Probably not. Isn't Dark Matter supposed to account for something along 90+% of the 'missing' mass of the universe?
Although, how did they get that figure (or whatever the real figure is) at all? It's not like we can point to a spot in the sky and say the universe ends there. So how do they (they being the astronomers and astrophysicists) know how much mass is missing? (Sounds like I really need to pick up that book by Hawking...)
Two words: gravitational lensing...
Ok, imagine for a second that you're looking at a distant galaxy. Since matter bends light, you get an image of it from one angle. Now, suppose you look for galaxies at an angle just slightly different from the first angle. You see a galaxy. Upon inspection, it looks eerily like the first galaxy... in fact, neighboring galaxies seem to have 'clones' like the first galaxy too! What is going on?!?
What's happening is you're experiencing a 'lensing' effect by some matter that you can't see, allowing you to see one galaxy from many different angles. You plug the numbers into your computer model of the universe, try to figure out how much matter would produce said effect, (by laws of general relativity), and lo and behold, you get this figure for large amounts of invisible matter!
Now, what I'm interested in is how many galaxies have 'eaten' all their surrounding dust. If there was any dust, the black hole would compress it to unimaginable degrees as it drew said dust in, producing x-rays of incredible magnitude... some of the brightest/most energy-producing objects in the universe are thought to be such super-holes. So, either those billions of black holes have mostly 'evaporated', (see another poster's explanation of the process), or they have sucked up all nearby gasses/dust... this discovery is going to produce some interesting fodder for the cosmologists. (and no, a cosmologist doesn't worry about makeup, guys, and the modeling careers of universes. Well, maybe some of them do, but that's not their job;)
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
for an exercise in turnabout is fair play, look at this Wired article about the idea of a Transparent Society. For instance, which washing-machine makers don't also produce weapons, or play fast and loose w/ environmental laws? If the Corps released transcripts of board meetings and information about affiliate/subsidiary companies, people could find out and adjust their buying habits accordingly. But ask any CEO if he wants people listening in on his meetings, or reading his mail, he'll say "Hell No!"
Why do the rich and powerful deserve more privacy than I have? Our current Gov. knows more about each of its citizens than any repressive 19th century leaders did, but since they are held accountable through representative democracy and the Freedom of Information act, we have the highest degree of freedom of any known society. So make the system fair. If Corporations want to invade our privacy, make them face the same.
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
My god, what have they done to tux! I mean, he's naked! If we allow this, soon they'll be tons of naked toons out there! At least the old Warner Brother's cartoons wore clothes like tuxedos!
Oh...wait...
nevermind...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Maybe I *was* redundant, but I *hate* moderators who mod down. It isn't very helpful, since there's enough noise already on/. that it isn't helpful except in the case of goastse.cx links, and I'd bet that most users browse at or above 2 anyways. I know I have a threshold of 3...
So to any other moderators out there, please don't follow the example of the guy who modded me down. If I was posting at 2, I could see modding it down as redundant, or even overrated, but there's enough noise at 2 that my ignorant posts aren't noticed and disdained that much...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Or at least we could prevent them from using the latest, greatest up-to-date versions of the software. Here's the angle.
While released under various Open Source licenses, there still is the original copyright ownership to consider. If every sympathetic hacker added an addendum to their patches arguing that certain companies/subsidiaries couldn't use these until the DMCA is repealed, well, they own the copyright to those patches, don't they? We could force the movie studios to fork their own versions, and go it alone, while incompatibilities pile up between the movie-studio versions and the better, more public versions. It might temporarily hurt the cause of Open Source deployment, but it might be worth it, in ensuring our future rights...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
IANACSM (Computer Science Major- yet), but what parts of these projects overlap? I mean, even in a C/S architecture, servers may have to distribute data among themselves (Game Masters Admin-ing different parts of a MMRPG universe, maybe?) but I don't know how much that bears similarity to P2P. So, is anyone working on similarities between the two projects, so we have two complimentary toolsets?
