Also, once we finally did start to take part in WWII, our equipment was horribly outdated due to massive military spending cuts that had happened since WWI. Much of the equipment we armed our soldiers with, early on, was the same stuff we had used in WWI (helmets, guns, etc.)
Just a guess, but I think he/she was referring to the strong isolationist position the US held during WWII right up until the day the Japanese started dropping bombs on our ships parked in Pearl Harbor.
Yes, the Folding@Home project, itself, is not a DIY project and the intellectual effort isn't distributed. However, the people contributing to the project by running the client software ARE amateurs. It can be suggested that the project has helped the DIY biology community from a PR standpoint because it has average people thinking about the nuts and bolts of biology and gives them a sense of involvement.
Sure some of the more exotic equipment will, probably, still be out of the hands of DIYers. However, one of the things that this movement is known for is designing home-made versions of some of the expensive lab-grade equipment (such as 30k+ rpm centerfuges from Dremels; digital optical microscopes from an optical scope and a webcam; home built electron microscopes; etc.) which, actually, work. Pair that with their willingness to publish their, individual, projects as step-by-step instructions and share all their info as a community and I think it's completely possible that their communal capabilities will ramp up, relatively, quickly. A similar effect can be seen in the, long existing, amateur astronomy community and the DIY CNC community.
With the exception of the niches/fetishes you mentioned yourself, the most immediate reason I can see for having such interest in a humanoid robot would be flexibility of function. We, as a race, have spent much of our existence working to modify our environment to fit our humanoid form factor. Doors, hallways, chairs, vehicles, tools, etc. are all designed to work, specifically, with the human body shape. One of the problems with mass adoption of non-humanoid robots for general tasks is that they require us to modify the environment with an infrastructure custom tailored to their capabilities. With a fully human-form robot, all the world is already designed to work with it and the rest is all software.
What he seems to be saying, is that he's already told the companies and they've done nothing. A better term for it might be "effective disclosure" in order to differentiate itself from the, proven ineffective, "responsible disclosure" advocated by the industry.
Apparently, it was a paper launch. As far as I can tell, they were days away from showing the final production model to the public for the first time. Before this, all they showed were prototypes. According to his post, the software wasn't done yet, causing it to crash after a few hours.
Much of what you said is wrong, even if I don't, necessarily agree with the OP's rabid rant.
"I own my home and the ground its on so I can do what I damn well please."
This depends, entirely, on where in the US you live. Many, many parts of this country (especially in and around cities) have zoning laws that restrict what you can and can't do on your land (examples: no cars on blocks, no loud noises at all hours, building size limited based on lot size, zoning board final approval over what you want to build, etc.). You can get away from much of this by living way out in the country, but even that isn't a gaurantee. Then (as mentioned by someone else in this thread) there are eminent domain laws which say that the government can take your land at any time as long as they pay you for it. You may not like it, but they are the law.
"Pet regulations aren't just for rabies, they are humanitarian so we don't have streets teeming with unvaccinated starving wild dogs and feral cats like Calcutta. Car insurance is so you don't get hit by a deadbeat who won't pay to fix your car, and is a common protection."
both true enough.
"Emissions tests are really only in California so you give yourself away as being against liberalism simply to be contrary since you have the choice to live where you will, but then you wouldn't have anything to bitch about, no?"
Thanks, I'll have to remember to let them know that the next time the state of Illinois tries to fine me for not bothering to submit to their mandatory emissions checks. Also, someone should write a letter to the New York State DMV to let then know about the typo on their website where it says "All vehicles registered in New York State must get a safety inspection and an emissions inspection every 12 months. " (http://www.nydmv.state.ny.us/vehsafe.htm). Let's see, that's two examples of you being, outright, wrong in your facts (representing, might I add, a very large portion of the population and, by extrapolation, a large portion of this country's economic opportunity with which to support yourself and your family). How much you wanna bet we can find more if we look?
This, of course, brings us to the sheer BS of your basic premise of "you have the choice to live where you will, but then you wouldn't have anything to bitch about, no?". We all live in what I like to call "the real world". Of course it's possible to move if you don't like your states laws, but in the "real world" moving is often a harsh economic/social hardship on you and your family especially if you happen to own you house outright like you just got done advocating in your previous sentence. I think it's, more than a little, condescending to try and write off his argument with that kind of, flippant, response.
