So they should. The Shuffle is a flimsy, easily damaged product (I have owned two 512 MB units). Its advertised as a unit to use when exercising, but my experience has been that it is not robust enough to be used in any situation where you and the Shuffle are in motion... Both of mine experienced a steady degradation of the rear slider switch after getting a little damp, to the point where the first one does not power on at all, and the second only works in "sequential" mode - it will no longer shuffle, and I have to cycle the switch on/off many times to get it to start playing. The only reason I persevere with it is due to its small form factor. At $99 a pop I felt ripped off, at $69 it would be border-line acceptable...
OK, he is wrong about pilot pay - they are paid reasonably considering the responsibility they have and the fact that only a small segment of the overall population have the right combination of physical, mental, and emotional skills required to be a professional pilot.
However, he is spot on in identifying the problem with the (US) airlines. Ask anyone who flies International flights regularly, and who has flown both US and foreign carriers. On a typical UAL or AA overseas flight, most of the flight attendants appear to be at least 50 years old. Many of them work like they are retired in place. The service is not good. On most of the foreign carriers, you see much more of a cross section in terms of age, and the service is generally much better. The difference is, on a US carrier there is a union dictated seniority system in place that results in absolutely the wrong people getting these assignments. The foreign carriers are not shackled with this problem.
Rutan uses an engine of a very different design than anything used by NASA (Nitrous Oxide and rubber), and the re-entry configuration (feathering the wings to maximize drag)is totally new AFAIK. Think about it - the skin of this spacecraft is constructed of fabric and glue!!!
I would love to learn more about how Scaled was able to be so succesfull on such a limited budget using a completely new and radical desgn. There is probably a lesson here applicable to just about any engineering endeavor.
Trouble is, their "insights" makes about as much sense as the Nazi's blaming the Jews for causing Germany's defeat in WW1 and the hyper-inflation during the Weimar republic. If you RTFM you'll see that the above quoted texts were supposed to be propaganda, directed at the Western public. There is a big difference between propaganda and policy. These people are trying hard to get us to withdraw from the Middle East, using terrorism as a strategy, and they embarked upon this policy long before we invaded Afghanistan and Iraq. The invasions were the part of the effect, not the cause. They simply miscalculated.
Indeed, but perhaps not in this case 20/20...we DID give the Taliban time (but not exactly 30 days) to hand over the perpetrators of 9/11. If you review the history you'll see that we did not begin the bombing campaign until October 7th, 2001, 28 days after 9/11. The Taliban refused to hand over Bin Laden unless we could prove his involvement...that proof was not found until after the Taliban were removed from power.
What makes it even lamer in my view is the fact that it reportedly takes 10 minutes to scan each envelope. Clearly in its present form the technology is not deployable.
Why is it that other countries somehow feel this smug superiority to the US when it comes to "international diplomacy". Is this based on a demonstrated record of success, or is it some cultural bias thing?
Sort of reminds me of all the talk in the International Press about how we would never prevail in Afghanistan, did not understand what we were up against, etc, etc. Yeah, right...
I beleive we know a good deal about how well international deplomacy works, and how sometimes it doesn't. Thats why we're the ones that took the risk in Iraq (along with the UK, Spain, and others), while the UN sat on the sidelines wringing their hands and figuring out new ways to appease Saddam and the Bathists...
I think its time that the international community accepted the fact that some people only understand force, diplomacy does not always work. Since we and our coalition partners had the means to remove Saddam, we had a moral duty to do so while the conditions were right...
Under Microsofts "Government Security Program" (GSP), certain governements are allowed to fully inspect Windows source code. While this is in some ways a benefit, it also is in itself a huge security problem, since some of the countries that are included under this agreement are sure to be looking for vulnerabilities to exploit (see//zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-990526.html).
While I agree that $900 is a little expensive, I think this guy did a great job. This is the type of story I'd like to see a lot more of on Slashdot, somebody showing real ingenuity and imagination...and no laws were broken!
Not an attempt to displace any blame here, but the version of this story that I saw said that the waste came from the US, Western Europe, and countries such as Korea and Japan (versus the slant here that this all US generated refuse). Also, are not the Chinese authorities are culpable as well? I don't think that the enterprise described in the report would exist without their approval at some level...
I live in Hollister and managed to test drive one of these things. It was sort of reminiscent of driving a forklift or one of those fair ground bumper cars. Handling was pretty good, and the vehicle accelerated real well. Interior finish was good. I have to admit though that it did not feel all that solid or safe. Basically you are in a motorcycle with an all-encasing crash helmet, and every other vehicle on the highway seems MUCH bigger and faster than you are. I think I would pay about $6-8000 based on my experiences. Supposedly Corbin is going to move a lot of the manufacturing out of california which should hopefully drop the price. $15,000 seems a little too much.
