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  1. But did they LISTEN? on US Losing R&D Dominance To Asia? · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I personally know people in industry who have been warning of this for the last 20 years. The "new economy" of that era promised to reduce costs by moving manufacturing overseas while keeping R&D in the USA. People who knew how R&D worked said that the manufacturing was, if nothing else, necessary to the local support (machinists, PWB fabs, etc.) that support R&D.

  2. Reread on Do Companies Punish Workers Who Take Vacations? · · Score: 1
    There was a reception -- we weren't there because we were off on our honeymoon.

    If I'd told them earlier it was our wedding, they might have rationalized themselves around to insisting that I come back to work, as it was they were thinking about how they'd look if the word got out.

  3. I did that once on Do Companies Punish Workers Who Take Vacations? · · Score: 5, Interesting

    There are those who are afraid, and there are those who think their job is just short term. I've found that by giving a 90 day notice of an upcoming vacation tends to make the more nervous bosses less so. I follow up every 30 days stating in my email, that on such and such a date I'll be taking some time off.

    I even reminded the Management that they'd need to assign someone to cover for me early enough for me to bring my stand-in up to speed. No action.

    As we got down to the last few weeks before I was scheduled to leave, my immediate manager started dropping hints that this wasn't a good time to be out of the office. I replied that that was why it was important to have someone cover for me.

    About a week before I'm scheduled for time off, I get called into a meeting with every suit above me right up to the senior VP. They go on at great length about how important the work I'm doing is, how critical etc. to the Company, and what a poor time it will be for me to be gone. I make understanding noises. Finally they ask me if I'm going to reschedule my time off. I tell them that we have travel booked, hotels, all that.

    They then dial up the "we really, really, really need you here" stuff. So I fold: "Well, if that's how it is we'll just have to tell the wedding guests they're on their own and call off the wedding." Silence.

    I'm reliably informed that the partying at the reception went on nearly till dawn. We weren't there.

  4. It might be that on Do Companies Punish Workers Who Take Vacations? · · Score: 1

    Every other country understands that this makes people healthier and creates a better workforce.

    Perhaps other countries' businesses are more about making money for the stockholders and less about reminding the management that they have power over the working stiffs.

  5. Re:Massive farms of artificial trees... on New CO2 Harvester Could Help Scrub the Air · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I often wonder where people who deny pollution is having any effect on the earth think they are going to live if they are wrong.

    Well, some of them aren't real good with the concept of "I could be wrong."

  6. Frayed Knot on New CO2 Harvester Could Help Scrub the Air · · Score: 5, Informative

    Sorry, but that idea only flies on Fox News. Actually, human activities cause 135 times as much CO2 emissions as volcanoes do.

  7. And once we have a few gigatonnes of CO2 on New CO2 Harvester Could Help Scrub the Air · · Score: 5, Funny
    We can launch it into space. OK, maybe not.

    How about we bury it at Yucca Mountain? Dissolve it in seawater?

    I HAVE IT! We separate the carbon and the oxygen, release the O2 into the atmosphere, and bury the carbon in abandoned coal mines!

  8. Remarkable on How Stephen Hawking Has Defied the Odds For 50 Years · · Score: 5, Informative
    How many physicists have written best-sellers? About physics?

    To join in wishing him the best: may he live as long as life brings him joy, and joy for as long as he lives.

  9. Thinking too small on US Chamber of Commerce Infiltrated By Chinese Hackers · · Score: 1

    Yeah but grabbing and leaking a few documents detailing bribery & coercion of politicians would have been nice.

    Not nearly as nice as getting a handle on the politicians would be, eh?

  10. I don't see the problem on US Chamber of Commerce Infiltrated By Chinese Hackers · · Score: 3, Informative

    The US Chamber of Commerce is a lobbying organization -- it's not like they have Industrial Super Secrets. Besides, a high proportion of their clients are Chinese anyway and presumably have pretty good access to the organization already.

  11. It's a matter of priorities on The Condescending UI · · Score: 2
    In office products and other general computing tasks, performance/productivity isn't really very important. It's much more important to be "friendly," whatever "friendly" means to the people making buying decisions (often the ones running the help desk.)

    When performance is important, you get a different picture. For instance, how many FPS games have a ribbon-type interface for weapon selection? FPS is probably the single most performance-emphasizing part of general computing, so there may be a lesson or two to be found there.

  12. The "dark" in "dark matter" isn't just "dim." on New Theory Challenges Need For Dark Matter · · Score: 2

    The Bullet Cluster result shows that some form of unobservable matter exists. But we already know that: brown dwarfs, rogue planets, etc.: that kind of "dark matter" has been observed, just not in the amounts to explain galactic rotation.

    Ummm ... No.

