Wind and direct solar have storage problems. Converting plant matter into a transportable liquid bridges that gap. In the end, all energy available to us traces back to two sources: solar, and geothermal. Growing plants to capture the solar energy is good way to shorten the time lag of waiting for geologic processes to create oil and coal, and mitigates the storage problem of letting solar energy create wind which is then captured with windmills. Efficient conversion processes combined with modern agronomy to optimize plant characteristics is a good path to sustainable energy production -- but it won't support Earth's current population. But then again, we are overfishing the oceans, too, so it seems to me we have passed the planet's carrying capacity. So back to your original comment about not having enough fertile ground -- that's one way to look at it, but it assumes the Earth's human population can only grow. When the oil runs out the population will shrink. There is no way around that. Plot the following three curves on a graph: 1) rate of new oil reserve discovery (barrels per year), 2) rate of oil production (barrels per year), 3) earth's population. You will see that #2, follows #1 at a 30 year lag, and that #1 peaked some time ago, and #2 somewhat recently. #3 ramps with #2. I believe that #2 will follow #1 down -- no one has be able to make a credible argument otherwise. I suspect #3 will -- painfully -- follow #2 down, and the ride will not be pleasant. As in 'interesting times' not pleasant.
Compare the efficiency of plans turning sunlight into carbohydrates, with that of a planet's geologic processes turning the results of mass-extinction events into fossil fuels over millions of years. Most of Earths oil was produced during two distinct mass-extinction events long ago. We're on track to use every drop of it up over the course of a couple hundred years. The phrase 'burn rate' comes to mind. If the planet can't produce energy that fast, then perhaps, we need to cut back how much we burn, eh?
So much fail. First of all, the 'militia' clause in the 2A controls nothing. Read the Heller decision from the Supreme Court.
Secondly, umm.... yes, the US has assembled militia. The militia of the various States fought under General Washington to throw off the British. Oh... BTW... what was General Gage trying to do when he engaged the militia at Lexington and Concord? He was trying to confiscate a Massachusetts Militia ammunition depot.
So... you might want to read up on history, and you might want to read up on current events. And if you have spare time, read up on what happened in between.
I'm pretty sure you have no idea what it takes to create a mold for injection molding. I have made molds and shot plastic. Crappy molds, because I'm an amateur machinist, but I have shot ABS in molds I made myself using a 20 ton Morgan Press manual injection molding machine, and taught others how to do it. Come back and tell me "it's just plastic" after you have made a mold in hardened tool steel, with tolerances spec'ed in hundreths of millimeters, and a high-polish surface specification, and shot millions of parts while keeping the dimensions and surface finish within spec. You can show me your math then. Until then, stop talking out of your ass.
You've got that right. Lego molds are extremely precise -- the jewelry of the machinists' art, and hand cleaned and polished periodically. And they use only top quality resins -- there is ABS, and then there is ABS -- better resins cost more. That is why Lego is expensive.
If you have version control, and yet still fear deleting code, then methinks your regression suite and code review process are weak.
Do you have a good handle on the coverage provided by your test suite? Is the code change, including the deletion, talked about during code review before your dev branch is merged into mainline? Does your defect tracking system allow you to tag defects with an 'incorrect deletion' marker? Are you adding a targeted test to the regression suite for every diagnosed defect?
If 'yes' to all, then delete it and let version control keep the history for you.
Let's see.... Diane Feinstein used to have a CCW permit, until she very publicly gave it up and was very privately deputized as a Federal Marshall allowing her to carry in all 50 states and on airplanes. Michael Boomberg has a security detail. David Gregory's children go to a private school that has had armed security guards for a long time... oh... and since the president's children go there too, they bring along their Secret Service agents.
Oooops, you wanted only 3. Sorry, in 10 seconds I couldn't keep it under 4.
Now seems like a good time to inject some uncomfortable facts. According the the latest FBI statistics, law enforcement officers are perpetrators of violent crime at *exactly* the same rate as the general population. This is not counting "police brutality" or any other duty-related charges, real or imagined. CCW holders on the other hand, are perpetrators of violent crime at about 1/20 the rate of the general population, and therefore at 1/20 the rate of law enforcement officers, also.
