The book describes a USENET system that is used by professional political analysts to debate issues and post opinion pieces, the best of which get selected to news media publication. Eventually they both get hired by national papers to write regular columns.
They were columnists, not bloggers. They cut their teeth on the professional level discussion boards, then started writing articles for legitimate news papers, and eventually became professional columnists for prominent new agencies.
They were smart enough to realize that the path to political clout was not though a blog or an amateur discussion site, but by acquiring real jobs as columnists for the best news sites. We can post political genius all day on our Facebook page or here on Slashdot and it will not get us anywhere. However, if instead we became professional columnists and worked hard to get a regular column on the WAPO or NYT and posted our wisdom there...the political powers will begin to materialize.
Lots of companies force employees to track their time. Even salary employees who legally do not have to punch a clock to get paid. That's fine. It helps them for future estimates and proposals involving labor hours. It can be a very valuable tool.
However, all too often management begins to use these time tracking systems to try and shift overhead expenses to something billable to a customer. You walk in and read e-mails on billing guidance on how regular staff meetings, training, and even fire drills are billable to customers. Then another e-mail on billing guidance informs you that the normal overhead related billing is now forbidden unless given explicit authorization (that you will never get). Essentially, they are lying to themselves, that they have zero overhead when running their business. That nothing ever goes wrong and no one has to wait for anything.
But the one thing they forget is that by charging their customers for everything, they are charging them too much for services. The business is now vulnerable to any other business that can provide the same service and not charge their overhead to the customer.
A while back, a friend an I talked about this and we had a pretty neat solution for problem 4.
The problem is preventing collisions while still allowing freedom of navigation. We came up with a system where at a certain altitude you must travel in a certain direction and at a certain speed. (We assumed that take-off and landing would be done at something resembling an airport where a control system of some sort would manage transitioning down from a certain altitude.) As you increase altitude, your direction yaws right and your speed increases. (speed being a target speed you should be flying at) Basically, like cars travel on roads that are directional lines with assigned speeds, flying cars travel on roads that are directional layers with assigned altitudes and speeds.
GPS, transponders, and mapping software aid the drivers. GPS units can plan routes between destinations and coordinate the proper altitude and airspeed to the autopilot. Transponders transmit vin, altitude, airspeed, position, and heading to traffic around it to allow them to make adjustments to avoid collisions (all within the altitude-airspeed-direction framework). Mapping software can tell the GPS where there are Restricted Airspaces like airports, cities, or tall mountains so the GPS can route around it. The tricky part is anticipating possible collisions, but with transponder info it should be much easier to calculate.
Q: "How much of Middle Earth would you like to see on film?"
A: As much as they can. The Silmarillion would make a great TV series.
As for The Hobbit. I had thought that two films at 3 hours a piece would be just enough to tell the bulk of the story. (starting the journey and a couple of the incidents up to Mirkwood along with the white council and some Dol Guldor scenes in the first film then Mirkwood, Dale, and Erebor and wraping up Dol Guldor in the second) But I had thought they would have to skimp on the Dol Guldor action to make it fit. With 3 films to work with, you can cut them down to 2 and a half hours each and have an extra hour and a half to tell more about the White Council and Dol Guldor. I'm OK with this.
Knuckel-balls are not as simple as "a tube.... that follows a smooth curve." That is a wobbling knuckle-ball, and is generally what people think of. This is usually the first pitch knuckle-ball, does not really move much but you can control it better to get that first strike. But if that is all you have got, then you are going to hit around a bit. That is not the strike-out knuckle-ball. By making minor changes in the grip, you can produce more movement that can cause it to dive, cut-in, and break-away. One of the guys that taught me had a knuckle-ball that he could snake in almost at will, much more movement than the smooth curved tube. If first broke slightly left to appear to be wide of the strike zone but then broke hard right to fall back in for a strike. The problem is that good hitters can anticipate it after seeing it a few times.
A good Knuckle-ball has a slight rotation. Somewhere between half a turn and a turn and a half on it's way to the plate. This slow rotation slightly changes how the seam are presented to the high pressure area in the front thereby changing the disruption of the airflow around the ball. Just like an airfoil will cause low pressure on the top of a wing creating lift and moving the plane up, these changing disruptions cause temporary low pressure areas on the ball and cause a small amount of "lift" in a vectored direction from the center of the mass of the baseball. If these happen rapidly and evenly over the front surface, you get the wobbling knuckle-ball like he describes. If they appear mostly on one side, it will move in that direction. With practice, you can begin to throw the wobbler when you want a strike and a hard breaking knuckler when you want to get them to chase a pitch out of the zone by slightly changing your grip and orientation.
As an aside, and interesting read is The Physics of Baseball by Robert Adair http://www.amazon.com/The-Physics-Baseball-3rd-Edition/dp/0060084367 (Though, I have to disagree with his opinion on the effect of ball rotation on a batted ball. If I remember correctly, he states that the effect is negligible. IMO and experience, I believe it is noticeable and sometimes determines fair/foul as some batted balls hook much more than others.)
The "Best" is going to greatly depend on lots of things including, but not limited to, how well you folded it, throw it, paper type, relative humidity, altitude, etc.
