This is not an argument - it will be obvious we agree that "outdated" tech is still useful:)
Especially in 2003 (less so today), a tape deck in your car still made sense - and I don't even mean just to people who had a large cassette collection. Want to hook up your brand new iPod (first available in 2001) to your car? You can buy an expensive radio transmitter device which is a pain in the ass to use and is unreliable, or you can pay $5 at wal-mart for a tape adapter.
Now car stereos mostly will have an auxiliary input, but only in the past couple of years is that standard.
My car is a '98 and has a 6-CD changer and a tape deck. Both of those are outdated by current standards, but I'm glad I have them both. I can buy a CD (I don't buy mp3s - I like having a physical product) at the record store and listen to it on the way home, then when I rip it to mp3 later I can hook up my mp3 player (which is not an iPod, so I'm glad my car doesn't have a proprietary ipod connector as some do...) and still play it in my car without futzing about with a radio transmitter thing.
It would be a gimmick in movies (and I assume you mean cinematographers and directors would hate it, not the producer, who probably wouldn't care as long as it drew large audiences) - but it would be interesting and useful for video games and certain other things.
I have a Canon 40D, and previously had a 350D, and with either if I actually attach(ed) it with a USB cable rather than using a card reader I do not have the issues you described... I am not sure if you are doing something wrong, or what - as EvanED already said in his reply, you really should be able to access it as a normal USB mass storage device - but it doesn't matter. The real solution for your father is to change his method of downloading and sorting photos.
There are multitudes of programs that are designed to make this really easy, whether you plug the camera in directly or use a card reader (you should use a decent card reader - it will cut the download time to a few minutes at most). They can be completely automated to store the images in whatever filing system you like on your hard drive. It doesn't matter how Canon stores the files on the memory card, they're reorganized automatically in the way you like - I organize by date. I use digikam, which I consider the best option on linux, but I am guessing your father doesn't use linux - in that case there are even more options. You might try something like Google's Picasa (which runs on linux too actually) as something simple and easy to understand. For a semi-computer-literate person, the only sensible solution is the use software that's designed to make this easy. The included Canon software, even, is not terribly bad!
Fathom isn't popular because their offerings are pretty bad, if you think about it. It sounds great - these events you can't go to yourself for whatever reason, on a huge screen with great sound. Except... the projection is pretty crappy, as you stated, and you lose approximately 90% of the experience of the event.
Opera is the one thing that might work OK... you lose the acoustic experience of a great opera hall, and give up going to the fancy, well-maintained theater for the sticky multiplex, of course. But, the people who would go to an opera performance probably won't even notice the projection quality, and I bet also that those who would actually go to one of these Fathom opera events can't necessarily afford to go to the real opera - much less the Metropolitan opera in NYC - and couldn't get good seats if they did go.
Now - who is the audience for their other "events"? I've seen their advertisements before movies, and it's never anything I or anyone I can think of would actually pay to go to.
That said, you are right about movie projection becoming just "good enough" - a lot of the DLP projection systems in place now are pretty bad, and noticeably worse than film - *if you're a nerd*. The new systems are much better, but if no one notices or cares now, I'm not sure all the old, less-than-great projectors will get replaced anytime soon.
He uses that joke in Annie Hall - didn't know he also had a short story with a similar theme. I've only read a couple of his story collections... guess I'll have to find the rest:)
I love that idea, but I don't think it would work in the US. You'd have to pay and maintain a force of a lot more attendants than are currently needed.
In Thailand I noticed that there are a lot of people paid to do jobs like that - probably not paid much, but it really makes things go a lot more smoothly. Here in the US everything is optimized for maximum profit and least amount of employees - in Thailand (and I'm guessing Taiwan too though I haven't been there) they just throw more employees at a problem until it works since labor is cheap. I really, really appreciated that while I was there (not the exploitation of cheap labor - you know what I mean;) ). Makes it a much more friendly place to be when someone is getting paid to worry about stuff like this (your parking ticket example) so you don't have to.
I've used parking meter machines as described in TFA in Toronto many times, and it's really not that bad, actually, but I still like Taiwan's idea better:)
I believe the scouts (the ones riding speeder bikes) had different armor - and they do in the Battlefront video games - but in the big battle sequence, where the ewoks win with sticks and rocks, the stormtroopers are wearing the same armor as in any other scene from the three movies.
I agree with your point, but besides what another replier mentions regarding real vs. simulated rape (are you really trying to say that when it's in a non-porn movie it's absolutely real rape, not simulated? that's honestly what it seems like though I don't think that's what you mean), there's another factor. In *most* movies, the rape scenes are meant to horrify the viewer. In rape porn, I'm assuming they aren't trying to horrify you, but to turn you on.
Of course, those that are into rape porn probably get a real kick out of rape in other movies, but still...
It's the intent of the filmmaker that's at question. I don't think it should matter, myself, but I can see where they're coming from - I don't care what turns other people on, but I can see how people would get upset that things like rape turn people on. They don't like that they're depicting what anyone would agree is a horrible act in a manner that turns people on sexually.
That said - what's the point of gory horror films if not to "turn on" parts of your brain? Most people aren't sexually aroused by violent death and gore, but we watch it in movies for entertainment.