So, using FBI statistics, the chance of a law enforcement officer using his firearms for nefarious ends are about 20X that of your neighbor with a CCW license doing likewise.
Read the news much? The mom of the guy in CT was trying to get the paper work in order to get him committed for mental health problems. CT has some of the strictest gun laws in the nation. His mother had jumped through all the hoops to acquire the guns legally. All her guns -- 100% legal in a restrictive state. The guy shot his own mother and stole her guns before she was able to get him help. Strict laws don't stop the mentally ill from shooting their own mother to steal their ammunition.
It's fair to ask why, if she was trying to get him committed, that she allowed him access to her guns. Poor judgement is the only thing I can say about that.
Why was it so hard to get him committed? Let's talk about that. In California, we have something called Penal Code 5150 -- PC5150 allows you to quite quickly put a 72 hour hold on someone with mental health issues. Immediately (within minutes) you go into the Cal DOJ data base as a person prohibited from buying firearms -- you won't be able to buy any, and you won't be allowed to pick up any that are still in the 10 day waiting period. Local law enforcement is immediately notified, and they pay a call on your home ASAP to collect any guns that may be in that residence. The person is guaranteed a due-process hearing in front of a judge within two weeks to see if they should be allowed their guns back. CT passed a law similar to PC5150, but its implementation was blocked by an ACLU lawsuit -- that is why she was having a hard time getting him the help that he needed.
Another provision of PC5150 -- mental health professionals have a duty to report to the state immediately if they determine a person is a danger to themselves or others. Look at the Batman shooter in Colorado -- his therapist reported up the management chain that he was a danger, and they sat on the information for over two weeks. In California, the guy would have already had his 5150 hearing, because the therapist would have been required by law to report to the Cal DOJ at the same time.
These 'active shooter' events have pretty much been a post-de-institutionalization phenomenon. In the Bad Old Days, it was too easy to get someone committed. Things *did* need to change. But now, it is too hard to get people the help they need. (I have personal experience trying to get an employee help that he needed, I'm very sympathetic to the mentally ill -- but I also never let down my guard out of self preservation -- I've had a close call.) California PC 5150 works pretty well. I think we need to ask the ACLU and the de-institutionalization proponents for an explanation for why the let this kind of tragedy happen. It's not the legal gun owners that are causing the problems, it is our utterly b0rk3d mental health care system (and attitudes) in this country that are causing the problems.
Boston Dynamics has been working on this (and posting YouTube videos) for years. That this exists isn't news. That it is finally deployed, OK, a little newsy, but nobody that follows robotics is unaware of Big Dog.
BTW -- here is a hilarious spoof video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXI4WWhPn-U but search for 'big dog' and watch some of the real ones first. Then the spoof - it's a crack up.
Well.... there is such a thing as balance. I've seen an endless stream of EE and CS new hires that got the degree because they saw it as a "meal ticket". Guess what, they weren't very happy, and didn't excel at the job. "Not hating" a job doesn't contribute much to a person's sense of self-worth.
Well, those forest fire towers went away a long time ago, in large part because 100% fire suppression turned out to be a bad idea.
But back to your point: Yes, spot on. There are a lot of way to steer what you like to do into something that actually pays well, or at least you need to assess how much of a factor material wealth is in your life. For my part, I was lucky, I liked math and electronics, and also music. So... let's see, electrical engineers are paid how much? Versus how much will I make teaching an endless streams of 10 year olds to play Dvorak badly? OK... so not hard to decide for me. A degree is a first step on a career path -- have a vision of your career path before shelling out large $$ for a degree. It won't happen the way you envision, but having a broken plan that you can update is far better than no plan at all.
