Have you noticed recently how the Geek personna is actually glorified in today's media. I mean back in the 80's we were look down upon as these social misfits. Now hackers and programmers are looked up to as "Gurus" and "Experts". Also the media gives alot of attention to these virus creators and to their arrests etc... this only serves to heighten the mystique and image of hackers, crackers, geeks and otherwise computer savvy individuals. The question is, whether or not this is just a trend or it the image here to stay? Personally, I think as long as PC's are a major part of our everyday life the power of "Geekhood" will be respected. People in trouble like to have answers and who best to turn to than someone who is an expert in computer lingo, software and hardware. Slightly off the topic but in someways related, our current generation of kids are so computer literate it often makes me wonder, who is going to be the futures firemen, policemen, garbage men etc... It just seems that these kids are all headed in the direction of programming, and computer related subjects. No doubt the introduction of the PC has truly changed our world, whether it be for better or worse.
What a reverse index of refraction means is that the substance they are refracting light through is simply less dense than air. There have been no laws of physics broken here. What this means is the substance for whatever reason is less dense than the surrounding air. Perhaps it is a result of some interesting crystal lattice structure where pockets are created which are virtually little vacumns. I would take a closer look at the actual structure and crystal topography of the substance before announcing to the world that you have broken all the Laws of Physics!
You nailed it... This guy is simply trying to make a buck (a big buck) by forcing people to use his system. I'm not against his idea of tons of gTLDs I just think that some non-profit organization, possibly funded by the government should control it and manage it. That is the role of ICANN, however ICANN still does not manage the registry, that is where Verisign comes in. I think ICANN's role should be extended and they should replace Verisign as the manager of the system, that way no one monopolistic company will have control of the domain name system. The money from registrations should go towards maintaining the registry and all of the infrastructure, which is tightly audited by a different body of the government. Some people argue that the US should not control the internet, I see some validity to their argument however remember it was the US that created the Internet in the first place, it is our baby and if the world wants a piece of it then they need to play by our rules.
Take a good look at the Universe... Its too perfect. Galaxies, with nice little stars orbiting the centers and planets orbiting the stars... and then life, and chances are we will eventually find life on numerous other planets. What does this suggest? Obviously, with our current understanding of Physics and the laws of thermodynamics, namely the principle of "Entropy" we can see that it doesn't make any more sense for our galaxy to naturally come together and form such a complex system of stars and planets anymore than it makes sense for copper ore to come together and form a new penny.
My conclusion, is that some (many) supreme beings, with knowledge far in advance of ours and power far in advance of ours are responsible for everything we see. They created or at least organized our planet, and seeded it with life. Call them Gods or are creators if you like, but in my opinion our universe and especially our world is to "perfect" to be the result of some random explosion of a singularity.
When I worked for this synthetic diamond manufacturing company, that is where I got to see some serious pressure. They would put these little boxes of graphite into these huge 6 cylinder presses and squeeze them into solid diamond. I'm not sure exactly how much pressure it was but I heard that one of their competitors had a malfunction at one of their plants in France and one of their presses broke. The release of pressure was so great that it sent one of the hydraulic cyclinders clean through their factory wall and into an adjacent building. Also unfortunately, the press operator was standing right in the way of the projectile, he was instantly killed.
I know, they do have a bunch of Open Relays floating around out there which are all on the Orbs list, but the funny thing is they tell all of their "customers" that they have a proprietary mail system and they do not offer SMTP outgoing relays... talk about a mixed up organization.
Not only do Pengiuns not come from the North Atlantic but JCPenny's doesn't even sell a quality Cardigan, if you want a nice cardigan I suggest The Gap.
Ok, this may be a bit off topic but I do agree with you this latest blunder is more a Verisign problem than a Microsoft problem. I mean who screwed up here??
You would think with Microsoft getting ready to be axed by the Justice Department would smarten up their tactics some and try to be more reasonable in their pricing and licensing but no they are going the opposite extreme. As if "per processor" licensing and CALs weren't bad enough now they will be trying to use a system or registration to "enable" your software you purchase from them. Kind of like Quickbooks does now with their accounting software. The justice department should force them to Open Source.
I'm sick of AOL, just another Microsoft type of company. What really gets me is they can't even give their ISP customers an outgoing SMTP server. I have never liked the AIM or ICQ "thing" myself. I'll stick with good ol' email for now.
While I was working at IBM's Almaden Center this sort of thing was getting lots of attention. Arranging atoms on copper plates to be exact. Take a look at:
http://www.almaden.ibm.com/vis/stm/corral.html
What an excellent idea, it amazes me what a person with a problem can come up with.
