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  1. Almost there... on YouTube TV Costs $50 Per Month After Another Price Hike (engadget.com) · · Score: 1

    I dropped cable TV, and had to pickup both Youtube TV, and Direct TV Now so that I could get Viacom (Comedy Central) and the Discovery properties.
    DirectTV Now has dropped Viacom for new subscribers, but I am still grandfathered in.

    With this announcement, I can drop Direct TV Now. I don't watch Comedy Central enough to justify the charge. YouTube TV delivers a better image than Direct TV Now, as well as has a better DVR capability.

  2. In my area, Comcast measures your data usage by how much data they send to you from their datacenter. This would include DOS attacks, monitoring traffic from Comcast.. My monthly logs often differ from Comcasts, sometimes by as much as 10x, as much of this traffic is rejected by my gateway. None of my other utilities get away with this sort of monitoring. It is based on what I consume, not what they send. If the water pipe breaks on their side of my meter, that is their problem. Comcast makes it mine. I have only exceeded the cap once, by their records. Twice in 12 months triggers the extra fees.

  3. Garmin Fenix 5X on Ask Slashdot: Are There Any Good Smartwatches Or Fitness Trackers? · · Score: 1

    I have had fitbits, three generations of apple watch, and the Garmin Fenix 5X. Check out the Garmin products. They tie in with the apple health applications. Excellent battery life. I can get 10 days out of it fairly easily just doing smart watch sort of things. If I use the GPS tracking, battery gets cut to around 36 hours of use. Apple has trained me to do a nightly recharge, so that is no big deal.

  4. Wisdom is a product of time and experience. Both of which have been constantly and consistently devalued by corporations seeking a quick profit.

  5. More platters = higher failure rates on Google Proposes New Hard Drive Format For Data Centers (thestack.com) · · Score: 1

    More platters yields more heads. More components to fail. This will increase failure rates for these drives at a given capacity over a similar capacity 3.5" drive with a lower platter count.

    Spinning media is still hard to beat on price. Desktop 7200 RPM drives are at $.03/GB. "Enterprise" 7200 RPM SATA at volume is between $.03/GB and $0.05GB. Cheap SSD is around $0.60/GB to $1.20/GB.

    A lot of data is still cold. At volume, this price difference matters a lot.

  6. Re:Test with unlocked phone? YES on T-Mobile Smartphones Outlast Competitors' Identical Models · · Score: 1

    I took an unlocked Nokia 1520 from AT&T, to T-Mobile, to Consumer Cellular.
    Originally, on AT&T, I could not make it through a complete day on a single charge. Took it off the charger at 4:30AM. Battery was dead by 3pm.
    Took phone to t-mobile. Off charger at 4:30AM, phone still had a quarter charge left at 10:30PM when I plugged it back in.
    Now on Consumer Cellular. Same phone. AT&T is the service provider to Consumer Cellular. Battery is not making it through the day again.

    Usage patterns are similar through all three carriers. I did not do any rigorous scientific tests on this. This is observational usage data.

  7. No, they have no passion for software! on Do Non-Technical Managers Add Value? · · Score: 1

    I have never met a successful manager of a software development team who did not have a technical background. I have even met a few liberal arts majors who learned to develop software on their own. They had passion, they achieved a technical background on their own.
    I have met plenty of unsuccessful software development managers that do not have a technical background.
    I waste 6 hours of my day, on average, dealing with non technical managers of technical teams. Much time wasted explaining the technical aspects of their own teams to them so I can get them to do what they should have known to do in the first place.
    I do not understand how someone can be passionate about a technology construction, and not be technical. These folks should chase their passions somewhere else.
    The best managers that I have had, and that I deal with now, are former EE's, CE's, CS types with development experience that went on into higher management ranks.
    You spend more time figuring out strategy, and less time bogged down on trivial matters that are obvious to the greenest of college hires.

  8. Criminal Shopping List on New York Paper Uses Public Records To Publish Gun-Owner Map · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This is just a great example of responsible journalism. Now the criminals know exactly where to go to get firearms that will never be traced back to them.

