"Whatever happened to worrying about the darned thing landing in one piece?"
It seems that the UK has co-opted all the crochity "When I was your age...!" space exploration jokes.
"When I was your age, we didn't have any of that fancy-shmancy technology on our probes. Wheels... hah! Back in my day we stayed where we landed and we liked it!"
"LCD TV. Above the stove. So it can catch the oil crackling in the pan, (etc.)"
Whoever lives in that apartment has a diet that consists of chips and ramen. When they're not ordering delivery. I'm sure he dusts the stove more often than he turns it on.
"The bed. In the middle of an open square, so it takes maximum space.""
Don't want it to knock anything over when it starts rotating...
"The sinks in the bathroom. They're round bowls with no shelf space in sight. Where do you put toothbrush, toothpaste, hair gel, combs, shaver, soap?"
Ignoring the bigger profile a 10 foot suit provides, there's still the weight factor. If they go much beyond half a ton(ne) in weight, they'll fall through the floors of anything that isn't either a parking garage or a library.
Re:Beavis..this is the coolest thing i have ever s
on
Your Own Mecha
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· Score: 1
"All we need now are auto-balancing walking chassis and shoulder mount gatlins!"
Don't forget the big fluorscent bull's-eye painted on it. It's too small to mount heavy armor and/or weaponry, it's too big and heavy to move nimbly through buildings and such and find cover, and it's too slow to have the manueverability of a VTOL. One RPG and the show's over.
Anybody that's seriously thought about the idea agrees that mecha isn't anything but a big, stupid target. If it's much more than a basic exoskeleton, it goes from science fiction to science fantasy.
"Biggest problem: Tech support is absolutely abysmal."
IMO, the biggest problem with satellite internet has to be the price. Everything I've seen is $600-$700 up front and then $60-$70 a month. Hell, getting a basic ISDN line costs less than that.
I'd be willing to swallow the up-front price tag if the monthly fee was closer to $50, but until then I may as just well continue using V.90 and the occasional multilink as needed.
No no, the "level" of talks refers to how high up in the building they got. "Low level talks" means they weren't able to get past the ground floor receptionist before security kicked them out.
"But the same light refraction phenomenon that gives Earth a blue sky as seen from the ground should give Mars a blue sky as seen from the ground as well."
Except that Mars doesn't have anywhere near the atmosphere we have. I'd say that the sky from the surface of Mars would more resemble the sky on Earth as viewed from 30,000 ft (as high as most of us have been) than the blue we're used to from the surface. In other words, it should be more black than anything, with maybe some hints of blue on the horizon.
"but this should not be the norm in calm weather conditions.
But you must remember that we have a very unique weather pattern in the star system. We have oceans to mitigate temperature differentials between the day and night side, and we have continents breaking up said oceans to dissipate the cyclical storms that get caused by said differentials. Every other planet lacks one or the other and is stuck with a more or less constant dull roar instead of a wide range from calm to hurricane that we tend to get.
"The idea that people won't spend $200, $300 or more on a portable device has been disproven by the success of the iPod."
But the iPod more or less had its killer app even before the folks at Apple thought of the idea. Hardware capabilities alone will make some money in the Japanese market, but at that price it better have some damned good games if they intend to sell it to us gaijins. And they had best be launch games, seeing as how it's not backwards compatable with the older library (probably a big factor in the successful launch of the PS2).
"Personally, I'm only using Republic of Texas money."
Considering Texas is one of those states with the ignoble distinction of having achieved US statehood twice.. are they hoping the third time will be the charm?:)
Besides, Texas is already a republic "or else" (per Article IV, section 4) and Austin might not take kindly to these people and their dabbling in currency if they decide to start minting gold and silver coins. Then you'd really be up a creek.
Seriously, with all these little efforts by states recently to send a big "fuck you!" to Washington (Alaska trying to legalize marajuana, other states buying drugs from Canada, etc.), I'm surprised minting state currency hasn't popped up in a state legislature recently.
"The problem is a lack of highly educated workers willing to work for the minimum wage or lower in the U.S."
Open the border to more work visas and naturalizations. Kinda hard for countries to go overseas for cheap labor when all the cheap labor comes here to the US. Businesses find cheaper workers, labor groups get more potential members as well as the satisfaction that these once-overseas workers are protected by US labor laws.
