I don't know about the NH state parks, but the National Park Service spells out pretty clearly when permits are needed, under the general category "Commercial Filming and Still Photography Permits". Basically if it's a location not normally accessible to the public; you bring in models, sets or props; or the park service would need additional resources to monitor the activity. He's bringing in a costume, and he's doing it to advertise his other artwork, so it would probably require a permit in a national park. But small scale, there are no onerous fees: 1 - 2 people, camera & tripod only $0/day. The system is set up to keep advertisers and corporations from abusing the parks for their own uses.
In the article, it sounds pretty similar for the NH state parks, except the fee is $100/day. As a photographer (who spends time in CA state parks and national parks), it doesn't sound to me like a question of free speech because they didn't deny him access, they just told him to follow the existing rules and get a necessary permit.
We talked about naming workstations after dead rock stars (after all, there's a never-ending supply), but ultimately we settled on elements in the periodic table. One nice benefit is that each had a well defined 1- or 2-letter abbreviation.
It's based a long-standing rule of project cycles, known as the 90/90 rule: the first 90% of the project takes 90% of the time, and the last 10% of the project takes the other 90% of the time. Or at least that's how most software projects seem to end up...:-)
I envision a system where every person has a personal recorder that they carry around, and all the output of public cameras is mirrored and shared in a fashion that made it difficult to tamper with. Something along the lines of Freenet, except simplified by the fact that you don't have to anonymize the sources. Ever read David Brin's "Kiln People"? They've got sort of a system like that, a combination of public CCTVs and private ones. The difference is that it's a free market system -- you may find what you want from a public camera, but if you need more (like the protagonist, who's a private investigator) you can put out bids for it. A good book even apart from that tidbit; the basic premise is about being able to make various temporary copies of yourself. Recommended reading if you've liked anything by Brin.
I'm glad I finally twacked you down. I've been getting endless junk mail related to prowducts I've never purchased. I got a restwaining order against that pesky wabbit, but the junk mail still kept coming.
Many poles, published on many sites, indicate that the business world is nonplussed with Vista and many have no plans to migrate over.
Many Poles? I certainly hadn't heard much about Polish bloggers before. I wonder why they're speaking out about Vista?:-)
My experience with Vista has been limited. It came on a friend's new (Dell) laptop. There weren't any particular problems with it, but the software I installed was Firefox, Thunderbird and a slew of Adobe apps (Photoshop, Illustrator, et al, from Creative Suite 3). I'm sure with more general software there'd be more problems, because I've certainly heard a lot of complaints from people.
But I didn't see anything in it to make me want it, either. It's got the 'shiny' (man, I miss "Firefly") Aero interface, and not a lot else that showed up in "what's new".
That's my experience, too. The keys are driving the speed limit instead of 10 or 15 MPH over, keeping a reasonable following distance to minimize braking and accelerating back up to speed, and taking advantage of downhills to accelerate when needed. I get 52MPG in a 2002 Prius when driving from the SF Bay Area to San Diego down I-5.
Sony hasn't heard our complaint yet, because I only just found out that the DVD was lost on the return trip to Netflix a week and a half ago. It wouldn't play in our Toshiba SD4700, but the DVD drive in my PC read it just fine. My screen is too small to watch a whole movie on (well, besides "Dark Side of the Rainbow" after a couple of beers:-), so I debated about trying to make a copy that our DVD player would play. Speaking in an entirely hypothetical manner, Sony's added layers didn't prevent Magic DVD Ripper from, um, seeing it;-) I'd never used it before, so I don't know if it was any slower or anything, but it didn't have any problems.
After I figure out things with Netflix, I'll put "Casino Royale" back in our queue and see if we get a new version and if it works any better. This is the first DVD we've had a problem playing on our player (besides ones that were scratched and/or dirty, that is).
Hooray for DRM! Keeping legitimate customers from their media since, well...I dunno. Did they have piracy problems with wax recording cylinders?:-)
So, let's say a prius costs $20,000 and it burns about $8,000 worth of fuel and costs $4,000 in maintenance (wild guess) in 100,000 miles. Where does the other $293,000 come from?
Or even putting in some approximate real world numbers:
$21,000 cost (in 2002; includes tax and tax credit)
total: $30,800
Very near your estimate, and our Prius is still going strong. I guess I should thank Toyota for the $294,200 subsidy!:-) Either that, or the disposal and recycling costs are gonna be way worse than I thought...