That said, I ran across this a few years ago: http://www.instructables.com/id/KlineFogleman-Airfoil-1-Paper-Airplane/ It requires very accurate folding, but if done right with the right kind of paper and flown in good conditions it can be impressive. The airfoil turns some of the drag into lift and stability. The two guys that patented the airfoil wrote a book about it some years ago.
Also, there is a difference between making a plane for record distance and making a plane for record time aloft. The former needs minimal drag while the latter needs maximum lift.
Even since then, more data has been collected as noted by it's Wikipedia article. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster A quick excerpt: "However, the largest study, as of 21 October 2011, on Fukushima fallout concludes that Fukushima was "the largest radioactive noble gas release in history not related to nuclear bomb testing. The release is a factor of 2.5 higher than the Chernobyl 133Xe source term.""
While politically motivated scaremongering is not sane, Sanity's position on the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Disaster may have to take a few steps in that direction.
Have to disagree. I had a lot of fun with SimCity 2000, even bought Streets of SimCity. But I am having more fun now with SimCity 4 + Rush Hour. Jumping into a police car and turning on the siren and racing around town while the citizens pull over, climbing into a tank and blowing up a building or two (hopefully the right one), that's FUN. The rest of the game is generally better too, more road types, zone types (like agricultural).
If you are a SimCity fan and don't have SimCity 4 + Rush Hour, you are missing out big time.
FYI, a patch came out for D2 a few years ago that allowed for a free character respec. I believe there was also a way to get another one, via some items.
"Given our current technology and potential near-future technology, what would a future space battlefield look like?"
Given Current Tech Available: Machine Guns, Guided Torpedoes w/ HE or Nuclear warheads, primitive rail-guns, primitive heat lasers, ground to low earth orbit booster rockets, small space shuttle, Soyuz capsules, communication satellites, ground observation and control, remote drones, micro-satellites, primitive Project Thor, IIS
Current Space Battle:
The goal would be to control cis-lunar space (between Moon and Earth) and would be the first battlefield of WWIII. (I can't see a scenario where the whole world puts up with someone trying to grab space for themselves.) Mostly orbital combat, with possible sub-orbital pop-up strikes. Booster rockets would launch guided torpedoes with High Explosive fragmentation warheads (steel clouds of death) at enemy targets (likely fragile communications/spy satellites) and disable them without needing a direct hit. The ISS would be turned to swiss cheese. Low Earth Orbit's space junk problem will become exponentially worse. Combat Shuttles could launch, but they would be sub-orbital or perhaps one orbit at most. The counter move to maintain a satellite presence would be to use micro-satellites to replace one large one with many "disposable" ones. All the while a crazy Electronic Counter-Measure war is going on in space to deny communications entirely and would not discriminate between military and consumer channels. Forget calling across an ocean as the world will have to fall back on copper wire or glass fiber. Eventually, it spills-over to Earth conventional war or even Global Thermonuclear War. The winner, if any at all, will be decided on the ground. The space war's most important impact will be that if one side actually does achieve cis-lunar space-superiority, the loser will be somewhat blinded and may be scared enough to start lobbing nuclear weapons around out of fear of the winner's ability to set up a Project Thor and bomb with impunity. I don't see people in space fighting it out in capsules or shuttles as they may not survive launch and re-entry without actually going into a battle.
Near Future Tech: Machine Guns turrets, Guided Torpedoes w/ HE or Nuclear warheads, primitive rail-guns, primitive heat lasers, ground to low earth orbit booster rockets, small space shuttle, Soyuz capsules, communication satellites, ground observation and control, remote drones, micro-satellites, primitive Project Thor, IIS, Moon Base, Space Station at Lunar L1, L2, L3, L4, L5, Space Marines in primitive Power Armor, Lunar Tanks, fighting robots, Lunar artillery.
Near Future Space Combat: The goal would be to control Earth Orbit, The Moon, and Lunar L1 through L5 and would be the prelude to Solar War I. Not sure that it will contain Global Thermonuclear War as I assume it will take global cooperation to get this far. Perhaps a limited exchange if it were a few nations making a power grab. Given the issues with radiation and micro-meteorites at the Lagrangian points, the stations would naturally be well shielded against fragmentation warheads. The stations themselves would likely be prized possessions. (if not, they get nuked using large booster delivered warheads from Earth) The Lunar Colonies would also be prized, so I would assume that nuking them would be a last-gasp "FU" from the losing side. There could be small fleets of space shuttle like warships that have machine guns or auto cannons for primary attack with the ability to carry a limited number of small guided torpedoes with frag/HE/nuke warheads. I would imagine that these craft would be well heat shielded for earth re-entry so heat lasers would have little to no effect on them. Battles between fleets would be long looping orbits with combatants sending fire at close approach moments possibly days apart in low earth/lunar orbit and even weeks apart if in high slow transitional orbits. Machine gun turret fire could be used as
The problems with the TV Networks "pitch zone" is that they are 2 dimensional, do not change for each batter, and the TV viewer has trouble seeing the true motion of the pitch. The strike zone covers all of home plate, including depth. Many pitchers use "back door" breaking balls/sliders to try and hit the very back side of the strike zone. In the "pitch zone" these would look like a ball, when in fact it crossed the plate in the zone. Also, the strike zone changes height for each batter as defined in the rules as the batter waits for the pitch. These "pitch zone" displays never do. Lastly, pitch movement is hard to pick up on television, especially when depth is involved. Pitches can curve around the strike zone and appear to be strikes as well as curve into the back of the strike zone. It is hard to tell from a single camera.
