Of course, with the pope's uncanny resemblance to Emperor Palpatine, I can't resist the thought of hearing, upon completion of the 100 MegaWatt facility, the words: "NOW YOU WILL WITNESS THE POWER OF THIS FULLY OPERATIONAL BATTLE STATION!"...
there was this period called the dark ages, where pretty much everything cool in continental Europe was 'un-invented' and rediscovered much later.
Agreed. But I will argue that the "Dark Ages" affected mostly just Europe. During this time many "advances" were made in the rest of the world, notably in mathematics and medicine in the Persian empire. Of course it was nothing as spectacular as the explosion that started in the "Renaissance" period, but some parts of the world were "less dark" during this time - east of Constantinople.
But now we have a whole world knit together (despite some governments' best efforts to "block" and "censor" the internet) with cheap communication. Short of a nuclear holocaust, I don't know what could quench the now global thirst for cheap knowledge (and farting videos on youtube).
Now, [South Koreans] can watch live TV on their phones. In the subway. And I can't get above 2Mbps on a hard line in my home.
I sympathize. The worst part is, those Koreans are probably paying less than you are for their superior bandwidth, while "Western" countries dream up schemes to "throttle", "cap" and charge you even more for less than you get today.
On the other hand I am a firm believer that if the "west" puts a high enough toll on the internet, some bright people somewhere will come up with an alternative - whether it be a way to transmit wireless from house to house in the town you live in, and lease fiber to connect the towns, or something even more creative no one has dreamed up yet.
The world has SEEN the internet, and the world WANTS free (or relatively cheap) digital communication. You can't un-invent something, ever. But I guess I'm just an optimist.
This is a prime example of the mistake people of any nation state thinking that any company, particularly one that's granted a local monopoly will in any way, shape or form act in the consumer's best interest.
It's not usually a mistake made by the people, but rather it's what gets voted for by political shills at every level of government, be it municipal or federal. They are bribed or coerced into thinking that the "free" market is the best system in the world, and they lack the intelligence to realize that a monopoly/oligopoly situation is anything BUT a free market. It's in fact quite the opposite.
So America is fed lines like "free market capitalism" in the media every day, and told this is a Good Thing(tm), but when things go wrong then you bump into "Too Big To Fail", extra fees added to your telephone or cable bill (or your savings in your bank account devalued when the currency loses value), because the companies that have this monopoly are faced with a "crumbling infrastructure".
Mind you, they can afford to pay some of their employees to sleep in their pickup trucks (as I caught one Time-Warner employee doing when he was supposed to actually be installing my cable modem. I woke him up and made him work, poor thing). They certainly can afford lobbyists and politicians. But ohhhhh, actually re-investing and maintaining their infrastructure - for SHAME, if we do THAT then how can we ask the "regulatory committees" for fee increases next round?
They treat this like it's a matter of national security.
For goodness sake, it's entertainment!
Some would argue that it's not even entertainment... more like - "torture"?
I certainly stopped going to the movies and listening to the radio a long time ago, and not because I'm downloading the content online. The internet IS to blame, but because I have found OTHER forms of entertainment. Here I can laugh at the stupidity of my fellow man (there's no shortage) when I want, or educate myself by watching MIT or Berkeley courses online, or troll forums. I don't have to wait in line with obnoxious teenagers, pay for overpriced stale popcorn and sticky sodas, sit in dirty seats and be interrupted by cell phones and childish behavior.
even claiming that the current rules are costing jobs to truck drivers delivering CDs and DVDs."
This is a fun game!
I will see your "jobless CD and DVD delivering truck drivers", and raise you one "dependence on foreign oil funds terrorism". So see, distributing digital material online actually reduces global terrorism and is thus a "goof thing"! Your move.
That's a square of roughly 450x450m. And "some startup" is planning a feat like that?
Not to mention how the huge cross sectional area will affect the orbit, and the weight of the darned thing (how much fuel did you say you needed to get it/keep it in orbit again?).
