I guess it's pretty obvious, I need to set up as many old crufty computers as I can on my home network, and set them to relentlessly spider across the whole damn web. A few automated processes on a 3 megabit pipe ought to generate some pretty nifty monthly logs.
If the goverment is gonna search through my web-surfing logs, they're gonna at least have a hell of a hard time finding anything incriminating among all that pr0n! Nosy bastards, that'll teach them. If I feel particularly vicious I'll set one or two to recursively spider through Celine Dion's website. They'll go blind before they hit any good stuff.
Actually, the polarity supposedly switches roughly every 200,000 years, and according to that school of thought we're currently way overdue to the tune of about 780,000 years. See here.
Assuming you believe all that, of course. As far as I know it's just a theory.
To some degree, yes the earth is flattened for that reason. Any *increase* in that flattening would assume that the centripetal acceleration experienced by masses on the equator was sufficiently pronounced to be able to counteract the natural gravitational pull experienced by every point on the earth towards its gravitational center - a flatter earth would therefore imply either a faster rate of rotation, or else a decrease in gravitational self-attraction.
Since we're not experiencing shorter days, and my ever-increasing weight indicates the earth's attraction for me is not lessening, I suspect that's not the cause. Besides, we're talking about a flatter gravitational field, not a flatter earth.:)
If you're referring to a differential gravitational attraction similar to that involved in Roche Limit" deformation of orbiting bodies, then no. What you're suggesting implies that the gravitational pull on the equator is significantly stronger than that on the polar regions. Since gravitational attraction drops off exponentially as the distance between the two bodies increases, that kind of differential pull only occurs when the gravitational bodies are relatively-speaking quite close together.
Perhaps if the moon had suddenly increased in mass a thousand-fold, but not possible due to distant stars or planets.
If the earth's gravitational field has 'flattened out' or concentrated more around the equator, that implies that the center of mass has concentrated there - the earth has *Developed* a spare tire, not lost one.
So give me 50,000 more laps around the sun, and no rest breaks!
Interesting opinion. Have you ever tried *listening* to one of the british trying to speak their own language? It's obvious that at one time they spoke the queen's english, but that is no longer the case. Canadians do in fact on average speak a more 'pure' dialect of the english language than do the english people themselves.
If one were to accept the premise that the shifting of a language over time in its homeland remained the accepted standard for that language, wouldn't welsh and manx both be considered alive and well, and stunningly similar to common english?
If it's indistinguishable from the original, then isn't it for all intents and purposes the original?
Okay, sort of a one-hand-clapping question, but really... 4:33 (that recorded silence I mentioned) sounds the same on CD, radio, and MP3.
It's a stupid idea, surely. Just not overly revolutionary.
Now, as for compressing the "bug repellent noise"... that's an interesting point. It may render it useless as far as bugs do, despite its being indistinguishable to humans. Quite interesting, actually.
Not to throw you off your rant there, but if you'd ever been on a fishing trip into the north woods of Ontario for a week or so you'd know by now that the smell of soap actually is an attractant to most insects.
As far as theinsects go, you're better off washing in clean water and not using soap at all, or else the mosquitos and blackflies will eat you alive.
Note: This is not meant to be taken as an excuse for geeks to omit soap from their daily lives - the relative effects are reversed on the human species!
How is this an outlandish concept? There are already recordings of complete silence which have been copyrighted and released on CD... creating an MP3 of one is a logical next progression.
It's not so much that they're designed to emit sounds humans can't hear, as it is that they can't really be designed *NOT* to emit sounds humans can't hear.
No matter what you do, you're going to be producing harmonics that may well lie outside the human range of hearing, and what with materials being imperfect, you could never perfectly limit the sound emissions to the normal human-audible range no matter how hard you tried. Even if you wanted to (and why?), there'd be the small matter of cost-effectiveness.
Paying an extra $500 per speaker just so your dog doesn't get to hear something you can't isn't really a good investment.
You are correct. What I'd meant to say, but didn't complete my thought, was that I'm not doing any of those things for personal credit, and nor should the rest of the net community.
However, given that we *DO* do these goodness-of-our-hearts acts, one would expect that sooner or later the general public and corporate america might choose to see us as something other than a group of hackers and thieves, and extend the tiniest bit of respect our way.
The fact that no such respect or consideration is forthcoming, particularly from the RIAA and MPAA, is what ultimately drove my prior comment - not some misplaced desire for accolades.
I hope that clears up my position for you. Sorry I didn't state it clearly enough the first time out.
