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User: smoore

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  1. Re:Your biggest screw up on "We Screwed Up," Says Reddit CEO In Formal Apology · · Score: 1

    > administrators hate their own userbase.

    The only people who caused me a problem were the mods, not the admins. Mods closed subreddits not admins. Had the mods not thrown a tantrum I would never had even noticed this person was fired.

  2. Bees? on Scientists Look For Patterns In North Carolina Shark Attacks · · Score: 1

    The word bees isn't even in the article linked.

  3. Re:Disarmamant? on How Nuclear Weapon Modernization Undercuts Disarmament · · Score: 4, Interesting

    India developed their nukes because of China not Pakistan. China is the only country with more potential soldiers than India and after several wars in the 60s where Chinese swamped the Indians with numbers they looked for an equalizer. Pakistan then followed India for the same reason to equalize their lesser forces with India's. India isn't going to disarm unless China does.

  4. Re:Erh... I don't get it on What Northern Hemisphere Astronomers Are Missing From the Southern Hemisphere · · Score: 1

    It was a balmy 70 something here yesterday too. You don't need summer time to have warm temperatures in North Florida.

  5. Won't make a differnece on Life Insurance Restrictions For Space Tourists · · Score: 1

    If I have the 20 million dollars it costs to be a space tourist in first place the increase in life insurance premiums is irrelevant. Even if I have the $250,000 sitting around to blow on a one time vacation they claim the price might come down to life insurance costs are not going to stop me from going.

  6. Re:Who would have guessed? on Harvard Study Links Neonicotinoid Pesticide To Colony Collapse Disorder · · Score: 5, Insightful

    they could increase the number of beehives by a factor of ten?

    Clearly you are not a beekeeper. I am. There are many limiting factors in increasing the number of hives maintained. The shear amount of work and time it takes you to maintain the hives becomes unmanageable. Hiring employees isn't as easy as it is with other profession, for some reason lots of people won't take a job where they wear a sealed up thick hot suit in the blazing sun all day because its the better choice than getting stung by the insects you are working with.

    You also need the physical space for the hives in a place where there is enough forage for the bees to feed on. Increasing by a factor of 10 isn't just adding 10 new hives to one location for every one already there, its finding new sites in rural areas a significant distance from the sites you already have (bees typically fly up to 3 miles). Having new sites vastly increases the amount of time it takes to maintain the hives since a lot of travel time is added in addition to the extra management. While backyard beekeepers can keep a few hives and no one notices, 10+ in a single location means you need to start looking for places with acreage isolated from the public.

    On top of that the equipment has to purchased, built, painted and carted to the new areas (you can hire for this part thankfully). The existing hives have to be split in a responsible manner that leaves the parent hive strong enough to survive, getting 3-4 new hives out of 1 every year is more than is usually practical 10 is ridiculous. Doing one split in spring (going from 1 hive to 2) is common, maybe a second split in late spring or fall if the hive is strong.

    Then you have to add in the winter losses. Losing 25%-30% of your hives over winter is not uncommon or too far out of the norm. The more you split the weaker the hives will be and the fewer that might make it through the winter.

    Once you have planned out all that you need the money to do it. Having a few hives for a hobby is nice, having dozens if not hundreds is a business. In order to support the capital investment in equipment, workers and bees you need pollination contracts (thats what makes beekeepers money, honey is a sideline). Which means you need farmers planting crops that they need bees to pollinate. Of the top crops in America (Corn, Soybeans, Hay, Wheat, Cotton ,Sorghum, Rice) only soybeans and cotton produce the nectar to feed bees. Putting bees in typical American wheat field is putting them in a food desert, they will starve. And while bees will pollinate soybeans and cotton the farmers don't need them pollinated so aren't going to pay you to put bees there. Our monoculture farming practices, and the crops we produce limits the locations you can keep bees and have some one pay you to do so. When the monoculture crop is done flowering you have to move the bees because the monoculture farming practices means as soon as a bee friendly crop is done blooming the area is a food desert again.

  7. Its the law on Are DVDs Inconvenient On Purpose? · · Score: 1

    >Specifically: Why do movie studios allow Netflix to send out DVDs to their subscribers by mail, but not to allow the same option in the form of "virtual DVDs" that you could "check out" through their website, and stream them while they're checked out to you?

