That fellow (Jeff Bauman) who lost both legs below the knee, the one whose femoral artery is being pinched shut by Carlos Arredondo as he's being wheeled away from the incident, identified his attacker. From Bloomberg:
"Minutes before the bombs blew up in Boston, Jeff Bauman looked into the eyes of the man who tried to kill him.
Just before 3 p.m. on April 15, Bauman was waiting among the crowd for his girlfriend to cross the finish line at the Boston Marathon. A man wearing a cap, sunglasses and a black jacket over a hooded sweatshirt looked at Jeff, 27, and dropped a bag at his feet, his brother, Chris Bauman, said in an interview.
Two and a half minutes later, the bag exploded, tearing Jeff’s legs apart. A picture of him in a wheelchair, bloodied and ashen, was broadcast around the world as he was rushed to Boston Medical Center. He lost both legs below the knee."
Print: 1) The Economist. Very informative. Their politics are not hidden, and socially, they're definitely left of center. Financially, they're the "Voice of the Plutonomy." But, it works. The articles are typically quite informative.
"“The technology is riding the fine line between promise and hype,” says Rick Tinsley, the boss of Silver Peak Systems, a networking firm. Sceptics fret that cost savings could easily be eaten up by the expense of new SDN controllers and software.
Better still, SDN makes it easier to reconfigure a network to, say, launch a new application for employees or customers. Its boosters liken it to a mobile-phone operating system onto which new apps can be loaded quickly and seamlessly. Small wonder, then, that companies such as Facebook and Google have been studying SDN carefully. Google runs two vast networks—one that links its huge data centres together and another that delivers its services to the outside world. The company has already deployed SDN across its data-centre network (which was not involved in this week’s snafu) and says that extending it to the external network is “inevitable”. Many big financial institutions and telecoms firms are also experimenting with the technology."
Some wish to assert all violence is bad. That's not true. Some - most - violence is bad. But sometimes it is good. It's an example of the complexity of the world. Like chemotherapy drugs. Under normal circumstances, they are a poison. But in certain circumstances, they can be used to lifesaving effect.
... so that I could confirm with a trusted third party that when someone claims to be speaking for, or doing the will of God, that I can reliably confirm it instead of just having to take the original individual's word for it.
It happens with government agencies all the time. Suggest that a cut or perhaps even lack of an increase is coming, and it's OH MY GOD, TOTAL SOCIETAL COLLAPSE.
It happened with the financial crisis, and it's happening today. Suggest that the financial sector not be backed by the government and it's OH MY GOD, IT'LL COLLAPSE THE ECONOMY.
Suggest that drug companies do with a bit less profit - at least charge us what they charge abroad and it's OH MY GOD, EVERYONE'S GONNA DIE! LIKE TOMORROW.
Pretty much any suggestion to any organization that it might get less money and it's TOTAL DISASTER.
A parlor game could be suggesting to organizational leaders that some rule be changed which would result in less profit. You would win by coming up with the correct PROCLAMATION_OF_IMPENDING_DISASTER they state.
A brilliant light extinguished itself when faced with the very credible possibility of several decades in prison.
In order to avoid repeating this kind of tragedy, it would be beneficial for society to know all of the details of the case, understand the thinking of the individuals involved, and examine their actions, so we can fully understand why the tragedy occurred, and work to avoid it in the future.
It's very simple really. Our society should be encouraging its Aaron Swartzes, not hounding them to death. This benefits all of us.
Financial products are logical constructs. Virtual products. Like objects in an online game which people buy and sell.
The financial world depends on logical constructs. Currency, the base of the financial world, is a logical construct. Slips of paper to which people ascribe value. Gold is the same way. One cannot eat gold, wear it, drink it, shelter under it, use it to bind wounds or cure ailments. But to many (most) it has "value." Currency is a durable construct because it makes people's lives easier, and improves their standard of living.
Stocks ("shares of ownership") are an older financial product. So are bonds. Futures are bets. Then you get into the myriad financial products/bets and their derivatives on which today's global financial system is based.
1) "A financial product is about as conceptual as you can get,” says Wilson Ervin, a senior adviser at Credit Suisse. “You just need paper and ink.”-- The Economist magazine
2) "In an even more blunt description, Tourre calls the CDOs he produced "intellectual masturbation" and likens himself to Dr. Frankenstein. "When I think that I had some input into the creation of this product (which by the way is a product of pure intellectual masturbation, the type of thing which you invent telling yourself: 'well, what if we created a 'thing', which has no purpose, which is absolutely conceptual and highly theoretical and which nobody knows how to price?")" -- CNN / Money
"Financial Innovation" consists of two things:
1) Creation of new virtual products / logical constructs.
