Date of birth was 1956, thank you. This particular runaway truck episode happened in 1999. But, I was a runaway several times in the latter '60's through 1974. Hence, my online nick.
As usual, one needs to examine the IQ test. Yeah, we know that smoking is stupid. What a simple thing to ask, "Do you smoke?" and deduct a point or six if the answer is yes. "Do you smoke more than a pack a day?" Deduct another point or 20.
IQ tests ALWAYS test for specific things, and if you've an agenda to prove that smokers are dumb, it's no big deal to rig the test to prove it.
I would go with prior art and obviousness, on the "lit portion" bit of the suit. As for the rest of it, I'd be skeptical of any claims of having "invented" a unique controller. I'll admit up front, I'm not ready to examine the patent to decide for myself. I'll leave that to people who actually use game controllers. It's possible that the internals are unique in some non-obvious way, and MS has a valid suit. I wouldn't take that to the bank until the fat lady is done singing though.
PDF on the most up to date version of the car I drive. Apparently, the 6 speed gets the same mileage, whether it's AT or MT. The 5 speed manual gets slightly better mileage than the 6 speed.
It's *possible* that the most modern AT's now rival the MT's - but it's also possible that they've rigged the numbers. I just don't know enough to say.
I'm also aware that many newer vehicles have a selector that tells the computer to adjust the engine and transmission for fuel economy, or to adjust everything for power/performance/towing/hauling. Again, it's quite possible that flipping that selector really optimizes things for fuel economy, and it drives as well as I can.
But, I'm still mindful that while I drive, I'm watching traffic conditions as well as road conditions around and ahead of me. The computer can't do that. If I see a bridge half a mile or more ahead of me that is obviously iced over, I want to slow down, and approach that bridge with just the slightest bit of power driving me forward, whether it is rear or front wheel drive. The computer is completely unable to anticipate that I want maximum tration, and minimum power. If the damned thing downshifts and lurches ahead, I'm in serious trouble with rear wheel drive, and I could be in trouble with front wheel drive.
A mind is a terrible thing to waste, I've heard. I certainly don't want a computer wasting me AND my mind!
Fair enough. And, I've been told that today's auto transmissions can be "locked" into your chosen gear. Whatever - Freightliner got it wrong in the early days, as I say, they took a nice stab at getting me killed, and I never gave them another chance. I DID downshift, and the gear selector was in 9th gear, I believe (can't remember for certain after all these years, that was in 1999) and the computer over rode my choice of gears when the tach reached whatever speed it was designed to shift at. 2500 rpm? I really don't remember now. I brought the truck back to the yard, and told the boss I was NOT driving the damned thing again.
I much prefer manually putting that tranny in my chosen gear, and KNOWING that no one, and no thing, can possibly over ride my judgement. You realize at least as well as I do that sometimes there is simply no time to second guess that computer and/or another driver, and put things back the way you want them.
Single screw tractor? That would really suck. I always drove dual axles, so I could have flipped the lock-out to get another wheel driving. Of course, that doesn't always work. A couple times, both wheels on the same side of the tractor engaged, and just shot gravel out from underneath . . .
Uhhhh - read the mileage stickers on most vehicles. The manufacturers tell you in black and white that the same car will get better fuel mileage if it's equipped with a standard shift. Any rumors to the contrary are utter nonsense.
BAG (bad analogy guy) modded flamebait here? Why? That stupid shuttle was a crappy idea from the word go. It was a compromise of many things. A spaceship is not an airplane, and an airplane is not a spaceship. It's about what you would get if you tried to make a Cadillac pickup truck. A butt ugly piece of shit that doesn't do anything as well as some other alternative vehicle. http://www.automedia.com/NewCarBuyersGuide2007/photos/2007/Cadillac/SRX/SUV/2007_Cadillac_SRX_ext_1.jpg Go ahead, look at it. It's every bit as ugly as the shuttle.
Has anyone ever done a poll of the shuttle pilots? Has anyone ever asked them if they would rather have driven a real spaceship, that actually went somewhere? Most pilots, most drivers, don't learn their skill so that they can drive on an established circular track a dozen times in their lives. Most of them learn their skills so that they can GO SOMEWHERE!!
Face it, we've not yet built a real spaceship. China will probably beat us to that. No, the space station doesn't count - that's just a freaking raft, tethered to the shore by a really short logistics chain.
