I'm on Gimp 2.2 because 2.4 refuses to open my 100k-wide panorama images. 2.2 opens them, but isn't too happy about doing so. It seems it wants to put the whole image in memory or a temp location somewhere, and when I paste in a new part of the image (e.g.to fix up a person that got chopped in half by the automatic blender of my panorama tool), it sits there and thinks for a few minutes. I change to difference blending mode to position that layer correctly... thinks for a few minutes. again. Start painting.. ugh.
I really wish it would work more like XRes did. I think XRes absolutely had the right idea*. But I guess the suggestion nowadays is to just get a 64bit machine and stuff 32GB of RAM in, then call it a day. Bloody inefficient.
I never argued with the fact that with the BSD you don't have to contribute back; that's what my parent poster already pointed out. My point isn't pointless given that the situation he describes applies just as well to the GPL, just to a lesser extent.
And yes, Affero GPLv3 would indeed make this apply to Google if they were using it as a server-side solution. But if it's in-house only - they still don't have to contribute back. If they (or anyone) develop for a specific client only, then only that client needs to get the fix (they, of course, can then choose to make it available, depending on what contract governed the development of the software itself.).
The non-Affero GPLv3, however, has no such clauses at all, and the existance of Affero GPLv3 does not change anything about the -main- GPLv3.
Point with these licenses is that if you fixed a bug in a project using them, you're not required to contribute the fix. With the BSD license this applies any time. With the standard GPL license this applies when you're not distributing the thing. With the Affero GPL license this applies when you're not distributing it and not using it as a server-side solution. In all of these cases, somebody can be sitting on a fix and whoever's project it originally was has no recourse, within the license, to have them make that fix available.
I'm not 'doing something down' because I don't like it - I'm just saying that they all have similar problems; it doesn't make it any less of a problem with BSD, but it clearly doesn't exempt GPL either (v2, v3, Affero or otherwise; short of a 'GPL'-style license I'm not aware of that explicitly states that all modifications must be contributed back, regardless of origin or purpose, period.)
say Google fixes something in a GPLed project that they're -not- distributing. Then GPL fans can't automatically get the fix because, hey, the GPL license*!
( * which only says something about making the code, and thus the fix, available if the code, or compiled version thereof, is distributed. )
The difference is trivial, isn't it. In both cases an existing fix would not automatically be contributed back.
the page layout (right vs left) is hardly a major issue when it concerns Foxit, a PDF -reader-. I can fully understand if you want it to work correctly for a PDF authoring app, so that it comes out the printer the way you see it on screen, but geeze.
It's like calling ThunderBird "beyond hope" because the thunderbird team appear to be unwilling to fix the folder rename issue on the Windows platform (renaming "Test" to "test" will tell you that it already exists. durrr. https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=92165 - July 2001. )
That said, next version (there's always a next version) of Foxit should have this implemented a la Adobe's Reader. If it is, then that's implemented a whole lot quicker than the aforementioned asinine TB bug ( http://www.foxitsoftware.com/bbs/archive/index.php/t-192.html - September 2005 ), although I agree that it should have been implemented in an afternoon's work (even done dirtily so by inserting a blank invisible page in the page array).
...for making it too easy for everybody to still have broken IPv6 records as Vista will just fall back to IPv4 anyway thereby slowing the adoption of IPv6 and new standards in general.
( if that type of argument doesn't sound familiar, you must be new here. )
Perhaps Wikipedia perfectly allows profanity in a subject that deals with, say, Profanity ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Profanity ) ? I quote: "For example, "fuck", a common (often considered strong) profanity in English, is a verb for the act of sexual intercourse and may be used literally in this sense ("I fucked her all night long.")or ("Fuck you bitch")." And that is just a tiny quote of that page. I swear I'll have to wash my eyes with soap later!
Perhaps they have a policy on not allowing profanity in subjects that do not call for it; or at least trying to keep it to a minimum. E.g. what is the added value of the profanity in this: -- Linux/lnks/ in motherfucking English; fucked up variants exist[1]) is a goddamn Unix-like computer operating system. Linux is one da motherfuckin' bomb when it comes to free software and open source development: typically all underlying source code can be freely modified, used, and redistributed by any motherfucker with half a clue.[2] -- Over the non-profane description that is there already?