And the besides all the other flaws noted in the article, it doesn't even get into emissions. The Prius (and smaller non-hybrids) generate a lot less emissions than a full-sized pickup, SUV or Hummer.
But a writer above is correct. To be really 'green', you don't get the Hummer, the Prius, or even the Scion...you walk, bike and take mass transit. But if you need a new car (in our case we were getting rid of a 1985 Nissan that wasn't running very well), a hybrid or smaller non-hybrid is worth looking into.
I used to own a 1981 diesel VW Rabbit, and it got 50+MPG, so I'd love to see more diesels in the U.S. once cleaner fuel is available.
I would guess it would be the same as with current sell-back systems for solar. There'd still be a meter that the utility controls and reads, and so it wouldn't be any different than now -- either your subgrid reads as a net user or net contributor by whatever amount. If you alter the meter, it can be made to say whatever.
Yep. As I posted about earlier, I'm in the process of building an addition to my house, and I used insulated concrete forms (ICFs) for the foundation. If I were building a house from scratch, I'd build the whole thing that way. Reinforced concrete is a great way to go, and easy to build with using ICFs.
They're resistant to hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, fires, termites, even bullets (well, not the windows or roof, but the rest sure is). And they create a very well insulated structure. If you're in a more extreme climate, you can use thicker ICFs and walls and make an R-50 insulated wall (compared with R-13 or less for normal walls).
And with some planning on the design end, you can make them safer in floods, too, by keeping the ground floor as garage and storage, and living quarters higher up. But even that won't help with a 30 foot storm surge or if you build 20 feet below sea level, but you can make a lot safer, more comfortable, more energy efficient house using reinforced concrete than with traditional stick framing. And concrete is pretty darn cheap, too.
That may be for an odd-ball project like sticking a manufactured home on top of something else, but for a normally framed house, steel studs are a great way to go, only slightly higher in cost than wood studs. One of the local Habitat for Humanity affilates has done steel stud construction, and Habitat builds houses very inexpensively (not even counting the whole volunteer labor thing).
No, it's clear indication that earthquake insurance is hideously expensive. If you run the numbers, it makes more sense to set aside some part of the amount each month/year that you'd spend on earthquake insurance, and put it in a rainy day, er...shaky day fund.
I don't know the building codes in hurricane country, but in California there are strict building codes for earthquake mitigation, and as they learn more (e.g., Northridge, Kobe, etc.) they update them for buildings and everything else. That doesn't guarantee survival when "the big one" hits, but it's far from a "relaxed attitude".
And there are plenty of people who are in denial about earthquakes and everything else, like building a house on a steep hillside then wondering why it slides when the ground gets saturated...
Actually, something that holds up quite well to hurricanes, tornadoes and earthquakes: reinforced concrete. I'm in the process of building an addition to my stick-framed house (circa 1948) that's within a couple of miles of the Hayward Fault (a major fault east of the San Andreas that runs through San Francisco). I used Quad-Lock insulated concrete forms (ICFs) for the foundation forms, and if I were building a house from scratch, I'd build the whole thing that way.
Besides reinforced concrete being resistant to hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes and fires, it's also termite-proof. And as an added bonus, ICFs make for very well insulated buildings for both heat and cold (you can use thicker ICFs and make an effective R-50 wall, as compared with R-13 or less for most walls built these days).
(But wait! There's more! You may not be able to do anything about the roof and the windows, but the walls are bulletproof!)
But none of that will help you in the event of a flood. There are some design things you can do to help for that (like putting the garage and non-essential storage on the ground floor), but the main thing to help with that is not building in places prone to flooding. Most places below sea level and in the floodplain of major rivers tend to be prone to flooding. I can't cast too many stones as I live near a major fault...
I agree. He may not be able to claim the moral high ground (frankly, it looks like both of them are in a cow stall full of what cows do), but I give him points for creativity.
Was Fuddrucker's right to hotlink to his game so it looked like part of their site? No. Was it illegal? Probably not, though I recall some lawsuits a while back from Disney/go.com to deep links on their sites, and this is way beyond that.
Was he right to swap out the game and link to slaughterhouse images? Who knows, but he didn't do anything illegal, either.
If he'd wanted to be really nasty, he could have included some images showing mad cow disease, E. coli, and some of the other even less pleasant aspects of the beef industry. After all, isn't Fuddrucker's the place that has a butcher on-site with sides of beef hanging at some locations?
