The mixup happened when doing (or failing to do) conversions between english and metric units. In my experience, it's always been common to collectively refer these conversions (in either direction) as "metric conversions."
I agree that a headline like "Unit mixup.." might have done just as well, but *I* personally saw no ambiguity between the headline and the story itself. I read "Metric mishap" and I immediately guessed (correctly) that someone goofed while doing a conversion.
The point of a story headline is to state the topic of the article in such a way as to both interest the reader and to use as few words as is possible. I think the existing headline did that perfectly. I doubt most people will be reading it and thinking to themselves that the Metric units of measurment caused the spacecraft to be lost.
If it *really* still bothers you, maybe you should write them a letter.
Assuming the author is seriously suggesting this (it's hard to tell by the writing style and gross errors in these "drafts"), this idea would never take off.
Firstly, consider just how massive and transient data is on the Internet. Now imagine for yourself a database capable of indexing and storing *ratings* for this massive volume of data, including necessary security precautions such as "this-person-has-already-rated-this-item", etc. The amount of data required for such a database is truly staggaring, and, depending on the popularity of an item being rated, could likely exceed the storage requirements of the item itself. This isn't even considering the database of users that would be required in an authenticated setting as he's suggesting.
Assuming one could construct such a titanic database, a rating system like this would only really be effective for static content (like non-dynamic web sites). Things like newsgroup articles stick around for a few days -- weeks at most. This is hardly enough time to get "moderators" to accurately rate articles in all but the most popular newsgroups. Face it: Slashdot has several orders of magnitude more readers and posters than any one newsgroup heirarchy in existence. It would be a rare thing to have more than one or two posts in a given newsgroup rated, and that rating would be virtually meaningless because of this.
The bottom line is that this is unfeasible and would not be adopted widely, which would be essential for its growth and continued use.
Could you elaborate on this? What two "families" of Metric are you referring to?
and then redesigning almost everything from the ground up
Surely you're exaggarating. Tools are readily available in Metric. Machines for building parts and tools are readily available in Metric. Flip your ruler over and you've got Metric.
I do agree, though, that designs based upon existing English unit-based designs will probably need to stick to English units. Nobody's saying you *have* to convert these designs, but unless your entire business is working with older mechanical designs, you can at least start designing new things using Metric. Or don't. I don't really have a problem with firms that, for whatever reason, have to continue using non-Metric units internally. So long as it doesn't affect me (I don't have to repair or work with it). As the rest of the country makes the conversion, though, you may have a hard time finding employees who are willing to stick with those units, however.
For everyone else, for those that don't necessarily have to work with aged designs, it shouldn't be terribly difficult to switch. You'll probably find that most fresh faces are accustomed to working in both units of measure. They usually would have no qualms about working for a Metric-based firm or a non-Metric-based firm, but once they start, those units become harder to let go of.
If everyone would simply accustom themselves to Metric measurments, it might make the process a lot easier.
As it is now, all street signs use strictly English units. It's going to cost a lot, but I think one of the first things that should be done is to start going through and replace the existing signs with ones that also have Metric units. All new signs would have both also. Start making gas pumps and signs "bilingual".
As far as legislation goes, I would have no problem with laws that require all new signage containing a unit of measurment have that measurment dominantly in Metric. ("350mL (11.5 Fl. Oz)" instead of the other way around.) Old/never updated signs can stay the way they are for all I care, but this law would apply to both new signage *and* all government-controled signs (road signs).
Kids today spend much more time with Metric than they do with English units. Once they get out of school, however, and enter the Real World, EVERYTHING uses English units. Most kids never deal with Metric again, so they lose their proficiency and embrace English units. If we adopted a policy of signs that use both (or simply Metric), it would be very easy for kids to "convert". Yes, it will be harder for the older folks that no longer know the difference between a gram and a liter, but eventually those people will be dead, and it won't matter.
"English System"? What's that? "Imperial mishap"? NASA and some emperor?
Everyone knows precisely what "metric" means. To write a headline that accurately described the problem would have to include something like "English System of Measurment" or "Imperial Units of Measure", both of which are rather lengthy for a headline.
They aren't being biased against Metric, they were just trying to write a clear, concise headline that described the article in as few words as possible. Using the word "metric", while seeming to offend the easily offended (and conspiracy theorists), was nevertheless a logical choice.