I'm suggesting a list below of other animal combinations that may be useful...
elephant tusks -> cows
Think of all of that ivory...
skunks smell + porcupine needles -> doberman pincher or pitbull
combine the ferocity of a good guard dog with the smell of a skunk and the needles of a porcupine and you have the ultimate home defense system. If the dogs teeth don't finish off the intruder, its smell and quills certainly will.
gills -> mammals
Just think, we could create a whole new sub-species of amphibious mammals.
Trees? In Canada? Ok, I admit there are trees, especially in British Columbia, but if you have ever lived there like myself you know full well that this landscape is not the pristine paradise so many make it out to be. What, with the clearcut logging that goes on throughout the whole northwest, its sometimes uglier than the rocky scerascape of Arizona. I don't buy that crap about Canada. The reason why it isn't full of people yet is 'cause no one wants to live there. However, I don't really think its because of the geography, probably the fact that its too cold and the economy and government do not provide an economically sound infrastructure for growth.
On the weather side of things take a look at California, the weather along the coast is practicully 70 degrees all year round, no wonder there is over 30 million people living there. It was paradise until everybody realized it...
Anyhow, I have no idea what I'm rambling about, its 3:12am, and I just needed to reply to the ridicoulus comments of this AC.
The article gaves some minor technical details on how this is supposed to work, but it didn't really explain how the data or signal is supposed to keep alive continously within the loop. Is there some sort of signal generator that reads the incoming signal and then pumps it back out again??
You have a very good point. With all of our technological advances and the ability now to make digital "copies" or clones of everything why can't Xerox or Canon come up with a copier that actually doesn't severly downgrade the copied image from the original. I mean come on the scanners we have now can handle resolutions far beyond our own optical resolution, and the color/black and white laser printers are very impressive. Actually the more I think about this the more I realize that the technology is there but no one has made it affordable yet...
The new version definately has its pluses but I still think I"ll wait for the next release on this one. Call me lazy but I'll only upgrade when there is "really" something significant to get all worked up about...
Why don't they beef this thing up a little more, heck I want the Rottwieller equivalent. This thing is too tame for me. Battlebots is good but what I want to see are smarter robots (autonomous) duking it out with more deadlier hardware... you know explosives, fires etc... now that would be intense. If something like this were on your local cable would you watch it?? Makes you wonder why they don't take the next step doesn't it.
This is just as crazy as those perpetual motion machines, I may be an engineer but I do know my physics well enough to tell you that there will be no net motion and this is just another ploy to gain either notoriety or money. Come on NASA your going to be laughed at if you take this idiot serious...
Interesting... I was not aware of the conclusions drawn up by Dr. Lovelock. However, I assure you that I came to this hypothesis after some reasoning and logical thinking about life and how it seems to pervade every possible corner of our earth.
This is exciting. I mean when was the last time the US has done something exciting in Space? Granted Apollo is hard to beat but... realistically this is definately within budget yet exciting at the same time. I'm still looking forward to that manned mission to Mars
Thank-you for the extremely insightful reply. How do you compete? I'm a mechanical engineer by trade but somehow I managed to become the CEO of this webhosting company. Anyhow, myself and my partner (Vice President) would be interested in competing. I've built two go-carts from basically nothing when I was 17 and literally can build anything when given the challenge.
Lets face it, its a dead planet. I hate to be pessimistic but if there were really life on Mars and it had been around for a few million or so years don't you think evolution may have taken place and these life forms evolved to some degree at least to be a bit more detectable by our measurements. We have about as much chance of find life on Mars as we do on the Moon I figure.
We may find extinct lifeforms or signs of previous living creatures to be more exact but the likelihood of find "living creatures" is very small I would think. Take a look at pictures of earth from space and compare them to Mars. Our planet is a living planet, swarming with life, every inch of our planet is covered with some form of life whether it be whales, bacteria or spores from a fungus. If Mars had any life at all don't you think that life would propagate around the planet filling every possible nick and cranny that is habitable just like earth? I guess what I'm trying to say is that if there were life then it would be easily detectable by us.
I admit after watching this program I was pretty impressed. However, just how unscripted is this program, I mean I watched the episode about the tractor pulling and one team just happened to find 4 brand new ATV wheels in this "junkyard". That was a little bit for me to swallow if you know what I mean. Got to admit though, this show is a lot better than half the trash they've got on the TV these days. That and BattleBots are my two most favorite, I think though that the BattleBots need to have like a 10 minute round vs. the current 3 minutes, its just not enough time to trash another robot.