Idaho is cool. I was driving north one night in Idaho, and realized that I had seen no electric lights in more than an hour. So, I started watching, thinking that I had just missed some. I drove, and drove, and drove. No lights. Not even oncoming traffic. No porch lights, no parking lot lights, nothing. I've driven through huge swathes of America that had no power due to blizzards or hurricanes, and saw more lighting! Talk about the wide open spaces. I've never driven so far without seeing lights, anywhere in the United States. What is the population density?
Idaho is cool. Cooler than Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, or even Utah.
What a sexist attitude. And, a sexist attitude that girls respond to. God knows why, but they choose to conform to this stereotype.
I've met little 80 pound women jockeying 40 ton trucks up and down the road, for God's sake. If they can drive those 9 speed, 13 speed, 19 speed, and sometimes even multi-plex transmissions, then ANY LITTLE GIRL can drive a standard.
I guess you'd like to see teenage girls riding horses on a side saddle too? That was the same sexist attitude, after all.
Ever driven an 18 wheeler? Ever driven an 18 wheeler with an AUTOMATIC???? I did. Once. Never again.
As has been pointed out, the transmission cannot anticipate that I need a bit more torgue to climb a hill that it hasn't sensed yet. Nor can it see that I need to merge into traffic. It senses nothing, anticipates nothing - it only responds to certain stimuli, and everything is WRONG by the time those stimuli reach the brain controlling the transmission.
Worse, that damned transmission took a nice stab at killing me. Going downhill, a driver puts the truck into a lower gear and/or engages the Jake brake to govern his speed going down the hill. Try that with an idiot computer which decides that you are wasting fuel at high RPM's and upshifts the transmission, just before you get to the steepest grade on the hill. I had a hairy few minutes, believe me. 80,000 pounds of inertia falling into the gravity well is hard to overcome when the machine is fighting with you!
I realize you're making fun of GP - but you're coming off looking a bit stupid.
Across the board, with all manufacturer's lineups, manual transmissions get roughly two mpg better fuel mileage than an automatic. Same model, same optional equipment, same size tires, everything else the same, the manual gets better fuel mileage. And, that's the point that g(x)parent was making. Most of the rest of the world can't AFFORD those wasteful automatic transmissions, or the myriad of optional equipment that wastes yet more fuel. They choose smaller, lighter cars with less optional equipment, and better engineering because wasting 100 gallons of fuel per year is not an option.
Yes, something is lost in the translation when we start comparing fuel prices. My fellow Americans don't realize that everyone in the world buys their fuel by the liter. 1 liter roughly equal to 1 quart so a person could multiply your price by 4 to get our price per gallon. But, that's just to hard for people to do. *sigh* Sometimes I'm just embarrassed by my people. I remember the good old days, when we had to go to the currency exchanges every time we crossed a border. NO ONE used the same currency. Imagine how lost most Americans were, LMAO
Kanye only does insults and bad music. Get real. They wanted an actor, preferably one with talent. Kanye could have been one of the inbreds on 'Deliverance' except for his dark complexion.
The money, yeah. But, Bill retired, right? He's the one person that I'm sure of who saw years into the future. Now, PLEASE, don't take that as a compliment to Bill - I despise the bastard, but I do try to give the devil his due. He publicly stated, multiple times, that he approved of people pirating Windows, because there would be a day of reckoning, when the entire world depended on his product. Very forward looking.
I understood your point. But, the facts stand - Walmart had a young woman arrested on false charges, presumably motivated by a racist attitude.
That business in California with the RIAA sweeping through flea markets was NOT a government action. It was a corporate action, enforce by armed men employed by the corporation. Get your facts straight. Apparently you didn't browse all the stories on those pages, and you most certainly didn't google to prove me wrong. I remember when the story hit the headlines. Employing off duty cops does not constitute "calling the authorities" to make a bust.
And, as for RIAA, MPAA, and telcos, you are aware that a war is being fought right now to restrict the powers and the authority of corporations. It's a losing war, because the corporations just pick and choose which politicians to buy, while we are restricted to a vote every couple years.
I don't send much, but I do send a few dollars to the EFF and other organizations fighting for citizen's rights, as opposed to corporate rights. No corporation has the right to monitor me, at any time, in any way, or to enforce their will upon me. Power, yes. Authority, no. Right, no.
Corporations can't do what, exactly? Perhaps you should check out some of the draconian moves made by corporations over the past years.