Dimmy and his employer was selling the software to US residents and charging $US for it...that makes him a criminal. What do you suppose would happen to a US citizen who sells software (that is illegal in Russia) to Russians over the Internet and charges them in rubles for it, then decides to take a trip to Russia and give a speech all about how he wrote said illegal (in Russia) software???
I beleive "IT" is an acronym for "Independance Technology". I suspect what this will turn out to be is a hopped up super mobile wheelchair for both physically challenged and non-physically challenged folks to use. The trick would be to get folks used to the idea of wheelchairs as a acceptable mode of transportation for average folks to use. I beleive the is information on this at the Johnson and Johnson website, but forgot the URL....
How is this article relevant to anything else Slashdot covers? This is just some whiners account of his rather unremarkable experiences with the Philly police and an advertisement for a dumb website...
The computer teachers I have run into in the local (Berryessa, San Jose CA.), school system seem to have little knowledge of Linux, *BSD, or Beos... As an experiment, I recently set up the computer that my 10 and 12 year old daughters (who have average computer skills) use to dual boot both Win 98 and Linux, to see if they could adapt to 2 operating systems and to see which they would prefer...after about a week they were spending about 90% of their time using Linux, mostly for Star Office and games, but also because they enjoyed the level of control afforded by the KDE desktop. Anyway, apparently my 12 year old told her computer teacher that she was now using Linux, and he replied that he thought it was "only for adults". My 10 year olds home room teacher apparently cautioned her that "Linux was very hard..." (and he advertises himself as a former private school computer technology teacher...). I think the problem is that these people just don't have much experience with anything outside of what the school system provides them. The teachers realize that the kids need to receive at least some computer education, but they lack the knowledge to work outside of the curriculem supplied by the school. I think the root of the problem may be that the typical Grade/Middle/High school teacher is usually not that computer savvy, perhaps the answer may be to bring in outsiders, (such as the people that teach the extension courses in the UC system) to teach computer classes instead of relying on the teachers to do it.
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I saw one of these in the UK 35 years ago...(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MONIAC_Compute r). Very cool.....
So they should. The Shuffle is a flimsy, easily damaged product (I have owned two 512 MB units). Its advertised as a unit to use when exercising, but my experience has been that it is not robust enough to be used in any situation where you and the Shuffle are in motion... Both of mine experienced a steady degradation of the rear slider switch after getting a little damp, to the point where the first one does not power on at all, and the second only works in "sequential" mode - it will no longer shuffle, and I have to cycle the switch on/off many times to get it to start playing. The only reason I persevere with it is due to its small form factor. At $99 a pop I felt ripped off, at $69 it would be border-line acceptable...
OK, he is wrong about pilot pay - they are paid reasonably considering the responsibility they have and the fact that only a small segment of the overall population have the right combination of physical, mental, and emotional skills required to be a professional pilot.
However, he is spot on in identifying the problem with the (US) airlines. Ask anyone who flies International flights regularly, and who has flown both US and foreign carriers. On a typical UAL or AA overseas flight, most of the flight attendants appear to be at least 50 years old. Many of them work like they are retired in place. The service is not good. On most of the foreign carriers, you see much more of a cross section in terms of age, and the service is generally much better. The difference is, on a US carrier there is a union dictated seniority system in place that results in absolutely the wrong people getting these assignments. The foreign carriers are not shackled with this problem.
No, it is very much a valid comparison...
Rutan uses an engine of a very different design than anything used by NASA (Nitrous Oxide and rubber), and the re-entry configuration (feathering the wings to maximize drag)is totally new AFAIK. Think about it - the skin of this spacecraft is constructed of fabric and glue!!!
I would love to learn more about how Scaled was able to be so succesfull on such a limited budget using a completely new and radical desgn. There is probably a lesson here applicable to just about any engineering endeavor.
Link to the Physics Web article: http://physicsweb.org/article/world/17/9/3
Trouble is, their "insights" makes about as much sense as the Nazi's blaming the Jews for causing Germany's defeat in WW1 and the hyper-inflation during the Weimar republic. If you RTFM you'll see that the above quoted texts were supposed to be propaganda, directed at the Western public. There is a big difference between propaganda and policy. These people are trying hard to get us to withdraw from the Middle East, using terrorism as a strategy, and they embarked upon this policy long before we invaded Afghanistan and Iraq. The invasions were the part of the effect, not the cause. They simply miscalculated.
