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"Encouraging Creativity and Innovation"
The CD therefore stands as a wonderful symbol of the music industry's inability to see the deeper, underlying trends in technology, and where they would take us. Back then, it meant that nobody was worried about the idea that people would copy digital files from CDs and share them, because they forgot that technology would make possible tomorrow the things that seemed impossible today. Now it means the copyright industries are still trying to preserve unsustainable 20th century business models instead of planning for the incredible technologies we will have in 10, 20 or even 30 years time. They only have to look at the history of the CD and digital piracy to see just how far things can go -- and how wrong our current assumptions can be.
As a possible solution to ALL CAPS accidents......Other keyboard mapping fixes are useful, but redundant if you use remapkey.exe, which works fine in Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, and Win7-64 Home Premium.
Tip - dispatching the CapsLock gremlin with Microsoft's remapkey.exe http://tips4laptopus...ck-gremlin-with.html
It refers to the Microsoft remapkey.exe utility.
...-IainB (August 24, 2008, 03:22 AM)-IainB (March 10, 2012, 03:28 PM)
I dunno Iain, just go content by content. The only 4th hand gripe I have of Khan Academy is it's a little disconnected, the items are shorter than reg college lectures, so it might take some work to organize them into an instructional pattern.Yes, that's the approach that I took for evaluating the online KA elementary maths tuition system for Lily, comparing it to the content of another online elementary maths tuition system (Mathletics) that she was already using per her primary school's contract for the service. She said the KA one helped her to learn/overcome some stuff that she had been a bit "stuck" with (had not understood) and that the Mathletics one didn't really cover/help with.-TaoPhoenix (October 20, 2012, 09:13 AM)
...Editor’s note: The Rickroll video was blocked from YouTube for 24 hours, but now it’s back. We’re contacting YouTube for an explanation.
Matthew Feeney|Oct. 19, 2012 2:15 pm
Member of the European Parliament and Youtube phenomenon Daniel Hannan posted a photo of a poster hanging in the European Commission on his blog today. The poster is from Europe4All and features the E.U. logo in the top right corner.
At first glance it looks like a happy-feely all inclusive tolerance plug, but on closer inspection a more sinister symbol can be seen amongst the crosses, star of Davids, ying-yangs, trisulas, and Torii gates, the hammer and sickle. Hannan remarks on the symbol of an atheist regime that killed tens of millions of people being among religious symbols in a poster promoting tolerance:For three generations, the badge of the Soviet revolution meant poverty, slavery, torture and death. It adorned the caps of the chekas who came in the night. It opened and closed the propaganda films which hid the famines. It advertised the people's courts where victims of purges and show-trials were condemned. It fluttered over the re-education camps and the gulags.Nauseating stuff. Whoever is responsible for the poster maybe should have considered the misery inflicted by the Soviet Union on countries that are now members of the E.U. While to ignorant left-wing westerners gripped by middle-class guilt the hammer and sickle might be some sort of pathetic symbolic refuge, to the people of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland it might have a different connotation.
All I want to know is who forgot the swastikas.
Air Traffic Control dialogue.
The following are supposedly actual accounts of radio exchanges between airline pilots and control towers around the world, but I have seen them coming up in email in various different guises, over the years. Genuine or not, however, they are quite amusing.
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Tower: "Delta 351, you have traffic at 10 o'clock, 6 miles!"
Delta 351: "Give us another hint! We have digital watches!"
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"TWA 2341, for noise abatement turn right 45 Degrees."
"Centre, we are at 35,000 feet. How much noise can we make up here?"
"Sir, have you ever heard the noise a 747 makes when it hits a 727?"
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From an unknown aircraft waiting in a very long takeoff queue: "I'm f...ing bored!"
Ground Traffic Control: "Last aircraft transmitting, identify yourself immediately!"
Unknown aircraft: "I said I was f...ing bored, not f...ing stupid!"
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O'Hare Approach Control to a 747: "United 329 heavy, your traffic is a Fokker, one o'clock, three miles, eastbound."
United 239: "Approach, I've always wanted to say this... I've got the little Fokker in sight."
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A student became lost during a solo cross-country flight.
While attempting to locate the aircraft on radar, ATC asked, "What was your last known position?"
Student: "When I was number one for takeoff."
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A DC-10 had come in a little hot and thus had an exceedingly long roll out after touching down.
San Jose Tower Noted: "American 751, make a hard right turn at the end of the runway, if you are able. If you are not able, take the Guadalupe exit off Highway 101, make a right at the lights and return to the airport."
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There's a story about the military pilot calling for a priority landing because his single-engine jet fighter was running "a bit peaked."
Air Traffic Control told the fighter jock that he was number two, behind a B-52 that had one engine shut down.
"Ah," the fighter pilot remarked, "The dreaded seven-engine approach."
