The Mars rovers were constantly negotiating new territory, while colonizing robots would be working very well known territory.
... for certain values of "new territory."
Those rovers only travelled (at a glacial pace) a handful of miles in total. The caterpillar trucks operating in the Alberta tarsands travel more distance over the course of a day than those rovers did over the course of a year.
This will allow people to receive a constant stream of idiotic Farmville/Mafiawars/Cafeworld updates all day long wherever they happen to be. Think of the potential this has to increase productivity in the field of lost productivity.
if they want to be secure and not have their bank info stolen/cleaned out, then don't use Windows/IE. Since that is what EVERY scam uses.
Seems to me that if a phish arrives at my email account, and I open it up using the default email client, and I click the http link that says "your banking details need to be updated", and I fill in all my personal financial information in the resulting web page... I'm equally boned whether I'm using Windows, MacOS, or Linux.
Same goes for when a former Nigerian oil minister contacts me to assist with a large funds transfer. Some goes for any number of other social engineering scams that don't rely on any specific technology platform.
At our current (and immediately foreseeable) level of technology, I'd trust robots to maybe perform simple mining of the regolith, and maybe something as complex as baking bricks (also performing some kind of destructive crush test on every 20th one in order to make sure the quality is where it needs to be) and leaving them stockpiled somewhere. Anything more complex than that? Thanks, but I want humans there.
I think it's the tweens & teens who are the biggest problem. They appear not to give a fuck at all. When asked why they install and run every single facebook app on the planet, and why they need so many idiotic cursors and smileys, the response generally goes something like "check it out, it's so cool though. What's the problem?"
Except most of the first hundred were past reproductive age, or close to it. So that mission wasn't really about seeding a population so much as seeding a technological infrastructure.
Nerds of the world, it is time to unite around a new cause. It is time to write, and release, a new virus that relies on a series of incredibly stupid attack vectors - the kinds of attack vectors that only a clueless dipshit would actually fall for. The virus has only one simple payload: it uninstalls all network drivers on the machine.
After several trips to get their machine "repaired," these folks will either wise up, or give up.
the economics profession is a complete fucking failure of a joke
I always find it interesting that a large swath of the population considers economics to be some kind of infallible science, while other
branches of science (most notably climate science) is just quackery and not to be trusted.
As far as I can tell, the "science" of economics has predicted exactly zero major economic events over the course of human history. Not a great track record. Not a source of confidence. Not a science, really.
Hang on, so the world's leading supplier of cheap, commoditized labour and production finds that it's cheaper to import labour costs from another country than to dig up metal at home?
It isn't so much about "offshoring" maintenance as it is contracting out to specialist firms. Lufthansa, for example, will happily service the airplanes of any other airline in the Frankfurt facilities for the right price. And many airlines choose to do so because relying on somebody else's centralized expertise is better, cheaper, and results in higher quality (read: fewer accidents) than trying to replicate that same expertise inhouse.
To GP's assertion that airlines don't care, that is correct to a point: the point at which risk profile begins to change appreciably. Airlines are cost conscious, but they are equally or even more image conscious. Just one major incident can ruin your reputation for years and cost you millions in lost bookings. For every bean-counter in an airline managing costs, there are also bean-counters managing risk.
there must still be a plan for the last drop of oil
According to peak oil theory, we aren't really worried about "the last drop of oil"... I forget who said it, but the gist of it is captured in the saying "we will always have enough oil for our bicycle chains."
What we need to be prepared for is a world in which profligate burning of fossil fuels becomes increasingly expensive and unrealistic. GP's question of what the aviation industry will look like in 50 years is a good one, because in 50 years we will well and truly be on the other side of the peak oil curve, and we will have either figured out some kind(s) of alternative(s), or we will be living in a much smaller, more local world where people tell their incredulous grandkids stories about taking a trip to the Cayman Islands for a week just to get away.
PDF's principal raison d'etre is distribution for printing. It's used as distribution for on-screen viewing which is definitely round peg in square hole.
I seem to recall that way back in the day, PDF was pretty much exclusively a screen viewing format, while Postscript was used for print distribution. I certainly don't recall ever reading anything from Adobe suggesting they believe PDF is inappropriate for onscreen use - in fact they offer several ways to lock files so they can only be used onscreen.
The question seems to be more which language will replace Java and trust of Oracle zeroes out as they kill the language by having clumsy fools trying to monetise it.
I don't know about everybody else, but my money is on Esperanto.
I came to the conclusion some time ago that the United States can not function without a bogeyman. In a country of highly polarized absolutes, it is impossible for most people to conceive of an America that exists as "good" unless something else is held up as an example of "evil."
Slashdot Mirror
I programmed a Sinclair ZX-81 you insensitive clod!
Tilt your head 90 degrees and you should be alright.
You're welcome.
I remember using BeOS R5 to access files or CDs that couldn't be opened using any other operating system known to mankind.
The Mars rovers were constantly negotiating new territory, while colonizing robots would be working very well known territory.
... for certain values of "new territory."
