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User: thogard

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  1. Re:this was tried on Egyptian Pyramid Mysteries to Be Explored Live · · Score: 1

    Thats another story but if you look at the old big stone buildings, you can't find any with the characteristic angles. Egypt has a 5.5K year history of not finishing buildings. Why would the pyramids be any different? I don't think all the casing stones were ever put on the pyraminds.

  2. Re:2 Ways to make this less painful for you. on 60,000 Credit Cards Numbers Stolen Online · · Score: 1

    A Visa Check Card is a debit card and they still don't verify account balances on 100% of transactions (but its above the 99% range).

    Will you get billed a charge if a transaction would have dropped the balance below 0? I suspect you will unless its from an ATM.

  3. Re:So the thieves have lost out this time on 60,000 Credit Cards Numbers Stolen Online · · Score: 1

    So what would you do if your on a trip to the middle of Africa and your bank cancled your card when all they would have to do is remove some transactions?

    This would be a great way to provide a denial of service attack on a major bank.

  4. Re:Credit Card on 60,000 Credit Cards Numbers Stolen Online · · Score: 1

    If I call up and say someone emptied my account and its because of a stolen debit card, how long will it take for that money get back in my account? With a credit card, its not my money that disappeard in teh first place and if it take a month to fix, its not my problem.

  5. Re:2 Ways to make this less painful for you. on 60,000 Credit Cards Numbers Stolen Online · · Score: 1

    The insurance isn't there because of the law, its there to get people to use their cards. Thats the same reason there is no minimum charge on Visa and MasterCard, they want to get you in the habbit of not having any cash on you at all so all yuor transactions go though their network and they get to take their tiny fraction of the cashflow.

  6. Re:2 Ways to make this less painful for you. on 60,000 Credit Cards Numbers Stolen Online · · Score: 2

    So your trading 0 risk (or maybe $50) in exchange for all the risk of someone entering a wrong amount and this is a good idea?

    If someone hits your account (because of fraud, entering a wrong amount,...) then you get hit with bank fees for going over the amount. Every try to get thouse undone? With most large banks, you can't with debit cards or it will take far more time than its worth. Credit cards already put the risk on the bank (who pushes it on to the merchant).

    I've been hit by credit card fraud a few times over the past 15 years and my total time to deal with it was less than 5 minutes. A single mistake involing a debit card will take at least a few hours to clear up.

  7. Re:Use one-time use numbers on 60,000 Credit Cards Numbers Stolen Online · · Score: 1

    As far as I know Address verifcaion only works well in the US since its rumored to violate privacy laws in most other countries

  8. Burton's wonderful webpage on Clothing Yourself In Technology · · Score: 2

    Did anyone else notice how useful and functional their web page was? After digging up an "alternate" browser, I managed to be able to read their site slow, ugly and disfunctional. The problem is I can't find out any more about the product like if I can order it and from where? I've got a birthday present to buy for a friend since I think she would love one of these jackets. Too bad Burton's web site is such a pain to use.

  9. Re:Difficulties on Perpetual Motion Delorean? · · Score: 1

    I would prefer good tires (or tyres) on pavement over rails anyday...

    Have the brits ever designed a car that can handle? My MGB is great on a dirt track but on paved roads its much worse than my German or even Sweedish cars.

  10. PV=nRT? on Undersea Deposits of Frozen Methane Found · · Score: 2, Informative

    Most living things produce some methane. At depth, the pressure is high, the temp is about 4 degrees and methane will freeze solid just by the water pressure since its on the solid side of the triple point .

    There is a huge amount of frozen methane over most of the ocean but only where its about 1000m deep. If you can find a way to get it out at lower cost than oil, you can put opec out of business.

  11. Re:Difficulties on Perpetual Motion Delorean? · · Score: 1

    The outside was stainless steel.

    It was one of the eary production cars with an aluminum v6. Maybe thats what you were thinging about.

