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User: bill_mcgonigle

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Comments · 18,097

  1. Re:Plastic Waste on 2018 Statistic of the Year: 90.5 Percent of Plastic Waste Has Never Been Recycled (bbc.com) · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Today's landfills are tomorrow's robotic mines. Labor is just too expensive now.

  2. Yes, they're [sociopathic] (evil is a child's word) but email solves a different problem than social media. This is just axiomatic - everybody had email before social media arose. There are CS terms for the collection of services social media provides, but that's not the main point here; email does not.

    The problem is ISP bans on "running servers". Everything Facebook does is possible (and better) in a fully distributed manner but governments grant service monopolies and then allow them to impose a "no servers" restriction on that monopoly. That's not Internet.

    ISP's and big-tech both would like to see home internet restricted to ports 80/443 because it benefits both to move everybody into centralized silos. Frankly, the governments granting those monopolies also benefit, so we have quite a quandry on how to wriggle out of this.

    Maybe Starlink will save us.

  3. Companies trade at a multiple of cash-on-hand, plus the funding will be launching an unprecedented communications constellation next year which will itself be a major driver of ongoing revenue (some from me).

    Yeah, that's worth more than $4B.

  4. no trouble attracting capital for new ventures

    That's because he lands rockets and cranks out more than half of the EV's in the world. And builds tunnels under LA. Does he still run a school in his spare time?

  5. Re:1984 and George Orwell were from the UK on UK Police Are Testing Facial Recognition on Christmas Shoppers in London this Week (theverge.com) · · Score: 1

    Once you accept the premise of a monarch, all other bets about self-ownership are off.

  6. By all means - completely enact a thorough and successful plan to fundamentally change the culture of "policing" in the United States. But, what should people do about package thieves for the next thirty years?

  7. Re:One big lawsuit waiting to happen on Former NASA Engineer Designed Glitter Bomb Trap To Avenge Amazon Delivery Theft Victims (cnbc.com) · · Score: 1

    definitely a danger to eyes as well as the respiratory system, the chemicals in the fart spray could trigger anaphylactic shock.

    There's not a jury in America that would convict if it were thumbtacks and mace. Especially if they've had their packages stolen.

    Just like if you break into a house and the dog rips your face off - maybe don't be a burglar next time.

    People need to stop being so damn afraid of defending themselves. And if what you're really afraid of is your government punishing you for defending yourself while at the same time refusing to defend you ... well, son, you got bigger problems than packages. "You might live under tyranny if..."

  8. Re:A transparent div? on 'Google Isn't the Company That We Should Have Handed the Web Over To' (arstechnica.com) · · Score: 1

    The comment claims that Microsoft couldn't keep up with fast-moving changes on YouTube. The biggest question in my mind is why why was the Edge team understaffed to such a degree that they couldn't track say, the hundred most popular websites, and keep them working well? That seems insane for a company the size of Microsoft with a technology as supposedly mission-critical as Edge. You're talking like, a million dollars a year total additional spend to have a relevant top-tier web browser.

    It seems more likely that Microsoft has had plans to standardized on Electron for longer than we suspected, and was just keeping Edge alive for pretenses. From what I've seen, the Edge code is actually pretty clean, and was a reasonable engineering effort.

  9. Re:And Mozilla helped with that. on 'Google Isn't the Company That We Should Have Handed the Web Over To' (arstechnica.com) · · Score: 0

    Right. We naively trusted Mozilla Foundation to keep a free and open web, but, my God, they left bugs open for a dozen years like multi-threading, because it was 'too hard", while they raked in literally hundreds of millions of dollars every year. Now all they do is try to imitate Chrome, as if there is no vision left there at all - which may well be true; any visionaries likely left mofo out of frustration.

    We deserve a refund.

  10. Re:I have already deleted tumbler off my phone. on Tumblr Porn Vanishes Today · · Score: 1

    And in a place where I'll never be bothered by that... I'll have to rethink my idea that Tumbler should just die.

  11. Re:Nice one on Germany Refuses To Ban Huawei, Citing Lack of Real Evidence (phys.org) · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The NSA doesn't care about Chinese spying. They care about people using network gear they can't get a foothold in.

    There are dozens of Snowden files on these topics.

  12. Depends where you live. Outside of s metropolis Amazon lets you get stuff that's not available locally and at a certain point in life you have all the hard goods you need that local places sell. Amazon lets you get things that city people can get at niche specialty stores without living a city life. We probably average three Amazon deliveries a week and the gas savings alone are worthwhile, even if the labor cost of trying to find obscure items is set at zero.

