Post #30,982
3/6/02 7:02:38 AM
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Oh the pain...Class of 2005
Each year the staff at Beloit College in Wisconsin puts together a list to try to give the Faculty a sense of the mindset of this year's incoming freshman.
Here is this year's list:
The people who are starting college this past fall across the nation were born in 1983.
They have no meaningful recollection of the Reagan Era and probably did not know he had ever been shot.
They were prepubescent when the Persian Gulf War was waged.
There has been only one Pope in their lifetime.
They were 10 when the Soviet Union broke apart and do not remember the Cold War.
They are too young to remember the space shuttle blowing up.
Tienamen Square means nothing to them.
Bottle caps have always been screw off and plastic.
Atari predates them, as do vinyl albums.
The expression "You sound like a broken record" means nothing to them.
They have never owned a record player.
They have likely never played Pac Man and have never heard of Pong.
They may have never heard of an 8 track.
The Compact Disc was introduced when they were 1 year old.
They have always had an answering machine.
Most have never seen a TV set with only 13 channels, nor have they seen a black and white TV.
They have always had cable.
There have always been VCRs, but they have no idea what BETA was.
They cannot fathom not having a remote control.
They don't know what a cloth baby diaper is.
They don't know about the "Help me, I've fallen and I can't get up" commercial.
They were born the year that the Walkman was introduced by Sony.
Roller skating has always meant inline for them.
Jay Leno has always been on the Tonight Show.
They have no idea when or why Jordache jeans were cool.
Popcorn has always been cooked in the microwave.
They have never seen Larry Bird play.
They never took a swim and thought about Jaws.
The Vietnam War is as ancient history to them as W.W.I, W.W.II and the Civil War.
They have no idea that Americans were ever held hostage in Iran.
They can't imagine what hard contact lenses are.
They don't know who Mork was or where he was from. (The correct answer, by the way, is Ork).
They never heard: "Where's the beef?", "I'd walk a mile for a
Camel," or "De plane Boss, de plane!"
They do not care who shot J.R. and have no idea who J.R. was.
Michael Jackson has always been white.
Kansas, Chicago, Boston, America, and Alabama are places, not bands.
There has always been MTV.
They don't have a clue how to use a typewriter.
They don't know who the Smurfs are nor do they know the Care Bears, Rainbow Brite,
or Strawberry Shortcake.
You were born...and so you're free...so Happy Birthday! Laurie Anderson
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #30,983
3/6/02 7:32:58 AM
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Why do you do this to us?
I know I shouldn't feel like an old fogey, but that makes me want to buy a cane.
Sheesh,
Ben
"... I couldn't see how anyone could be educated by this self-propagating system in which people pass exams, teach others to pass exams, but nobody knows anything."
--Richard Feynman
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Post #30,984
3/6/02 7:39:14 AM
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Oh my.
Aside from making me feel godawful old, one line set me to giggling uncontrollably.
"Michael Jackson has always been white."
Hee hee hee. Hard to type while laughing.
With this much manure around, there must be a pony somewhere.
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Post #30,993
3/6/02 8:55:08 AM
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In 2005, the Amiga will be 20 years old!
I recently had a dream about that. The Amiga celebrated its 20th birthday and they came out with that Super Amiga finally with AmigaOS 4.0, G4 PowerPC chip, and the Amiga 500 chipset emulation on one chip.
BTW Class of 2005 never heard of the Amiga, unless they are running it via an emulator like UAE?
"Will code Visual BASIC for cash."
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Post #31,080
3/6/02 3:43:22 PM
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If you have dreams with Amigas in them
..it may be too late for Electro-shock (is that the super-Deluxe model of Electrolux ?)
Buy a cornet. Learn the scales. This employs a different kind of brain we have; one often underdeveloped, especially.. lately. When you can play, Sounds from the Hudson or Carnival of Venice - you'll be Cured!
:-\ufffd
Ashton
Worked for me.
Nothing wrong with me.. with me..
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Post #31,258
3/7/02 6:15:37 PM
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My dreams have a lot of things in them
The Amiga, or Super Amiga, is but one of many things that I dream about. Is this normal? I dreamt up a whole new GUI interface, new design, Amiga 500 system on a single chip for backwards compatability, Virtual Machines to run older AmigaDOS environments, and a Virtual Machine to run the MS-OS and other PC systems within. Also they had incorporated the XFree86 interface into the new AmigaOS and had a port of Mozila for the browser. It put Linux and MacOSX to shame as far a benchmarks went.
