I've always sort of assumed that at least one side already has nukes in space. If you were going to go for a preemptive strike, why not? If you can fit 10 reentry vehicles on a Peacekeeper, you could probably fit a whole bunch on a Titan IV.
No need for stealth, even. You just launch the warhead carrier to a polar orbit and claim it's a meteorological satellite or whatever. All of the missile warning systems I've ever heard of detect launches - it's going to be much tougher to spot a deorbit burn, and even if you do, the warheads are already right on top of you.
Of course, you've still got enemy subs to worry about...
You shouldn't take a report like this as evidence that the Air Force believes in psychic phenomena. They dole out quite a bit of money for various studies, and the people getting the money and doing the studies sometimes aren't the right people. The company I used to work for did a lot of papers for the Air Force and other agencies, and often I got the impression that it was material we had very little background in.
It really came down to the company being a lot better at selling itself to these agencies than actually doing worthwhile research.
Ditto. I read the Slashdot articles on the subject a while back, and it's the first thing that popped into my head when I saw the trailer. I think the movie's going to have trouble because it's just so slightly OFF. The old guy on the train telling the kid to 'believe'? It just comes out creepy.
It may not seem like a big deal, but I think it's really going to interfere with the audience forming any kind of emotional bond with the characters.
I can't remember the last time I was so put off by a movie trailer. I don't plan to go see it. I think they really need to stick to cartoonish characters and ogres and such until the realism in facial expressions and body language catch up with the pretty graphics.
Not sure about the.torrent links, but they can catch those sharing the files. My coworker just got three C&Ds from a contractor working for Paramount for downloading (and simultaneously sharing) three Paramount movies.
My parents live in Virginia's Shenandoah valley, and they just this week ordered DSL. For what they're paying for 384k/128k, I get 3m/768k here in California. But there's just one local ISP, that's also the phone company and cable company.
I'm not sure exactly what the deal is, but apparently years ago they merged a number of smaller telcos and all of the subscribers got stock in the resulting company, and now they've got a vested interest in keeping out competition. Or so I've heard. In any case, if you want broadband in that area, you either deal with them, or get satellite.
I'm forwarding this on to my facility manager. It's freaking COLD in here! And it's not just in the winter that it's cold - it's ALWAYS cold in here. Someone decided to put a ton of servers in the next room, and the servers like it cold, but guess what? There's no way to isolate the two areas. Yeah, it affects productivity - we're always huddling around our space heaters shivering rather than typing.
Oh, and now we're not supposed to have space heaters. Thank God for surplus AlphaServers...
Maybe so, but every time I use the SMS messaging on my Verizon phone (Motorola T720) I get the feeling that the user interface was designed by a complete moron. Sending to a number requires tapping each number 4 times since it defaults to alphanumeric mode. Just getting to the right screen requires navigating around multiple menus with the stupid circular arrow button.
Right Down Select 44446666666644445555 OK
OK Done Yes
Deleting a message is similarly a multi-step operation. And God forbid you should get a message while you're trying to read another one.
Do all phones suck this bad? My old StarTAC had a fairly simple interface, but it didn't have all the features.
"Oh, and you don't need power steering when the vehicle's in motion. And your braking power doesn't suffer that much if you cut the power."
This is very true for all the vehicles I've driven, anyway. I've driven more than one with the power steering out, and I once had the engine (and power brakes) die while rolling backwards on a steep hill. Yeah, I had to stand on the brake pedal, but I got it stopped.
"16-year olds are going to get a "spacing permit", along with Dad's old clunker, only capable of going to the moon and back."
Just like we have so many 16-year olds now with their 100 ton licenses who can only take the family boat 200 miles offshore. Sure, you can do it. Just takes money.
Not a good idea to do with clothes. It can soak in and cause some really nasty frostbite injuries. I've taken a lot of LN2 splashes to bare skin with no problems, though.
Celestia is cool, but it doesn't seem to be terribly stable. I can run it exactly once after installing it. After that, I get an access violation every time I start it. I've got to completely remove and re-install the program if I want to use it again. And I'm not running anything exotic - a Dell Precision 650 workstation running Win2k. Might be the dual monitors - that seems to break a lot of programs.
True. QRP (low-power operation) is lots of fun. Just keep in mind that PSK31 is a whopping 31.25 bits/second. Not kbits, BITS. Works fine for keyboard-to-keyboard - I can out-type it, but I eventually run out of stuff to say and it'll catch up. Varicode makes it even more interesting - throw in some less common characters and it really slows down. Cartoon profanity (@&$@#$%&*!!!) gives it fits.
Someone better at math (and less lazy) than myself could probably explain the bit about the amount of power needed to transmit data a certain distance and how it increases as the bandwidth increases. I believe that's stated by Shannon's Law, but again, I'm too lazy to provide a cite. In fact, I'm too lazy to write the third paragraph of this comment.