But hell, maybe they got someone at the power co to sign a document (after all, the power co probably didn't have to pony up any cash, only promise to buy the power if it was available) - and NOW the fun part begins, because they can go and screw over shareholders because "WE HAVE A SIGNED DOCUMENT PLEASE BUY OUR STOCK YOUR $2/share today will be worth zillions!!!11". Ahhh capitalism. Doesn't matter if they ever get it to orbit or not. I expect millions of dollars to be paid in executive bonuses, and the planning/design meetings will certainly be held in 5 star hotels around the world.
And the best part is that it's all LEGAL, provided they actually try (not succeed) to make it work.
So one day someone will come up with a hybrid solar/electric vehicle, that uses stored energy to accelerate, and solar power to cruise/extend the range?
You live on a planet with close to 7 billion other human beings. Your privacy died as soon as there were two of us. If you don't like it, feel free to build a 16 foot wall around the outside of your property but remember - we'll still be able to see you from a satellite!
Frankly I don't see what the big deal is. There are many more people who use/will use Street View to check out neighborhoods for OTHER purposes like - nostalgia, see where a friend lives, look at a neighborhood before buying a house, etc. After all, there is absolutely nothing stopping a person with criminal intent from walking down your street WITH A CAMERA (dramatic music).
I thought price fixing was illegal in the US. I'm curious as to how the two top competitors manage to release "new" products at the same time and for roughly the same price (within $50 of each other)...
Ohhh wait, must be that "free" market at work again?
We need a viable model to be able to support the bureaucracy of the communication business
Fix'd.
Because everyone knows how unprofitable the communications industry is. Poor things. Even breaking up Ma Bell resulted in several companies swelling each to many times Ma Bell's original size in under 30 years. Yep, a very unprofitable business. I almost feel like donating something to them via paypal, poor fools.
Yes, because of the definite link between autism, food, and being alive. 100% of autistic people eat. 100% of people who stop eating eventually die. And better yet, NO dead people have been observed to exhibit autistic behavior. Therefore dead people can't get autism, or death is a cure for autism.
Oh wait, what were you saying about important correlations?
No, they're not necessarily important, either. It's called "barking up the wrong tree", which isn't really nice when you're doing it with money and a research staff/equipment that don't belong to you.
Yes it's amazing how important facial expressions and tone of voice are to even the simplest communications. My attitude is generally "live and let alone", I think "organized" and "millitant" atheists give the rest of us a bad name - they're just as bad as the other types of lunatics. However in my mind I tend to scoff at the most extremely religious zealots, and I don't hesitate at all to voice my opinions online or (shudders with delight) if some "Witnesses" come knocking at my door to "talk to me about God"... But generally I think everyone has a right to believe/do whatever they want (even if it's completely silly in my opinion) provided they don't oppress others - physically or psychologically. There should always be room for the flower of doubt in the Garden of Eden... lest we forget how to think completely.
If you are so blind that you can't differentiate between the ideologies you are criticising, perhaps it's time to shut-up for a while and reflect on the problems that you have in yourself.
Hmmm? I was speaking generally using a sarcastic tone. Yet you decide to retort with a personal attack by calling me a person full of "anger and hate", surprising considering we don't know each other. While you are entitled to your attitude and personality (after all who am I to judge you? you are the result of your life experiences, and I have no idea what you have lived through) I would just point generally in the direction of a mirror and suggest you look at it.
The religion a person practices is sorta like the OS a computer runs
Or from another point of view, it's more like a virus that spreads from infected people to healthy people. This transmission usually happens in early childhood when parents pass it to their children, but infection can happen at any age.
Like most viruses, they tend to slow you down and impair your judgment, creativity and free thinking, although the infected claim that somehow they are made "more efficient" by the infection. Signs of infection usually manifest themselves as: circular reasoning, repeated non sequiturs, intolerance of the non infected, passive aggressive behavior and sometimes violence towards others due to extreme repression of sexual behavior.
