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User: MPAB

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Comments · 277

  1. Re:One of the better ideas to fix health care... on Discuss the US Presidential Election & Health Care · · Score: 1

    Both. There's private insurance with its usual rules, but you can also pay for yourself if you have enough money.

  2. Re:One of the better ideas to fix health care... on Discuss the US Presidential Election & Health Care · · Score: 5, Informative

    I agree. I'm a doctor in Spain and the system works exactly that way. Here it's not the insurance companies, but the "benevolent health system" that press us into delaying or denying tests and treatments to people. The exact people that see a nice amount of their income substracted de facto by the health system.
    Those that want (and can) go to the private system to get things done ASAP. They are paying double, though: to the public system which they can't renounce and to the private system.
    Still, nothing can beat the fact the public system is obliged to receive and trat you as long as you're alive. But once inside it's not the money but the "I know someone inside" or "I'll file a complaint" that will get you the best bed, the shortest queue or the specialists you want.

  3. Re:So... on PC Makers Try To Pinch Seconds From Their Boot Times · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't mind boot time so much - what really gets on my nerves is when a machine comes on, pretends it's ready but is then maybe five minutes doing other stuff before you can actually use it while you stare at the screen and frustratedly try to click on things. That's especially bad in the roaming profile scenario you mentioned.

    That's perhaps the worst part, as most people that have no idea of how a computer works will start clicking on progran after program, thus starting yet another parallel process that adds up to the rest. And parallel processes take more than the same ones in series because of memory/disk seek times and the need to share a common pipeline.
    I always try to encourage people not to "start" after the screen appears, but after "the red light goes from always on to scarcely blinking". Of course most people ignore the advice and press things frantically till they end up CTRL-ALT-DELing and thinking it did the trick.

  4. Re:Are they really being lost? on British MoD Stunned By Massive Data Loss · · Score: 1

    *Study performed in its integrity by browsing eBay.

  5. Re:Shhh... Don't tell the terrorists on Qantas Blames Wireless For Aircraft Incidents · · Score: 5, Funny

    Coming this summer: Mice on a Plane!

  6. RMS was right! on Microsoft To Release Cloud-Oriented Windows OS · · Score: 5, Informative
  7. Re:Sounds like a good move on Activision Goes After Individual Game Pirates · · Score: 1

    Which is a trap to keep CRAB PEOPLE busy and out of the way.

  8. Re:Sounds like a good move on Activision Goes After Individual Game Pirates · · Score: 1

    In Lima, Peru there's HUGE MALLS of piracy, bootlegging and stolen goods where the police don't venture. Either because they're paid off or because the politicians in charge don't want to get involved because they fear a bloodbath.

    The very few times the police have intervened and confiscated stuff, there's been lots of bruised, stoned, scalded and even shot people and cops. Tons of merchandise ended up hauled out and next morning business would be resumed as usual.

  9. Re:"This is me..." on Activision Goes After Individual Game Pirates · · Score: 1

    In your analogy, it would be more like if she went to the store and took a picture of each and every page of the book. By stealing the book she's getting that one irreplaceable copy out of the market and directly harming the last buyer (the storekeeper).

    If the book gets its value from being a nicely put-together book (which is the usual thing in coffee table books) then it would be more like games where you get maps, action figures, helmets, etc. (which you don't get by pirating the data on the disk).

    OTOH, if your wife -which never intended to buy the book- spreads copies of the photos from the book and one of them gets for free to someone that intended to buy the book, not because of its looks but because of its contents, then it would indeed be a lost sale.

  10. Re:For use in new aircraft? on US Army To Develop "Thought Helmets" · · Score: 1

    In Soviet Rusia, helmet thinks YOU!

  11. Re:Might work for some things... on Military Uses Virtual Iraq To Treat PTSD · · Score: 2, Funny

    What happened? Was he eaten by a grue?

  12. Re:Asset valuation programmer seeks job on Data Centers Crucial To Lehman Sale · · Score: 1

    Governments encouraging companies to enable "idiots" buy things they cannot afford are ... praised for "saving the economy" as they buy the companies with taxpayers' money.
    In the near future, the companies will be sold again and close the circle.

  13. Re:Peru & Microsoft?? on Peru To Be First To Put Windows On OLPC Laptop · · Score: 2, Informative

    Never happened. OTOH, Peru has a HUGE piracy market, known locally as "Wilson Galleries" or "Wilson st." in the case of software, "Mesa Redonda" and "El Hueco" for music and video. And let's not forget "Polvos Azules" for bootlegging, "Tacora" and "La Victoria" (a whole district) for stolen car parts and "Malvinas Ave." for pretty much everything ele that's been stolen.

    The availability of cheap (stolen/counterfeit/pirated) computers and software has pushed MS deep into the peruvian psyche as the one and only option.

  14. Re:Relative risk on New Study Links Plastics To Heart Disease, Diabetes · · Score: 1

    And do you choke on their ashes?

  15. Re:about that... on New Study Links Plastics To Heart Disease, Diabetes · · Score: 1, Offtopic

    Khaaaa.aaaa.aaaa.nnnn!

  16. Re:Programmer Priests on Tech Vs. Business? · · Score: 1

    The Incas didn't have pyramids. You're being too reliant on Indiana Jones.

  17. Re:Simple: on San Fran Hunts For Mystery Device On City Network · · Score: 5, Funny

    And because of Murphy's law the drywalled server never overheats or has downtime, unlike its well-cared-for counterparts.

  18. Re:uh on Verizon Tech Accused Of Making $220K In Sex Calls On User Lines · · Score: 1

    I guess it gets you off ... the pole.

  19. Re:"Water Bears" on "Water Bears" First Animals to Survive Trip Into Space Naked · · Score: 3, Funny

    With lasers

  20. Re:Not patent-worthy on Apple Admits iPod Is From 1970s UK · · Score: 5, Funny

    Wow! You were college friends with Bill Gates?

  21. Re:Seems Like A Bad Summary on Apple Admits iPod Is From 1970s UK · · Score: 1

    The first digital audio player, perhaps. MP3 wasn't developed until the nineties.

  22. Re:New Sony Figures on Sony Pledges More Accurate Laptop Battery Figures · · Score: 1

    Also it never gets flat under OSX because it recharges by the smug.

  23. Re:Battery testing methods on Sony Pledges More Accurate Laptop Battery Figures · · Score: 1

    The real new SONY methrod: a rootkit that probes the battery each second. With the minor side effect of disabling the optic drive.

  24. Re:New Sony Figures on Sony Pledges More Accurate Laptop Battery Figures · · Score: 3, Funny

    They should put a big red LED counter on each battery, that way we might cut the red wire before it gets to 00:01

  25. Re:social networking considered harmful on Researchers Build Malicious Facebook App · · Score: 1

    And a beowulf cluster of those!