Your memory of the geography of Portugal is correct. "North coast" is referring to the northern end of its long western coast, not a northern (i.e., north-facing) coast. Isn't English a marvelously concise language sometimes?
Obviously, AB is worried that cross-pollination will occur in to rice used for Budweiser. Once the cross-pollination occurs, mutations will take place, causing Budweiser drinkers' IQs to double, making them too smart to drink swill like that:-)
Looking at the article and pics, this sums it up pretty well (emphasis mine):
...these comparisons, particularly the test images, demonstrate with certainty that Monster Cable offers a slightly improved picture. Of course, the jump from composite to S-Video is much larger.
In other words, use S-Video connectors; Monster Cables don't add much.
In my own experience installing and running sound and video at churches, more important than the brand is:
make sure the cables have decent shielding
make sure you run the cables intelligently
When running cables, keep them away from EM sources like power cables. If you must cross a power cable with a signal cable, do it at right angles. And try to protect the cables from damage -- no amount of shielding is going to help if you mangle the cable and shielding around it.
I recently designed an addition to our house. (It's currently in to the city for design review and building permits). I tried a number of software options, including Punch! Pro and Better Homes and Gardens Home Designer. The latter is produced by Chief Architect that makes the professional level Chief Architect series -- heavy-duty stuff, even more than I needed to make permit-ready quality drawings.
Punch! Pro and BH&G Home Designer are each $100 or less, and even those are probably overkill for what you need for redesigning an apartment, but either would get the job done. I settled on BH&G Home Designer (the Pro version, about $500, because it had features I needed for the design approval and permit process). Both have some annoying aspects, but are pretty easy to use to lay out a house or other building. Punch! Pro is probably the easier to use of the two, but BH&G Designer is more powerful, and produces nicer-looking overall results and particularly nicer-looking 3D renderings. The 3D renderings part was important for me not for the design and permit process, but because my wife has a harder time visualizing things in 3D, and the renderings I could create with BH&G Home Designer let me easily show her what different design changes would mean.
One definite advantage that Punch! Pro has is that it lets you design your own 3D objects, which is nice for rendering a particular fixture or piece of furniture that's not included in the library. Making your own objects is definitely harder than just drawing a house, though. And that's where a fair number of the quirks in Punch! Pro reside -- the 3D custom workshop where you create your own objects.
All that said, I'd be interested in hearing about any open source alternatives as the follow-on question by Cliff asks. I've learned enough in the process of designing my own addition (and rendering the current house) that I'd be interested in contributing to an open source program of this nature, too.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't know about the NH state parks, but the National Park Service spells out pretty clearly when permits are needed, under the general category "Commercial Filming and Still Photography Permits". Basically if it's a location not normally accessible to the public; you bring in models, sets or props; or the park service would need additional resources to monitor the activity. He's bringing in a costume, and he's doing it to advertise his other artwork, so it would probably require a permit in a national park. But small scale, there are no onerous fees: 1 - 2 people, camera & tripod only $0/day. The system is set up to keep advertisers and corporations from abusing the parks for their own uses. In the article, it sounds pretty similar for the NH state parks, except the fee is $100/day. As a photographer (who spends time in CA state parks and national parks), it doesn't sound to me like a question of free speech because they didn't deny him access, they just told him to follow the existing rules and get a necessary permit.
We talked about naming workstations after dead rock stars (after all, there's a never-ending supply), but ultimately we settled on elements in the periodic table. One nice benefit is that each had a well defined 1- or 2-letter abbreviation.
I just spat Newcastle all over my keyboard reading this post. Luckily it still appears to be work
Keyboard, shmeboard...won't somebody think of the Newcastle!?! Let's all have a moment of silence for a nice brown ale gone to waste.
It's based a long-standing rule of project cycles, known as the 90/90 rule: the first 90% of the project takes 90% of the time, and the last 10% of the project takes the other 90% of the time. Or at least that's how most software projects seem to end up... :-)
Dear Mistuh Togie,
I'm glad I finally twacked you down. I've been getting endless junk mail related to prowducts I've never purchased. I got a restwaining order against that pesky wabbit, but the junk mail still kept coming.
