The Ranting Room

from the E'nin Stanna last Wednesday... A spokesman for Mr Johnson said: "Boris feels strongly that cyclists should not jump red lights and if he did so then clearly that was a mistake and he will be more careful in the future."

so, that's 6 'mistakes' caught on camera while cycling to work and four more on the way home, plus failing to stop at a pedestrian crossing, riding on the pavement and cycling through a park... how careful can he be? 

My thread is locked and rightly so, i should've renamed it how thick is London, regardless as to how bad Labour are running our country. Which suicidal megolamaniac would ever vote for an upper class twit like Boris Johnson? Only Londoners.

Edited by rhinn - May 18 2008 at 20:54

oh, a big P.S. on PCs - in a free market economy, what is the problem with consumers making the "supposed" wrong choice when purchasing computers ? Indeed, if said purchasers can't be bothered to choose another browser/media player/email  etc software or program than those Microsoft pre-installed options, is Bill Gates an idiot to promote usage of his products this way.
I use Firefox as my Browser. I use Nero mix as my media player. I don't use Google too often as my search engine.
But I know people who have Google as their home page, because they don't know how  & don't care to set it to another page (mine is CBC.ca).
Apple is now becoming THE electronic brand name par excellence. The Mac, the Ipod, the Iphone, Itunes, all enjoy mainstream cool appeal. The Mac is slowly gaining market share. The Ipod is the benchmark for MP3 players. The Iphone threatens to upend what many think of a cellphone. And Itunes has recently become the biggest music retailer in the States.
So I say let the people choose. Ya know, use their freedom of choice, even if it's not yours, eh.
Otherwise, let them ignore the greatness of Ange, Klaatu; let them be unaware that hockey is the most magnificent of sports, and that the T had every reason to proclaim Dream Theater place atop the prog world (at least until they released a greatest hit album. That is the sign of an over the hill act, i.e. our best days are behind us).
Remember, a majority of Americans voted for Gore , not Bush. Take comfort that things sometimes actually work out for the best. IN this case, that an American president cannot serve more than two terms.
Well, actually, it would have been nice to see Clinton wipe Dubya in an election. Hell, I believe a case could be made that big bad Bill could have beaten Ronnie Reagan. Twice.

darqDean wrote: ranting at Microsoft is like tilting at windmills in a barrel

Indeed - about as difficult as hitting a cow's @rse with a banjo (and about as pointless); much as we hate it, so called progress happens... I'm still getting over the fact that our latest PC doesn't have a floppy-disc drive .

James - it seems you're happy with your current PC, you just want it to perform better/faster; with the budget you spoke about earlier, would it not be easier (and probably cheaper) to get a good engineer to upgrade your existing machine? This way, you'd keep your existing applications & operating system of choice, but they'd run more efficiently.

+++

OK - time for a rant

THIS ISN'T THE BLOODY TECHTALK THREAD, GARTEN, THIS IS THE RANTING ROOM!

That's better - a bit of self chastisement's always good for the soul.

Amen, debrewguy.  No matter the state of this sorry world, someone, somewhere will be complaining about inconsequential minutiae that means nothing to no one.  So my wife watches American Idol even though I hate it.  At least I didn't spend 4 years in a concentration camp.  At least I have health insurance.  At least I haven't been a victim of identity theft.  At least none of my family members haven been killed by a drunk driver.  I think I can put up with a little AI, considering the big picture.

NaturalScience wrote: prog-chick wrote: yeah actually you can still buy Dell laptop with XP in the UK if you are a business customer...  but you could probably get around that fairly easily!   Good Luck!     Just tell them you're a consultant for an internet site.

Well the fact that my spec seems to be a bit pro-gamer, I doubt I'll need to justify it.

prog-chick wrote: yeah actually you can still buy Dell laptop with XP in the UK if you are a business customer...  but you could probably get around that fairly easily!   Good Luck!

Just tell them you're a consultant for an internet site. 