But yes, I do dream of better Amiga systems. Is this normal? I guess not?
Electro-shock, it was tried on my grandfather, didn't work. IIRC it made him more depressed than he had been before? Only one cure that I know of for depression (with the exception of God curing me), but to do it would kill me. The only other hope is to wait for Jesus to come back, and have him cure me. But what are the chances of that happening in my lifetime?
"Will code Visual BASIC for cash."
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Post #31,002
3/6/02 9:37:44 AM
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Ack
OK, I'm among the younger part of the crowd here (being merely 9 years older than the folk discussed in the post), and every single one of those made perfect sense to me.
sigh...
-YendorMike
Real programmers use "vi a.out".
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Post #31,004
3/6/02 9:45:26 AM
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They sure are an ignorant bunch, aren't they?
[link|http://www.aaxnet.com|AAx]
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Post #31,049
3/6/02 1:14:12 PM
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Re: Oh the pain...Class of 2005
They never saw Adam West as Batman.
They're confused why all the old fogies continually add -gate suffixes to every scandal that comes along.
They've never heard of Bobby Fischer - even if they *are* a chess nut.
Where each demon is slain, more hate is raised, yet hate unchecked also multiplies. - L. E. Modesitt
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Post #31,054
3/6/02 1:26:01 PM
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Bobby Fischer
Amy's little brother
thanx,
bill
There is no difference between a "settler," "soldier," "secular," or "Chassidic Jew." The target is the JEW.
\ufffd Harvey Tannenbaum
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Post #31,076
3/6/02 3:09:52 PM
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Amy Fisher?
They are really too young to have heard or cared anything about her, either.
Where each demon is slain, more hate is raised, yet hate unchecked also multiplies. - L. E. Modesitt
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Post #31,079
3/6/02 3:41:05 PM
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that long ago huh?
There is no difference between a "settler," "soldier," "secular," or "Chassidic Jew." The target is the JEW.
\ufffd Harvey Tannenbaum
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Post #31,088
3/6/02 4:11:20 PM
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Heck, I remenber Eddie Fisher.
That will draw some blanks from the crew here. [link|http://www.cdmo.com/cgi-bin/cdmo/83785-10312-|This one.]
Father of [link|http://www.starwars.com/bio/carriefisher.html|Carrie Fisher] - Princess Leia in the first Star Wars movie.
Alex
"People demand freedom of speech to make up for the freedom of
thought which they avoid." -- Soren Aabye Kierkegaard (1813-1855)
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Post #31,139
3/6/02 10:44:37 PM
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See that and raise you..
The Kingfish
... :-\ufffd
Not to mention Avery Fisher..
hi-fi with vacuum tubes; now immortalized in NY, by
Avery Fisher Hall (for the Performing Arts?)
Ashton
PS - lookin for the post on Mozilla .98!
to thank you - got it. So far so Good -
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Post #31,143
3/6/02 11:21:27 PM
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Ah, the Kingfish! I must fold. Man, we are old! :)
You know I never connected Avery Fisher Hall with the Fisher hi-fi. So thanks for that tidbit. In the tube days, Fisher stuff was superb but too pricey for me. I drooled and then built a Heathkit. Now how many of our folks here, know about Heathkits.
OT: Glad Moz the Lizard is working for you so far. I have purged all signs of Netscape from my system.
Alex
"People demand freedom of speech to make up for the freedom of
thought which they avoid." -- Soren Aabye Kierkegaard (1813-1855)
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Post #31,145
3/7/02 12:43:43 AM
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Heathkit..
Note that its demise.. also signals the demise of lots of kids finding out how 'lectronics Really works - not to mention 'housewives' who assembled their own color Tee Vee. They may not have gotten even much into Ohm's law but, imagine the satisfaction..
The new Tee Vee? I built it!
Fisher stuff - that was about the time I started doing 'audio consulting'. FM-200 with real Nuvistors! in the front-end. Capture ratios nearing 1 dB. (Recently acquired one of the RF, stereo generators, way too expensive then: Sound Technology ST-1000A. It's still perfectly calibrated w/ vanishing distortion, etc.)
The last of the Heaths was as brilliant as the first - I have (two of!) their 'scope calibrators' = better specs than the HP, Teks (of a few years earlier). A nice risetime pulser with claimed 1 nS Tr, nearer 0.6 nS.
