" It can fast charge in an hour or so to 80%, which isn't so bad,"
At a Tesla Supercharge station. Can you name even one track in the US, let alone the UK that has a Tesla Supercharge station installed at it? Without that supercharge station you're looking at hours to charge off a regular wall socket.
That said, Top Gear did exaggerate the scope of the problem, presenting what is more of a worst-case scenario than an everyday problem, but the point remains that going for a "track day" in a Tesla will more likely be a track couple of hours.
Even more reason for a *double* barreled shotgun. Your fancy AR-15 with the 30 round clip isn't going to do much if the first round in the chamber misfires and jams, but the chances that both barrels of a shotgun will not work is pretty tiny.
"That means you'd get 2 shots. Hope you don't miss or your ass is dead."
This isn't nearly as stupid advice as you'd think. Any competent person only needs 1 shot with a 20 gauge shotgun loaded with the appropriate ammo, especially inside a house or other structure. On top of that, a wound from a single shot of a weapon like that is far worse than a couple of rounds from an AR-15. I shoot you in the hip twice with an AR-15, you're in a lot of pain and probably down for the count. I shoot you once with a 20 gauge at less than 10 yards in the hip, you're going to need reconstructive surgery assuming you don't bleed to death on the spot. Plus, I guess you've never fired a shotgun indoors. They are LOUD. Like bowel-voidingly loud. If there are multiple burglars I really don't think they'll be sticking around to see how many rounds you've got after the first shot deafens everyone and puts one of their number on the floor with a fist sized hole in them.
" I am doing it, on my own, for my own business. That I sure as hell did build. Without your or the government's help."
This kind of attitude really annoys me. The government helps you in MANY ways. Let's break it down, shall we?
" am here at 2 in the morning, reading a little/. after testing a hard drive for errors so I can install it in a customer's computer in the morning."
Why does that customer want their computer? Probably to do either work or recreation on the Internet. Which wouldn't have ever come into existence without taxpayer dollars. We've seen how private enterprise did when they tried to make their version of an "internet". Compuserve, GENie, AOL, all isolated little walled gardens. "The government" that didn't help you actually created an entire industry, and your little PC business most likely wouldn't exist without it because prior to the internet age, the number of PCs sold was a fraction of today since the average Joe didn't see a need for them. Take a look at how many businesses like yours are in the area and ask yourself how well you'd be doing if you had to compete with all of them for only 30% of the current customer base.
But let's step back and have an even more granular look. How much did you pay the local mob boss this month to prevent his boys from coming into your store and trashing the place? Oh, that's right you didn't have to do that because government law enforcement prevents shakedowns like that in first world countries. And those computers and equipment you plug in at work, you don't have to worry about their power supplies being so shoddily put together that they might start the place on fire when you're not around, why is that? That's right, government standards being enforced on those same goods. When your suppliers deliver goods to you, they can't turn around and demand an extra payment for any random reason because you have a contract with them, the provisions of which are dictated by the laws of your country, and enforced by the judicial branch of that country.
Or on an even more basic "life" level. When you go to the supermarket and buy milk, you don't have to worry that the manufacturer spiked the milk with melamine to artificially raise the protein count on quality tests. Your parents didn't have to pay out of pocket up front to send you to a school to learn to read and write. You don't need to worry about roving gangs doing home invasions on your house (OK, this can happen, but it's not a weekly event like in far too many parts of the world).
The big bad government provides the framework that allows your business to even EXIST. Try imagining your life if you were born in even a relatively stable country in Africa like Nigeria. You really think you'd have even close to the same level of success?
A quote by John Steinbeck sums this problem up perfectly:
“Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.”
And that's really the issue. You'll have Americans who are poor as dirt voting repeatedly against their own self interest because they have been conditioned to think if they work hard enough their ship will come in one day, and when that ship comes in they don't want parts of it chopped off to help OTHER people out, Never mind the staggering odds against that ship ever arriving.
And how big and loud is your machine compared to this one? Is your machine heat efficient enough to have its cpu fan turn completely off at idle like this one? Is it the size of a standard tower? The point of this machine is in no small part that it can play 1080p video, be quiet while doing it and fit in an entertainment unit is the same type of space that a video game console or DVD player would. Just like a laptop or a rackmount server, part of that cost is from condensing the form factor.
"He had no responsibility or right to attack the software a second time, call it "testing" if you like, he choose to attack the software using the exact same exploit he warned them about earlier."
Because it's not like he was a student at that university and his own personal information was at risk or anything, right? Oh wait...