2) Methods by which one can entice others to take on more debt.
I'm all for financial innovation just as long as it doesn't lead to "financial pollution" - public costs. Like a tannery which dumps effluent into a river. The tannery keeps the profit and the public bears the costs. The concept is known in the financial sector as "privatize the profits, socialize the losses." In recent years, the financial sector has been able to successfully privatize its profits, yet push the costs onto the public. This is done by government insurance of private debt, and outright rescues and bailouts.
In any regulation of the financial sector, the key I think is to make sure that losses are limited to the participants in the transaction.
This fellow - well if he is able to make money, bravo. If he and his shareholders lose money, the laws regulating the financial sector should make sure that the losses are limited to participants in the transaction, and not imposed on the public.
So the 110 dollar current cost is significantly more than can be explained by inflation. IMO it's part of road-to-hell-paved-with-good-intentions government intervention plus the worldwide debt bubble.
This is how I dealt with the problem. If you combine both solutions, it'll be super quiet but I found just the headsets to be enough - usually:
1) Foam ear plugs: 1a) The foam earplugs have a trick. You have to roll them between your fingers so they become long and thin. Then put them into deep into your ear (not too deep). They'll expand and provide a good seal. Don't pull them out quickly because of the seal. It can hurt your ear drum. Pull them out slowly. 1b) Cost: Maybe 5 dollars. 1c) How to correctly put in foam earplugs. Can't just shove them in. They don't work that way. 1d) It says they're to be used only once. I use mine multiple times and put them in the case that usually comes with them. You can wash them if you want. 1e) Ear plugs from Bass Pro Shops. You can go to Dick's or whatever sporting goods store you'd like.
Don't go crazy with the headsets. They're a good investment but you don't need the microphones or anything else. Just get a basic set and save yourself some money. A high decibel rating from a reputable company. Look on Amazon for the reviews.
Contrast this with Aaron Swartz. A soft target. It's unclear how much, if any, of a net cost he imposed with his illegal downloads of journal articles. "Illegal Downloads Of Journal Articles." It even sounds trivial. And they hounded him for it. To death. They presented the credible possibility of decades in jail to him.
But, as always, follow the money. Wall Streets spends a tremendous amount of money on federal politicians so they can keep running their swindles and funnel part of the proceeds back to Washington. Swartz was paying little if anything to the politicians as he was trying to provide information to the public at no personal gain.
To understand what's going on here, you have to understand politicians: "No one will really understand politics until they understand that politicians are not trying to solve our problems. They are trying to solve their own problems — of which getting elected and re-elected are number one and number two. Whatever is number three is far behind." -- Thomas Sowell
Actually, different ancient populations ate differently.
Inuits (Eskimos) eat an extremely high protein, high fat diet. Not much farming in the far north.
Nordic populations (Finns and Swedes for example) eat a diet different from Spaniards, who eat a diet different from sub-Saharan Africans who eat a diet different from southern Asians.
It seems to me that there isn't a one-size-fits-all solution to diet. One needs to understand one's genetic ancestry, and then using that as a guide, figure out what's best for that person. What might be too much protein for a vegetarian south Asian farmer might not be enough for a Finn or an Inuit hunter. What might be too much fat or carbohydrate for one population might not be enough for another.
My certificate authority sends me nagging emails like 6 weeks before my certificate's about to expire. Microsoft's certificate authority group needs to create a database and automated emails when certificates get near expiration. Start emailing a bunch of folks. It's very simple. Probably most CA's have such a setup.
It's the difference between a tutorial and a reference.
A tutorial tells you how to do something. "How do I balance the wheel on this car?"
A reference simply describes the tools in detail. A reference will just describe the wrench, the weights, the balancing machine, the readouts on the balancing machine.
A tutorial walks you through how to do something. If you want to figure out how to do something, you go to a tutorial.
A reference describes the tools you use to do something. If you know have a very good idea of what you want to do, you go to a reference to get the detailed view of the tools you plan to use.
StackOverflow is an interactive tutorial. A lot of documentation is just a reference (and imperfect/incomplete ones at that).
There's a device I've used with some success that works ONLY against bloodsuckers. It's called a "Mosquito Magnet".