However - let's say an article deals with Muhammad, either the very topic or reasonably tangentially - then the added value, certainly in the former, of graphical depictions of the guy is, at least to me, quite clear. Similarly, however, I wouldn't expect pictures of Muhammad to appear in subjects that have little to nothing to do with him - but not because I feel it would unnecessarily potentially offend islamists visiting that page not having expected to see the picture and seeing it anyway, but because the subject wouldn't call for such the picture in the first place.
That, at least to me, is the difference between your Muhammad vs Profanity and how Wikipedia handles it example.
sorry, but a graphics card does not speed up your rendering unless your renderer can take advantage of the graphic card; hint: that's not very many, and those that do only do so for very limited tasks.
The only reason you should have for upgrading your graphics card within the 'consumer' market is if your viewport redraws are being sluggish; this will still allow you to play games properly* as well. The only reason to upgrade to e.g. FireGL or a QuadroFX is if you're pushing really massive amounts of polys and want a dedicated support line; e.g. for 3ds Max, there's the MaxTreme drivers for the QuadroFX line - you don't get that for a consumer card.
* on the other hand, do *not* expect to play games with a QuadroFX properly. Do not expect frequent driver upgrades just to fix a glitch with some game. Do not expect the performance in games to be similar to, let alone better than, that of the consumer cards.
For 3D Artists dealing with rendering, the CPU should always be the primary concern (faster CPU / more cores = faster rendering**) followed by more RAM (more fits in a single render; consider a 64bit O/S and 3D Application), followed by a faster bus (tends to come with the CPU)/faster RAM, followed by a faster drive (if you -are- going to swap, or read in lots of data, or write out lots of data, you don't want to be doing that on a 4200RPM drive with little to no cache) followed by another machine to take over half the frames or half the image being rendered (** 'more cores' only scales up to a limited point. A second machine overtakes this limit in a snap), as long as you don't have something slow like a 10MBit network going (for data transfer).
I guess it'll depend on what you mean by a parallel universe.
Do you mean a universe that exists completely independent of our own at any and all points in time? If so - it's not likely to be similar at all, no.
Do you mean a universe that exists as a 'branch' of our own as one of many universes that could exist where if somebody went left here, they went right in that one, and all that stuff which would quickly lead to a near-infinite number of universes? If so - then you have to wonder what the odds are of the parallel universe we'd be accessing is one that was VERY recently formed, in which case perhaps I'm wearing a white shirt instead of a blue shirt, or formed a few years ago, in which 9/11 didn't happen, or one happening much longer ago in which mankind never evolved (or got placed on Earth by the almighty God, if you so desire). I certainly don't have hard data on this, I don't think anybody does, but a gut feeling tells me it'd be easier to access a parallel universe formed more recently than one formed longer ago. As such, it's quite likely to be similar.
Then there's the whole phase thing and dimensions thing and oh dear, so I might have forgotten an "alternate universe" option. I'm guessing wikipedia might have more, but those are the two I'd imagine to be the most common.
look, don't get me wrong, I think artists making gajillions shouldn't complain either. But I do take issue with your last statement. I'll dissect it a bit.
"There is no right to profit from your work." Correct.
"There is a right to try to profit from your work." Sure, even if that's not written in stone anywhere - it's as basic right, I suppose.
"The difference is subtle but very important" Absolutely.
"and frankly, I'm starting to get more than a bit sick of the copyright creeps demanding that all society and technology bend over backwards to help them profit." And that's where I take issue. There is a difference between telling society that A. they -must- purchase Artwork X and B. they -must not- pirate Artwork X
In situation A, society is bending over backwards to help them profit and I agree, there shouldn't be some mandate saying that every consumer must purchase a minimum of Artworks to help the artists.
In situation B, however, all that is said is that if society -wants- a given Artwork, they'd better either pay for it, or deal with the fact that they won't have said Artwork. And that, I think, is perfectly fair. If that results in the Artist neither getting purchases -nor- popularity from pirating, then that's the result of the Artist's own choice.
"Giving bills in Congress misleading names, like ''Protect America''."
Just to touch on this - it's not necessarily so much misleading for the act; I'm sure the act in itself is intended to help protect the U.S.. Just that the ways in which it aims to do this are possibly misguided.
However, the misleading part really comes in when you vote -against- such an act/bill/etc. "You voted -against- Protect(ing) America!? UN-American! NON-Patriot! You're clearly not with us, so you're against us!"