Anyways, given that different games have different needs (I wouldn't want a P2P MMRPG, too much wiggle room for cheating) I think that the two projects aren't really competitors. I mean, if I'm throwing around information about a sprite-based action game (see Nil for a good example) I probably would prefer P2P for the latency, and just use the honor system and social pressures to weed out cheaters... and frankly, writing and using 'helpful' (as opposed to cheating) scripts and macros would be part of the fun of the game, on another end. I've occasionally wondered if there's a gaming niche for 'cyborg' gaming, i.e., scripts/hacks allowed, just share what ones you use to get that give you that edge... the maps and games created for such gaming would be pretty weird and cool, probably... imagine making a game run by bots, where your sole role and ability is to co-ordinate them... I wonder if that's one of the things Valve is considering w/Team Fortress 2? I heard the 'Commander' role is approaching a certain amount of RTS in style, I believe
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
NO HUMAN would go and put their entire life into public eyes unless they were
a) stupid
b) getting the chance to win a million dollars.
Well, I'm not stupid, (valedictorian in high school, like many other/.'ers, I'm sure) and no one has offered me a Megabuck or two, but I'm considering putting my life in the public eye. My current plan is to get a degree in Law, Political Science and CS (as a backup in case of disillusionment) and maybe head into politics, while documenting and posting a *ton* of information about my personal finances, life, etc. on the web.
I figure, if you want to have the privilege of holding power in the world, you should be held accountable for your personal life. For instance, one criticism of liberals is that they spend other people'a money,(the taxpayers) and get the credit for it, all the while contributing next to nothing to charity. I plan on tithing 10% at least, and putting up my personal financial records of it so that I hold myself above that reproach. This is giving the public more information about me than most would feel comfortable with, but I feel that this and other rules dictate the way I should live my life.
We don't have a shortage of intelligent people in politics, we have a shortage of honest, intelligent people. The guy mentioned yesterday on/. is an exception to that rule, as are many others (Colin Powell, for one), but the goodguys are mostly outnumbered by the venal and the incompetent. I plan to do my bit to change that.
Politics is more attractive to me than pure science at this point, since science seems to me to have the same drawbacks as professional sports: You have only 15, maybe 20 years at your peak when you can be counted among the best in the world.(check the age that most Nobel-winning scientists were at when they did their best work) Politicians, however, don't peak until middle-aged or older, though the climb up takes a bit longer than in science. And furthermore, I feel that America has a large enough supply of geniuses in science work today, given that we get the cream of the crop from other countries too. We don't have enough able, honest politicians who give a damn, though. So I'll have less competition to work against in making my mark.:)
OTOH, some may classify politicians as 'not human' on principle...:P That ignores, however, those few good men that *are* in office today, though, and things like that can be discouraging to them.:( So don't mentally damn *every* politican out there. Public service is poorly rewarding enough as is...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Or are your songs inspired by him instead? And if you're still writing the songs, why don't you post them? They may be trolls, but they're funny trolls, and as one/. user says in his sig, "I'd stop coming back here if the place weren't so funny." If I ever get moderator access again, I'd feel privileged to mod them up.
And finally, how many/. accounts do you have, anyways, to not notice the *real* trolls your friend put there? I've had two/. accounts that I've lost/forgotten the password to, and the password to the associated email accounts, which doesn't even count the few 'throwaway' accounts I've created in attempts to be funny, like Canus Domesticus. (yeah, I realized I mispelled Canis (sp?) as soon as I wrote it. What do you expect? I was a dog that day, and dogs don't spell very well...;)
New/. poll anyone? This is one someone suggested a while back, but Taco and friends didn't use it... enough 'me too' posts and maybe they'll reconsider...
How many/. accounts do you have?
0
1
2-4
5+
I 0wn CmdrT4c0
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Warning: His Kiddie Porn link is a reporting system!
This is a well written, insightful post for the most part, worthy of a +5, insightful. However, even if you wrote that last link in as a measure hoping to catch some real pedophiles, you're likely to get many more innocent people, who wonder if your link is as informative about the troubling issue of kiddie porn as your EHAP link.
