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  1. Re:Still too vague and too poorly defined on Is Net Neutrality Really Needed? · · Score: 1

    In general (more free) cases business has some responsibility, or lose customers, for sure.

    But in monopolies (be they natural, govn't granted, or if they sprung up through collusion between carriers splitting regions, etc) this not the case. In large swaths of the US, the only 'competitor' you change ship to is satellite, or perhaps wireless, which can't compete due to obvious factors...

    If the last mile was municipal, and it went to a headend where any ISP could lease your line, sure. change providers. Unfortunately that simply isn't the case.

    Even with that vastly improved setup, I'm sure the big guys would try and squish new upstarts on the backhaul side... They'll try to crush competition by hook or by crook - and the customers are the losers.

  2. Re:Business on RIAA, MPAA Recruit MasterCard As Internet Police · · Score: 2

    I suppose the *IAA kickbacks will be larger than the fees gained on infringing sites.

    Why else would they do it?

  3. Re:Just more extreme on Thief Posts His Photo To Facebook Victim's Account · · Score: 1

    Not sure why english never picked up on the unambiguous term 'milliard'.

    I suppose that still makes 10^12 billion ambiguous though.

  4. Re:Killing millions is fine. on Microsoft Puts the Kibosh On Kinect Sex Game Plans · · Score: 3, Insightful

    america is the one with tit fear, not humans as a whole.

  5. Re:This is hacking now? on Hackers Dual-Boot Chrome OS With Ubuntu Linux on CR-48 · · Score: 1

    I suppose the next step will then be:

    hacker: a person who is able to read

  6. Re:Sweet on Debian 6.0 To Feature a Completely Free Kernel · · Score: 2

    The problem with non-free stuff, is you can't change it, you know. So if your router has a binary blob proprietary driver for the wifi... great, it works miraculously under 2.4 kernel.

    Now - If you want to upgrade to 2.6, you're hooped. No source, and the manufacturer didn't release a blob for 2.6. This is the biggest problem, you're at the mercy of the manufacturer for continued support, unless someone reverse engineers the thing and writes an open driver. I don't like being in that situation.

  7. Re:But but but on FBI Alleged To Have Backdoored OpenBSD's IPSEC Stack · · Score: 2

    Upgrading is fairly painless these days, from what I recall.

    Download new kernel, installer version or whatnot.
    Reboot, boot to it.
    Press U for upgrade or somesuch.
    Untar the new config files, check/merge the ones you've changed.

    then uh.. pkg_add upgrade or so

    The longest part is merging config, if you've made a lot of changes to the default. I seem to think there is a tool to hold your hand for it too, sysmerge?

    not too bad. I think it was worse in the 3.x days though, it's been a while.

  8. Re:Giant goliath convector heater of sorts on 4chan Declares War On Snow · · Score: 1

    I, for one, welcome our new snake underlords.

  9. This is what I have in my lab on Equipping a Small Hackerspace? · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Which is sadly under utilized these days (too much real work unfortunately)

    Several voltmeters - I like the old Fluke bench units... LED displays you can see across the room, and the batteries are never dead because there are none.
    Several scopes - tek is king here.
    Drill press - bloody essential for anything mechanical at all.
    Logic analyzer, i'm partial to the HP ones
    Spectrum analyzer - pricy, but a godsend for RF work (if you'll be doing any) - HP, again.
    Power supply - hp made good ones again. you can never have too many it seems. I have some homebrew ones too - ATX supplies and random ebay SMPS units can be handy and dirt cheap, but not adjustable (you can add an external reg easily though..)
    Freq counter - hp, but fluke made decent ones. more for RF, but can be handy for digital, clocking and stuff...
    Freq gen, whether you need a lower freq audio one or one that does RF depends on what you're planning on.

    For soldering irons im partial to the hakko ones, '936' is the model, and there are plenty of knockoffs available on ebay. The genuine model isn't crazy expensive though.

    Then a PC, a few programmers, depending on what you want. I'm partial to Atmel's AVR, but PIC is big, some folks are still stuck with moto 6800 derivatives for some unknown reason, likewise with 8051's... For the money ARM is really the way to go, but I havent played with them much yet. Some sort of JTAG unit will be handy for random programming also. I usually use a linux box with avr-gcc, but some tools are win32 only, so might want to have a windows box or virtualbox around - not to mention some schematic / board layout stuff is win only too.

    For dev boards, I have a few from atmel, but some of them are pretty pricy. these guys make some nice dev boards, but I'm not crazy about their compiler. The IDE looks nice enough, but I'm used to gcc and my own editor. I have one of their AVR boards, and I use a GPL'd AVR based AVR programmer (chicken and egg if you dont already have one ;) ) with it, because their built in programmers (which work well, mind you) are windows only.

  10. Re:The $14.95 DSL days are finally ending on FCC Approving Pay-As-You-Go Internet Plans · · Score: 1

    It's a damn shame they didn't bother to use years of revenue and govn't grants to upgrade the network.

    They milked whatever they could get out of an oversold network for far too long, profited handsomely, and now it's going to harm technological progress. I can't say it surprises me, with the myopic view of "next quarter" above progress and sustainability.

  11. Re:Yes: your framing on FCC Approving Pay-As-You-Go Internet Plans · · Score: 1

    Metered delivery could be alright, if the connection fee and per gig rate is fair.

    eg. $10 connection fee, 10c per gig (or whatever. just example):

    Grandma downloads 593k of emails, pays $10.10/mo
    Power user DL's 200GB, pays $30/mo

    However, I'm thinking they'll make the current.. $40 or whatever be the flat connection fee, and add data on top of it. Which doesn't give grandma a discount for her data thriftiness, and could double the cost for someone that actually uses the service. Which is a sort of lose-lose, except for the telcos of course.

