sharpn

Hmmm, this smells like opinion presented as fact to me. For example, 'an historic' is good English (in England, not sure about US-English convention) in the same way as you can say 'an honour' or 'an hour'; ie. because the 'h' is pronounced softly.

wow, yes - they weren't there when I posted the link. Swivel-eyed loons :o

Not to split hairs, but a pardon is an action & implies regret - ie communicates something tangible explicitly. Whereas an apology without pardon is 'just words' & implicitly declines the opportunity to pardon. I can't speak for those who are facing similar discrimination, but my guess is that a pardon would be a more tangible comfort.

Either way, due credit for making the statement.

Well perhaps 'gimmick' is a loaded word; what I meant was that a full pardon would have been more fitting, and also that he's apologising for something done by someone else long ago - I can't think of a better word, but I do take your point.

Political gimmick, but I remember the petition for this was posted here & I guess this apology was prompted by that campaign.

Just in case anyone else is thinking of getting 4 steps, it's $10 cheaper from here (not an affiliate link) than Amazon:

http://www.cafepress.com/kandsranch.58024175

Thanks for the tip - I'll check VLC out.

I don't usually like techcrunch but this hit the spot for me. Itunes is broken for my (simple) needs. A 'lite' option that is basically a file manager would be very welcome.

On a related note, it would be useful to have more fonts. I went to try using the font my company's logo uses and it wasn't there. Good apart from that, though.

the browser: http://thebrowser.com/

Here's some more colour on this from a US (investor) perspective:

http://www.distressed-debt-investing.com/2009/09/possible-eq...

What evidence I can find indicates it was actually the other way around - that Henry VII co-opted the legend to reinforce his legitimacy, rather than being inspired by it. If anything, the other part of your original point (having strong problems to overcome) is probably more apt for that case.

Anyway, your broader point of having heroes is still valid.

Geoffrey of Monmouth (Wales != England) did not invent the Arthurian legend, he reinvented it. The Arthurian legend predates him & appears to have been based on a 'Roman' soldier who remained in the British Isles after the first Roman invasion:

184 - Lucius Artorius Castus, commander of a detachment of Sarmatian conscripts stationed in Britain, led his troops to Gaul to quell a rebellion. This is the first appearance of the name, Artorius, in history and some believe that this Roman military man is the original, or basis, for the Arthurian legend. The theory says that Castus' exploits in Gaul, at the head of a contingent of mounted troops, are the basis for later, similar traditions about "King Arthur," and, further, that the name "Artorius" became a title, or honorific, which was ascribed to a famous warrior in the fifth century.

Ok, to continue your (excellent) mountain-climbing analogy, the ultimate goal is to climb the mountain and return safely. Encountering potentially fatal difficulties near the summit will result in you turning back to retry later if you are "determined" to reach the ultimate goal. If you willfully abandon the long-term goal of returning safely to achieve the "ambition" of reaching the summit, that's reckless rather than disciplined.

That's willfull. Having the discipline to wait until spring (no matter what the cost) would have been determined.

Good points well made.

An interesting second-derivation of this is with co-founders. Two (or more) people who share a goal can spur each other on via internal competitiveness & a symbiotic pattern of compensating for dips in the other's discipline or willpower. For example I'm sure neither Lennon or McCartney would have achieved half of their combined output.

Oops, thanks - I didn't mean to misattribute the quote.

I enjoyed that. Money quote:

"There are two ways of constructing a software design; one way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult."

I agree a small truly random sample can often be reliably extrapolated - but in this case the 136>7m figure was based on research paid for by the BMI (who lobbied heavily against file-sharing) in a report still not fully published, based on two numbers of which one differs from the official ONS number without explanation. The fact that the lobbyist organisation paid for the original report was obscured by misattributing the source, which also seems dubious to me.

I don't doubt that political misuse of statistics is common, but it should always be called out.

Agreed. I don't want anyone to be able to guess my cell number & spam call me, why would anyone want that?

Ok, the chance your idea is stolen is not zero - but it's a lot lower than you think. That said, there are a few things you can do without revealing your idea; use google trends to identify search volume for the problem you're solving, search forums for questions indicating frustration at the lack of your solution etc.

Mechanical Turk can also generate cheap data about the likely size of your market & whether your solution is viable. There was a post here yesterday with good advice on how to screen for quality there. [edit] http://www.itworld.com/internet/76659/experimenting-mechanic...

I've also seen a friend garner some useful data with a small adwords campaign testing to see if people would click on 'solve problem x' ads - but that's a dubious tactic if you don't have a product yet...

Good luck.

Run an internal competition (with a significant prize) to come up with a product that would outdo the existing product. Assuming the winning idea is good enough, that becomes the template for version 2.0

OPM

Some useful data in that article, thanks!

We've had an acredited distance learning university in the UK for 20 years - the degrees issued are considered equal to the equivalent course in normal universities (although less prestigious). The idea was copied/partnered in the US - I think in the early '80s, but it never took off there. I do agree that live-in colleges will likely be overtaken by some form of virtual equivalent, but it's not a 100% done deal that this will happen.

I can't find the full paper online, but it does seem to be a very narrowly defined idea of language aquisition. It deals only with children learning to read their native tongue. No allowance is made for any learning outside of the classroom. No consideration of the difficulty in learning the gender assignment to words in non-English languages. There are some valid observations too, but it's a pretty serious leap to draw the conclusion in the title.

User support differs from many other roles in that a standard interview actually can be a very good way to evaluate a candidate: it gives you a chance to demonstrate clarity and succinct answers to questions you initially have no control over. Remember that your interviewer (should) be looking for someone who can quickly & clearly answer a question - so always be brief rather than expansive [which is not always good advice for other roles]. I recommend mentioning the importance of gently (but firmly) controlling the direction of a support conversation to identify the core issue & efficiently identifying the best response - resolve/escalate/apologise/whatever. Then if possible demonstrate that skill within the interview - so if subsequently asked a vague 'open' question, politely ask 'closed' questions to narrow down the real substance behind that question, and then answer that decisively. Good luck!

Glad I'm not the only one who thought this article demonstrates the decline of the NYT more than the decline of Facebook. The plural of anecdote.

My findings would be a bit esoteric for this arena, arcane stuff about when Italian music scholars started using counterpoint, previously unknown ancient Irish nature poems by bored medieval monks etc. And I'm only just evolving my methodology to the google books stuff - it's actually formatted quite badly if you want to read the pages (scans are bigger than my screen) but is still a lot quicker than travelling to a university library & trawling through parchments (when you're allowed).

Good point. I like the term 'smart-sourcing' - having a presence 'on-shore' & 'off-shore' & having the customer-relationship stuff done near the customer (on-shore) & the non-relationship stuff wherever's best (sometimes, but not always 'off-shore).