Lightcraft Technologies Inc. have been flying laser-powered craft since 1997 their heighest flight reached a 233ft in October 2000.
Their technolnogy is rather different to nasa's photon-pushed leightweight design, instead they have a 1-kilo spinning-top that has a curved mirror on the bottom, which focuses very short laser pulses from the ground to heat the air under the spinning top to extreme temperatures, 'blasting' the top upwards.
Sadly, their website (www.lightcrafttechnologies.com) was last updated in Dec 2000, does anyone know if the idea/company has any life left in it?
There is no need to mess with other people's machines, you'll just gain an enemy for life.
There is plenty that you can do to demonstrate your 1337 hax0r skillz and sense of humour on your own machine.
Try squashing your head and hands into in a colour scanner, use the resulting picture as a screensaver, with a piece of audio of you saying "help I'm trapped in the monitor!" set to that play every 5 minutes and go to lunch.
If the company you work for is profitable, the best solution is to leave and start up a company that does the same thing, it will clearly be more profitable as you won't be treating your workforce like prisoners.
If (as it would appear from their management style) they are a sinking ship, you could content yourself with leaving just as promptly at the end of your shift, and arranging that your departure occurs when you are midway through a sentence talking to your boss.
When he asks ask why you are going home halfway through a sentence, tell him, and bill the company overtime for your explanation.
I still haven't figured out if "Fire upon the Deep" won the later Hugo because voters wanted to compensate for the earlier decision, or because FUtD used Internet references just when the Internet was gaining mass market penetration.
Actually I think it was because it was an amazingly good book. I guess you just didn't like it? Sure, the net references were timely (and the grey-goo based stuff almost prescient), but it's the way things like the tine's civilisation was built so convincingly from the one really nice idea about pack communication, and the implications of zones and sublimed ancients that made it great book.
Because they also released his location at the time, the number of computers in his posession and the extent of his association with the username in question (crazyface@KaZaA). This is "Info".
....the open source/slashdot communities would have long since dropped Mozilla and Linux and be putting the finishing touches to Lawyerkiller, SuperBallmerBall II and Grand Theft Intellectalproperty III.
When a game gradually introduces me to new concepts, and I end up mastering a highly complex system of controls, I feel I have really achieved something by performing the manouvers needed for the hard bits.
Yoshi's Island is the best emample of this I can think of. If you sit down at the game for the first time and see all the controls it's overwhelming, but after you are 70% done, it's all become second nature.
Contrast this with Gran Turismo 2 (and it's derivatives for PS2). You are required to comlpete the most difficult things in the game (the licence tests) BEFORE you can get to any of the events where you woiuld learn the necessary skils! The curve actually goes the wrong way, if you pass the very hardest licence, you can finally enter the race where you win a fortune for simply holding the accellerator dowm for half an hour and turning a gentle flat out left turn every few minutes (cue the NASCAR jokes).
The best way to incorporate difficulty is to make the game enjoyable without leaving the people who don't do the hardest things feel they have 'lost'. The old N64 game Wetrix does exactly this, finishing it (by getting a billion points) took a bunck of people exchanging strategies of the net for months, and was the hardest think I eve did in gaming, but it was a complete surprise that the game actually did finish at all until we got there, so everyone is happy!
In Britain, the single really is dead, and our local RIAA equivalent (the BPI) killed it.
Here the big record companines want their latest manuifactured boy band to get to number one, so they promote the single for months before realease to get pent-up demand, then they launch the single at a huge discount to the normal price, and it gets to number one. Then they raise the price massively to try and recoup their losses after the first week.
The result of this is that if you hear a single and want to buy it, the chances are it's either not out, or it's overpriced at 4.99 (that's $7.90, not for an album, but for a SINGLE!).
The artists make no money at all from singles because high overall sales have been sacrificed for one week peak sales, and the discount price is only achieved by record companies GIVING shops the CDs for free, which they recoup from the artists under the name of "marketing expenses"
Sucks, doesn't it? But wait, I've only told you half of it...
The all important charts here are compiled by the BPI, and a few years back theye were getting their asses kicked by small dance labels that were actually putting out music that the public liked. The BPI was paying a fortune to get the small label acts to remix their tired formula pop, and still losing the sales batte. In order to stamp out long dance tracks with plenty of remixes, they introduced a rule that a single only qualifies for the charts if it is less than 20 minutes long, and has less than 4 tracks on it, which favours low value for money baladeers.