Mozy & Carbonite offer unlimited backups for about $60 per year. If your parents are willing to pick up the tab, go for it.
Personally, I do this: - mirrored data drive stores pictures and video. Happens automatically. - 2 external HDs gets copies of data drive. Manually cold mirror via SyncToy a few times a month. - burn 3 copies of DVDs of new files, keep one, send other two to parents and in-laws. I may do this once or twice a year. It is manual and does consume some time, but for the cost of a few DVD RWs, envelopes, and two postage stamps I get off-site backups. Oh, and they'll likely load them on their PC, so that's another backup copy.
It probably costs me more than $60 per year, but I prefer to do things like this myself.
While I too have also not read it, however I can easily understand how any differing view of events can look like it came from a "Propoganda Department". There is always more than one side to any story. Self Defense from one view may appear to be Murder from another.
Going all the way back to the Music of the Ainur, Melkor had just as much right as any of the Valar as to what was to become of Middle-Earth and the peoples within it. Manwë and the others formed a clique about what the Vision of Ilúvatar should be like and left Melkor out. Basically, Melkor was the geek outcast to the popular Valar. Melkor was the smartest of the bunch, "the nerd". The popular crowd even sent their "jock", Tulkas, to go beat up Melkor and stuff him in a locker. Go read The Silmarillion for yourself. It's all there.
The whole War of Wrath, and everything else, was probably started when Melkor made some really creative thing and the others were jealous and then ruined it. Why? Because they didn't approve. Who are they? Nobody special. They were all essentially equal with no one really having a real claim over another. But they chose to gang up on him because he was different. Melkor's idea of beauty didn't fit in with theirs, so they went about ridiculing and undermining all that he tried to do. Push came to shove, and next thing you know the Valar ganged up on Melkor. Melkor sees that he'll never get his own way with anything as long as the popular Valar gang is keeping him down. So he decided to wreck what they are trying to do. It's not "evil", it's JUSTICE! Melkor's responding in kind. And he's very good at it 'cause he's smarter than all of them. Melkor is the geek. Along the way he starts to gather his own clique of outcasts from the Valar gang, one of which is Sauron. Obviously, the Valar gang stepped on a lot of toes with their "Holier than Thou" attitude. They even started using derogatory nick-names to reference him, like Morgoth. See that? He's geeky AND goth and they make fun of him 'cause he's different.
But, you can't fight the popular clique. Principal Ilúvatar is always going to side with them. Eventually the Valar brats gets Melkor expelled from Middle-Earth High. Sure, Melkor probably went too far here and there, but if the Valar brats did to you what they did to Melkor...you'd be fighting right along side him. All because the Valar brats thinks that technology and industry, and the Vo-Tech kids in general, are stupid and ugly. Melkor's best friend, Sauron, swears that he'll do what he can to make them pay for it, but it is to no avail. They get him expelled too.
The Rings of Power. That was Sauron's last ditch effort to show the rest of Middle-Earth how the wool was pulled over their eyes by the Valar. The Rings of Power didn't brainwash anyone. Sauron just showed them the kind of life they could be living if not for the Valar keeping them down. There were all kinds of technological cool stuff that they could be using to improve their lives. The Rings alone gave them superpowers. IMMORTALITY! Sauron basically said to The Nine, "look at all this cool technology you could you could be using. The Valar have been keeping it from you only because they are technophobes. Isn't that stupid?!" And The Nine were like "This stuff is AWESOME! You're totally freakin' right! How have I been living without these things?? Sign me up." (it was probably similar to when you got your first smart-phone) I'm sure Sauron was proably workin' on some steampunk tech too before the end. Just take a look at Grond.
You see, it's not that Melkor was Right or Wrong. He was DIFFERENT. That's all. But the Valar didn't like that, not one bit. So they went about humiliating him and destroying him and all his friends. Does that sound "Right" to you?
IANAL, However it seems that a good portion of Title 18 Chapter 37 ESPIONAGE AND CENSORSHIP pertain to him.
# 793. Gathering, transmitting or losing defense information (Gathering, yes. Transmitting, maybe) # 794. Gathering or delivering defense information to aid foreign government (maybe) # 795. Photographing and sketching defense installations (maybe) # 796. Use of aircraft for photographing defense installations (probably not) # 797. Publication and sale of photographs of defense installations (maybe) # 798. Disclosure of classified information (Yes. "or publishing")
Remember, they don't have to be content with what was just leaked recently. The DoJ can go back in time and drag out everything that they can prove was _EVER_ leaked on his site and use it to convict him of ESPIONAGE. If he's extradited, he's screwed.
Regular DII player here. The one patch also allowed you to go CD free by copying some files from the original and expansion discs.
However, I do not believe you get a respec until you complete the Den of Evil quest on Hell difficulty. There is apparently some charm or cube recipe or some such that allows you to get another respec chance if you wish.