For this purpose, english units are superior on a small scale such as this.
I don't understand where you get this. There is a finite number of "tick" marks you can make on a ruler regardless of the measurment system in use.
You can either go with 1/32nd inch increments or 1mm increments (slightly less dense). 1/2 of an inch or 1cm increments. I totally don't understand your objections on precision. Instead of saying, "1/16th of an inch!" say "2 millimeters!"
As many other posters have pointed out, it all boils down to the fact that you're accustomed to the Imperial units, so those units (and their various fractions) seem like "natural" units of measure. It's just a mind-set that must be overcome.
This becomes less of a benign "feature request" and more of a fundamental change in one of Perl's more frequently used operators.
Granted, you could make the distinction by looking for whitespace near the . (e.g. $blah = $one . scalar($two);), but you would still end up breaking a significant number of scripts. Plus it's less obvious when you see $one->{$two} versus $one.$two versus $one . $two. Also, how do you distinguish between $one->{'item'} and $one->item (a method)? Use paranthesis? Things get complicated.
Unless you can pump your 15" monitor up to, say, 1600x1200, these might not do all that. You're also magnifying the dot pitch of the monitor itself, so you're going to get a noticable loss of quality.
I have my 17" at home set at about 1280x1024 and my 21" at work set to 1600x1200. Things are about the same size either way, but I have lots more "area" at work.
I think the focal length for these types of lenses might be just a little bit longer than the distance these are meant to be held away from the screen.:)
I certainly laughed at some of the stuff I saw in that article, but if you replace some of the occurrences of the word "hacker" with, say, "script kiddie" or "packet kiddie," things actually aren't so far from the truth.
Most "hackers" the media tries to report on really are nothing but adolescent/high school/college dropout types that pick up a few tips over IRC. Most of them can't code, and DO have exceptional difficulty getting their latest exploit of the week to compile on various operating systems. I'll occasionally see people like this on IRC asking each other how they get rid of really trivial compile errors.
Like you, I disagree totally with the generalizations you mention, though most of your "respected" members of the "hacker" and security industry do happen to have degrees, Real Jobs, that sort of thing, but that hardly means people that *have* dropped out or haven't pursued formal education are "bad" or stupid in the least.
With a hardware encryption scheme (note: *not* ID), it's *impossible* for someone to "steal" your key and use your identity. That's the whole point behind hardware encryption. The private key is stored in hardware and is totally inaccessible to software. This is the most fundamental reason hardware encryption exists.
IANAL, but after studying some of these URL's you gave me, I've come to the conclusion that these people aren't lawyers either.
I can't even hazard a guess why this is necessary, but I imagine it has something to do with the local government's ability to govern its citizens. By surrendering absolute ownership (you still maintain ownership in "cooperation" with the state, as I understand it), this gives the state the ability to do things like impound your car if you break laws, etc. But along that line of thought it would then be illegal for the state I'm in now to impound my car, since it's still registered in my last state of residence. So again, I'm not quite certain what all of this means.
It would be nice to get a lawyer's take on the matter.
In any event, all of the URL's you quoted deal with vehicle registration and the certificate of title, not driver's licenses or "invisible contracts". The third URL simply quoted a bunch of text from various decisions without giving any sort of background on the cases. For all you know these cases could be about bus terminals and airports barring a person from travelling without sufficient reason, which naturally would be illegal. (I just happen to notice that a couple of the defendants were names like Dulles (the airport?).)
In addition, International Driver's Licenses are only valid in member countries EXCEPT the country of origin. Thus, feel free to get an IDL, but it won't do anything for you while you're in the States.
In cases like these, a breathalizer isn't considered an "unreasonable" search. Like I suggested elsewhere, you should probably ask a lawyer about all of this. He can probably explain these things better than I can.
I disagree. There's a very definite, legally acknowledged difference between a potentially self-incriminating statement or testimonial and allowing/forbidding an officer to investigate.
It's like a cop saying, "Hmm, that person lying in front of you appears to have been stabbed. Oh, my, is that a knife you're hiding behind your back? May I see it please?" You can't simply plead the 5th (or the 4th) and refuse to turn the knife over.
I'd suggest you consult a lawyer if any of this is unclear to you. He can probably better explain it than I can.