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Taxiing down the tarmac, a DC-10 abruptly stopped, turned around and returned to the gate. After an hour-long wait, it finally took off.
A concerned passenger asked the flight attendant, "What, exactly, was the problem?"
"The pilot was bothered by a noise he heard in the engine." explained the flight attendant, adding, "It took us a while to find a new pilot."
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One day the pilot of a Cherokee 180 was told by the tower to hold short of the active runway while a DC-8 landed. The DC-8 landed, rolled out, turned around, and taxied back past the Cherokee.
Some quick-witted comedian in the DC-8 crew got on the radio and said, "What a cute little plane. Did you make it all by yourself?"
The Cherokee pilot, not about to let the insult go by, came back with a real zinger: "I made it out of DC-8 parts. Another landing like yours and I'll have enough parts for another one."
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The controller who was working a busy pattern told the 727 on downwind to make a three-sixty (do a complete circle, usually to provide spacing between aircraft).
The pilot of the 727 complained, "Do you know it costs us two thousand dollars to make a three-sixty in this airplane?
Without missing a beat the controller replied, "Roger, give me four thousand dollars worth!"
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Tower: "Eastern 702, cleared for takeoff, contact Departure on frequency 124.7"
Eastern 702: "Tower, Eastern 702 switching to Departure. By the way, after we lifted off we saw some kind of dead animal on the far end of the runway."
Tower: "Continental 635, cleared for takeoff behind Eastern 702, contact Departure on frequency 124.7. Did you copy that report from Eastern 702?"
Continental 635: "Continental 635, cleared for takeoff, roger; and yes, we copied Eastern... we've already notified our caterers."
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The German air controllers at Frankfurt Airport can sometimes be a short-tempered lot. They not only expect one to know one's gate parking location but also how to get there without any assistance from them. So it was with some amusement that we (a PanAm 747) listened to the following exchange between Frankfurt ground control and a British Airways 747 (call sign "Speedbird 206") after landing:
Speedbird 206: "Top of the morning Frankfurt, Speedbird 206 clear of the active runway."
Ground: "Guten morgen! You vill taxi to your gate!"
The big British Airways 747 pulled onto the main taxi way and slowed to a stop.
Ground: "Speedbird, do you not know vare you are going?"
Speedbird 206: "Stand by a moment ground, I'm looking up our gate location now."
Ground: (with some arrogant impatience) "Speedbird 206, haff you never flown to Frankfurt before?"
Speedbird 206 (coolly): "Yes, I have, in 1944. In another type of Boeing. I didn't stop."
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A Pan Am 727 flight waiting for start clearance in Munich overheard the following:
Lufthansa (in German): "Ground, what is our start clearance time?"
Ground (in English): "If you want an answer you must speak in English."
Lufthansa (in English): "I am a German, flying a German airplane, in Germany. Why must I speak English?"
Unknown voice from another plane (in a beautiful British accent): "Because you lost the bloody war."
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During taxi at London Heathrow, the crew of a US Air departure flight to Ft.Lauderdale, made a wrong turn and came nose to nose with a United 727. The irate ground controller (a female) lashed out at the US Air crew screaming, "US Air 2771, where are you going? I told you to turn right on "Charlie" taxi way; you turned right on "Delta." Stop right there. I know it's difficult to tell the difference between C's and D's but get it right."
Continuing her lashing to the embarrassed crew, she was now shouting hysterically, "God, you've screwed everything up; it'll take forever to sort this out. You stay right there and don't move until I tell you to. You can expect progressive taxi instructions in about a half hour and I want you to go exactly where I tell you, when I tell you, and how I tell you. You got that, US Air 2771?"
The humbled crew responded: "Yes Ma'am".
Naturally, the "ground control" frequency went terribly silent after the verbal bashing of US Air Flight 2771. No one wanted to engage the irate ground controller in her current state. Tension in every cockpit at LGA was running high.
Shortly after the controller finished her admonishment of the U.S. Air crew, an unknown male pilot broke the silence and asked, "Wasn't I married to you once?"
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My question is: Why is a court deciding this? Shouldn't something like this be left up to science, rather than law?Well, no, not necessarily.-Deozaan (October 20, 2012, 03:22 AM)
...Looks like another authoritarian clusterfark to me. It could only happen in the good ol' USA (I hope).-IainB (October 19, 2012, 06:39 AM)
Minnesota Decides Not to Suck After All, Legalizes Free Online College Courses
Katherine Mangu-Ward|Oct. 19, 2012 8:56 pm
That was fast.
Slate is reporting this evening that one day after the Internet (myself included) lost its collective mind with rage, Minnesota has backed off its announced ban on free online courses like the ones offered by Coursera and Marginal Revolution University.