Additionally, as someone that must remember crazy long passwords, I can offer some hope. The human brain is totally capable of memorizing multiple long random character strings. Yes at first it was hard, but after a week or so they were as easy to remember as any other. They just took longer to type and were more prone to typos. Also, I knew a guy that memorized a license key number, something towards 128 characters. The brain is an amazing tool.
Some advice for the password-challenged _HOME_ user: - Keep a password list, but not on your computer. Write them down on paper and put it somewhere safe from damage and misplacement. This allows you to use stronger passwords and acts as a backup if your computer dies. Only write down enough information as needed so that if someone were to see it they still didn't have enough info to abuse it. More on this later. - Increase complexity for anything banking or credit related. It's OK to have short ones for Facebook and Twitter. But your money should be guarded as best as you can. - When creating answers for those "Security Questions" either pick questions for which only you would know the answer to OR give false answers to common questions and write them down. I hate that most answers to those questions can be found in a few quick searches on that person and some educated guessing. - Many programs and websites accept spaces, " ", as special characters. This allows a transition from difficult passwords to easily remembered pass phrases or sentences.
A few words on complex password creation and storage: 1) If you want a challenge, make them all random and unique. There are several on-line random generators out there. Generate a hundred or so and pick one for each. In time, you won't even need the list. Yes, you can do it.
2a) If you just want something that works, try this: - go to a generator and get a hundred or so that are 10 characters long, then pick the first one that looks like you could remember it. This will be your core. Over time this will be memorized since you will be using it everywhere. - Create a method to generate a prefix and/or suffix that is site dependent. They could be initials for the site, a few characters for incrementing at sites that force changes, an easily remembers old password, etc... use your imagination and make them easy to re-figure-out if needed. From that, you can now have separate and secure passwords for all your sites, where your passwords would look something like (prefix)(core)(suffix) and be anywhere from 12 to 20+ characters long with little memorization. The memorization being the core and the method used to create the prefix or suffix.
2b)If you want easy and the site accepts spaces, just come up with a pass phrase and sentence. Example: "You can't handle the truth!1!" or "1 of these days, Bang! Zoom!"
3) Write it down, but leave out the things you have memorized. This way, even if stolen this list won't do them any good. - For example, don't name the website, just what it is you do there. Instead of Facebook, write chat with Jenny. - If you know your your prefix and your core, just write down the suffix. Instead of FooBar001, where you know the prefix Foo and the core Bar, just write down 001. Your password list will say "Chat with Jenny 001" and you'll know what it means, but no one else will.
The RFID systems I have seen in the field are poorly implemented. Most were thick, think 9v battery, tags that were either attached via zip ties or velcro. Even if it was securely attached, most were attached to removable face plates, while others were attached to the rear and would actually prevent you from pulling out the server and/or damage the cabling if you did, as it tended to hang down and catch on stuff. (snap off fibers, pull out power cords, etc.) They offered no assurance that that piece of equipment was in the room since they could easily be separated from the tag. Even with this system, you'll still need people to visually verify it anyway.
How often do you actually lose a piece of hardware? This is a solution to a problem that does not exist.
Barcode or your own SN sticker followed up by visual inspections is cheaper, safer, and more reliable compared to the RFID solutions I have seen out there.
De-friending seems harsh for only a constant barrage of drivel. Just use the Hide feature and most of the drivel is gone. Especially the Game related as you can choose to hide the game messages or the person. Just pick the game and you still get the real messages and keep your friend.
Only De-friended someone once when a friend got divorced and I did not care to hear their ex's bs.
What is _NOT_ explained anywhere in tolkien literature or letters is the exact origin of the Hobbits. They just appeared out of nowhere in the Third Age. It is my belief that Hobbits were created as a counter to Sauron's, and earlier Melkor's, evil. The quiet, simple melody Ilúvatar introduced to take back control of the great song of the ainur from Melkor. They simply had a natural resistance to the power of the ring as designed by Ilúvatar.
Bad Theory. Frodo gave the ring to Bombadil to look at and Bombadil showed that he had power over the ring, something the Witch King would not have, so Bombadil is not the Witch King. If he was then he would have taken it immediately back to his master, Sauron, but he didn't, he gave it back to Frodo, something the Witch King would never have done. Elrond's refusal to let Bombadil keep the ring is more out of his understanding that Bombadil, though powerful, could not be trusted as he would just as easily misplace it as keep it safe. (An alternative no better than throwing it in the deep ocean hoping it lost forever. Elrond wanted the ring destroyed and guided the council to that purpose.)
Bombadil is an enigma that Tolkien purposefully never wanted explained. The theory I prefer is that he and Goldberry are one of the Aniur that was appointed to do a task, probably by Manwë, in that area of Middle Earth in the Third Age.
IMHO, both you two (jd and Thing) should consider getting III with all the expansions. It is superior to II (which is fun and I played a good bit of) and on par with IV. III is the game Sid wanted I and II to be.
If you love II, you owe it to yourself to give III Complete a shot.
Google being quick at finding information does not make us know less. People know as much as they want to put the effort into knowing. Google can help them find more to know.
Slashdot Mirror
That depends on where you post your wisdom.
The book describes a USENET system that is used by professional political analysts to debate issues and post opinion pieces, the best of which get selected to news media publication. Eventually they both get hired by national papers to write regular columns.
