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User: interkin3tic

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  1. Re:welleee on Best Way To Clear Your Name Online? · · Score: 1

    Be that as it may, did anyone read the summary? He didn't do any time. No criminal record. The "record" is a friend talking about the incident in a zine.

  2. Re:Nothing you can do... on Best Way To Clear Your Name Online? · · Score: 2, Funny

    IMHO just as thre's a 7-year stature of limitations on law, so too should employers have a limitation on how far back they can dig. Anything that predates this decade should be irrelevant.

    Sorry for the typos - I'm typing on a mac.
    I'm not usd to this keyboard'

    You're using a mac? Well, good luck on getting hired by MS for the next 7 years.

  3. Re:welleee on Best Way To Clear Your Name Online? · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Be a man and take responsibility for your actions.

    Employers turn down applicants because of photos showing the applicant drinking beer in college. He was interviewed by law enforcement and no charges were filed according to the summary. It sounds like he did take responsibility already. Being denied employment for something trivial isn't "taking responsibility for one's actions," it's being screwed over.

    At some point employers are going to realize they're hiring -people- and that all of their employees have had lapses in judgement, and maybe then they'll have reasonable standards. For now though, many seem to think that if their lapses in judgment haven't made it onto the internet, that means they didn't happen, so they should only hire people with absolutely no dirt on their online profile.

  4. Re:Yes, Here's Why on The Science Credibility Bubble · · Score: 1

    I'm a scientist: my opinion is fact!

  5. Re:Or parents... on FTC Says Virtual Worlds Bad For Minors · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Or parents could be parents. Don't want you kids looking at something? Act as the filter don't let them buy/play games that expose them to things you don't want 'em to see....

    I personally would argue more that a few kids getting exposed to violence or -gasp- S.E.X. is more than an acceptable tradeoff for freedom.

    The problem with arguing along the lines of "Parents should keep their kids from looking at that stuff" is that we all know they're not going to even take reasonable steps, and we all know that kids are going to find ways around their parents' efforts no matter what.

  6. Re:It's private property people ... on Biometric Face Recognition At Your Local Mall · · Score: 1

    But lets be real, 99% of the population could not care less that someone is watching them shop and as such the stores really don't care that you don't like it.

    You brought up the same argument before, so I'm again going to respond with "I don't give a flying crap how most people feel. This is idiotic no matter how many idiots are okay with it."

  7. Re:Math is now a science? on The Science Credibility Bubble · · Score: 1

    The journal, Science? (Nature?-- it's one of them) declared several years ago, after global warming was only a few years old and before many of the initial predictions failed, that the global warming debate was over and it was time for political action. Does that sound like the scientific method to you?

    No, that sounds like an individual editor, or maybe even several editors, at "the journal" jumping the gun or overstating things in an attempt to generate more publicity for their publication. What it does -not- sound like is a global conspiracy of scientists. Talk to any researcher who has submitted a paper to whichever journal it is you're talking about: they will tell you that the staff at those places are wrong sometimes. In fact, they'll -probably- tell you that they're downright stupid and may use colorful language. It doesn't mean that science as a whole or even the publication are wrong.

    Compare it to non-scientific media. Every paper has at some point, weekly even, published extremely stupid opinions that are not endorsed as policy by the publication.

  8. Re:Yes, Here's Why on The Science Credibility Bubble · · Score: 1

    It wouldn't be real science without real skepticism. A theory should remain a theory until it can stand up the to the scrutiny of skepticism.

    Seeing as how we're talking about public opinion, we're not facing skepticism, we're facing ignorance and partisan politics. Both may be made to look somewhat like valid skepticism, but that doesn't make it so. Many of the proponents on either side of the PUBLIC controversies surrounding stem cells, evolution, and climate change will never change their minds because they're not approaching the debate with skepticism, and their stances often aren't based on evidence, they're approaching it with an entrenched beliefs.