To make matters worse, the chart rules allow 2 different CDs for each single to be released, as well as a DVD single (The DVD single is only allowed to have 1 video track on it, the video is entirely static for 2 of the tracks!) so to obtain all the versions of a track that the US gets on 1 CD single, we would have to buy 3 disks at 4.99, making a total of 14.97, which translates to $23.70
That's TWENTY THREE DOLLARS SEVENTY CENTS for the same music you americans get on one single, and to listen to it all, we have to swap CDs, and also have a DVD player that doesn't actually show moving pictures most of the time!
Part of my business is web design, but that's really an offshoot from doing print and video design work. Here's my advice:
1) Don't 2) Look for clients that got ripped off for a site 5-10 years ago, they paid $50k for some junk, so they think $30k for something good is a bargain. 3) Everyone and their dog can write html, so you need a speciality. Incorportating bits of Flash where it is actually beneficial is my trick, you need to find your trick. 4) People are inclined to buy their headed paper, business cards etc from the same source as they get their website. You can get business put your way (and pass on business for a mark-up) by forming close relationships with local printers/copy shops. 5) See all those people saying Don't? Listen to them!
RFID tags have the potential problem of a thief scanning my house to see what I have inside....and the advantage that the police can scan the thief's house, arrest him and give you your stuff back.
The way that RFID will get accepted by the public is when big ticket stealable items refuse to work, and better yet 'phone home' when they are stolen.
Under MacOS 9, the fix for that is quite simple: set your clock for the far future, see popup, return to corect time, popup will not appear again until the far future is past.
no, this is Slashdot building up a stock of spoof stories to dupe on April 1st
Why do people insist on getting the plural wrong?
on
Space Legos!
·
· Score: 1
There is no such word as "Legos", just as there is no such word as "sheeps". The correct word to use is simply Lego.
I'm sure that everyone who has ever read a slashdot story about lego must know this by now, so why are people still getting it wrong? Obstinacy? Stupidity? Or maybe posters (and the US Air Force) just think they are right and the Lego company are wrong about this?
I've been pleasantly surprised by Flash MX, actionscript is a fully featured programming language that runs across all the platforms Flash is ported to. You can pass variables from your html page, so your graphing application should be writable as 1 single 'movie' that accepts data, rather than writing a new one every time you need to draw a graph.
The only problem is that the tutorials and manuals are aimed purely at designers, not at programmers, so the concept of a variable is given a 20 page explanation whereas the syntax of the more complex commands is glossed over in a 'do this and it works, you probably don't need to mess with it' manner.
Your analysis is correct if the defender rolls first, but that never happens in Risk. The throws are either simultanious, or attacker first, depending on which set of rules you got in your set. I the attacker rols first it can be better for the defender to only roll 1 die.
Consider what happens if the attacker rolls first and gets 2 or 3 sixes. The defender then only has a 1 in 6 chance of matching the 2nd 6 and therfore successfully defending with his second die.
He is better off not throwing it this time, since the attacker is likely to throw less than 2 sixes next time, which would give him better odds.
Let's see what the Risk FAQ has to say about this:
The old U.K. rules are quite clear that the attacker rolls the dice first, then the defender rolls. Though it isn't explicit, this suggests that the defender can choose how many to roll based on the attacker's dice, since this would seem to be the only point of rolling later.
This sometimes causes the defender to use only 1 die when he was entitled to use 2. If faced by 2 sixes you only roll 1, whereas faced with the second highest being a one you roll 2. (In both cases this assumes you are not trying to let the attacker through with minimal losses to get to a mutual enemy.)
The U.S. and new U.K. rules specify that both attacker and defender decide beforehand and roll simultaneously. This leads to a faster game and it is rare that the defender rolls 1 when entitled to 2
I live in the UK and got the old rules with my set, I guess you didn't?
Slashdot Mirror
Well in the meantime, you can use this list free of charge...
Do Not Call:
Absolutely every number in the whole world except 248-926-0688
I'm sure you and Mr Ralsky will get along just fine.
Lightcraft Technologies Inc. have been flying laser-powered craft since 1997 their heighest flight reached a 233ft in October 2000.
Their technolnogy is rather different to nasa's photon-pushed leightweight design, instead they have a 1-kilo spinning-top that has a curved mirror on the bottom, which focuses very short laser pulses from the ground to heat the air under the spinning top to extreme temperatures, 'blasting' the top upwards.