I should have mentioned, actually, that for North America, Google Earth probably has better resolution elevation data than this. I think it's based on topographic maps, which have approximately 12-15m resolution, while this new data has 30m resolution. So you might not actually see any improvement in your mountain bike trail profile in Google Earth. However, it may very well be interesting to import it anyway to see the differences. I'm not sure how Google processes the elevation data and it may very well be inaccurate in some places.
Where this new data is really useful is for the rest of the world, where high resolution digital data was not available.
That's not really an issue with this type of data. Remember, the resolution is 30m. There is nothing geologic (that would show up in this type of data) that moves anywhere close to that on human time scales.
There IS data on movement such as those you list, showing real time (in geologic time anyway) movement of the crust due to tectonics, or other things. It's actually a pretty major field in geology, studying minute changes. InSAR and millimeter-accurate differential GPS are two techniques.
Relatively coarse DEM data like ASTER or SRTM is used for different applications where millimeter accuracy isn't necessary - i.e., most things:)
Additionally, there is enough inaccuracy in the instrumentation used for DEM data like this that doing multiple passes will give you significantly different results - the error is measured in meters. Therefore, any small changes - and earthquakes, volcanoes, and tectonic movements are small changes in the big scheme of things - are completely irrelevant as they'll be averaged out anyway. It should be interesting to make a comparison to previous datasets, though, and I'm sure there are people working on that already.
Of course, I suppose you'd notice in this data if a huge volcanic explosion occurred, like when half of Mt. St. Helens blew off. However, that's exceedingly rare:)
The previous SRTM data is available completely free to the end-user. I downloaded several gigabytes of it for use in my thesis.
There are commercial vendors who will provide you somewhat better versions of it - with the holes filled, and the individual tiles stitched together. But for someone actually working with the data, that's not really worth much because you can do it yourself in a few minutes.
I'm trying to get the new data right now - I'm still working on my thesis and this will be really great stuff - and it appears it's pretty much the same set-up as before.
Basically, there's no need for cynicism. The people at NASA, USGS, and other government science agencies really do want their data to be free and accessible by anyone.
Interestingly enough, the reason only 90m resolution data is available from the SRTM mission - previously the best-available global DEM data - is because the Department of Defense restricted it. Within NASA scientists need special permission to access it, and outside of NASA absolutely no one has access. So for the scientific community, this new data being available is really great.
As for terrorists? Give me a break... Google Earth is 100x more useful than this data to terrorists, and not because Google probably will use this new data. I really don't think elevation data is that useful to terrorists.
I'm a geology grad student, and I actually work with this data. To be restricted access to better data because the DOD says it's sensitive is extremely frustrating. That's something you're supposed to opine about on slashdot, not actually experience!
The elevation data in Google Earth and World Wind is apparently already based upon the previous best data available - either the SRTM 90m data, or digitized topographic maps. They don't really specify (at least as far as I could tell) but the Google Earth data matches pretty well with the SRTM data.
That said, the best way to handle data like this is not in Google Earth. I'm guessing eventually they will update their data to incorporate this, unless they are actually using another source. In the mean time, you can use the data directly in a GIS program.
I'm a grad student using this data for my thesis, so I have access to advanced tools, most importantly ArcGIS (you can, of course, find this on any good torrent site) which allows for all kinds of great analyses. However, I have also played around with the open source GRASS GIS and qgis, and for basic stuff they should be pretty good. You can't get a 3D view in qgis, though - it may be possible in GRASS, I'm not sure.
For programs focused on DEMs, check out MicroDEM and 3DEM, as detailed in articles on this site: http://freegeographytools.com/series. You can get your 3D views and a heck of a lot more with those programs. I'm pretty sure those are going to be Windows programs, though.
Google Earth is probably good enough, of course. If the tool you mention works, I don't see why you wouldn't want to just use that to get your KML file. I don't find Google Earth that useful for my thesis work (besides the fact that it hard-freezes my computer - probably an Intel video card issue with the Linux drivers, but I can't figure out a solution), but for basic visualizations it is perfect.
I am actually using this data for my thesis project in geology. Actually, I'm really excited to learn about this, as the previously available 90m resolution SRTM data isn't really sufficient for my needs.
The SRTM data is all free to download, if you can figure out their poor interface for selecting the files you need. If it wasn't, there would be a lot fewer people working with it. It is the most important data for the analyses I'm doing, and without it my thesis would be a lot different (you can do similar things with regular topographic maps, but essentially only by making hand measurements). I'm really glad that I haven't done a ton of analyses using the SRTM data - now I will wait until I can get my hands on the new stuff.
For a grad student like me with little to no funding for my research and a tiny paycheck from working as a TA, even a nominal fee to download is prohibitive. Even for someone that DOES have funding, paying for stuff like this is extremely annoying. Despite what journal publishers want you to think, science is about openness and sharing of information. Most scientists freely share their data and work with others - even those that work with proprietary data in industry, if you ask them nicely.
And as others have noted - we already paid for it. It's produced by the government.
Now, here's the best part - there is actually 30m data from the SRTM mission. However, except for North America, only the 90m data is available, because it's restricted - not by NASA, but by the DOD. So with this new data they've apparently side-stepped the DOD. NASA and the USGS do seem like they want to get their data out their and accessible by scientists, despite what the DOD may want. I am working on Thailand, so the 30m SRTM data was restricted, but now I should be able to get this new data at the same resolution.
