Prophasi

In fact, another current HN article right now details all that IE4 innovated: http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2012/08/22/the-innovations-of-...

IE3 started Netscape's decline, but it really picked up in the couple years after IE4's release (1998-2000).

All that competition, the proliferation of features, the new ecosystems of dev tools, new jobs as companies saw the Internet taking off with MS's weight behind it, the press about the browser wars, being able to click the desktop "Internet" icon on your new computer and see well-rendered and fast websites... to state that none of that actually grew web usage and that MS just took NS's users 1-for-1 is unbelievable to me.

MS made a better browser and put it in front of everyone's face while simultaneously convincing lots of companies to join the fray. The pie exploded.

Microsoft's domination was achieved by making passable-to-excellent browsers in the beginning and putting them on the desktop, which made the web more accessible to millions of people, boosted commerce, and pushed feature development forward much more quickly than Netscape (or any company) would have done absent competition. Bigger market, bigger pie, more investment, more jobs, more consumers.

Netscape died, of course. But it didn't have to be that way; and Microsoft won far more than Netscape lost.

Of Warren's cited examples, schools are the only plausible answer. To say that school is valuable isn't an insight, and to say that school can only be government-funded and -run is baseless.

An argument can be made that government does it the best, but it's disingenuous to say that because Republicans (along with everyone else, and forcibly) had public schooling, they give up their right to upgrade what they got, for the next generation.

But I sincerely hope you'd assert the same (with tweaked parameters) for Democrats.

Which is, in turn, a poor job of paraphrasing the actual small-government view, which would be better stated as 'I was on my own, I made it, and you can do the same.'

And not all Republicans/libertarians have made it yet. For them it might be 'I haven't made it yet, but I will -- and so can you.'

Her line implies that the view is an asymmetric "benefits for me, but not for thee" philosophy, which isn't the case. It'd be great if more ideologues had enough confidence in their own views to accurately depict and dispute the opposition's, rather than relying on strawmen.

The money speech contains the essence of the overriding philosophy in the novel at large; I'm curious what you found ridiculous in the rest of the book that isn't stated here (at least in its logical precepts).

But eloquence isn't binary; it lives on a gradient. Where there's a common, monosyllabic, four-letter word, it could be displacing another with a fair likelihood of being more interesting.

In fact, I'd argue your Shakespearean actors are far more likely to be making a compromise than an ineloquent person who'd otherwise drop the modifier or use a simplistic alternative.

So they're not rendered ineloquent as people, of course; but less eloquent than they'd be without that crutch.

Strict logic aside, though, I've anecdotally observed that folks who swear publicly among people they don't know tend to swear easily and often, and given the inherent flexibility of most swear words, I think it's fair to say increased usage usually takes a toll on eloquence and creativity in diction. The relationship isn't necessary, but it's intuitive and observably common.

Further restrictions -- for example, kneecapping pricing structures that companies can use to differentiate themselves -- will only exacerbate that, though.

Another thought is that with the right market dynamic, I have more variety than it seems at first blush: cable, DSL, fiber, dial-up, satellite, WiMax, 3G, power lines, and possibly others. There's a variegation of technical specialty there that lends itself to horizontal competition by many companies. For heavy usage, several of these are currently poor... but looking at our present options and determining that only cable and fiber matter, for instance, is selling innovation short. It's surprising what can crop up out of nowhere when someone sees an unexploited opportunity.

The reason there hasn't been a mass flight from the standard telcos yet, I think, is that packet profiling has largely taken the form of capping torrents for heavy users, which is a small minority of the market -- and they're arguably being capped for the benefit of the majority. If the telcos make a gamble on harming access or speeds for the majority, there will be a scramble for alternatives, and they will present themselves.

Legislation is too often proposed with the deeply flawed assumption of an inelastic economic model.

Specifically for the net, it's a concession that we need gov't to wield the ultimate authority over detailed aspects of the Internet and step into many disputes between private parties if the specter of non-neutrality is raised (and of course it will be). You might think it's in your immediate favor, but voting for net neutrality isn't really voting for equal packet treatment: it's voting for government control over packet treatment, which will be turned against you in ways you haven't foreseen.

Net neutrality is like saying I can't open a store w/out handicap access, even though handicapped folks have the option of a) passing by my store to another; or b) finding a way to shop at mine because it's closer and has lower prices. "Shop neutrality" would dictate that if I won't treat everyone equally - although it's clear in my terms - I just shouldn't exist. There are those who agree with this analogy, too, of course.