Furthermore, looking at your user info, you have been trolling, that is, so long as it is false that CmdrTaco and friends are anally obsessed. If they in fact are anally obsessed, you have been unfairly modded down, and someone should give you back that karma.
But I really don't think that is the case...
Just one request for the future. Please don't mix trolling/entrapment with your informative, interesting posts. I got suckered in by that link, and insofar as I'm a decent, kiddie-porn hating, god-fearing person, I feel upset that I'm even now being reported to Customs. This is even more upsetting once you realize that I'm playing with the idea of a future career in politics, trying to be one of the world's most honest, intelligent, caring politicians. If this goes on any govt. record/file being kept about me, it could be a dirty piece of allusion that some muck-raking, negative-ad-using political opponent could use against me. So please. Think about your actions before doing something impulsive like this in the future...
Offtopic: is your wife Swedish? Does she run the website "speedygrrl"? I think I stumbled on her webpage last night, either that or the webpage of one of her female colleagues (sp?)... How's that for weird co-incidences?
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Come to that what gives people the right to own land, after all they didn't make it.
Well, ownership of land (and much of personal property, even) is the natural result of agriculture. You till the land, you should be the one to 'own' the bread, after all, it wouldn't be around w/o you. So, first step towards personal property, click. Eventually, land itself becomes a valued resource, and decisions have to be made as to who gets to use it. Eventually, you end up with Private Property. And with agriculture, there are enough people to specialize in pottery and such, so personal possessions become important. Eventually, you outnumber and displace any hunter-gatherer nomads, and yours is the only system around.
And in this world, bandwidth is only useful so far as there is not much interference, so someone has to co-ordinate frequency usage. And frankly, the system works well enough, (I know I couldn't create a cell phone system, personally.) so I'm content with my status as a frequency renter. If you can come up with an improved system, I guess I'll listen, but I'm not the one to convince. If you improve the way we use the radio spectrum, give your ideas to the FCC, talk to broadcasters, you know... get some strength and money behind you, ok? Anyways, that's where the current ownership of the radio spectrum comes from, and I can live with the situation as such.
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Here's the background: Huntsville, AL- Redstone arsenal had a problem with beavers. So, the Army Corps of Engineers is tasked to solve it. Their solution: Predators! And make 'em cold blooded! That way, when the frost comes in, they'll all die off!
They forgot about little things, things like 'hibernation'. Things like, it doesn't get that cold in N. Alabama reliably. Things like "what do we do if the lakes flood, and the 'gators get out?"
So yes, Huntsville AL still has the occasional 'gator turn up. And no, it didn't kill all the beavers, either...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
I mean, it was so punitive that it led to WWII. And it was bad enough that the nations imposing it felt enough remorse that they turned a blind eye to Hitler's extremism, thus letting him stay in power until he started actual war. I mean reparations as in fully symmetric reparations, which aint gonna happen anytime. We don't expect Germany to reimburse us for troops killed in Normandy, in exchange for us reimbursing for the bombing of Dresden.
In other words, the Treaty of Versailles is an example of how not to run a peace treaty. You accept certain actions in war as done deals, and move on with life. The only reason Germany is paying for the Holocaust still is because that was so extreme it fell outside the normal losses expected in war.
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
I've heard that it's difficult and rare, but that it can happen. I dunno how it's done- My personal guess is that it would involve string or wire, and would be *very* painful. Haven't you ever wound a rubber band around your finger multiple times, then watched it swell up? Kinda painful, if you leave it on, no?
And who says it would be a beautiful blonde that rapes you? More likely it would be some skanky chick with a weird hairdoo. If she is beautiful, then she's probably even more sadistic than the ugly chick, 'cause she can get gentle sex for free. So I don't think you'd like to be raped by a woman, esp. if they didn't remove the string and then you got gangrene or something...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Or at least false communications, like the classic shouting Fire! in a crowded theater. And we place limitations at least on trivial communications, which is why I'm supposed to whisper in a library when I want to converse, instead of signalling by cannon.