I guess the appropriate course of action was to instead anonymously hint that such a thing is possible and then when someone else takes the data, start a class action lawsuit against the university. Lesson learned.
My Xbox 360 is almost that old, and all I've had to do is REPLACE THE FUCKING THING TWICE at my own expense because of RRoDs after the warranty ran out. So, yay?
Also, $3000 for a high end PC? If you think a high end PC costs 3K, you're sadly misinformed. My 3 year old PC runs Borderlands 2 just fine and it cost me $800 to build back then.
Windows doesn't have any "elasticity". It's the very definition of an inelastic product. 995 out of 1000 non-Apple desktops and laptops run Windows. And even a chunk of those Apple machines are dual-boot. In the non-developing world, piracy isn't making a significant dent in Windows sales any more. Pretty much every non-custom PC and laptop sold at retail comes with a Windows license built into the price, so the vast majority of current gen machines are all legit right from the get go.
And pirating Windows isn't nearly as simple as it used to be so for many people spending the $100 once for an OEM license is less of a pain in the ass than jumping through all the hoops to get it to activate and stay activated. So for many people the choices are a) buy a new computer with Win7 or 8, buy a Mac, or keep your old computer/don't have one.
Because they're required to by building code? That's what happened at the hospital that lost power. Tanks underground, water covers them, fuel gets contaminated, and poof, no more power.
I'm going to have to disagree a little here. The controller and the uprated graphics are the only really new features of the WiiU, correct. But the controller does bring a whole lot to the equation. It's like the difference between the Game Boy Advance and the Nintendo DS. When you boil it down the only "real" functional differences between those two systems for most people is the DS has two more buttons, a more powerful processor and the addition of the touchscreen. From an experience standpoint the two systems are on different planets. The touchscreen and second display added a lot to the DS's games that take advantage of them. Some games were crappy shovelware, true, but others embraced the new abilities of the DS and literally revolutionized portable gaming.
It's my hope that the WiiU does the same for the living room.
So you're saying that there are seismologists who CAN predict a likely earthquake a week ahead of time? Interesting. Could you perhaps, provide any evidence these people exist? And tell us why they're not being used to predict earthquakes all over the world in hotspots to save lives?
I've been involved with a situation that's about as close to a perfect storm as you can imagine for that and it was still not a problem. In 2001 we had a rack of a dozen IBM servers, each running 3 drives in RAID 5 with a shelf at the bottom with another 10 drives in RAID 6 for the database. Unfortunately these were the infamous IBM drives made in Hungary so they ALL started failing. Under our service agreement we called IBM and had them down at the data center almost daily for the entire month replacing drives within hours of each failing, and then starting to pre-emptively replace the remainder. Didn't lose a single byte. The closest we came was a couple machines had second drives fail about 36-48 hours after the first drives were replaced so ~48-60 hours apart.
Oh please. Someone is vehemently opposed to subsidies, yet takes full advantage of them only because they're currently legal. That's like someone being vehemently opposed to abortion, but having one every six months because they're legal. Last time I looked, part of opposing something meant you didn't partake in it yourself because you are *opposed* to it.
Or... you could take 6 months of weekly movie ticket money and just buy a projector and decent screen for your home instead. Then you can have whatever the heck you want for snacks as well as other perks like no annoying audience members texting or talking, no sticky floors, nobody's head in the way, and you can pause the movie while you take a bathroom or snack refill break. And after the initial investment it won't cost $30-$40 for 2 people to "go" to the movies any more.
Anyone who's been paying attention to how whistleblowers are treated in the US shouldn't be surprised by this. It has known for decades that deciding to be a whistleblower is a selfless sacrifice and pretty much any whistleblower has to prepare themselves for the fact that they almost certainly won't ever work in the industry they blow the whistle on ever again. Plus it seems the Obama Administration has been going after government whistleblowers with a vengeance.
"Indivuduals that are profitable to retain are retained, those that aren't are not - that's what business (and life) is about."
In theory, this is how it is supposed to work. In reality, I have seen MANY instances where personalities and egos completely ignore this calculation and productive, profitable employees get tossed out the door to the detriment of the organization simply to sate the ego of the boss. Hell, I have seen people run their companies into the ground while firing the very people who could have saved it simply because they "challenged decisions", regardless of the fact that those challenges led to more revenue and benefit to the company.
Torture only works if you can IMMEDIATELY verify the information given. Otherwise, it's bullshit. Want proof? Give me 5 minutes in a room with you strapped to a table, and using only a simple blowtorch and pliers I'm certain I can have you confess the secret location of a dirty bomb somewhere in the continental US. Now whether or not the bomb is actually there when someone goes to look for it is another matter.