Unfortunately this virus is endemic in the human population (although animals are fortunately free of it despite often forming the center of religious fantasies and rituals) and is probably caused by a faulty human OS. Fortunately a very few humans are running an OS that is impervious to this virus, but they are in the extreme minority.
Remember, of all the things you can do in this world, Jehova/Yaweh, God or Allah will be EXTREMELY displeased with you if you masturbate. Out of all the things happening in the universe, "He" is always watching out in case your hand strays onto your genitals. (Raping 9 year old boys doesn't seem to bother "Him" as much, though).
Not only that, but humans are "causing" the warming with CO2 which, instead of appearing magically underground 6000 years ago because "God" knew the human race would eventually need crude oil, was actually fixed from the atmosphere by millions of years worth of microorganisms and plants that ended up forming sludge at the bottom of lakes and marshes. Yet somehow all that carbon that was taken OUT of the atmosphere millions of years ago (when life apparently seemed to be doing quite well thank you) will cause "THE END OF THE WORLD ZOMG OUR PLANET IS GOING TO TURN INTO VENUS" if it finds its way back in to the atmosphere.
I for one welcome the thought of 40 degree summers in the arctic circle - think of all the crops we'll be able to plant.
I think a majority of the public bases most of their thinking
I would argue that only a minority of the public are capable of much rational thought beyond what channel on the television to watch and where the beer is.
160 miles is MORE than enough for most people (just like 640k), who just drive to work/shops and back. With the added bonus that maybe you can negotiate with your boss, pay the electricity, and plug it in during the day at work, effectively doubling your range.
Slashdot Mirror
Of course, with the pope's uncanny resemblance to Emperor Palpatine, I can't resist the thought of hearing, upon completion of the 100 MegaWatt facility, the words: "NOW YOU WILL WITNESS THE POWER OF THIS FULLY OPERATIONAL BATTLE STATION!"...
there was this period called the dark ages, where pretty much everything cool in continental Europe was 'un-invented' and rediscovered much later.
Agreed. But I will argue that the "Dark Ages" affected mostly just Europe. During this time many "advances" were made in the rest of the world, notably in mathematics and medicine in the Persian empire. Of course it was nothing as spectacular as the explosion that started in the "Renaissance" period, but some parts of the world were "less dark" during this time - east of Constantinople.
But now we have a whole world knit together (despite some governments' best efforts to "block" and "censor" the internet) with cheap communication. Short of a nuclear holocaust, I don't know what could quench the now global thirst for cheap knowledge (and farting videos on youtube).
Now, [South Koreans] can watch live TV on their phones. In the subway. And I can't get above 2Mbps on a hard line in my home.
I sympathize. The worst part is, those Koreans are probably paying less than you are for their superior bandwidth, while "Western" countries dream up schemes to "throttle", "cap" and charge you even more for less than you get today.
On the other hand I am a firm believer that if the "west" puts a high enough toll on the internet, some bright people somewhere will come up with an alternative - whether it be a way to transmit wireless from house to house in the town you live in, and lease fiber to connect the towns, or something even more creative no one has dreamed up yet.
The world has SEEN the internet, and the world WANTS free (or relatively cheap) digital communication. You can't un-invent something, ever. But I guess I'm just an optimist.
This is a prime example of the mistake people of any nation state thinking that any company, particularly one that's granted a local monopoly will in any way, shape or form act in the consumer's best interest.
It's not usually a mistake made by the people, but rather it's what gets voted for by political shills at every level of government, be it municipal or federal. They are bribed or coerced into thinking that the "free" market is the best system in the world, and they lack the intelligence to realize that a monopoly/oligopoly situation is anything BUT a free market. It's in fact quite the opposite.
So America is fed lines like "free market capitalism" in the media every day, and told this is a Good Thing(tm), but when things go wrong then you bump into "Too Big To Fail", extra fees added to your telephone or cable bill (or your savings in your bank account devalued when the currency loses value), because the companies that have this monopoly are faced with a "crumbling infrastructure".