They were columnists, not bloggers. They cut their teeth on the professional level discussion boards, then started writing articles for legitimate news papers, and eventually became professional columnists for prominent new agencies.
They were smart enough to realize that the path to political clout was not though a blog or an amateur discussion site, but by acquiring real jobs as columnists for the best news sites. We can post political genius all day on our Facebook page or here on Slashdot and it will not get us anywhere. However, if instead we became professional columnists and worked hard to get a regular column on the WAPO or NYT and posted our wisdom there...the political powers will begin to materialize.
Lots of companies force employees to track their time. Even salary employees who legally do not have to punch a clock to get paid. That's fine. It helps them for future estimates and proposals involving labor hours. It can be a very valuable tool.
However, all too often management begins to use these time tracking systems to try and shift overhead expenses to something billable to a customer. You walk in and read e-mails on billing guidance on how regular staff meetings, training, and even fire drills are billable to customers. Then another e-mail on billing guidance informs you that the normal overhead related billing is now forbidden unless given explicit authorization (that you will never get). Essentially, they are lying to themselves, that they have zero overhead when running their business. That nothing ever goes wrong and no one has to wait for anything.
But the one thing they forget is that by charging their customers for everything, they are charging them too much for services. The business is now vulnerable to any other business that can provide the same service and not charge their overhead to the customer.
A while back, a friend an I talked about this and we had a pretty neat solution for problem 4.
The problem is preventing collisions while still allowing freedom of navigation. We came up with a system where at a certain altitude you must travel in a certain direction and at a certain speed. (We assumed that take-off and landing would be done at something resembling an airport where a control system of some sort would manage transitioning down from a certain altitude.) As you increase altitude, your direction yaws right and your speed increases. (speed being a target speed you should be flying at) Basically, like cars travel on roads that are directional lines with assigned speeds, flying cars travel on roads that are directional layers with assigned altitudes and speeds.
GPS, transponders, and mapping software aid the drivers. GPS units can plan routes between destinations and coordinate the proper altitude and airspeed to the autopilot. Transponders transmit vin, altitude, airspeed, position, and heading to traffic around it to allow them to make adjustments to avoid collisions (all within the altitude-airspeed-direction framework). Mapping software can tell the GPS where there are Restricted Airspaces like airports, cities, or tall mountains so the GPS can route around it. The tricky part is anticipating possible collisions, but with transponder info it should be much easier to calculate.
Q: "How much of Middle Earth would you like to see on film?"
A: As much as they can. The Silmarillion would make a great TV series.
As for The Hobbit. I had thought that two films at 3 hours a piece would be just enough to tell the bulk of the story. (starting the journey and a couple of the incidents up to Mirkwood along with the white council and some Dol Guldor scenes in the first film then Mirkwood, Dale, and Erebor and wraping up Dol Guldor in the second) But I had thought they would have to skimp on the Dol Guldor action to make it fit.
With 3 films to work with, you can cut them down to 2 and a half hours each and have an extra hour and a half to tell more about the White Council and Dol Guldor. I'm OK with this.
Knuckel-balls are not as simple as "a tube .... that follows a smooth curve." That is a wobbling knuckle-ball, and is generally what people think of. This is usually the first pitch knuckle-ball, does not really move much but you can control it better to get that first strike. But if that is all you have got, then you are going to hit around a bit. That is not the strike-out knuckle-ball. By making minor changes in the grip, you can produce more movement that can cause it to dive, cut-in, and break-away. One of the guys that taught me had a knuckle-ball that he could snake in almost at will, much more movement than the smooth curved tube. If first broke slightly left to appear to be wide of the strike zone but then broke hard right to fall back in for a strike. The problem is that good hitters can anticipate it after seeing it a few times.
A good Knuckle-ball has a slight rotation. Somewhere between half a turn and a turn and a half on it's way to the plate. This slow rotation slightly changes how the seam are presented to the high pressure area in the front thereby changing the disruption of the airflow around the ball. Just like an airfoil will cause low pressure on the top of a wing creating lift and moving the plane up, these changing disruptions cause temporary low pressure areas on the ball and cause a small amount of "lift" in a vectored direction from the center of the mass of the baseball. If these happen rapidly and evenly over the front surface, you get the wobbling knuckle-ball like he describes. If they appear mostly on one side, it will move in that direction. With practice, you can begin to throw the wobbler when you want a strike and a hard breaking knuckler when you want to get them to chase a pitch out of the zone by slightly changing your grip and orientation.
As an aside, and interesting read is The Physics of Baseball by Robert Adair
http://www.amazon.com/The-Physics-Baseball-3rd-Edition/dp/0060084367
(Though, I have to disagree with his opinion on the effect of ball rotation on a batted ball. If I remember correctly, he states that the effect is negligible. IMO and experience, I believe it is noticeable and sometimes determines fair/foul as some batted balls hook much more than others.)
The "Best" is going to greatly depend on lots of things including, but not limited to, how well you folded it, throw it, paper type, relative humidity, altitude, etc.
That said, I ran across this a few years ago:
http://www.instructables.com/id/KlineFogleman-Airfoil-1-Paper-Airplane/
It requires very accurate folding, but if done right with the right kind of paper and flown in good conditions it can be impressive. The airfoil turns some of the drag into lift and stability. The two guys that patented the airfoil wrote a book about it some years ago.