I think it's annoying enough that NASA wants to give all sorts of satellite missions 'catchy' names for the grand public, but the clearly misleading names of some of these bills/act/etc. which are given those names not to be catch but to evoke a gut-feeling within anybody that voting against it may be a Bad Thing^tm based on the name alone, really, really needs to end.
And no, I don't know how. Writing to representatives or, if you're lucky, senators clearly doesn't help.
"Human cloning, animal-human hybrid research, warrantless wiretaps" Now, I understand that your post is exactly that - your post, and thus your own personal opinion.
But whose freedoms are trampled, exactly, by researching the possibility of cloning human parts, or whole humans*?
And what do you think those with the valves of pigs' hearts saving their lives think of your "animal-human hybrid research" item?
Just food for thought.
* Possibly, the clone's; if they're to become a sentient being, etc. But these are far deeper 'freedom' questions (do clones have freedoms? do they have the same freedoms as 'regular' human beings? etc.) than the freedom of a person to get cloned, let alone that of a person to research the matter in the first place.
"These two popups are there practically every time you visit Snopes (see for yourself)."
Well, I did. And I didn't get any popups. I'm on refresh #30 or so.
No, I don't run adblock. No, firefox isn't telling me it blocked a popup either.
I also tried with IE6. Still nothing.
Is the author quite sure they're not just targeting -him-? Be it my some manner of IP -> location lookup, or via an old cookie he's got laying around, or whatever? Either that, or Snopes already changed things. Woo conspiracy theorists rejoice.
Oh, and read the first post. No, really - read it, and mod it up or reply that it's silly to pre-emptively ban 'unlicensed' used of geiger detectors on the off-chance that crappy ones will cause some manner of mass hysteria (imho - your reply may differ.. free will and all that.)
what needs to happen is that they demonstrate, from the get-go, a device that does exactly what the patent describes. Enough of these theoretical patents already - describe, and demonstrate, an actual implementation of the thing and demonstrate how the implementation is non-trivial (+ the usual prior art discovery, etc.)
It more-or-less becomes a TARball anyway - not in format, of course, but most zip apps (not sure about Windows' built-in) don't bother with compressing JPG files.. they realize it's a JPG and just store the file 'as is'.
"Um, Anybody concerned with internet privacy along with everybody who had a myspace account with pictures posted privately they did not intend the public to see."
I thought one of the first rules on the internet was that anything you put out there can fall into the wrong hands / become public?
I certainly wouldn't trust MySpace with personal affairs - if not because of technical glitches / hackers, then because of a disgruntled employee who decides offering the entire database up is so much more rewarding than going postal.
Though the whole idea of using MySpace - a site where everybody openly shares information about themselves.. that's the whole point, after all - for *anything* private at all sounds ridiculous to me in its very premise.
Just my 2cts.. I do feel sorry for those who are/will be affected, especially in the days to come as the juicier bits are filtered out and plastered all over the web and into youtube videos for truly everybody to see, as even though my opinion is that there's no reasonable expectation for true privacy on those sites, that doesn't mean they asked for some stupid hacker and a scriptkiddie to go running amok with it.
Just curious - as most seem to have just shrugged this off and purchased a new license of QuickTime Pro last time this happened. Now, granted, it's hardly the most expensive piece of software in the world - but one would think people would be a little less eager to just roll over?
Moreover: ungrounded extension cords. Tons of those, and you can still buy them.
Why can you still buy those, you might ask.. because there's still plenty of round plugs that do not have the gaps in the sides so that they will fit in a grounded outlet.
I'm staying over at my folks' at the moment - that's why it's so easy to find them (and why this thing isn't grounded right now). At my own place, I've had ungrounded outlets replaced (I 'am' an EE, but not practicing, so can't legally pull the wires and I only rent) and replaced all ungrounded extension cords myself. I'll probably be doing the same around here when I find some time.
...after all, no part of the casing *should* be making contact with the electrical parts at all. The whole thing with making the casing grounded is for the unfortunate event that it does; typically as the result of some manner of physical malfunction within (e.g. a wire coming loose).
