I already have to deal with my little brother standing directly in front of the IR receiver on the TV for the remote control. He's gonna have a field-day screwing with my quake ping rates!
How dare the government regulate where I get my media! What are they socialists???
They don't care about my rights as a consumer to have ALL my services charged on one convenient bill, all my services installed and fixed by one courteous, prompt repairman!
My life is so convenient when I can get all this stuff from one, homogenous provider! Maybe the government would like to provide all these services, oh, wait a minute, maybe it's not so socialist afterall./Satire, or, at least something like it.
I think your point is well taken, but if you applied the same assumptions to the nuclear arms race, you'd be quite suprised that the poor schmucks in North Korea, Pakistan, and maybe Bolivia posess nuclear weapons.
Assuming your enemy will always be weaker than you, is a terrible weakness.
Ok, pure speculation here. Wouldn't a military vehicle buzzing with nanomachines likely give off some sort of electroic signature that would be easy to detect? Just a question. I'm sure there are ways around it.
The tiny body panels of these things won't hold nearly enough lighter fluid to allow me to recreate the crazy hot stunz I so enjoy. I much prefer to create basketball-sized flaming heaps of molded plastic.
I'm really tired of the japanese enforcing their culture on all of the rest of us earth-dwellers. I mean come on! I can't even walk down the street with out tripping over a sushi restaurant, or an anime video store. Now they're taking over disney! Is nothing sacred!/sarcasm
Read this interesting article detailing how japan can leverage it's cultural roots to overcome it's economic hardships: Japan's Gross National Cool
Come on. No true thourough review will come from having "town meetings." This is just a public stunt to make people feel like they have input in drafting the policy. My bet is that this thing is already signed-sealed and delivered.
If they really wanted a quality review they'd submit it to 20-30 different universities, think tanks and businesses and individuals who are integral to studying the internet. By doing reviews in a "town meeting" format, they might as well just put it on a call in talk show and have the callers "draft" the policy.
I don't mean to put down the quality of input that ordinary "citizens" can add to this policy, a town hall is just not the way to do it.
I think it's important to note, that while CANDU reactors may produce less spent fuel, with a shorter half-life, they still produce all of the other contaminated muckety-muck that comes with any nuclear installation. The contaminated soil, building materials, equipment, water, clothing, and safety devices, all of which still need to be safely disposed, are often overlooked in the nuclear debate. In fact, these are the materials that make up the highest percentage of stored waste, because they're just so damn bulky.
While this low level waste is less dangerous than spent uranium, it's still dangerious if it's allowed to leach into ground water.
Legolas, I think this is the most intelligent conversation I've ever had on slashdot. Thanks! =)
The other poster did summ up my point. I think i read a stat recently that stated that more energy makes its way from the sun to the earth in a 12 hour period, than is stored in the earth's petroleum reserves. Harness 1/1000th of that and I think we'd have our energy crisis solved.
However, like fuel cells, what's most limiting to solar power is the cost of PV cells.
This is irritating though, since solar cell tech is so old. It should have evolved further than it has in the last 30 years.
The fact is that no large power companies are willing to put serious money into solar reserach and development to bring the cost down. An example: BP Amoco is currently running an advertisment bragging that they've spent $200 million over six years researching Solar technologies. $200 million? Big deal. The U.S. defense budget this year is over $300 billion.
The only major U.S. solar tech developer is Siemens, and they only seem interested in doing solar for highly specialized applications.
And while Nuke energy may be inexpensive and efficient in the beginning, the costs of waste storage are astronomical. Estimates I've read put out by the NRDC show that it will cost well over $1.2 trillion to properly set up Yucca Mountain, and that's going to take 10 years.
Put that trillion into solar energy development and it would be much farther along in the develpment cycle.
Lastly, I'll mention a point from a recent Mother Jones article on wind power. Wind and solar installations are far less vulnerable, and less dangerous in the event of a terrorist attack.
Legolas, the nice thing about fuel cells is that they operate at an extremely high rate of efficiency. They're safe, (the use them on the space shuttle because they're nearly inert) and they don't genereate too much heat.
As far as the hydrogen question goes, this is where solar energy comes in to play. Because you can easily transport hydrogen and oxygen over great distances without the loss of it's potential energy, you could set up one massive bank of solar collectors to provide the energy to generate an entire country's hydrogen and Oxygen. Or wind generators.