A young woman arrived in a WalMart in near Houston, with ~$4,700 worth of Walmart money orders. It has been proven conclusively that the money orders were genuine, and lawfully hers - but she was charged by the Walmart manager with trying to pass counterfeit money orders. False arrest and false imprisonment (which, by any reasonable definition amounts to kidnapping) committed by a corporation. http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/6932914.html
Corporations don't knock your door down, and sieze your goods? How about taking your property at gunpoint, in public, with witnesses? California
May 15-16, 2002 - The RIAA and Fonovisa representatives executed a series of voluntary surrender actions at two flea markets in Indio, CA and Torrance, CA. 11 vendors were issued notices and 3,637 alleged illicit sound recordings were recovered from both locations. Artist recordings seized included works from top-selling acts such as Thalia and Shaggy. http://www.grayzone.com/october2008busts.htm
Don't let the terminology fool you, in that story. A "voluntary surrender action" involves the presence of armed men telling you that you can't have certain items in your possession. In most times and places throughout history, this would be considered robbery.
Corporations do a lot of things that aren't publicized, and the ones that do get into the news are sanitized with meaningless phrases such as "voluntary surrender action".
The VFD almost certainly drives vehicles that were bought by the city, village, township, boro, or whatever they reside in, with both donated and tax money, and maybe the proceeds of a raffle or two. In some few wealthy municipalities, the VFD might be financially independent of the local government. I've seen that exactly twice in my life.
I thought Darwin had that solved. Those who are susceptible to cancer die off sooner or later, while those who are not so susceptible breed like rabbits.
I wish more cops and more emergency personnel would publish photos. These images need to be in the mind of every person who drives a vehicle. It should be part of driver's education. "This is what YOU will look like, if you are stupid enough to drive your car into a rock wall at 80 mph!"
It should hit females harder than males. No female wants to be buried looking fugly. Guys care about their appearance at their own funeral somewhat less, but the graphic images SHOULD get their attention anyway.
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Date of birth was 1956, thank you. This particular runaway truck episode happened in 1999. But, I was a runaway several times in the latter '60's through 1974. Hence, my online nick.
As usual, one needs to examine the IQ test. Yeah, we know that smoking is stupid. What a simple thing to ask, "Do you smoke?" and deduct a point or six if the answer is yes. "Do you smoke more than a pack a day?" Deduct another point or 20.
IQ tests ALWAYS test for specific things, and if you've an agenda to prove that smokers are dumb, it's no big deal to rig the test to prove it.
I would go with prior art and obviousness, on the "lit portion" bit of the suit. As for the rest of it, I'd be skeptical of any claims of having "invented" a unique controller. I'll admit up front, I'm not ready to examine the patent to decide for myself. I'll leave that to people who actually use game controllers. It's possible that the internals are unique in some non-obvious way, and MS has a valid suit. I wouldn't take that to the bank until the fat lady is done singing though.
http://www.mazdausa.com/MusaWeb/musa2/pdf/specs/specs_MX5.pdf
PDF on the most up to date version of the car I drive. Apparently, the 6 speed gets the same mileage, whether it's AT or MT. The 5 speed manual gets slightly better mileage than the 6 speed.
It's *possible* that the most modern AT's now rival the MT's - but it's also possible that they've rigged the numbers. I just don't know enough to say.
I'm also aware that many newer vehicles have a selector that tells the computer to adjust the engine and transmission for fuel economy, or to adjust everything for power/performance/towing/hauling. Again, it's quite possible that flipping that selector really optimizes things for fuel economy, and it drives as well as I can.
But, I'm still mindful that while I drive, I'm watching traffic conditions as well as road conditions around and ahead of me. The computer can't do that. If I see a bridge half a mile or more ahead of me that is obviously iced over, I want to slow down, and approach that bridge with just the slightest bit of power driving me forward, whether it is rear or front wheel drive. The computer is completely unable to anticipate that I want maximum tration, and minimum power. If the damned thing downshifts and lurches ahead, I'm in serious trouble with rear wheel drive, and I could be in trouble with front wheel drive.
A mind is a terrible thing to waste, I've heard. I certainly don't want a computer wasting me AND my mind!
Fair enough. And, I've been told that today's auto transmissions can be "locked" into your chosen gear. Whatever - Freightliner got it wrong in the early days, as I say, they took a nice stab at getting me killed, and I never gave them another chance. I DID downshift, and the gear selector was in 9th gear, I believe (can't remember for certain after all these years, that was in 1999) and the computer over rode my choice of gears when the tach reached whatever speed it was designed to shift at. 2500 rpm? I really don't remember now. I brought the truck back to the yard, and told the boss I was NOT driving the damned thing again.