    Its handling was bad for many reasons but mostly American designers trying to do Euro sports car like things and making a few bad assumptions.

  12. MS can win this on Palladium, 'Trusted PCs' in the News · · Score: 1

    What if MS starts selling PC's at a price that makes them the cheapst bang for the buck but they only run their OS's and there is a small monthy fee but that includes net access and the hardware and after X years, they agree to send you a new box. Work just purchased a new PC to test compatability and the most expensive single componet was a MS license. A MS OS and Office would have cost more than the computer and thats what 99% of the businesses think they need.

    What will happen to your local scredriver shop if MS decides to sell PC's at $200 plus $39/mo through the local walmart and they just happen to have the newest Intel offering which no one else seems to have in stock? The Xbox is the 2nd MS offering that fits in the model (web Tv was the 1st).

  13. The real reason they want the spam... on FTC Encourages Consumers to Forward Them Spam · · Score: 1

    Does the goverment want to get in on the mass email game? "Dear Sir, were you running low on cash, we have a new plan and you'll make millions, just send $10 to IRS..."

    Another possible reason (that will sit well with the black helicopter people) is that the their email recorders (they are reading YOUR email RIGHT NOW) is getting overloaded by the spam and they need a way to remove known spam to make looking at the other stuff easier.

    Of course maybe they are looking into the spam problem are are attempting to fix it but remember this is the goverment and its a good thing we don't get all the goverment we pay for.

  14. Re:Difficulties on Perpetual Motion Delorean? · · Score: 1

    I've heard that the biggest problem with delorean's is their frames rust out. It would suck to have a stainless steel car thats rusting apart.

  15. Re:This might actually help... on Online Auctions Patented, eBay Sued · · Score: 2

    Can ebay tell millions of people that they have to shut down unless they patent law gets changed? A million people calling their congresscritters will get things changed real fast (and congress so wants a safe issue right now). Yes they could but they won't. They have enough cash to make this problem go away. All they need to do is figure out the costs.

  16. You do not understand jury duty on Online Auctions Patented, eBay Sued · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Even though the judge and every lawyer in sight will disagree with this... Your purpose on the jury is to judge the law in the context of the accused. The jury is the last check and balance in the system. Use it when you get the chance.

  17. How many compaines still have receptionists? on The Return Of The Live Human Being · · Score: 2

    Last year we bought a VoE phone system. Its got all kinds of cool features that a computer can do but the old key systems couldn't. One major problem is that the thing can not cope with the concept of a receptionist. It appears that who ever designed the thing just didn't ever consider that one person would need to be able to answer a call, talk to the person and then put them on hold where where they sit in a que for what ever extention they wanted. It also couldn't even generate a busy singal until a few montsh ago. In a country where every connected call costs real money, the busy signal can be your friend. We have even had clients tell us they won't deal with us any more if they get voice mail.

  18. Prior Art and History on Making the Case Against Software Patents? · · Score: 2

    The following assumes they are going to allow software patnets (which is wrong...)

    If your patent office currently is rejecting software patents, then their database on prior art in the field should have no entries. When the 1st software patents comes in, they will need to check it against all other software patents and see if its unique. Since its 1st, it will be no matter how much prior art exists in the rest of the world, it will appear unique. Your patent office must have a seeding time (I would say 5 to 20 years or so) where any one can file a patent like application which protects their inventor's right to nonexclusive use and prevent future patents for the same thing. This is much like the "sunrise period" for domain names in new TLDs.

  19. Re:This is why the old air traffic control works on Britain's CAA Considers Laptop Ban on Commercial Aircraft · · Score: 1

    The hubs exist only because of limits in Sabre. Kill it off and many smaller hubs would work much better. Right now that old hunk of junk does everything fro guessing how many seats have been sold (it doesn't know) to weight and balance for most airlines. Its far more limiting than the ATC system.

  20. Grass used ot be a cool program... on GIS - GRASS Users Conference · · Score: 1

    Back in 1987 when I was installing it on expensive hardware, it was the coolest GIS program out there.