    The Bullet Cluster result shows that some form of matter that does not interact with baryonic matter except through gravity is present. The "dark" in "dark matter" doesn't just mean that we can't see it, it means that it doesn't interact with baryonic matter in any way except gravitationally. It not only doesn't emit electromagnetic radiation, it doesn't absorb it, and furthermore it doesn't even collide with it.

    In the Bullet Clusters, two interpenetrating clusters are radiating furiously in the X-ray wavelengths due to gas, dust, etc. collisions at intergalactic velocities. The amount energy lost to these collisions is enough to actually slow down the clusters. And yet the gravitational lensing from the clusters shows the majority of their masses separate from the visible clusters. This is exactly what we would see if the majority of the cluster mass is nonbaryonic, and quite the opposite of what we would see if the mass was cold baryonic matter.

  13. Asymptotic to zero on Half Life of a Tech Worker: 15 Years · · Score: 1
    And here I am, sixty in a few months, and I'm having a blast as an individual contributor.

    I've turned down management "promotions" and managed to stay in hands-on tech (but paid nicely, thank you) and the egoboo as the office greybeard is awesome. Including one business card in my portfolio that lists my title as "mad scientist."

    So the question I have to ask is this: how many drop out because that's the nature of the business and how many lose interest? Because the other geezers I work with stuck with the technical track as our hair turned gray (those who didn't lose it) and you couldn't catch any of us anywhere else. I may retire some day, but I'm sure not in a hurry.

  14. Radioactive decay: random? on Physicist Uses Laser Light As Fast, True-Random Number Generator · · Score: 1

    Actually, radioactive decay is totally random (that's why Schrödinger used it in the famous cat-in-a-box gedankenexperiment. The half-life just tells you the overall rate, but that no more help than knowing how often you flip a coin -- no help with heads or tails.

  15. Genuinely random? on Physicist Uses Laser Light As Fast, True-Random Number Generator · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Unlike easily predicted phenomena like radioactive decay and thermal noise?

  16. Doesn't need to be in the print job on Printers Could Be the Next Attack Vector · · Score: 0

    I had no idea one could put a firmware update in a print job.

    One of the main reasons for using a general-purpose operating system (*cough* Windows *cough*) in a printer is to allow remote administration -- such as downloading updates to it.

  17. What do you mean, rock? on Earthscraper Takes Sustainable Design Underground · · Score: 1

    It's not volume which matters, it's surface area with the water table bearing rock which determins how much water is going to get in.

    It's all alluvial silt. In a former lake bed. Most of it below the water table.

  18. Pumps on Earthscraper Takes Sustainable Design Underground · · Score: 1

    fail

  19. Seasons on Earthscraper Takes Sustainable Design Underground · · Score: 2
    I take it you've never been to Mexico City. Seasonal variation isn't a big deal there, being at high altitude in the tropics.

    Most houses -- even for the wealthy -- don't bother to have heating or air conditioning.

  20. You're forgetting the water table. on Earthscraper Takes Sustainable Design Underground · · Score: 4, Insightful
    No shit, Sherman. Mexico City is built in a silted-up lakebed. What's more, their sewage processing ... shall we say, leaves a bit to be desired.

    So -- how do they plan emergency evacuation of this thing if the pumps fail? Maybe during an earthquake? (Not like Mexico City has those, mind.)

  21. Shelves? You want shelves? on Good Disk Library Solutions? · · Score: 1
    These have a single row for disks, but it's just a matter of rearranging the spacings to make a few hundred feet of disk shelving.

    http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f104/tsudhonimh/bookcases/bookcase_4unit.jpg

  22. Say what? on In Australia, Immunize Or Lose Benefits · · Score: 2

    If millions of years of mammalian immune systems getting infected haven't done it yet, a few decades of a few billion humans reducing the number of pathogens which are exposed to them isn't going to.

  23. Meryl Dorey on In Australia, Immunize Or Lose Benefits · · Score: 2

    If she didn't already go around foaming at the mouth, this would certainly light her off. I've got to check on Peter Bowditch [ratbags.com] more often; he's going to have a blast covering this.

  24. Causality on Study Finds Frequent Gaming Changes Your Brain · · Score: 2
    Insert usual observation regarding correlation.

    The results are equally consistent with the hypothesis that those with more developed left ventral striatum are more disposed to gaming.

  25. Third Parties on AFL-CIO and Big Content Advocate For SOPA · · Score: 1

    Why not vote for who you want rather than the lesser of two evils?

    Every now and then we try that. The most recent example was in 2000, when enough people voted for Ralph Nader to decide the election.

    I will point out that the "lesser of two evils" is a false dichotomy. If you wait for November next year, yeah, that's what it comes to. If you want more choices, get active in the parties -- the people who actually put in the work year in and year out have a lot more leverage than those whose whole involvement amounts to checking a few lines on a ballot.