But back to realism -- one of my good friends in high school -- verrrrry smart guy -- went the forest ranger route. He worked his butt off to get dual degrees in forestry and wildlife biology, with nearly a 4.0. That meant he actually made the cut to get into the forest service, since they accept only a small percentage of applicants. Pretty soon, he was living in the mountains, making trail maps for off-road vehicles. He was getting paid survival wages, eating ramen, and loving every minute of his life. Money had little interest for him -- he wanted a different kind of green. He was happy. He went into the job with eyes wide open from his first day of college.
My point (your point, too, I think): Be realistic. Know thyself. Have a career vision that is compatible with that. Know what it takes to get into the business. Don't take on more debt than the job will pay off.
Does anything in the old terms of service say "copyright assignment"? Because you have a copyright in any photos that you upload. They can't just assign a license to themselves by changing TOS.
Riiiiiiight. Because Wikipedia is such a good source for doing legal research.
Freedom of speech has many limits. The SCOTUS has a number of benchmark rulings spelling out edge cases.
Broad guidelines:
"political speech" is given much deference. If you have a political message, want to praise or vilify the government, or make about any other political statement, the court will give you a lot of scope. If your speech can be possibly construed as political, you will not find many limits on you.
"commercial speech" has many limits. That's why advertising is subject to laws about truthfulness, and telemarketing can be limited.
"dangerous speech" is also limited. Poster child phrase: yelling "fire" in a crowded theater. No political content, no value in the content at all, merely a malicious and potentially deadly prank. Let's hope you look good in orange.
"hate speech" that can't be found to have any political content has little constitutional protection.
No, it WAS totally obvious, and you said the key phrase yourself: "they never toally committed" -- the handwriting was on the wall for the film business, but they just couldn't bring themselves to shift enough resources over to digital. They were always afraid of cannibalizing the film business. It was that fear that doomed them, and it was totally dead obvious to anybody with Silicon Valley management experience. They never went after consumer digital cameras in any serious way. It was like watching a dinosaur die of thirst at a rapidly drying water hole because it wouldn't cross the plain to another water hole that it already knew about.
Also, keeping "both Fuji and Kodak doing quite well with film for much longer" is exactly the kind of thinking that got them in trouble. *You* didn't see it coming because you think like their managers. You are thinking like an old Ma Bell, days-of-the-regulated-monopoly, manager. Trying to keep the film business alive longer is what killed them. Being the first to make film pointless would have saved them, instead, they let someone else do it. When you understand that lesson well enough to fire people that think like you do now, you have the potential to snag a corner office.
It really *was* obvious, because this scenario has played out over and over. Sili Valley is littered with the bones of companies that died that way. Read Christensen's "Innovator's Dilema". You will rethink Kodak's demise.
Read anything by Clayton Christensen. He has been writing about the phenomenon and outlining solutions that work, for years. Many. Years. Kodak was an obvious slow motion train wreck to anybody that had read his books. Digital photography is the modern poster child for how a cheaper, crummier, technology eventually eats the lunch of the old guard as it improves. CC obseved the same thing happen years before with steel mini-mills.
He has a book titled "Disrupting Class" about how modern developments (Khan Academy, et al) are up-ending education. If his predictions hold true, the current education system will go the way of Kodak within 5 to 10 years.
But back to companies like Kodak... the short answer is that you have to be willing to kill off your own cash cows, because if you don't someone else will. That takes a very directed effort on the part of upper management, because the entire corporate system works against that.
Then the Joomla folks need educating. Anyone can take any code with an MIT or modern BSD license and slap a GPL onto it any time they want. Adding MIT code to a GPL project is never a problem. AFATG, since you own the copyright, you could push to github with MIT (which accomplishes your "fire and forget" objective), and push to Joomla with GPL to keep them happy (assuming I understand you correctly that the Joomla gate-keepers require GPL.) You can put your code out under as many licenses as you want, since you hold the copyright.
And some that you would expect to be clueful are surprisingly not, or are at least very sloppy. I recently was studying an example in the Pyside code base. Pyside, a major project, from Qt, owned by Digia, formerly owned by Nokia. People you would expect to be clueful. I looked quite diligently for license information. I found in a directory some levels up from the code I was studying a one sentence "licensed under GPLv2". Okaaaaaay....., how about since each example is a stand-alone program in a stand-alone build directory, let's say we put a license in each one? How about putting a bleeding copyright notice on each source file?????