Twilight launches are the best. The setting sun catches the ice crystals and exhaust vapor and makes huge, glowing, twisted trails in the evening sky. Might have been the one the parent post mentions, but there was a launch (MSLS I think) that got just perfect conditions, and I heard it stopped traffic on the Strip in Las Vegas, hundreds of miles away.
My name and office phone are listed on the schedule site, and I got deluged with calls... from the public, TV stations, and a UFO research organization. I can usually get a pretty good indication of how visible the launch was just by watching the number of hits on the server.
There are actually a few good viewing sites on or around the base that are accessible to the general public, including the viewing stands at the base weather station.
I run the website that hosts the official base launch schedule (http://mocc.vandenberg.af.mil), and I've tried a number of times to get Public Affairs to compile - or allow me to compile - a list of these sites and related information, but I haven't had any luck so far. I get email from people all the time asking about this, and usually all I can do is direct them to Brian's page.
The commercial launch operators are usually pretty good about releasing information on launch schedules, payloads, and so on. The military is understandably more restrained, and you won't even see all of the military launches listed on the schedule. They are generally listed on a number of sites like Brian's, though.
Now, before anyone starts freaking out about classified information, it should be noted that even the classified launches have an unclassified launch window published. There's simply no way to keep such an operation secret. The real launch window, though, is often classified. For example, a launch might have a published 8-hour window, even though the real window could be a few minutes or less. (For the record, I don't deal with classified schedules. Even when I'm spending the night working launch support, I often don't know the exact launch time until I hear the countdown on the radio.)
If you're ever in the area for a Delta or Atlas launch especially, it's worth watching. Of course, they're even cooler to watch when they blow up. Liquid-fuelled rockets turn into huge fireballs, and solid-fuelled rockets fragment into thousands of little tiny shooting stars of burning fuel. And then they start thousands of little brush fires if they're low enough, which isn't so cool.
Slashdot Mirror
Hey, if FreeBSD can be made to run on ARM7, I might be able to help you out there. Give me a couple of months.
I've always sort of assumed that at least one side already has nukes in space. If you were going to go for a preemptive strike, why not? If you can fit 10 reentry vehicles on a Peacekeeper, you could probably fit a whole bunch on a Titan IV.
No need for stealth, even. You just launch the warhead carrier to a polar orbit and claim it's a meteorological satellite or whatever. All of the missile warning systems I've ever heard of detect launches - it's going to be much tougher to spot a deorbit burn, and even if you do, the warheads are already right on top of you.
Of course, you've still got enemy subs to worry about...
You shouldn't take a report like this as evidence that the Air Force believes in psychic phenomena. They dole out quite a bit of money for various studies, and the people getting the money and doing the studies sometimes aren't the right people. The company I used to work for did a lot of papers for the Air Force and other agencies, and often I got the impression that it was material we had very little background in.
It really came down to the company being a lot better at selling itself to these agencies than actually doing worthwhile research.
Hey, YOU try learning a foreign language from a video game!
Especially when most of what you hear is roughly 'Look out!' and 'Grenade!'...
J'avais joué le Halo 2 pendant deux semaines, et appris à parler français, aussi!
Ditto. I read the Slashdot articles on the subject a while back, and it's the first thing that popped into my head when I saw the trailer. I think the movie's going to have trouble because it's just so slightly OFF. The old guy on the train telling the kid to 'believe'? It just comes out creepy.
It may not seem like a big deal, but I think it's really going to interfere with the audience forming any kind of emotional bond with the characters.
I can't remember the last time I was so put off by a movie trailer. I don't plan to go see it. I think they really need to stick to cartoonish characters and ogres and such until the realism in facial expressions and body language catch up with the pretty graphics.
Not sure about the .torrent links, but they can catch those sharing the files. My coworker just got three C&Ds from a contractor working for Paramount for downloading (and simultaneously sharing) three Paramount movies.
My parents live in Virginia's Shenandoah valley, and they just this week ordered DSL. For what they're paying for 384k/128k, I get 3m/768k here in California. But there's just one local ISP, that's also the phone company and cable company.
I'm not sure exactly what the deal is, but apparently years ago they merged a number of smaller telcos and all of the subscribers got stock in the resulting company, and now they've got a vested interest in keeping out competition. Or so I've heard. In any case, if you want broadband in that area, you either deal with them, or get satellite.
I've spent the last two days solid in French language immersion on my XBox.
I'm forwarding this on to my facility manager. It's freaking COLD in here! And it's not just in the winter that it's cold - it's ALWAYS cold in here. Someone decided to put a ton of servers in the next room, and the servers like it cold, but guess what? There's no way to isolate the two areas. Yeah, it affects productivity - we're always huddling around our space heaters shivering rather than typing.