So, I'd object to jamming the President's cell phone, especially if we're pissing off China, but I think the vast majority of cell phone conversations aren't that d***ed important. Certainly not important to justify pissing off a whole ballet audience, esp. if the building's owners warned you that they'll jam cell phones inside their building. If the jamming extends beyond their building, then you might have a legitimate complaint.
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Just because a plane flies over your house doesn't give you the right to shoot it down for tresspassing. Think about it.
It depends on who the 'we' in question is. If you're a whole nation, (Switzerland in WWII) then it does seem that you do have that right. I mean, AFAIK we haven't tried to sue the Swiss for their aggressive protection and prosecution of their neutrality, have we? After all, if we did, then people would start demanding reparations for all damages incurred in war, which while interesting, is unlikely to happen. (successfully) Can you hear the complaints now?
Serbia: Damn you western Europe! You destroyed valuable equipment! We demand reparations! World: Wait a sec- wasn't that equipment specifically designed to exterminate ethnic minorities? Serbia: What of it? It was still private property! World: Oh, go fsck a goat, you genocidal bastards. As long as you ignore the civil and human rights of Albanians, we're ignoring your d*** property rights. Hell, we'll ignore the rights of your soldiers, or at least those regarding 'life, liberty, etc.', even though we'll obey the Geneva Convention. And what do you say to that? Serbia: We'll sue! World: Tough s**t. We'll shoot.
(Hmmm, I think I've drifted offtopic enough to almost count as a 'troll'.) Well, anyways, if the jammer works on their property exclusively, and they warn you, don't they have the right to jam you? I mean, even though you own your phone, who the hell gave you those frequencies? You don't own them, you're a renter, if anything, and the real owner (The FCC, or its equivalent) should have the right to evict you if you're a true danger/nuisance. If your phone access is that d****ed important, don't go in the building! They aren't breaking/shooting your phone, they're just making it unusable on their property. And I think they have that right.
There. Am I back on-topic now?:)
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
/* Man, I just criticised the programming syntax of a census entry...I guess I'm officially a geek now...oh, and feel free to criticise my comment style, haven't really used pascal */
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
And then you might have something worth watching. Like Spider Robinson pointed out in his hugo-winning short story Melancholy Elephants, there is only a finite number of enjoyable stories/songs/art subjects, even if that number is very large. At this point, Trek has mined out all the episodic stories that fit with the mood of the series. Their options come down to
tell stories that change the mood of the series totally, alienating fans
or
tell non-episodic stories that fit in with the Trek universe.
There are definite disadvantages to the second approach. (the disadvantages of the first are all but self-evident) You can't keep extending a given series, for example, because real stories have endings. Once you've told a story, you have to find a new story to tell, and if you don't find new characters to go with it, the story becomes somewhat derivative. The other disadvantage of the second approach is that a full story requires a certain amount of resources to be committed to the project beforehand. I mean, you can kill the series halfway through the story, but then there are so many loose ends that the complaints kill your public relations people. And finally, how do you do movie tie-ins with a finite series? Short answer: you can't, not in the traditional manner. You can retell the story in a short movie, you can make the climax of the series and story into a movie, but you can't create the traditional 'related to the TV series' endless parade of movies.
All these things may put off executives from creating a 'one big plot' Trek series. But they're milking the series dry, as things currently stand. Ah well, the cool geeks are off watching stuff from Japan and Hong Kong these days. We've seen Trek, and unless some bold moves are made, they won't show us anything new...