  13. Re:One of those is easily solved on The Decline of American Peyote (vice.com) · · Score: 2

    The idea of a tax credit like the GP suggested is a pretty good one. You have to cook feral hog well-done but it's quite delicious.

    Target practice may be the current standard but if that target is worth $200 then more shooters will be out bagging them.

    Avoiding the Saigon Cobra Problem is important but a simple lipid test should be able to determine feral from farmed - my tastebuds sure can. Maybe $4 cost on a $200 benefit.

  14. Re:Don't indians now use alcohol for their rituals on The Decline of American Peyote (vice.com) · · Score: 5, Informative

    The founder of AA felt psychadelics were so important to combating alcoholism that he resigned from AA when the board refused to make it one of the twelve steps.

    So go ahead and criminalize (in 1972, as a political weapon) substances that societies have used for at least 180,000 years and see what the repercussions might be.

    Here's an example of where conservatism is wise.

  15. Re:That's a terrible chart on A Bright Green 'Christmas Comet' Will Fly the Closest To Earth In Centuries · · Score: 1

    This is the summary we were looking for.

  16. Professionally? on OpenJDK Bug Report Complains Source Code 'Has Too Many Swear Words' (java.net) · · Score: 1

    Does this reporter have any evidence of people using the source of OpenJDK and being somehow unable to cope with the comments or otherwise having problems because of the language?

    It sounds to me like he's making shit up.

  17. Re:Another great reason not to worry too much on Experts Urge US To Continue Support For Nuclear Fusion Research (scientificamerican.com) · · Score: 1

    This is exactly the most dangerous kind of thinking. There is no reason to believe that a fusion power plant is any less likely than any of the other pie-in-the-sky schemes to control global CO2. As this article infers, fusion research is paid for with surplus tax money from various world governments (ignoring Lockheed and other private programs). That kind of money comes from increased economic activity which is directly correlated with the amount of fossil fuels that are burned. Restricting the free flow of energy only serves to decrease economic activity, which decreases net available surplus taxation to be dedicated to these kinds of projects. Experience shows us that massive, direct, concerted efforts are the only ways to make massive breakthroughs of this type, for example the Manhattan Project. This kind of underfunding and hemming and hawing on what we know to be the best option for the future of Humanity's energy needs, is what will lead directly to massive CO2 levels in the future, if current models are to be believed. Only ignorance of the history of technology and economics can lead one to favor a "slow-trickle" approach to fusion.

    Make helium, not war.

  18. Re:OFAC are not friendly people on Cloudflare Under Fire For Allegedly Providing DDoS Protection For Terrorist Websites · · Score: 3, Insightful

    They don't care if you sold a sandwich. They do care that if you become politically inconvenient later on they can get you off to prison for having sold that sandwich within the statute of limitations.

  19. Re:Ridiculous patents on Apple Will Update iPhones In China To Avoid a Ban On Sales (theverge.com) · · Score: 1

    Nobody asks, "how do we make a better cancer"? The patent game keeps small players out and stifles innovation.

  20. Re:Why do you think it will not happen? on A New Engine Could Bring Back Supersonic Air-Travel (economist.com) · · Score: 1

    Don't feed the trolls - I'm sure he used to say that landing rockets was impossible too. Gwen really, really wants the e2e system in place, because she wants to use it personally. When she says within a decade, that's on Gwen time, not on Elon time.

  21. Lithium is fairly common. Look at all the elements less abundant than Lithium; many of them are cheap and plentiful:

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik...

  22. Re:Yes, sometimes you get this form Amazon on The Painful, Costly Journey of Returned Goods -- and How You End Up Purchasing Some of Them Again (cnbc.com) · · Score: 1

    Put an edge bit on your router, not a straight-cutting bit.

  23. Re:This is how I "rent" electronics for free. on The Painful, Costly Journey of Returned Goods -- and How You End Up Purchasing Some of Them Again (cnbc.com) · · Score: 2

    "This is how I make other people pay for my stuff through higher prices."

    TFTFY

    P.S. Try politics - it'd be a good fit.

  24. Stone Markers on Japan Plans For 100ft Tsunami (thesun.ie) · · Score: 1

    They should encircle the Island with big stone markers at the 100' wave height that say "do not build below this height" so that future generations don't have to retain the knowledge directly.

    Like the ancient ones uphill from the Fukushima Daiichi plant.