Mosquitoes are attracted to things with blood. They apparently track their food by warmth, exhaled carbon dioxide, and a few other chemicals. This devices emits warmth, carbon dioxide and a few other chemicals in an attractant. The device is quite sensitive though. I've placed a battery driven model outside, under a small wooden table, to protect it from the elements. It definitely captures mosquitoes but sometimes it makes a difference, sometimes it doesn't. Mine is 5 years old. Last year it was... eh. Not as dramatic as year 1. I need to get it serviced this year I suppose.
Anyhoo, focusing on something like the mosquito's natural drives to attract them to a trap might be the Next Big Thing. Note that bug zappers don't attract mosquitos.
One way to do it - eliminate anonymous speech. Yes, there's a lot of vicious nastiness that internet tough guys and raging nerds say on the internet that they would never say in real life. But what about a whistleblower at a financial company? Or in a politician's office?
What happens if a citizen writes something unflattering about a politician and the politician decides to pursue a vendetta against the citizen? Politicians have a great deal of power to make that happen.
Anonymous speech is essential to lubricate the flow of information. It's something that leaders and marketplace gatekeepers have a hard time controlling. It undermines their authority and profit. Which is why we need it.
Slashdot Mirror
That fellow (Jeff Bauman) who lost both legs below the knee, the one whose femoral artery is being pinched shut by Carlos Arredondo as he's being wheeled away from the incident, identified his attacker. From Bloomberg:
"Minutes before the bombs blew up in Boston, Jeff Bauman looked into the eyes of the man who tried to kill him.
Just before 3 p.m. on April 15, Bauman was waiting among the crowd for his girlfriend to cross the finish line at the Boston Marathon. A man wearing a cap, sunglasses and a black jacket over a hooded sweatshirt looked at Jeff, 27, and dropped a bag at his feet, his brother, Chris Bauman, said in an interview.
Two and a half minutes later, the bag exploded, tearing Jeff’s legs apart. A picture of him in a wheelchair, bloodied and ashen, was broadcast around the world as he was rushed to Boston Medical Center. He lost both legs below the knee."
-- http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-19/boston-bombing-victim-in-iconic-photo-helped-identify-attackers.html
I'll typically read a magazine over a meal, or while waiting for something.
Print is physically flexible and tough, and doesn't require a network connection.
Print:
1) The Economist. Very informative. Their politics are not hidden, and socially, they're definitely left of center. Financially, they're the "Voice of the Plutonomy." But, it works. The articles are typically quite informative.
Online magazines:
1) IEEE Spectrum
2) Communications of the ACM
3) Dr. Dobbs
4) Infoworld
5) Linux Journal
6) Machine Design
And a variety of online information sources for current events. Typically, Google and Google News are good starting points.
The Economist, December 15th, 2012:
"“The technology is riding the fine line between promise and hype,” says Rick Tinsley, the boss of Silver Peak Systems, a networking firm. Sceptics fret that cost savings could easily be eaten up by the expense of new SDN controllers and software.
Better still, SDN makes it easier to reconfigure a network to, say, launch a new application for employees or customers. Its boosters liken it to a mobile-phone operating system onto which new apps can be loaded quickly and seamlessly. Small wonder, then, that companies such as Facebook and Google have been studying SDN carefully. Google runs two vast networks—one that links its huge data centres together and another that delivers its services to the outside world. The company has already deployed SDN across its data-centre network (which was not involved in this week’s snafu) and says that extending it to the external network is “inevitable”. Many big financial institutions and telecoms firms are also experimenting with the technology."
From Boston.com.
Images of a big fireball and a lot of blood on the pavement: http://deadspin.com/explosions-reported-at-the-boston-marathon-473008941
Not in World War II.
Some wish to assert all violence is bad. That's not true. Some - most - violence is bad. But sometimes it is good. It's an example of the complexity of the world. Like chemotherapy drugs. Under normal circumstances, they are a poison. But in certain circumstances, they can be used to lifesaving effect.
So they're telling me I've gotta proofread the title of the post too?
It happens with government agencies all the time. Suggest that a cut or perhaps even lack of an increase is coming, and it's OH MY GOD, TOTAL SOCIETAL COLLAPSE.
It happened with the financial crisis, and it's happening today. Suggest that the financial sector not be backed by the government and it's OH MY GOD, IT'LL COLLAPSE THE ECONOMY.
Suggest that drug companies do with a bit less profit - at least charge us what they charge abroad and it's OH MY GOD, EVERYONE'S GONNA DIE! LIKE TOMORROW.
