Well, if someone does the "shotgun trick" with the starling, maybe in 30 years someone will be waxing poetically about the starling and how it used to cover the skies and the peculiar sound it made.
Live flocks of birds make noise and shit. Dead flocks of birds make ornithologists nostalgic.
Seriously, all I see in a Bitcoin is a number on a computer. That's it. Where is the value?
Before you get all into the fiat currency argument; yeah, I understand *that*. But (for example) the U.S. dollar has an accepted value that (I'd argue) that isn't completely independent of goods and services produced in the U.S. Yes, you have to *believe* that fiat currency has value, but there is something indirectly tangible behind it for the U.S. dollar and other currencies.
Bitcoins, not so much. It is a number on a computer. It may be a fiat currency in the purest sense, which means you need to make sure everyone *truly* believes it to have value, in the same way some people believe the earth is flat or in unicorns. It really is like getting an answer from an ouiji board - as long as everyone agrees you get an answer that has some value.
When the bitcoin fanbois get distracted by the next New Shiny paradigm-buster, bitcoin will not be worth the electrons it is printed on.
Electric cars are not ubiquitous because range and ability to charge is a concern. Charging stations are not ubiquitous because electric cars are not ubiquitous.
Gasoline automobiles were able to take off when they were invented because the liquid fuel infrastructure was in largely in place prior to their invention. Kerosene for lamps was distributed by metered pumps that were easily converted to dispense gasoline.
Establishing a standard charging station would allow companies to make the investment in charging infrastructure, confident that it would be widely applicable to different vehicles and would not disappear overnight. When you can pull into the CircleK and purchase a few kWh of juice while grabbing a burrito, that's when electric cars will really take off.
I'm not a software engineer, just a user, but why do we need to have new OS versions every fucking year? Really, couldn't Microsoft have an OS that looks largely like Windows 3.1 or XP or whatever to the user, but is streamlined and patched to modern standards of security and interoperability?
I'm not trying to start a flame war, but really - as a user I see more change in software as churning to turn a dollar vs. actual improvement. A model where a software might be patched and "recalled" for improvement for a long period of time would be much more satisfactory than the jiggles in UI format that seem to introduce more bugs than improvements.
And yeah, this costs money to do. What cost <X> would I have to plunk down *once* to sit and enjoy an stable OS that were patched and upgraded ad infinitum (or until I died, close enough)?
This must-churn-a-new-shiny-every-reporting-quarter is bullshit. I need a stable OS that I can operate for years without relearning everything. Is such a business model even possible?
The writer of this article knows jack shit about nuclear plant operations. Ever get a look at the inside of a nuclear containment, especially the older ones with lots of modifications? Just being a human in a coverall getting around can be a PITA, never mind adding an exoskeleton. And the exposure to a worker in a normally operating plant is minimal and very well understood. Exoskeleton not needed, thanks.
This is a solution looking for a problem, or a sentient robot desperately looking for work to feed his family of toasters.
If the plant goes bad like Fukushima, then maybe, but both humans and robots can get fried pretty quickly if they wander into a high radiation environment. I'd rather be able to run away quickly if my counter spiked wildly instead of being encumbered with a lot of metal. Even better, I'd rather just send in some cheap disposable robots to map the danger regions.
Yeah, I think you get my drift. The problem is really with the user interface and the experience, not necessarily with the underlying capabilities of the OS.
If users are confused and frustrated by trying to do simple things with the OS, the "advanced features" are pretty much invisible, no matter how great and innovative they may be.
When your business leaves your customers wondering "What the fuck am I paying for again?", you have a problem.
Windows has jumped the shark. It's all downhill from here.
Many folks have finally tired of Microsoft just churning the interface just to make a new product. All that did was alienate the users that had grown accustomed to menu interfaces in Office and the Start menu. Paying to buy a whole new version of the OS and then dealing with the headaches of just trying to figure out how to just get back to the capability the user had before the change got really old.