Also, there is a difference between making a plane for record distance and making a plane for record time aloft. The former needs minimal drag while the latter needs maximum lift.
This should also be linked with that chart:
http://blog.xkcd.com/2011/04/26/radiation-chart-update/
Even since then, more data has been collected as noted by it's Wikipedia article.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster
A quick excerpt:
"However, the largest study, as of 21 October 2011, on Fukushima fallout concludes that Fukushima was "the largest radioactive noble gas release in history not related to nuclear bomb testing. The release is a factor of 2.5 higher than the Chernobyl 133Xe source term.""
While politically motivated scaremongering is not sane, Sanity's position on the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Disaster may have to take a few steps in that direction.
Have to disagree. I had a lot of fun with SimCity 2000, even bought Streets of SimCity. But I am having more fun now with SimCity 4 + Rush Hour. Jumping into a police car and turning on the siren and racing around town while the citizens pull over, climbing into a tank and blowing up a building or two (hopefully the right one), that's FUN. The rest of the game is generally better too, more road types, zone types (like agricultural).
If you are a SimCity fan and don't have SimCity 4 + Rush Hour, you are missing out big time.
FYI, a patch came out for D2 a few years ago that allowed for a free character respec. I believe there was also a way to get another one, via some items.
"Given our current technology and potential near-future technology, what would a future space battlefield look like?"
Given Current Tech Available:
Machine Guns, Guided Torpedoes w/ HE or Nuclear warheads, primitive rail-guns, primitive heat lasers, ground to low earth orbit booster rockets, small space shuttle, Soyuz capsules, communication satellites, ground observation and control, remote drones, micro-satellites, primitive Project Thor, IIS
Current Space Battle:
The goal would be to control cis-lunar space (between Moon and Earth) and would be the first battlefield of WWIII. (I can't see a scenario where the whole world puts up with someone trying to grab space for themselves.) Mostly orbital combat, with possible sub-orbital pop-up strikes. Booster rockets would launch guided torpedoes with High Explosive fragmentation warheads (steel clouds of death) at enemy targets (likely fragile communications/spy satellites) and disable them without needing a direct hit. The ISS would be turned to swiss cheese. Low Earth Orbit's space junk problem will become exponentially worse. Combat Shuttles could launch, but they would be sub-orbital or perhaps one orbit at most. The counter move to maintain a satellite presence would be to use micro-satellites to replace one large one with many "disposable" ones. All the while a crazy Electronic Counter-Measure war is going on in space to deny communications entirely and would not discriminate between military and consumer channels. Forget calling across an ocean as the world will have to fall back on copper wire or glass fiber. Eventually, it spills-over to Earth conventional war or even Global Thermonuclear War. The winner, if any at all, will be decided on the ground. The space war's most important impact will be that if one side actually does achieve cis-lunar space-superiority, the loser will be somewhat blinded and may be scared enough to start lobbing nuclear weapons around out of fear of the winner's ability to set up a Project Thor and bomb with impunity. I don't see people in space fighting it out in capsules or shuttles as they may not survive launch and re-entry without actually going into a battle.
Near Future Tech:
Machine Guns turrets, Guided Torpedoes w/ HE or Nuclear warheads, primitive rail-guns, primitive heat lasers, ground to low earth orbit booster rockets, small space shuttle, Soyuz capsules, communication satellites, ground observation and control, remote drones, micro-satellites, primitive Project Thor, IIS, Moon Base, Space Station at Lunar L1, L2, L3, L4, L5, Space Marines in primitive Power Armor, Lunar Tanks, fighting robots, Lunar artillery.
Near Future Space Combat:
The goal would be to control Earth Orbit, The Moon, and Lunar L1 through L5 and would be the prelude to Solar War I. Not sure that it will contain Global Thermonuclear War as I assume it will take global cooperation to get this far. Perhaps a limited exchange if it were a few nations making a power grab. Given the issues with radiation and micro-meteorites at the Lagrangian points, the stations would naturally be well shielded against fragmentation warheads. The stations themselves would likely be prized possessions. (if not, they get nuked using large booster delivered warheads from Earth) The Lunar Colonies would also be prized, so I would assume that nuking them would be a last-gasp "FU" from the losing side. There could be small fleets of space shuttle like warships that have machine guns or auto cannons for primary attack with the ability to carry a limited number of small guided torpedoes with frag/HE/nuke warheads. I would imagine that these craft would be well heat shielded for earth re-entry so heat lasers would have little to no effect on them. Battles between fleets would be long looping orbits with combatants sending fire at close approach moments possibly days apart in low earth/lunar orbit and even weeks apart if in high slow transitional orbits. Machine gun turret fire could be used as
Brawndo! The Thirst Mutilator!
I wonder what their Prime Radiant looks like.
The problems with the TV Networks "pitch zone" is that they are 2 dimensional, do not change for each batter, and the TV viewer has trouble seeing the true motion of the pitch. The strike zone covers all of home plate, including depth. Many pitchers use "back door" breaking balls/sliders to try and hit the very back side of the strike zone. In the "pitch zone" these would look like a ball, when in fact it crossed the plate in the zone. Also, the strike zone changes height for each batter as defined in the rules as the batter waits for the pitch. These "pitch zone" displays never do. Lastly, pitch movement is hard to pick up on television, especially when depth is involved. Pitches can curve around the strike zone and appear to be strikes as well as curve into the back of the strike zone. It is hard to tell from a single camera.