We see it all the time where "a few" bad cops are protected by the Thin Blue Line. To actually be good cops, cops should be incredibly proactive about cleaning house on any bad elements in their force but instead the opposite is true, in many cases the cops who try to clean house are labeled as rats.
Also, they're not factoring in that a lot of people who are buying those new games at $60 a pop have factored in that they're going to get a few weeks of fun out of it and then trade it in for $30-$35 of store credit for the next shiny thing. If they can't get that store credit to apply to that next $60 purchase they're obviously not going to make the next purchase so soon. Plus the fact that they were getting rid of older games and didn't have them around any more might have driven the cycle as well.
Wonder what the publishers will do when they find out that people who were buying 10-12 titles a year like this suddenly change to buying 4-5 per year, or horror of horrors, discover that $30 goes a lot further on Steam than it does on a console without trade-in capability.
Outliers. I have run a few of my humble bundle purchases on a couple of my linux machines and thought "hey neat", but my main workstation at the house is Windows for a lot of reasons, so I don't feel compelled to use those purchases on linux just to prove a point.
I take it you haven't read of any of the many stories of troubled iPhone software developers getting arbitrarily cut off from the Apple store or having their apps not approved at all after months of development time and money for nebulous reasons, only told to "make some changes after you read the agreement and resubmit"
But these are two different things entirely. Developing software for Nintendo's platforms has entirely different requirements. How many "home based" developers have a game released on the Xbox 360 or PS3? MInecraft, and what else?
And does this watermarking survive being converted to other formats through Calibre or other similar software people use to manage their e-readers? I doubt it.
And as a corollary to that, make sure YOU know between XX:XX and YY:YY you're on the job. And more importantly, after YY:YY you're NOT on the job. This was something I always had trouble with when I worked from home. I'd sit down in front of the computer and start working, then go and throw a load of laundry in since it was there, and then work some more, then go have lunch in the kitchen, then work, go get the mail, do a few other 10-15 minute chores around the house and as a result of that feel that I should put more work time in and then next thing you know it's 9PM and even though I took breaks I still probably ended up working 9.5 hours and I feel burnt because I've been (mostly) sitting in front of a computer for 12 hours.
That's why I like working outside of home, it gives clear work/home delineation (for the most part).
Slashdot Mirror
" It can fast charge in an hour or so to 80%, which isn't so bad,"
At a Tesla Supercharge station. Can you name even one track in the US, let alone the UK that has a Tesla Supercharge station installed at it? Without that supercharge station you're looking at hours to charge off a regular wall socket.
That said, Top Gear did exaggerate the scope of the problem, presenting what is more of a worst-case scenario than an everyday problem, but the point remains that going for a "track day" in a Tesla will more likely be a track couple of hours.
Even more reason for a *double* barreled shotgun. Your fancy AR-15 with the 30 round clip isn't going to do much if the first round in the chamber misfires and jams, but the chances that both barrels of a shotgun will not work is pretty tiny.
"That means you'd get 2 shots. Hope you don't miss or your ass is dead."
This isn't nearly as stupid advice as you'd think. Any competent person only needs 1 shot with a 20 gauge shotgun loaded with the appropriate ammo, especially inside a house or other structure. On top of that, a wound from a single shot of a weapon like that is far worse than a couple of rounds from an AR-15. I shoot you in the hip twice with an AR-15, you're in a lot of pain and probably down for the count. I shoot you once with a 20 gauge at less than 10 yards in the hip, you're going to need reconstructive surgery assuming you don't bleed to death on the spot. Plus, I guess you've never fired a shotgun indoors. They are LOUD. Like bowel-voidingly loud. If there are multiple burglars I really don't think they'll be sticking around to see how many rounds you've got after the first shot deafens everyone and puts one of their number on the floor with a fist sized hole in them.
" I am doing it, on my own, for my own business. That I sure as hell did build. Without your or the government's help."
This kind of attitude really annoys me. The government helps you in MANY ways. Let's break it down, shall we?
" am here at 2 in the morning, reading a little /. after testing a hard drive for errors so I can install it in a customer's computer in the morning."
Why does that customer want their computer? Probably to do either work or recreation on the Internet. Which wouldn't have ever come into existence without taxpayer dollars. We've seen how private enterprise did when they tried to make their version of an "internet". Compuserve, GENie, AOL, all isolated little walled gardens. "The government" that didn't help you actually created an entire industry, and your little PC business most likely wouldn't exist without it because prior to the internet age, the number of PCs sold was a fraction of today since the average Joe didn't see a need for them. Take a look at how many businesses like yours are in the area and ask yourself how well you'd be doing if you had to compete with all of them for only 30% of the current customer base.