No agency shall disclose any record which is contained in a system of records by any means of communication to any person, or to another agency, except pursuant to a written request by, or with the prior written consent of, the individual to whom the record pertains, unless disclosure of the record would be--
(1) to those officers and employees of the agency which maintains the record who have a need for the record in the performance of their duties;
(2) required under section 552 of this title;
(3) for a routine use as defined in subsection (a)(7) of this section and described under subsection (e)(4)(D) of this section;
(4) to the Bureau of the Census for purposes of planning or carrying out a census or survey or related activity pursuant to the provisions of Title 13;
(5) to a recipient who has provided the agency with advance adequate written assurance that the record will be used solely as a statistical research or reporting record, and the record is to be transferred in a form that is not individually identifiable;
(6) to the National Archives and Records Administration as a record which has sufficient historical or other value to warrant its continued preservation by the United States Government, or for evaluation by the Archivist of the United States or the designee of the Archivist to determine whether the record has such value;
(7) to another agency or to an instrumentality of any governmental jurisdiction within or under the control of the United States for a civil or criminal law enforcement activity if the activity is authorized by law, and if the head of the agency or instrumentality has made a written request to the agency which maintains the record specifying the particular portion desired and the law enforcement activity for which the record is sought;
(8) to a person pursuant to a showing of compelling circumstances affecting the health or safety of an individual if upon such disclosure notification is transmitted to the last known address of such individual;
(9) to either House of Congress, or, to the extent of matter within its jurisdiction, any committee or subcommittee thereof, any joint committee of Congress or subcommittee of any such joint committee;
(10) to the Comptroller General, or any of his authorized representatives, in the course of the performance of the duties of the General Accounting Office;
(11) pursuant to the order of a court of competent jurisdiction; or
(12) to a consumer reporting agency in accordance with section 3711(e) of Title 31.
I don't see "published on a public website" anywhere in there...
Then explain my collection of the first five years of the magazine I have.
"the Bandai Sattelaview,"
The funny think about satellite services is that they require... you know... a satellite. Satellites over Japan aren't visible from way on the other side of the Pacific. It might be visible from Hawaii, but I wouldn't bet on it. Throwing up a satellite for a new market when the service was a fizzle in the home market is rather silly.
Besides, bits and pieces of the exclusives still trickle over. The cut scenes added to the GBC version of Dragon Warrior were first introduced into the BS-X version of the game (no, they weren't in Remix for the SFC). And I seem to recall a small text game from Squaresoft... something called "Radical Dreamers" or "Chrono Cross" or something like that...
"or that Sega service"
You mean the Sega Channel? We had that too. Or are you referring to Sega.net, which we also got?
"I predict that what Nintendo will anounce is a portable gamecube that uses the same media."
So if Sony ends up shooting themselves in the foot with using optical media on a portable, Nintendo can go down in flames right along with it? I doubt it.
Personally, for their upcoming mysery announcement (megaton!), my money is an iQue-esque online service for the GCN that lets you buy ROM images of older console games.
"Well, IBM is hardly any more objective than Microsoft."
Why not? IBM hasn't been in the desktop OS business since the early 90's, and they've long since switched gears away from AIX and System/n in their low-end server line. I would imagine that they operate one of the biggest (if not the biggest) support shops for Linux in the industry, sitting side-by-side with their Windows NT/2k/XP support (which is actually bigger than Microsoft's own). If anybody is best able to compare/contrast XP and Linux in the office and in the server room, it's definately IBM.
Windows... Linux... IBM hardware runs it all. And let's not forget OS X!:)
Slashdot Mirror
"that they had even entered folks' minds about being similarly sensitive to a loss of air pressure."
The crew knows how to get into the Soyuz capsule all by themselves.
"Whatever happened to worrying about the darned thing landing in one piece?"
It seems that the UK has co-opted all the crochity "When I was your age...!" space exploration jokes.
"When I was your age, we didn't have any of that fancy-shmancy technology on our probes. Wheels... hah! Back in my day we stayed where we landed and we liked it!"
"New Zealand (which still maintains Niue's defense)"
Alright. So... um... who maintains New Zealand's defense?
"LCD TV. Above the stove. So it can catch the oil crackling in the pan, (etc.)"
Whoever lives in that apartment has a diet that consists of chips and ramen. When they're not ordering delivery. I'm sure he dusts the stove more often than he turns it on.
"The bed. In the middle of an open square, so it takes maximum space.""
Don't want it to knock anything over when it starts rotating...
"The sinks in the bathroom. They're round bowls with no shelf space in sight. Where do you put toothbrush, toothpaste, hair gel, combs, shaver, soap?"
Huh? What are those?
"IPv6 will only be introduced in the US when a government supplier wants it"
You know, the US government is essentially all-metric...
It's good to know they won't run out until we switch to IPv6.
Will they actually be dropping Windows, or are they simply fishing for better pricing from Microsoft, like India, Israel, et al?
"I think they were maybe 10 feet tall at most."
Ignoring the bigger profile a 10 foot suit provides, there's still the weight factor. If they go much beyond half a ton(ne) in weight, they'll fall through the floors of anything that isn't either a parking garage or a library.
"All we need now are auto-balancing walking chassis and shoulder mount gatlins!"
Don't forget the big fluorscent bull's-eye painted on it. It's too small to mount heavy armor and/or weaponry, it's too big and heavy to move nimbly through buildings and such and find cover, and it's too slow to have the manueverability of a VTOL. One RPG and the show's over.
Anybody that's seriously thought about the idea agrees that mecha isn't anything but a big, stupid target. If it's much more than a basic exoskeleton, it goes from science fiction to science fantasy.