I guess Orange County generically refers to the one in CA (I live in Placentia/Fullerton) but there IS an Orange County in Florida as well (which happens to be where Disneyworld is located, funnily enough). Here you're replying to an AC that's apparently from Northern CA so it's fine, but I noticed you answered this question a couple other times without specifying California.
My point is, to most people from the US just saying Orange County is probably sufficient, but it's not really being precise especially considering that/. has an international audience.
Before I traveled here a couple years ago (and then moved here last August from New York) I would not have been able to tell you that Orange County is in Southern California. I think I just assumed it was all Los Angeles, or at least LA County;) Most people know about Orange County because of The OC, the "housewives" shows, and Orange County Choppers (which apparently is located in New York anyway... and Daytona, where they have Bike Week, is not in Orange County FL.... who knows). If you don't pay attention to any of those things, which many people don't, it's not necessarily obvious where you mean when you say Orange County:)
By the way, I have had trouble meeting people here as well. Though as a poor grad student I'm in a different situation, universities and university-connected events really are probably the best place to meet geeky people. The only people I've met around here who are geeky are either students or connected to the universities in some way. If you're in Tustin, check out if there are any geeky events at UC Irvine.
You said you're looking for a geek girl so at least you're not making the mistake of wanting the cheerleader when you have nothing in common with the cheerleader.
I know it's just an example, and surely this is something people do, but is this a mistake that geeks actually make? This is what happens in a lot of movies... but who writes those movies, and who is the intended audience? It's not geeks in either case...
Real life geeks are far more apt to obsess over geek girls, even if they don't have supermodel looks. I mean, I can't speak for everyone, and there are different levels of geekiness, but that has been my experience. The people who are changed into these geeky characters obsessed with cheerleaders when they're written into the movies are more like general "unpopular" guys, most of whom are not geeks.
Amazon.co.uk has The Dark Knight for ~£15. I've only been to an HMV in Toronto, not in the UK where I presume you're from, but I could tell right away it was one of those mall/high-street stores that charge $10 more than if you go to any other store. I imagine there are other places that you could buy stuff from, and honestly I'm not sure who actually buys stuff from stores like HMV (US equivalent is FYE) - they do tend to occasionally have harder to find titles, that's true, but when you can get them on Amazon for half the cost and with minimal or free shipping, it still doesn't make sense to ever shop there.
That said - even in "regular" stores, Blu-Rays are overpriced. There's no denying that. However, if you only buy when they've got a discount sale, you can easily get your £12 price for new releases (often the first week they're out they'll be discounted) and even less for catalog titles or movies older than 1-2 years.
It's stupid that they're trying to keep the price so high, but it's not impossible to buy Blu-Ray, if you're so inclined, without paying the official asking price. Amazon (and probably other online retailers) are currently the best place. Retail stores hopefully will catch up, as buying online doesn't replace impulse purchases for things you want to watch that same night, but for now it's the only reasonable option.
Interesting - I'm not opposed to being screened in such a way, I suppose, but good to know regardless.
I would love to be able to get out and look around. I've wanted to go to Korea for a long time. I'm not sure if I will have time between flights but I will definitely take your advice if I do - better than wandering around not knowing where to go, for sure:)
Maybe next time I will find a research project that will take me to Korea so I can actually spend some time there - this time I'm going to Thailand at someone else's expense to do research for my geology master's:)
This is in reply just to the part about summer camp. I do appreciate your reasoning, but I hope you tell her she can't just call you whenever she wants while at camp. Your camp may be different but at the one I worked at (and attended as a kid) we were in the wilderness and part of the point was to get away from the ubiquitous technology in regular life.
Obviously, you're free to parent as you like, and the camp your daughter goes to is probably a lot different than mine. However, as someone with a lot of experience in that area, perhaps you'll appreciate that there are actually several good reasons to not allow cell phones at camp.
Now, my camp was actually in a pretty remote location, and only in the past couple of years has sporadic cell service been available, so it hasn't been a huge problem. Still, I knew that a lot of kids brought their cell phones, and I confiscated them if they caused problems. As you can imagine, "illicit" devices like that can cause quite a stir among kids, especially if they were cool phones. Next thing you know, showing off turns into fights and broken/lost/stolen phones. Sounds like an exaggeration, but it really does happen. Kids are like that.
Besides that, and more importantly, you send your kid to camp to learn independence and all that great stuff. Don't ruin it by giving her a way out - make sure she only uses the phone if there really is an emergency, not just because she's homesick.
And the great thing is, after spending a lot of time away from technology while at camp, a lot of kids find they're less addicted to their cell phones and video games than they were before! I love my electronics as much as anyone here, but the benefits of that should be pretty obvious.
I don't think the problem is really with the amount of lab time provided - this is limited for a reason. They rightfully require supervision from the grad student TAs, or whoever, who don't have unlimited time. Most likely, these policies are based on years of experience that says that letting undergrads into the labs on their own time is a bad idea. Considering some of the stuff that went on in lab classes I took as an undergrad while the grad students *were* there, I can easily imagine what could "go wrong" if they weren't there.
The problem is with those who are grading the lab reports who will only accept the "one true" answer. Yes, the result should have confirmed conservation of energy, or whatever. But despite being a simple question, the lab setups are usually not that simple, and can be quite precise. And you're using decades-old equipment that's passed through hundreds of undergrad hands before you, and the grad student doesn't have time to waste to properly calibrate and fix everything beforehand. Not to mention that you as the undergrad aren't familiar with the equipment or its use. So sometimes - more often than not, in my experience - things won't work quite right.