The reason businesses adopting this model will not succeed is precisely the same reason we don't see copies of a program functionally equivalent to "MS Paint" being sold for $1000.
So long as there's competition in the marketplace, it would be insane for a company to start tying all of their software to specific systems just so they can force their customers to keep buying licenses as their hardware is upgraded. There will always be competition.
This simply doesn't make good business sense for typical consumer software.
Even for high-end software that, even today, is written and tied to specific systems, usually all you have to do is call them up and say "We're moving this software to another system, so we need another license key." The main reason they use those hardware dependencies today isn't to foil their customers. Rather, it's to keep copies of the software from appearing on warez newsgroups and being distributed to friends and sold illegally overseas, that sort of thing. It's usually quite easy to get a replacement license in these cases if/when you move the software to another piece of hardware.
I suppose the whole "Miranda rights" thing is used to be sure you don't "accidentally" testify against yourself, so I may not be entirely accurate when I say "witness" has been interpreted to mean a court testimonial, but the rest of my argument still stands.
Exactly, but this isn't a US law. I was making the comparison to show why it wouldn't qualify for 5th amendment US protections. Citizens in the UK have no such protections (well, not like ours is set up at least).
A law like this would not be passable in the US without suitable alterations.
Huh? Again, this has nothing to do with testifying against yourself. Allow me to quote from the 5th amendment directly, since you seem to have never actually read it:
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation.
"To be a witness against himself" has always been interpreted by the courts to mean a testimony in a court of law.
Cops aren't *asking* you anything but administering a breathalizer test. You aren't *giving* them information by allowing it. You are simply allowing them to *collect* information, similar to when a cop searches you for weapons.
Constitutionally, this is *perfectly* legal. If you have any doubt about this, please by all means consult a lawyer. If ANY law in your area is unconstitutional, it's your OBLIGATION as a citizen to have this law contested and repealed.
Every time I hear somebody say "this is yet another example of laws passed that are unconstitutional," I just get this knot in my stomach. If your local legislature is busy passing laws that are *actually* unconstitutional, your local government has some serious problems and needs to be fixed or overthrown ASAP. (I recommend the former.)
You're not testifying. You're permitting law enforcement access to information. In the US, refusing would be equivalent to not allowing law enforcement access to your home, in spite of the court order/search warrant.
This has nothing at all to do with 5th amendment protections against self-incrimination.
You're making this more complicated than it needs to be.
1. Set your brightness to maximum (100%) and contrast to a minimum (0%).
2. Slowly bring your brightness setting down until the color "black" on your screen is as black as it's going to get (in a well-lit room, this can easily mean leaving the brightness setting at 100%).
3. Starting with contrast at a minimum, slowly bright it up until the color "white" on your screen matches the brightness of things lit by ambient light in your room.
4. If you want to go a bit further (after you've installed new lighting or moved your PC to another place, for example) and want to do color correction, now would be a good time to do that as well by adjusting your monitor's "color temperature" until the color "white" on your monitor closely matches other "white" items in your room.
In most cases, all I ever adjust is the contrast control depending on the lighting. "Brightness" only really matters if you're in low light conditions (where "black" might actually appear "gray", sorta like your TV when you have the lights out), and color correction is a pretty constant thing.
Actually hostnames (which are trivially gleamed from IP's) frequently share a wealth about physical locations:
smith-150.dorms.university.edu The 150 might not mean anything, but it's a safe bet this guy goes to school at University and is in a dorm named Smith.
pc270.bldg150.labs.univ.edu If you figure out what building 150 is (as most students at univ.edu probably can), you can walk right up and introduce yourself to The Man himself.
ppp-150.stlmo.bigisp.com This guy's probably in St. Louis.
dnet0151.seattle.wa.dialup.biggerisp.com I think it's a safe bet this one's in Seattle.
Now, I will agree that it's typically rather difficult to get anything more specific than this, but hostnames are very frequently made up is geographical details.
There are also a number of other reasons IP's can be used maliciously to make your life difficult, but I think the other posters have adequately covered those.
First of all, Lose the bold. It makes you look like an idiot.
I think he just forgot to use a </b> tag. It's an easy thing to do if you don't habitually use the Preview button. I've done it once myself. Give the guy a break.
Slashdot Mirror
The mixup happened when doing (or failing to do) conversions between english and metric units. In my experience, it's always been common to collectively refer these conversions (in either direction) as "metric conversions."