That said - my acer laptop has a brushed aluminum finish and has the same problem *if* I don't plug it into a grounded wall outlet (as it currently isn't). It doesn't feel so much like a jolt or a tingle, however, as that the surface feels strange.. almost like it's vibrating at a high frequency; but only when touched very, very lightly.. a firm touch increases contact area and away goes that odd feel. Surprisingly, the metallic finish (probably aluminum as well) on my USB keyboard has the same thing going on. Again, though, if plugged into a proper outlet, the problem goes away.
It seems fairly common for the housings of low-power (and yes, a laptop is pretty much low power; although a 'jolt' sounds light it might be otherwise.. high performance gaming laptop sucking 150W+ perhaps?) to not be properly insulated, though.. I can probably walk around the house and find a dozen more appliances that exhibit this.
Suspend the platter on a pencil or pen, grab something metal (a spoon will do) and tap the platter. You'll easily hear the difference between glass and metal the same way you've probably been doing with hearing what a material might be since you were 4 or so. Glass is also significantly lighter; but you're not going to notice this unless you know (from experience) a comparison to a metal one.
There's also some plastic platters (rare, but I had one in a 2.5" drive) - same test.. tap it.
Which has excellent images of the individual blocks, the manual (with a robot-shaped design) on the front, etc.
Maybe there's patents in the way - or they're still being made - or they're too expensive to make - but the Denshi Block people could pick up a thing or two from them.
The ones I'm talking about were different in that: - they were a more vibrant green
- they were completely cubic (the small pieces, at least); no cylindrical protrusion on top - they didn't use metal strips, but rather metal contacts and studs. The studs were round (conical) and would slot into the contact like a 'dovetail joint'; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Joinery-throughdovetail.gif The above two points make it so that you could actually twist the blocks and form junctions at off-angles; the Denshi blocks seem to be restricted in an essentially 2D layout
- Each block that had an actual component (i.e.. not ones with just a wire that creates a 90 degree corner, pass-through, etc.) could be connected from 4 sides. E.g. in the Denshi block, the diode only has two contacts - one for the anode, one for the cathode. The ones I'm referring to would have 2 for the anode and 2 for the cathode... one of each being the 'stud', the other being the 'contact'; thus always being able to fit it to another component without needing a 'joint' block, so to speak
The above three points also make it so that you did not need a base board. Each block could connect to another and form a reasonably solid connection. Denshi blocks can't - they need a base board to hold each block in place so that the metal strips would touch.
All in all, I'd say the ones I'm referring to would be technically better. Now if only I could find them online.. perhaps I'll have to dig the box up after all.
Give that the ID tends to be one's drivers' license (I like how people refuse an 'ID Card' but seem to think using a drivers' license for the same purpose is a-OK. Ahhh the USA and cars.), wouldn't having a damaged-beyond-recognition (be it manually or automatically) end up invalidating the ID? I.e. if some trooper were to catch you speeding (hopefully not while drunk), demands your ID, you give it to him, and his scanner can't read it - couldn't that just land you in more trouble?
Just curious, really... my old passport had its plastic bit broken off, I taped it back together and lo-and-behold, it wasn't valid and I get to get an emergency one or the U.S. would happily send me back on the next flight.. even though the plastic bit is the only important bit anyway (the rest being the paper pages with stamps, showing (somehow - can't say they're very clear stamps) what countries you've been to... much the same as reading the passport and getting that data out of the databanks does in the first place.
And you think that Rosa Parks usually sat at home, magically heard about this law and then decided to break it on purpose just to make a point?
Rosa Parks went to take a bus, period. That the Bus Driver then told her to move to the back irked her for many reasons (including the law, which she had been aware for a loooong time, but also personal) and she basically refused, doesn't have anything directly to do with "let me go out and break this law". It was a bonus, if you will.
It's not all that different from people downloading MP3s. They're not saying "it's illegal - therefore I'm downloading".. they just want their music for free and pissing off the RIAA is just a bonus.
That's my take on it, anyway.. It's 'civil disobedience' either way, but it's not being disobedient for the specific purpose of being disobedient just to make a point about the law/rule/regulation you're supposed to be obedient to.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm on Gimp 2.2 because 2.4 refuses to open my 100k-wide panorama images. 2.2 opens them, but isn't too happy about doing so. It seems it wants to put the whole image in memory or a temp location somewhere, and when I paste in a new part of the image (e.g.to fix up a person that got chopped in half by the automatic blender of my panorama tool), it sits there and thinks for a few minutes. I change to difference blending mode to position that layer correctly... thinks for a few minutes. again. Start painting.. ugh.