"Your tax info is just wrong. You have to file one return for State (that includes your whole family), one for Federal, and possibly a local/COUNTY"
That's only true if you are either young (and don't have all the complications of a full family and investment portfolio) and/or are willing to pay much more in taxes than the system is designed to charge you. When you start to have kids, houses/condos, investments, businesses, you start to have to file multiple extra tax forms at the state and federal level to declare everything and (more commonly) to claim tax credits/deductions. Before you start going on about how no-one if forcing him/her to claim all the credits/deductions, remember that the tax rate is calculated assuming that the people eligible for those credits/deductions will claim them. Without them, a person will be subjected to much higher taxes than they are supposed to (I'm talking about people who, honestly, have a claim to them, not to people that game the system to claim credits/deductions they don't, really, deserve). US taxes are not the simple, one form per government level, system you are trying to claim they are.
"Airline security is theater to make sure people don't stop (as I have) using the
Don't worry, he did say this was two years ago. I'm sure that, unless she's been careful to keep her tinfoil hat on at all times, the secret "death panels" have long since sent their black helicopters out to eliminate her.
Because this can, very easily, turn into one, giant, bait-and-switch. Once the big content companies companies get the entire market to abandon physical media and adopt online, on-demand, delivery it won't take long for them to end the "all you can eat" pricing system and adopt a "pay per view" system. Once that's done, they'll just keep jacking up the rates arbitrarily. We've already seen this kind of behavior from the broadband ISPs and cell phone companies in the US.
Wanna know what playing games on a system like this would be like? Go to your favorite video streaming site and change the player settings (if you can) to 0 caching. The end result is, approximately, what you'd get here. The internet is a very unstable place. The only reason online games work is that programmers have gotten really good at developing latency hiding tricks which all stop working when the video rendering is done by the server. And, don't think this will just effect fps games. Just because it doesn't make or break a game like WOW doesn't mean you'd want the stuttering game-play you'd have to put up with. As far as I can see, the only kind of game this would be useful for it photo-realistic checkers.
Yes, there are a number of standards including one by UL. The problem is in the details of those standards. If the standard calls for, or allows, a 60 degree F ambient temperature then it will artificially extend the life of the bulbs being tested by a significant amount. The devil is in the details.
It also depends on the quality of the power delivered to your house as well as the wiring in the house. Of course, if your electricity is dirty enough it can be killing all your electronics devices, not just your CF bulbs.
If they're smart, and like all the standard electronic amenities that most people do, they'll spend the money. It isn't just CF bulbs that die early from poor power sources. TVs, DVD players, stereos, PCs, and any other electronic device can all meet early deaths because of dirty power. Many people don't even realize this and just think they're "cursed" when buying electronics. It'd be interesting to see someone do some research to see how much money is lost every year do to prematurely destroyed electronics equipment and whether fixing all the houses with poor power sources might be a major source of environmental improvement in it's own right.
Actually, light bulb manufacturers are known for gaming their life-span specs by doing things like testing in carefully controlled conditions which don't represent reality (for example, they tend to test the bulbs well below standard room temperature because it, dramatically, extends the life-span). On the other hand, you are right that the even if the testing were 100% honest, it really doesn't take into account the variable temperatures and humidity of an outdoor environment (or, for that matter bathrooms with showers an over the stove hood fixtures).
Because Sun and Oracle want to be able to sell their products in Europe. If they decided not to then, by all means, they can ignore the EU's authority.
If, by not merging, Sun goes out of business, then no more support for your newly purchased equipment. Of course, I don't have any idea how likely Sun is to go under, but that's what they're trying to allude to in pressuring the EU. As for counter evidence, just point to all the competing products/companies that will still exist in their markets after the merger.
Um, the point here was that the developer, apparently, tried to pass responsibility for the instability onto other apps/drivers. The problem mentioned in the post you responded to implies that he's full of crap and deserves to be called out on it.
Slashdot Mirror
"Udder puppycock!"
There, fixed that for you.
Also, once we finally did start to take part in WWII, our equipment was horribly outdated due to massive military spending cuts that had happened since WWI. Much of the equipment we armed our soldiers with, early on, was the same stuff we had used in WWI (helmets, guns, etc.)
