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User: Old97

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  1. The airplane is a regression in train making on How Apple Watch Is Really a Regression In Watchmaking · · Score: 3, Insightful

    As a train, the airplane is pitiful. It can't haul as much freight or as many passengers. It costs more. It needs to land and be refueled more frequently. And who needs an airplane anyway? Trains are safer as you are less likely to die in an accident. Trains may not be as fast, but what's the hurry? I like sitting in the car and seeing the country go by at ground level. You can't see a damn thing from an airplane and what you do see looks like little toys. Yep, only an idiot would build or buy an airplane because I like trains.

  2. Re:Was pretty obvious on Skilled Foreign Workers Treated as Indentured Servants · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Before him it was the Bush Administration. Before Bush it was Clinton. Minions of the ruling class always do their bidding regardless of major party affiliation.

  3. Re:Bottom line... on German Intelligence Spying On Allies, Recorded Kerry, Clinton, and Kofi Annan · · Score: 2

    Courts and police do not predate the concept of a government. Even the Greek city-states were states. The alternative to states were tribes. Not all state's are nations and not all nations have states. Germany is a nation state, but the USA is not. Nor are most if not all African countries and other countries created by colonial or other imperial powers. The Kurds are a nation that has no state. Israel is an attempt to create a nation state by reassembling the nation into a geographic area and declaring a state. The 50 US states are part of a federal system. We tried a confederacy (in 1783-9) but found it didn't work well so we strengthened the central government. So are you saying that you don't like Germany, but you like the USA? How well are the African states working out? The problem with international institutions is that they are not democratic. Totalitarian and authoritarian governments end up with as much say as those with more representative democracies.

  4. Re:Bottom line... on German Intelligence Spying On Allies, Recorded Kerry, Clinton, and Kofi Annan · · Score: 1

    Who would enforce the contracts? Contracts of all kind are enforced by government, i.e. the states you think are unnecessary. It's the states that provide the mechanisms to make and enforce laws, contracts, private property, etc. How would you replace that? How does anarchy work exactly?

  5. Re:Snake Oil on How Facebook Sold You Krill Oil · · Score: 2

    Yes, but then there are the data brokers who put that all together for their customers. Selling and exchanging data is a big business. A company can buy the raw data in some cases or share their data where it goes into a pool and the broker provides (sells) you details about customers, prospects, leads, partners, etc.

  6. Re:For a sense of scale on Will 7nm and 5nm CPU Process Tech Really Happen? · · Score: 2

    Then IBM would saddle it with some really complex, bloated, crappy middleware called "WebSphere Atomic Appliance for Business". It would be more expensive and run slower than a no-name Intel based blade running Linux and an open source framework. You'd need their professional services to manage it for you.

  7. Re:China anyone? on Greenland Is Getting Darker · · Score: 4, Insightful

    No. It's China not implementing pollution controls that is the problem, not who they are manufacturing for. They could continue to produce these products and still implement the controls they promised, but they haven't. China and a number of other countries compete on cost not just with cheap labor, but by not requiring their manufacturers to minimize pollution. It's bad for their citizens and bad for the world.

  8. Re:If only Bill Waterson inspired other cartoonist on Bill Watterson (briefly) Returns To Comics · · Score: 2

    Get Fuzzy! Enough said.

  9. Re:Linux soon? on Netflix Ditches Silverlight For HTML5 On Macs · · Score: 2

    I don't know if its Netflix demanding the DRM or the content providers. iTunes DRM was not Apple's desire. It was mandated by the music publishers. Eventually they relented in exchange for a higher price. Now that Netflix is also producing content they might also want the DRM. Anyone know?

  10. Re:Amazon provides a service on Amazon Escalates Its Battle Against Publishers · · Score: 2

    Lousy analogy. Microsoft makes Word and Word competed against Wordperfect so one would not expect the manufacturer of one product to sell the competing product of a competitor. Amazon sells books. It does not write them or publish them. It is an important channel through which publishers and authors seek to sell their products. The books are electronic so the cost of stocking and selling any one book is close to zero. Amazon is simply refusing to sell certain books in order to put price pressure on a publisher or to punish an author or publisher for their behavior. If Amazon was found to be a monopoly their behavior could be ruled as illegal. That's basically the question, is Amazon's position in electronic book sales so dominant as to effectively constitute a monopoly. I don't think so as I rarely buy ebooks from Amazon, but then I don't buy contemporary popular fiction either.

  11. Re:In a century... on Scientists Warn of Rising Oceans As Antarctic Ice Melts · · Score: 2

    Let's see. You might check on the Koch Industries environmental record. http://www.polluterwatch.com/k... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K... http://www.bloomberg.com/news/... Perhaps the Exxon Valdez disaster - still not repaired for Exxon or the oil rig disaster in the Gulf of Mexico for BP just a couple of years ago. The numerous leaks on the Alaska oil pipeline? These folks make billions (trillions collectively) and leave a trail of destruction. They actively fight most every attempt at regulation and disaster prevention. They fund global warming denial web sites and groups. Mountain top removal for the coal industry? How about strip mining. Do you think that's good for the environment? How about your drinking water? Duke Power and the pollution in the Cape Fear river some weeks ago? The spill in West Virginia weeks before that? The spill in the Tennessee river valley a few years ago? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K... Would you say none of that was preventable? Their very business is the destruction of the environment in order to obtain fossil fuels. The use of these fuels is also the primary contributor to the global warming we've been witnessing. What part of this do you not get? Are you an astroturfer? How much are getting paid to pretend to be this dumb?