Mozy & Carbonite offer unlimited backups for about $60 per year. If your parents are willing to pick up the tab, go for it.
Personally, I do this:
- mirrored data drive stores pictures and video. Happens automatically.
- 2 external HDs gets copies of data drive. Manually cold mirror via SyncToy a few times a month.
- burn 3 copies of DVDs of new files, keep one, send other two to parents and in-laws. I may do this once or twice a year. It is manual and does consume some time, but for the cost of a few DVD RWs, envelopes, and two postage stamps I get off-site backups. Oh, and they'll likely load them on their PC, so that's another backup copy.
It probably costs me more than $60 per year, but I prefer to do things like this myself.
While I too have also not read it, however I can easily understand how any differing view of events can look like it came from a "Propoganda Department". There is always more than one side to any story. Self Defense from one view may appear to be Murder from another.
Going all the way back to the Music of the Ainur, Melkor had just as much right as any of the Valar as to what was to become of Middle-Earth and the peoples within it. Manwë and the others formed a clique about what the Vision of Ilúvatar should be like and left Melkor out. Basically, Melkor was the geek outcast to the popular Valar. Melkor was the smartest of the bunch, "the nerd". The popular crowd even sent their "jock", Tulkas, to go beat up Melkor and stuff him in a locker. Go read The Silmarillion for yourself. It's all there.
The whole War of Wrath, and everything else, was probably started when Melkor made some really creative thing and the others were jealous and then ruined it. Why? Because they didn't approve. Who are they? Nobody special. They were all essentially equal with no one really having a real claim over another. But they chose to gang up on him because he was different. Melkor's idea of beauty didn't fit in with theirs, so they went about ridiculing and undermining all that he tried to do. Push came to shove, and next thing you know the Valar ganged up on Melkor. Melkor sees that he'll never get his own way with anything as long as the popular Valar gang is keeping him down. So he decided to wreck what they are trying to do. It's not "evil", it's JUSTICE! Melkor's responding in kind. And he's very good at it 'cause he's smarter than all of them. Melkor is the geek. Along the way he starts to gather his own clique of outcasts from the Valar gang, one of which is Sauron. Obviously, the Valar gang stepped on a lot of toes with their "Holier than Thou" attitude. They even started using derogatory nick-names to reference him, like Morgoth. See that? He's geeky AND goth and they make fun of him 'cause he's different.
But, you can't fight the popular clique. Principal Ilúvatar is always going to side with them. Eventually the Valar brats gets Melkor expelled from Middle-Earth High. Sure, Melkor probably went too far here and there, but if the Valar brats did to you what they did to Melkor...you'd be fighting right along side him. All because the Valar brats thinks that technology and industry, and the Vo-Tech kids in general, are stupid and ugly. Melkor's best friend, Sauron, swears that he'll do what he can to make them pay for it, but it is to no avail. They get him expelled too.
The Rings of Power. That was Sauron's last ditch effort to show the rest of Middle-Earth how the wool was pulled over their eyes by the Valar. The Rings of Power didn't brainwash anyone. Sauron just showed them the kind of life they could be living if not for the Valar keeping them down. There were all kinds of technological cool stuff that they could be using to improve their lives. The Rings alone gave them superpowers. IMMORTALITY! Sauron basically said to The Nine, "look at all this cool technology you could you could be using. The Valar have been keeping it from you only because they are technophobes. Isn't that stupid?!" And The Nine were like "This stuff is AWESOME! You're totally freakin' right! How have I been living without these things?? Sign me up." (it was probably similar to when you got your first smart-phone) I'm sure Sauron was proably workin' on some steampunk tech too before the end. Just take a look at Grond.
You see, it's not that Melkor was Right or Wrong. He was DIFFERENT. That's all. But the Valar didn't like that, not one bit. So they went about humiliating him and destroying him and all his friends. Does that sound "Right" to you?
IANAL, However it seems that a good portion of Title 18 Chapter 37 ESPIONAGE AND CENSORSHIP pertain to him.
# 793. Gathering, transmitting or losing defense information (Gathering, yes. Transmitting, maybe)
# 794. Gathering or delivering defense information to aid foreign government (maybe)
# 795. Photographing and sketching defense installations (maybe)
# 796. Use of aircraft for photographing defense installations (probably not)
# 797. Publication and sale of photographs of defense installations (maybe)
# 798. Disclosure of classified information (Yes. "or publishing")
For more info, try here:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/uscode18/usc_sup_01_18_10_I_20_37.html
Remember, they don't have to be content with what was just leaked recently. The DoJ can go back in time and drag out everything that they can prove was _EVER_ leaked on his site and use it to convict him of ESPIONAGE. If he's extradited, he's screwed.
Regular DII player here. The one patch also allowed you to go CD free by copying some files from the original and expansion discs.
However, I do not believe you get a respec until you complete the Den of Evil quest on Hell difficulty. There is apparently some charm or cube recipe or some such that allows you to get another respec chance if you wish.