And no nasty waste to cart off to Nevada.
That being said, fuel cells are still pie in the sky. Far too expensive to manufacture with current technologies.
I do own a fuel cell. To be exact, it's a small direct methanol cell, which runs on a 3% methanol and 97% water solution. I'm damn sure that 3% methanol is not too flamable.
My guess is that the number one thing keeping fuel cells off the mainstream market is the cost of production. Specifically, the poles of the cell have to be made of platinum. Last time I checked platinum isn't too cheap.
The EU, Africa and Russia have all threatened to bypass U.S. drug company patents on drugs used to combat H.I.V. in order to reduce the costs of distribution to the people who need them.
Could you ever see the same measures taken in terms of technology to help bridge the digital divide?
Slashdot Mirror
I already have to deal with my little brother standing directly in front of the IR receiver on the TV for the remote control. He's gonna have a field-day screwing with my quake ping rates!
Play the Stock Market Drinking Game
tcd004
Please, noone accuse me of oversimplification just for karma points. Even if it is true.
Tcd004
Technology is always first developed for one of four things:
1. The Military
2. Sexual Urges
3. Easy Money
4. Security (making sure the above services are properly paid for)
If we can't have sex with it, blow it up, or make loads of cash off of it, we're just not interested.
Visit Richard Gere's Ass Zoo
tcd004
Cause, really, nothing says "I'm a counter culture rebel, fighting the establishment" like an Aibo on a skateboard.
Visit Richard Gere's Ass Zoo
tcd004
How dare the government regulate where I get my media! What are they socialists???
/Satire, or, at least something like it.
They don't care about my rights as a consumer to have ALL my services charged on one convenient bill, all my services installed and fixed by one courteous, prompt repairman!
My life is so convenient when I can get all this stuff from one, homogenous provider! Maybe the government would like to provide all these services, oh, wait a minute, maybe it's not so socialist afterall.
See Richard Gere's Ass Zoo
tcd004
I called them the other day and this was all I heard.
tcd004
I think your point is well taken, but if you applied the same assumptions to the nuclear arms race, you'd be quite suprised that the poor schmucks in North Korea, Pakistan, and maybe Bolivia posess nuclear weapons.
Assuming your enemy will always be weaker than you, is a terrible weakness.
tcd004
As evidenced by this review
tcd004
Ok, pure speculation here. Wouldn't a military vehicle buzzing with nanomachines likely give off some sort of electroic signature that would be easy to detect? Just a question. I'm sure there are ways around it.
tcd004
What would you do with your own Oil company?
Make an ultra-durable polymer version that I could use as a cutting surface with an X-acto knife.
A semitransparent version for use in tracing.
Clothing - afterall, if you can make a sheet of this stuff, you could conceiveably make a fiber out of it, no?
Just thinking out loud.
tcd004
If I had my own oil company, I would...
The tiny body panels of these things won't hold nearly enough lighter fluid to allow me to recreate the crazy hot stunz I so enjoy. I much prefer to create basketball-sized flaming heaps of molded plastic.
Read Richard Gere's Ass Zoo.
tcd004
I'm really tired of the japanese enforcing their culture on all of the rest of us earth-dwellers. I mean come on! I can't even walk down the street with out tripping over a sushi restaurant, or an anime video store. Now they're taking over disney! Is nothing sacred! /sarcasm
Read this interesting article detailing how japan can leverage it's cultural roots to overcome it's economic hardships:
Japan's Gross National Cool
Then, on a less serious, unrelated note, read:
Ricard Gere's Ass Zoo
tcd004
Come on. No true thourough review will come from having "town meetings." This is just a public stunt to make people feel like they have input in drafting the policy. My bet is that this thing is already signed-sealed and delivered.
If they really wanted a quality review they'd submit it to 20-30 different universities, think tanks and businesses and individuals who are integral to studying the internet. By doing reviews in a "town meeting" format, they might as well just put it on a call in talk show and have the callers "draft" the policy.
I don't mean to put down the quality of input that ordinary "citizens" can add to this policy, a town hall is just not the way to do it.
hrumph.
tcd004
Read Richard Gere's Ass Zoo, really
Chains, nails, you can chew them up with your titanium teeth and spit them out like bullets!