I really wish it would work more like XRes did. I think XRes absolutely had the right idea*. But I guess the suggestion nowadays is to just get a 64bit machine and stuff 32GB of RAM in, then call it a day. Bloody inefficient.
I never argued with the fact that with the BSD you don't have to contribute back; that's what my parent poster already pointed out. My point isn't pointless given that the situation he describes applies just as well to the GPL, just to a lesser extent.
And yes, Affero GPLv3 would indeed make this apply to Google if they were using it as a server-side solution. But if it's in-house only - they still don't have to contribute back. If they (or anyone) develop for a specific client only, then only that client needs to get the fix (they, of course, can then choose to make it available, depending on what contract governed the development of the software itself.).
The non-Affero GPLv3, however, has no such clauses at all, and the existance of Affero GPLv3 does not change anything about the -main- GPLv3.
Point with these licenses is that if you fixed a bug in a project using them, you're not required to contribute the fix. With the BSD license this applies any time. With the standard GPL license this applies when you're not distributing the thing. With the Affero GPL license this applies when you're not distributing it and not using it as a server-side solution. In all of these cases, somebody can be sitting on a fix and whoever's project it originally was has no recourse, within the license, to have them make that fix available.
I'm not 'doing something down' because I don't like it - I'm just saying that they all have similar problems; it doesn't make it any less of a problem with BSD, but it clearly doesn't exempt GPL either (v2, v3, Affero or otherwise; short of a 'GPL'-style license I'm not aware of that explicitly states that all modifications must be contributed back, regardless of origin or purpose, period.)
say Google fixes something in a GPLed project that they're -not- distributing. Then GPL fans can't automatically get the fix because, hey, the GPL license*!
( * which only says something about making the code, and thus the fix, available if the code, or compiled version thereof, is distributed. )
The difference is trivial, isn't it. In both cases an existing fix would not automatically be contributed back.
the page layout (right vs left) is hardly a major issue when it concerns Foxit, a PDF -reader-. I can fully understand if you want it to work correctly for a PDF authoring app, so that it comes out the printer the way you see it on screen, but geeze.
It's like calling ThunderBird "beyond hope" because the thunderbird team appear to be unwilling to fix the folder rename issue on the Windows platform (renaming "Test" to "test" will tell you that it already exists. durrr. https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=92165 - July 2001. )
That said, next version (there's always a next version) of Foxit should have this implemented a la Adobe's Reader. If it is, then that's implemented a whole lot quicker than the aforementioned asinine TB bug ( http://www.foxitsoftware.com/bbs/archive/index.php/t-192.html - September 2005 ), although I agree that it should have been implemented in an afternoon's work (even done dirtily so by inserting a blank invisible page in the page array).
...for making it too easy for everybody to still have broken IPv6 records as Vista will just fall back to IPv4 anyway thereby slowing the adoption of IPv6 and new standards in general.
( if that type of argument doesn't sound familiar, you must be new here. )
subject is tongue-in-cheek.
/lnks/ in motherfucking English; fucked up variants exist[1]) is a goddamn Unix-like computer operating system. Linux is one da motherfuckin' bomb when it comes to free software and open source development: typically all underlying source code can be freely modified, used, and redistributed by any motherfucker with half a clue.[2]
Perhaps Wikipedia perfectly allows profanity in a subject that deals with, say, Profanity ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Profanity ) ?
I quote:
"For example, "fuck", a common (often considered strong) profanity in English, is a verb for the act of sexual intercourse and may be used literally in this sense ("I fucked her all night long.")or ("Fuck you bitch")."
And that is just a tiny quote of that page. I swear I'll have to wash my eyes with soap later!
Perhaps they have a policy on not allowing profanity in subjects that do not call for it; or at least trying to keep it to a minimum.
E.g. what is the added value of the profanity in this:
--
Linux
--
Over the non-profane description that is there already?
However - let's say an article deals with Muhammad, either the very topic or reasonably tangentially - then the added value, certainly in the former, of graphical depictions of the guy is, at least to me, quite clear.
