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User: Chris+Mattern

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Comments · 7,102

  1. Ye gods, those legs on Japanese Astronaut Gets Designer "Space Suit" · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Maybe next time she can design a spacesuit for a human. It's been a long time since the fashion industry designed anything for actual human beings.

  2. Re:C-whatever on C Programming Language Back At Number 1 · · Score: 1

    Um, what? No. All those languages are, in fact, OLDER than C.

  3. Re:TIOBE methodology is so flawed it's pointless on C Programming Language Back At Number 1 · · Score: 1

    Actually, it probably just reflects that "C" is Citi's New York Stock Exchange ticker symbol.

  4. Re:Penny-arcade already covered this. on Star Wars To Air As Animated Sitcom · · Score: 3, Insightful

    In fact, they covered it in more general terms some five and half years ago.

  5. Re:Tariffs are a comin'.... on Net Neutrality Suffers Major Setback · · Score: 1

    You stated that Moore's Law takes place in a hyper-regulated market. If that's not what you meant to say, you should have reviewed what you said more carefully.

  6. Re:Tariffs are a comin'.... on Net Neutrality Suffers Major Setback · · Score: 1

    Moore's Law applies to microchips. Not what I would call "a hyper-regulated market." In fact, it's one of the least regulated markets in the US. Funny how they get all the innovation, no?

  7. How bad it is depends on how they're implementing on Scrabble To Allow Proper Nouns · · Score: 1

    It's not terribly clear from the article. If you are still limited to words in your dictionary of reference, then it's not that bad. If your dictionary is not the final arbiter now, then its horrible, because then you can no longer definitively determine if a word is allowed or not, which makes playing the game seriously basically impossible.

  8. Re:Sigh on Scrabble To Allow Proper Nouns · · Score: 1

    Maybe next we can have Jeopardy change to multiple choice.

    I believe it was called "Who Want to Be a Millionaire?"

  9. Re:Keep in mind... on DoD Report On 32 "Nuclear Accidents" · · Score: 1

    You don't understand. It's not enough that the explosive in the trigger explode. They have to explode exactly right, with microsecond precision. Otherwise, they won't force the pit to critical mass correctly and no big boom. By this point, I would expect them to have deteriorated to the point where there's no chance of a nuclear explosion any more.

  10. Re:So, what now? on What the Top US Companies Pay In Taxes · · Score: 1

    I don't know what the situation is in the US, but most tax systems go to a lot of trouble to ensure that dividends aren't taxed twice.

    The situation in the US is that dividends get no protection at all from being taxed twice. Corporations pay taxes on their profits, with no deduction for dividends paid, and then those receiving the dividends must pay income taxes on them like any other income.

  11. Falco? on Navy Wants Cyber Weapons That Shoot Data Beams · · Score: 1

    Falco went on to explain that the data beams would be fitted to their Arwings, enabling him, Fox, Peppy and Slippy to defeat Andross.

  12. Re:Filtering.. on Finland To Try Scanning Snail Mail · · Score: 1

    Couldn't do that in the US. A carrier could be fired or even criminally prosecuted if he deliberately failed to deliver a piece of mail legally posted to you. It's called "interfering with the mail" and it's a Federal felony.

  13. Re:V-Mail (victory mail) on Finland To Try Scanning Snail Mail · · Score: 1

    Especially if you want them to be really private.

    There was no privacy in V-Mail, of course. It was wartime, and you were writing to troops in the field (or they were writing to you). Every V-Mail was read and censored before being microfilmed; everybody was very aware this was the case.

  14. Re:V-Mail (victory mail) on Finland To Try Scanning Snail Mail · · Score: 1

    film negatives are really a pain in the ass to deal with for this purpose.

    Not so bad when you're set up to process it in bulk. The recipient never got the microfilm negative, of course; he got a print of the image produced by the V-Mail facility. The size was still reduced by 60%, though.

  15. Re:So Many Questions on Gaming in the 4th Dimension · · Score: 1

    Two circles on a piece of paper cannot physically merge with each other if you assume their boundaries are solid and cannot pass through each other. Neither can 2 rings lain on a table, or two cylinders or two spheres be overlapped without breaking them somewhere. /blockquote.

    Correct--but if you're seeing the spheres/rings/cylinders in a two-dimension projection, they can *appear* to be passing through each other, but in fact are not, because they are separated in the third dimension that you're not seeing. The same thing can apply if you are seeing 4-D objects in a 3-D projection.

  16. Re:Um..no on James Lovelock Suggests Suspending Democracy To Save the World · · Score: 1

    But Lovelock is right. There are certain sorts of problems that democracies can't really deal with.

    The problem is, the record shows that this problem is one that dictatorships are *even worse* at.

  17. Yeah, that'll work. on James Lovelock Suggests Suspending Democracy To Save the World · · Score: 2, Insightful
  18. Re:That's fine on Solaris No Longer Free As In Beer · · Score: 1

    Many, perhaps even most, licenses include termination clauses.

    Well, yeah, but they deal with the *licensee* terminating the license, and/or outline limited cases where the licenser may terminate. Very few licenses allow the licenser to terminate the license without cause.

  19. Re:Why they tell you to turn off your phone... on Do Car Safety Problems Come From Outer Space? · · Score: 1

    According to the table the OP posted, it's an alpha decay, which means it decays into mercury-200, which is stable. It appears to be unsure if that's the only kind of decay it undergoes; given the half-life, they probably only have a handful of observed events to squeeze data from.

  20. Re:Why they tell you to turn off your phone... on Do Car Safety Problems Come From Outer Space? · · Score: 1

    I'm not sure why, but it lists a half life for lead-204 even though I thought it was supposed to be stable.

    I would guess that they list a half-life for lead-204 because it has one. Given that that half-life is listed as *over* 140 quadrillion years, it can certainly be considered stable for all practical purposes.

  21. Too late... on Nvidia's GF100 Turns Into GeForce GTX 480 and 470 · · Score: 1

    Just bought a new gaming rig and went with ATI because nVidia didn't have a DX11 card. Probably would've gone with ATI anyways, but not supporting DX11 just put nVidia right out of the running.

  22. Re:Adobe was removed 3 years ago on New Malware Overwrites Software Updaters · · Score: 2, Funny

    I have never seen a fake Linux dialog. I've had my browser in Linux display fake *Windows* dialogs. They tend to be fairly...obvious.

  23. Re:CD-Key on GameStop Sued Over Lack of DLC For Used Games · · Score: 4, Insightful

    No, it's not the same at all. The StarCraft second-hand purchaser is only denied his online play if the seller commits fraud. The XBox 360 second-hand purchaser cannot, under any circumstances, get online play without paying the game publisher a second time for the same thing. Those are two completely different situations.

  24. Re:On the other hand... on IE8, Safari, iPhone All Fall At Pwn2Own Contest · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Software Engineering is an engineering discipline. That means the principles according to which the product should work are always tempered by the reality of how the work must be conducted.

    Wow. Just wow. You realize that in any engineering discipline other than software "engineering", that attitude could quite literally leave you facing charges of criminal negligence in court? You follow best practices, you use the established procedures to avoid failure, you *do the work that has to be done* or you are legally liable when it fails.

  25. Re:wow. they *exist* on How the TSA Plans On Inspecting Your Monkey · · Score: 1

    Dogs have, through extensive breeding, been modified from the original wild template far more than cats have. Both physically and psychologically.