That's fine, that's part of the "learning experience." At my school, the University of Rochester, if your results were not "correct" but you knew specifically why, that was good enough. You can't just write "human error" and get away with it, but through the course of the experiment if you keep track of what wasn't working and how you tried to fix it (or how the grad student tried to fix it), you can write a pretty compelling paragraph about why the experiment failed. If you can figure that out and explain the deviation, you probably learned more from the lab than those whose equipment worked the first time. And your grade didn't suffer for it, at my school anyway, and that's the way it should be.
Though highly cynical, I appreciate your point, but for the last paragraph - as any photographer will tell you, there is *always* something new to photograph.
If there wasn't, then no one would bring their fancy cameras anywhere, especially to places like the US national parks. Ansel Adams got it perfect already, so what's the point, right?
In places like national parks, yes, it's easy to get bored and disinterested in photographing things that you know thousands have photographed before. But if you put some effort in to be creative, that is when it's most rewarding - knowing you're doing something creative and unique instead of the hum-drum shots that everyone else got.
And if you're in outer space, for fuck's sake, there would be endless things to photograph. Even if it's been photographed before. I'm practically drooling just thinking of all the things you could photograph in a space station. It doesn't have to be all the geeky technical stuff, or the view out the window. Having some great photographs of the astronauts in space, for example - not just while they're doing official work - would be priceless not only for them and their grandchildren, but for future generations who will always wonder what it's like to be in space (until cheap and easy space flight becomes available, of course, but even then - I'm still fascinated by the world's early explorers even though I can "explore" the planet much more easily than they did).
The Alien Skin photoshop plugins work great, but it isn't going to fool too many people into thinking your photo is actually a polaroid if it isn't. Using Alien Skin to alter colors/contrast and add film grain works great to create images simulating other types of aesthetically pleasing film, but with polaroid there are several other factors which make simulation pointless. Primarily is the work that goes into it. If you want to do a good job simulating a polaroid with a digital image, you have to put a lot of thought into shooting it the right way with the right lens, and a lot of processing (beyond the Alien Skin kind of thing) to make it look right.
That's completely opposite of the point of polaroid, which is to enable spontaneous, instant results.
In summary: to do a good fake of polaroid = a lot of thought, time, and processing work, removing the spontaneity and most of the fun for what will likely be a mediocre result; to take a real polaroid = instantaneous, spontaneous, gratifying, fun.
I don't have much to add, but wanted to say that I have an A-1 my grandfather gave me as well as a 40D. I have several quite expensive EF lenses for the 40D, but on the A-1 I just use the stock 50mm f/1.8.
Yet... when I do occasionally use the A-1, I am so much more pleased with the photos I get. It's not just the quality, though that is certainly there - especially with black and white film - but somehow the photos almost always turn out better. It's got something to do with the different techniques you use with a camera like the A-1 or AE-1 compared to those with one like the 40D with big lenses.
I do have 30mm f/1.4, 50mm f/1.8, and 85mm f/1.8 EF primes for the 40D... that helps, but it's not just the classic 50mm f/1.8 on the A-1 that does it. There's much more to it that draws me back to using the A-1 once in a while.
I can't speak for other places, but in the Cal State University system, us graduate students who are paid as an RA or TA do have a union. I'm not sure how much the union actually does, but it's there and considering how little I'm paid I can't imagine what it'd be like if there wasn't a union.
Besides that I do agree with your sentiments, but without being a grad student yourself I'm not sure you'll fully understand - though I'm sure you've experienced a little bit working in a couple labs (and yes - PHD comics *is* accurate). We're not in it to be paid a lot and to be treated exceptionally well. We're at a low rung in academia and at the low rungs in any field, you have to take what you're given - to a certain extent of course - until you're able to advance.
What I've noticed is that the grad students who are miserable are the ones that shouldn't really be in grad school. They're probably more than smart enough, that's not the problem. The problem is that they're probably there because they thought that's what they needed to do to get a good job, or their parents "encouraged" them, or whatever. These people would be much, much happier if they got a job instead (if they could even find one - that's part of the problem of course).
That said there are of course abusive advisors and all-around bad places to be a student. You have to expect this, and figure out if that's the case before you decide to go somewhere. And if it's not working out, you have to accept that it might be best to leave and go somewhere else, even if it means wasting a semester or two. Or, you have to just go with it and take the initiative to make the best of it. I'm not necessarily entirely happy with what I'm doing right now, but I'm definitely making the best of it and planning for better things in the future.
In other words - these things vary wildly depending on the school and specific department. Your experience - even in separate labs - does not mean every graduate program is like that.
Anyway - I agree with you overall. Graduate students pretty much bring these bad conditions upon themselves. We - myself included - just accept things because "that's the way it is." However, as I hinted at earlier, I don't just accept everything crappy that's thrown at me, and that's something I wish - and something, frankly, I expected - more graduate students would do. It'd make things better for everyone, and as you say, for academic research in general.