Slashdot Mirror
Have you noticed recently how the Geek personna is actually glorified in today's media. I mean back in the 80's we were look down upon as these social misfits. Now hackers and programmers are looked up to as "Gurus" and "Experts". Also the media gives alot of attention to these virus creators and to their arrests etc... this only serves to heighten the mystique and image of hackers, crackers, geeks and otherwise computer savvy individuals. The question is, whether or not this is just a trend or it the image here to stay? Personally, I think as long as PC's are a major part of our everyday life the power of "Geekhood" will be respected. People in trouble like to have answers and who best to turn to than someone who is an expert in computer lingo, software and hardware. Slightly off the topic but in someways related, our current generation of kids are so computer literate it often makes me wonder, who is going to be the futures firemen, policemen, garbage men etc... It just seems that these kids are all headed in the direction of programming, and computer related subjects. No doubt the introduction of the PC has truly changed our world, whether it be for better or worse.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
US Synthetic in Provo Utah, they have since moved to Orem Utah. Yes, I worked there for some time in R&D and also as a press operator.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
What a reverse index of refraction means is that the substance they are refracting light through is simply less dense than air. There have been no laws of physics broken here. What this means is the substance for whatever reason is less dense than the surrounding air. Perhaps it is a result of some interesting crystal lattice structure where pockets are created which are virtually little vacumns. I would take a closer look at the actual structure and crystal topography of the substance before announcing to the world that you have broken all the Laws of Physics!
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
You nailed it... This guy is simply trying to make a buck (a big buck) by forcing people to use his system. I'm not against his idea of tons of gTLDs I just think that some non-profit organization, possibly funded by the government should control it and manage it. That is the role of ICANN, however ICANN still does not manage the registry, that is where Verisign comes in. I think ICANN's role should be extended and they should replace Verisign as the manager of the system, that way no one monopolistic company will have control of the domain name system. The money from registrations should go towards maintaining the registry and all of the infrastructure, which is tightly audited by a different body of the government. Some people argue that the US should not control the internet, I see some validity to their argument however remember it was the US that created the Internet in the first place, it is our baby and if the world wants a piece of it then they need to play by our rules.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
Take a good look at the Universe... Its too perfect. Galaxies, with nice little stars orbiting the centers and planets orbiting the stars... and then life, and chances are we will eventually find life on numerous other planets. What does this suggest? Obviously, with our current understanding of Physics and the laws of thermodynamics, namely the principle of "Entropy" we can see that it doesn't make any more sense for our galaxy to naturally come together and form such a complex system of stars and planets anymore than it makes sense for copper ore to come together and form a new penny.
My conclusion, is that some (many) supreme beings, with knowledge far in advance of ours and power far in advance of ours are responsible for everything we see. They created or at least organized our planet, and seeded it with life. Call them Gods or are creators if you like, but in my opinion our universe and especially our world is to "perfect" to be the result of some random explosion of a singularity.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
When I worked for this synthetic diamond manufacturing company, that is where I got to see some serious pressure. They would put these little boxes of graphite into these huge 6 cylinder presses and squeeze them into solid diamond. I'm not sure exactly how much pressure it was but I heard that one of their competitors had a malfunction at one of their plants in France and one of their presses broke. The release of pressure was so great that it sent one of the hydraulic cyclinders clean through their factory wall and into an adjacent building. Also unfortunately, the press operator was standing right in the way of the projectile, he was instantly killed.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
I know, they do have a bunch of Open Relays floating around out there which are all on the Orbs list, but the funny thing is they tell all of their "customers" that they have a proprietary mail system and they do not offer SMTP outgoing relays... talk about a mixed up organization.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
Not only do Pengiuns not come from the North Atlantic but JCPenny's doesn't even sell a quality Cardigan, if you want a nice cardigan I suggest The Gap.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
Ok, this may be a bit off topic but I do agree with you this latest blunder is more a Verisign problem than a Microsoft problem. I mean who screwed up here??
You would think with Microsoft getting ready to be axed by the Justice Department would smarten up their tactics some and try to be more reasonable in their pricing and licensing but no they are going the opposite extreme. As if "per processor" licensing and CALs weren't bad enough now they will be trying to use a system or registration to "enable" your software you purchase from them. Kind of like Quickbooks does now with their accounting software. The justice department should force them to Open Source.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
I'm sick of AOL, just another Microsoft type of company. What really gets me is they can't even give their ISP customers an outgoing SMTP server. I have never liked the AIM or ICQ "thing" myself. I'll stick with good ol' email for now.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
Or better yet take a look at this link:
http://www.almaden.ibm.com/vis/stm/atomo.html
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
While I was working at IBM's Almaden Center this sort of thing was getting lots of attention. Arranging atoms on copper plates to be exact. Take a look at:
http://www.almaden.ibm.com/vis/stm/corral.html
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
What an excellent idea, it amazes me what a person with a problem can come up with. I'm suggesting a list below of other animal combinations that may be useful...
elephant tusks -> cows
Think of all of that ivory...
skunks smell + porcupine needles -> doberman pincher or pitbull
combine the ferocity of a good guard dog with the smell of a skunk and the needles of a porcupine and you have the ultimate home defense system. If the dogs teeth don't finish off the intruder, its smell and quills certainly will.
gills -> mammals
Just think, we could create a whole new sub-species of amphibious mammals.
swordfish -> horse = Unicorn!! eagles wings -> horse = Pegasus!!