  9. If Dell doesn't make $$$, they don't do it again.. on Dell's Ubuntu Ultrabook Now On Sale; Costs $50 More Than Windows Version · · Score: 1

    A more important reason to pay for this SKU is so that the bean counters at Dell see that there is money in selling computers with open source software.
    Dell is a spreadsheet run organization. If the SKU doesn't do the volume, or make money, they don't do another version of the SKU.

    Getting the Windows version and loading your own build is shooting the movement in the foot.

  10. Have you tried Windows 8? on The Empire In Decline? · · Score: 1, Informative

    I see a lot of criticism of Windows 8, but I don't see a lot of folks that have actually tried to use it with a touch screen device.
    I have played with the all in ones and touch screen tablets at the Microsoft store. As much as a cringe when a co-worker touches my monitor, I think there is something to this adaption of the tablet interface. I actually like the live data features of the icons, I get information without going into the apps. I get that this is a new take on the old widget concept.

    I would not count Microsoft out.

  11. Dealing with Management on Do Recreational Drugs Help Programmers? · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Recreational drugs serve more as a device to cope with Management than they do for any other aspects of developing code.

  12. Reviews are biased, get over it. on NYC To Release Teacher Evaluation Data Over Union Protests · · Score: 2

    I don't expect public sector reviews to be any less unbiased than they are in the private sector. If your boss doesn't like you / writes a bad review, it is in your best interested to find a boss that does. Public sector employees are not exempt from this workplace reality.

  13. Nothing to worry about.... on Congress Warns NASA About Shortchanging SLS/Orion For Commercial Crew · · Score: 1

    .... check out how long it has been since Congress has passed a budget...

  14. Two components to this arguement on Is Climate Change the New Evolution? · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The climate science debate has two important components to it. This issue focuses on one component, and that is the anti-science attack on climate science. This has the same source of ignorance and zealotry that has challenged teaching evolution in the classroom. This is a stand of religious based ignorance against science. I have not met anyone who understands the scientific process who challenges the theory of evolution. I am using the scientific definition of theory, which is an operating model, and not the "theory is not a fact" arguement that my religious friends pick up.

    The second component to climate science is that there are some great issues of modern science and society that can be taught here. To not teach this in the classroom is missing out on a real opportunity to teach critical thinking that children can get passionate about.

    You can teach about data collection, and how this can be a source for controversy.
    You can teach about computer modeling and statistical analysis. What these tools are great for, and where they fall short.
    Plenty to teach about weather vs. climate, and what the climate means for other systems on the planet.
    Lab experiements on basic components of the atmosphere, and why they don't always translate to the actual model of the world.
    You can teach the ethics of how to prioritze science against society and economic concerns.

    Lots more stuff that I am not getting in to.

    My point being, this is another area where zealotry is screwing up a great opportunity to train the next generation of scientists.

  15. Legal Issue - can company erase YOUR machine? on Businesses Now Driving "Bring Your Own Device" Trend · · Score: 2

    There is an interesting legal issue here.. IANAL though..
    When the company owns the machine, there is a much clearer line as to who owns the applications and data on that machine. When an employee leaves the company, the company can "brick" the system with minimal problems. They own the hardware, they own the software licenses, and the company probably has a policy about no personal applications or data on the machine.
    When the employee owns the machine, the rights of the company to erase data get really murky, fast. Does the employee have to agree to allow the company to inspect their (the employee's owned system) to remove company assets from the system? I don't see how that is going to work. My employer does not have the right to search my car after I quit, even though I called into conference calls in it, and used it for work related trips quite a bit.

    I know of several companies that completely prohibit employee owned devices in the workplace for exactly the reasons I mentioned above.

  16. Re:your calculation is flawed on Inside Amazon's Data Centers · · Score: 1

    They pay the per 1,000's price (or close to it), which is not list price. These numbers are published. This is the quantity in which they purchase the processors, so it makes sense. The number you can't see is the negotiated power deals.
    The price for a quad processor capable system is still 4x to 10x what a single socket processor costs.