Indeed, but perhaps not in this case 20/20...we DID give the Taliban time (but not exactly 30 days) to hand over the perpetrators of 9/11. If you review the history you'll see that we did not begin the bombing campaign until October 7th, 2001, 28 days after 9/11. The Taliban refused to hand over Bin Laden unless we could prove his involvement...that proof was not found until after the Taliban were removed from power.
Or malicious spectators could engage in this, like those dirt bags at the Reno air races that try to jam the air-to-air voice transmissions...
Donnie Darko - you won't regret it...
What makes it even lamer in my view is the fact that it reportedly takes 10 minutes to scan each envelope. Clearly in its present form the technology is not deployable.
Why is it that other countries somehow feel this smug superiority to the US when it comes to "international diplomacy". Is this based on a demonstrated record of success, or is it some cultural bias thing?
Sort of reminds me of all the talk in the International Press about how we would never prevail in Afghanistan, did not understand what we were up against, etc, etc. Yeah, right...
I beleive we know a good deal about how well international deplomacy works, and how sometimes it doesn't. Thats why we're the ones that took the risk in Iraq (along with the UK, Spain, and others), while the UN sat on the sidelines wringing their hands and figuring out new ways to appease Saddam and the Bathists...
I think its time that the international community accepted the fact that some people only understand force, diplomacy does not always work. Since we and our coalition partners had the means to remove Saddam, we had a moral duty to do so while the conditions were right...
History will be the best judge of who was right.
Under Microsofts "Government Security Program" (GSP), certain governements are allowed to fully inspect Windows source code. While this is in some ways a benefit, it also is in itself a huge security problem, since some of the countries that are included under this agreement are sure to be looking for vulnerabilities to exploit (see //zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-990526.html).
While I agree that $900 is a little expensive, I think this guy did a great job. This is the type of story I'd like to see a lot more of on Slashdot, somebody showing real ingenuity and imagination...and no laws were broken!
Not an attempt to displace any blame here, but the version of this story that I saw said that the waste came from the US, Western Europe, and countries such as Korea and Japan (versus the slant here that this all US generated refuse). Also, are not the Chinese authorities are culpable as well? I don't think that the enterprise described in the report would exist without their approval at some level...
I live in Hollister and managed to test drive one of these things. It was sort of reminiscent of driving a forklift or one of those fair ground bumper cars. Handling was pretty good, and the vehicle accelerated real well. Interior finish was good. I have to admit though that it did not feel all that solid or safe. Basically you are in a motorcycle with an all-encasing crash helmet, and every other vehicle on the highway seems MUCH bigger and faster than you are. I think I would pay about $6-8000 based on my experiences. Supposedly Corbin is going to move a lot of the manufacturing out of california which should hopefully drop the price. $15,000 seems a little too much.
Dimmy and his employer was selling the software to US residents and charging $US for it...that makes him a criminal. What do you suppose would happen to a US citizen who sells software (that is illegal in Russia) to Russians over the Internet and charges them in rubles for it, then decides to take a trip to Russia and give a speech all about how he wrote said illegal (in Russia) software???
I beleive "IT" is an acronym for "Independance Technology". I suspect what this will turn out to be is a hopped up super mobile wheelchair for both physically challenged and non-physically challenged folks to use. The trick would be to get folks used to the idea of wheelchairs as a acceptable mode of transportation for average folks to use. I beleive the is information on this at the Johnson and Johnson website, but forgot the URL....
How is this article relevant to anything else Slashdot covers? This is just some whiners account of his rather unremarkable experiences with the Philly police and an advertisement for a dumb website...
Since Al Gore invented the internet, surely it only makes sense that most of the traffic would route through Northern Virginia...
The computer teachers I have run into in the local (Berryessa, San Jose CA.), school system seem to have little knowledge of Linux, *BSD, or Beos... As an experiment, I recently set up the computer that my 10 and 12 year old daughters (who have average computer skills) use to dual boot both Win 98 and Linux, to see if they could adapt to 2 operating systems and to see which they would prefer...after about a week they were spending about 90% of their time using Linux, mostly for Star Office and games, but also because they enjoyed the level of control afforded by the KDE desktop. Anyway, apparently my 12 year old told her computer teacher that she was now using Linux, and he replied that he thought it was "only for adults". My 10 year olds home room teacher apparently cautioned her that "Linux was very hard..." (and he advertises himself as a former private school computer technology teacher...). I think the problem is that these people just don't have much experience with anything outside of what the school system provides them. The teachers realize that the kids need to receive at least some computer education, but they lack the knowledge to work outside of the curriculem supplied by the school. I think the root of the problem may be that the typical Grade/Middle/High school teacher is usually not that computer savvy, perhaps the answer may be to bring in outsiders, (such as the people that teach the extension courses in the UC system) to teach computer classes instead of relying on the teachers to do it.