Pretty much any suggestion to any organization that it might get less money and it's TOTAL DISASTER.
A parlor game could be suggesting to organizational leaders that some rule be changed which would result in less profit. You would win by coming up with the correct PROCLAMATION_OF_IMPENDING_DISASTER they state.
A brilliant light extinguished itself when faced with the very credible possibility of several decades in prison.
In order to avoid repeating this kind of tragedy, it would be beneficial for society to know all of the details of the case, understand the thinking of the individuals involved, and examine their actions, so we can fully understand why the tragedy occurred, and work to avoid it in the future.
It's very simple really. Our society should be encouraging its Aaron Swartzes, not hounding them to death. This benefits all of us.
Good point: Indian Businessman Dazzles The World With His $230k Shirt Made Of Real Gold
Financial products are logical constructs. Virtual products. Like objects in an online game which people buy and sell.
The financial world depends on logical constructs. Currency, the base of the financial world, is a logical construct. Slips of paper to which people ascribe value. Gold is the same way. One cannot eat gold, wear it, drink it, shelter under it, use it to bind wounds or cure ailments. But to many (most) it has "value." Currency is a durable construct because it makes people's lives easier, and improves their standard of living.
Stocks ("shares of ownership") are an older financial product. So are bonds. Futures are bets. Then you get into the myriad financial products/bets and their derivatives on which today's global financial system is based.
1) "A financial product is about as conceptual as you can get,” says Wilson Ervin, a senior adviser at Credit Suisse. “You just need paper and ink.”-- The Economist magazine
2) "In an even more blunt description, Tourre calls the CDOs he produced "intellectual masturbation" and likens himself to Dr. Frankenstein. "When I think that I had some input into the creation of this product (which by the way is a product of pure intellectual masturbation, the type of thing which you invent telling yourself: 'well, what if we created a 'thing', which has no purpose, which is absolutely conceptual and highly theoretical and which nobody knows how to price?")" -- CNN / Money
"Financial Innovation" consists of two things:
1) Creation of new virtual products / logical constructs.
2) Methods by which one can entice others to take on more debt.
Paul Volcker, former chairman of the Federal Reserve, said the only beneficial financial innovation of the last 30 years was the ATM. However, the ATM is not a financial innovation, but a technological one. So that leaves a dim legacy of recent financial innovation.
I'm all for financial innovation just as long as it doesn't lead to "financial pollution" - public costs. Like a tannery which dumps effluent into a river. The tannery keeps the profit and the public bears the costs. The concept is known in the financial sector as "privatize the profits, socialize the losses." In recent years, the financial sector has been able to successfully privatize its profits, yet push the costs onto the public. This is done by government insurance of private debt, and outright rescues and bailouts.
In any regulation of the financial sector, the key I think is to make sure that losses are limited to the participants in the transaction.
This fellow - well if he is able to make money, bravo. If he and his shareholders lose money, the laws regulating the financial sector should make sure that the losses are limited to participants in the transaction, and not imposed on the public.
It's much more than inflation:
1) The first edition of the book came out in 1993 or 1994. The cost was around 20 dollars.
2) Fast forward to today, the Bureau of Labor Statistics Inflation Calculator says 20 dollars in 1993 should be 32 dollars today.
So the 110 dollar current cost is significantly more than can be explained by inflation. IMO it's part of road-to-hell-paved-with-good-intentions government intervention plus the worldwide debt bubble.
This is how I dealt with the problem. If you combine both solutions, it'll be super quiet but I found just the headsets to be enough - usually:
1) Foam ear plugs:
1a) The foam earplugs have a trick. You have to roll them between your fingers so they become long and thin. Then put them into deep into your ear (not too deep). They'll expand and provide a good seal. Don't pull them out quickly because of the seal. It can hurt your ear drum. Pull them out slowly.
1b) Cost: Maybe 5 dollars.
1c) How to correctly put in foam earplugs. Can't just shove them in. They don't work that way.
1d) It says they're to be used only once. I use mine multiple times and put them in the case that usually comes with them. You can wash them if you want.
1e) Ear plugs from Bass Pro Shops. You can go to Dick's or whatever sporting goods store you'd like.
2) Shooting headsets: Put these over your ears after you put in your earplugs:
2a) Cost: Not too expense, like 30-50 dollars.