James wrote: Patrick, that is all well and good, but I have a lot of Microsoft products I want to keep and some don't do Linux alternatives. It's a complete travesty in my opinion.  I'm hating Microsoft and hardware producers more and more and I read how difficult it is to dual boot with XP/Vista, as well as the annoying backwards compatibility issues. I don't care if Microsoft lose customers over this, but I do care about the customers being shafted.  VIsta isn't ready yet, it still has many issues, even after Service Pack 1.  Lots of Software does not work on Vista yet.  What is so wrong with dual booting?  Microsoft hate the idea, companies like HP hate the idea. Yet from what I've been reading, there's a lot of people wanting to dual boot or even downgrade to XP.  It's a very difficult process for most people.  There's issues with SATA drives for starters and if your BIOS won't allow you to sort that out, you'll need a floppy drive to install the XP SATA drivers and if you have a Laptop, then you need to purchase a USB or external floppy disc drive.  That's a complete and utter pain! Some people, like myself, also don't have XP to install, so we're going to be stuck with an Operation System we cannot use fully. I'm using a desktop using Windows 2000 with a 1 GHz. processer, but I cannot put up with it for much longer, it's slow and a lot of things I want to do, I cannot. I'm frustrated.  All I want is an XP laptop with a non Intel AGP card in it... preferably nVidia GeForce.  Yet they're almost impossible to find!

It's odd that, apparently, the UK has such slim offerings in this regard.  The US Dell Site gave me this config in about 2 minutes:



Edited by NaturalScience - April 23 2008 at 17:20

^ it's called progress James,
Even though some people might find it hard to get used to.

I'm happy with VIsta, I have no issues with it.



Edited by king of Siam - April 23 2008 at 16:37

My Rant today - why was the American Idol thread closed ? Too many inane posts stating that a TV show meant for mass entertainment was responsible for allowing the mainstream (i.e. the supposedly knuckle dragging uneducated idiotic lowest common denominator loving pile of pooh eating people) to watch  something that they enjoy ! Too many insecure proggers wanting to believe that somehow their favourite music would attain mass success and   (which sounds remarkably like the early English punk rockers thinking that if Genesis and Pink  Floyd weren't around to hog all the record sales that their own albums .Hi Mr guy with the Jam et al) would be selling the millions it so not obviously deserved to sell ! Too many overly serious critics of modern day society who see danger & damaging trends wherever and whenever something they don't like (or, to use a fave PA putdown - "dont' get") in what most other people, some of whom they may even know & love (except for their objectively obvious poor taste) prefer to watch, read, and listen to.
In essence, too many folks arguing about something that frankly ranks very low on the list of things that the inhabitants of this one & only planet that we know should be worrying about.

Let's see - Darfur, Tibet, hockey's inability to crack the major american tv networks, food prices increasing and causing shortages/possible Ethiopia like disasters, internet pedophile rings, identity theft, international organized crime, wars, wars, wars, home less people, lonely people, sick people, poor people, Aids, cancer, massive self -inflicted health problems such as obesity/drug & alcohol abuse/ overwork, trade deals omitting human right & labour condition clauses, racism, religious factionalism, corporate takeover of the public "good", mass media misinformation led by celebrity know-it-all-not-by-a- mile (let's get started on the annual media superstars' trek to the seal hunt where they protest these non extinction endangered animals being killed for human use, without any mention that cows, pigs, fish,fowl, and many other animals meet the same end. Anyone for a little foie gras ? Force feed a goose ? Sounds defensible - the ends justify the means. UMMMMM GOOOD!), the never ending race to the bottom for tax cutting at the expense of social programs, the never ending promotion of dog eat dog attitude amongst civil society, pollution, .......... and many other ills that we should be discussing & TRYING  to come up with solutions, even if they are compromises.

There ... that is my rant today.
The tortured progger or artist shall confront his "bourreau" and find that it is He/She. As most non-proggers aren't even aware of their so-called efforts to kill a type of music.
Remember the old saying - You can't kill Rock n Roll ? Well, we couldn't kill disco either, so why think that someone could actually kill prog ?

Headline
Country Music Fan Kills King Crimson Connoisseur, Twanging Commentary at the Through.
Rapper Rips Rush Fanatic's Face Off. Rhythmic Report to Follow.
American Idol Whips Anglagard Assistant Manager's Ass.
Timberlake tosses Taal Guitarist in Trash Compactor.
Puff Daddy puts Porcupine Tree in their Place - the Thresher !
Mujahadeen incite new Gabriel Vs Collins mass slaughter!
Punkers Piss On Possibility that Prog is perfect.


That's all folks. All you need to sift through the inanities of humanity, the perverse perspective of people who should know better.



Edited by debrewguy - April 23 2008 at 12:57