If you read Melancholy Elephants, you'll see how Copyright extensions will eventually kill creativity in this country, but that's nothing new. I mean, we killed comic books as a mass medium in this country, through societal pressures and strange intellectual property laws... Witness Japan, in contrast, with a Manga series for everyone. But I'm not bitter, noooo... I'm both determined to learn another language, and incredibly bitter...Ok, I'll stop ranting now...(Damn Stan Lee to hell)...really, I'll stop now, rea
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Just a nifty one, if all worked out perfectly. OTOH, I am well aware that H2O is the biggy of greenhouse gases, so yeah, the venus effect is more likely, given that murphy seems to be the secret ruler of the universe. In any case, cloud heat reflection/retention is only just beginning to be incorporated into climate models AFAIK, so we're probably not going to get a good idea of the real effects any time soon. sigh.
Climatology is only really beginning as a science, so we're (me especially) all just talking out of our asses, right? It would be nice if we could predict the effects of X, Y, or Z on the planet, and move right along w/ the climate engineering and keep the earth habitable for the next x-thousand years, but that isn't something I expect to see in my lifetime. It would be nice to see those spaceplanes in my lifetime though...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Well, on a related note, how pleased are you w/ thawing relations w/ the North? I know that the gov has used N. Korea as a boogieman excuse for their corruption, control of the press, etc, but they're slowly losing that ability. For awhile they had a legitimate threat w/ N. Korea (world's largest armed border, right?) but nowadays the N. Koreans are having enough problems keeping their people fed. So, I'd say the future is reasonably hopeful, if the N. Koreans don't get themselves branded as a 'rogue nation' by selling rockets, but what do I know? I'm not Korean, so tell me: how do things look out there?
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
There are legitimate questions about how much material the upper atmosphere can absorb. Pumping out quantities of hot steam at high altitude may have a negative long-term impact. There's already a good deal of evidence that civil and military contrails lead to increased cloud-formation, what effects would be at even higher altitudes is not yet known.
Well, AFAIK increased cloud-formation increases the amount of energy reflected back into space by those clouds, so airplanes may actually reduce global warming, the current big climate worry. Of course, I don't know if planes cause increased cloud-formation, or just displace cloud-formation, so the issues keep piling up. But wouldn't it be cool if the overall effect of these planes were (ahem) cool? (pun intended)
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
It basically had a fully translated scanned copy of the last manga, and bits and pieces of other parts of the series. I dunno if it's still around or where it is, but if you've watched the anime, you might want to search around a little for it, or ask about it on one of the shoujo newsgroups. And if you do find it, could you let me know where it is so I can bookmark it? Thanks.
And oh yeah, there's the whole 'talking head' problem with the last episodes, but Key remains one of my favorites, despite its flaws...:)
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
I mean, an error of 0.1 with your exponent will create a bigger error than a.1 difference in your coefficient, or whatever you call it... think about the difference between 10^0 and 10^0.1, and I think you'll see its bigger than 1/39th, which is the difference between 3.9 and 4.0
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Slashdot Mirror
Two words: gravitational lensing...
Ok, imagine for a second that you're looking at a distant galaxy. Since matter bends light, you get an image of it from one angle. Now, suppose you look for galaxies at an angle just slightly different from the first angle. You see a galaxy. Upon inspection, it looks eerily like the first galaxy... in fact, neighboring galaxies seem to have 'clones' like the first galaxy too! What is going on?!?
What's happening is you're experiencing a 'lensing' effect by some matter that you can't see, allowing you to see one galaxy from many different angles. You plug the numbers into your computer model of the universe, try to figure out how much matter would produce said effect, (by laws of general relativity), and lo and behold, you get this figure for large amounts of invisible matter!
Now, what I'm interested in is how many galaxies have 'eaten' all their surrounding dust. If there was any dust, the black hole would compress it to unimaginable degrees as it drew said dust in, producing x-rays of incredible magnitude... some of the brightest/most energy-producing objects in the universe are thought to be such super-holes. So, either those billions of black holes have mostly 'evaporated', (see another poster's explanation of the process), or they have sucked up all nearby gasses/dust... this discovery is going to produce some interesting fodder for the cosmologists. (and no, a cosmologist doesn't worry about makeup, guys, and the modeling careers of universes. Well, maybe some of them do, but that's not their job ;)
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Why do the rich and powerful deserve more privacy than I have? Our current Gov. knows more about each of its citizens than any repressive 19th century leaders did, but since they are held accountable through representative democracy and the Freedom of Information act, we have the highest degree of freedom of any known society. So make the system fair. If Corporations want to invade our privacy, make them face the same.