.." might have done just as well, but *I* personally saw no ambiguity between the headline and the story itself. I read "Metric mishap" and I immediately guessed (correctly) that someone goofed while doing a conversion.
I agree that a headline like "Unit mixup
The point of a story headline is to state the topic of the article in such a way as to both interest the reader and to use as few words as is possible. I think the existing headline did that perfectly. I doubt most people will be reading it and thinking to themselves that the Metric units of measurment caused the spacecraft to be lost.
If it *really* still bothers you, maybe you should write them a letter.
Assuming the author is seriously suggesting this (it's hard to tell by the writing style and gross errors in these "drafts"), this idea would never take off.
Firstly, consider just how massive and transient data is on the Internet. Now imagine for yourself a database capable of indexing and storing *ratings* for this massive volume of data, including necessary security precautions such as "this-person-has-already-rated-this-item", etc. The amount of data required for such a database is truly staggaring, and, depending on the popularity of an item being rated, could likely exceed the storage requirements of the item itself. This isn't even considering the database of users that would be required in an authenticated setting as he's suggesting.
Assuming one could construct such a titanic database, a rating system like this would only really be effective for static content (like non-dynamic web sites). Things like newsgroup articles stick around for a few days -- weeks at most. This is hardly enough time to get "moderators" to accurately rate articles in all but the most popular newsgroups. Face it: Slashdot has several orders of magnitude more readers and posters than any one newsgroup heirarchy in existence. It would be a rare thing to have more than one or two posts in a given newsgroup rated, and that rating would be virtually meaningless because of this.
The bottom line is that this is unfeasible and would not be adopted widely, which would be essential for its growth and continued use.
Just my $0.02 ($0.02 Canadian).
Switching to metric means picking which metric
Could you elaborate on this? What two "families" of Metric are you referring to?
and then redesigning almost everything from the ground up
Surely you're exaggarating. Tools are readily available in Metric. Machines for building parts and tools are readily available in Metric. Flip your ruler over and you've got Metric.
I do agree, though, that designs based upon existing English unit-based designs will probably need to stick to English units. Nobody's saying you *have* to convert these designs, but unless your entire business is working with older mechanical designs, you can at least start designing new things using Metric. Or don't. I don't really have a problem with firms that, for whatever reason, have to continue using non-Metric units internally. So long as it doesn't affect me (I don't have to repair or work with it). As the rest of the country makes the conversion, though, you may have a hard time finding employees who are willing to stick with those units, however.
For everyone else, for those that don't necessarily have to work with aged designs, it shouldn't be terribly difficult to switch. You'll probably find that most fresh faces are accustomed to working in both units of measure. They usually would have no qualms about working for a Metric-based firm or a non-Metric-based firm, but once they start, those units become harder to let go of.
If everyone would simply accustom themselves to Metric measurments, it might make the process a lot easier.
As it is now, all street signs use strictly English units. It's going to cost a lot, but I think one of the first things that should be done is to start going through and replace the existing signs with ones that also have Metric units. All new signs would have both also. Start making gas pumps and signs "bilingual".
As far as legislation goes, I would have no problem with laws that require all new signage containing a unit of measurment have that measurment dominantly in Metric. ("350mL (11.5 Fl. Oz)" instead of the other way around.) Old/never updated signs can stay the way they are for all I care, but this law would apply to both new signage *and* all government-controled signs (road signs).
Kids today spend much more time with Metric than they do with English units. Once they get out of school, however, and enter the Real World, EVERYTHING uses English units. Most kids never deal with Metric again, so they lose their proficiency and embrace English units. If we adopted a policy of signs that use both (or simply Metric), it would be very easy for kids to "convert". Yes, it will be harder for the older folks that no longer know the difference between a gram and a liter, but eventually those people will be dead, and it won't matter.
"English System"? What's that? "Imperial mishap"? NASA and some emperor?
Everyone knows precisely what "metric" means. To write a headline that accurately described the problem would have to include something like "English System of Measurment" or "Imperial Units of Measure", both of which are rather lengthy for a headline.
They aren't being biased against Metric, they were just trying to write a clear, concise headline that described the article in as few words as possible. Using the word "metric", while seeming to offend the easily offended (and conspiracy theorists), was nevertheless a logical choice.
