I travelled quite a bit around Europe and lots in several other places that have horrible European-style phone pricing plans (Australia, New Zealand, Argentina)
Now I'm no big American nationalist flag waving fascist or anything, but I must say that we have waaaaay better phone service here than in Europe.
Calling a mobile from a landline or public phone in Europe is ridiculously expensive. In fact, I can call a landline in Europe and speak for several hours on my international calling card, but only about 14-20 minutes if I'm calling a mobile (WTF!?!?!).
Travelling in Spain, for example, not wanting to invest in a mobile (maybe I will next time), I can't tell you how many goddamn Euros I spent in public phone cards just making 1 minute calls to cell phones. We're talking like.50 Euros a minute or more or something. I don't remember exactly, I just remember it sucked. I remember England being a bit better because you could put coins in a public phone and then use a cheap calling card to make calls... but still... calling mobile phones would vapori(s/z)e it (it was 60p/minute to call mobiles... is that right? that would be $1.20/minute, folks).
So I have a bunch of European friends that I cannot really afford to speak with for very long. And they aren't even geeks or anything, so I can't speak over MSN messenger or whatever:(
Sure, you "pay" to receive calls on cell phones here in the US, but it's not a problem. You just keep your call short if you want to and everyone's happy. Want to talk longer? Wait until nighttime and talk virtually forever on your night and weekend minutes. Over there, ALL the cost (and maybe the real cost times 2 just to punch you in the gut) is on the caller. Not good.
Also, text messaging here in the US is totally cheap. Sure it's not as popular as it is in Europe, but it's cheap to use. Over there, they realized that it is something that people use and went waaay overboard with overcharging people. It's obscene. Also, you can send people text messages for free from their phone company's website (usually you can get like 100-200 messages free per month... add ~$4.95 and you can get very, very, very many text messages per month)
In the US you can typically call anywhere in our gigantic country for the same rate from your cell phone. Nice, right?
Now, the US system has a lot of problems as well. First, we have these awful contracts that we have to sign to get cell phone service at a reasonable rate. 1 year minimum with a terrible penalty for cancelling.
Umm... that's all I can think of right now, actually. I'm no homophobic retard-executing Christian-fundamentalist supply-sider, but the market made phones rock here.
I *almost* bought a SidStation until I found out how damn difficult it was to fool around with. Also, I was doing my best to sell all my hardware, so I bought QuadraSID, a virtual SID synth VSTi plugin. It gives you the equivalent of Four SID chips or something close to that.
When I want to show people how totally full of dorks Slashdot is, I'll just point them to this article. The responses here are classic dorkery. Stereotypical nerdiness.
Really guys, he posted a question about which Live distro to give to friends with their Xmas cards. Instantly, a war erupts.
Everyone is yelling at him that it is the worst gift to ever give someone. IT'S JUST SOMETHING IN A CHRISTMAS CARD! If I got this, I would be like "oh, cool... he must be into this" and give it a try... whether I was the computer guy I am or not! If the people can't figure it out or aren't interested... big deal... who cares?
I've only seen a handful of real recommendations... the rest has been Comic Book Guy type bickering. Are you trying to stop him from doing it or what?
Great work folks. This one's for the Hall of Fame.
Just to weigh in, YES! Yes I would, today if I could. MacOS X is wonderful, I don't use it because I don't want to get hooked on an expensive hardware habit.
Assuming that Apple would make it work with the world of x86 associated hardware, I would do it! My skillset would be so much better, too, since it would be more fun to get all good at BSD.
birds make nests
ants live in colonies
lions hunt
dogs hang out in packs
etc.
humans are superstitious
For those who want to mention Bokonon, I'll save you the trouble:
Tiger got to hunt, Bird got to fly;
Man got to sit and wonder, 'Why, why, why?'
Tiger got to sleep,
Bird got to land,
Man got to tell himself he understand.
My good friend Liz has been taking all kinds of permaculture classes and what not at Pomona College here in California. Well, one day they had these guys in a big cool bus talk to them about how to make your own diesel fuel. They all hopped in, drove to a fast food place, got a bunch of oil, drove back, and started making a bunch. Apparently these guys travel around and give talks... all while powering their bus on either pure or mostly biodiesel fuel.
After she told me about this, I was, of course, totally fascinated, as I'd never heard of such a thing before. I looked for instructions on Google and found some very interesting info. If an engine is going to be running biodiesel, some changes have to be made. Many say that a totally necessary change is replacing all rubber hoses and stuff with items made from another material. Biodiesel rots rubber over time. Also, one should tune their engine a little differently. Apparently all French diesel vehicles made past a certain year are biodiesel ready... minus some minor tuning because all their diesel is already a certain percentage biodiesel... as required by a law (please correct me if this is inaccurate). Apparently, many other European countries use a percentage of biodiesel in their petrodiesel as well.
I simply cannot find the exact page I originally learned this all from... but you can still search away!
I found this nice page about modern biodiesel usage in Europe by typing "biodiesel france percentage" into Google.
LOTS AND LOTS of biodiesel stuff online. This stuff really has a future, it's not just a hippy thing.