Similarly, however, I wouldn't expect pictures of Muhammad to appear in subjects that have little to nothing to do with him - but not because I feel it would unnecessarily potentially offend islamists visiting that page not having expected to see the picture and seeing it anyway, but because the subject wouldn't call for such the picture in the first place.
That, at least to me, is the difference between your Muhammad vs Profanity and how Wikipedia handles it example.
sorry, but a graphics card does not speed up your rendering unless your renderer can take advantage of the graphic card; hint: that's not very many, and those that do only do so for very limited tasks.
The only reason you should have for upgrading your graphics card within the 'consumer' market is if your viewport redraws are being sluggish; this will still allow you to play games properly* as well.
The only reason to upgrade to e.g. FireGL or a QuadroFX is if you're pushing really massive amounts of polys and want a dedicated support line; e.g. for 3ds Max, there's the MaxTreme drivers for the QuadroFX line - you don't get that for a consumer card.
* on the other hand, do *not* expect to play games with a QuadroFX properly. Do not expect frequent driver upgrades just to fix a glitch with some game. Do not expect the performance in games to be similar to, let alone better than, that of the consumer cards.
For 3D Artists dealing with rendering, the CPU should always be the primary concern (faster CPU / more cores = faster rendering**) followed by more RAM (more fits in a single render; consider a 64bit O/S and 3D Application), followed by a faster bus (tends to come with the CPU)/faster RAM, followed by a faster drive (if you -are- going to swap, or read in lots of data, or write out lots of data, you don't want to be doing that on a 4200RPM drive with little to no cache) followed by another machine to take over half the frames or half the image being rendered (** 'more cores' only scales up to a limited point. A second machine overtakes this limit in a snap), as long as you don't have something slow like a 10MBit network going (for data transfer).
I guess it'll depend on what you mean by a parallel universe.
Do you mean a universe that exists completely independent of our own at any and all points in time? If so - it's not likely to be similar at all, no.
Do you mean a universe that exists as a 'branch' of our own as one of many universes that could exist where if somebody went left here, they went right in that one, and all that stuff which would quickly lead to a near-infinite number of universes? If so - then you have to wonder what the odds are of the parallel universe we'd be accessing is one that was VERY recently formed, in which case perhaps I'm wearing a white shirt instead of a blue shirt, or formed a few years ago, in which 9/11 didn't happen, or one happening much longer ago in which mankind never evolved (or got placed on Earth by the almighty God, if you so desire). I certainly don't have hard data on this, I don't think anybody does, but a gut feeling tells me it'd be easier to access a parallel universe formed more recently than one formed longer ago. As such, it's quite likely to be similar.
Then there's the whole phase thing and dimensions thing and oh dear, so I might have forgotten an "alternate universe" option. I'm guessing wikipedia might have more, but those are the two I'd imagine to be the most common.
look, don't get me wrong, I think artists making gajillions shouldn't complain either. But I do take issue with your last statement. I'll dissect it a bit.
"There is no right to profit from your work."
Correct.
"There is a right to try to profit from your work."
Sure, even if that's not written in stone anywhere - it's as basic right, I suppose.
"The difference is subtle but very important"
Absolutely.
"and frankly, I'm starting to get more than a bit sick of the copyright creeps demanding that all society and technology bend over backwards to help them profit."
And that's where I take issue. There is a difference between telling society that
A. they -must- purchase Artwork X
and
B. they -must not- pirate Artwork X
In situation A, society is bending over backwards to help them profit and I agree, there shouldn't be some mandate saying that every consumer must purchase a minimum of Artworks to help the artists.
In situation B, however, all that is said is that if society -wants- a given Artwork, they'd better either pay for it, or deal with the fact that they won't have said Artwork. And that, I think, is perfectly fair. If that results in the Artist neither getting purchases -nor- popularity from pirating, then that's the result of the Artist's own choice.
"Giving bills in Congress misleading names, like ''Protect America''."
Just to touch on this - it's not necessarily so much misleading for the act; I'm sure the act in itself is intended to help protect the U.S.. Just that the ways in which it aims to do this are possibly misguided.
However, the misleading part really comes in when you vote -against- such an act/bill/etc. "You voted -against- Protect(ing) America!? UN-American! NON-Patriot! You're clearly not with us, so you're against us!"
I think it's annoying enough that NASA wants to give all sorts of satellite missions 'catchy' names for the grand public, but the clearly misleading names of some of these bills/act/etc. which are given those names not to be catch but to evoke a gut-feeling within anybody that voting against it may be a Bad Thing^tm based on the name alone, really, really needs to end.