Really, people, this isn't that hard. Stand-alone code with no notice of even copyright much less a license is not acceptable.
In a past life I managed a software product validation group for a rather biggish company. This kind of stuff was on the first page of the source release check list. This kind of stuff was a stop-ship bug, as in, your code is kicked off the RC master until you can demonstrate a linear arrangement of water fowl.
It looks to me like the printer they are planning to deploy takes standard copier paper. So I'm guessing the cost of material for a suit of armor is about the same as a case or two of printer paper. Plus some for the glue, I guess. That doesn't sound bad. Now, also, to make money at this they also have to charge for time-on-the-tool, which covers things like the maintenance contract, and consumables such as the fancy cutter blade. They also will either charge for job set-up, or bake that into the total price.
So, on a rational basis, I think printing a holloween costume this way is totally affordable, although it's a lot more than I would pay for a costume, but heck, to each his own. On the other hand, this *is* Staples, so the pricing might be "We're Staples, and we're dicks, so we plan to gouge you." But fundamentally this looks like a pretty low cost printer to run.
Why? I have a CupCake and a homebrew plastic FDM printer in the works, but I don't share your attitude. Plastic is nice, but other technologies have their benefits. Paper is easy to come by, and cheap. Laminated paper is going to be about as strong as a solid medium-density wood such as birch. It will take paint very nicely. The build volume on the machine in question is basically 3 reams of copier paper. That build volume has your replicator beat by quite a lot. The output would make excelent masters for hot metal casting, if you're into the home foundary scene.
Slashdot Mirror
Wind and direct solar have storage problems. Converting plant matter into a transportable liquid bridges that gap. In the end, all energy available to us traces back to two sources: solar, and geothermal. Growing plants to capture the solar energy is good way to shorten the time lag of waiting for geologic processes to create oil and coal, and mitigates the storage problem of letting solar energy create wind which is then captured with windmills. Efficient conversion processes combined with modern agronomy to optimize plant characteristics is a good path to sustainable energy production -- but it won't support Earth's current population. But then again, we are overfishing the oceans, too, so it seems to me we have passed the planet's carrying capacity. So back to your original comment about not having enough fertile ground -- that's one way to look at it, but it assumes the Earth's human population can only grow. When the oil runs out the population will shrink. There is no way around that. Plot the following three curves on a graph: 1) rate of new oil reserve discovery (barrels per year), 2) rate of oil production (barrels per year), 3) earth's population. You will see that #2, follows #1 at a 30 year lag, and that #1 peaked some time ago, and #2 somewhat recently. #3 ramps with #2. I believe that #2 will follow #1 down -- no one has be able to make a credible argument otherwise. I suspect #3 will -- painfully -- follow #2 down, and the ride will not be pleasant. As in 'interesting times' not pleasant.
Compare the efficiency of plans turning sunlight into carbohydrates, with that of a planet's geologic processes turning the results of mass-extinction events into fossil fuels over millions of years. Most of Earths oil was produced during two distinct mass-extinction events long ago. We're on track to use every drop of it up over the course of a couple hundred years. The phrase 'burn rate' comes to mind. If the planet can't produce energy that fast, then perhaps, we need to cut back how much we burn, eh?
So much fail. First of all, the 'militia' clause in the 2A controls nothing. Read the Heller decision from the Supreme Court.
Secondly, umm.... yes, the US has assembled militia. The militia of the various States fought under General Washington to throw off the British. Oh... BTW... what was General Gage trying to do when he engaged the militia at Lexington and Concord? He was trying to confiscate a Massachusetts Militia ammunition depot.
So... you might want to read up on history, and you might want to read up on current events. And if you have spare time, read up on what happened in between.
I'm sure if he re-reads your internal design specifications, coding standards, and comments in the code he will understand your design.
Three words for you: Do The Math.