But let's step back and have an even more granular look. How much did you pay the local mob boss this month to prevent his boys from coming into your store and trashing the place? Oh, that's right you didn't have to do that because government law enforcement prevents shakedowns like that in first world countries. And those computers and equipment you plug in at work, you don't have to worry about their power supplies being so shoddily put together that they might start the place on fire when you're not around, why is that? That's right, government standards being enforced on those same goods. When your suppliers deliver goods to you, they can't turn around and demand an extra payment for any random reason because you have a contract with them, the provisions of which are dictated by the laws of your country, and enforced by the judicial branch of that country.
Or on an even more basic "life" level. When you go to the supermarket and buy milk, you don't have to worry that the manufacturer spiked the milk with melamine to artificially raise the protein count on quality tests. Your parents didn't have to pay out of pocket up front to send you to a school to learn to read and write. You don't need to worry about roving gangs doing home invasions on your house (OK, this can happen, but it's not a weekly event like in far too many parts of the world).
The big bad government provides the framework that allows your business to even EXIST. Try imagining your life if you were born in even a relatively stable country in Africa like Nigeria. You really think you'd have even close to the same level of success?
A quote by John Steinbeck sums this problem up perfectly:
“Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.”
And that's really the issue. You'll have Americans who are poor as dirt voting repeatedly against their own self interest because they have been conditioned to think if they work hard enough their ship will come in one day, and when that ship comes in they don't want parts of it chopped off to help OTHER people out, Never mind the staggering odds against that ship ever arriving.
And how big and loud is your machine compared to this one? Is your machine heat efficient enough to have its cpu fan turn completely off at idle like this one? Is it the size of a standard tower? The point of this machine is in no small part that it can play 1080p video, be quiet while doing it and fit in an entertainment unit is the same type of space that a video game console or DVD player would. Just like a laptop or a rackmount server, part of that cost is from condensing the form factor.
"He had no responsibility or right to attack the software a second time, call it "testing" if you like, he choose to attack the software using the exact same exploit he warned them about earlier."
Because it's not like he was a student at that university and his own personal information was at risk or anything, right? Oh wait...
I guess the appropriate course of action was to instead anonymously hint that such a thing is possible and then when someone else takes the data, start a class action lawsuit against the university. Lesson learned.
My Xbox 360 is almost that old, and all I've had to do is REPLACE THE FUCKING THING TWICE at my own expense because of RRoDs after the warranty ran out. So, yay?
Also, $3000 for a high end PC? If you think a high end PC costs 3K, you're sadly misinformed. My 3 year old PC runs Borderlands 2 just fine and it cost me $800 to build back then.
Windows doesn't have any "elasticity". It's the very definition of an inelastic product. 995 out of 1000 non-Apple desktops and laptops run Windows. And even a chunk of those Apple machines are dual-boot. In the non-developing world, piracy isn't making a significant dent in Windows sales any more. Pretty much every non-custom PC and laptop sold at retail comes with a Windows license built into the price, so the vast majority of current gen machines are all legit right from the get go.
And pirating Windows isn't nearly as simple as it used to be so for many people spending the $100 once for an OEM license is less of a pain in the ass than jumping through all the hoops to get it to activate and stay activated. So for many people the choices are a) buy a new computer with Win7 or 8, buy a Mac, or keep your old computer/don't have one.
Because they're required to by building code? That's what happened at the hospital that lost power. Tanks underground, water covers them, fuel gets contaminated, and poof, no more power.
I'm going to have to disagree a little here. The controller and the uprated graphics are the only really new features of the WiiU, correct. But the controller does bring a whole lot to the equation. It's like the difference between the Game Boy Advance and the Nintendo DS. When you boil it down the only "real" functional differences between those two systems for most people is the DS has two more buttons, a more powerful processor and the addition of the touchscreen. From an experience standpoint the two systems are on different planets. The touchscreen and second display added a lot to the DS's games that take advantage of them. Some games were crappy shovelware, true, but others embraced the new abilities of the DS and literally revolutionized portable gaming.
It's my hope that the WiiU does the same for the living room.
So you're saying that there are seismologists who CAN predict a likely earthquake a week ahead of time? Interesting. Could you perhaps, provide any evidence these people exist? And tell us why they're not being used to predict earthquakes all over the world in hotspots to save lives?