And no, I don't know how. Writing to representatives or, if you're lucky, senators clearly doesn't help.
"Human cloning, animal-human hybrid research, warrantless wiretaps"
Now, I understand that your post is exactly that - your post, and thus your own personal opinion.
But whose freedoms are trampled, exactly, by researching the possibility of cloning human parts, or whole humans*?
And what do you think those with the valves of pigs' hearts saving their lives think of your "animal-human hybrid research" item?
Just food for thought.
* Possibly, the clone's; if they're to become a sentient being, etc. But these are far deeper 'freedom' questions (do clones have freedoms? do they have the same freedoms as 'regular' human beings? etc.) than the freedom of a person to get cloned, let alone that of a person to research the matter in the first place.
"These two popups are there practically every time you visit Snopes (see for yourself)."
Well, I did. And I didn't get any popups. I'm on refresh #30 or so.
No, I don't run adblock.
No, firefox isn't telling me it blocked a popup either.
I also tried with IE6. Still nothing.
Is the author quite sure they're not just targeting -him-? Be it my some manner of IP -> location lookup, or via an old cookie he's got laying around, or whatever?
Either that, or Snopes already changed things. Woo conspiracy theorists rejoice.
...that phone?
http://mobile.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/01/25/0514215&from=rss
Oh, and read the first post. No, really - read it, and mod it up or reply that it's silly to pre-emptively ban 'unlicensed' used of geiger detectors on the off-chance that crappy ones will cause some manner of mass hysteria (imho - your reply may differ.. free will and all that.)
what needs to happen is that they demonstrate, from the get-go, a device that does exactly what the patent describes. Enough of these theoretical patents already - describe, and demonstrate, an actual implementation of the thing and demonstrate how the implementation is non-trivial (+ the usual prior art discovery, etc.)
It more-or-less becomes a TARball anyway - not in format, of course, but most zip apps (not sure about Windows' built-in) don't bother with compressing JPG files.. they realize it's a JPG and just store the file 'as is'.
"Um, Anybody concerned with internet privacy along with everybody who had a myspace account with pictures posted privately they did not intend the public to see."
I thought one of the first rules on the internet was that anything you put out there can fall into the wrong hands / become public?
I certainly wouldn't trust MySpace with personal affairs - if not because of technical glitches / hackers, then because of a disgruntled employee who decides offering the entire database up is so much more rewarding than going postal.
Though the whole idea of using MySpace - a site where everybody openly shares information about themselves.. that's the whole point, after all - for *anything* private at all sounds ridiculous to me in its very premise.
Just my 2cts.. I do feel sorry for those who are/will be affected, especially in the days to come as the juicier bits are filtered out and plastered all over the web and into youtube videos for truly everybody to see, as even though my opinion is that there's no reasonable expectation for true privacy on those sites, that doesn't mean they asked for some stupid hacker and a scriptkiddie to go running amok with it.
Just curious - as most seem to have just shrugged this off and purchased a new license of QuickTime Pro last time this happened. Now, granted, it's hardly the most expensive piece of software in the world - but one would think people would be a little less eager to just roll over?
The Netherlands - still plenty left in old homes.
Moreover: ungrounded extension cords. Tons of those, and you can still buy them.
Why can you still buy those, you might ask.. because there's still plenty of round plugs that do not have the gaps in the sides so that they will fit in a grounded outlet.
I'm staying over at my folks' at the moment - that's why it's so easy to find them (and why this thing isn't grounded right now). At my own place, I've had ungrounded outlets replaced (I 'am' an EE, but not practicing, so can't legally pull the wires and I only rent) and replaced all ungrounded extension cords myself. I'll probably be doing the same around here when I find some time.
...after all, no part of the casing *should* be making contact with the electrical parts at all. The whole thing with making the casing grounded is for the unfortunate event that it does; typically as the result of some manner of physical malfunction within (e.g. a wire coming loose).
That said - my acer laptop has a brushed aluminum finish and has the same problem *if* I don't plug it into a grounded wall outlet (as it currently isn't). It doesn't feel so much like a jolt or a tingle, however, as that the surface feels strange.. almost like it's vibrating at a high frequency; but only when touched very, very lightly.. a firm touch increases contact area and away goes that odd feel.