I'm pretty sure you have no idea what it takes to create a mold for injection molding. I have made molds and shot plastic. Crappy molds, because I'm an amateur machinist, but I have shot ABS in molds I made myself using a 20 ton Morgan Press manual injection molding machine, and taught others how to do it. Come back and tell me "it's just plastic" after you have made a mold in hardened tool steel, with tolerances spec'ed in hundreths of millimeters, and a high-polish surface specification, and shot millions of parts while keeping the dimensions and surface finish within spec. You can show me your math then. Until then, stop talking out of your ass.
You've got that right. Lego molds are extremely precise -- the jewelry of the machinists' art, and hand cleaned and polished periodically. And they use only top quality resins -- there is ABS, and then there is ABS -- better resins cost more. That is why Lego is expensive.
If you have version control, and yet still fear deleting code, then methinks your regression suite and code review process are weak.
Do you have a good handle on the coverage provided by your test suite? Is the code change, including the deletion, talked about during code review before your dev branch is merged into mainline? Does your defect tracking system allow you to tag defects with an 'incorrect deletion' marker? Are you adding a targeted test to the regression suite for every diagnosed defect?
If 'yes' to all, then delete it and let version control keep the history for you.
Let's see.... Diane Feinstein used to have a CCW permit, until she very publicly gave it up and was very privately deputized as a Federal Marshall allowing her to carry in all 50 states and on airplanes. Michael Boomberg has a security detail. David Gregory's children go to a private school that has had armed security guards for a long time... oh... and since the president's children go there too, they bring along their Secret Service agents.
Oooops, you wanted only 3. Sorry, in 10 seconds I couldn't keep it under 4.
Now seems like a good time to inject some uncomfortable facts. According the the latest FBI statistics, law enforcement officers are perpetrators of violent crime at *exactly* the same rate as the general population. This is not counting "police brutality" or any other duty-related charges, real or imagined. CCW holders on the other hand, are perpetrators of violent crime at about 1/20 the rate of the general population, and therefore at 1/20 the rate of law enforcement officers, also.
So, using FBI statistics, the chance of a law enforcement officer using his firearms for nefarious ends are about 20X that of your neighbor with a CCW license doing likewise.
People have rights. People delegate *powers* to the state. The state does not have rights. Con Law 101, or maybe Con Law 1.
How in blazes did your ignorance get modded +5 informative? Oh.... I guess the mods need to take Con Law 1, too.
Read the news much? The mom of the guy in CT was trying to get the paper work in order to get him committed for mental health problems. CT has some of the strictest gun laws in the nation. His mother had jumped through all the hoops to acquire the guns legally. All her guns -- 100% legal in a restrictive state. The guy shot his own mother and stole her guns before she was able to get him help. Strict laws don't stop the mentally ill from shooting their own mother to steal their ammunition.
It's fair to ask why, if she was trying to get him committed, that she allowed him access to her guns. Poor judgement is the only thing I can say about that.
Why was it so hard to get him committed? Let's talk about that. In California, we have something called Penal Code 5150 -- PC5150 allows you to quite quickly put a 72 hour hold on someone with mental health issues. Immediately (within minutes) you go into the Cal DOJ data base as a person prohibited from buying firearms -- you won't be able to buy any, and you won't be allowed to pick up any that are still in the 10 day waiting period. Local law enforcement is immediately notified, and they pay a call on your home ASAP to collect any guns that may be in that residence. The person is guaranteed a due-process hearing in front of a judge within two weeks to see if they should be allowed their guns back. CT passed a law similar to PC5150, but its implementation was blocked by an ACLU lawsuit -- that is why she was having a hard time getting him the help that he needed.
Another provision of PC5150 -- mental health professionals have a duty to report to the state immediately if they determine a person is a danger to themselves or others. Look at the Batman shooter in Colorado -- his therapist reported up the management chain that he was a danger, and they sat on the information for over two weeks. In California, the guy would have already had his 5150 hearing, because the therapist would have been required by law to report to the Cal DOJ at the same time.