(from Slate)-----------------------------
Here's the new statement from Larry Pogemiller, director of the Minnesota Office of Higher Education:"Obviously, our office encourages lifelong learning and wants Minnesotans to take advantage of educational materials available on the Internet, particularly if they’re free. No Minnesotan should hesitate to take advantage of free, online offerings from Coursera."
He added that the 20-year-old statute in question clearly didn't envision free online classes from accredited universities:"When the legislature convenes in January, my intent is to work with the Governor and Legislature to appropriately update the statute to meet modern-day circumstances. Until that time, I see no reason for our office to require registration of free, not-for-credit offerings."(end)-----------------------------
Slate's calling it a victory for common sense and a pleasing example of government responsiveness. I agree. Looks like Minnesota is nice after all.
The Street View trike has managed to penetrate where thousands of German spies couldn't and enabled Google Maps to show Street View from all around the Bletchley Park estate.(Bletchley Park is where British cryptanalysts and mathematicians, such as Alan Turing, famously broke the German Enigma code.)
...Listary usefully beefs up Windows Explorer if that's all you have...- I began to realise how seriously limited WE was in design and functionality in about 2003 when I stumbled upon 2explorer - having formerly had no basis for comparison. I rarely use WE now except typically to check to see how it does what compared to similar functionality in xplorer².
...Looking at the video again, I realise there are plenty of other good features I'm not using yet...- I can quite understand, and I have the same view of my use of xplorer².
Minnesota bans Coursera: State takes bold stand against free education.
By Will Oremus
Posted Thursday, Oct. 18, 2012, at 7:28 PM ET
Coursera banned in Minnesota
Want to take free courses? Not in Minnesota, you can't.
Honorable mentions go to New York City’s Taxi and Limousine Commission for driving out Uber’s online taxi-hailing service and to automobile dealers’ groups in four states for trying to have Tesla dealerships declared illegal. But the grand prize in this week’s unexpectedly heated competition for most creative use of government to stifle innovation has to go to Minnesota.
The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that the state has decided to crack down on free education, notifying California-based startup Coursera that it is not allowed to offer its online courses to the state’s residents. Coursera, founded by Stanford computer science professors Daphne Koller and Andrew Ng, partners with top-tier universities around the world to offer certain classes online for free to anyone who wants to take them. You know, unless they happen to be from Minnesota.
A policy analyst for the state’s Office of Higher Education told The Chronicle that Minnesota is simply enforcing a longstanding state law requiring colleges to get the government’s permission to offer instruction within its borders. She couldn’t say whether other online education startups like edX and Udacity were also told to stay out.
As the Chronicle notes, with admirable restraint, “It’s unclear how the law could be enforced when the content is freely available on the Web.” And keep in mind, Coursera isn't offering degrees—just free classes. Nevertheless, the startup appears to be playing along, posting on its terms of service a special notice to Minnesota users. It reads, in part:If you are a resident of Minnesota, you agree that either (1) you will not take courses on Coursera, or (2) for each class that you take, the majority of work you do for the class will be done from outside the State of Minnesota.Hear that, kids? The Internet is no place for learning. You can Facebook and Twitter and play World of Warcraft all you want, but if you want to study Machine Learning, Principles of Macroeconomics, or Modern & Contemporary American Poetry, you’re going to have to take it elsewhere. Maybe you can hit a wifi hotspot in North Dakota on your way back from buying fireworks.
...Last Thursday, after evening prayers, more than 60 people attended the first screening by the Red Wax secret cinema in a large warehouse in the south-western city of Abha. Directed to the clandestine event by text message, they crowded inside the hired space, which was then bolted shut.- from Secret cinema gently subverts Saudi Arabia's puritanism
Most sat on cheap red plastic chairs placed in rows before a makeshift screen made from a large white sheet, but as the audience was larger than the organisers had expected, some stood. As the lights dimmed, nervousness gave way to quiet anticipation and in silence they watched a film about the lives of migrant workers on one of the country's major building projects. After the screening the audience discussed the issues it raised and the ban on cinema in the kingdom.
"I was really nervous; everyone was nervous," said the film's director, one founder of Red Wax. "We didn't have a plan if [police came]. Everyone parked away from the place. We sent them directions by text message to their mobiles or rang them. Our fears are just to get caught or sent to jail."...
You'd need a lot more samples to construct a corpus valid for comparing OCR productsYes, definitely a comprehensive and rigorous comparison test would be useful, but I ran a quick comparison of some of the tools, and the OCR scan was just of numeric data and full stops. I suspect that if alphabetic characters had been involved in the OCR scan, then there could have been some more interesting variability in the results.
...
I would expect Google to have some really wicked stuff internally these days, not the least because of reCAPTCHA, but I do wonder how much of that power they open to the wider public.-f0dder (October 18, 2012, 06:25 PM)