    For example, many people who publicly oppose stem cell research raise the specter that this will encourage women to get abortions so the cells can be used for treatment. That's absurd: aborted fetuses don't have pluripotent stem cells. ESC are harvested from embryos ~5 days post fertilization, from in-vitro fertilizations. 5 days after natural conception, a woman wouldn't know she's pregnant, abortion surgeries which could harvest fetal tissue aren't done at that stage. But it's still an argument that floats out there during discussions of stem cells and people don't bother to fact-check.

    I suspect that if the credibility bubble is burst, and the public feels they need to question scientists, we won't be hearing much healthy skepticism, we'll be hearing politicians and other demagogues urging the public to ignore scientific findings and medical experts when it's convenient for their purposes. "Sure, the 'experts' SAY this pollutant causes cancer, birth defects, and general mayhem, but remember 'climategate?' They're just a bunch of quacks and besides, cleaning it up would raise your taxes!"

  9. Re:It's private property people ... on Biometric Face Recognition At Your Local Mall · · Score: 1

    First off, I'm busy with biological research, loftier goals, I won't be starting my own store. Second, plenty... no wait... the vast majority of stores out there don't use this and manage to not be robbed out of business. Third, one or even several stores won't change much. If these systems get convenient and cheap enough for stores to implement, and they think they can prevent enough loss to pay for the system, it's going to be in their interests to all implement systems like this. They don't care about privacy issues, which is fine, but we do need to establish laws preventing this, to balance their interests with our interests.

    Last, I don't give a flying crap how most people feel. This is idiotic no matter how many idiots are okay with it

  10. Re:It's private property people ... on Biometric Face Recognition At Your Local Mall · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If you don't want to be entered into their surveillance system don't shop at their mall.

    And when every business participates in a facial ID program to help stop theft, the excuse will be "it's private property and everyone else does it." When cities start putting facial ID systems in public places the excuses will be "It's to help catch bad people, and anyway it already happens every place you go into, so we might as well connect it all and know where you are at all times."

    Maybe that won't happen, but why the hell are we letting them risk it? This is to catch "thieves?" Give me a break. That's a stupid reason to start this crap.

  11. Re:It all comes down to what you do with it on Biometric Face Recognition At Your Local Mall · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If you ignore the possible invasion of privacy which is kind of moot in such a public place

    I find fault with that logic. You wear clothes in public, don't you? That's privacy in a public place, it clearly exists. Being automatically identified by a computer, WOULD eventually be used to track you between destinations and WOULD eventually be used for things which are not at all security related (such as in minority report, vending machines calling to you personally.) You can and will lose your privacy in public and in private if this shit continues.

    If you were being facetious, you need to be a little less subtle, or else it's just borderline trolling.

  12. Media bias? on Biometric Face Recognition At Your Local Mall · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Wow. I'm not familiar with "Sydney morning herald" so I'm not sure what I was expecting, but they certainly didn't meet it.

    Half: "Police say this is great!"
    Maybe a third: "Besides, it's already being used and you didn't even know it, so it can't be bad!"

    And then: "Some academic loon has his panties in a twist over this"

    Quickly followed by: "Another professor... of various more important things... says it should be used more though."

    Australia often makes me feel better about the US. Right now, they're making me realize that as bad as Fox news is, it could get somewhat worse.

  13. Re:The classic double speak on AT&T Moves Closer To Usage-Based Fees For Data · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I'm really suprised they didn't try to blame this on jailbroken Iphones using tethering. It seems exactly like the type of thing they would scapegoat it on. They're trying to discouage both, and I could -actually- believe that's a -part- of it.

    I'm guessing they so misjudged usage that even if they stamped out tethering they still would be over, so they're trying to charge even people who aren't tethering.

  14. Re:Time Machine on AT&T Moves Closer To Usage-Based Fees For Data · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Another sense of Deja vu: years ago AOL started offering unlimited connection, appearntly expecting people to not actually start using much more time.

    The results of ATT's experiment duplicate the results AOL got about 10 years ago. So obviously this is taking ATT by suprise. Different company. Different product: this is phones, not dialup! And of course they can't be expected to think about wheter or not they could meet demand before offering it.