    Has it made much progress other than a modern box won't take hours to render an image?

  21. This is why the old air traffic control works on Britain's CAA Considers Laptop Ban on Commercial Aircraft · · Score: 3, Insightful

    ATC on many parts of the US and world is based on allocation of large amounts of air space for fixed times just like the old railroad lines. Its designed so that radio failure isn't a problem. Now that a generation of programmers have read Booch's book on OOD and know how to do air trafic control better than the old system we get all these new systems that work as long as all the gear works.

    Old the system made use of paper strips that track the planes. The cool thing about the paper system is that when the power goes out or the scope reboots or whatever, the controller has a bunch of paper strips to look at and know whats going on. All the controller needs is a radio and they can get all the planes down.

    Australia has a "modern" ATC system and I've got to talk to three different people to groups to fly into the general aviation airoport in Melbourne if I come from the north. In the US, that would be two. The controllers here out number the ones in the US and can't cope with a much lighter load. The new system for London has had major issues since it was turned on.

    General rules for programming have been discovered. Most of them have been used in the Kansas City freight yards for a long time.--Derrick Lehmer (1949) from Knuth Vol1

  22. Re:I still don't get it... on Bertelsmann Looking At Pulling Plug On Napster · · Score: 2

    Having taked to quite a few song writers, think most artist are screwed in the head when it comes to reality.

    I used to run a site where local artist could put their tunes on line. This sold CDs for some of them. I asked a guy a few weeks ago if he wanted any of his songs on an MP3 site, and he said "mp3s are only for pirates". Funny words coming from a guy who does covers. In fact his band only does covers which maks him a pirate too since live preformances of someone elses work is illegal by copyright laws. Most of the musicians think that covers are allowed and a few have even pointed out why but I've yet to find any bit of law that allows it. I wonder how long before the RIAA starts going after coverbands and then any band doing any live music?

    On the mp3 site I used to run, I had three good bands. One does early blues covers (and has paid the copyright fees). They got an international gig out of the mp3 site. The second band is out travling the world and people do click the "buy the cd" link but I don't know how much they sold and the third band plays what I would describe as mediterranean and middle eastern classical. chekc out ozmp3.com if these sound good to you. The site still is up but I haven't found any other bands worth putting up and I don't spend any time on it anymore.

  23. Re:I still don't get it... on Bertelsmann Looking At Pulling Plug On Napster · · Score: 2

    The problem is that its not the riaa's property. Its not even their members property, Its the artists' property that they have obtinaed through strong armed tactics. Once the artists figure that out, it will all be much better for everyone.

  24. Re:Napster gets pulled at last?... on Bertelsmann Looking At Pulling Plug On Napster · · Score: 2

    Since Bertelsmann was one of the factors that drove Napster into backruptcy and then they bought it, I would say that should be investigated by the appropriate legal authorities since it sounds like racketeering to me.

  25. Re:You can't believe everything you see in demos on 802.11 vs. 3G For Mobile Access · · Score: 2

    There are several others in the mesh game. Radiant systems is the other one in the "dog and pony show" stage. There are about 5 players that are are approaching the rigged demo stage and at least two compaines that are doing this with optical. Radiant Networks used to have a flash thing about how their network works. They use high GHZ radios to build an ATM mesh and can deliver OC3 speeds to the mesh. Their mesh will let you pull out 100mb ethernet from any of the hubs and/or E1/T1 circuts. The problem is it only goes a few KM per hop and the gear isn't low cost. If they could do a 10km hop, then it would be great for a backaul of a wifi net but its range is very limited.

    When this takes off, I expect it will be the newer optical mesh stuff. Since they can deliver much more bandwidth than the microwave system, it can scale much better. Curren wireless mesh systems seem to be able to deliver slightly better than cable systems or ADSL with a high oversubscription rate.

    One major problem with all the wireless systems is that there just aren't enough bits allocated to go around if any of this stuff gets popular.