The problems with Windows 8 are not necessarily with the features. Windows 8 may be the best OS under the sun, but most users won't ever know that because it is buried under one of the most craptastic PC user interfaces contrived. Folks probably would be happy to have the core features of Windows 8 if the menus and buttons looked familiar to the last version. They do not.
I finally went to Linux simply because they kept a lot of the UI features like menus and start buttons that Windows abandoned. Linux really is now at a point where it is an easier OS to transition to from Windows XP and 7 vs transitioning to Windows 8. That is not because Linux interfaces improved dramatically (though they are better than they were) but because Windows 8 broke a lot of UI features that the users really liked and wanted.
Happy trails Microsoft, best wishes from a formerly happy customer from the Windows 3.1 days. Friendly advice - stop pissing off your loyal customers and give them what they want to see.
Umm... if you're in court asking this question, yes... you're reputation is pretty fucked, no matter what the photograph contains.
Unless you are planning to make stripping and oblong vegetable porn a career - DON'T. LET. ANYONE. PHOTOGRAPH. YOU. WITH. A. ZUCCHINI. IN. YOUR. <ORIFICE>! Just don't do it. It's that easy folks to keep a good reputation with the puritans amongst us.
Similar but less portable technologies are being used in just this way, to document existing structures, locations of electrical, plumbing, HVAC, networking cables, etc.. This location-based inventory is massively useful when planning and costing systems upgrades, particularly on campuses where there may be a complicated interaction of old and new structures.
This is also used in nuclear containments, for similar reason. It is even more useful as operators generally have limited periodic access to the containment, for obvious exposure reasons. Having an accurate 3D model of the containment and locations of equipment would greatly enhance the ability to simulate accident scenarios and to plan for upgrade outages.
The one hangup with these technologies is making the 3D models clean enough such they can be readily imported into engineering simulation software. In particular, CFD models of nuclear containments is complicated by poor geometry rendering (thin slivers of volume, non-planar surfaces, etc.).
Really though, we're trying to genetically resurrect an animal that died off likely due to human depredation and the end of the ice age. Now there are 7 billion MORE humans and the earth is getting warmer.
Way to jam a genetically square peg into a round hole.
Not that I think Snowden is completely pulling stuff out of his ass, but..how do we know Snowden is NOT pulling stuff out of his ass?
I'm asking in the spirit of diabloa advocatus. Snowden should get the same scrutiny as any other source. If he is as genuine as I think he is, he shouldn't be offended by this questioning of the source.
Wow! I've been modded Flamebait! I feel so proud. The Flamebait criterion is pretty easy to breach here on/. Jeez, you folks can't handle painful truths at all.
Yes RichO, what you say is correct, and tying our vehicle infrastructure to the electrical grid is a necessary first step, irregardless of how the power transmitted is produced.
I just worry that there are a lot of smug hipsters driving electric vehicles that think everything is fine, not realizing that perhaps 90% of the electrons in their battery came from a big-ass coal plant.
Full-disclosure - I have worked in the coal industry AND in renewables, and I see the continuing need for fossil fuels to bridge a transition period to a fully-renewable infrastructure, so I am not a hater either way.
Electric vehicles are not (necessarily) zero emission - you need to consider where the electricity used to charge the batteries comes from.
All from wind and hydro? Not bad (depends on how much fossil fuel went into the construction of that wind and hydro, so not necessarily zero emission but close). All from the coal plant? Ermmm...not so much.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, if someone does the "shotgun trick" with the starling, maybe in 30 years someone will be waxing poetically about the starling and how it used to cover the skies and the peculiar sound it made.
Live flocks of birds make noise and shit. Dead flocks of birds make ornithologists nostalgic.
Seriously, all I see in a Bitcoin is a number on a computer. That's it. Where is the value?
Before you get all into the fiat currency argument; yeah, I understand *that*. But (for example) the U.S. dollar has an accepted value that (I'd argue) that isn't completely independent of goods and services produced in the U.S. Yes, you have to *believe* that fiat currency has value, but there is something indirectly tangible behind it for the U.S. dollar and other currencies.