I know what you're saying, but we as a community have been doing many things for the public good with little or no recognition - how much goodwill has millions of CPU hours of cancer research, human genome research, and SETI research garnered for the internet community? None.
I say to heck with it. If I cannot get recognition for the good, supportive things I do, then maybe at least I can get recognition of those things I want changed.
I'd be the first in line to drop SETI@Home and sign up for DoStheRIAA@Home.
They've officially aligned themselves with Perens, then? I hadn't heard, but that is indeed good news! I hope they go beyond moral support and really hit the DMCA with both barrels.
That's just it - I don't disrespect ATI at all. They have some extremely nice hardware which is all too often hampered by poor drivers.
ATI would have you believe they have become kings of the world because they can pump out graphics more effectively than the last generation of cards. Yes, this is comparison is partially relevant in that it demonstrates the progression of video technology, but my point (since I apparently wasn't clear enough) is that it's about as meaningful in the real world as comparing a Voodoo2 SLI configuration to an ATI Rage I back in the day. Vaguely interesting, but not something from which to draw intelligent conclusions. The R300 should stomp a GF4, and should do it by a good margin. The real news would be if it had NOT, or had only barely surpassed a GF4.
I'm not a fanboy for any company, but I will admit to some skepticism as to ATI's sticking power and commitment to changing their problematic driver writing approach. I feel I'm more than entitled to that, having owned three ATI cards in the past, all with the same types of problems. As well, everything I have seen so far indicates that as good as the R300 is, its days are numbered as the NV30 approaches release. Despite that, I wish ATI nothing but the best, because strong competition is good for the market, and brand loyalty is for the weak-minded.
P.S. To those who complain about my.sig, I freely admit I ripped it off of some AC on these boards. Just because it be the exact quote from the ultimate source doesn't change the fact that it's true, and truth should be spread around.
No big surprise, it SHOULD trounce the GF4... after all, it's the first of the next generation cards - it's interesting to compare to previous generation cards, but it really should more appropriately be put head-to-head against the GF4 successor NV30. Trouncing current cards is a big yawn, but if it can go toe-to-toe with the big boys in 3 or 4 months they'll have something.
That said, congrats to ATI - I love competition in the marketplace. Now if only they could write some decent drivers for once in their lives.
Close, but the bioagents did not in the end necessarily get spread. Did you not notice that the psycho activist guy had the evil future-scientist-woman as his seatmate once he got on the plane?
Bruce had managed to send enough information forward that they could send an assassin after the guy. Now, whether you choose to believe they succeed or not is up to you - personally I'm just happy that Bruce died in the end. As you say, it's a wonderfully bleak ending, and part of what makes me love that movie to this day. The fact that even after all he'd done for them, the scientists were still perfectly happy to sacrifice Bruce needlessly says a lot.
A game like this, where there is actually a storyline and real characters to interact with (say what you will about the movies in this respect) interests me far more than a game like the Star Wars MMORPG from Verant.
The immersion of interacting with a real character instead of hordes of l33t 13 year-olds 'camping the wookiee' is far more appealing.
Geez, good thing the ruling went the way it did, or else you can be sure we'd have the RIAA and MPAA charging hard soon after to imply that copyrights on movies and music renewed every time someone listened to them. That would make the Sonny Bono copyright extension act almost laughable by comparison in terms of granting copyright near-perpetuity.
If the data format for key files changes for whatever reason and only the Microsoft brand supports the changed format or data, the Microsoft branded product will fire up.
Oh my dear god, do you mean that in the case that only a Microsoft application can handle the data file, we'll be FORCED to use that Microsoft application to open the file, instead of righteously spinning our wheels and doing nothing, thereby asserting our independence?
Get a grip. Now, had you made the inference that by simply "embracing and extending" those data formats and moving them slightly to the left Microsoft could in fact reassert its prominence, you might have had something. As it is, you whined pointlessly and accomplished nothing but pushing hot air around.
The more interesting question to me is, given what it can do to a Mac, what would happen if you threw this into a Vaio laptop? Would it magically work there?
Sony: "Hey, buy our laptops, they're the only ones guaranteed to play all CDs out there! Even copy-protected CDs!" Bastards. Next there'll be EULAs on the CDs that grant you license to use the CD only on an approved brand of computer, and only if you've paid your listener license fee for the year and can verify that in writing.
Slashdot Mirror
I guess it's pretty obvious, I need to set up as many old crufty computers as I can on my home network, and set them to relentlessly spider across the whole damn web. A few automated processes on a 3 megabit pipe ought to generate some pretty nifty monthly logs.