    And then you have to factor in speed. If i want a 100Mb connection instead of 1Mb, do they bump up the "connection fee" or the per GB charge?

  12. Re:And nothing of value was lost on China's Influence Widens Nobel Peace Prize Boycott · · Score: 1

    Is harmful to world peace? Hardly.

    Maybe you meant something else, hard to interpret a one word comment.

    I presume they are abstaining due to the fact that china supports their sovereignty over kosovo.

  13. Re:The Russians used a pencil on Rear-View Cameras On Cars Could Become Mandatory In the US · · Score: 1

    The boiling water was a contributing factor as well. The graphite wouldn't have burned at all had the water not blown the top off and exposed the core to air.

    Rather, I'm not understanding the relevance of chernobyl to pencils and space. Damn pens.

  14. Take with a grain of salt on Hacker Sends Out Fake Tsunami Warning On Twitter · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Trusting twitter? Turn on the TV or radio. Perhaps check the meteorological service's website.

  15. Re:Anonymous is people. on Pirate Party's North American Debut · · Score: 1

    The Soviet Union found out the same thing. Remove God from society and it falls apart and degenerates into mass drug abuse through the lack of hope and destruction of morality that looks to something greater than humanity itself. Remember, the Soviet Union had alcoholism rates of over 50% in the general population, and the government murdered millions of its own citizens.

    Drug use is way up in the former Soviet Union, Now that God is back, taking care of his flock.

    I'm not certain, but believe alcoholism is fairly level (and probably was the same during the tsar era, no less). The difference now is the worst drunks no longer have state housing and end up homeless. Birth rates are way down without the state supporting single mothers and such (although they are working on this, I think Putin announced some grants for children recently). Although the Oligarchs are definitely in better shape now.

    "MOSCOW, December 3 (RIA Novosti) - Drug use in Russia has increased almost tenfold since 1990, the head of the Federal Drug Control Service said on Wednesday. "
    source

  16. Re:This is great on Chicago Using Coyotes To Fight Rodents · · Score: 1

    Nah, people hit deer all the time around here, and it isn't usually a death sentence.

    Elk, and especially moose, are a different story though. Moose are so heavy... they're like a concrete block on stilts.

  17. Re:Me suspects many dead cats on Chicago Using Coyotes To Fight Rodents · · Score: 1

    If your animal requires to be free range, and you don't have a farm - perhaps it is rather selfish of you to keep that animal.

  18. Re:If only there were some on Chicago Using Coyotes To Fight Rodents · · Score: 1

    that people wouldn't mind seeing around...

    Speak for yourself. I'll take the coyotes.

  19. Re:Still getting over penis-shock. on TSA Saw My Junk, Missed Razor Blades, Says Adam Savage · · Score: 1

    Maybe so, but an "average" stripper and an "average" citizen are two different things.

    Although a 7 might get more tips than a 9 - there aren't many twos and threes stripping... and they do fly!

  20. Liability on Seagate To Pay Former Worker $1.9M For Phantom Job · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Neato. I'm curious to what extent they're liable though. Naturally if he just moves and is canned, there should be some liability, although rarely honoured, rough deal...

    but.. 3 months, 6? a year?

    If you move and work at a company two years, and they make you redundant... can you get some sort of pro-rated settlement on the 20 year career you were planning on having there?

  21. Re:Still getting over penis-shock. on TSA Saw My Junk, Missed Razor Blades, Says Adam Savage · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'd like to think that the women in a strip club are slightly more distracting than the average flying American.

    Hell, I'd be trying to look away from the scanners, not stare at them.

  22. Grasping for straws on MP3Tunes 'Safe Harbor' Court Challenge Approaching · · Score: 1

    As long as it's not publicly accessible (and therefore promoting infringement), how could they construe storing files on a private location to be illegal? Insanity.

    So - storing your own CDs in your house - acceptable. CDs in your car, illegal (because you can play the CDs at various residences)?

    Anything to protect that dying model. It would almost be humorous, if it wasn't sad.

  23. Re:FUD parade continues on... on Microsoft (Probably) Didn't Just Buy Unix · · Score: 1

    Yeah I suppose that came out a bit more dick-like than I had intended. I rather like the guy I replied to no less, from what I remember of his posts.

    It is a Unix clone, but it is not Unix.

  24. Re:FUD parade continues on... on Microsoft (Probably) Didn't Just Buy Unix · · Score: 1

    Anyway I really did think Linux was a branch of Unix ("Unix like" says wikipedia). That makes me ignorant of the details, not stupid. If I was stupid I would not have two college degrees, or an above-average IQ, would I?

    Yes, Ignorance is indeed not stupid, it can be curable. "Unix like" in the way that Pepsi is a "Coca-cola like" beverage.

    However, making comments on something you are ignorant about can be stupid, depending how the comment is phrased.
    It doesn't hurt to throw in a "correct me if i'm mistaken" or so on things you aren't certain about. Although this is pretty major. Not being Unix is pretty much the whole point of Linux.

    There are plenty of bright folk without college degrees, and certainly some idiots with them, and there's more to being a decent person than solely IQ. Seems sort of childish to mention it, really.

  25. excellent on UK Law Body Targets RIAA-Style Settlement Letters · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Now if firms responsible will actually be punished for false claims, we might be going somewhere.