These 'active shooter' events have pretty much been a post-de-institutionalization phenomenon. In the Bad Old Days, it was too easy to get someone committed. Things *did* need to change. But now, it is too hard to get people the help they need. (I have personal experience trying to get an employee help that he needed, I'm very sympathetic to the mentally ill -- but I also never let down my guard out of self preservation -- I've had a close call.) California PC 5150 works pretty well. I think we need to ask the ACLU and the de-institutionalization proponents for an explanation for why the let this kind of tragedy happen. It's not the legal gun owners that are causing the problems, it is our utterly b0rk3d mental health care system (and attitudes) in this country that are causing the problems.
Boston Dynamics has been working on this (and posting YouTube videos) for years. That this exists isn't news. That it is finally deployed, OK, a little newsy, but nobody that follows robotics is unaware of Big Dog.
BTW -- here is a hilarious spoof video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXI4WWhPn-U
but search for 'big dog' and watch some of the real ones first. Then the spoof - it's a crack up.
Well.... there is such a thing as balance. I've seen an endless stream of EE and CS new hires that got the degree because they saw it as a "meal ticket". Guess what, they weren't very happy, and didn't excel at the job. "Not hating" a job doesn't contribute much to a person's sense of self-worth.
Well, those forest fire towers went away a long time ago, in large part because 100% fire suppression turned out to be a bad idea.
But back to your point: Yes, spot on. There are a lot of way to steer what you like to do into something that actually pays well, or at least you need to assess how much of a factor material wealth is in your life. For my part, I was lucky, I liked math and electronics, and also music. So... let's see, electrical engineers are paid how much? Versus how much will I make teaching an endless streams of 10 year olds to play Dvorak badly? OK... so not hard to decide for me. A degree is a first step on a career path -- have a vision of your career path before shelling out large $$ for a degree. It won't happen the way you envision, but having a broken plan that you can update is far better than no plan at all.
But back to realism -- one of my good friends in high school -- verrrrry smart guy -- went the forest ranger route. He worked his butt off to get dual degrees in forestry and wildlife biology, with nearly a 4.0. That meant he actually made the cut to get into the forest service, since they accept only a small percentage of applicants. Pretty soon, he was living in the mountains, making trail maps for off-road vehicles. He was getting paid survival wages, eating ramen, and loving every minute of his life. Money had little interest for him -- he wanted a different kind of green. He was happy. He went into the job with eyes wide open from his first day of college.
My point (your point, too, I think): Be realistic. Know thyself. Have a career vision that is compatible with that. Know what it takes to get into the business. Don't take on more debt than the job will pay off.
Does anything in the old terms of service say "copyright assignment"? Because you have a copyright in any photos that you upload. They can't just assign a license to themselves by changing TOS.
Riiiiiiight. Because Wikipedia is such a good source for doing legal research.
Freedom of speech has many limits. The SCOTUS has a number of benchmark rulings spelling out edge cases.
Broad guidelines:
"political speech" is given much deference. If you have a political message, want to praise or vilify the government, or make about any other political statement, the court will give you a lot of scope. If your speech can be possibly construed as political, you will not find many limits on you.
"commercial speech" has many limits. That's why advertising is subject to laws about truthfulness, and telemarketing can be limited.
"dangerous speech" is also limited. Poster child phrase: yelling "fire" in a crowded theater. No political content, no value in the content at all, merely a malicious and potentially deadly prank. Let's hope you look good in orange.
"hate speech" that can't be found to have any political content has little constitutional protection.
Sorry, your Wikipedia quote is pure crap.
No, it WAS totally obvious, and you said the key phrase yourself: "they never toally committed" -- the handwriting was on the wall for the film business, but they just couldn't bring themselves to shift enough resources over to digital. They were always afraid of cannibalizing the film business. It was that fear that doomed them, and it was totally dead obvious to anybody with Silicon Valley management experience. They never went after consumer digital cameras in any serious way. It was like watching a dinosaur die of thirst at a rapidly drying water hole because it wouldn't cross the plain to another water hole that it already knew about.