I much prefer manually putting that tranny in my chosen gear, and KNOWING that no one, and no thing, can possibly over ride my judgement. You realize at least as well as I do that sometimes there is simply no time to second guess that computer and/or another driver, and put things back the way you want them.
Single screw tractor? That would really suck. I always drove dual axles, so I could have flipped the lock-out to get another wheel driving. Of course, that doesn't always work. A couple times, both wheels on the same side of the tractor engaged, and just shot gravel out from underneath . . .
Uhhhh - read the mileage stickers on most vehicles. The manufacturers tell you in black and white that the same car will get better fuel mileage if it's equipped with a standard shift. Any rumors to the contrary are utter nonsense.
BAG (bad analogy guy) modded flamebait here? Why? That stupid shuttle was a crappy idea from the word go. It was a compromise of many things. A spaceship is not an airplane, and an airplane is not a spaceship. It's about what you would get if you tried to make a Cadillac pickup truck. A butt ugly piece of shit that doesn't do anything as well as some other alternative vehicle. http://www.automedia.com/NewCarBuyersGuide2007/photos/2007/Cadillac/SRX/SUV/2007_Cadillac_SRX_ext_1.jpg Go ahead, look at it. It's every bit as ugly as the shuttle.
Has anyone ever done a poll of the shuttle pilots? Has anyone ever asked them if they would rather have driven a real spaceship, that actually went somewhere? Most pilots, most drivers, don't learn their skill so that they can drive on an established circular track a dozen times in their lives. Most of them learn their skills so that they can GO SOMEWHERE!!
Face it, we've not yet built a real spaceship. China will probably beat us to that. No, the space station doesn't count - that's just a freaking raft, tethered to the shore by a really short logistics chain.
Idaho is cool. I was driving north one night in Idaho, and realized that I had seen no electric lights in more than an hour. So, I started watching, thinking that I had just missed some. I drove, and drove, and drove. No lights. Not even oncoming traffic. No porch lights, no parking lot lights, nothing. I've driven through huge swathes of America that had no power due to blizzards or hurricanes, and saw more lighting! Talk about the wide open spaces. I've never driven so far without seeing lights, anywhere in the United States. What is the population density?
Idaho is cool. Cooler than Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, or even Utah.
Your mileage may vary, of course.
Typo above: replace 19 speed with 18 speed. I've never heard of a 19 speed, LMAO
What a sexist attitude. And, a sexist attitude that girls respond to. God knows why, but they choose to conform to this stereotype.
I've met little 80 pound women jockeying 40 ton trucks up and down the road, for God's sake. If they can drive those 9 speed, 13 speed, 19 speed, and sometimes even multi-plex transmissions, then ANY LITTLE GIRL can drive a standard.
I guess you'd like to see teenage girls riding horses on a side saddle too? That was the same sexist attitude, after all.
"keep knocking automatic transmissions based on outdated information"
The waste of fuel is most certainly not outdated information. I believe that was GP's primary complaint.
Again, someone making fun of GP.
Ever driven an 18 wheeler? Ever driven an 18 wheeler with an AUTOMATIC???? I did. Once. Never again.
As has been pointed out, the transmission cannot anticipate that I need a bit more torgue to climb a hill that it hasn't sensed yet. Nor can it see that I need to merge into traffic. It senses nothing, anticipates nothing - it only responds to certain stimuli, and everything is WRONG by the time those stimuli reach the brain controlling the transmission.
Worse, that damned transmission took a nice stab at killing me. Going downhill, a driver puts the truck into a lower gear and/or engages the Jake brake to govern his speed going down the hill. Try that with an idiot computer which decides that you are wasting fuel at high RPM's and upshifts the transmission, just before you get to the steepest grade on the hill. I had a hairy few minutes, believe me. 80,000 pounds of inertia falling into the gravity well is hard to overcome when the machine is fighting with you!
I realize you're making fun of GP - but you're coming off looking a bit stupid.
Across the board, with all manufacturer's lineups, manual transmissions get roughly two mpg better fuel mileage than an automatic. Same model, same optional equipment, same size tires, everything else the same, the manual gets better fuel mileage. And, that's the point that g(x)parent was making. Most of the rest of the world can't AFFORD those wasteful automatic transmissions, or the myriad of optional equipment that wastes yet more fuel. They choose smaller, lighter cars with less optional equipment, and better engineering because wasting 100 gallons of fuel per year is not an option.