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This is not an argument - it will be obvious we agree that "outdated" tech is still useful :)
Especially in 2003 (less so today), a tape deck in your car still made sense - and I don't even mean just to people who had a large cassette collection. Want to hook up your brand new iPod (first available in 2001) to your car? You can buy an expensive radio transmitter device which is a pain in the ass to use and is unreliable, or you can pay $5 at wal-mart for a tape adapter.
Now car stereos mostly will have an auxiliary input, but only in the past couple of years is that standard.
My car is a '98 and has a 6-CD changer and a tape deck. Both of those are outdated by current standards, but I'm glad I have them both. I can buy a CD (I don't buy mp3s - I like having a physical product) at the record store and listen to it on the way home, then when I rip it to mp3 later I can hook up my mp3 player (which is not an iPod, so I'm glad my car doesn't have a proprietary ipod connector as some do...) and still play it in my car without futzing about with a radio transmitter thing.
It would be a gimmick in movies (and I assume you mean cinematographers and directors would hate it, not the producer, who probably wouldn't care as long as it drew large audiences) - but it would be interesting and useful for video games and certain other things.
I have a Canon 40D, and previously had a 350D, and with either if I actually attach(ed) it with a USB cable rather than using a card reader I do not have the issues you described... I am not sure if you are doing something wrong, or what - as EvanED already said in his reply, you really should be able to access it as a normal USB mass storage device - but it doesn't matter. The real solution for your father is to change his method of downloading and sorting photos.
There are multitudes of programs that are designed to make this really easy, whether you plug the camera in directly or use a card reader (you should use a decent card reader - it will cut the download time to a few minutes at most). They can be completely automated to store the images in whatever filing system you like on your hard drive. It doesn't matter how Canon stores the files on the memory card, they're reorganized automatically in the way you like - I organize by date. I use digikam, which I consider the best option on linux, but I am guessing your father doesn't use linux - in that case there are even more options. You might try something like Google's Picasa (which runs on linux too actually) as something simple and easy to understand. For a semi-computer-literate person, the only sensible solution is the use software that's designed to make this easy. The included Canon software, even, is not terribly bad!
Fathom isn't popular because their offerings are pretty bad, if you think about it. It sounds great - these events you can't go to yourself for whatever reason, on a huge screen with great sound. Except... the projection is pretty crappy, as you stated, and you lose approximately 90% of the experience of the event.
Opera is the one thing that might work OK... you lose the acoustic experience of a great opera hall, and give up going to the fancy, well-maintained theater for the sticky multiplex, of course. But, the people who would go to an opera performance probably won't even notice the projection quality, and I bet also that those who would actually go to one of these Fathom opera events can't necessarily afford to go to the real opera - much less the Metropolitan opera in NYC - and couldn't get good seats if they did go.
Now - who is the audience for their other "events"? I've seen their advertisements before movies, and it's never anything I or anyone I can think of would actually pay to go to.
That said, you are right about movie projection becoming just "good enough" - a lot of the DLP projection systems in place now are pretty bad, and noticeably worse than film - *if you're a nerd*. The new systems are much better, but if no one notices or cares now, I'm not sure all the old, less-than-great projectors will get replaced anytime soon.
He uses that joke in Annie Hall - didn't know he also had a short story with a similar theme. I've only read a couple of his story collections... guess I'll have to find the rest :)
I love that idea, but I don't think it would work in the US. You'd have to pay and maintain a force of a lot more attendants than are currently needed.
In Thailand I noticed that there are a lot of people paid to do jobs like that - probably not paid much, but it really makes things go a lot more smoothly. Here in the US everything is optimized for maximum profit and least amount of employees - in Thailand (and I'm guessing Taiwan too though I haven't been there) they just throw more employees at a problem until it works since labor is cheap. I really, really appreciated that while I was there (not the exploitation of cheap labor - you know what I mean ;) ). Makes it a much more friendly place to be when someone is getting paid to worry about stuff like this (your parking ticket example) so you don't have to.
I've used parking meter machines as described in TFA in Toronto many times, and it's really not that bad, actually, but I still like Taiwan's idea better :)
I believe the scouts (the ones riding speeder bikes) had different armor - and they do in the Battlefront video games - but in the big battle sequence, where the ewoks win with sticks and rocks, the stormtroopers are wearing the same armor as in any other scene from the three movies.
I agree with your point, but besides what another replier mentions regarding real vs. simulated rape (are you really trying to say that when it's in a non-porn movie it's absolutely real rape, not simulated? that's honestly what it seems like though I don't think that's what you mean), there's another factor. In *most* movies, the rape scenes are meant to horrify the viewer. In rape porn, I'm assuming they aren't trying to horrify you, but to turn you on.
Of course, those that are into rape porn probably get a real kick out of rape in other movies, but still...
It's the intent of the filmmaker that's at question. I don't think it should matter, myself, but I can see where they're coming from - I don't care what turns other people on, but I can see how people would get upset that things like rape turn people on. They don't like that they're depicting what anyone would agree is a horrible act in a manner that turns people on sexually.
That said - what's the point of gory horror films if not to "turn on" parts of your brain? Most people aren't sexually aroused by violent death and gore, but we watch it in movies for entertainment.
I should have mentioned, actually, that for North America, Google Earth probably has better resolution elevation data than this. I think it's based on topographic maps, which have approximately 12-15m resolution, while this new data has 30m resolution. So you might not actually see any improvement in your mountain bike trail profile in Google Earth. However, it may very well be interesting to import it anyway to see the differences. I'm not sure how Google processes the elevation data and it may very well be inaccurate in some places.