Mind you, they can afford to pay some of their employees to sleep in their pickup trucks (as I caught one Time-Warner employee doing when he was supposed to actually be installing my cable modem. I woke him up and made him work, poor thing). They certainly can afford lobbyists and politicians. But ohhhhh, actually re-investing and maintaining their infrastructure - for SHAME, if we do THAT then how can we ask the "regulatory committees" for fee increases next round?
They treat this like it's a matter of national security.
For goodness sake, it's entertainment!
Some would argue that it's not even entertainment... more like - "torture"?
I certainly stopped going to the movies and listening to the radio a long time ago, and not because I'm downloading the content online. The internet IS to blame, but because I have found OTHER forms of entertainment. Here I can laugh at the stupidity of my fellow man (there's no shortage) when I want, or educate myself by watching MIT or Berkeley courses online, or troll forums. I don't have to wait in line with obnoxious teenagers, pay for overpriced stale popcorn and sticky sodas, sit in dirty seats and be interrupted by cell phones and childish behavior.
even claiming that the current rules are costing jobs to truck drivers delivering CDs and DVDs."
This is a fun game!
I will see your "jobless CD and DVD delivering truck drivers", and raise you one "dependence on foreign oil funds terrorism". So see, distributing digital material online actually reduces global terrorism and is thus a "goof thing"! Your move.
That's a square of roughly 450x450m. And "some startup" is planning a feat like that?
Not to mention how the huge cross sectional area will affect the orbit, and the weight of the darned thing (how much fuel did you say you needed to get it/keep it in orbit again?).
But hell, maybe they got someone at the power co to sign a document (after all, the power co probably didn't have to pony up any cash, only promise to buy the power if it was available) - and NOW the fun part begins, because they can go and screw over shareholders because "WE HAVE A SIGNED DOCUMENT PLEASE BUY OUR STOCK YOUR $2/share today will be worth zillions!!!11". Ahhh capitalism. Doesn't matter if they ever get it to orbit or not. I expect millions of dollars to be paid in executive bonuses, and the planning/design meetings will certainly be held in 5 star hotels around the world.
And the best part is that it's all LEGAL, provided they actually try (not succeed) to make it work.
So one day someone will come up with a hybrid solar/electric vehicle, that uses stored energy to accelerate, and solar power to cruise/extend the range?
In other news, can we have a permanent moratorium on the 'in other news' joke format?
In Soviet Russia, joke is other news
What happened to privacy?
You live on a planet with close to 7 billion other human beings. Your privacy died as soon as there were two of us. If you don't like it, feel free to build a 16 foot wall around the outside of your property but remember - we'll still be able to see you from a satellite!
Frankly I don't see what the big deal is. There are many more people who use/will use Street View to check out neighborhoods for OTHER purposes like - nostalgia, see where a friend lives, look at a neighborhood before buying a house, etc. After all, there is absolutely nothing stopping a person with criminal intent from walking down your street WITH A CAMERA (dramatic music).
I thought price fixing was illegal in the US. I'm curious as to how the two top competitors manage to release "new" products at the same time and for roughly the same price (within $50 of each other)...
Ohhh wait, must be that "free" market at work again?
We need a viable model to be able to support the bureaucracy of the communication business
Fix'd.
Because everyone knows how unprofitable the communications industry is. Poor things. Even breaking up Ma Bell resulted in several companies swelling each to many times Ma Bell's original size in under 30 years. Yep, a very unprofitable business. I almost feel like donating something to them via paypal, poor fools.
doesn't mean that correlation is not important...
Yes, because of the definite link between autism, food, and being alive. 100% of autistic people eat. 100% of people who stop eating eventually die. And better yet, NO dead people have been observed to exhibit autistic behavior. Therefore dead people can't get autism, or death is a cure for autism.
Oh wait, what were you saying about important correlations?