    Its the First Sale Doctrine. Once Netflix has purchased the physical medium of a DVD the movie studio has no control over what they do with it. With digital formats however Netflix never actually owns medium, they are just granted a license to use it and the studios maintain control by changing the license as they see fit. The studios would love to stop the use of First Sale and the subsequent mailing of DVDs, its just that that right goes back to printed books and was well established before digital medium existed. The model of licensing movies they way they do provides them with much more control and profit than a mimicry of physical medium check out system.

  8. Re:Can't Stand on 5-Year Mission Continues After 45-Year Hiatus · · Score: 1

    The sets were faithfully recreated from the original plans. No CGI involved except in a few scenes where the set wasn't finished and they CGIed in the end of a corridor. They are located in Kingsland, GA. Vic told us at Dragoncon that they should be available for tours starting next year.

  9. Is not April 1st on Come Try Out Slashdot's New Design (In Beta) · · Score: 1

    April fools days in a few months away. Your supposed to hold stuff like this for then when we will appreciate it as a joke.

  10. Re:every time i see "Ender's Game" on Ender's Game Trailer Released · · Score: 1

    Because its possible that hollywood would leave out that scene (or more specifically the punchline) feeling its too edgy to have a kid do that. By showing it they have at least alleviated some fears of them totally remaking the story in hollywoods image.

  11. Re:IMAP on Ask Slashdot: Best Way To Archive and Access Ancient Emails? · · Score: 1

    Real easy, I remember that email with the friends address who moved away a few years ago was in the 2009 folder, or was it the 2008? or the 2010 folder?

  12. Just find the right place to use it. on To Open Source Obama's Get-Out-the-Vote Code Or Not? · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I know for a fact the Republican Party of Florida has similar a software/database setup that is constantly tweaked, maintained and used. There are too many elections between Presidential ones to let it go to waste. The DNC just needs to sell it to the state party offices to keep it useful.

  13. Old reliable tools on Ask Slashdot: What Tech For a Sailing Ship? · · Score: 2

    A sextant, a clock, a compass, a nautical almanac and paper charts more advanced technology than that will fail you when you need it most.

  14. Don't they lock those things? on Let the Campaign Edit Wars Begin · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Why hasn't it been reverted to the preannouncment page and locked for editing with the addition of "prospective VP candidate for the Republican party? Seems like the best and only proper solution.

  15. what better qualifications could there possibly be on Earth, Night Glow, Aurora and Atmosphere (Video) · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Better qualifications would be Test Pilot like they were originally. Part of our problem with risk aversion in the space program is we are sending guys with PhDs up to take snapshots and run experiments for high school kids. Then we tell tourists its too dangerous for them to go up there. Which is it? Safe for a academics or dangerous?

  16. If I were empress (or emporer) of the Universe on Sci-fi Writer Elizabeth Moon Believes Everyone Should Be Chipped · · Score: 1

    She starts with "If I were empress of the Universe" which is an important part of her statement. There would be a lot of things I and anyone else who wanted to stay the absolute ruler of the universe would do to secure power, and make things run smoothly with little disregard for the desires of the lowly "people" that wouldn't be viable in today's society. She didn't advocate chipping everyone now, just when she rules the universe.

  17. Re:Very vague terms on Decent Book Clubs for Sci-Fi Fans? · · Score: 1

    Of the last 9 books I purchased from them all ranged from 13.99 to 17.99. with a SH of 3.99 for 1 book and 6.48 for 2. Thats about 1 year of purchases. These prices are pretty consistant. New stuff is available as well as older stuff, and often special reprints of older stuff.

    New:
    In the Court of Crimson kings by Stirling
    Into the looking glass by Ringo
    Victory Conditions by Moon
    Galactic Empires (Anthology)
    Vorpal Blade by Ringo
    Dragon Harper by Mccffery
    1634: The Baltic War by Weber and Flint
    Fatal Revenant by Donaldson

    Reprints/collections
    The Earthsea trilogy by Le guin
    Only Begotton daughter by Marrow
    The Complete Hammers slammers I and I by Drake

  18. Re:I have, and I only want to visit it occasionaly on An Enlightened Look at an Over-Lighted World · · Score: 1
    I don't know how your watch runs but the Naval Observatory gives this data for Seattle on Dec 21, the shortest day of the year.