For this purpose, english units are superior on a small scale such as this.
I don't understand where you get this. There is a finite number of "tick" marks you can make on a ruler regardless of the measurment system in use.
You can either go with 1/32nd inch increments or 1mm increments (slightly less dense). 1/2 of an inch or 1cm increments. I totally don't understand your objections on precision. Instead of saying, "1/16th of an inch!" say "2 millimeters!"
As many other posters have pointed out, it all boils down to the fact that you're accustomed to the Imperial units, so those units (and their various fractions) seem like "natural" units of measure. It's just a mind-set that must be overcome.
Then you would break things like:
$onetwo = $one.$two;
and:
$blah = $one.scalar($two);
This becomes less of a benign "feature request" and more of a fundamental change in one of Perl's more frequently used operators.
Granted, you could make the distinction by looking for whitespace near the . (e.g. $blah = $one . scalar($two);), but you would still end up breaking a significant number of scripts. Plus it's less obvious when you see $one->{$two} versus $one.$two versus $one . $two. Also, how do you distinguish between $one->{'item'} and $one->item (a method)? Use paranthesis? Things get complicated.
"Sorry, babe, in order for you to see it too we need to squeeze closer together. Yah, just like that...."
Unless you can pump your 15" monitor up to, say, 1600x1200, these might not do all that. You're also magnifying the dot pitch of the monitor itself, so you're going to get a noticable loss of quality.
I have my 17" at home set at about 1280x1024 and my 21" at work set to 1600x1200. Things are about the same size either way, but I have lots more "area" at work.
I think the focal length for these types of lenses might be just a little bit longer than the distance these are meant to be held away from the screen. :)
I certainly laughed at some of the stuff I saw in that article, but if you replace some of the occurrences of the word "hacker" with, say, "script kiddie" or "packet kiddie," things actually aren't so far from the truth.
Most "hackers" the media tries to report on really are nothing but adolescent/high school/college dropout types that pick up a few tips over IRC. Most of them can't code, and DO have exceptional difficulty getting their latest exploit of the week to compile on various operating systems. I'll occasionally see people like this on IRC asking each other how they get rid of really trivial compile errors.
Like you, I disagree totally with the generalizations you mention, though most of your "respected" members of the "hacker" and security industry do happen to have degrees, Real Jobs, that sort of thing, but that hardly means people that *have* dropped out or haven't pursued formal education are "bad" or stupid in the least.
With a hardware encryption scheme (note: *not* ID), it's *impossible* for someone to "steal" your key and use your identity. That's the whole point behind hardware encryption. The private key is stored in hardware and is totally inaccessible to software. This is the most fundamental reason hardware encryption exists.
IANAL, but after studying some of these URL's you gave me, I've come to the conclusion that these people aren't lawyers either.
I can't even hazard a guess why this is necessary, but I imagine it has something to do with the local government's ability to govern its citizens. By surrendering absolute ownership (you still maintain ownership in "cooperation" with the state, as I understand it), this gives the state the ability to do things like impound your car if you break laws, etc. But along that line of thought it would then be illegal for the state I'm in now to impound my car, since it's still registered in my last state of residence. So again, I'm not quite certain what all of this means.
It would be nice to get a lawyer's take on the matter.
In any event, all of the URL's you quoted deal with vehicle registration and the certificate of title, not driver's licenses or "invisible contracts". The third URL simply quoted a bunch of text from various decisions without giving any sort of background on the cases. For all you know these cases could be about bus terminals and airports barring a person from travelling without sufficient reason, which naturally would be illegal. (I just happen to notice that a couple of the defendants were names like Dulles (the airport?).)
In addition, International Driver's Licenses are only valid in member countries EXCEPT the country of origin. Thus, feel free to get an IDL, but it won't do anything for you while you're in the States.
In cases like these, a breathalizer isn't considered an "unreasonable" search. Like I suggested elsewhere, you should probably ask a lawyer about all of this. He can probably explain these things better than I can.
I disagree. There's a very definite, legally acknowledged difference between a potentially self-incriminating statement or testimonial and allowing/forbidding an officer to investigate.
It's like a cop saying, "Hmm, that person lying in front of you appears to have been stabbed. Oh, my, is that a knife you're hiding behind your back? May I see it please?" You can't simply plead the 5th (or the 4th) and refuse to turn the knife over.