Where this new data is really useful is for the rest of the world, where high resolution digital data was not available.
That's not really an issue with this type of data. Remember, the resolution is 30m. There is nothing geologic (that would show up in this type of data) that moves anywhere close to that on human time scales.
There IS data on movement such as those you list, showing real time (in geologic time anyway) movement of the crust due to tectonics, or other things. It's actually a pretty major field in geology, studying minute changes. InSAR and millimeter-accurate differential GPS are two techniques.
Relatively coarse DEM data like ASTER or SRTM is used for different applications where millimeter accuracy isn't necessary - i.e., most things :)
Additionally, there is enough inaccuracy in the instrumentation used for DEM data like this that doing multiple passes will give you significantly different results - the error is measured in meters. Therefore, any small changes - and earthquakes, volcanoes, and tectonic movements are small changes in the big scheme of things - are completely irrelevant as they'll be averaged out anyway. It should be interesting to make a comparison to previous datasets, though, and I'm sure there are people working on that already.
Of course, I suppose you'd notice in this data if a huge volcanic explosion occurred, like when half of Mt. St. Helens blew off. However, that's exceedingly rare :)
IAAGGS (I am a geology grad student).
The previous SRTM data is available completely free to the end-user. I downloaded several gigabytes of it for use in my thesis.
There are commercial vendors who will provide you somewhat better versions of it - with the holes filled, and the individual tiles stitched together. But for someone actually working with the data, that's not really worth much because you can do it yourself in a few minutes.
I'm trying to get the new data right now - I'm still working on my thesis and this will be really great stuff - and it appears it's pretty much the same set-up as before.
Basically, there's no need for cynicism. The people at NASA, USGS, and other government science agencies really do want their data to be free and accessible by anyone.
Interestingly enough, the reason only 90m resolution data is available from the SRTM mission - previously the best-available global DEM data - is because the Department of Defense restricted it. Within NASA scientists need special permission to access it, and outside of NASA absolutely no one has access. So for the scientific community, this new data being available is really great.
As for terrorists? Give me a break... Google Earth is 100x more useful than this data to terrorists, and not because Google probably will use this new data. I really don't think elevation data is that useful to terrorists.
I'm a geology grad student, and I actually work with this data. To be restricted access to better data because the DOD says it's sensitive is extremely frustrating. That's something you're supposed to opine about on slashdot, not actually experience!
The elevation data in Google Earth and World Wind is apparently already based upon the previous best data available - either the SRTM 90m data, or digitized topographic maps. They don't really specify (at least as far as I could tell) but the Google Earth data matches pretty well with the SRTM data.
That said, the best way to handle data like this is not in Google Earth. I'm guessing eventually they will update their data to incorporate this, unless they are actually using another source. In the mean time, you can use the data directly in a GIS program.
I'm a grad student using this data for my thesis, so I have access to advanced tools, most importantly ArcGIS (you can, of course, find this on any good torrent site) which allows for all kinds of great analyses. However, I have also played around with the open source GRASS GIS and qgis, and for basic stuff they should be pretty good. You can't get a 3D view in qgis, though - it may be possible in GRASS, I'm not sure.
For programs focused on DEMs, check out MicroDEM and 3DEM, as detailed in articles on this site: http://freegeographytools.com/series. You can get your 3D views and a heck of a lot more with those programs. I'm pretty sure those are going to be Windows programs, though.
Google Earth is probably good enough, of course. If the tool you mention works, I don't see why you wouldn't want to just use that to get your KML file. I don't find Google Earth that useful for my thesis work (besides the fact that it hard-freezes my computer - probably an Intel video card issue with the Linux drivers, but I can't figure out a solution), but for basic visualizations it is perfect.
I am actually using this data for my thesis project in geology. Actually, I'm really excited to learn about this, as the previously available 90m resolution SRTM data isn't really sufficient for my needs.
The SRTM data is all free to download, if you can figure out their poor interface for selecting the files you need. If it wasn't, there would be a lot fewer people working with it. It is the most important data for the analyses I'm doing, and without it my thesis would be a lot different (you can do similar things with regular topographic maps, but essentially only by making hand measurements). I'm really glad that I haven't done a ton of analyses using the SRTM data - now I will wait until I can get my hands on the new stuff.
For a grad student like me with little to no funding for my research and a tiny paycheck from working as a TA, even a nominal fee to download is prohibitive. Even for someone that DOES have funding, paying for stuff like this is extremely annoying. Despite what journal publishers want you to think, science is about openness and sharing of information. Most scientists freely share their data and work with others - even those that work with proprietary data in industry, if you ask them nicely.
And as others have noted - we already paid for it. It's produced by the government.
Now, here's the best part - there is actually 30m data from the SRTM mission. However, except for North America, only the 90m data is available, because it's restricted - not by NASA, but by the DOD. So with this new data they've apparently side-stepped the DOD. NASA and the USGS do seem like they want to get their data out their and accessible by scientists, despite what the DOD may want. I am working on Thailand, so the 30m SRTM data was restricted, but now I should be able to get this new data at the same resolution.