If the goverment is gonna search through my web-surfing logs, they're gonna at least have a hell of a hard time finding anything incriminating among all that pr0n! Nosy bastards, that'll teach them. If I feel particularly vicious I'll set one or two to recursively spider through Celine Dion's website. They'll go blind before they hit any good stuff.
Grande? They come that small? I never order anything but a Venti, myself.
But then, I have issues since I hate coffee and yet I go to Starbucks religiously - for the Chai tea.
Actually, the polarity supposedly switches roughly every 200,000 years, and according to that school of thought we're currently way overdue to the tune of about 780,000 years. See here.
Assuming you believe all that, of course. As far as I know it's just a theory.
To some degree, yes the earth is flattened for that reason. Any *increase* in that flattening would assume that the centripetal acceleration experienced by masses on the equator was sufficiently pronounced to be able to counteract the natural gravitational pull experienced by every point on the earth towards its gravitational center - a flatter earth would therefore imply either a faster rate of rotation, or else a decrease in gravitational self-attraction.
:)
Since we're not experiencing shorter days, and my ever-increasing weight indicates the earth's attraction for me is not lessening, I suspect that's not the cause. Besides, we're talking about a flatter gravitational field, not a flatter earth.
If you're referring to a differential gravitational attraction similar to that involved in Roche Limit" deformation of orbiting bodies, then no. What you're suggesting implies that the gravitational pull on the equator is significantly stronger than that on the polar regions. Since gravitational attraction drops off exponentially as the distance between the two bodies increases, that kind of differential pull only occurs when the gravitational bodies are relatively-speaking quite close together.
Perhaps if the moon had suddenly increased in mass a thousand-fold, but not possible due to distant stars or planets.
If the earth's gravitational field has 'flattened out' or concentrated more around the equator, that implies that the center of mass has concentrated there - the earth has *Developed* a spare tire, not lost one.
So give me 50,000 more laps around the sun, and no rest breaks!
Interesting opinion. Have you ever tried *listening* to one of the british trying to speak their own language? It's obvious that at one time they spoke the queen's english, but that is no longer the case. Canadians do in fact on average speak a more 'pure' dialect of the english language than do the english people themselves.
If one were to accept the premise that the shifting of a language over time in its homeland remained the accepted standard for that language, wouldn't welsh and manx both be considered alive and well, and stunningly similar to common english?
This was an excellent, eloquent post. Thank you for your lucid commentary.
If it's indistinguishable from the original, then isn't it for all intents and purposes the original?
Okay, sort of a one-hand-clapping question, but really... 4:33 (that recorded silence I mentioned) sounds the same on CD, radio, and MP3.
It's a stupid idea, surely. Just not overly revolutionary.
Now, as for compressing the "bug repellent noise"... that's an interesting point. It may render it useless as far as bugs do, despite its being indistinguishable to humans. Quite interesting, actually.
Not to throw you off your rant there, but if you'd ever been on a fishing trip into the north woods of Ontario for a week or so you'd know by now that the smell of soap actually is an attractant to most insects.
As far as theinsects go, you're better off washing in clean water and not using soap at all, or else the mosquitos and blackflies will eat you alive.
Note: This is not meant to be taken as an excuse for geeks to omit soap from their daily lives - the relative effects are reversed on the human species!
How is this an outlandish concept? There are already recordings of complete silence which have been copyrighted and released on CD... creating an MP3 of one is a logical next progression.
It's not so much that they're designed to emit sounds humans can't hear, as it is that they can't really be designed *NOT* to emit sounds humans can't hear.
No matter what you do, you're going to be producing harmonics that may well lie outside the human range of hearing, and what with materials being imperfect, you could never perfectly limit the sound emissions to the normal human-audible range no matter how hard you tried. Even if you wanted to (and why?), there'd be the small matter of cost-effectiveness.
Paying an extra $500 per speaker just so your dog doesn't get to hear something you can't isn't really a good investment.
You are correct. What I'd meant to say, but didn't complete my thought, was that I'm not doing any of those things for personal credit, and nor should the rest of the net community.
However, given that we *DO* do these goodness-of-our-hearts acts, one would expect that sooner or later the general public and corporate america might choose to see us as something other than a group of hackers and thieves, and extend the tiniest bit of respect our way.
The fact that no such respect or consideration is forthcoming, particularly from the RIAA and MPAA, is what ultimately drove my prior comment - not some misplaced desire for accolades.
