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Admin
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Almost everyone is in good health. That is the point. No tuberculosis, not the same rate of teen mothers, not the same rate of young child death. And I do not think it is easyier to find a job in the USA during crisis...
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Not really cold, but here it's against the law. And I'm serious: labor regulations state that temperature in office areas has to be at least 18°C. One good side of what some idiots call socialism.
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We ain't worry aboat too cold workplace in my job.
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Good luck being a decent typist with gloves on!
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I know this one! Is it because that's not a reasonable situation to expect anywhere on the planet and your question is deliberately hyperbolic, for the sake of being a smug shithead?
Admin
I've never been to a CRT concert before. Loved their first album, though.
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You're likely to type faster with thin gloves than typing on a glass surface.
Maybe they can justify an IPad for work purposes. The actual purpose is a lap/hand warmer.
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No, I don't think that's the reason.
On the bright side, Stephen Hawking is still alive and not facing any of these 'death panels' I hear so much about from the US :)
A couple of employers ago, I worked in an office that only had one aircon setting for the entire building. There was one floor where everyone used desktops and they had the sun on them all day; and then there was us, where we all used desktops and were in the shade of other buildings.
Come summertime, we used to freeze; until we found a screwdriver that we could use to open the locked windows and let the heat in.
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I'm sorry to break it to you guys, but the "Alex is dead" guy passed away last night. He was reading the Darwin Awards, and decided to try a few of them (apparently it's really not a good idea to juggle live hand grenades). He has no known family and certainly no friends, so there's no need to keep anyone in your thoughts. Have a nice day.
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Maybe he was = placebo effect !
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I did exactly this, for the exact same reason as the Story Submitter. Except, I spawned 64 threads each solving the Towers of Hanoi problem each with 1,000 discs.
In Java.
I never had to worry about heat.
Admin
That has always been my experience in the US as well.
A++ Where can I subscribe to your newsletter.
Admin
umad bro?
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A few years ago, I worked for a government contractor, in government-leased space, where we did have some control over the thermostat, but managed to freeze ourselves. We did this by parking a LaserJet II under the thermostat, where it kept the thermostat nice and toasty till somebody had an Aha moment.
We did not so easily resolve the summer problem of tech staff with a southern window and PHB with a northern one. Or rather, we solved to the satisfaction of one person only.
But the LaserJet solution suggests to me that some approach involving cold packs should be been possible.
Captcha: laoreet, a rope used in SE Asia.
Admin
Remy Martin? Good riddance. I've had to put up with his dumb articles for quite a bit longer than I would have liked.
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Regardless of whether I'm a smug shithead or not, declaring Socialism a failure because it hasn't created an impossible utopian scenario is really just complaining about an ideology you don't like in the stupidest possible way. Either you're an idiot who thinks there's a scenario where a particular ideology will create an instant utopia, or else you're being transparently hyperbolic for the sake of ridicule.
Bonus points for pretending 100% wealth and happiness was ever promised.
Admin
If there is an alternate source of heat, wouldn't the main heat simply stop functioning if it is registering a temperature above the threshhold?
In that case, unless these computers are capable of providing A LOT of heat, all that would happen is that the temperature would still remain at the thermostat setting, and the main heat would be working less of the time.
Admin
I remember IRQ this was for COM3 and IRQ that was for COM 4, and where was the modem on, and so on.
But that was 20 years ago.
Whatever happened to IRQ's in the Windows 7 world?
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But it is, fundamentally, a utopian ideology: the historical dialectic predicts an relentless march towards a worker's paradise. It's not just that socialism is supposed to bring that, but that socialism is merely one step in an inevitable process. Part of the justification of socialism is that we should go along with it simply because it will happen whether we like it or not.
The fact that nothing like that has ever materialized, and the fact that all implementations of socialism have been utter failures. In backwards society, we've seen crushing famine and outright mass murder of the populace. In advanced societies, we've seen vibrant economies grind to a halt, and demographic suicide (birthrates below replacement).
There has never been the slightest hint of success, ever, in the history of socialism, not with any variant of it whatsoever. It has not merely not lived up to its impossible vision, but has utterly failed every possible test imaginable.