  17. Re:your calculation is flawed on Inside Amazon's Data Centers · · Score: 1

    Your points are exactly why these large data centers are locating in areas with access to cheap power. I used $0.10 as an example, however, that is extremely HIGH when factoring in the deals that large data centers strike with regional power providers that are giving cheap access to hydro power. This is the exact reason folks are not putting large data centers in Europe and the Bay Area. Power has to be cheap for the economics to work out.
    Also, read the papers published by Google and Facebook. These guys are pushing PUE below 1.2, whereas a typical data center is 2.0 or higher!

  18. Re:any reason they don't buy larger servers? on Inside Amazon's Data Centers · · Score: 5, Informative

    Looking at a 3-5 years TCO, and power costs where these data centers are located, power costs are noise in the equation.
    Taking advantage of commodity pricing in the lower tiers is where the savings is at. Example, single socket systems are a lot cheaper on the procs and mainboards than dual sockets. Quad socket processors are significantly more expensive per proc..
    At $0.10 per KwH, a 400W server is $350/year to power. Quad socket processors (Intel I7) can be as high as $4500 each!

  19. Re:Correlation is not causation on Requiring Algebra II In High School Gains Momentum · · Score: 1

    Maybe if he had taking Alg II, he could have done it more efficiently, and saved you some money!

  20. Still ticked that they replaced CTRL with Caps-Loc on Google Wants To Take Away Your Capslock Key · · Score: 1

    Time to abandon hope that the CTRL key will never go back to where it is supposed to be?

  21. There can only be one! on Nokia, Intel Merge Maemo, Moblin Into MeeGo · · Score: 1

    How about the handset manufacturers get behind one distro, and make it awesome? All multuple distros, with multiple app stores, and all sorts of crazy interfaces will do is fragment the market. In the end, none of them will succeed!

  22. Will it make and receive calls? on Does Microsoft Finally Have a Phone Worth Buying? · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This is a serious step 1 here. I have had several Windows Mobile phones in the past. What sold me on the iPhone was that I could hear the phone ring, and actually receive the call. With Windows Mobile, more often than not, I would get the call.. go to answer... phone locks up... reboot phone... call person back. FAIL on the basic UI of the phone. The other features would work well... just often found myself rebooting the phone when it came time to get a call.

  23. Slick way to increase fuel tax! on GPS-Based System For Driving Tax Being Field Tested · · Score: 1

    Currently, the fed tax on fuel is $0.18 (according to the link). Making the tax $.01 to $.02 cents a mile, and assuming that a car can get anywhere from 18 to 45 mpg, this makes the tax range effectively $0.18 to $.90 per gallon!

    A few interesting points here:
    1) Less fuel efficient cars will be less tax per gallon of gas consumed.
    2) I thought there would be no new taxes on folks making less that $250,000 a year!
    3) What will the states do to jump on this hidden tax inrease bandwagon?

  24. PSU failures, still statistically insignificant on When Does Powering Down Servers Make Sense? · · Score: 1

    I used to believe this. I have looked at data in my environment. My project reboots servers by cutting the power supply at a managed power strip. Power is brought back to the system by re-energizing the power strip port.

    My findings after 5 years of doing this (which many machines experienceing this multiple times per day), no noticable rate of power supply failures over a large installed base (less than 1% of all failures). These are cheap power supplies at that.

    Point is, machines are much more capable of surviving the "shock" of a power up/down sequence than your instincts would lead you to believe

  25. Don't care about the other 99.8%, I won't buy EA! on 99.8% of Gamers Don't Care About DRM, Says EA · · Score: 1

    I will never purchase another EA product, and I will tell friends and family not to do so either. Ran into a situation with Spore where they assigned the DRM key that was printed in my manual to another user the day before I purchased the game.

    Their solution was to have me go through the hassle of returning a game with open shrink wrap to an on line retailer that I purchased it from.

    Their mistake, and they made it my problem.

    The right answer should have been "We are sorry for the inconvenience sir, here is another key".

    I am taking it to small claims court. This will eat any profits they could have possibly made on my sale.

    Exchanging the software requires effort and no compensation to me.

    Small claims court allows 100% compensation for my efforts.