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User: reidconti

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  1. Re:"Affordable" on Elon Musk Announces $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Electric Car · · Score: 1

    What amazes me is that people are willing to put down deposits now and then wait 2-3 years for delivery.

    Yeah, I'm really kicking myself for that $1000 deposit. If only I had the financial acumen to put it in a 1.55% 24mo CD, it would be worth $31 more in 2 years. That's like a latte every 3 months! I could be really living high on the hog.

  2. Re:"mass market affordable car" on Elon Musk Announces $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Electric Car · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Yes, but that "average" includes a million pickup trucks, most of which are sold well over that average.

    The "average" price of a F-150 these days is in the mid $40's, with higher end models near $60K.

    I'm sorry, am I supposed to not understand how averages work, just because you live in Texas? I know y'all try to fuck up everyone else's textbooks, but the reason 35k is called an average is because some vehicles sell for more, and others sell for less. In particular, commercial vehicles damn well better cost more than average given the amount of tax writeoffs we're throwing at them. I'd sure hope they're providing more utility than a Nissan Versa. The least a lifted F-whatever with a gun rack and hay guard and brush guard and duallies and smokestack can do is haul a few hundred pounds of oilfield crap from the defunct jobsite.

    Yes, but I'm paying $1.50 a gallon, so who cares?

    The real problem is the lack of a SUV, that thing is WAY too small to be useful, at least in Texas.

    Yeah, we all know how impressed Texans are with themselves and their obsession with size. While ignoring the SUV Tesla just released last year.
    We know, it's too expensive for y'all. And by the way, you're dangerously close to "obviously troll" territory when you tout gas prices that have been in effect for, like, a month or two, and are far from a historical or recent average.

  3. Get rid of the piece of shit NetworkManager on Ask Slashdot: How Would You Fix the Linux Desktop? · · Score: 1

    If I have to touch another fucking server that this pile of shit software has decimated, I'm going to scream.

  4. Re:It's an Effing Toll Road on Texas Opens Fastest US Highway With 85 MPH Limit · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What, what an asshole move. Not only do you care so little about safety that you threaten to cause bodily harm to another driver because you *don't like the way they drive*, but you're perfectly fine with causing massive traffic jams. Have you ever noticed how most instances of really heavy (but rolling) traffic occur because there's some inconsiderate driver with no lane discipline, no ability to look in their mirrors, and a self-important outlook on their driving, who is holding up countless cars behind them by going slow in the left lane?

    Yeah, probably not. You wouldn't notice something like that.

  5. Re:Nothing new on Texas Opens Fastest US Highway With 85 MPH Limit · · Score: 2

    Sadly, we cannot drive until after we are capable of reproducing.

  6. Re:Nations and their mental defects on Texas Opens Fastest US Highway With 85 MPH Limit · · Score: 1

    You seem to be convinced that the proliferation of signs and rules on roadways makes them safer. Why is that?

  7. Re:There's nothing Darwin about it. on Texas Opens Fastest US Highway With 85 MPH Limit · · Score: 0

    I'm not sure I've *ever* seen evidence of two vehicles colliding on a freeway side-to-side. It's virtually 100% rear-ending.

  8. Re:Has anyone ever been there? on Is Phoenix the Next Silicon Valley? · · Score: 1

    Omaha's quite nice, actually! Beautiful downtown. I could be really happy there. Unlike Phoenix. But I'll stay in Silicon Valley until I have a reason to move.

  9. Re:I think everyone has already made up their mind on Mitt Romney To Announce VP Decision Via Smartphone App · · Score: 1

    No. I'm aware that she never said "I can see Russia from my house". I'm aware that she appealed to a certain segment of voters. I'm aware that many of the knocks against her were unfair and not based in reality.

    But she's still SOFAKING STUPID. I'm not sure what kind of kool-aid you have to drink to ignore this fact.

  10. Re:2007 Mac Mini couldn't be upgraded on Mac OS X Mountain Lion Gets Three Million Downloads In 4 Days · · Score: 1

    That is true, that apple has an incentive to make the new OS not work on old hardware. I have a 2006 Mac Pro (first model with Intel chips) that ran me ~$2800 back in August 2006. It's still chugging along great, doing my video transcoding work when I ask it to do so -- albeit not as quickly as a brand new machine, of course.

    I don't use it much anymore, but it still works fine, as does my Dell monitor I bought at the same time.

    The Mac Pro is not capable of running Mountain Lion. That's a bit of a bummer, as I like having all of my machines on the same OS. However, I don't use the system a lot, and Lion will work fine on it. It's 6 years old. I'm sure in another 2 years I'll stop using it entirely, but 8 years is a pretty good run.

  11. Re:Mac is the cheaper alternative on Mac OS X Mountain Lion Gets Three Million Downloads In 4 Days · · Score: 1

    Cygwin is also more Pile-Of-Shit compliant than OS X too. You are probably correct when it comes to proper behavior of Unix code; all I know is that, in day-to-day use, Cygwin sucks ass and has countless problems.

    And yes, I've used it on and off on the rare miserable occasions where I was not able to have a Linux or OS X system provided by my employer -- a couple of years in 06-07 standing out in my mind the most.

  12. Re:Mac is the cheaper alternative on Mac OS X Mountain Lion Gets Three Million Downloads In 4 Days · · Score: 1

    well then it also means that $cost for a Mac is change-between-the-couch-cushions trivial.

    Actually, I agree with that, in the sense that, when I need a new machine, I buy one without any deliberation.

    But it's NOT true in the sense that I can buy a new one every day.

