Can you make any comments on what happens when the signal quality of the OTA digital broadcasts drops? With analogue broadcasts, the picture goes fuzzy, and when it gets really bad, the audio gets staticky, but the signal can degrade a very long way before a tv show becomes fuzzy. My worry with poor reception is that digital television shows will just drop out for short periods of time, which I find much more distracting. Like if, say, the punchline in a joke gets lost due to atmospheric interference.
I've met many individual American people. They have almost universally been friendly, kind, intelligent, and really, indistinguishable from my fellow Canadians apart from their opinions on health care.
I constantly wonder how a government that is supposed to represent those people can end up sending its poor overseas to fight and die protecting the interests of oil companies. Or any of the other crazy shit your president signs into law.
Don't worry, Americans. The rest of the world doesn't dislike you as individuals. In fact, if you want out, consider moving up north. I welcome any of you that want to flee a sinking ship.
Okay, so this system would allow the cops to stop speeders, if that's the goal. They're never going to sell it to their customers if that's the case. The only way to sell it would be as a theft-prevention device. How is this any more effective than having that little fob on your keychain which tells the car it's okay to start? The car is basically looking for an electronic signal which states it's okay to keep working. Thieves can already bypass that system. You think they're not going to notice a big OnStar box in the car, and take steps to disable that as well?
There's already a comment in this discussion which states that OnStar (in one particular guy's vehicle) can be completely disabled by pulling a fuse. Sounds awfully tough.
One can still be a fan of the story, poetry, and prose, while finding them difficult to read. I agree with the AC, it takes much more effort to read something that is rife with spelling or grammatical errors.
Well, given that the ballots should be very predictable (since they're machine generated), you'll get the benefits of fewer spoiled ballots, and it should be relatively easy to design a machine reader to count the votes (like scantron cards) rapidly. Are there other benefits that e-voting is supposed to have?
Except that machine-printed ballots will not be subjected to such problems as hanging chads, partially filled circles, or multiple boxes checked.
Additionally, since you are not limited to a single piece of paper on which to display all information, it should be possible to make the UI much more user-friendly. As I understand it, on US ballots, there are often multiple selections that need to be made at one time. With electronic voting, each electoral race (President, Police Chief, Congressman, etc) could be presented on a single screen, so you don't end up accidentally selecting a potential Congressman for Police Chief.
Apparently, this is not something new for good ole JT. He's been cautioned before about including pornography in his filings. From the article:
... this isn't the first time Thompson has been warned by a court not to include suggestive photos in those case filings. An April 12th entry in the Florida Supreme Court docket covering the Florida Bar's case against Thompson includes this notation:
...the Court notes that [Thompson] has attached inappropriate and pornographic materials to his petitions that are irrelevant to his arguments. Respondent is warned that should he continue to submit such inappropriate filings, the Court will consider imposing sanctions which may include, but are not limited to, a limitation on Respondent's ability to submit further filings without the signature of an attorney other than himself.
I'm kind of disappointed. I want him to come up with some new tricks to amuse me.
I originally thought that as well, but the blob on the tether is in orbit at the same time as the spaceship. You still have to impart some delta-vee to start the capsule moving away from the spaceship. Things can't just be "lowered" from orbit. I assume they're giving this ball a shove out the door to start it on its way down, and just using the tether to control it for the first 30km. Same thing could be done without the tether, and you'd have a less controlled release.
Maybe that's the point. The ball hanging at the end of a 30km tether will fall in a well-defined location, whereas if it were just shoved, it would not (a small difference in shove speed could make it end up on the far side of the world).
Technically, to lower it down enough that it was no longer travelling at orbital velocity, at which point the tether would be released, and the capsule would fall through the atmosphere before a parachute opened up.
Given that LEO is at least 200km, the object would still be at 170km when released, and would have to survive the entire brunt of the re-entry problems. I'm not sure how lowering something on a tether is more economical/effective than using thrust to de-orbit, though.
Do you really think that you could get even the real estate for a 6-lane highway between the airport and the centre of Munich for the measly price of $1.2B? There are houses in downtown Toronto on lots 12ftx25ft that cost over a million dollars.
It's more than just 10 minutes difference, though. With a single track and a single train, the maglev can make the round-trip in 20 minutes. Say 2.5 minutes on either end for loading/unloading, and you'd never wait at the airport for more than 25 minutes for your train. With a single conventional train, it's possible that you could wait for as much as 45 minutes. Add the travel times, and you're looking at a difference between a trip taking 10-35 minutes, and one taking 20-65 minutes. Yes, multiple tracks and trains could alleviate the problem, but then you're increasing the cost of the conventional rail system, as well as the complexity.
In Canada, at least, tresspass at night is an indictable offense. That means that if someone is tresspassing on your property (or on property that you were charged to protect) after sunset and before sunrise, you are allowed to place them under citizen's arrest, and hold them until you can hand them over to an officer of the law. As part of placing & holding someone under citizen's arrest, you are allowed to use reasonable force to detain them if they try to resist or escape.