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Oh...wait...
nevermind...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
So to any other moderators out there, please don't follow the example of the guy who modded me down. If I was posting at 2, I could see modding it down as redundant, or even overrated, but there's enough noise at 2 that my ignorant posts aren't noticed and disdained that much...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
While released under various Open Source licenses, there still is the original copyright ownership to consider. If every sympathetic hacker added an addendum to their patches arguing that certain companies/subsidiaries couldn't use these until the DMCA is repealed, well, they own the copyright to those patches, don't they? We could force the movie studios to fork their own versions, and go it alone, while incompatibilities pile up between the movie-studio versions and the better, more public versions. It might temporarily hurt the cause of Open Source deployment, but it might be worth it, in ensuring our future rights...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Anyways, given that different games have different needs (I wouldn't want a P2P MMRPG, too much wiggle room for cheating) I think that the two projects aren't really competitors. I mean, if I'm throwing around information about a sprite-based action game (see Nil for a good example) I probably would prefer P2P for the latency, and just use the honor system and social pressures to weed out cheaters... and frankly, writing and using 'helpful' (as opposed to cheating) scripts and macros would be part of the fun of the game, on another end. I've occasionally wondered if there's a gaming niche for 'cyborg' gaming, i.e., scripts/hacks allowed, just share what ones you use to get that give you that edge... the maps and games created for such gaming would be pretty weird and cool, probably... imagine making a game run by bots, where your sole role and ability is to co-ordinate them... I wonder if that's one of the things Valve is considering w/Team Fortress 2? I heard the 'Commander' role is approaching a certain amount of RTS in style, I believe
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Well, I'm not stupid, (valedictorian in high school, like many other /.'ers, I'm sure) and no one has offered me a Megabuck or two, but I'm considering putting my life in the public eye. My current plan is to get a degree in Law, Political Science and CS (as a backup in case of disillusionment) and maybe head into politics, while documenting and posting a *ton* of information about my personal finances, life, etc. on the web.
I figure, if you want to have the privilege of holding power in the world, you should be held accountable for your personal life. For instance, one criticism of liberals is that they spend other people'a money,(the taxpayers) and get the credit for it, all the while contributing next to nothing to charity. I plan on tithing 10% at least, and putting up my personal financial records of it so that I hold myself above that reproach. This is giving the public more information about me than most would feel comfortable with, but I feel that this and other rules dictate the way I should live my life.
We don't have a shortage of intelligent people in politics, we have a shortage of honest, intelligent people. The guy mentioned yesterday on /. is an exception to that rule, as are many others (Colin Powell, for one), but the goodguys are mostly outnumbered by the venal and the incompetent. I plan to do my bit to change that.
Politics is more attractive to me than pure science at this point, since science seems to me to have the same drawbacks as professional sports: You have only 15, maybe 20 years at your peak when you can be counted among the best in the world.(check the age that most Nobel-winning scientists were at when they did their best work) Politicians, however, don't peak until middle-aged or older, though the climb up takes a bit longer than in science. And furthermore, I feel that America has a large enough supply of geniuses in science work today, given that we get the cream of the crop from other countries too. We don't have enough able, honest politicians who give a damn, though. So I'll have less competition to work against in making my mark. :)
OTOH, some may classify politicians as 'not human' on principle...:P That ignores, however, those few good men that *are* in office today, though, and things like that can be discouraging to them. :( So don't mentally damn *every* politican out there. Public service is poorly rewarding enough as is...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
And finally, how many /. accounts do you have, anyways, to not notice the *real* trolls your friend put there? I've had two /. accounts that I've lost/forgotten the password to, and the password to the associated email accounts, which doesn't even count the few 'throwaway' accounts I've created in attempts to be funny, like Canus Domesticus. (yeah, I realized I mispelled Canis (sp?) as soon as I wrote it. What do you expect? I was a dog that day, and dogs don't spell very well...;)
New /. poll anyone? This is one someone suggested a while back, but Taco and friends didn't use it... enough 'me too' posts and maybe they'll reconsider...