I guess Orange County generically refers to the one in CA (I live in Placentia/Fullerton) but there IS an Orange County in Florida as well (which happens to be where Disneyworld is located, funnily enough). Here you're replying to an AC that's apparently from Northern CA so it's fine, but I noticed you answered this question a couple other times without specifying California.
My point is, to most people from the US just saying Orange County is probably sufficient, but it's not really being precise especially considering that /. has an international audience.
Before I traveled here a couple years ago (and then moved here last August from New York) I would not have been able to tell you that Orange County is in Southern California. I think I just assumed it was all Los Angeles, or at least LA County ;) Most people know about Orange County because of The OC, the "housewives" shows, and Orange County Choppers (which apparently is located in New York anyway... and Daytona, where they have Bike Week, is not in Orange County FL.... who knows). If you don't pay attention to any of those things, which many people don't, it's not necessarily obvious where you mean when you say Orange County :)
By the way, I have had trouble meeting people here as well. Though as a poor grad student I'm in a different situation, universities and university-connected events really are probably the best place to meet geeky people. The only people I've met around here who are geeky are either students or connected to the universities in some way. If you're in Tustin, check out if there are any geeky events at UC Irvine.
You said you're looking for a geek girl so at least you're not making the mistake of wanting the cheerleader when you have nothing in common with the cheerleader.
I know it's just an example, and surely this is something people do, but is this a mistake that geeks actually make? This is what happens in a lot of movies... but who writes those movies, and who is the intended audience? It's not geeks in either case...
Real life geeks are far more apt to obsess over geek girls, even if they don't have supermodel looks. I mean, I can't speak for everyone, and there are different levels of geekiness, but that has been my experience. The people who are changed into these geeky characters obsessed with cheerleaders when they're written into the movies are more like general "unpopular" guys, most of whom are not geeks.
Amazon.co.uk has The Dark Knight for ~£15. I've only been to an HMV in Toronto, not in the UK where I presume you're from, but I could tell right away it was one of those mall/high-street stores that charge $10 more than if you go to any other store. I imagine there are other places that you could buy stuff from, and honestly I'm not sure who actually buys stuff from stores like HMV (US equivalent is FYE) - they do tend to occasionally have harder to find titles, that's true, but when you can get them on Amazon for half the cost and with minimal or free shipping, it still doesn't make sense to ever shop there.
That said - even in "regular" stores, Blu-Rays are overpriced. There's no denying that. However, if you only buy when they've got a discount sale, you can easily get your £12 price for new releases (often the first week they're out they'll be discounted) and even less for catalog titles or movies older than 1-2 years.
It's stupid that they're trying to keep the price so high, but it's not impossible to buy Blu-Ray, if you're so inclined, without paying the official asking price. Amazon (and probably other online retailers) are currently the best place. Retail stores hopefully will catch up, as buying online doesn't replace impulse purchases for things you want to watch that same night, but for now it's the only reasonable option.
Interesting - I'm not opposed to being screened in such a way, I suppose, but good to know regardless.
I would love to be able to get out and look around. I've wanted to go to Korea for a long time. I'm not sure if I will have time between flights but I will definitely take your advice if I do - better than wandering around not knowing where to go, for sure :)
Maybe next time I will find a research project that will take me to Korea so I can actually spend some time there - this time I'm going to Thailand at someone else's expense to do research for my geology master's :)
Do they do this if you're just passing through, making a flight connection?
I'll be traveling to Thailand, connecting in Seoul, in a few weeks and I'm curious.
If they don't scan people unless they leave it seems... maybe not pointless, but ridiculously less effective.
This is in reply just to the part about summer camp. I do appreciate your reasoning, but I hope you tell her she can't just call you whenever she wants while at camp. Your camp may be different but at the one I worked at (and attended as a kid) we were in the wilderness and part of the point was to get away from the ubiquitous technology in regular life.
Obviously, you're free to parent as you like, and the camp your daughter goes to is probably a lot different than mine. However, as someone with a lot of experience in that area, perhaps you'll appreciate that there are actually several good reasons to not allow cell phones at camp.
Now, my camp was actually in a pretty remote location, and only in the past couple of years has sporadic cell service been available, so it hasn't been a huge problem. Still, I knew that a lot of kids brought their cell phones, and I confiscated them if they caused problems. As you can imagine, "illicit" devices like that can cause quite a stir among kids, especially if they were cool phones. Next thing you know, showing off turns into fights and broken/lost/stolen phones. Sounds like an exaggeration, but it really does happen. Kids are like that.
Besides that, and more importantly, you send your kid to camp to learn independence and all that great stuff. Don't ruin it by giving her a way out - make sure she only uses the phone if there really is an emergency, not just because she's homesick.
And the great thing is, after spending a lot of time away from technology while at camp, a lot of kids find they're less addicted to their cell phones and video games than they were before! I love my electronics as much as anyone here, but the benefits of that should be pretty obvious.
I don't think the problem is really with the amount of lab time provided - this is limited for a reason. They rightfully require supervision from the grad student TAs, or whoever, who don't have unlimited time. Most likely, these policies are based on years of experience that says that letting undergrads into the labs on their own time is a bad idea. Considering some of the stuff that went on in lab classes I took as an undergrad while the grad students *were* there, I can easily imagine what could "go wrong" if they weren't there.