  12. Re:In a century... on Scientists Warn of Rising Oceans As Antarctic Ice Melts · · Score: 1

    Koch brothers. Executives of Exxon. Executives of BP. Executives of every major coal company. On and on and on.

  13. Re:In a century... on Scientists Warn of Rising Oceans As Antarctic Ice Melts · · Score: 4, Informative

    There was no "global cooling" phenomenon being widely touted in the 1970's. That's a myth. The climate change report recently issued http://nca2014.globalchange.go... addresses that among other things. Global warming and this particular problem of glacier melting in Antarctica were both called out in the 1970's though. According to the NY Time reporting the second case - Antarctica is related to a variety of factors in addition to global warming. There are no big bucks to be made being an environmentalist. Provide some names of a few folks who became billionaires from pushing environmental protection. There are trillions being made producing fossil fuels.

  14. Re:Gun nuts on "Smart" Gun Seller Gets the Wrong Kind of Online Attention · · Score: 1

    So you're a lawyer and you've researched this completely or you've latched on to a snippet out of context and are misinterpreting it to favor your own prejudices. Snopes has a nice objective write up of misinterpretations of the Dick Act (Militia Act of 1903) including yours. http://www.snopes.com/politics... Specifically, the Dick Act does not void gun control laws or address any right to bear arms. Try again. BTW, for those who assume I'm against gun ownership, try again because I'm not. I just don't think the 2nd amendment is a slam dunk obvious argument in favor of a universal right to bear arms - any arms. Personally I believe I have an inalienable right to self defense.

  15. Re:Gun nuts on "Smart" Gun Seller Gets the Wrong Kind of Online Attention · · Score: 1

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S... SCOTUS has issued different opinions on this over time. They can always change their minds again. Even if it is settled as case law it is not settled politically any more than Rowe v Wade ended the debates on abortion.

  16. Re:Gun nuts on "Smart" Gun Seller Gets the Wrong Kind of Online Attention · · Score: 3, Informative

    Which Militia Act - 1792, 1795, 1862 or 1903? You see, the act of 1903 superseded all the previous acts and established the National Guard as the states' militias. If you are not a member of the National Guard then you aren't in a militia. These militia acts all dealt with the role and rights of states to create and regulate militias versus the role and rights of the Federal government in these matters. Try again.

  17. Re:Gun nuts on "Smart" Gun Seller Gets the Wrong Kind of Online Attention · · Score: 1
    You're not quite correct on a couple of points.

    The 2nd Amendment of the US Constitution guarantees that each citizen has the right to keep and bear arms for self-defense.

    The 2nd amendment qualifies that right with words about a "well regulated militia". Not everyone agrees that individuals have the right to bear arms when they are not acting as participants in a state sanctioned militia. Courts have ruled both ways on this and there is still quite a bit of debate.

    If you wish to live in community that heavily regulates firearms, then band together and do so - nothing restricts a locality/city/region from banning the things of their own initiative (see also Chicago, D.C, New York City, etc.) .

    It is not true that communities can ban fire arms on their own. That notion has been over turned in court along with all the related local laws. I live in Chicago and the city and state are now grappling with how far they can go to restrict even concealed carry much less the possession of guns. We actually have to post signs if we don't want people to bring fire arms on our property.

  18. Re:Buggy whips? on The Koch Brothers Attack On Solar Energy · · Score: 1

    Perhaps they are Body Thetans! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T...

  19. Re:Why do these people always have something to hi on VA Supreme Court: Michael Mann Needn't Turn Over All His Email · · Score: 4, Informative

    If you read the article, it what was denied was unpublished research. The research the plaintiff's are challenging is available to them. He doesn't have to defend arguments that he hasn't made.

  20. Re:Pretty much true on Michael Bloomberg: You Can't Teach a Coal Miner To Code · · Score: 1

    Yes, if you are programming a robot or a bag ripping device.

  21. Re:We need a US base in the Ukraine on Russian Army Spetsnaz Units Arrested Operating In Ukraine · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What was illegal about it? The invasion of Iraq in 1991 was sanctioned by the UN. Hostilities were suspended (not ended) on the condition that Saddam complied with a number of conditions. He violated some of those conditions. His violations included firing on UN sponsored forces - aircraft in the no-fly zone, obstructing weapons inspectors among other thing. So the US invaded. In my view the invasion was unnecessary and a waste of US resources and lives, but it wasn't illegal. The final verdict of the legality/illegality of this invasion was decided in what court? Did said court have jurisdiction?

  22. Just like where I work ... on Top U.S. Scientific Misconduct Official Quits In Frustration With Bureaucracy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    and its a large corporation in the private sector. Its hard for very large organizations to be efficient.

  23. Re:Hmmm... on How Do You Backup 20TB of Data? · · Score: 3, Informative

    The first 8" I used held 128k. The last one had a capacity of around 1.2 mb. They were twice as fast (transfer rate) as those new fangled 5 1/4 inch floppies. Kids, what do they know?

  24. Re:I've heard that government moves slowly... on Embarrassing Stories Shed Light On US Officials' Technological Ignorance · · Score: 1

    There is what they are trying to do and then there is what we are paying them to do, isn't there?

  25. Re:I've heard that government moves slowly... on Embarrassing Stories Shed Light On US Officials' Technological Ignorance · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm happy to give them a break until they assume the authority to make decisions that depend on understanding technology. Once they do that they have the duty to be knowledgeable and competent. Anyone aspiring to such authority should be preparing and educating themselves.