Yes, something is lost in the translation when we start comparing fuel prices. My fellow Americans don't realize that everyone in the world buys their fuel by the liter. 1 liter roughly equal to 1 quart so a person could multiply your price by 4 to get our price per gallon. But, that's just to hard for people to do. *sigh* Sometimes I'm just embarrassed by my people. I remember the good old days, when we had to go to the currency exchanges every time we crossed a border. NO ONE used the same currency. Imagine how lost most Americans were, LMAO
Kanye only does insults and bad music. Get real. They wanted an actor, preferably one with talent. Kanye could have been one of the inbreds on 'Deliverance' except for his dark complexion.
The money, yeah. But, Bill retired, right? He's the one person that I'm sure of who saw years into the future. Now, PLEASE, don't take that as a compliment to Bill - I despise the bastard, but I do try to give the devil his due. He publicly stated, multiple times, that he approved of people pirating Windows, because there would be a day of reckoning, when the entire world depended on his product. Very forward looking.
Talk is cheap.
I understood your point. But, the facts stand - Walmart had a young woman arrested on false charges, presumably motivated by a racist attitude.
That business in California with the RIAA sweeping through flea markets was NOT a government action. It was a corporate action, enforce by armed men employed by the corporation. Get your facts straight. Apparently you didn't browse all the stories on those pages, and you most certainly didn't google to prove me wrong. I remember when the story hit the headlines. Employing off duty cops does not constitute "calling the authorities" to make a bust.
And, as for RIAA, MPAA, and telcos, you are aware that a war is being fought right now to restrict the powers and the authority of corporations. It's a losing war, because the corporations just pick and choose which politicians to buy, while we are restricted to a vote every couple years.
I don't send much, but I do send a few dollars to the EFF and other organizations fighting for citizen's rights, as opposed to corporate rights. No corporation has the right to monitor me, at any time, in any way, or to enforce their will upon me. Power, yes. Authority, no. Right, no.
Corporations can't do what, exactly? Perhaps you should check out some of the draconian moves made by corporations over the past years.
A young woman arrived in a WalMart in near Houston, with ~$4,700 worth of Walmart money orders. It has been proven conclusively that the money orders were genuine, and lawfully hers - but she was charged by the Walmart manager with trying to pass counterfeit money orders. False arrest and false imprisonment (which, by any reasonable definition amounts to kidnapping) committed by a corporation. http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/6932914.html
Corporations routinely monitor your internet traffice, as well as your cell phone traffic, for reasons of their own, and they also enable the gubbermint to monitor your telephone traffic without warrants. http://arstechnica.com/telecom/news/2008/01/senate-blocks-vote-on-surveillance-bill-that-would-grant-telecom-immunity.ars
Corporations don't knock your door down, and sieze your goods? How about taking your property at gunpoint, in public, with witnesses? California
May 15-16, 2002 - The RIAA and Fonovisa representatives executed a series of voluntary surrender actions at two flea markets in Indio, CA and Torrance, CA. 11 vendors were issued notices and 3,637 alleged illicit sound recordings were recovered from both locations. Artist recordings seized included works from top-selling acts such as Thalia and Shaggy. http://www.grayzone.com/october2008busts.htm
Don't let the terminology fool you, in that story. A "voluntary surrender action" involves the presence of armed men telling you that you can't have certain items in your possession. In most times and places throughout history, this would be considered robbery.
Corporations do a lot of things that aren't publicized, and the ones that do get into the news are sanitized with meaningless phrases such as "voluntary surrender action".
The VFD almost certainly drives vehicles that were bought by the city, village, township, boro, or whatever they reside in, with both donated and tax money, and maybe the proceeds of a raffle or two. In some few wealthy municipalities, the VFD might be financially independent of the local government. I've seen that exactly twice in my life.
Agree, 20,000 percent.
It's amazing how quick people who never do anything are to judge people who actually DO THINGS.
"correct the problems that cause it."
I thought Darwin had that solved. Those who are susceptible to cancer die off sooner or later, while those who are not so susceptible breed like rabbits.
I wish more cops and more emergency personnel would publish photos. These images need to be in the mind of every person who drives a vehicle. It should be part of driver's education. "This is what YOU will look like, if you are stupid enough to drive your car into a rock wall at 80 mph!"
It should hit females harder than males. No female wants to be buried looking fugly. Guys care about their appearance at their own funeral somewhat less, but the graphic images SHOULD get their attention anyway.
Hey, that's cool. Can I get MSE for Linux?
"It's been 19 seconds since you hit 'reply'."
NOTE TO SELF: Try typing slower, alright?