You suppose the government should be the ultimate arbiter of what options should be on offer, rather than the entrepreneur and the market of free people? A dangerous way to look at it, I think.

No, the telecoms aren't by any stretch unregulated as it is. But if that's your complaint, tackle it from that direction, not by badly regulating bad regulations.

"the end result is that we all wind up being treated as potential thieves"

We all are potential thieves from the perspective of anyone who doesn't know us; and if you have a valuable good, it's a far more reasonable (and profitable) assessment than "no one is a potential thief." It's the same stance you take when you design a website: "everyone is a potential hacker."

A potential thief, however, is not an actual thief, and to repeat what I said above, I don't believe DRM treats users as actual thieves: it treats them as potential thieves until they've authenticated and as honest users afterward. If you have to authenticate annoyingly often, it's a usability problem, but it doesn't change the essential dynamic.

Do you think locking your front door treats everyone else in the entire world as a criminal?

"DRM starts from the premise that all readers are slimeballs and thieves."

Such a dire pronouncement doesn't logically follow. DRM starts from the premise that there exist many slimeballs and thieves. Next, that we should thwart as many as we can with technology, even at the inconvenience of paying customers, presumably yielding greater profit than in the absence of DRM.

The first assumption's undeniably true; the second is open to much debate. But "all readers are scum" is a needlessly cynical attitude to read into it.

"The teaching of some scientific subjects, including, but not limited to, biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global warming, and human cloning, can cause controversy..."

That's a true statement; and not only CAN those topics cause controversy, but they can be counted on for it. The value and substance of the controversy raised is a related topic, but not directly implicated here; the mere presence of such controversy is a valid concern for educators -- blithely pretending it's not there isn't an effective answer, I don't think.

But what to do about the controversy?

"[Educators] shall endeavor to create an environment within public elementary and secondary schools that encourages students to explore scientific questions, learn about scientific evidence, develop critical thinking skills, and respond appropriately and respectfully to differences of opinion about controversial issues."

Sounds reasonable. Not only are we acknowledging controversy, but we're bringing students into the meta-conversation about it. That, as much as the primary topic, is essential to critical thinking, collaboration, and dispassionate discourse. Ideally, they engage in civics here as well as science.

Now, obviously anything put forth by a politician should be examined with a critical eye; there are usually ulterior motives. That said, I'd hate to become so cynical that I dismiss a bill like this because, for example, it was a) raised by a politician in X Party; and b) it mentions topics I know I'll disagree with him on. In substance, I really can't find anything here about which to take umbrage.

You're right that this opens the door to the debate, but shouldn't it? The ostensible focus on scientific evidence and critical thinking should subsequently wither baseless dogmas, whether they be religious or not.

Finally, I think that in practical terms the bill itself is fairly worthless, lacking in specifics as it does.

It's myopic to equate GM and Chrysler with the American auto industry. My hope was that those tragically unfit companies and their corrupt unions would go bankrupt, only to have their assets swept up at fire-sale prices by a company or person willing and able to ignite a rebirth of the industry.

Sometimes you gotta clear out the brush. The old, rickety, terribly designed, onerously-high overhead, ridiculous pension brush.

So annoying, riiight? Guys...?

My original post was relevant and not too inflammatory, I don't think. If you disagree with the substance of what I said, state your case instead of (or at least in addition to) downvoting.

A reaction of moral indignation without discussion on a logical basis is at the heart of virtually everything wrong in modern US society. Break that, at least here.

What it mostly reinforces to me, however, is just how terribly ignorant and wishful laws like that are. If I build a business and bottom out my bank account, kill myself with 100-hour weeks, and build my very life around making the company work, you better believe I have the right to know if the person I'm hiring plans to take off for 6 months right after being hired. And you better believe that weighs against them in the hiring process. I didn't set up the business as a facet of family planning services: I want to hire someone who's willing to work hard to build my business in exchange for pay. If a person knows they're going to take 6 months off immediately, then it's not time to apply for a job, because you're not going to be working; apply for something when you're ready to actually do it.

It continually amazes me how government largesse and layers of indirection break people's natural intuitions and allow them to condone forcing a third party to pay for their own life choices, in a vain attempt to mitigate the unfortunate trade-offs that accompany our constrained mortal existence.