Bitcoins, not so much. It is a number on a computer. It may be a fiat currency in the purest sense, which means you need to make sure everyone *truly* believes it to have value, in the same way some people believe the earth is flat or in unicorns. It really is like getting an answer from an ouiji board - as long as everyone agrees you get an answer that has some value.
When the bitcoin fanbois get distracted by the next New Shiny paradigm-buster, bitcoin will not be worth the electrons it is printed on.
Ummm...you need oxygen to burn stuff.
Electric cars are not ubiquitous because range and ability to charge is a concern. Charging stations are not ubiquitous because electric cars are not ubiquitous.
Gasoline automobiles were able to take off when they were invented because the liquid fuel infrastructure was in largely in place prior to their invention. Kerosene for lamps was distributed by metered pumps that were easily converted to dispense gasoline.
Establishing a standard charging station would allow companies to make the investment in charging infrastructure, confident that it would be widely applicable to different vehicles and would not disappear overnight. When you can pull into the CircleK and purchase a few kWh of juice while grabbing a burrito, that's when electric cars will really take off.
I'd hack a sign to say "KISS HER YOU FOOL" or "THAT FELT GOOD". That should make things interesting.
...Duh?
The non-American world is happily sitting at keyboards and attempting to hack the evil U.S. to pieces. Is this really a surprise to anyone?
It is a shame the next corpse still won't have life.
FTFY
I'm not a software engineer, just a user, but why do we need to have new OS versions every fucking year? Really, couldn't Microsoft have an OS that looks largely like Windows 3.1 or XP or whatever to the user, but is streamlined and patched to modern standards of security and interoperability?
I'm not trying to start a flame war, but really - as a user I see more change in software as churning to turn a dollar vs. actual improvement. A model where a software might be patched and "recalled" for improvement for a long period of time would be much more satisfactory than the jiggles in UI format that seem to introduce more bugs than improvements.
And yeah, this costs money to do. What cost <X> would I have to plunk down *once* to sit and enjoy an stable OS that were patched and upgraded ad infinitum (or until I died, close enough)?
This must-churn-a-new-shiny-every-reporting-quarter is bullshit. I need a stable OS that I can operate for years without relearning everything. Is such a business model even possible?
The writer of this article knows jack shit about nuclear plant operations. Ever get a look at the inside of a nuclear containment, especially the older ones with lots of modifications? Just being a human in a coverall getting around can be a PITA, never mind adding an exoskeleton. And the exposure to a worker in a normally operating plant is minimal and very well understood. Exoskeleton not needed, thanks.
This is a solution looking for a problem, or a sentient robot desperately looking for work to feed his family of toasters.
If the plant goes bad like Fukushima, then maybe, but both humans and robots can get fried pretty quickly if they wander into a high radiation environment. I'd rather be able to run away quickly if my counter spiked wildly instead of being encumbered with a lot of metal. Even better, I'd rather just send in some cheap disposable robots to map the danger regions.
Yeah, I think you get my drift. The problem is really with the user interface and the experience, not necessarily with the underlying capabilities of the OS.
If users are confused and frustrated by trying to do simple things with the OS, the "advanced features" are pretty much invisible, no matter how great and innovative they may be.
When your business leaves your customers wondering "What the fuck am I paying for again?", you have a problem.
Windows has jumped the shark. It's all downhill from here.
Many folks have finally tired of Microsoft just churning the interface just to make a new product. All that did was alienate the users that had grown accustomed to menu interfaces in Office and the Start menu. Paying to buy a whole new version of the OS and then dealing with the headaches of just trying to figure out how to just get back to the capability the user had before the change got really old.
The problems with Windows 8 are not necessarily with the features. Windows 8 may be the best OS under the sun, but most users won't ever know that because it is buried under one of the most craptastic PC user interfaces contrived. Folks probably would be happy to have the core features of Windows 8 if the menus and buttons looked familiar to the last version. They do not.