Hey buddy, I saw that same movie... a movie about people... cops... drug users... politicians and what-not. I saw how they cope with the future's technology and political atmosphere.
I noticed the cool sound effects, the incredible visual effects, the fact that everything looked grey and sterile, yet that isolated things were moving and flashing, the different modes of transport, the casting of Tom Cruise and Max von Sydow, and in the thick of all that wonderful stuff, I noticed that nearly all the extras were white.
Just another detail, really, especially when I remember my last trip to Washington D.C.... and the varied colors of the people I saw there. Now, I'm not going to break the window of a Starbucks or start some Boycott Spielberg campaign, but I am going to wonder what the fuck is going on.
If they made some movie about the future of my Los Angeles and included only white people, I would think it was terribly unrealistic.
Source of Some Space Sounds
on
Space Music
·
· Score: 4, Informative
Nice sounds from our magnetosphere:
http://www-pw.physics.uiowa.edu/mcgreevy/
Luckily for the companies in the movie, they only had to advertise to one group: "White Americans"... because aside from the Token Black Cop(tm) (one male and one female), and a few people in the crowd (a few Asians here and there and couple of other dark skinned folk).
I found it strange that Washington D.C. of all places... one well known for its large black population and its folks from other races would have 99% white people in it. Take a look for yourself, around the pool, in the mall, in the cars, in the jail, everywhere public... white people.
Go ahead and make up scenarios for yourself to explain this phenomenon.
You've got the resolution totally wrong, my friend.
I just spoke to my good friend who just happened to write all the video software for this laptop (in addition to many other company duties) and he told me that the resolution PER SCREEN is 1024 Vertically x 768 Across.
Other sweet gossip he told me was that they're working on one with a really nice dual head 3D card suitable for gaming and what-not and various other improvements.
You all should send your questions and gripes to him directly. His name is Matthew... now put an @xentex.com after that. (I wrote his email address out like this to prevent spam bots from picking his address up. He's really a cool guy totally devoted to this awesome computer... it's really a cool thing to see in person. Plus, ask him whatever you want... he'd certainly fit in here if he wasn't actually doing stuff for his company all day and night.
Whenever I hear about competitions between designs to win a contract, I can't help but think about Macross Plus.
This short series dealt with all kinds of drama surrounding a group of old friends involved in a contest between two fighter designs competing for official adoption by the armed forces. Really great stuff.
In the FAQ... right above "Part 5" it says that the highest transfer speed is 6MB/s.
I thought Firewire transfered much, much faster than that (like ~30MB/s). If this is slower, is it just because it's such a hassle to deal with the iPod on a PC?
... so that for future school shootings... when the media mentions that the kids played "video games like Doom", they will be talking about something that modern kids *actually* do.
Slashdot Mirror
Now I'm no big American nationalist flag waving fascist or anything, but I must say that we have waaaaay better phone service here than in Europe.
Calling a mobile from a landline or public phone in Europe is ridiculously expensive. In fact, I can call a landline in Europe and speak for several hours on my international calling card, but only about 14-20 minutes if I'm calling a mobile (WTF!?!?!).
Travelling in Spain, for example, not wanting to invest in a mobile (maybe I will next time), I can't tell you how many goddamn Euros I spent in public phone cards just making 1 minute calls to cell phones. We're talking like .50 Euros a minute or more or something. I don't remember exactly, I just remember it sucked. I remember England being a bit better because you could put coins in a public phone and then use a cheap calling card to make calls ... but still ... calling mobile phones would vapori(s/z)e it (it was 60p/minute to call mobiles ... is that right? that would be $1.20/minute, folks).
So I have a bunch of European friends that I cannot really afford to speak with for very long. And they aren't even geeks or anything, so I can't speak over MSN messenger or whatever :(
Sure, you "pay" to receive calls on cell phones here in the US, but it's not a problem. You just keep your call short if you want to and everyone's happy. Want to talk longer? Wait until nighttime and talk virtually forever on your night and weekend minutes. Over there, ALL the cost (and maybe the real cost times 2 just to punch you in the gut) is on the caller. Not good.
Also, text messaging here in the US is totally cheap. Sure it's not as popular as it is in Europe, but it's cheap to use. Over there, they realized that it is something that people use and went waaay overboard with overcharging people. It's obscene. Also, you can send people text messages for free from their phone company's website (usually you can get like 100-200 messages free per month ... add ~$4.95 and you can get very, very, very many text messages per month)
In the US you can typically call anywhere in our gigantic country for the same rate from your cell phone. Nice, right?
Now, the US system has a lot of problems as well. First, we have these awful contracts that we have to sign to get cell phone service at a reasonable rate. 1 year minimum with a terrible penalty for cancelling.
Umm ... that's all I can think of right now, actually. I'm no homophobic retard-executing Christian-fundamentalist supply-sider, but the market made phones rock here.
mod parent up lol
Did anyone else get a "Diamond Age" vibe when they thought about huge numbers of Chinese kids with laptops?
But it just might work.
Find out about it here.
It's a whole lot of fun!