Just a guess, but I think he/she was referring to the strong isolationist position the US held during WWII right up until the day the Japanese started dropping bombs on our ships parked in Pearl Harbor.
Yes, the Folding@Home project, itself, is not a DIY project and the intellectual effort isn't distributed. However, the people contributing to the project by running the client software ARE amateurs. It can be suggested that the project has helped the DIY biology community from a PR standpoint because it has average people thinking about the nuts and bolts of biology and gives them a sense of involvement.
Sure some of the more exotic equipment will, probably, still be out of the hands of DIYers. However, one of the things that this movement is known for is designing home-made versions of some of the expensive lab-grade equipment (such as 30k+ rpm centerfuges from Dremels; digital optical microscopes from an optical scope and a webcam; home built electron microscopes; etc.) which, actually, work. Pair that with their willingness to publish their, individual, projects as step-by-step instructions and share all their info as a community and I think it's completely possible that their communal capabilities will ramp up, relatively, quickly. A similar effect can be seen in the, long existing, amateur astronomy community and the DIY CNC community.
You seem to have forgotten the Mars rovers, the stardust probe, and all the other robotic probes they've sent out recently.
With the exception of the niches/fetishes you mentioned yourself, the most immediate reason I can see for having such interest in a humanoid robot would be flexibility of function. We, as a race, have spent much of our existence working to modify our environment to fit our humanoid form factor. Doors, hallways, chairs, vehicles, tools, etc. are all designed to work, specifically, with the human body shape. One of the problems with mass adoption of non-humanoid robots for general tasks is that they require us to modify the environment with an infrastructure custom tailored to their capabilities. With a fully human-form robot, all the world is already designed to work with it and the rest is all software.
What he seems to be saying, is that he's already told the companies and they've done nothing. A better term for it might be "effective disclosure" in order to differentiate itself from the, proven ineffective, "responsible disclosure" advocated by the industry.
This is pretty old, but I'll reply to it anyway.
http://www.epa.state.il.us/air/vim/
That says state of Illinois, not city of Chicago. Not sure why you don't know about it.
Apparently, it was a paper launch. As far as I can tell, they were days away from showing the final production model to the public for the first time. Before this, all they showed were prototypes. According to his post, the software wasn't done yet, causing it to crash after a few hours.
Much of what you said is wrong, even if I don't, necessarily agree with the OP's rabid rant.
"I own my home and the ground its on so I can do what I damn well please."
This depends, entirely, on where in the US you live. Many, many parts of this country (especially in and around cities) have zoning laws that restrict what you can and can't do on your land (examples: no cars on blocks, no loud noises at all hours, building size limited based on lot size, zoning board final approval over what you want to build, etc.). You can get away from much of this by living way out in the country, but even that isn't a gaurantee. Then (as mentioned by someone else in this thread) there are eminent domain laws which say that the government can take your land at any time as long as they pay you for it. You may not like it, but they are the law.
"Pet regulations aren't just for rabies, they are humanitarian so we don't have streets teeming with unvaccinated starving wild dogs and feral cats like Calcutta. Car insurance is so you don't get hit by a deadbeat who won't pay to fix your car, and is a common protection."
both true enough.
"Emissions tests are really only in California so you give yourself away as being against liberalism simply to be contrary since you have the choice to live where you will, but then you wouldn't have anything to bitch about, no?"
Thanks, I'll have to remember to let them know that the next time the state of Illinois tries to fine me for not bothering to submit to their mandatory emissions checks. Also, someone should write a letter to the New York State DMV to let then know about the typo on their website where it says "All vehicles registered in New York State must get a safety inspection and an emissions inspection every 12 months. " (http://www.nydmv.state.ny.us/vehsafe.htm). Let's see, that's two examples of you being, outright, wrong in your facts (representing, might I add, a very large portion of the population and, by extrapolation, a large portion of this country's economic opportunity with which to support yourself and your family). How much you wanna bet we can find more if we look?
This, of course, brings us to the sheer BS of your basic premise of "you have the choice to live where you will, but then you wouldn't have anything to bitch about, no?". We all live in what I like to call "the real world". Of course it's possible to move if you don't like your states laws, but in the "real world" moving is often a harsh economic/social hardship on you and your family especially if you happen to own you house outright like you just got done advocating in your previous sentence. I think it's, more than a little, condescending to try and write off his argument with that kind of, flippant, response.