May you wot in hell.
sincerwly,
Elmer J. Fudd
Many Poles? I certainly hadn't heard much about Polish bloggers before. I wonder why they're speaking out about Vista? :-)
My experience with Vista has been limited. It came on a friend's new (Dell) laptop. There weren't any particular problems with it, but the software I installed was Firefox, Thunderbird and a slew of Adobe apps (Photoshop, Illustrator, et al, from Creative Suite 3). I'm sure with more general software there'd be more problems, because I've certainly heard a lot of complaints from people.
But I didn't see anything in it to make me want it, either. It's got the 'shiny' (man, I miss "Firefly") Aero interface, and not a lot else that showed up in "what's new".
That's my experience, too. The keys are driving the speed limit instead of 10 or 15 MPH over, keeping a reasonable following distance to minimize braking and accelerating back up to speed, and taking advantage of downhills to accelerate when needed. I get 52MPG in a 2002 Prius when driving from the SF Bay Area to San Diego down I-5.
Sony hasn't heard our complaint yet, because I only just found out that the DVD was lost on the return trip to Netflix a week and a half ago. It wouldn't play in our Toshiba SD4700, but the DVD drive in my PC read it just fine. My screen is too small to watch a whole movie on (well, besides "Dark Side of the Rainbow" after a couple of beers :-), so I debated about trying to make a copy that our DVD player would play. Speaking in an entirely hypothetical manner, Sony's added layers didn't prevent Magic DVD Ripper from, um, seeing it ;-) I'd never used it before, so I don't know if it was any slower or anything, but it didn't have any problems.
:-)
After I figure out things with Netflix, I'll put "Casino Royale" back in our queue and see if we get a new version and if it works any better. This is the first DVD we've had a problem playing on our player (besides ones that were scratched and/or dirty, that is).
Hooray for DRM! Keeping legitimate customers from their media since, well...I dunno. Did they have piracy problems with wax recording cylinders?
- $21,000 cost (in 2002; includes tax and tax credit)
- 102,000 miles (so far)
- 45 MPG (older model, and we live in the hills)
- $6,800 fuel (102000/45=2267 gallons * $3.00/gallon)
- $3,000 maintenance
total: $30,800Very near your estimate, and our Prius is still going strong. I guess I should thank Toyota for the $294,200 subsidy!
And the besides all the other flaws noted in the article, it doesn't even get into emissions. The Prius (and smaller non-hybrids) generate a lot less emissions than a full-sized pickup, SUV or Hummer.
But a writer above is correct. To be really 'green', you don't get the Hummer, the Prius, or even the Scion...you walk, bike and take mass transit. But if you need a new car (in our case we were getting rid of a 1985 Nissan that wasn't running very well), a hybrid or smaller non-hybrid is worth looking into.
I used to own a 1981 diesel VW Rabbit, and it got 50+MPG, so I'd love to see more diesels in the U.S. once cleaner fuel is available.
Simple...they may have liked what he did, but they wanted to be the ones in charge, not him.
If you're not smart enough to ask someone besides /. for advice, there's no hope for you :-)
I would guess it would be the same as with current sell-back systems for solar. There'd still be a meter that the utility controls and reads, and so it wouldn't be any different than now -- either your subgrid reads as a net user or net contributor by whatever amount. If you alter the meter, it can be made to say whatever.
Obviously you go and beat up your neighbors for not supporting their part of the grid :-)
Yep. As I posted about earlier, I'm in the process of building an addition to my house, and I used insulated concrete forms (ICFs) for the foundation. If I were building a house from scratch, I'd build the whole thing that way. Reinforced concrete is a great way to go, and easy to build with using ICFs.
They're resistant to hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, fires, termites, even bullets (well, not the windows or roof, but the rest sure is). And they create a very well insulated structure. If you're in a more extreme climate, you can use thicker ICFs and walls and make an R-50 insulated wall (compared with R-13 or less for normal walls).
And with some planning on the design end, you can make them safer in floods, too, by keeping the ground floor as garage and storage, and living quarters higher up. But even that won't help with a 30 foot storm surge or if you build 20 feet below sea level, but you can make a lot safer, more comfortable, more energy efficient house using reinforced concrete than with traditional stick framing. And concrete is pretty darn cheap, too.
That may be for an odd-ball project like sticking a manufactured home on top of something else, but for a normally framed house, steel studs are a great way to go, only slightly higher in cost than wood studs. One of the local Habitat for Humanity affilates has done steel stud construction, and Habitat builds houses very inexpensively (not even counting the whole volunteer labor thing).
