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I'd assumed all cgi and comp shots were being rendered at full size.

https://xkcd.com/1339/

Not gonna happen, but I really wanted a complete HD transfer

By building a "Services as a Service" layer on top, which delegates the storage to whoever's still around.

Oblig. https://xkcd.com/927/

I think Younited tries to implement something like this.

Of course, there's a suitable xkcd for that.

There's likely something unusual about those lights. They may be dependent on another abnormal signal, or may need to accommodate higher traffic that disperses before the next lights in the series. They could also be the nodes where several green-light waves intersect, so they have to be the irritating red for somebody.

For those of you who want to know the answer, but don't know the math, xkcd once again has your back. http://what-if.xkcd.com/14/

The non-permanence of cloud services like storage and sharing is going to be hard to solve. Sure some will last. But some will not. How do you choose the ones the will?

By building a "Services as a Service" layer on top, which delegates the storage to whoever's still around.

Oblig. https://xkcd.com/927/

We need to start having "radiation leaks" in terms of units that people can understand, like "bananas."

There is a metric for that, and a handy diagram, but the news never uses it because it could lead to people actually having a clue what is going on.

Conveniently, that graph even has a banana-equivalence: one tenth of a microsievert. If you consumed 50,000 bananas in a year, you would reach the standard dosage limit for workers in irradiated (as in, the time they're told to go home and stay out of the glow). 100,000 bananas in a year and you may see an increased risk of cancer. However, the concept of eating 23 1/3 tons of bananas in a year is rather absurd when the average human food consumption in a year is less than half a ton.

Yes, BRCA is a counterexample. It is also an outlier, and testing for BRCA can usually be guided by a simple family history. If there is BRCA in the family, there will be a very high incidence of breast/prostate cancer in the family. If that's the case in your family, consider talking to a medical geneticist and possibly getting BRCA testing. As before, I'm not proposing people be barred from having tests done to learn their status, but I am against goading people (especially if it's not going to be helpful).

In general, the 23andme type GWAS crap isn't helpful for the layperson. The type of results returned (before the FDA cease & desisted them) were freaking people out due to the "increased risk effect". If it gives the person a nudge to live a healthier life (diet, exercise, dropping bad habits) then that's great, and those lifestyle changes are going to have a far greater effect than most any "increased risk" result from a GWAS.

As for my general point regarding aggressive screening & intervention: how many breast cancers have been ironically iatrogenically induced by the radiation dose from routine mammograms vs lives saved by early detection? How many non-BRCA breasts have been surgically removed due to benign conditions that were "suspect" on mammography? Also, don't discount the pain and stress of having a breast biopsy of suspicious findings on mammogram.

Aggressive screening is a double-edged sword, and that's why medicine is backing away from swinging it so enthusiastically.

So.... the first thing the guy does is post it on YouTube instead of heeding the alert. Myth confirmed.

Obligatory XKCD

http://xkcd.com/793/

Wow, OKStupid's PR and marketing agency have just hit the jackpot! Got everyone all riled up and ready to argue into the small hours of the morning about who's right https://xkcd.com/386/
 
Don't do internet dating but if I did it'd be with OKStupid's immediate competitor.

your statement sums up the tea party.
The government is spending money on stuff I don't understand, therefore waste.

To a teabagger, "stuff I don't understand" is almost everything except huntin' and killin'.

https://xkcd.com/1339/

Also http://xkcd.com/1314/

You're still stuck with the shitty sensor and tiny lens on the camera itself, regardless of what hipster filter you stick on it.

But, my phone has the most megapixels!

https://xkcd.com/538/

By late next month you'll have over four dozen husbands.

I really find this to be apropos.

I haven't seen this yet, so here goes:

https://xkcd.com/902/

Although Star Trek TNG was outstanding, the real problem is that there hasn't been much high quality science fiction TV series in the last 25 years.

I agree. There's so much shallow-war tripe and cop drama BS (even one where PRISM is a good thing, ugh), I feel that kids today could use some more ethical conundrums and imaginative exploration on prime time TV.

I've exposed space fascinated kids to Planetes and Space Brothers with scores of success (the later has world's 1st voice acting from space from the ISS). Too bad we don't have any prime-time shows about striving for peaceful coexistence in the hostile universe. It's too bad, they haven't made a reboot of Star Trek yet.