"Your tax info is just wrong. You have to file one return for State (that includes your whole family), one for Federal, and possibly a local/COUNTY"
That's only true if you are either young (and don't have all the complications of a full family and investment portfolio) and/or are willing to pay much more in taxes than the system is designed to charge you. When you start to have kids, houses/condos, investments, businesses, you start to have to file multiple extra tax forms at the state and federal level to declare everything and (more commonly) to claim tax credits/deductions. Before you start going on about how no-one if forcing him/her to claim all the credits/deductions, remember that the tax rate is calculated assuming that the people eligible for those credits/deductions will claim them. Without them, a person will be subjected to much higher taxes than they are supposed to (I'm talking about people who, honestly, have a claim to them, not to people that game the system to claim credits/deductions they don't, really, deserve). US taxes are not the simple, one form per government level, system you are trying to claim they are.
"Airline security is theater to make sure people don't stop (as I have) using the
Of course some old stand-byes (Margarette Thatcher on a cold day) won't work as expected in those situations...
Don't worry, he did say this was two years ago. I'm sure that, unless she's been careful to keep her tinfoil hat on at all times, the secret "death panels" have long since sent their black helicopters out to eliminate her.
Because this can, very easily, turn into one, giant, bait-and-switch. Once the big content companies companies get the entire market to abandon physical media and adopt online, on-demand, delivery it won't take long for them to end the "all you can eat" pricing system and adopt a "pay per view" system. Once that's done, they'll just keep jacking up the rates arbitrarily. We've already seen this kind of behavior from the broadband ISPs and cell phone companies in the US.
Wanna know what playing games on a system like this would be like? Go to your favorite video streaming site and change the player settings (if you can) to 0 caching. The end result is, approximately, what you'd get here. The internet is a very unstable place. The only reason online games work is that programmers have gotten really good at developing latency hiding tricks which all stop working when the video rendering is done by the server. And, don't think this will just effect fps games. Just because it doesn't make or break a game like WOW doesn't mean you'd want the stuttering game-play you'd have to put up with. As far as I can see, the only kind of game this would be useful for it photo-realistic checkers.
apricot
Yes, there are a number of standards including one by UL. The problem is in the details of those standards. If the standard calls for, or allows, a 60 degree F ambient temperature then it will artificially extend the life of the bulbs being tested by a significant amount. The devil is in the details.
It also depends on the quality of the power delivered to your house as well as the wiring in the house. Of course, if your electricity is dirty enough it can be killing all your electronics devices, not just your CF bulbs.
If they're smart, and like all the standard electronic amenities that most people do, they'll spend the money. It isn't just CF bulbs that die early from poor power sources. TVs, DVD players, stereos, PCs, and any other electronic device can all meet early deaths because of dirty power. Many people don't even realize this and just think they're "cursed" when buying electronics. It'd be interesting to see someone do some research to see how much money is lost every year do to prematurely destroyed electronics equipment and whether fixing all the houses with poor power sources might be a major source of environmental improvement in it's own right.
Actually, light bulb manufacturers are known for gaming their life-span specs by doing things like testing in carefully controlled conditions which don't represent reality (for example, they tend to test the bulbs well below standard room temperature because it, dramatically, extends the life-span). On the other hand, you are right that the even if the testing were 100% honest, it really doesn't take into account the variable temperatures and humidity of an outdoor environment (or, for that matter bathrooms with showers an over the stove hood fixtures).
It's not a bug, it's a feature. Some people pay lots of money for laser eye surgery...
Because Sun and Oracle want to be able to sell their products in Europe. If they decided not to then, by all means, they can ignore the EU's authority.
If, by not merging, Sun goes out of business, then no more support for your newly purchased equipment. Of course, I don't have any idea how likely Sun is to go under, but that's what they're trying to allude to in pressuring the EU. As for counter evidence, just point to all the competing products/companies that will still exist in their markets after the merger.
Um, the point here was that the developer, apparently, tried to pass responsibility for the instability onto other apps/drivers. The problem mentioned in the post you responded to implies that he's full of crap and deserves to be called out on it.
WHOA, I know Kung-Fu!