When I want to show people how totally full of dorks Slashdot is, I'll just point them to this article. The responses here are classic dorkery. Stereotypical nerdiness.
Really guys, he posted a question about which Live distro to give to friends with their Xmas cards. Instantly, a war erupts.
Everyone is yelling at him that it is the worst gift to ever give someone. IT'S JUST SOMETHING IN A CHRISTMAS CARD! If I got this, I would be like "oh, cool ... he must be into this" and give it a try ... whether I was the computer guy I am or not! If the people can't figure it out or aren't interested ... big deal ... who cares?
I've only seen a handful of real recommendations ... the rest has been Comic Book Guy type bickering. Are you trying to stop him from doing it or what?
Great work folks. This one's for the Hall of Fame.
Assuming that Apple would make it work with the world of x86 associated hardware, I would do it! My skillset would be so much better, too, since it would be more fun to get all good at BSD.
Hey Apple, you listening?
birds make nests
ants live in colonies
lions hunt
dogs hang out in packs
etc.
humans are superstitious
For those who want to mention Bokonon, I'll save you the trouble:
Tiger got to hunt, Bird got to fly;
Man got to sit and wonder, 'Why, why, why?'
Tiger got to sleep,
Bird got to land,
Man got to tell himself he understand.
After she told me about this, I was, of course, totally fascinated, as I'd never heard of such a thing before. I looked for instructions on Google and found some very interesting info. If an engine is going to be running biodiesel, some changes have to be made. Many say that a totally necessary change is replacing all rubber hoses and stuff with items made from another material. Biodiesel rots rubber over time. Also, one should tune their engine a little differently. Apparently all French diesel vehicles made past a certain year are biodiesel ready ... minus some minor tuning because all their diesel is already a certain percentage biodiesel ... as required by a law (please correct me if this is inaccurate). Apparently, many other European countries use a percentage of biodiesel in their petrodiesel as well.
I simply cannot find the exact page I originally learned this all from ... but you can still search away!
I found this nice page about modern biodiesel usage in Europe by typing "biodiesel france percentage" into Google.
LOTS AND LOTS of biodiesel stuff online. This stuff really has a future, it's not just a hippy thing.
Look at the Reply titled "McNugget-powered Volkswagen Rabbi"
It's got a +5
Already available, I believe:
Flip-Pad Voyager from Xentex
Already available, I believe: Flip-Pad Voyager from Xentex http://www.xentex.com/home.html
I also wondered this a while back. Take a look at this
Click on "Official Site" for more info and system requirements ... looks like it runs on windows 95/98 compatible computers. Yay!
ALWAYS check Everything2 first! :)
I folded it up and I imagined that carrying it would be like hauling around an artist's portfolio. I didn't expect it to be so huge.
Hmmm ... maybe this is a little better?
I noticed the cool sound effects, the incredible visual effects, the fact that everything looked grey and sterile, yet that isolated things were moving and flashing, the different modes of transport, the casting of Tom Cruise and Max von Sydow, and in the thick of all that wonderful stuff, I noticed that nearly all the extras were white.
Just another detail, really, especially when I remember my last trip to Washington D.C. ... and the varied colors of the people I saw there. Now, I'm not going to break the window of a Starbucks or start some Boycott Spielberg campaign, but I am going to wonder what the fuck is going on.
If they made some movie about the future of my Los Angeles and included only white people, I would think it was terribly unrealistic.
For live sounds, check out NASA's Online VLF Receiver
These sounds were incorporated into a song by totally badass producer Si Begg:
S.I. Futures - Ionic Funk
I found it strange that Washington D.C. of all places ... one well known for its large black population and its folks from other races would have 99% white people in it. Take a look for yourself, around the pool, in the mall, in the cars, in the jail, everywhere public ... white people.
Go ahead and make up scenarios for yourself to explain this phenomenon.
I saw a single Taco Bell in Sydney, Australia in 1999.
I just spoke to my good friend who just happened to write all the video software for this laptop (in addition to many other company duties) and he told me that the resolution PER SCREEN is 1024 Vertically x 768 Across.
Other sweet gossip he told me was that they're working on one with a really nice dual head 3D card suitable for gaming and what-not and various other improvements.
You all should send your questions and gripes to him directly. His name is Matthew ... now put an @xentex.com after that. (I wrote his email address out like this to prevent spam bots from picking his address up. He's really a cool guy totally devoted to this awesome computer ... it's really a cool thing to see in person. Plus, ask him whatever you want ... he'd certainly fit in here if he wasn't actually doing stuff for his company all day and night.
This short series dealt with all kinds of drama surrounding a group of old friends involved in a contest between two fighter designs competing for official adoption by the armed forces. Really great stuff.
I thought Firewire transfered much, much faster than that (like ~30MB/s). If this is slower, is it just because it's such a hassle to deal with the iPod on a PC?
I keep expecting to see desperate, lost explorers begging and messaging for help in front of the camera.
This concept reminds me a lot of the Gungan "Boom-Booms" or whatever. Throwable, popping balls that do stuff. Yay. :)
... so that for future school shootings ... when the media mentions that the kids played "video games like Doom", they will be talking about something that modern kids *actually* do.