Those rovers only travelled (at a glacial pace) a handful of miles in total. The caterpillar trucks operating in the Alberta tarsands travel more distance over the course of a day than those rovers did over the course of a year.
small crew orbiting Mars
If you're sending them into Martian orbit, you might as well drop them on the ground somewhere so they can send the postcard home.
Don't diss the potential of this.
This will allow people to receive a constant stream of idiotic Farmville/Mafiawars/Cafeworld updates all day long wherever they happen to be. Think of the potential this has to increase productivity in the field of lost productivity.
if they want to be secure and not have their bank info stolen/cleaned out, then don't use Windows/IE. Since that is what EVERY scam uses.
Seems to me that if a phish arrives at my email account, and I open it up using the default email client, and I click the http link that says "your banking details need to be updated", and I fill in all my personal financial information in the resulting web page ... I'm equally boned whether I'm using Windows, MacOS, or Linux.
Same goes for when a former Nigerian oil minister contacts me to assist with a large funds transfer. Some goes for any number of other social engineering scams that don't rely on any specific technology platform.
At our current (and immediately foreseeable) level of technology, I'd trust robots to maybe perform simple mining of the regolith, and maybe something as complex as baking bricks (also performing some kind of destructive crush test on every 20th one in order to make sure the quality is where it needs to be) and leaving them stockpiled somewhere. Anything more complex than that? Thanks, but I want humans there.
I think it's the tweens & teens who are the biggest problem. They appear not to give a fuck at all. When asked why they install and run every single facebook app on the planet, and why they need so many idiotic cursors and smileys, the response generally goes something like "check it out, it's so cool though. What's the problem?"
Except most of the first hundred were past reproductive age, or close to it. So that mission wasn't really about seeding a population so much as seeding a technological infrastructure.
When javascript is outlawed, only outlaws will use javascript.
Nerds of the world, it is time to unite around a new cause. It is time to write, and release, a new virus that relies on a series of incredibly stupid attack vectors - the kinds of attack vectors that only a clueless dipshit would actually fall for. The virus has only one simple payload: it uninstalls all network drivers on the machine.
After several trips to get their machine "repaired," these folks will either wise up, or give up.
Who wants to join the crusade?
the economics profession is a complete fucking failure of a joke
I always find it interesting that a large swath of the population considers economics to be some kind of infallible science, while other branches of science (most notably climate science) is just quackery and not to be trusted.
As far as I can tell, the "science" of economics has predicted exactly zero major economic events over the course of human history. Not a great track record. Not a source of confidence. Not a science, really.
Hang on, so the world's leading supplier of cheap, commoditized labour and production finds that it's cheaper to import labour costs from another country than to dig up metal at home?
It isn't so much about "offshoring" maintenance as it is contracting out to specialist firms. Lufthansa, for example, will happily service the airplanes of any other airline in the Frankfurt facilities for the right price. And many airlines choose to do so because relying on somebody else's centralized expertise is better, cheaper, and results in higher quality (read: fewer accidents) than trying to replicate that same expertise inhouse.
To GP's assertion that airlines don't care, that is correct to a point: the point at which risk profile begins to change appreciably. Airlines are cost conscious, but they are equally or even more image conscious. Just one major incident can ruin your reputation for years and cost you millions in lost bookings. For every bean-counter in an airline managing costs, there are also bean-counters managing risk.
there must still be a plan for the last drop of oil
According to peak oil theory, we aren't really worried about "the last drop of oil" ... I forget who said it, but the gist of it is captured in the saying "we will always have enough oil for our bicycle chains."
What we need to be prepared for is a world in which profligate burning of fossil fuels becomes increasingly expensive and unrealistic. GP's question of what the aviation industry will look like in 50 years is a good one, because in 50 years we will well and truly be on the other side of the peak oil curve, and we will have either figured out some kind(s) of alternative(s), or we will be living in a much smaller, more local world where people tell their incredulous grandkids stories about taking a trip to the Cayman Islands for a week just to get away.
I think the real question here is: if Microsoft were to somehow buy LibreOffice, how many heads would simultaneously explode around the world?
Given a choice between Microsoft's evil, Oracle's evil, and Apple's evil, I tend to view Microsoft with a certain degree of warmth and fuzziness.
PDF's principal raison d'etre is distribution for printing. It's used as distribution for on-screen viewing which is definitely round peg in square hole.
I seem to recall that way back in the day, PDF was pretty much exclusively a screen viewing format, while Postscript was used for print distribution. I certainly don't recall ever reading anything from Adobe suggesting they believe PDF is inappropriate for onscreen use - in fact they offer several ways to lock files so they can only be used onscreen.
The question seems to be more which language will replace Java and trust of Oracle zeroes out as they kill the language by having clumsy fools trying to monetise it.
I don't know about everybody else, but my money is on Esperanto.
s/geopolitical/propaganda
What if somebody wants a side of garlic bread or a large coke?
The war on toner has begun.
I came to the conclusion some time ago that the United States can not function without a bogeyman. In a country of highly polarized absolutes, it is impossible for most people to conceive of an America that exists as "good" unless something else is held up as an example of "evil."
I blame Stephen Colbert ... after all, the March to Keep Fear Alive is tomorrow.