Obligatory xkcd: http://xkcd.com/16/

Birds are very smart. Another reason to be afraid of dinosaurs, I suppose.

As a programmer, I always remember that Velociraptors dislike goto statements.

It certainly will :) Except with a horizontal flywheel, it would try to turn the car when ac-/de-celerating, and twist to the side when entering/leaving a steep hill. Could certainly make for entertaining speed bumps!

Oblig ref. is oblig:
https://xkcd.com/332/

Is the parenthesis part of the emoticon?!!! or is your EMOTICON MOUTHLESS?!?!?!

XKCD
How do you know it's not random?

EST (Earth Standard Time)

Standards

And it's been drunk by at least one dinosaur too.

http://www.xkcd.com/538/

Obligatory XKCD comic...

http://xkcd.com/327/

Maybe because our history of wild animal conservation is pretty poor. Relevant xkcd http://xkcd.com/1338/.

Lasers May Solve the Black Hole Information Paradox

!! But, but -- how do we get the sharks into the black hole? I didn't think they fly! ... Hmm, I guess we'll first have to evolve them into intelligent sapient spaceship-flying beings before we fling them headfirst into a black hole. (Or tailfirst? Which way should the laser point?)

Ob

http://xkcd.com/875/

A combination of dictionary words can be a strong password. This does require a large password field, but WPA 2 seems to support 64 characters so that's covered.
A random set of dictionary words is easy to remember for a human and difficult to guess for a computer.
We need to get away from insane password rules.
1. A max length of below 32 characters is bullshit. Instead, set a minimum length of 16 characters and advise to use a few random words.
2. Requiring non-alpahnumeric characters seems safe, but it moves the passwords away from words, thus it moves it to a less useful password style. Besides, the attacker knows this rule. So he'll try a dictionary attack with o's replaced with zeroes and stuff like that.
3. ...
4. Profit. Or at least less losses from theft.

Face it. Most password rules do not create passwords that are easy to remember. They create passwords that are relatively easy to brute-force.

I rather view it as an example that science actually works (bitches!). This "dissenting opinion" is being as ruthlessly attacked as any hypothesis, the difference is that a warming hypothesis is apparently much more difficult to shoot down with facts that a cooling one.

https://xkcd.com/284/

Perhaps this one is more appropriate:

http://xkcd.com/1343/

What happened to it was it was never true.

https://xkcd.com/1204/

Obligatory: Randall Munroe, self portrait of a cunt.

A moderate-length (24+ chars) phrase will be way more secure than your random pattern of letters, numbers and characters, PLUS it's FAR easier to remember, thereby reducing the odds that the super-secure gobbledy-gook you forced them to invent wont just get written down on a piece of paper and stuck to the refrigerator door for every passer-by to read...

Oblig XKCD

-AC

Some time back, there was an informative pair of pictures in an xkcd forum. Scan down for "but this" for the images.

There might be a way to include such a search string in a URL, but I don't know how to encode it ...

http://xkcd.com/378/

Well I guess this is obligatory:

https://xkcd.com/936/

Even worse than this?

As both a Dilbert and XKCD fan, I appricaite them both for different reasons.

DIlbert often highlights the funny / depressing work side of my life. (Control systems engineer) e.g. http://dilbert.com/strips/comi... recienlt just about made me choke on my coffee.

Where as XKCD appeals to my geeky nature, though also applicable to work situations sometimes e.g. https://xkcd.com/927/ but there are so many others that come up in ever day life for those of us that are geeky

Most economists would say that Western capitalism requires a growth rate of about 3% per year to keep everyone happy (low unemployment, funding, etc).

Most economists are also idiots chanting a religious mantra. Malthus never ever goes out of style.

Infinite economic growth is unnecessary if the population ceases to expand, and if not for immigration, it would have already done so in the US and western Europe. It already has stopped in Japan. Developed world living conditions ultimately reduce population growth rates. Empirical evidence shows they reduce the rate so far it turns negative. There is speculation as to possible reasons why, but whether or not we understand the reasons, it's happening. I think this nicely sums up why you're jumping at shadows.

Oblig XKCD https://what-if.xkcd.com/29/

I think you have the wrong xkcd https://xkcd.com/974/ BTW, this one is on the door to my office.

http://xkcd.com/927/

Lets ignore that fact this is is 14/03/2014. oblig XKCD
I just love it when we try to find meaning in something, after we choose to ignore aspects of it.

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/wa...