  15. Corporations are people too on AT&T Moves Closer To Usage-Based Fees For Data · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Corporate America: our mistakes are our customers' fault and they need to pay through the nose or else they'll never learn.

    Maybe with all the extra money they'll be getting with this, they'll upgrade their network so they can actually give people what they said they would give them at the price they said they would!

  16. Re:New players AGAIN? on Nvidia Announces 3D Blu-ray Format For 2010 · · Score: 2, Funny

    The PS9, featuring ultraviolet Ray 5D technology is set to drop in another month. Think I'll wait for that.

  17. Re:extremes on Cell Phones Don't Increase Chances of Brain Cancer · · Score: 1

    "Are there any levels/frequencies of RF that are known to increase cancer rates?"

    No, radio waves are non-ionizing.

    "Or could I live on top of a radio tower and do just fine?"

    You might get cooked as in a microwave, but no cancer.

    Given the sheer volume of things that appear to cause cancer besides ionizing radiation, and given difficulties in detecting some forms of subtle DNA damage, I'd be hesitant to conclude that it -can't- cause cancer.

    The first part I have no dispute with, I'm not saying there is evidence that RF causes cancer. But "You could live on a radio tower and have no cancer" isn't a safe conclusion since we can't prove the negative "RF can not cause cancer."

    Can RF cause cancer via inactivation of specific cell cycle inhibitors? I doubt there is evidence that they can, I doubt even more that there is evidence that they can't.

    In the absence of anything suggesting that they can or can', we obviously shouldn't build a lead-lined house, but we probably shouldn't live on a radio tower unless there's a good reason to either. As far as more realistic concerns go, I still hold my phone up to my ear, but I'm a little paranoid about it. (More paranoid about my cell phone being next to my nuts and prostate, but that is just paranoia.)

  18. Re:Oh God on Gran Turismo Gamer Becomes Pro Race Driver · · Score: 4, Funny

    Just what we need - more people thinking that since they can play games they can do it in real life. Hide all the Guitar Hero/Rock Band addicts.

    And keep all the "Phoenix Wright" players off of slashdot.

    "I am not a lawyer, but I've played one on the DS!"

  19. Re:Electric car with problems? on Electric Mini Cooper Has Rough Start · · Score: 2, Informative

    They were happy because GM leased the cars to them at a loss. If they were forced to pay retail rates for the vehicles I doubt many people would have kept them.

    At least some of them would have, and many wanted to buy the car from GM after their lease expired. Instead, GM destroyed them.

    If they had offered the customers the option to buy it for retail price, and most declined, that would have been pretty strong support for your argument. As such one either has to suspect either they did self-sabotage, or that they were so stupid they crunched the numbers wrong, and even the EV1 would have been profitable.

    But now that the US government owns a significant chunk of GM I'm SURE they won't make any more dumb decisions like that...

  20. Re:Electric car with problems? on Electric Mini Cooper Has Rough Start · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Somewhere along the line, someone didn't quite think this electric vehicle revolution through...

    Pollution, smog, limited fossil fuels, accidents, traffic jams, gas supply problems, getting oil from 3rd world countries.

    Somewhere along the line, someone didn't think this combustion engine automobile revolution through... yet it happened anyway just as the electric vehicle revolution might.

    Here's hoping that whatever will eventually replace electric vehicles (if they ever become dominant) will be absolutely problem free.

  21. Re:Online Survey? on Children Using Technology Have Better Literacy Skills · · Score: 1

    An online survey isn't science, (If you're using these numbers to do anything important, you're insane)

    What "important" things could one even do if these results WERE valid? Pass legislation reguarding education and literacy? From what I can see, using flawed studies is pretty much par for the course in how we set some of our policies.

    That whole "prayer in school" thing for example. Things like this are apperantly convincing to some people.

  22. Re:automated tool for locating cells? on Sprint Revealed Customer GPS Data 8 Million Times · · Score: 1

    - Because insurers don't hold a monopoly (i.e. if Microsoft Insurance sucks, I can switch to Apple Insurance, or Linux Insurance, or no insurance at all (pay cash as expenses happen)).