Also, keeping "both Fuji and Kodak doing quite well with film for much longer" is exactly the kind of thinking that got them in trouble. *You* didn't see it coming because you think like their managers. You are thinking like an old Ma Bell, days-of-the-regulated-monopoly, manager. Trying to keep the film business alive longer is what killed them. Being the first to make film pointless would have saved them, instead, they let someone else do it. When you understand that lesson well enough to fire people that think like you do now, you have the potential to snag a corner office.
It really *was* obvious, because this scenario has played out over and over. Sili Valley is littered with the bones of companies that died that way. Read Christensen's "Innovator's Dilema". You will rethink Kodak's demise.
Read anything by Clayton Christensen. He has been writing about the phenomenon and outlining solutions that work, for years. Many. Years. Kodak was an obvious slow motion train wreck to anybody that had read his books. Digital photography is the modern poster child for how a cheaper, crummier, technology eventually eats the lunch of the old guard as it improves. CC obseved the same thing happen years before with steel mini-mills.
He has a book titled "Disrupting Class" about how modern developments (Khan Academy, et al) are up-ending education. If his predictions hold true, the current education system will go the way of Kodak within 5 to 10 years.
But back to companies like Kodak... the short answer is that you have to be willing to kill off your own cash cows, because if you don't someone else will. That takes a very directed effort on the part of upper management, because the entire corporate system works against that.
True enough. A lot of people overlook that option.
Then the Joomla folks need educating. Anyone can take any code with an MIT or modern BSD license and slap a GPL onto it any time they want. Adding MIT code to a GPL project is never a problem. AFATG, since you own the copyright, you could push to github with MIT (which accomplishes your "fire and forget" objective), and push to Joomla with GPL to keep them happy (assuming I understand you correctly that the Joomla gate-keepers require GPL.) You can put your code out under as many licenses as you want, since you hold the copyright.
Ohhh NooooEeeesses!! This is exactly like getting a tar.gz of the source!!!!! $DEITY save us all!!!
I think you are looking for the BSD or MIT license.
And some that you would expect to be clueful are surprisingly not, or are at least very sloppy. I recently was studying an example in the Pyside code base. Pyside, a major project, from Qt, owned by Digia, formerly owned by Nokia. People you would expect to be clueful. I looked quite diligently for license information. I found in a directory some levels up from the code I was studying a one sentence "licensed under GPLv2". Okaaaaaay....., how about since each example is a stand-alone program in a stand-alone build directory, let's say we put a license in each one? How about putting a bleeding copyright notice on each source file?????
Really, people, this isn't that hard. Stand-alone code with no notice of even copyright much less a license is not acceptable.
In a past life I managed a software product validation group for a rather biggish company. This kind of stuff was on the first page of the source release check list. This kind of stuff was a stop-ship bug, as in, your code is kicked off the RC master until you can demonstrate a linear arrangement of water fowl.
It looks to me like the printer they are planning to deploy takes standard copier paper. So I'm guessing the cost of material for a suit of armor is about the same as a case or two of printer paper. Plus some for the glue, I guess. That doesn't sound bad. Now, also, to make money at this they also have to charge for time-on-the-tool, which covers things like the maintenance contract, and consumables such as the fancy cutter blade. They also will either charge for job set-up, or bake that into the total price.
So, on a rational basis, I think printing a holloween costume this way is totally affordable, although it's a lot more than I would pay for a costume, but heck, to each his own. On the other hand, this *is* Staples, so the pricing might be "We're Staples, and we're dicks, so we plan to gouge you." But fundamentally this looks like a pretty low cost printer to run.
Why? I have a CupCake and a homebrew plastic FDM printer in the works, but I don't share your attitude. Plastic is nice, but other technologies have their benefits. Paper is easy to come by, and cheap. Laminated paper is going to be about as strong as a solid medium-density wood such as birch. It will take paint very nicely. The build volume on the machine in question is basically 3 reams of copier paper. That build volume has your replicator beat by quite a lot. The output would make excelent masters for hot metal casting, if you're into the home foundary scene.