I'd suggest you consult a lawyer if any of this is unclear to you. He can probably better explain it than I can.
I agree. I was only suggesting using the monitor's controls because that's the only way I can think of doing that right now.
Some monitors with more digital controls can "save" profiles, yes? Do those profiles ever include brightness/contrast settings?
The reason businesses adopting this model will not succeed is precisely the same reason we don't see copies of a program functionally equivalent to "MS Paint" being sold for $1000.
So long as there's competition in the marketplace, it would be insane for a company to start tying all of their software to specific systems just so they can force their customers to keep buying licenses as their hardware is upgraded. There will always be competition.
This simply doesn't make good business sense for typical consumer software.
Even for high-end software that, even today, is written and tied to specific systems, usually all you have to do is call them up and say "We're moving this software to another system, so we need another license key." The main reason they use those hardware dependencies today isn't to foil their customers. Rather, it's to keep copies of the software from appearing on warez newsgroups and being distributed to friends and sold illegally overseas, that sort of thing. It's usually quite easy to get a replacement license in these cases if/when you move the software to another piece of hardware.
I suppose the whole "Miranda rights" thing is used to be sure you don't "accidentally" testify against yourself, so I may not be entirely accurate when I say "witness" has been interpreted to mean a court testimonial, but the rest of my argument still stands.
Exactly, but this isn't a US law. I was making the comparison to show why it wouldn't qualify for 5th amendment US protections. Citizens in the UK have no such protections (well, not like ours is set up at least).
A law like this would not be passable in the US without suitable alterations.
Cops aren't *asking* you anything but administering a breathalizer test. You aren't *giving* them information by allowing it. You are simply allowing them to *collect* information, similar to when a cop searches you for weapons.
Constitutionally, this is *perfectly* legal. If you have any doubt about this, please by all means consult a lawyer. If ANY law in your area is unconstitutional, it's your OBLIGATION as a citizen to have this law contested and repealed.
Every time I hear somebody say "this is yet another example of laws passed that are unconstitutional," I just get this knot in my stomach. If your local legislature is busy passing laws that are *actually* unconstitutional, your local government has some serious problems and needs to be fixed or overthrown ASAP. (I recommend the former.)
Is there a mouse designed to fit the left hand comfortably?
Yep. AFAIK, all "sculpted" Microsoft mice are available for both orientations: http://www.microsoft.com/products/ hardware/mouse
You're not testifying. You're permitting law enforcement access to information. In the US, refusing would be equivalent to not allowing law enforcement access to your home, in spite of the court order/search warrant.
This has nothing at all to do with 5th amendment protections against self-incrimination.
You're making this more complicated than it needs to be.
1. Set your brightness to maximum (100%) and contrast to a minimum (0%).
2. Slowly bring your brightness setting down until the color "black" on your screen is as black as it's going to get (in a well-lit room, this can easily mean leaving the brightness setting at 100%).
3. Starting with contrast at a minimum, slowly bright it up until the color "white" on your screen matches the brightness of things lit by ambient light in your room.
4. If you want to go a bit further (after you've installed new lighting or moved your PC to another place, for example) and want to do color correction, now would be a good time to do that as well by adjusting your monitor's "color temperature" until the color "white" on your monitor closely matches other "white" items in your room.
In most cases, all I ever adjust is the contrast control depending on the lighting. "Brightness" only really matters if you're in low light conditions (where "black" might actually appear "gray", sorta like your TV when you have the lights out), and color correction is a pretty constant thing.
Actually hostnames (which are trivially gleamed from IP's) frequently share a wealth about physical locations:
The 150 might not mean anything, but it's a safe bet this guy goes to school at University and is in a dorm named Smith.
If you figure out what building 150 is (as most students at univ.edu probably can), you can walk right up and introduce yourself to The Man himself.
This guy's probably in St. Louis.
I think it's a safe bet this one's in Seattle.
Now, I will agree that it's typically rather difficult to get anything more specific than this, but hostnames are very frequently made up is geographical details.
There are also a number of other reasons IP's can be used maliciously to make your life difficult, but I think the other posters have adequately covered those.
First of all, Lose the bold. It makes you look like an idiot.
I think he just forgot to use a </b> tag. It's an easy thing to do if you don't habitually use the Preview button. I've done it once myself. Give the guy a break.