Transparency is not a bad thing. There are people out there who want a solid job that pays well and fulfills their ambition while making good money; and there are employers willing to offer those things in exchange for solid performance, a reasonable salary, and reliability. Get out of our way with this red tape garbage and let us find each other and do great things.

To have a preachy bot post nominally inspirational quotes from women, with the ostensible goal of demonstrating with child-like simplicity that women are people too, would get on my nerves for two immediate reasons:

1) I get it, I get it! How many cliches do I have to scroll past before we reach mission accomplished?

2) Someone really thinks I'm stupid.

It's propaganda, but worse than that, it's propaganda with an assumed audience of evildoers to thwart -- and I'm included.

I get the frustration with the male-centric dev culture and I'd fight back on that for sure, but this kind of holier-than-thou brute force attack levels a possibly undeserved accusation at everyone forced to read it, and it also flouts some of the most basic aspects of psychology in its strategy.

Would it make a woman more acutely feel in the minority through juxtaposition? Sure. And obviously jokes to do with sex can make ANYONE feel uncomfortable and are probably inappropriate at work, but it depends on where you work.

Making the leap to sexism from that age-old schtick of a guy playing up his junk, though, is a stretch. It's more about the ego of the guy saying it than the hypothetical woman used as a foil.

I wonder if gay guys make TWHS jokes.

To know "what the best sort of the response would be," you'd have to know a lot about the person you're talking to and how they'll respond to your unsolicited advice, and no one on HN is going to be able to grant you that.

But then, I'm not too sympathetic to what strikes me as an arrogant desire to transform the primitive worldview of a thinking adult with your wet blanket nostrums. By all means intervene if someone's being demeaning to another person, but in the case of a woman making a kitchen joke, I doubt you're dealing with a neanderthal waiting to be shaken into the 21st century by sobering thoughts about how retrograde it is to even joke about such things.

Emotional fragility has got to be at an all-time high these days.

But he may've switched to advertising at any of those other schools. Or he may have stayed in fine arts and enjoyed even greater success that he can't even dream of now. But those opportunities were lost in favor of the path he took instead (whether by choice or not).

Arguably, if you end up happy and without regrets, you DID succeed. But not everyone has that same metric, and depending on your dreams there's a wide spectrum of possibilities. Being happy doesn't mean you couldn't have been even happier otherwise.

At its best, the military serves to protect citizens from foreign threats. Like with police, some people are bad and sometimes we have to kill them to defend the good people.

In the hands of the ideal military, technology can serve to lessen civilian casualties, save troops' lives, avoid using troops at all, or act as a deterrent. And yes, we're all aware that no military is ideal.

Ensure your military -- and police -- stick as closely as possible to their strict and just duty... any power can and will be abused. But it strikes me as naive to react against military as an abstract concept. The ostensible goal of protecting a free nation hardly seems ignoble.

Myth 1: Who is he to say how people feel about their neighborhood is nonsense? There are plenty where the neighbors know each other, their kids play, they have block parties and BBQs, and there's a strong fabric of trust. To pitch them all as "nonsense" is to sweep away all pretense of objectivity.

Myth 2: How much traffic someone gets varies widely with the street. In his red zone, I'd bet traffic is next-to-none on E. Radiom, Amona, E. Lemona, and Hallock; light on Nemo and Damson; medium on W. Radiom and W. Lemona; and "heavy" on the rest. But consider even Erie and Avila: no car would take both, and many will take neither; their realistic exposure is maybe 50-75 households? Compare that to a giant grid, where every street is a route to every other, and I don't think the outcome is clear at all. But it'd be dumb to get a house on N. Radio or N. Hale to avoid traffic, sure.

An added question is whether people speed more in a closed community or in a grid. Daily I see lots of people on main roads tear off onto residential streets to circumvent red lights, and the last thing they want to see when they meet back up with the artery is the people who waited, passing them by.

Myth 3: For the reasons above, less traffic traveling by my house -- which is clearly possible in these neighborhoods -- means less pollution in the form of noise, smoke, and gas fumes.

...

Not to say the grid system doesn't have its merits, and I agree on some of them. But I don't think I'd want to see either system entirely eliminated... much less with the presumption that there are just millions of closed-minded people out there who are dead wrong about where they want to live, because they're simply not as enlightened as your humble author.