DII was, and still is, a great game.
It's been done already.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQ7N6V-YKJ8&feature=related
I was thinking the same myself.
Additionally, as someone that must remember crazy long passwords, I can offer some hope. The human brain is totally capable of memorizing multiple long random character strings. Yes at first it was hard, but after a week or so they were as easy to remember as any other. They just took longer to type and were more prone to typos. Also, I knew a guy that memorized a license key number, something towards 128 characters. The brain is an amazing tool.
Some advice for the password-challenged _HOME_ user:
- Keep a password list, but not on your computer. Write them down on paper and put it somewhere safe from damage and misplacement. This allows you to use stronger passwords and acts as a backup if your computer dies. Only write down enough information as needed so that if someone were to see it they still didn't have enough info to abuse it. More on this later.
- Increase complexity for anything banking or credit related. It's OK to have short ones for Facebook and Twitter. But your money should be guarded as best as you can.
- When creating answers for those "Security Questions" either pick questions for which only you would know the answer to OR give false answers to common questions and write them down. I hate that most answers to those questions can be found in a few quick searches on that person and some educated guessing.
- Many programs and websites accept spaces, " ", as special characters. This allows a transition from difficult passwords to easily remembered pass phrases or sentences.
A few words on complex password creation and storage:
1) If you want a challenge, make them all random and unique. There are several on-line random generators out there. Generate a hundred or so and pick one for each. In time, you won't even need the list. Yes, you can do it.
2a) If you just want something that works, try this:
- go to a generator and get a hundred or so that are 10 characters long, then pick the first one that looks like you could remember it. This will be your core. Over time this will be memorized since you will be using it everywhere.
- Create a method to generate a prefix and/or suffix that is site dependent. They could be initials for the site, a few characters for incrementing at sites that force changes, an easily remembers old password, etc... use your imagination and make them easy to re-figure-out if needed. From that, you can now have separate and secure passwords for all your sites, where your passwords would look something like (prefix)(core)(suffix) and be anywhere from 12 to 20+ characters long with little memorization. The memorization being the core and the method used to create the prefix or suffix.
2b)If you want easy and the site accepts spaces, just come up with a pass phrase and sentence. Example: "You can't handle the truth!1!" or "1 of these days, Bang! Zoom!"
3) Write it down, but leave out the things you have memorized. This way, even if stolen this list won't do them any good.
- For example, don't name the website, just what it is you do there. Instead of Facebook, write chat with Jenny.
- If you know your your prefix and your core, just write down the suffix. Instead of FooBar001, where you know the prefix Foo and the core Bar, just write down 001. Your password list will say "Chat with Jenny 001" and you'll know what it means, but no one else will.
The RFID systems I have seen in the field are poorly implemented. Most were thick, think 9v battery, tags that were either attached via zip ties or velcro. Even if it was securely attached, most were attached to removable face plates, while others were attached to the rear and would actually prevent you from pulling out the server and/or damage the cabling if you did, as it tended to hang down and catch on stuff. (snap off fibers, pull out power cords, etc.) They offered no assurance that that piece of equipment was in the room since they could easily be separated from the tag. Even with this system, you'll still need people to visually verify it anyway.
How often do you actually lose a piece of hardware? This is a solution to a problem that does not exist.
Barcode or your own SN sticker followed up by visual inspections is cheaper, safer, and more reliable compared to the RFID solutions I have seen out there.
De-friending seems harsh for only a constant barrage of drivel. Just use the Hide feature and most of the drivel is gone. Especially the Game related as you can choose to hide the game messages or the person. Just pick the game and you still get the real messages and keep your friend.
Only De-friended someone once when a friend got divorced and I did not care to hear their ex's bs.
What is _NOT_ explained anywhere in tolkien literature or letters is the exact origin of the Hobbits. They just appeared out of nowhere in the Third Age. It is my belief that Hobbits were created as a counter to Sauron's, and earlier Melkor's, evil. The quiet, simple melody Ilúvatar introduced to take back control of the great song of the ainur from Melkor. They simply had a natural resistance to the power of the ring as designed by Ilúvatar.
Bad Theory. Frodo gave the ring to Bombadil to look at and Bombadil showed that he had power over the ring, something the Witch King would not have, so Bombadil is not the Witch King. If he was then he would have taken it immediately back to his master, Sauron, but he didn't, he gave it back to Frodo, something the Witch King would never have done. Elrond's refusal to let Bombadil keep the ring is more out of his understanding that Bombadil, though powerful, could not be trusted as he would just as easily misplace it as keep it safe. (An alternative no better than throwing it in the deep ocean hoping it lost forever. Elrond wanted the ring destroyed and guided the council to that purpose.)
Bombadil is an enigma that Tolkien purposefully never wanted explained. The theory I prefer is that he and Goldberry are one of the Aniur that was appointed to do a task, probably by Manwë, in that area of Middle Earth in the Third Age.
IMHO, both you two (jd and Thing) should consider getting III with all the expansions. It is superior to II (which is fun and I played a good bit of) and on par with IV. III is the game Sid wanted I and II to be.
If you love II, you owe it to yourself to give III Complete a shot.
Google being quick at finding information does not make us know less. People know as much as they want to put the effort into knowing. Google can help them find more to know.