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User: jdoverholt

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  1. Re:Vaccinating carriers... on HPV Vaccine Recommended For Boys · · Score: 1

    I am also not a doctor, but I'd point out that you're comparing apples and oranges -- or more accurately: urethrae and cervices. The high cell turnover is a property of the cervix, which men do not have. Women's urethrae are just like men's urethrae, neither of which have the duality of epithelial cells.

  2. Re:Google retrieval? on Will Google TV Owe Royalties For Universal Search? · · Score: 1
    (Patent Application, for those interested.)

    I like your take on this. The whole application should be reject because it's based on a faulty premise (statement 6, below).

    [0004] Searching online for various media such as video, audio, and still images is known. Further, searching for such media on a user's local hard drive is also known. For example, programs such as Microsoft's Media Center.RTM., Google.RTM., Yahoo.RTM., Youtube.RTM., OSX.RTM., iTunes.RTM., Windows.RTM., and TIVO.RTM., all include integrated search mechanisms to locate specific data.

    [0005] However, each of these programs compartmentalizes the search process to specific kinds of data. For example, iTunes.com.RTM. locates all media stored or available within the iTunes.RTM. system, which is a small subset of all the video, images, and audio available online. iTunes.RTM. also only searches for data stored in its own format, and does not search a users locally or remotely stored available data. Youtube.RTM. only searches for videos on Youtube.RTM.. Windows.RTM. only searches for data on the user's internal and external hard drives. Yahoo.RTM. only searches the internet and not the user's hard drive or local media storage devices. Google.RTM., while providing a mechanism to search both the internet and the user's hard drive, cannot search both the internet and the user's hard drive simultaneously and provide a single set of search results. Further, Google only allows searches dedicated to video, audio, or images, and does not provide a mechanism for searching for all media types at the same time.

    [0006] Thus, there does not exist a system that searches all known media sources, both local and remote, and presents to a user a consolidated list of search results that is grouped according to media content and filtered and sorted according to the user's preferences.

    A quick Google search for Trains shows relevant webpages, images, videos, and news articles. I'm pretty sure they've done this for awhile now, though I couldn't prove it.

  3. Re:4G in non-4G areas on 34% of iPhone Owners Think the 4 Is 4G · · Score: 1

    Mine (T-Mobile HTC G2) shows one icon with a letter indicating what technology it's using: G for GPRS, E for EDGE, H for (well, I thought HSPA+, but it's showing it now for UMTS), and I think one other that I see infrequently. Maybe it's all just a trick to make me feel better about the money I shell out.

  4. Re:What happens when the power goes out? on Could PSTN Go Away By 2018? · · Score: 1

    Funny thing about redundant power supplies: that technology transfers. It's not that cell tower operators haven't figured it out, it's that they do/might not do it because that costs extra and so far they can get away without. If PSTN goes away, that regulatory requirement will almost surely be applied to the tower ops.

  5. Re:Um, sure... on IBM Watson To Replace Salespeople and Cold-Callers · · Score: 1

    Sometimes you have to physically walk in and make the effort.

    Yes, but cold calls on the phone are still cold calls. Bigger companies can afford sales staff across the geography, but the companies that I've dealt with (Dell, EMC, SAP, Oracle) have significantly more sales staff in a central office operating by phone than "in the field" making the face-to-face cold calls and wining/dining the customers. Watson won't replace the field guys, it'll augment/replace the centralized sales and support teams.

    The big companies are smart enough to know that they can't completely replace their human phone staff any more than they can successfully outsource all of it. People prefer a neighbor over a another person half a world away, same as they'd prefer any other person over a machine. Dell enterprise support, for instance, has a large call center a few miles from my school, where all of our calls go, but when my $300 netbook has a problem I can call India, talk to India in online chat, or email India. Some of these segments are candidate for replacement/augmentation by fully automated systems.

    In short: they'll shrink one segment of the sales/support teams and add a new segment to them that's completely automated.

  6. Re:high-tech armies are vulnerable on US Army Spent $2.7 Billion On Crashing Computer · · Score: 1

    Very well played AC. You'd have my points if I had any.

  7. Re:You are a renegade. on JavaScript Servers Compared · · Score: 1
    You make several good points, I only take exception to one small part.

    JS is SIMPLE. In the browser it is single threaded. You don't need to worry about concurrent programming. The language itself is also dead simple, but still very powerful if needed.

    C (or most any other language) is single threaded too, and you don't have to worry about concurrent programming. That is, until a single thread just isn't good enough anymore and it's time to break out a threading library. Then you have to worry about concurrency, blocking, etc. Incidentally, this has a tendency to come about when you're writing server software.