No, it's clear indication that earthquake insurance is hideously expensive. If you run the numbers, it makes more sense to set aside some part of the amount each month/year that you'd spend on earthquake insurance, and put it in a rainy day, er...shaky day fund.
I don't know the building codes in hurricane country, but in California there are strict building codes for earthquake mitigation, and as they learn more (e.g., Northridge, Kobe, etc.) they update them for buildings and everything else. That doesn't guarantee survival when "the big one" hits, but it's far from a "relaxed attitude".
And there are plenty of people who are in denial about earthquakes and everything else, like building a house on a steep hillside then wondering why it slides when the ground gets saturated...
Oh, and forgot one of the other appeals of building with ICFs -- it's a lot like building with Lego!
Actually, something that holds up quite well to hurricanes, tornadoes and earthquakes: reinforced concrete. I'm in the process of building an addition to my stick-framed house (circa 1948) that's within a couple of miles of the Hayward Fault (a major fault east of the San Andreas that runs through San Francisco). I used Quad-Lock insulated concrete forms (ICFs) for the foundation forms, and if I were building a house from scratch, I'd build the whole thing that way.
Besides reinforced concrete being resistant to hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes and fires, it's also termite-proof. And as an added bonus, ICFs make for very well insulated buildings for both heat and cold (you can use thicker ICFs and make an effective R-50 wall, as compared with R-13 or less for most walls built these days).
(But wait! There's more! You may not be able to do anything about the roof and the windows, but the walls are bulletproof!)
But none of that will help you in the event of a flood. There are some design things you can do to help for that (like putting the garage and non-essential storage on the ground floor), but the main thing to help with that is not building in places prone to flooding. Most places below sea level and in the floodplain of major rivers tend to be prone to flooding. I can't cast too many stones as I live near a major fault...
I agree. He may not be able to claim the moral high ground (frankly, it looks like both of them are in a cow stall full of what cows do), but I give him points for creativity.
Was Fuddrucker's right to hotlink to his game so it looked like part of their site? No. Was it illegal? Probably not, though I recall some lawsuits a while back from Disney/go.com to deep links on their sites, and this is way beyond that.
Was he right to swap out the game and link to slaughterhouse images? Who knows, but he didn't do anything illegal, either.
If he'd wanted to be really nasty, he could have included some images showing mad cow disease, E. coli, and some of the other even less pleasant aspects of the beef industry. After all, isn't Fuddrucker's the place that has a butcher on-site with sides of beef hanging at some locations?
Your memory of the geography of Portugal is correct. "North coast" is referring to the northern end of its long western coast, not a northern (i.e., north-facing) coast. Isn't English a marvelously concise language sometimes?
Obviously, AB is worried that cross-pollination will occur in to rice used for Budweiser. Once the cross-pollination occurs, mutations will take place, causing Budweiser drinkers' IQs to double, making them too smart to drink swill like that :-)
In other words, use S-Video connectors; Monster Cables don't add much.
In my own experience installing and running sound and video at churches, more important than the brand is:
- make sure the cables have decent shielding
- make sure you run the cables intelligently
When running cables, keep them away from EM sources like power cables. If you must cross a power cable with a signal cable, do it at right angles. And try to protect the cables from damage -- no amount of shielding is going to help if you mangle the cable and shielding around it.Punch! Pro and BH&G Home Designer are each $100 or less, and even those are probably overkill for what you need for redesigning an apartment, but either would get the job done. I settled on BH&G Home Designer (the Pro version, about $500, because it had features I needed for the design approval and permit process). Both have some annoying aspects, but are pretty easy to use to lay out a house or other building. Punch! Pro is probably the easier to use of the two, but BH&G Designer is more powerful, and produces nicer-looking overall results and particularly nicer-looking 3D renderings. The 3D renderings part was important for me not for the design and permit process, but because my wife has a harder time visualizing things in 3D, and the renderings I could create with BH&G Home Designer let me easily show her what different design changes would mean.
One definite advantage that Punch! Pro has is that it lets you design your own 3D objects, which is nice for rendering a particular fixture or piece of furniture that's not included in the library. Making your own objects is definitely harder than just drawing a house, though. And that's where a fair number of the quirks in Punch! Pro reside -- the 3D custom workshop where you create your own objects.
All that said, I'd be interested in hearing about any open source alternatives as the follow-on question by Cliff asks. I've learned enough in the process of designing my own addition (and rendering the current house) that I'd be interested in contributing to an open source program of this nature, too.