Surprisingly, the metallic finish (probably aluminum as well) on my USB keyboard has the same thing going on.
Again, though, if plugged into a proper outlet, the problem goes away.
It seems fairly common for the housings of low-power (and yes, a laptop is pretty much low power; although a 'jolt' sounds light it might be otherwise.. high performance gaming laptop sucking 150W+ perhaps?) to not be properly insulated, though.. I can probably walk around the house and find a dozen more appliances that exhibit this.
here's a demo disc image:
http://scr3.golem.de/?d=0706/ecodisc&a=52735&s=5
The warning on that one is much clearer. The plain 'english' still leaves a bit to be desired, but the graphics are quite clear.
Suspend the platter on a pencil or pen, grab something metal (a spoon will do) and tap the platter. You'll easily hear the difference between glass and metal the same way you've probably been doing with hearing what a material might be since you were 4 or so.
Glass is also significantly lighter; but you're not going to notice this unless you know (from experience) a comparison to a metal one.
There's also some plastic platters (rare, but I had one in a 2.5" drive) - same test.. tap it.
hate replying to myself; finally found it. The name is actually "bloc-tronic". Google returns several hits, such as:
http://images.lifeaftercoffee.com/v/bloc-tronic/
Which has excellent images of the individual blocks, the manual (with a robot-shaped design) on the front, etc.
Maybe there's patents in the way - or they're still being made - or they're too expensive to make - but the Denshi Block people could pick up a thing or two from them.
yeah.... not entirely the same...
The ones I'm talking about were different in that:
- they were a more vibrant green
- they were completely cubic (the small pieces, at least); no cylindrical protrusion on top
- they didn't use metal strips, but rather metal contacts and studs. The studs were round (conical) and would slot into the contact like a 'dovetail joint'; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Joinery-throughdovetail.gif
The above two points make it so that you could actually twist the blocks and form junctions at off-angles; the Denshi blocks seem to be restricted in an essentially 2D layout
- Each block that had an actual component (i.e.. not ones with just a wire that creates a 90 degree corner, pass-through, etc.) could be connected from 4 sides. E.g. in the Denshi block, the diode only has two contacts - one for the anode, one for the cathode. The ones I'm referring to would have 2 for the anode and 2 for the cathode... one of each being the 'stud', the other being the 'contact'; thus always being able to fit it to another component without needing a 'joint' block, so to speak
The above three points also make it so that you did not need a base board. Each block could connect to another and form a reasonably solid connection. Denshi blocks can't - they need a base board to hold each block in place so that the metal strips would touch.
All in all, I'd say the ones I'm referring to would be technically better. Now if only I could find them online.. perhaps I'll have to dig the box up after all.
Give that the ID tends to be one's drivers' license (I like how people refuse an 'ID Card' but seem to think using a drivers' license for the same purpose is a-OK. Ahhh the USA and cars.), wouldn't having a damaged-beyond-recognition (be it manually or automatically) end up invalidating the ID? I.e. if some trooper were to catch you speeding (hopefully not while drunk), demands your ID, you give it to him, and his scanner can't read it - couldn't that just land you in more trouble?
Just curious, really... my old passport had its plastic bit broken off, I taped it back together and lo-and-behold, it wasn't valid and I get to get an emergency one or the U.S. would happily send me back on the next flight.. even though the plastic bit is the only important bit anyway (the rest being the paper pages with stamps, showing (somehow - can't say they're very clear stamps) what countries you've been to... much the same as reading the passport and getting that data out of the databanks does in the first place.
And you think that Rosa Parks usually sat at home, magically heard about this law and then decided to break it on purpose just to make a point?
Rosa Parks went to take a bus, period. That the Bus Driver then told her to move to the back irked her for many reasons (including the law, which she had been aware for a loooong time, but also personal) and she basically refused, doesn't have anything directly to do with "let me go out and break this law". It was a bonus, if you will.
It's not all that different from people downloading MP3s. They're not saying "it's illegal - therefore I'm downloading".. they just want their music for free and pissing off the RIAA is just a bonus.
That's my take on it, anyway.. It's 'civil disobedience' either way, but it's not being disobedient for the specific purpose of being disobedient just to make a point about the law/rule/regulation you're supposed to be obedient to.