If it's not nighttime, then tresspass is just a summary offense, and a citizen is not allowed to make an arrest in that case.
Pray tell, then, what does one have to do to qualify as a documentarian? Tell the truth? Can you point out the parts in his movie where he doesn't tell the truth? Be unbiased? Can you point me to a single documentary that does not contain any editorial bias? Can you point me to anything published ever that does not contain any bias?
Michael Moore is a documentarian. He creates documentaries. His documentaries have a very strong left wing bias. The trick is in recognizing this factor, and judging his films accordingly.
That said, I have to agree with the grandparent poster. The US medical system is scary. The fact that it is possible to have to go into Bankruptcy because of a medical condition scares the fuck out of me. I'm with Moore's relatives. I would not set foot into the US without additional medical insurance. In fact, for the most part, I've been steering clear of the US as much as possible. Ever since that whole right of Habeas Corpus was suspended.
I'd tell you, but I'm assuming you're from the States, and as I'm a Canadian, I really don't want to be dragged into the WTO courts until there's some precedent set.
The BMI also becomes very unreasonable for anyone who is short or tall. I'm 6'3", 215lbs. According to the BMI, I'm overweight. Check out this pictoral representation of people who are different heights & weights.
No, it would be considered a trade secret. Applying for a copyright would protect any software maker should the source code be leaked to the public prior to the end of the copyright term, but they should never be under any obligation to release that source code.
If I write a diary and get it notarized, I have a copyright on that work. I'm under no obligation to show my diary to the general public at all. However, because I have a copyright, if someone steals my diary and makes thousands of prints, which he sells for $50 apiece (I write very juicy stories in my diary), then I can depend on copyright laws to protect me. Is that a decent analogy?
I don't know that your objections are entirely accurate. Google runs thousands of parallel servers, and must manage the load-balancing between those servers. They have to maintain zero downtime when individual servers require maintenance. They must have plans in place to mitigate the issues that arise when a backhoe digs up a fibre-optic line. Surely the things that they have learned here can be applicable to a power distribution network?
From a pure mathematics point of view, the two systems are probably almost identical: an interconnected network with a collection of providers and consumers.
Unfortunately, with the ability to turn the torso after the movement phase, if the other mech has any armaments on it's arms, you'll be unable to avoid defensive fire. I tried one like that, and closing with the other mech was also a real bitch. I got chewed to pieces before I could get in range.
Slashdot Mirror
Can you make any comments on what happens when the signal quality of the OTA digital broadcasts drops? With analogue broadcasts, the picture goes fuzzy, and when it gets really bad, the audio gets staticky, but the signal can degrade a very long way before a tv show becomes fuzzy. My worry with poor reception is that digital television shows will just drop out for short periods of time, which I find much more distracting. Like if, say, the punchline in a joke gets lost due to atmospheric interference.
I've met many individual American people. They have almost universally been friendly, kind, intelligent, and really, indistinguishable from my fellow Canadians apart from their opinions on health care.
I constantly wonder how a government that is supposed to represent those people can end up sending its poor overseas to fight and die protecting the interests of oil companies. Or any of the other crazy shit your president signs into law.
Don't worry, Americans. The rest of the world doesn't dislike you as individuals. In fact, if you want out, consider moving up north. I welcome any of you that want to flee a sinking ship.
Okay, so this system would allow the cops to stop speeders, if that's the goal. They're never going to sell it to their customers if that's the case. The only way to sell it would be as a theft-prevention device. How is this any more effective than having that little fob on your keychain which tells the car it's okay to start? The car is basically looking for an electronic signal which states it's okay to keep working. Thieves can already bypass that system. You think they're not going to notice a big OnStar box in the car, and take steps to disable that as well?
There's already a comment in this discussion which states that OnStar (in one particular guy's vehicle) can be completely disabled by pulling a fuse. Sounds awfully tough.
Strap four M-class solid rocket boosters to a filing cabinet and I can pretty much guarantee it will "fly." For certain values of "flying," that is.
One can still be a fan of the story, poetry, and prose, while finding them difficult to read. I agree with the AC, it takes much more effort to read something that is rife with spelling or grammatical errors.
No, men resort to porn because they are too lazy or socially inept to find a woman to interact with. Oh, wait, you meant starring in porn . . .
Well, given that the ballots should be very predictable (since they're machine generated), you'll get the benefits of fewer spoiled ballots, and it should be relatively easy to design a machine reader to count the votes (like scantron cards) rapidly. Are there other benefits that e-voting is supposed to have?
Except that machine-printed ballots will not be subjected to such problems as hanging chads, partially filled circles, or multiple boxes checked.
Additionally, since you are not limited to a single piece of paper on which to display all information, it should be possible to make the UI much more user-friendly. As I understand it, on US ballots, there are often multiple selections that need to be made at one time. With electronic voting, each electoral race (President, Police Chief, Congressman, etc) could be presented on a single screen, so you don't end up accidentally selecting a potential Congressman for Police Chief.
It'll all work out as long as the Pope hasn't built a giant open shaft down to the reactor core in the middle of St. Peters.