How many /. accounts do you have?
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
This is a well written, insightful post for the most part, worthy of a +5, insightful. However, even if you wrote that last link in as a measure hoping to catch some real pedophiles, you're likely to get many more innocent people, who wonder if your link is as informative about the troubling issue of kiddie porn as your EHAP link.
Furthermore, looking at your user info, you have been trolling, that is, so long as it is false that CmdrTaco and friends are anally obsessed. If they in fact are anally obsessed, you have been unfairly modded down, and someone should give you back that karma.
But I really don't think that is the case...
Just one request for the future. Please don't mix trolling/entrapment with your informative, interesting posts. I got suckered in by that link, and insofar as I'm a decent, kiddie-porn hating, god-fearing person, I feel upset that I'm even now being reported to Customs. This is even more upsetting once you realize that I'm playing with the idea of a future career in politics, trying to be one of the world's most honest, intelligent, caring politicians. If this goes on any govt. record/file being kept about me, it could be a dirty piece of allusion that some muck-raking, negative-ad-using political opponent could use against me. So please. Think about your actions before doing something impulsive like this in the future...
Offtopic: is your wife Swedish? Does she run the website "speedygrrl"? I think I stumbled on her webpage last night, either that or the webpage of one of her female colleagues (sp?)... How's that for weird co-incidences?
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
And in this world, bandwidth is only useful so far as there is not much interference, so someone has to co-ordinate frequency usage. And frankly, the system works well enough, (I know I couldn't create a cell phone system, personally.) so I'm content with my status as a frequency renter. If you can come up with an improved system, I guess I'll listen, but I'm not the one to convince. If you improve the way we use the radio spectrum, give your ideas to the FCC, talk to broadcasters, you know... get some strength and money behind you, ok? Anyways, that's where the current ownership of the radio spectrum comes from, and I can live with the situation as such.
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Here's the background: Huntsville, AL- Redstone arsenal had a problem with beavers. So, the Army Corps of Engineers is tasked to solve it. Their solution: Predators! And make 'em cold blooded! That way, when the frost comes in, they'll all die off!
They forgot about little things, things like 'hibernation'. Things like, it doesn't get that cold in N. Alabama reliably. Things like "what do we do if the lakes flood, and the 'gators get out?"
So yes, Huntsville AL still has the occasional 'gator turn up. And no, it didn't kill all the beavers, either...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Quick Toolkit? Quickie Toolkit? QuomndrTaco Toolkit? (ducks and runs)
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
In other words, the Treaty of Versailles is an example of how not to run a peace treaty. You accept certain actions in war as done deals, and move on with life. The only reason Germany is paying for the Holocaust still is because that was so extreme it fell outside the normal losses expected in war.
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
And who says it would be a beautiful blonde that rapes you? More likely it would be some skanky chick with a weird hairdoo. If she is beautiful, then she's probably even more sadistic than the ugly chick, 'cause she can get gentle sex for free. So I don't think you'd like to be raped by a woman, esp. if they didn't remove the string and then you got gangrene or something...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
So, I'd object to jamming the President's cell phone, especially if we're pissing off China, but I think the vast majority of cell phone conversations aren't that d***ed important. Certainly not important to justify pissing off a whole ballet audience, esp. if the building's owners warned you that they'll jam cell phones inside their building. If the jamming extends beyond their building, then you might have a legitimate complaint.
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Serbia: Damn you western Europe! You destroyed valuable equipment! We demand reparations!
World: Wait a sec- wasn't that equipment specifically designed to exterminate ethnic minorities?
Serbia: What of it? It was still private property!