  8. Re:This is one of the few that is legal and 'right on RIAA-Backed Warrantless Search Bill In California · · Score: 1

    Businesses are not people

    Not all businesses are corporations, but corporations are people for most purposes in the US (and others) today. Google "corporate personhood" or "legal personality" for more information.

  9. Re:News? on FCC.gov: A Modern Open Platform · · Score: 1

    It sounds like you've already read about the efforts of the State Department with their shiny website. Feel free to submit a write-up on it for everyone else's reading pleasure.

  10. Re:Umm, 'scuse me? on Univ. of Illinois Goes War-of-the-Worlds On Students · · Score: 1

    I'm curious, as the school I work for is currently rolling out SSO for the various staff and student systems, what sort of things were they complaining about? Try as I might, I just can't comprehend anybody thinking it's a bad idea.

  11. Re:feels hollow on AMD's New Flagship HD 6990 Tested · · Score: 1

    An Apple fanboi friend of mine has their 30" cinema display. It's absolutely gorgeous from all angles, is probably one of the 6 GP refers to, and retails for about $1600. I think our staff graphics artist has one too.

  12. Re:Great plan there on Kids Who Skip School Get Tracked By GPS · · Score: 1

    In my school we had "employability points" that made up some 10-20% of our grade in each class. This was a discretionary grade from which points were subtracted for things like tardiness, failing to do homework, etc. It's a fairly transparent step toward the goal of making profitable worker bees. It's not really a bad thing, though. I don't like working with people who can't be bothered to show up on time, I can't imagine why anyone would.

    <criticism type='constructive'>It's "fewer" employees, not "less". Fewer is for discrete objects.</criticism>

  13. Personal Genome on Man Open Sources His Genetic Data · · Score: 4, Informative

    PGP did it first.

  14. Re:1st Amendment on Sarah Palin Seeks To Trademark Her Name · · Score: 1

    Bad analogy--It's freedom of the press he's hiding behind, not freedom of speech.

  15. Re:YOU PUT MY HAND UPON YOUR ALGORITHM on Bing Is Cheating, Copying Google Search Results · · Score: 1

    Hot cocoa out my nose... thanks for that.

  16. Re:How can a biology teacher not be a biology majo on Teachers Back Away From Evolution In Class · · Score: 1

    Certainly sounds like somebody that spent four years studying teaching at an American university.

  17. Re:What if you crash? on Apple May Remove the Home Button On the Next IPad · · Score: 1

    If it captures a 5 finger goatse gesture...

    Great. Thanks for that.

  18. Re:What if you crash? on Apple May Remove the Home Button On the Next IPad · · Score: 1

    It is impressive to watch being played. An old roommate of mine used to practice it incessantly.

  19. Re:No, this IS the war on Twitter Fights US Court For WikiLeaks Details · · Score: 1
  20. Re:More like fiery death on DIY FireHero Project · · Score: 1

    The tank on my grill has a flow rate cut-off. I connected it when the valves were all open by accident and it locked itself shut. Had to turn everything off and let it sit for 15 minutes to reset itself.

  21. Re:I already have some bathroom games on SEGA Brings Gaming To Public Restroom Toilets · · Score: 1

    Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.

  22. Re:Artificial Brains? on A Mind Made From Memristors · · Score: 1

    "Visual system" not referring specifically to the eyes, but rather the visual cortex, which is structurally almost identical to your other higher-functioning centers. Hallucinations don't happen in your eyes, they happen in your brain, and they produce just as meaningful and "real" input as your eyes and ears can. If you try hard enough you can clearly remember things that never really happened, as though they were real, regardless of where your body is/was.

  23. Re:Artificial Brains? on A Mind Made From Memristors · · Score: 1

    I always imagined it would work identically to fork(). There is but one "me", then suddenly there is another with exactly the same recollection up to that point. The new "me" would probably be disoriented, given the sudden change in inputs, but I imagine the artificial brain would be as good at adapting to change as our squishy ones are. Just putting regular me to sleep first would probably make the transition easier.

    For those who insist on a soul: maybe this process creates a new soul, reallocates one from heaven, or whatever else you believe happens when you're born. I don't recall anywhere in the bible saying this isn't the case. Maybe God will ordain our new process for creating life and endow our creations with souls, as he allows modern medicine to defy his mortality schedule.

    I don't really care about any of the spiritual side of the argument, I'm kind of hoping that one day I'll have the option to go to sleep and wake up in a totally sweet new robot body.

  24. Re:Ffs on Space-Time Cloak Could Hide Actual Events · · Score: 1

    ...from the DJ Rumpy school of physics.

    No, but that's really neat :-)

  25. Re:Legality on UK's National Rail Shuts Down Free Timetable App · · Score: 4, Interesting

    When I was in the (U.S.) military we were instructed not to put blanket disclaimers about privacy/secrecy in our emails to avoid dilution of the meaning and hopefully keep it more enforceable.