory. Any time you use a laser, as in an optical drive you rely upon a quantum effect that was derived before it was discovered. The energy levels of electrons in chemicals, of the affinities between chemicals, the reaction cross-sections of the fusion processes that power our stars, of the voltages in the millions of transistors in your microprocessor, you're relying on precise effects that are calculated with the quantum theory. It's not a scam, it's a mystery.
Just because you CAN screw around with someone else's property doesn't mean you SHOULD. Although it can be exciting (especially at that age) to do something forbidden, he can suffer the consequences if caught. He might inadvertently harm the system and could wind up in serious legal trouble. It's like walking up to someone's front door, twisting the knob and discovering that they forgot to lock it when they left. That doesn't give him the right to enter the house, even if all he wanted to do was "look around". Turn the situation around: would he want someone hacking into his home computer because he didn't have it properly secured? Would they have the right to do it to him?