Admin
Why are the East Asians angry?
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If you're a software developer in the U.S., and you are working at a job that pays less than minimum wage, your problem isn't that the government fails to protect you from greedy employers. Your problem is that you don't know how to read the want ads or write a resume.
Admin
I call fraud!! He worked for a U.S. government office and they had a budget too small to heat the building? I used to work for the U.S. government. A "small budget" meant that they could only afford to hire five people to do the work of one instead of the standard ten. I think direct deposit was invented by government employee unions so their people wouldn't have to get out of bed to come to work twice a month just to pick up their paychecks. At least once a year we would be told that we needed to spend a bunch of money fast to use up the money left in the budget or the boss would get in trouble for not spending it all.
Now, I'd believe it if he said that they had a huge budget for heating and cooling and they spent it all on some wacky AC system that never worked, because it used "green energy" or was bought from a company that made large campaign contributions to the right Congressman or some such. That would be plausible.
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Thanks tips. You'll also notice that I did not attribute that statement to you.
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You had thermostats?
I worked at one government building where they turned on the air conditioning on a specified day every year, and they turned on the heat on a specified day every year, regardless of the outside temperature. So if winter weather started early one year, we'd all freeze, because the magic day to turn the heat on hadn't come yet. If winter started late, we'd all broil, because they turned the heat on anyway.
One year they had the building so overheated in winter that we opened all the windows and brought in big fans.
People complained regularly, but we were told this was more efficient than using a thermostat. Umm, yeah.
Admin
I don't get it.
How did the computer(s) heat the environment to a comfortable degree?
Admin
Protip: All ideologies at their most basic (outside of dictatorships maybe) are utopian ideals. None of them are intentionally designed to destroy societies. Also, every single one of them (including dictatorships) fail to live up to that idea once people get involved.
And even without knowledge of your sources,
does not ring true.
Admin
To evaluate the various cure-all political systems it helps to imagine 10 people on a desert island with no near-term hope of rescue.
Inflation: everyone gets large piles of paper. It is not edible. Everyone dies.
Stimulus: The strongest inhabitant commands everyone to hand a large stack of paper to the person on the right, in order to stimulate a vibrant economy. The paper moves rapidly, but it is still not edible. Everyone dies.
Theft: After initially gathering one coconut each, the inhabitants realize that won't be enough. "A" decides it is easier to take the coconut from "B" than go out and pick another. "B" takes "C"s coconut. Eventually they're all eaten and there is nothing left to steal. Everyone dies.
Socialism / Marxism / Communism: One guy gets hungry and goes off to pick coconuts. When he comes back with 100 coconuts he generously shares with everyone. They assume he will continue to do so, and work on their tans. After a few days he gets tired of doing all the work and applies one coconut to the head of each of the other inhabitants in the middle of the night. Everyone but the producer dies.
Free market: everyone goes off and gathers their own stuff. If you like my coconuts and I like your oranges, we trade. Everyone lives. Except the one lazy ass who is still working on his tan.
Admin
I've actually done something like this. In an office that was kept cold, instead of writing a script, I would open a terminal and flood ping localhost, sending CPU utilization to 100%. This was on a laptop with fan vents on top, which would keep my hands warm enough to work.
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Why bother to write a program to heat your working environment? Just try to boot Eclipse twice, it has the same effect.
Admin
In theory, they can. However, unions are highly unpopular which is, in a way, ridiculous. Because those rights are really what unions are about--or, more properly, those rights give workers the right to create a union, at least in theory.
But, if they could, companies/plutocrats would do away with all those rights so that workers would:
Not be free to pursue political advantage for unions. For an example of this, you can take the screams of plutocrat outrage when Democrats win, because they are "pro worker" and "pro union". Or, if you want another, the screams of outrage when the unions try to buy political commercials (big bucks for political commercials is ok for companies, but not for unions).
Not free to seek legal redress against the company when the company is wrong. The latest example of this is the no-class-action, arbitration only contracts employees are being "forced" to sign. (Yes, there's no actionable force, but when a worker is told, "You want to work here you WILL sign it," it really is duress.)