And before we realize that, if they're looking for time at US telescopes, what they're looking for probably can't be seen from south of the Equator. :)
"Biggest problem: Tech support is absolutely abysmal."
IMO, the biggest problem with satellite internet has to be the price. Everything I've seen is $600-$700 up front and then $60-$70 a month. Hell, getting a basic ISDN line costs less than that.
I'd be willing to swallow the up-front price tag if the monthly fee was closer to $50, but until then I may as just well continue using V.90 and the occasional multilink as needed.
Yes and no. It's what they give their artists just before presenting them their new contract.
A True Geek doesn't need Hilton's Star Trek: The Experience. They already have their own version in their parents' basement.
No no, the "level" of talks refers to how high up in the building they got. "Low level talks" means they weren't able to get past the ground floor receptionist before security kicked them out.
Hard to say. They keep sucking up the oceans before they finish skipping.
"But the same light refraction phenomenon that gives Earth a blue sky as seen from the ground should give Mars a blue sky as seen from the ground as well."
Except that Mars doesn't have anywhere near the atmosphere we have. I'd say that the sky from the surface of Mars would more resemble the sky on Earth as viewed from 30,000 ft (as high as most of us have been) than the blue we're used to from the surface. In other words, it should be more black than anything, with maybe some hints of blue on the horizon.
"but this should not be the norm in calm weather conditions.
But you must remember that we have a very unique weather pattern in the star system. We have oceans to mitigate temperature differentials between the day and night side, and we have continents breaking up said oceans to dissipate the cyclical storms that get caused by said differentials. Every other planet lacks one or the other and is stuck with a more or less constant dull roar instead of a wide range from calm to hurricane that we tend to get.
"The idea that people won't spend $200, $300 or more on a portable device has been disproven by the success of the iPod."
But the iPod more or less had its killer app even before the folks at Apple thought of the idea. Hardware capabilities alone will make some money in the Japanese market, but at that price it better have some damned good games if they intend to sell it to us gaijins. And they had best be launch games, seeing as how it's not backwards compatable with the older library (probably a big factor in the successful launch of the PS2).
"Personally, I'm only using Republic of Texas money."
:)
Considering Texas is one of those states with the ignoble distinction of having achieved US statehood twice.. are they hoping the third time will be the charm?
Besides, Texas is already a republic "or else" (per Article IV, section 4) and Austin might not take kindly to these people and their dabbling in currency if they decide to start minting gold and silver coins. Then you'd really be up a creek.
Seriously, with all these little efforts by states recently to send a big "fuck you!" to Washington (Alaska trying to legalize marajuana, other states buying drugs from Canada, etc.), I'm surprised minting state currency hasn't popped up in a state legislature recently.
"If it's not written in COBOL or ADA they don't want anything to do with it."
I didn't know Microsoft actually made VisualCOBOL and VisualADA...
Doesn't the entire state of Wyoming qualify as an "undisclosed location?"
"The problem is a lack of highly educated workers willing to work for the minimum wage or lower in the U.S."
Open the border to more work visas and naturalizations. Kinda hard for countries to go overseas for cheap labor when all the cheap labor comes here to the US. Businesses find cheaper workers, labor groups get more potential members as well as the satisfaction that these once-overseas workers are protected by US labor laws.
Or am I not being xenophobic enough?
"any more than America got Nintendo Power,"
Then explain my collection of the first five years of the magazine I have.
"the Bandai Sattelaview,"
The funny think about satellite services is that they require... you know... a satellite. Satellites over Japan aren't visible from way on the other side of the Pacific. It might be visible from Hawaii, but I wouldn't bet on it. Throwing up a satellite for a new market when the service was a fizzle in the home market is rather silly.
Besides, bits and pieces of the exclusives still trickle over. The cut scenes added to the GBC version of Dragon Warrior were first introduced into the BS-X version of the game (no, they weren't in Remix for the SFC). And I seem to recall a small text game from Squaresoft... something called "Radical Dreamers" or "Chrono Cross" or something like that...
"or that Sega service"
You mean the Sega Channel? We had that too. Or are you referring to Sega.net, which we also got?
"I predict that what Nintendo will anounce is a portable gamecube that uses the same media."
So if Sony ends up shooting themselves in the foot with using optical media on a portable, Nintendo can go down in flames right along with it? I doubt it.
Personally, for their upcoming mysery announcement (megaton!), my money is an iQue-esque online service for the GCN that lets you buy ROM images of older console games.
"Well, IBM is hardly any more objective than Microsoft."
:)
Why not? IBM hasn't been in the desktop OS business since the early 90's, and they've long since switched gears away from AIX and System/n in their low-end server line. I would imagine that they operate one of the biggest (if not the biggest) support shops for Linux in the industry, sitting side-by-side with their Windows NT/2k/XP support (which is actually bigger than Microsoft's own). If anybody is best able to compare/contrast XP and Linux in the office and in the server room, it's definately IBM.
Windows... Linux... IBM hardware runs it all. And let's not forget OS X!