/me nods sagely and returns to his library to re-read Neutron Star.
Yeah, I can see how that would require less energy than just imparting delta-vee. Thanks.
I originally thought that as well, but the blob on the tether is in orbit at the same time as the spaceship. You still have to impart some delta-vee to start the capsule moving away from the spaceship. Things can't just be "lowered" from orbit. I assume they're giving this ball a shove out the door to start it on its way down, and just using the tether to control it for the first 30km. Same thing could be done without the tether, and you'd have a less controlled release.
Maybe that's the point. The ball hanging at the end of a 30km tether will fall in a well-defined location, whereas if it were just shoved, it would not (a small difference in shove speed could make it end up on the far side of the world).
Technically, to lower it down enough that it was no longer travelling at orbital velocity, at which point the tether would be released, and the capsule would fall through the atmosphere before a parachute opened up.
Given that LEO is at least 200km, the object would still be at 170km when released, and would have to survive the entire brunt of the re-entry problems. I'm not sure how lowering something on a tether is more economical/effective than using thrust to de-orbit, though.
Do you really think that you could get even the real estate for a 6-lane highway between the airport and the centre of Munich for the measly price of $1.2B? There are houses in downtown Toronto on lots 12ftx25ft that cost over a million dollars.
It's more than just 10 minutes difference, though. With a single track and a single train, the maglev can make the round-trip in 20 minutes. Say 2.5 minutes on either end for loading/unloading, and you'd never wait at the airport for more than 25 minutes for your train. With a single conventional train, it's possible that you could wait for as much as 45 minutes. Add the travel times, and you're looking at a difference between a trip taking 10-35 minutes, and one taking 20-65 minutes. Yes, multiple tracks and trains could alleviate the problem, but then you're increasing the cost of the conventional rail system, as well as the complexity.
In Canada, at least, tresspass at night is an indictable offense. That means that if someone is tresspassing on your property (or on property that you were charged to protect) after sunset and before sunrise, you are allowed to place them under citizen's arrest, and hold them until you can hand them over to an officer of the law. As part of placing & holding someone under citizen's arrest, you are allowed to use reasonable force to detain them if they try to resist or escape.
If it's not nighttime, then tresspass is just a summary offense, and a citizen is not allowed to make an arrest in that case.
Exactly. Thank you. Being a propagandist makes him no less of a documentarian.
Pray tell, then, what does one have to do to qualify as a documentarian? Tell the truth? Can you point out the parts in his movie where he doesn't tell the truth? Be unbiased? Can you point me to a single documentary that does not contain any editorial bias? Can you point me to anything published ever that does not contain any bias?
Michael Moore is a documentarian. He creates documentaries. His documentaries have a very strong left wing bias. The trick is in recognizing this factor, and judging his films accordingly.
That said, I have to agree with the grandparent poster. The US medical system is scary. The fact that it is possible to have to go into Bankruptcy because of a medical condition scares the fuck out of me. I'm with Moore's relatives. I would not set foot into the US without additional medical insurance. In fact, for the most part, I've been steering clear of the US as much as possible. Ever since that whole right of Habeas Corpus was suspended.
I'd tell you, but I'm assuming you're from the States, and as I'm a Canadian, I really don't want to be dragged into the WTO courts until there's some precedent set.
Just wait until you get the bill for downloading you electronic bill to your iPhone. I sure hope you went with the unlimited data plan!
The BMI also becomes very unreasonable for anyone who is short or tall. I'm 6'3", 215lbs. According to the BMI, I'm overweight. Check out this pictoral representation of people who are different heights & weights.
t .shtml
http://www.cockeyed.com/photos/bodies/heightweigh
Look at the dude who is 6'3", 210lbs. Does he look overweight? Hell, check out the guy that's 6'3", 250lbs. He's officially obese!
I'd much rather have a nuclear power plant built in my back yard than a pollution-belching coal-fired generation plant. How about you?
No, it would be considered a trade secret. Applying for a copyright would protect any software maker should the source code be leaked to the public prior to the end of the copyright term, but they should never be under any obligation to release that source code.
If I write a diary and get it notarized, I have a copyright on that work. I'm under no obligation to show my diary to the general public at all. However, because I have a copyright, if someone steals my diary and makes thousands of prints, which he sells for $50 apiece (I write very juicy stories in my diary), then I can depend on copyright laws to protect me. Is that a decent analogy?
I don't know that your objections are entirely accurate. Google runs thousands of parallel servers, and must manage the load-balancing between those servers. They have to maintain zero downtime when individual servers require maintenance. They must have plans in place to mitigate the issues that arise when a backhoe digs up a fibre-optic line. Surely the things that they have learned here can be applicable to a power distribution network?
From a pure mathematics point of view, the two systems are probably almost identical: an interconnected network with a collection of providers and consumers.
Unfortunately, with the ability to turn the torso after the movement phase, if the other mech has any armaments on it's arms, you'll be unable to avoid defensive fire. I tried one like that, and closing with the other mech was also a real bitch. I got chewed to pieces before I could get in range.