I hope that clears up my position for you. Sorry I didn't state it clearly enough the first time out.
I know what you're saying, but we as a community have been doing many things for the public good with little or no recognition - how much goodwill has millions of CPU hours of cancer research, human genome research, and SETI research garnered for the internet community? None.
I say to heck with it. If I cannot get recognition for the good, supportive things I do, then maybe at least I can get recognition of those things I want changed.
I'd be the first in line to drop SETI@Home and sign up for DoStheRIAA@Home.
Australia invents the best of everything? I have one word for you: Vegemite.
They've officially aligned themselves with Perens, then? I hadn't heard, but that is indeed good news! I hope they go beyond moral support and really hit the DMCA with both barrels.
That's just it - I don't disrespect ATI at all. They have some extremely nice hardware which is all too often hampered by poor drivers.
.sig, I freely admit I ripped it off of some AC on these boards. Just because it be the exact quote from the ultimate source doesn't change the fact that it's true, and truth should be spread around.
ATI would have you believe they have become kings of the world because they can pump out graphics more effectively than the last generation of cards. Yes, this is comparison is partially relevant in that it demonstrates the progression of video technology, but my point (since I apparently wasn't clear enough) is that it's about as meaningful in the real world as comparing a Voodoo2 SLI configuration to an ATI Rage I back in the day. Vaguely interesting, but not something from which to draw intelligent conclusions. The R300 should stomp a GF4, and should do it by a good margin. The real news would be if it had NOT, or had only barely surpassed a GF4.
I'm not a fanboy for any company, but I will admit to some skepticism as to ATI's sticking power and commitment to changing their problematic driver writing approach. I feel I'm more than entitled to that, having owned three ATI cards in the past, all with the same types of problems. As well, everything I have seen so far indicates that as good as the R300 is, its days are numbered as the NV30 approaches release. Despite that, I wish ATI nothing but the best, because strong competition is good for the market, and brand loyalty is for the weak-minded.
P.S. To those who complain about my
No big surprise, it SHOULD trounce the GF4... after all, it's the first of the next generation cards - it's interesting to compare to previous generation cards, but it really should more appropriately be put head-to-head against the GF4 successor NV30. Trouncing current cards is a big yawn, but if it can go toe-to-toe with the big boys in 3 or 4 months they'll have something.
That said, congrats to ATI - I love competition in the marketplace. Now if only they could write some decent drivers for once in their lives.
Close, but the bioagents did not in the end necessarily get spread. Did you not notice that the psycho activist guy had the evil future-scientist-woman as his seatmate once he got on the plane?
Bruce had managed to send enough information forward that they could send an assassin after the guy. Now, whether you choose to believe they succeed or not is up to you - personally I'm just happy that Bruce died in the end. As you say, it's a wonderfully bleak ending, and part of what makes me love that movie to this day. The fact that even after all he'd done for them, the scientists were still perfectly happy to sacrifice Bruce needlessly says a lot.
A game like this, where there is actually a storyline and real characters to interact with (say what you will about the movies in this respect) interests me far more than a game like the Star Wars MMORPG from Verant.
The immersion of interacting with a real character instead of hordes of l33t 13 year-olds 'camping the wookiee' is far more appealing.
Happily enough, Molson has a feedback form!
Molson Feedback
I've already submitted to them a lengthy comment on what I think about their frivolous litigation efforts, and I hope you will too.
Geez, good thing the ruling went the way it did, or else you can be sure we'd have the RIAA and MPAA charging hard soon after to imply that copyrights on movies and music renewed every time someone listened to them. That would make the Sonny Bono copyright extension act almost laughable by comparison in terms of granting copyright near-perpetuity.
Get a grip. Now, had you made the inference that by simply "embracing and extending" those data formats and moving them slightly to the left Microsoft could in fact reassert its prominence, you might have had something. As it is, you whined pointlessly and accomplished nothing but pushing hot air around.
The more interesting question to me is, given what it can do to a Mac, what would happen if you threw this into a Vaio laptop? Would it magically work there?
Sony: "Hey, buy our laptops, they're the only ones guaranteed to play all CDs out there! Even copy-protected CDs!" Bastards. Next there'll be EULAs on the CDs that grant you license to use the CD only on an approved brand of computer, and only if you've paid your listener license fee for the year and can verify that in writing.
I'd pay EXTRA for a DVD that set the neighbor's cat on fire - the damn thing keeps me up at night while it meows pitifully looking for love.