The problem is with those who are grading the lab reports who will only accept the "one true" answer. Yes, the result should have confirmed conservation of energy, or whatever. But despite being a simple question, the lab setups are usually not that simple, and can be quite precise. And you're using decades-old equipment that's passed through hundreds of undergrad hands before you, and the grad student doesn't have time to waste to properly calibrate and fix everything beforehand. Not to mention that you as the undergrad aren't familiar with the equipment or its use. So sometimes - more often than not, in my experience - things won't work quite right.
That's fine, that's part of the "learning experience." At my school, the University of Rochester, if your results were not "correct" but you knew specifically why, that was good enough. You can't just write "human error" and get away with it, but through the course of the experiment if you keep track of what wasn't working and how you tried to fix it (or how the grad student tried to fix it), you can write a pretty compelling paragraph about why the experiment failed. If you can figure that out and explain the deviation, you probably learned more from the lab than those whose equipment worked the first time. And your grade didn't suffer for it, at my school anyway, and that's the way it should be.
Though highly cynical, I appreciate your point, but for the last paragraph - as any photographer will tell you, there is *always* something new to photograph.
If there wasn't, then no one would bring their fancy cameras anywhere, especially to places like the US national parks. Ansel Adams got it perfect already, so what's the point, right?
In places like national parks, yes, it's easy to get bored and disinterested in photographing things that you know thousands have photographed before. But if you put some effort in to be creative, that is when it's most rewarding - knowing you're doing something creative and unique instead of the hum-drum shots that everyone else got.
And if you're in outer space, for fuck's sake, there would be endless things to photograph. Even if it's been photographed before. I'm practically drooling just thinking of all the things you could photograph in a space station. It doesn't have to be all the geeky technical stuff, or the view out the window. Having some great photographs of the astronauts in space, for example - not just while they're doing official work - would be priceless not only for them and their grandchildren, but for future generations who will always wonder what it's like to be in space (until cheap and easy space flight becomes available, of course, but even then - I'm still fascinated by the world's early explorers even though I can "explore" the planet much more easily than they did).
The Alien Skin photoshop plugins work great, but it isn't going to fool too many people into thinking your photo is actually a polaroid if it isn't. Using Alien Skin to alter colors/contrast and add film grain works great to create images simulating other types of aesthetically pleasing film, but with polaroid there are several other factors which make simulation pointless. Primarily is the work that goes into it. If you want to do a good job simulating a polaroid with a digital image, you have to put a lot of thought into shooting it the right way with the right lens, and a lot of processing (beyond the Alien Skin kind of thing) to make it look right.
That's completely opposite of the point of polaroid, which is to enable spontaneous, instant results.
In summary: to do a good fake of polaroid = a lot of thought, time, and processing work, removing the spontaneity and most of the fun for what will likely be a mediocre result; to take a real polaroid = instantaneous, spontaneous, gratifying, fun.
I don't have much to add, but wanted to say that I have an A-1 my grandfather gave me as well as a 40D. I have several quite expensive EF lenses for the 40D, but on the A-1 I just use the stock 50mm f/1.8.
Yet... when I do occasionally use the A-1, I am so much more pleased with the photos I get. It's not just the quality, though that is certainly there - especially with black and white film - but somehow the photos almost always turn out better. It's got something to do with the different techniques you use with a camera like the A-1 or AE-1 compared to those with one like the 40D with big lenses.
I do have 30mm f/1.4, 50mm f/1.8, and 85mm f/1.8 EF primes for the 40D... that helps, but it's not just the classic 50mm f/1.8 on the A-1 that does it. There's much more to it that draws me back to using the A-1 once in a while.
I can't speak for other places, but in the Cal State University system, us graduate students who are paid as an RA or TA do have a union. I'm not sure how much the union actually does, but it's there and considering how little I'm paid I can't imagine what it'd be like if there wasn't a union.
Besides that I do agree with your sentiments, but without being a grad student yourself I'm not sure you'll fully understand - though I'm sure you've experienced a little bit working in a couple labs (and yes - PHD comics *is* accurate). We're not in it to be paid a lot and to be treated exceptionally well. We're at a low rung in academia and at the low rungs in any field, you have to take what you're given - to a certain extent of course - until you're able to advance.
What I've noticed is that the grad students who are miserable are the ones that shouldn't really be in grad school. They're probably more than smart enough, that's not the problem. The problem is that they're probably there because they thought that's what they needed to do to get a good job, or their parents "encouraged" them, or whatever. These people would be much, much happier if they got a job instead (if they could even find one - that's part of the problem of course).
That said there are of course abusive advisors and all-around bad places to be a student. You have to expect this, and figure out if that's the case before you decide to go somewhere. And if it's not working out, you have to accept that it might be best to leave and go somewhere else, even if it means wasting a semester or two. Or, you have to just go with it and take the initiative to make the best of it. I'm not necessarily entirely happy with what I'm doing right now, but I'm definitely making the best of it and planning for better things in the future.
In other words - these things vary wildly depending on the school and specific department. Your experience - even in separate labs - does not mean every graduate program is like that.
Anyway - I agree with you overall. Graduate students pretty much bring these bad conditions upon themselves. We - myself included - just accept things because "that's the way it is." However, as I hinted at earlier, I don't just accept everything crappy that's thrown at me, and that's something I wish - and something, frankly, I expected - more graduate students would do. It'd make things better for everyone, and as you say, for academic research in general.