Dunno who will use, fix the electronics of the present and future, as most kids take the EZ MBA basketweaving courses and eschew science. Innumeracy grows. Musta been that way in Atlantis too? :(
Mozilla nicely converted my several mail folders, huge bookmarks. Maybe sometime I'll turn on jscript - just for the hell of it. Gotta explore the other featurez soon. Let it be STABLE (!!)
Cheers,
Ashton
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Post #31,228
3/7/02 2:07:34 PM
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Glad to hear Moz did OK with mail.
I use Eudora so that's an uknown area for me.
Alex
"People demand freedom of speech to make up for the freedom of
thought which they avoid." -- Soren Aabye Kierkegaard (1813-1855)
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Post #31,218
3/7/02 1:16:25 PM
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Heathkit...
I built their TV, doorbell, motion sensor... lots of things.
I used to get up on Saturday morning and solder circuit boards down in the basement while wearing my bathrobe.
I actually lived 25 miles north of Heathkit's location. Was fun to go down there and look at everything. It was a sad day for me when they closed down. :-(
Regards,
-scott anderson
"Welcome to Rivendell, Mr. Anderson..."
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Post #31,227
3/7/02 1:58:23 PM
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Re: Heathkit...
Yes, it was sad when they closed shop. I'm still using their garage door opener, metronome, and the basic oscilloscope. My daughter has the "handed down" Heathkit walnut hi-fi cabinet.
Alex
"People demand freedom of speech to make up for the freedom of
thought which they avoid." -- Soren Aabye Kierkegaard (1813-1855)
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Post #31,230
3/7/02 2:30:40 PM
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Especially sad: it wasn't due to lack of "quality"
of their designs. They seemed to be about to incorporate the ideas of (the scope-cal example) into other basic test equipment, equalling the quality of HP et al -- not so much in fancy boxes, though they were also nice-enough: but in bang/buck with no apologies for the specs.
Lack of demand killed them :( I see that as akin to the MBA love for the M$ onesizefitsall mindset, a morphing of nobody ever got fired by choosing IBM.. Companies as well as individuals could have profited from using their products, had bizness not entirely forgotten what, "cost effective" might mean. (Most were available assembled, too)
So I saw their demise as We Lost and also.. an early symptom of the dumbing-down of all things. Fewer and fewer care to learn ~ how *anything* "works". Just...
Consume. Can't set your VCR clock? - we'll have that difficult info transmitted to you!
Can't figure out Why you might want to put certain 'files' into certain 'directories' ? Hah: we gots Windoze and automatic updates (and lock-in and data collecting about You) for ya..
Heath: another canary, dead in the mineshaft..
{sigh}
Ashton
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Post #31,149
3/7/02 4:21:44 AM
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Oh nutz, vacuum tubes
Remember when every Radio Shack (hell, half a dozen other places, too) had a tube testing center? Hell, my memory is a bit hazy on the details there, I just remember the things, not the details.
*We* had a black and white television, and if my mind serves me correctly, my parents woke me up to watch either the Moon landing or the first step on the moon or both on it. (I was really too young at the time to remember much, but I do remember grainy black-and-white images.)
That's another thing for the class of 2002. The Apollo program is ancient history to them, as much as the American Civil War and World War 1. They stare blankly when you talk about Voyager. They never heard anything about the controversy about what is on the encoded disk on Voyager, which I doubt anyone on Earth could themselves read anymore.
Where each demon is slain, more hate is raised, yet hate unchecked also multiplies. - L. E. Modesitt
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Post #31,152
3/7/02 4:56:21 AM
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Even in '02 - they possess one huge advantage:
Impervious to EMP.
I don't know what strides have been made in fast, active devices as can stand the humongous peak amplitude (if any such exist by now).
But US used to laugh at early MIGS with vac. tube electronics, before we realized why they were there. (Natch we didn't laugh at their also outflying our stuff).
Anyway, as transistorization proceeds even unto the toaster - one blast quite a few miles above say, Omaha - can ruin a few trillion transistor junctions = the vast majority of those as are not 'hardened'. (While leaving Omaha pretty much as boring as it was prior)
Remember too: M.A.D. is precisely and still, the current 2002 formula for launch. We are <2 minutes away from such a possible Final Solution to the folly-seeking gene in homo-sap. This is not mentioned by pols, natch - but it is true.
Sleep tight,
Ashton
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Post #31,263
3/7/02 6:44:18 PM
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Voyager.
Actually, to many people "Voyager" means the fourth Star Trek series, not the space-probes.
Incidentally, whilst the moon walk was before my time, I do remember the news reports about Challenger exploding. Dad turned the TV during the morning to see the pictures - something he very rarely did.