Not free to associate and form a union. A recurrent form of this is the retaliation for even meeting with union organizers. Lately, the argument over secret ballot for union organization votes falls in this category: The unions want to open up balloting because companies routinely "buy votes" in secret ballots, to keep unions out.
Addendum (2012-07-11 22:03): Clarification for the last point: The unions want to permit other methods of voting, not require them. But permitting other methods would make it harder for companies to subvert the voting process.
Admin
Turning the argument on its head, in effect you say, "If we don't interfere with unionization by taking away the employee's freedom of association, then the employee will lose his freedom of association."
Is there no middle road? Where people can be free to join a union or not, and those who do join the union can negotiate with the company as a union? And those who choose not to join can negotiate as individuals?
According to both sides, the answer is, "Positively not."
In actuality, there is a middle of the road for your complaint about unions: It's called "right to work", and I have no problem with it. It ensures the freedom of association so precious to you.
Now, what will you give in turn to allow freedom of association for employees who wish to join a union? Would you be fine with a "right to unionize" law? One that can't be easily circumvented, as companies today routinely circumvent the existing protections?
Admin
I worked in one office where one day everyone else put a space heater under their desk to combat the cold from the "extremely close to our heads" airconditioning vents. They turned them all on - and blew the fuses on the electric circuit providing power to their cubes ...
Admin
Can't do it in my private employer's systems, either, unless you'd like the security software to either encrypt the device (if it finds a Windows filesystem) or reformat it and THEN encrypt it (if it finds anything else).
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No, but he owns a socket puppet that runs one ...
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Simply tell your boss you can log into the thermostat and override the setting as well as the display, using a priviledged "admin" password. Cobble together some kind of fake web interface, and be sure to emphasise the word "privilege", to put boss into a power rush.
Boss will literally jump on the opportunity and will reward you richly. No more heating problems.
Admin
Socialism / Marxism / Communism -- eee wrong supply for everyone is directed centrally and everyone has ot do his part. not working is looked down upon and while work is propagated as the greatest value of all.
problem= work for work itself and also that central direction doesn't really adjust fast enough to what people need.
moving on there is no socialism in Eeurope and there never really was (despite countries calling themselves socialist). even today in social democracy countries the benefits are limited. for example a common missconception is that you don't have to work and still get benefits. well you do get them when you are unemployed (for a limted period) but you need to activelly seek employment during this time. if oyu don't you loose the benefits. and yes there are less poor people in Europe than in America. And even if they are poor they still get good medical service :-P might not be best in the world or gratest but it is sitll good. most people here probably live in flats, but then again houses are expencive as they are not usually made out of cheap wooden/plaster pannel but thick brics.
Admin
Socialism does fail precisely because it does make those promises, and in spite of the overwhelmingly compelling lessons of history, people continue to be drawn by them.
Moreover, the main reason socialist societies allow themselves to get so f**ked up that millions are allowed to freeze or starve to death, is that people rationalise and try to shift the goalposts. For example by trying to rewrite history and pretend that utopia was never promised. This serves to inhibit the debunking process and the juggernaught rolls on.
Capitalism only promises gradual improvements in wealth, along with inequality, recessions, bankruptcies and various other ills. But even when these bad things all happen, people are still better off than those who chose the path of wilful ignorance and blundered into socialism.
Capitalism (like democracy) sucks - the point is that it sucks less.
Admin
I like this idea.
I'd go further and introduce some initial randomness so that he thinks somebody else has access and is changing it. You can get extra brownie points by "blocking their account" so the boss has exclusive control.
Admin
Also ... add an email alert in case he sets it to some extreme value to check if it's working.
This give you a chance to go over and adjust the real controls appropriately until he's satisfied everything is in order.
Admin
I often use gloves when I type. The cotton ones that high school marching bands wear. I started when I worked two cubicles away from a floor-to-ceiling window, and in the summer my fingers would stick to the keys, causing typos. My pay was directly proportional to my typing speed. Now I wear the gloves to keep my hands warm.