Oh, and now we're not supposed to have space heaters. Thank God for surplus AlphaServers...
Maybe so, but every time I use the SMS messaging on my Verizon phone (Motorola T720) I get the feeling that the user interface was designed by a complete moron. Sending to a number requires tapping each number 4 times since it defaults to alphanumeric mode. Just getting to the right screen requires navigating around multiple menus with the stupid circular arrow button.
Right
Down
Select
44446666666644445555
OK
OK
Done
Yes
Deleting a message is similarly a multi-step operation. And God forbid you should get a message while you're trying to read another one.
Do all phones suck this bad? My old StarTAC had a fairly simple interface, but it didn't have all the features.
"Oh, and you don't need power steering when the vehicle's in motion. And your braking power doesn't suffer that much if you cut the power."
This is very true for all the vehicles I've driven, anyway. I've driven more than one with the power steering out, and I once had the engine (and power brakes) die while rolling backwards on a steep hill. Yeah, I had to stand on the brake pedal, but I got it stopped.
"16-year olds are going to get a "spacing permit", along with Dad's old clunker, only capable of going to the moon and back."
Just like we have so many 16-year olds now with their 100 ton licenses who can only take the family boat 200 miles offshore. Sure, you can do it. Just takes money.
Not a good idea to do with clothes. It can soak in and cause some really nasty frostbite injuries. I've taken a lot of LN2 splashes to bare skin with no problems, though.
It's not so much because it's obscene - it's just unprofessional. We're not supposed to be dropping bombs out of some personal hatred for the enemy.
I once thought I was developing Mono for an entire year. Turns out I was just really bored.
Celestia is cool, but it doesn't seem to be terribly stable. I can run it exactly once after installing it. After that, I get an access violation every time I start it. I've got to completely remove and re-install the program if I want to use it again. And I'm not running anything exotic - a Dell Precision 650 workstation running Win2k. Might be the dual monitors - that seems to break a lot of programs.
Since your name is Badnarik, I'm assuming you're not George W. Bush. Is that correct?
Yes? Ok. You've got my vote.
Mission to Mars and Red Planet.
I still can't remember which movie was which.
True. QRP (low-power operation) is lots of fun. Just keep in mind that PSK31 is a whopping 31.25 bits/second. Not kbits, BITS. Works fine for keyboard-to-keyboard - I can out-type it, but I eventually run out of stuff to say and it'll catch up. Varicode makes it even more interesting - throw in some less common characters and it really slows down. Cartoon profanity (@&$@#$%&*!!!) gives it fits.
Someone better at math (and less lazy) than myself could probably explain the bit about the amount of power needed to transmit data a certain distance and how it increases as the bandwidth increases. I believe that's stated by Shannon's Law, but again, I'm too lazy to provide a cite. In fact, I'm too lazy to write the third paragraph of this comment.
They don't call it the Vomit Comet for nothing.
www.none-of-your-goddamned-business.org.
Twilight launches are the best. The setting sun catches the ice crystals and exhaust vapor and makes huge, glowing, twisted trails in the evening sky. Might have been the one the parent post mentions, but there was a launch (MSLS I think) that got just perfect conditions, and I heard it stopped traffic on the Strip in Las Vegas, hundreds of miles away.
My name and office phone are listed on the schedule site, and I got deluged with calls... from the public, TV stations, and a UFO research organization. I can usually get a pretty good indication of how visible the launch was just by watching the number of hits on the server.
There are actually a few good viewing sites on or around the base that are accessible to the general public, including the viewing stands at the base weather station.
I run the website that hosts the official base launch schedule (http://mocc.vandenberg.af.mil), and I've tried a number of times to get Public Affairs to compile - or allow me to compile - a list of these sites and related information, but I haven't had any luck so far. I get email from people all the time asking about this, and usually all I can do is direct them to Brian's page.
The commercial launch operators are usually pretty good about releasing information on launch schedules, payloads, and so on. The military is understandably more restrained, and you won't even see all of the military launches listed on the schedule. They are generally listed on a number of sites like Brian's, though.
Now, before anyone starts freaking out about classified information, it should be noted that even the classified launches have an unclassified launch window published. There's simply no way to keep such an operation secret. The real launch window, though, is often classified. For example, a launch might have a published 8-hour window, even though the real window could be a few minutes or less. (For the record, I don't deal with classified schedules. Even when I'm spending the night working launch support, I often don't know the exact launch time until I hear the countdown on the radio.)
If you're ever in the area for a Delta or Atlas launch especially, it's worth watching. Of course, they're even cooler to watch when they blow up. Liquid-fuelled rockets turn into huge fireballs, and solid-fuelled rockets fragment into thousands of little tiny shooting stars of burning fuel. And then they start thousands of little brush fires if they're low enough, which isn't so cool.
This is excatly what I need for when I buy my missile silo!