Wade.
"All around me are nothing but fakes
Come with me on the biggest fake of all!"
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Post #31,303
3/7/02 10:54:30 PM
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Voyager
Actually to Trekkies you must use "V'Ger" and not "Voyager" and then they are understanding what you are talking about. You must have seen the first Star Trek Motion Picture to understand that one. Heh!
"Will code Visual BASIC for cash."
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Post #31,312
3/8/02 12:35:43 AM
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Re: Voyager.
Tears are running down my cheeks even now at the Challenger.
The class of 2002 hasn't any clue how powerful and/or depressing that is/was.
Where each demon is slain, more hate is raised, yet hate unchecked also multiplies. - L. E. Modesitt
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Post #31,410
3/8/02 6:01:51 PM
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Challenger
I recall it, I was in High School when it happened. An English teacher of mine that liked to joke around told me that Challenge blew up, I thought we was joking until someone turned on a TV set on a cart to show me that it was true. No words could describe that momment when I learned that it was destroyed. All over an O-Ring and ignoring a computer's warning that it was unsafe.
"Will code Visual BASIC for cash."
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Post #31,408
3/8/02 5:50:30 PM
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Recall testing them at Jewel/Osco
When I was in grade school we had a 25" color TV in a really nice wooden console. Whenever the set acted funny we'd get a shoe box, put all the tubes in it, drive down to the store and test all the tubes.
There were a bunch of sockets on the tester to accommodate the various tubes(I believe # of pins and space between pins differed). Then you'd set a dial to test the correct socket and get a pass/fail response. The new tubes were stored in the bottom of the tester unit.
Darrell Spice, Jr.
[link|http://home.houston.rr.com/spiceware/|SpiceWare] - We don't do Windows, it's too much of a chore
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Post #31,439
3/8/02 11:38:43 PM
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Still use em.
I've got 2 guitar amps that run 12AX7 preamp tubes. For the power section the Peavey uses 6L6 and the Boogie uses EL34 or 6L6. There's only one store in the Denver area I've found to test them. For music use, though, I generally buy 5-6 sets online and compare them in the amp and select on sound. It's amazing how different same-brand tubes sound.
Source for tubes? Russia. Company called Sovtek.
-----
Steve
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Post #31,448
3/9/02 1:41:14 AM
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Valve guitar amps...
I remember reading somewhere some stories about guitar enthusiasts younger than me getting a valve guitar amp for the first time. One of the things that doesn't always occur to them is that, yes, there are actually different types of valves.
One story was about one such guy who found his amp stopped working one day, so he pulled out one valve and went into his guitar shop and asked for "six of these". The store clerk was not being observant that day and sold him precisely that. Not surprisingly, his amp didn't work with the 6 new valves.
Wade.
"All around me are nothing but fakes
Come with me on the biggest fake of all!"
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Post #31,087
3/6/02 4:09:02 PM
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Good.
The less chess players idolize that racist, nazi fuck, the better.
Oh, did I mention I used to play chess?
"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche
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Post #31,150
3/7/02 4:30:22 AM
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I think you got your reply in the wrong column
but in general you're right.
Fischer was always screwy and paranoid. (But are you paranoid when they *are* out to get you? Soviet complicity in world championship events is almost a sure thing. Larry Evans makes a good case that Paul Keres threw his games against Botvinnik in 1948 because of pressure by the USSR against his family.)
But his insanity accelerated when he won (and then gave up) the title. I mean, really, to get fillings removed because you think they're mind control devices? And his latest anti-Semitic hatred spews (not going to post here, just go to Google and search on Bobby Fischer) are appalling.
It has been said that there is a fine line between genius and insanity, and Fischer is certainly on the insanity side of it.
Where each demon is slain, more hate is raised, yet hate unchecked also multiplies. - L. E. Modesitt
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Post #31,086
3/6/02 4:03:57 PM
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Look at the bright side!
Much less 'history' left to unlearn, as new info makes clear just how much the winners fixed-up the accounts. Only a few engrams of the elder Bushie.. mangling the language in his own way - ever lacking the vision thing.
Be glad for them.. never will they have infused into a nightmare, a picture of Ronnie! comparing the Contras to the Founding Fathers\ufffd - on Tee Vee.
Envy them.
(But someday we'll have to break it to them.. gently)
Ashton
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Post #31,398
3/8/02 4:41:50 PM
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Trust me. They won't care and more is the pity.
Damn, I am even *sounding* like an old fart. :-\\
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