I finally went to Linux simply because they kept a lot of the UI features like menus and start buttons that Windows abandoned. Linux really is now at a point where it is an easier OS to transition to from Windows XP and 7 vs transitioning to Windows 8. That is not because Linux interfaces improved dramatically (though they are better than they were) but because Windows 8 broke a lot of UI features that the users really liked and wanted.
Happy trails Microsoft, best wishes from a formerly happy customer from the Windows 3.1 days. Friendly advice - stop pissing off your loyal customers and give them what they want to see.
You'll shoot your eye out!
...dem radioactive urine-packin' kittehz.
Yeah Kittehz!
http://24.media.tumblr.com/ab9...
Hans Brix! Oh No!
Umm ... if you're in court asking this question, yes ... you're reputation is pretty fucked, no matter what the photograph contains.
Unless you are planning to make stripping and oblong vegetable porn a career - DON'T. LET. ANYONE. PHOTOGRAPH. YOU. WITH. A. ZUCCHINI. IN. YOUR. <ORIFICE>! Just don't do it. It's that easy folks to keep a good reputation with the puritans amongst us.
Similar but less portable technologies are being used in just this way, to document existing structures, locations of electrical, plumbing, HVAC, networking cables, etc.. This location-based inventory is massively useful when planning and costing systems upgrades, particularly on campuses where there may be a complicated interaction of old and new structures.
This is also used in nuclear containments, for similar reason. It is even more useful as operators generally have limited periodic access to the containment, for obvious exposure reasons. Having an accurate 3D model of the containment and locations of equipment would greatly enhance the ability to simulate accident scenarios and to plan for upgrade outages.
The one hangup with these technologies is making the 3D models clean enough such they can be readily imported into engineering simulation software. In particular, CFD models of nuclear containments is complicated by poor geometry rendering (thin slivers of volume, non-planar surfaces, etc.).
You can still get frozen mammoth in the Siberian tundra, while supplies last!
<URL:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2358695/Woolly-mammoth-frozen-Siberia-39-000-YEARS-goes-display-Tokyo-woolly.html/>
Really though, we're trying to genetically resurrect an animal that died off likely due to human depredation and the end of the ice age. Now there are 7 billion MORE humans and the earth is getting warmer.
Way to jam a genetically square peg into a round hole.
Not that I think Snowden is completely pulling stuff out of his ass, but..how do we know Snowden is NOT pulling stuff out of his ass?
I'm asking in the spirit of diabloa advocatus. Snowden should get the same scrutiny as any other source. If he is as genuine as I think he is, he shouldn't be offended by this questioning of the source.
Now now, self euthanasia is always a politically correct option.
I bet they weren't expecting that.
Just saying. The whole Nanking unpleasantness, now Kawasaki's disease.
Can't we all get along?
Wow! I've been modded Flamebait! I feel so proud. The Flamebait criterion is pretty easy to breach here on /. Jeez, you folks can't handle painful truths at all.
Yes RichO, what you say is correct, and tying our vehicle infrastructure to the electrical grid is a necessary first step, irregardless of how the power transmitted is produced.
I just worry that there are a lot of smug hipsters driving electric vehicles that think everything is fine, not realizing that perhaps 90%
of the electrons in their battery came from a big-ass coal plant.
Full-disclosure - I have worked in the coal industry AND in renewables, and I see the continuing need for fossil fuels to bridge a transition period to a fully-renewable infrastructure, so I am not a hater either way.
"90% of Everything is Crap".
This applies to everything, including cable TV.
The remaining 10%? Well, 90% of that is crap too.
Electric vehicles are not (necessarily) zero emission - you need to consider where the electricity used to charge the batteries comes from.
All from wind and hydro? Not bad (depends on how much fossil fuel went into the construction of that wind and hydro, so not necessarily zero emission but close). All from the coal plant? Ermmm...not so much.