  13. Re:Same as most everyone else on What's Keeping You On Windows? · · Score: 1

    2. Home. My wife has no interest in Apple, she thoroughly detests the single-button mouse. I explain that Apple computers can right-click now, but she's uninterested. And she uses a notebook, so a two-button touch pad is her 'need'. Since I am her primary tech support, I need to accomodate her platform of choice here also.

    I understand needing to accommodate her choices, but it's worth pointing out that there are no single-button mice or trackpads on Apple products anymore. The trackpad itself is the button, so two fingers is a right click. Same on the standard mice they distribute with desktops.

    I've got a new laptop with Lion and bought a magic trackpad for desktop use, I'm really loving the gestures.

    Carry on.

  14. Re:Software distribution culture, and Open Source on What's Keeping You On Windows? · · Score: 1

    Some Mac software is available in binary form in nice DMG images, and when it is, installation is a snap. But these images are still much less ubiquitous than Windows installers, and when they are not available, you're left typing "./configure; make" just like on Linux -- only now with less support.

    Um, basically anything you would run on OS X either has a Windows-style installer (in other words, utter shite) or as a drag-and-drop which is the way things USED to be more often in OS X. This also means delete the icon when you want to uninstall, and you're done. Sadly things are moving a bit more in the Windows installer direction, where you specifically need to run an UNinstaller to get rid of some applications.

    Anything you need to build on the command line is likely something you simply cannot get in Windows (without dealing with Cygwin or some such hack), so it counts in favor of OS X, not against it.

  15. Re:Outlook on What's Keeping You On Windows? · · Score: 1

    I'm sure there are features that are missing from Outlook for the Mac, but 99.9% of users would never notice. I sure as hell don't know what's missing.

    Microsoft Entourage was more hit-or-miss, but that's been around since at least 2004, and at least it let you sync with exchange.

  16. Re:Turbo Tax on What's Keeping You On Windows? · · Score: 1

    At least for my Mom, it's Turbo Tax. The DRM seems to make it impossible -- at least for her -- to install and in an emulator or virtual machine. There's other software that does the same thing and is more emulation friendly (or even Max or Linux compatible), and I think there's even a web version of TT, but she doesn't want to risk changing anything since she's responsible for all her siblings' and in-laws tax returns.

    Turbo Tax runs on OS X natively, and has for some time. I'm not sure if I'm misreading you here, and you're anti-Mac. But the fact that you mentioned other Mac/Linux compatible software leads me to believe you're open to OS X and just didn't realize TurboTax runs on it.

  17. Re:Switched back to Windows from Linux/OSX on What's Keeping You On Windows? · · Score: 1

    I'm sorry, how are WinSCP and Putty anything but the tools of absolute last resort? They're both, quite frankly, absolutely terrible. So is Cygwin. If you spend any time dealing with Unix, I don't see how a Mac isn't the better choice, unless you're also a corp IT person who needs to deal with Windows servers.

  18. Re:Mafia on Zynga To Employees: Surrender Pre-IPO Shares Or You're Fired · · Score: 1

    Because we like being paid for our skills, not for the skills of the average drone. Unionization is great if you're lazy and don't like working.

  19. Nothing; the Valley is very Mac-friendly. on What's Keeping You On Windows? · · Score: 1

    Last 2 jobs have bought me Macbook Pros. Most tech companies are Mac friendly these days. If they're not, you can usually still expense them. I'm not interested in being a sysadmin somewhere that things that Windows is an appropriate tool for the job of working with Unix systems -- it's simply not, it's a huge handicap.

    I haven't used Windows for work since 2006 when I had an ill-fated attempt at working for an accounting firm.

    At my current job, though, I have VMware Fusion with Windows 7, so that I can run one thing: VMware vSphere client. Funny that VMware is so intent on driving their customers into their competitor's arms (Microsoft).

    I don't find it necessary to re-hash why using OS X is so nice for working with Unix systems, or why I choose closed-source over open-source. That ship has sailed, I used Linux on the desktop from 1995 to 2002. It's not worth the effort to me; the cost of the Mac hardware is fairly trivial, and I'm not interested in the ideological arguments.

  20. Re:Timespan and other details on Massive Explosion On the Sun · · Score: 1

    It's not profitable to plan for rare events. It's profitable to plan for common events and let the insurance cover the catastrophes. The public interest be damned.

    As part of the public, I agree with this plan to not overspend to cover extremely rare contingencies.

    This is why I don't have hotspare houses on 3 different continents.

  21. Re:Oh, I laughed when I read this on Spam Text Prematurely Blows Up Suicide Bomber · · Score: 1

    no, it actually is, in fact, funny.

  22. Re:Yeah, this reminds me of Apple's other failed i on Apple Patent Hints at Net-Booting Cloud Strategy · · Score: 1

    They were dead when Apple stopped shipping systems with them. And they merely shifted the burden to the user who had to buy a USB floppy drive. So it went from standard to optional. Note how when I word it that way it turns into the more graceful method you think PC makers used.

  23. Re:timothy... on Unwise — Search History of Murder Methods · · Score: 1

    MAC address comes to mind, though of course it can be spoofed.

  24. Headline awfully slanted on this on Ballmer, Bezos Fund Effort To Undermine Bill Gates · · Score: 1

    It's not a "rich guys pay lots of money to fight other rich guys to avoid paying taxes" issue.

    It's an initiative created to implement, for the first time, a state income tax in a state that has fought hard many times against having one -- A state that has created alternate taxation schemes to make up for the 'lost' revenue over the years. But don't worry! It only applies to the rich! Bill Gates Senior would never tax 'normal' people! Unfortunately, 2 years after being implemented, the legislature can amend the tax rate any time they want with a simple majority vote.

  25. Re:Hmmmm on ACLU Sues To Protect Your Right To Swear · · Score: 3, Funny

    oh, well in that case... .... grow up.