The possibilities are endless. Perhaps these scientists may have opened up a serious pandora's box.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
Trees? In Canada? Ok, I admit there are trees, especially in British Columbia, but if you have ever lived there like myself you know full well that this landscape is not the pristine paradise so many make it out to be. What, with the clearcut logging that goes on throughout the whole northwest, its sometimes uglier than the rocky scerascape of Arizona. I don't buy that crap about Canada. The reason why it isn't full of people yet is 'cause no one wants to live there. However, I don't really think its because of the geography, probably the fact that its too cold and the economy and government do not provide an economically sound infrastructure for growth. On the weather side of things take a look at California, the weather along the coast is practicully 70 degrees all year round, no wonder there is over 30 million people living there. It was paradise until everybody realized it... Anyhow, I have no idea what I'm rambling about, its 3:12am, and I just needed to reply to the ridicoulus comments of this AC.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
The article gaves some minor technical details on how this is supposed to work, but it didn't really explain how the data or signal is supposed to keep alive continously within the loop. Is there some sort of signal generator that reads the incoming signal and then pumps it back out again??
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
You have a very good point. With all of our technological advances and the ability now to make digital "copies" or clones of everything why can't Xerox or Canon come up with a copier that actually doesn't severly downgrade the copied image from the original. I mean come on the scanners we have now can handle resolutions far beyond our own optical resolution, and the color/black and white laser printers are very impressive. Actually the more I think about this the more I realize that the technology is there but no one has made it affordable yet...
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
The new version definately has its pluses but I still think I"ll wait for the next release on this one. Call me lazy but I'll only upgrade when there is "really" something significant to get all worked up about...
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
Why don't they beef this thing up a little more, heck I want the Rottwieller equivalent. This thing is too tame for me. Battlebots is good but what I want to see are smarter robots (autonomous) duking it out with more deadlier hardware... you know explosives, fires etc... now that would be intense. If something like this were on your local cable would you watch it?? Makes you wonder why they don't take the next step doesn't it.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
This is just as crazy as those perpetual motion machines, I may be an engineer but I do know my physics well enough to tell you that there will be no net motion and this is just another ploy to gain either notoriety or money. Come on NASA your going to be laughed at if you take this idiot serious...
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
Interesting... I was not aware of the conclusions drawn up by Dr. Lovelock. However, I assure you that I came to this hypothesis after some reasoning and logical thinking about life and how it seems to pervade every possible corner of our earth.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
This is exciting. I mean when was the last time the US has done something exciting in Space? Granted Apollo is hard to beat but... realistically this is definately within budget yet exciting at the same time. I'm still looking forward to that manned mission to Mars
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
Thank-you for the extremely insightful reply. How do you compete? I'm a mechanical engineer by trade but somehow I managed to become the CEO of this webhosting company. Anyhow, myself and my partner (Vice President) would be interested in competing. I've built two go-carts from basically nothing when I was 17 and literally can build anything when given the challenge.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
Lets face it, its a dead planet. I hate to be pessimistic but if there were really life on Mars and it had been around for a few million or so years don't you think evolution may have taken place and these life forms evolved to some degree at least to be a bit more detectable by our measurements. We have about as much chance of find life on Mars as we do on the Moon I figure.
We may find extinct lifeforms or signs of previous living creatures to be more exact but the likelihood of find "living creatures" is very small I would think. Take a look at pictures of earth from space and compare them to Mars. Our planet is a living planet, swarming with life, every inch of our planet is covered with some form of life whether it be whales, bacteria or spores from a fungus. If Mars had any life at all don't you think that life would propagate around the planet filling every possible nick and cranny that is habitable just like earth? I guess what I'm trying to say is that if there were life then it would be easily detectable by us.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
I admit after watching this program I was pretty impressed. However, just how unscripted is this program, I mean I watched the episode about the tractor pulling and one team just happened to find 4 brand new ATV wheels in this "junkyard". That was a little bit for me to swallow if you know what I mean. Got to admit though, this show is a lot better than half the trash they've got on the TV these days. That and BattleBots are my two most favorite, I think though that the BattleBots need to have like a 10 minute round vs. the current 3 minutes, its just not enough time to trash another robot.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13
Remember all of the Floating Point bugs in the PIII initially.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
Domain Names for $13