Sadly, their website (www.lightcrafttechnologies.com) was last updated in Dec 2000, does anyone know if the idea/company has any life left in it?
Screengrab SETI running, photoshop in a dialogue box that says "alien life found, please contact NASA immediately", and set it as target's wallpaper.
There is no need to mess with other people's machines, you'll just gain an enemy for life.
There is plenty that you can do to demonstrate your 1337 hax0r skillz and sense of humour on your own machine.
Try squashing your head and hands into in a colour scanner, use the resulting picture as a screensaver, with a piece of audio of you saying "help I'm trapped in the monitor!" set to that play every 5 minutes and go to lunch.
If the company you work for is profitable, the best solution is to leave and start up a company that does the same thing, it will clearly be more profitable as you won't be treating your workforce like prisoners.
If (as it would appear from their management style) they are a sinking ship, you could content yourself with leaving just as promptly at the end of your shift, and arranging that your departure occurs when you are midway through a sentence talking to your boss.
When he asks ask why you are going home halfway through a sentence, tell him, and bill the company overtime for your explanation.
No, it's not a continent, it's a country in the continent of North America.
Because there is no ball, it's optical.
I still haven't figured out if "Fire upon the Deep" won the later Hugo because voters wanted to compensate for the earlier decision, or because FUtD used Internet references just when the Internet was gaining mass market penetration.
Actually I think it was because it was an amazingly good book. I guess you just didn't like it? Sure, the net references were timely (and the grey-goo based stuff almost prescient), but it's the way things like the tine's civilisation was built so convincingly from the one really nice idea about pack communication, and the implications of zones and sublimed ancients that made it great book.
never be reported by the "mainstream" press...
#4: David Blaine Pelted with Eggs and Golf Balls During Stunt
The BBC actually went a bit wilder with this one - no golf balls were mentioned, but they reported the eggs and added fruit, chips (or "freedom fries" if you are American) and a half naked woman
Because they also released his location at the time, the number of computers in his posession and the extent of his association with the username in question (crazyface@KaZaA). This is "Info".
I poured McDonald's coffee on myself twice (both straight from the pot, not after it had been poured) and I only received one minor burn
1) Jury awards $2.9 million against McDonalds because their coffee was too hot.
2) You have discovered McDonalds coffee is no longer too hot.
I suggest you hit yourself repeatedy with a cluestick until you see the connection!
....the open source/slashdot communities would have long since dropped Mozilla and Linux and be putting the finishing touches to Lawyerkiller, SuperBallmerBall II and Grand Theft Intellectalproperty III.
When a game gradually introduces me to new concepts, and I end up mastering a highly complex system of controls, I feel I have really achieved something by performing the manouvers needed for the hard bits.
Yoshi's Island is the best emample of this I can think of. If you sit down at the game for the first time and see all the controls it's overwhelming, but after you are 70% done, it's all become second nature.
Contrast this with Gran Turismo 2 (and it's derivatives for PS2). You are required to comlpete the most difficult things in the game (the licence tests) BEFORE you can get to any of the events where you woiuld learn the necessary skils! The curve actually goes the wrong way, if you pass the very hardest licence, you can finally enter the race where you win a fortune for simply holding the accellerator dowm for half an hour and turning a gentle flat out left turn every few minutes (cue the NASCAR jokes).
The best way to incorporate difficulty is to make the game enjoyable without leaving the people who don't do the hardest things feel they have 'lost'. The old N64 game Wetrix does exactly this, finishing it (by getting a billion points) took a bunck of people exchanging strategies of the net for months, and was the hardest think I eve did in gaming, but it was a complete surprise that the game actually did finish at all until we got there, so everyone is happy!
In Britain, the single really is dead, and our local RIAA equivalent (the BPI) killed it.
Here the big record companines want their latest manuifactured boy band to get to number one, so they promote the single for months before realease to get pent-up demand, then they launch the single at a huge discount to the normal price, and it gets to number one. Then they raise the price massively to try and recoup their losses after the first week.
The result of this is that if you hear a single and want to buy it, the chances are it's either not out, or it's overpriced at 4.99 (that's $7.90, not for an album, but for a SINGLE!).
The artists make no money at all from singles because high overall sales have been sacrificed for one week peak sales, and the discount price is only achieved by record companies GIVING shops the CDs for free, which they recoup from the artists under the name of "marketing expenses"
Sucks, doesn't it? But wait, I've only told you half of it...
The all important charts here are compiled by the BPI, and a few years back theye were getting their asses kicked by small dance labels that were actually putting out music that the public liked. The BPI was paying a fortune to get the small label acts to remix their tired formula pop, and still losing the sales batte. In order to stamp out long dance tracks with plenty of remixes, they introduced a rule that a single only qualifies for the charts if it is less than 20 minutes long, and has less than 4 tracks on it, which favours low value for money baladeers.
To make matters worse, the chart rules allow 2 different CDs for each single to be released, as well as a DVD single (The DVD single is only allowed to have 1 video track on it, the video is entirely static for 2 of the tracks!) so to obtain all the versions of a track that the US gets on 1 CD single, we would have to buy 3 disks at 4.99, making a total of 14.97, which translates to $23.70
That's TWENTY THREE DOLLARS SEVENTY CENTS for the same music you americans get on one single, and to listen to it all, we have to swap CDs, and also have a DVD player that doesn't actually show moving pictures most of the time!
Is it any wonder the single is dead here?
Part of my business is web design, but that's really an offshoot from doing print and video design work. Here's my advice:
1) Don't
2) Look for clients that got ripped off for a site 5-10 years ago, they paid $50k for some junk, so they think $30k for something good is a bargain.
3) Everyone and their dog can write html, so you need a speciality. Incorportating bits of Flash where it is actually beneficial is my trick, you need to find your trick.
4) People are inclined to buy their headed paper, business cards etc from the same source as they get their website. You can get business put your way (and pass on business for a mark-up) by forming close relationships with local printers/copy shops.
5) See all those people saying Don't? Listen to them!
The Seiko Kinetic Watch for women!
RFID tags have the potential problem of a thief scanning my house to see what I have inside. ...and the advantage that the police can scan the thief's house, arrest him and give you your stuff back.
The way that RFID will get accepted by the public is when big ticket stealable items refuse to work, and better yet 'phone home' when they are stolen.
I'm not sure if this is a good thing or not.
A proud moment for any Slashdot user, the very first dupe of an article I orginally submitted!
2001-01-04 16:31:48 Forget fiber optics, use Marine Worm Spines! (articles,news) (accepted)
I can't find it in the old stories archive to give a direct link to though.
Under MacOS 9, the fix for that is quite simple: set your clock for the far future, see popup, return to corect time, popup will not appear again until the far future is past.
no, this is Slashdot building up a stock of spoof stories to dupe on April 1st
There is no such word as "Legos", just as there is no such word as "sheeps". The correct word to use is simply Lego.
I'm sure that everyone who has ever read a slashdot story about lego must know this by now, so why are people still getting it wrong? Obstinacy? Stupidity? Or maybe posters (and the US Air Force) just think they are right and the Lego company are wrong about this?
Each man kills the thing he loves (but only if he rolls high enough)
Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much (except casting fireballs, that really pisses them off)
In all matters of opinion, our adversaries are insane (especially the undead ones)
The only thing to do with good advice is pass it on. It is never any use to oneself (especially if you are a NPC)
It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious (and you REALLY need to find some charisma +1s, loser!)
To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness ^H^H^H^H^H^H^H a rather predictable plot device
The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it (or make a saving roll)
Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it is always from the noblest motives (or it's a just cut scene to keep the plot moving)
and of course...
We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars^H^H^H^H^H rather shoddy lens-flare effects
I've been pleasantly surprised by Flash MX, actionscript is a fully featured programming language that runs across all the platforms Flash is ported to. You can pass variables from your html page, so your graphing application should be writable as 1 single 'movie' that accepts data, rather than writing a new one every time you need to draw a graph.
The only problem is that the tutorials and manuals are aimed purely at designers, not at programmers, so the concept of a variable is given a 20 page explanation whereas the syntax of the more complex commands is glossed over in a 'do this and it works, you probably don't need to mess with it' manner.
Your analysis is correct if the defender rolls first, but that never happens in Risk. The throws are either simultanious, or attacker first, depending on which set of rules you got in your set. I the attacker rols first it can be better for the defender to only roll 1 die.
Consider what happens if the attacker rolls first and gets 2 or 3 sixes. The defender then only has a 1 in 6 chance of matching the 2nd 6 and therfore successfully defending with his second die.
He is better off not throwing it this time, since the attacker is likely to throw less than 2 sixes next time, which would give him better odds.
Let's see what the Risk FAQ has to say about this:
I live in the UK and got the old rules with my set, I guess you didn't?