World: Oh, go fsck a goat, you genocidal bastards. As long as you ignore the civil and human rights of Albanians, we're ignoring your d*** property rights. Hell, we'll ignore the rights of your soldiers, or at least those regarding 'life, liberty, etc.', even though we'll obey the Geneva Convention. And what do you say to that?
Serbia: We'll sue!
World: Tough s**t. We'll shoot.
(Hmmm, I think I've drifted offtopic enough to almost count as a 'troll'.) Well, anyways, if the jammer works on their property exclusively, and they warn you, don't they have the right to jam you? I mean, even though you own your phone, who the hell gave you those frequencies? You don't own them, you're a renter, if anything, and the real owner (The FCC, or its equivalent) should have the right to evict you if you're a true danger/nuisance. If your phone access is that d****ed important, don't go in the building! They aren't breaking/shooting your phone, they're just making it unusable on their property. And I think they have that right.
There. Am I back on-topic now? :)
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
(* Ahhhh, thank you. Now I can at least keep my comments commented out now... *)
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
the number of people putting down 'Sith' exceeds two ;)
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Religion
/* Man, I just criticised the programming syntax of a census entry...I guess I'm officially a geek now...oh, and feel free to criticise my comment style, haven't really used pascal */
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
There are definite disadvantages to the second approach. (the disadvantages of the first are all but self-evident) You can't keep extending a given series, for example, because real stories have endings. Once you've told a story, you have to find a new story to tell, and if you don't find new characters to go with it, the story becomes somewhat derivative. The other disadvantage of the second approach is that a full story requires a certain amount of resources to be committed to the project beforehand. I mean, you can kill the series halfway through the story, but then there are so many loose ends that the complaints kill your public relations people. And finally, how do you do movie tie-ins with a finite series? Short answer: you can't, not in the traditional manner. You can retell the story in a short movie, you can make the climax of the series and story into a movie, but you can't create the traditional 'related to the TV series' endless parade of movies.
All these things may put off executives from creating a 'one big plot' Trek series. But they're milking the series dry, as things currently stand. Ah well, the cool geeks are off watching stuff from Japan and Hong Kong these days. We've seen Trek, and unless some bold moves are made, they won't show us anything new...
If you read Melancholy Elephants, you'll see how Copyright extensions will eventually kill creativity in this country, but that's nothing new. I mean, we killed comic books as a mass medium in this country, through societal pressures and strange intellectual property laws... Witness Japan, in contrast, with a Manga series for everyone. But I'm not bitter, noooo... I'm both determined to learn another language, and incredibly bitter...Ok, I'll stop ranting now...(Damn Stan Lee to hell)...really, I'll stop now, rea
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Climatology is only really beginning as a science, so we're (me especially) all just talking out of our asses, right? It would be nice if we could predict the effects of X, Y, or Z on the planet, and move right along w/ the climate engineering and keep the earth habitable for the next x-thousand years, but that isn't something I expect to see in my lifetime. It would be nice to see those spaceplanes in my lifetime though...
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
Well, on a related note, how pleased are you w/ thawing relations w/ the North? I know that the gov has used N. Korea as a boogieman excuse for their corruption, control of the press, etc, but they're slowly losing that ability. For awhile they had a legitimate threat w/ N. Korea (world's largest armed border, right?) but nowadays the N. Koreans are having enough problems keeping their people fed. So, I'd say the future is reasonably hopeful, if the N. Koreans don't get themselves branded as a 'rogue nation' by selling rockets, but what do I know? I'm not Korean, so tell me: how do things look out there?
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
And oh yeah, there's the whole 'talking head' problem with the last episodes, but Key remains one of my favorites, despite its flaws...:)
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----
I mean, an error of 0.1 with your exponent will create a bigger error than a .1 difference in your coefficient, or whatever you call it... think about the difference between 10^0 and 10^0.1, and I think you'll see its bigger than 1/39th, which is the difference between 3.9 and 4.0
-----
IANASRP- I am not a self-referential phrase
-----