2b) http://www.basspro.com/Remington-M30-Earmuffs/product/26026/
2c) Amazon search
3) The best book on how to study I ever read: "College Study Skills" by Deanna L. Van Blerkom. Side note - When I was in school some *cough* years ago, this book was a fraction of the 2013 price. It is unreal how much they gouge students nowadays. Unreal. It was like 20 or 30 bucks back then, and like 110 bucks today. Unreal.
Don't go crazy with the headsets. They're a good investment but you don't need the microphones or anything else. Just get a basic set and save yourself some money. A high decibel rating from a reputable company. Look on Amazon for the reviews.
Textbook example of why you need to be cautious of geniuses in their specialty field preaching in fields outside their specialty.
One of the academically smartest people I've ever personally known, simply seems to be missing the social intelligence processor.
Today, Holder testified before the Senate: "US Attorney General Eric Holder testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Capitol Hill today, and discussed the lack of criminal cases against financial institutions in the aftermath of the financial crisis." -- Forbes magazine online
Contrast this with Aaron Swartz. A soft target. It's unclear how much, if any, of a net cost he imposed with his illegal downloads of journal articles. "Illegal Downloads Of Journal Articles." It even sounds trivial. And they hounded him for it. To death. They presented the credible possibility of decades in jail to him.
But, as always, follow the money. Wall Streets spends a tremendous amount of money on federal politicians so they can keep running their swindles and funnel part of the proceeds back to Washington. Swartz was paying little if anything to the politicians as he was trying to provide information to the public at no personal gain.
To understand what's going on here, you have to understand politicians: "No one will really understand politics until they understand that politicians are not trying to solve our problems. They are trying to solve their own problems — of which getting elected and re-elected are number one and number two. Whatever is number three is far behind." -- Thomas Sowell
Actually, different ancient populations ate differently.
Inuits (Eskimos) eat an extremely high protein, high fat diet. Not much farming in the far north.
Nordic populations (Finns and Swedes for example) eat a diet different from Spaniards, who eat a diet different from sub-Saharan Africans who eat a diet different from southern Asians.
It seems to me that there isn't a one-size-fits-all solution to diet. One needs to understand one's genetic ancestry, and then using that as a guide, figure out what's best for that person. What might be too much protein for a vegetarian south Asian farmer might not be enough for a Finn or an Inuit hunter. What might be too much fat or carbohydrate for one population might not be enough for another.
With a small cube of C-4 on it, and a detonator, it could be a problem.
My certificate authority sends me nagging emails like 6 weeks before my certificate's about to expire. Microsoft's certificate authority group needs to create a database and automated emails when certificates get near expiration. Start emailing a bunch of folks. It's very simple. Probably most CA's have such a setup.
It's the difference between a tutorial and a reference.
A tutorial tells you how to do something. "How do I balance the wheel on this car?"
A reference simply describes the tools in detail. A reference will just describe the wrench, the weights, the balancing machine, the readouts on the balancing machine.
A tutorial walks you through how to do something. If you want to figure out how to do something, you go to a tutorial.
A reference describes the tools you use to do something. If you know have a very good idea of what you want to do, you go to a reference to get the detailed view of the tools you plan to use.
StackOverflow is an interactive tutorial. A lot of documentation is just a reference (and imperfect/incomplete ones at that).
Details on how to build the mosquito laser: From the IEEE Spectrum magazine
There's a device I've used with some success that works ONLY against bloodsuckers. It's called a "Mosquito Magnet".
Mosquitoes are attracted to things with blood. They apparently track their food by warmth, exhaled carbon dioxide, and a few other chemicals. This devices emits warmth, carbon dioxide and a few other chemicals in an attractant. The device is quite sensitive though. I've placed a battery driven model outside, under a small wooden table, to protect it from the elements. It definitely captures mosquitoes but sometimes it makes a difference, sometimes it doesn't. Mine is 5 years old. Last year it was... eh. Not as dramatic as year 1. I need to get it serviced this year I suppose.
Anyhoo, focusing on something like the mosquito's natural drives to attract them to a trap might be the Next Big Thing. Note that bug zappers don't attract mosquitos.
One way to do it - eliminate anonymous speech. Yes, there's a lot of vicious nastiness that internet tough guys and raging nerds say on the internet that they would never say in real life. But what about a whistleblower at a financial company? Or in a politician's office?
What happens if a citizen writes something unflattering about a politician and the politician decides to pursue a vendetta against the citizen? Politicians have a great deal of power to make that happen.
Anonymous speech is essential to lubricate the flow of information. It's something that leaders and marketplace gatekeepers have a hard time controlling. It undermines their authority and profit. Which is why we need it.