I've been involved with a situation that's about as close to a perfect storm as you can imagine for that and it was still not a problem. In 2001 we had a rack of a dozen IBM servers, each running 3 drives in RAID 5 with a shelf at the bottom with another 10 drives in RAID 6 for the database. Unfortunately these were the infamous IBM drives made in Hungary so they ALL started failing. Under our service agreement we called IBM and had them down at the data center almost daily for the entire month replacing drives within hours of each failing, and then starting to pre-emptively replace the remainder. Didn't lose a single byte. The closest we came was a couple machines had second drives fail about 36-48 hours after the first drives were replaced so ~48-60 hours apart.
Oh please. Someone is vehemently opposed to subsidies, yet takes full advantage of them only because they're currently legal. That's like someone being vehemently opposed to abortion, but having one every six months because they're legal. Last time I looked, part of opposing something meant you didn't partake in it yourself because you are *opposed* to it.
Or... you could take 6 months of weekly movie ticket money and just buy a projector and decent screen for your home instead. Then you can have whatever the heck you want for snacks as well as other perks like no annoying audience members texting or talking, no sticky floors, nobody's head in the way, and you can pause the movie while you take a bathroom or snack refill break. And after the initial investment it won't cost $30-$40 for 2 people to "go" to the movies any more.
Anyone who's been paying attention to how whistleblowers are treated in the US shouldn't be surprised by this. It has known for decades that deciding to be a whistleblower is a selfless sacrifice and pretty much any whistleblower has to prepare themselves for the fact that they almost certainly won't ever work in the industry they blow the whistle on ever again. Plus it seems the Obama Administration has been going after government whistleblowers with a vengeance.
"Indivuduals that are profitable to retain are retained, those that aren't are not - that's what business (and life) is about."
In theory, this is how it is supposed to work. In reality, I have seen MANY instances where personalities and egos completely ignore this calculation and productive, profitable employees get tossed out the door to the detriment of the organization simply to sate the ego of the boss. Hell, I have seen people run their companies into the ground while firing the very people who could have saved it simply because they "challenged decisions", regardless of the fact that those challenges led to more revenue and benefit to the company.
Torture only works if you can IMMEDIATELY verify the information given. Otherwise, it's bullshit. Want proof? Give me 5 minutes in a room with you strapped to a table, and using only a simple blowtorch and pliers I'm certain I can have you confess the secret location of a dirty bomb somewhere in the continental US. Now whether or not the bomb is actually there when someone goes to look for it is another matter.
We see it all the time where "a few" bad cops are protected by the Thin Blue Line. To actually be good cops, cops should be incredibly proactive about cleaning house on any bad elements in their force but instead the opposite is true, in many cases the cops who try to clean house are labeled as rats.
Also, they're not factoring in that a lot of people who are buying those new games at $60 a pop have factored in that they're going to get a few weeks of fun out of it and then trade it in for $30-$35 of store credit for the next shiny thing. If they can't get that store credit to apply to that next $60 purchase they're obviously not going to make the next purchase so soon. Plus the fact that they were getting rid of older games and didn't have them around any more might have driven the cycle as well.
Wonder what the publishers will do when they find out that people who were buying 10-12 titles a year like this suddenly change to buying 4-5 per year, or horror of horrors, discover that $30 goes a lot further on Steam than it does on a console without trade-in capability.
Outliers. I have run a few of my humble bundle purchases on a couple of my linux machines and thought "hey neat", but my main workstation at the house is Windows for a lot of reasons, so I don't feel compelled to use those purchases on linux just to prove a point.
The linux version of this?
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2002/07/12/
I take it you haven't read of any of the many stories of troubled iPhone software developers getting arbitrarily cut off from the Apple store or having their apps not approved at all after months of development time and money for nebulous reasons, only told to "make some changes after you read the agreement and resubmit"
But these are two different things entirely. Developing software for Nintendo's platforms has entirely different requirements. How many "home based" developers have a game released on the Xbox 360 or PS3? MInecraft, and what else?
And does this watermarking survive being converted to other formats through Calibre or other similar software people use to manage their e-readers? I doubt it.
And as a corollary to that, make sure YOU know between XX:XX and YY:YY you're on the job. And more importantly, after YY:YY you're NOT on the job. This was something I always had trouble with when I worked from home. I'd sit down in front of the computer and start working, then go and throw a load of laundry in since it was there, and then work some more, then go have lunch in the kitchen, then work, go get the mail, do a few other 10-15 minute chores around the house and as a result of that feel that I should put more work time in and then next thing you know it's 9PM and even though I took breaks I still probably ended up working 9.5 hours and I feel burnt because I've been (mostly) sitting in front of a computer for 12 hours.
That's why I like working outside of home, it gives clear work/home delineation (for the most part).