    Begin civil twilight 7:19 a.m.
    Sunrise 7:55 a.m.
    Sunset 4:20 p.m.
    End civil twilight 4:56 p.m.

    All times PST.

    There is no way its dark at 9am. The sun has been up for an hour and twilight (when you can see although the sun isnt visible) started 1:41. Yea its dark at 5pm. Thats what you have headlights for. Its safer for you to use your headlights that great big lights blasting down causing glare and mixing light and shadow areas. In fact without all the lights the stars and moon provide enough light to see by on clear nights. I do it all the time on the way to the observatory. My biggest problem with the headlights off? The light coming off my digital odometer and radio shining in my eyes blinding me. No I can't drive safely at 70mph with no lights and the headlights off. But one or the other will suffice we don't need both.

    Why does work have to go on in the daylight? Are you a farmer that plows by hand still? What does it matter if its dark or light for the 8 hours your in the cubucle with no windows?

    Most of us astronomers, who don't fall into your burn the cities down category dont want all the lights turned off. Just built correctly. Properly shielded so they aim down not up. Put on timers or sensors so they are on only when needed (ever drive by a car dealership at 3am? Does it need to look like daylight?) Sensible rational lighting aimed where it needs to be is much better, safer and cheaper than football stadium like lighting blasting all over the place.

    See The Dark Sky institute for more information on good lighting. Shawn

  19. Re:Rerun... on Leonid Meteor Shower 2002 · · Score: 1

    Last year was also more important because the moon didnt wash out the shower as it will this year.

  20. Re:There's a Hurricaine on UUNET/WorldCom Backbone Diffiiculties · · Score: 1

    I'm in the southern portion of the US, Tallahasse, FL, blue sky scattered white fluffy clouds. No Hurricane. In fact there is a big High pressure center sitting over most of the south. The Souths a big place, Hurricanes arnt that big.

  21. Re:Is there a resource page? on Aurora Season Begins · · Score: 3, Informative

    Try signing up for AstroAlert at http://skyandtelescope.com/observing/proamcollab/a stroalert/article_332_1.asp. They send out email when there is solar activity that may trigger an aurora (usually 24-48 hrs in adavnce of the possible aurora). The cover best viewing times, and apr southern limit of the viewing. Great for people who don't live in Florida like I do.

    Sightings of Aurora should go to http://solar.spacew.com/www/auroras.html

  22. Re:FYI on Mushrooms And Geiger Counters · · Score: 1

    Actually it means both gramdmother and type of head scarf, depending on how you stree the word. The grandmother meaning has stres at the beginning, and scarf on the "ush" syllable.

  23. Wrote my own on Internet Book Database? · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Wrote my own Mysql/PHP. Not very good just enough to keep track of them. http://www.teuse.net/books

  24. Re:No good show on Coming Soon: Comet Ikeya-Zhang · · Score: 3, Informative

    I've been looking for this comet for about weeks now (starting 1 week after discovery) and have yet to see it in my 6" scope. Its just barley at the limit for visual observations (without a telescope or binoculars) at a dark site (mag 6.8) and really low in the sky. You have to wait for the sun to go down and then you get about an hour max to find it. My numbers for today say the sun sets and the glow is gone by 19:50 EST and the comet sets at 21:07 EST. Even then if you have any light on your horizen (light a city to your west) the comet will be in the glow and washed out. The moon has been an issue too. Over the last weekend it was in the same area of the sky as the comet and washed it out. They are predicting it will get brighter but it is also getting closer to the sun as it does, so your viewing time shortens.

  25. Re:Satellite sightings?? in Athens, GA on First-hand Account Of The Leonid Shower · · Score: 1

    Check out http://www.heavens-above.com. They calculate satillite pass predictions for any location and you can go back to figure out what you saw. I saw 3 down here in Florida that night, and one flared quite brightly almost directly overhead. It was a nice added bonus to the Leonids.