    They don't? Seems to me like you can choose between your employer-provided mediocre health insurance, or you can buy your own insurance which will range from pretty much the same to far, far worse depending on luck and your health history.

    From my limited experiences, if you've had cancer or something else, then you're either on a group policy, are paying through the nose, or are going uninsured and are really hoping the cancer doesn't come back.

    That may not be a monopoly technically, but a fat lot of good that does me.

    - Because insurers can't draft me and send me to die in a hellhole like Korea or Nam or Afghanistan

    But they can and do refuse to pay for your healthcare and leave you to die in whatever hellhole you can afford on your own. And they do this far more often than the US government drafts people these days.

  23. Re:automated tool for locating cells? on Sprint Revealed Customer GPS Data 8 Million Times · · Score: 1

    The subject at hand outrages Illiberal slashdotters because the government's law enforcers find it "too easy" to get GPS-data about their suspects (the subset of suspects, who are also Sprint customers) from Sprint. The "health insurance rant" is related to that, because people with self-consistent beliefs ought to be even more outraged, by the government's attempts to learn about each citizen's (suspected of anything or not) health care, linked precisely to their financial information [csmonitor.com].

    You're saying it's on topic because people should be mad at both? If you get mad that sprint appears to be allowing all levels of law enforcement to track you without any cause or scrutiny you should also be mad that the government is going to soon be doing things that health insurance companies are already doing, and therefore it relates?

    That's still off-topic.

    And no, I'm still more outraged that sprint is willing to help everyone from the local sheriff to the CIA know where I am at all times than I am about my medical record being shared with the government.

    I don't understand why so many conservatives trust health insurance companies more than the government. To me they seem pretty much the same, except that health insurance companies have even less transparency.

  24. Re:Politically correct? on Canadian Blood Services Promotes Pseudoscience · · Score: 1

    I obnoxiously answered "I don't know" (even when I did) just to avoid being typed. Of course, I answer the same to Thais when they ask "What days of the week were you born on?" and to westerners' "What's your sign?"

    Can't speak to the others, but if a westerner asks you what your sign is, they were hitting on you.

    Or so I have heard. Oh wait... you're on slashdot too. Yeah, she was trying to steal your credit card, so good job.

  25. Re:Not surprising. on Canadian Blood Services Promotes Pseudoscience · · Score: 4, Informative

    If you lived in Ottawa, like I do, you'd understand that we're nearly the most absurdly "politically correct" place on earth.

    From what I've seen, the Japanese take this only slightly more seriously than people here in the US take horoscopes. If Ottawa is actually concerned about not offending Japanese Ottowans, I think they should probably be more concerned about not assuming the Japanese are that stupid.

    Looking at the website in question though, it seems like it's just a gimmick to get people to donate.

    For type O here is the full extent of the information:

    So, you’re an O. You already know that having type O blood suggests that you might be competitive, goal oriented and a real meat eater. Did you also know that anthropologists believe that type O is the oldest and most common blood type, originating in Southern Africa?

    [next page]

    45% of Canadians have type O blood. Group O blood is like no other and can only receive blood from other people who are group O.

    One unit of your blood can help save up to three lives, and we know that giving blood is in your nature.

    Many experts believe that your personality, career and even your diet can be influenced by your blood type. In addition to your tendency towards romanticism, an aptitude for writing and a love of hearty eating and exercise, here are a few other things you should know about being an O [3x3 chart here with fluff]

    [next page]

    All Types

    Every minute of every day, someone in Canada needs blood. Blood is used to help save the lives of ordinary people in extraordinary health situations.

    If you are unsure of your eligibility, please take a look at our basic eligibility and temporary and indefinite deferral information, or call 1 888 2 DONATE (1 888 236-6283) for assistance.

    If you have already made an appointment to donate, thank you. If not, please review our clinic locator and call 1 888 2 DONATE (1 888 236-6283) to book an appointment or to find a "What's Your Type" even in your community today.

    For more information on blood and blood types, please browse our Web site or visit: