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User: Charliemopps

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  1. Re:hmmm... on Carnegie-Mellon Sends Hundreds of Acceptance Letters By Mistake · · Score: 1

    I agree for the most part. I did, however, have a small grant based on the school I picked when I went. I had to say "yes" or "no" to, etc... I could see myself calling them and telling them to give it to someone else, etc... I think it's rather unlikely any particular person would find themselves in a situation like that. But there were 800 affected people... the chances go way up once you see that.

    Too be honest, it's been decades since I went to school, so I'm probably not the best resource in knowing how admissions are handled now-a-days.

  2. Re:... and this is surprising how? on Samsung Smart TVs Don't Encrypt the Voice Data They Collect · · Score: 3, Insightful

    There is no legal obligation to encrypt.
    There is no culpability if the data is lost.
    It costs time and money to secure it.

    Why would they bother?

  3. They'd send a couple of capsules the size of a nickle into our atmosphere from outside the ort cloud. They'd either be laced with a virus to kill us all, antimater or some other yet-to-be-discovered nastiness and it'd be all over in seconds. We'd have no idea if they didn't want us to have one.

  4. hmmm... on Carnegie-Mellon Sends Hundreds of Acceptance Letters By Mistake · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I suspect those that turned down other university offers for this one, only to find out they weren't accepted and no have no-where to go have basis for a lawsuit. And what about those that had scholarships at other schools and lost them? Mistakes like this, and such a critical point in your life, affect the whole of the rest of your life. It could change the entire trajectory of your career.

  5. Re:uh yea on Ask Slashdot: Version Control For Non-Developers? · · Score: 1

    I maintain a wiki used by 3000 non-techie people as you put it. You don't give people enough credit. Word is not exactly "East" to use. lol

  6. Re:Need to consider this on Theory of Information Could Resolve One of the Great Paradoxes of Cosmology · · Score: 1

    What if the universe is 120 times larger? Maybe our part of the observable universe just looks like it happened from a Big Bang.

    Well, actually, the universe is infinite in all directions according most. They're basing their math here on a given volume, "The observable universe" which, makes sense given how relativity works. You know, it's the whole cat paradox. If you cannot observe it, it does not exist, etc...

  7. Re:Numerology on Theory of Information Could Resolve One of the Great Paradoxes of Cosmology · · Score: 4, Informative

    Why, for instance, 10 cubic-kilometer voxels? Why not 100, or 1, or 0.1? How about 10^{15} cubic kilometers, which is about the volume of the sun? Adjust this number correctly, and you can match any energy density you want.

    This is the problem with the science blogosphere: they'll take any press release whatsoever and echo it around regardless of whether or not it makes any fucking sense at all.

    No, they are basing it on Plank Length: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P...
    A unit of measure derived specifically from universal constants, the speed of light, the Planck constant, and the gravitational constant.

    So it's not some arbitrary unit of measure as you suggest. It's the universes unit of measure. (assuming our current model of the universe holds) It's the smallest unit of measure that has any meaning in the real world.

  8. uh yea on Ask Slashdot: Version Control For Non-Developers? · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Um, your problem is trying to version control office.
    Stop using it.
    Put up a wiki.
    You're done and just saved the company several hundred thousand dollars a year in licensing.

  9. hmmm on Radioshack Declares Bankruptcy · · Score: 1

    I was in Radio shack a few months ago looking for a Mic for my HAM Radio. The guy at the counter said "We don't sell radio stuff like that..." I said "But you're radio shack!" He laughed at me "No-body comes to the Mall to buy Radios" I finally said "The only person you currently have standing in your store came here for a Radio, you might want to rethink your inventory" and walked out. Morons.

  10. Re:That's why nobody sensible wants them on US Health Insurer Anthem Suffers Massive Data Breach · · Score: 1

    ...properly securing them is very very difficult...

    No it's not. You can hire a person with a degree in computer security starting around $40k a year. You can get someone with 10yrs+ experience for under $100k/yr. Then its a matter of doing what they say, and not letting executives over-rule every inconvenient policy they put into place.

  11. Re:Good for Mississipi on Mississippi - the Nation's Leader In Vaccination Rates · · Score: 1

    But underlying all this, it seems that the US American belief that you should have the complete right as a parent to decide how to raise your children, even if it is against their well being, is not new. I clearly remember 'Huckleberry Finn', and the description of his father who falls in the same category as those people that are opposed to vaccination (for whichever reason). And that was written 130 years ago.

    Right, and I even agree with them. But in this case you're not just making a choice that puts your kid at risk. You're also making a choice that puts my kid at risk, which is where it crosses the line. If a vaccine were 100% effective, I'd agree with them on choice. But they're not, so they should be mandatory.

  12. Wow on Sony Sells Off Sony Online Entertainment · · Score: 1

    Smeadly finally drove them into the ground. Without Sony propping them up they'll be dead in less than a year. That morons done more to hurt gaming than just about anyone else in the industry.

    The Frogloks and Jedi finally have their revenge on that lying scum.

  13. obligatory on China's Engineering Mega-Projects Dwarf the Great Wall · · Score: 1

    As is usual, there's always an appropriate metal song warning of the folly of man: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

    Today the warning came in the flood
    Architects and fools never cared for poor men's blood
    Cursed to repeat the past they are
    The river dragon swims upstream
    They've built another wall.

    Ironically based on Chinese myth to.

  14. Re:Wait on EnOcean Wireless Sensors Don't Need Batteries (Video) · · Score: 0

    Why was that a scam and this is not?

    Because that they have working products and aren't grubbing around for the great unwashed's loose change on Kickstarter, for a start.

    That past Slashdot story was about the many questions that were already being floated about iFind. That's why it was a story in the first place.

    So, really, your question is a bit like asking why a story about Steve Jobs kicking a puppy results in more negative comments about the subject than one about Bill Gates single handedly saving 20 children from an orphanage fire.

    Incidentally I think you credit Slashdot with way too much influence if you think it can bring down a startup in a couple of days. Those guys were already on their way out (this, again, being what the story was more or less about).

    But read the thread... no one discussed the dudes fishyness. It was all a lot of bloated "I know about electronics and..." nonsense saying it was physically impossible. It's not. You can buy a dozen sensors just like the ones in this article that are powered by ambient RF or light, or whatever. It's an industry that's existed for years now. Were they a scam? I have no idea, but if it were a scam it had nothing to do with the physical impossibility of the device they designed.

  15. Re:Wait on EnOcean Wireless Sensors Don't Need Batteries (Video) · · Score: 0

    Violates the laws of physics does it?
    http://www.mouser.com/new/powe...

    Look at it. Read the damned data sheet: http://www.mouser.com/ds/2/329...

    You'd better let the world know one of the largest Electronics parts suppliers in the world is scamming them then. Because that's exactly what that IC does. 50ma output to! I doubt it gets that continuously, but carried around in close proximity to your phone and computer? Over a period of months? You're damned strait that'd charge it.

    FYI that RF harvester is specifically designed to power sensors like what's described in this article. You're supposed to hook it up to a battery and a sensor like this and power that sensor to wireless transmit its readings.

  16. Re:Wait on EnOcean Wireless Sensors Don't Need Batteries (Video) · · Score: 0

    1. They specify low power sensors, not transmitters.

    Whoever said iFind was a transmitter? For all we know it "Beeped' when lost. In fact, I assumed that's how it would work. Why the hell would it transmit? Even if it did transmit, the most power it could transmit by law would be 1 watt. Why is that unfeasible?

    2. They specify a number of different methods to gain power, not just RF.

    And that has what to do with the price of tea in china? So only 1 of there several methods of charging is a scam?

    3. Siemans spinoff indicates access to real engineers and technology.

    right... because they used to work at Siemans, they are fully backed by that companies brand name? lol

  17. Re:Wait on EnOcean Wireless Sensors Don't Need Batteries (Video) · · Score: 0

    As usual the devil is in the details. Harvesting enough energy from the environment to run a very low power IC in short bursts to do simple sensor measurements? Completely feasible. Charging your cellphone from ambient radio waves? Complete bullcrap.

    As usual, the ability of the Slashdot community to even bother clicking on the god damned link is thwarted by their lazyness. It doesn't charge your cellphone. Where the hell did you get that?

    It was a tag that hung on your keys, charged by RF that listened for a specific radio signal (like your garage door opener) When it received said signal it would beep. That's it. There's no physical reason that wasn't possible. The company could have still been a scam, but the device itself was possible.

  18. Re:Just hire a CPA on Intuit Charges More For Previously Offered TurboTax Features, Users Livid · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...or if 40$ hurts that bad maybe reconsider your self employment and/or investments.

    The point is, they aren't offering anything for that $40. It's the same thing as last year, but twice the price. And there are a dozen other products out there that don't charge that much. In fact, many are free and simply charge for state filing.

  19. Wait on EnOcean Wireless Sensors Don't Need Batteries (Video) · · Score: -1

    I thought powered by RF was impossible and a scam?
    http://mobile.slashdot.org/sto...

    Slashdot basically killed that company outright with nothing more than the argument that the technology was impossible. Search the thread for my screen name and watch me get shouted down for suggesting it actually is possible and even provide links to ICs you could use.

    And now here we have a story that's touting it as a legitimate device?

    I've no idea if iFind was actually a scam or not. They clearly went bust just days after the Slashdot story. But this kind of smacks of hypocrisy. Why was that a scam and this is not?

  20. Re:Hacked? Uh huh, sure... on US Central Command's Twitter Account Hacked, Filled With Pro-ISIS Messages · · Score: 1

    The PFC appointed as Social Media Officer probably chose a weak password. Seriously, whenever I see a news article about a social media account being "hacked," I really wish journalists would understand these are just password-protected web services!

    Celebrities' naked pictures and Twitter feeds get hacked because they have simple passwords, not because some genius hacker spends months looking for an exploit on their personal phone and the opportunity to introduce it. And even "security question" based password resets don't work when a celebrity will choose answers that anyone can find in 100 gossip rags.

    And cockroaches scuttling across a restaurant floor don't mean the place is dirty either. But I get up and leave either way.

  21. Re:Before this gets even more overblown... on US Central Command's Twitter Account Hacked, Filled With Pro-ISIS Messages · · Score: 2

    ...just remember this XKCD: http://xkcd.com/932/

    You're assuming they aren't using the same password for their Twitter account that they're using for the Nukes launch codes.

    Oh... you think I'm kidding?
    Seriously... it's a real concern:
    http://www.theguardian.com/wor...

  22. 1. Speech that directly and immediately puts human lives in danger (The old, yelling fire in a crowded theater, thing.)

    FALSELY yelling fire in a crowded theatre. The "falsely" is important.

    No it's not. "Falsely" is often a subjective determination. What if you smelled smoke and it was just a cigarette?
    Ambiguity and law are a bad mix.

  23. Re:hmmm on FBI Access To NSA Surveillance Data Expands In Recent Years · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If I remember, didn't Obama run on a platform that included implementing the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission? The same 9/11 Commission that concluded the attacks happened because the FBI and the various intelligence agencies weren't talking to each other and sharing information?

    Watch and learn: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

    And there's nothing inherently bad about that.

    Yes there is. Go read the constitution. It's spelled out very plainly there. There is no ambiguity.

    The problem isn't that the agencies are sharing information, it's that they're sharing information that's outside their lane. And that occurs not because they're sharing information, but because they're outside their lanes to begin with. I'd much rather have agencies that are focused on not sifting through every American's data, than ones that do that but don't share it with each other.

    You've no idea how this works do you? They are collecting everything so that should a crime happen, they can retroactively comb though everything you've ever done to find evidence against you. It's like the local police placed cameras in your home and then said it wasn't a search because they wont look at the tapes unless there's a crime. But in reality, they really are looking at the tapes, but that's beyond the scope of this conversation.

    But know this: This really is the nightmare scenario of 1984. There is direct and solid documented proof that they are doing exactly what all the conspiracy nuts were terrified of. It's not myth, its real. The only difference is, our government has not yet used this insane power to subvert the publics interest that we know of. But remember, at no time in human history has a government ever refused to exercise dictitorial power. It's only a matter of time until we elect the next Nixon or Stalin... and that person will use the NSA powers to make you wish this was just some sort of joke. But it's not. You should be horrified that your government feels it's Legal to do this.

  24. hmmm on FBI Access To NSA Surveillance Data Expands In Recent Years · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What happened in 2008 that allowed them to change their policies?

    Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

  25. wrong problem on How Bitcoin Could Be Key To Online Voting · · Score: 1

    The key to increasing voter turnout is not about making it easier to vote.
    The key to increasing voter turnout is allowing someone to run that's worth voting for.