Sorry, this just spawned memories of my favorite SeaLab 2021
Visit
tcd004
I think it's important to note, that while CANDU reactors may produce less spent fuel, with a shorter half-life, they still produce all of the other contaminated muckety-muck that comes with any nuclear installation. The contaminated soil, building materials, equipment, water, clothing, and safety devices, all of which still need to be safely disposed, are often overlooked in the nuclear debate. In fact, these are the materials that make up the highest percentage of stored waste, because they're just so damn bulky.
While this low level waste is less dangerous than spent uranium, it's still dangerious if it's allowed to leach into ground water.
tcd004
Legolas, I think this is the most intelligent conversation I've ever had on slashdot. Thanks! =)
The other poster did summ up my point. I think i read a stat recently that stated that more energy makes its way from the sun to the earth in a 12 hour period, than is stored in the earth's petroleum reserves. Harness 1/1000th of that and I think we'd have our energy crisis solved.
However, like fuel cells, what's most limiting to solar power is the cost of PV cells.
This is irritating though, since solar cell tech is so old. It should have evolved further than it has in the last 30 years.
The fact is that no large power companies are willing to put serious money into solar reserach and development to bring the cost down. An example: BP Amoco is currently running an advertisment bragging that they've spent $200 million over six years researching Solar technologies. $200 million? Big deal. The U.S. defense budget this year is over $300 billion.
The only major U.S. solar tech developer is Siemens, and they only seem interested in doing solar for highly specialized applications.
And while Nuke energy may be inexpensive and efficient in the beginning, the costs of waste storage are astronomical. Estimates I've read put out by the NRDC show that it will cost well over $1.2 trillion to properly set up Yucca Mountain, and that's going to take 10 years.
Put that trillion into solar energy development and it would be much farther along in the develpment cycle.
Lastly, I'll mention a point from a recent Mother Jones article on wind power. Wind and solar installations are far less vulnerable, and less dangerous in the event of a terrorist attack.
Tcd004
Legolas, the nice thing about fuel cells is that they operate at an extremely high rate of efficiency. They're safe, (the use them on the space shuttle because they're nearly inert) and they don't genereate too much heat.
As far as the hydrogen question goes, this is where solar energy comes in to play. Because you can easily transport hydrogen and oxygen over great distances without the loss of it's potential energy, you could set up one massive bank of solar collectors to provide the energy to generate an entire country's hydrogen and Oxygen. Or wind generators.
And no nasty waste to cart off to Nevada.
That being said, fuel cells are still pie in the sky. Far too expensive to manufacture with current technologies.
tcd004
I do own a fuel cell. To be exact, it's a small direct methanol cell, which runs on a 3% methanol and 97% water solution. I'm damn sure that 3% methanol is not too flamable.
My guess is that the number one thing keeping fuel cells off the mainstream market is the cost of production. Specifically, the poles of the cell have to be made of platinum. Last time I checked platinum isn't too cheap.
Visit
tcd004
Only $499.99 for a pair!
They're gonna need more $ than that when Apple Sues them for using Aqua buttons on their site.
Visit LostBrain
tcd004
without human intervention.
But what will burt reynolds do?
read the EXTREME worst case scenario guidebook
tcd004
Grace is 3 years old. She weighs 157 pounds. She is 4 feet, 6 inches tall, and she has a Magavox for a face.
Reject Artificiality!
tcd004
The EU, Africa and Russia have all threatened to bypass U.S. drug company patents on drugs used to combat H.I.V. in order to reduce the costs of distribution to the people who need them.
Could you ever see the same measures taken in terms of technology to help bridge the digital divide?
Thanks!
tcd004
Read the EXTREME Worst-Case Scenario Guidebook
was "Theatre of Magic" which you can still buy on ebay. (wish I had 3 grand laying around.
Second might be the twilight zone.
Just my thoughts.
tcd004
I thought they were talking about Indiana Jones games. It was the dog who was named Indy. The dog.
Play the Stock Market Drinking Game!
tcd004
"Mountain Waves" had something to do with mountains attending sporting events. That would be sweet.
Read Justin Timberlake's "I banged Britney" homepage
tcd004