No, they're not necessarily important, either. It's called "barking up the wrong tree", which isn't really nice when you're doing it with money and a research staff/equipment that don't belong to you.
The astronauts in the ISS should declare independence and form their own state in the ISS.
Fine, but they shouldn't expect any supply missions or help getting back down...
If you are going to declare "independence" it's a good idea to make sure that you are really "independent" first.
Or bread, ducks...small rocks
Yes it's amazing how important facial expressions and tone of voice are to even the simplest communications. My attitude is generally "live and let alone", I think "organized" and "millitant" atheists give the rest of us a bad name - they're just as bad as the other types of lunatics. However in my mind I tend to scoff at the most extremely religious zealots, and I don't hesitate at all to voice my opinions online or (shudders with delight) if some "Witnesses" come knocking at my door to "talk to me about God"... But generally I think everyone has a right to believe/do whatever they want (even if it's completely silly in my opinion) provided they don't oppress others - physically or psychologically. There should always be room for the flower of doubt in the Garden of Eden... lest we forget how to think completely.
If you are so blind that you can't differentiate between the ideologies you are criticising, perhaps it's time to shut-up for a while and reflect on the problems that you have in yourself.
Hmmm? I was speaking generally using a sarcastic tone. Yet you decide to retort with a personal attack by calling me a person full of "anger and hate", surprising considering we don't know each other. While you are entitled to your attitude and personality (after all who am I to judge you? you are the result of your life experiences, and I have no idea what you have lived through) I would just point generally in the direction of a mirror and suggest you look at it.
The religion a person practices is sorta like the OS a computer runs
Or from another point of view, it's more like a virus that spreads from infected people to healthy people. This transmission usually happens in early childhood when parents pass it to their children, but infection can happen at any age.
Like most viruses, they tend to slow you down and impair your judgment, creativity and free thinking, although the infected claim that somehow they are made "more efficient" by the infection. Signs of infection usually manifest themselves as: circular reasoning, repeated non sequiturs, intolerance of the non infected, passive aggressive behavior and sometimes violence towards others due to extreme repression of sexual behavior.
Unfortunately this virus is endemic in the human population (although animals are fortunately free of it despite often forming the center of religious fantasies and rituals) and is probably caused by a faulty human OS. Fortunately a very few humans are running an OS that is impervious to this virus, but they are in the extreme minority.
Remember, of all the things you can do in this world, Jehova/Yaweh, God or Allah will be EXTREMELY displeased with you if you masturbate. Out of all the things happening in the universe, "He" is always watching out in case your hand strays onto your genitals. (Raping 9 year old boys doesn't seem to bother "Him" as much, though).
No one actually listens to the UN anymore, anyway.
3. Humans are causing the warming.
Not only that, but humans are "causing" the warming with CO2 which, instead of appearing magically underground 6000 years ago because "God" knew the human race would eventually need crude oil, was actually fixed from the atmosphere by millions of years worth of microorganisms and plants that ended up forming sludge at the bottom of lakes and marshes. Yet somehow all that carbon that was taken OUT of the atmosphere millions of years ago (when life apparently seemed to be doing quite well thank you) will cause "THE END OF THE WORLD ZOMG OUR PLANET IS GOING TO TURN INTO VENUS" if it finds its way back in to the atmosphere.
I for one welcome the thought of 40 degree summers in the arctic circle - think of all the crops we'll be able to plant.
I think a majority of the public bases most of their thinking
I would argue that only a minority of the public are capable of much rational thought beyond what channel on the television to watch and where the beer is.
And I propose that US lawmakers adopt "non profit" status as well!
I dunno, but it's probably going to break my sound drivers... again (sigh).
I bow to your superior intellect. You certainly "pw3ned" me. Well done! You have made a huge contribution to science.
160 miles is MORE than enough for most people (just like 640k), who just drive to work/shops and back. With the added bonus that maybe you can negotiate with your boss, pay the electricity, and plug it in during the day at work, effectively doubling your range.