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  1. What is with this "my city" or "my town"? on Can the US Actually Cultivate Local Competition in Broadband? · · Score: 1

    I see this all the time in submissions on Slashdot, when people talk about personal experience with ISPs in their local areas. Few people want to mention *where the hell they are* when they comment. Why are so many people afraid to mention where they are from? Post anonymously if you're so afraid of being identified, but without a location, your story is far, FAR less useful!

    If we knew what city you are talking about, we'd be able to find out more information about what happened and how the citizenry overcame the state law. That is a compelling story that should be known, so that others can attempt to duplicate the effort. You even state that "few cities around the USA that have done this": come on, man! If you're one of them, shout out your success story! Name the city, let us find out more!

  2. Banished to the Basement because of the noise on The Greatest Keyboard Ever Made · · Score: 1

    Completely agree with the sentiment. My computer is required by law (the wife) to be as far away as possible if I use the Model M, hence in the basement it goes.

    In case it ever dies (yeah right), I still have 4 more stockpiled as replacements.

  3. Re:Jamming unlinced spectrum is illegal? on Marriott Fined $600,000 For Jamming Guest Hotspots · · Score: 3, Interesting

    In Meraki's Air Marshal Whitepaper [cisco.com], they explicitly state on page 8 that Unauthorized containment is prosecutable by law (subject to the FCC’s Communications Act of 1934, Section 333, ‘Willful or Malicious Interference’)..

    Hmm, according to the whitepaper you linked it says "As containment renders any standard 802.11 network completely ineffective, containment measures should taken in your airspace(emphasis mine). Extreme caution should be taken to ensure that containment is not being performed on a legitimate network nearby and, action should only be taken as a last resort. Unauthorized containment is prosecutable by law (subject to the FCC’s Communications Act of 1934, Section 333, ‘Willful or Malicious Interference’). "

    So provided that the "containment" effort took place only on Marriott's property (not a public space), I'm having trouble seeing how Marriott is legally in the wrong. Obviously, it's sleazy (and the FCC found reason to fine them, as well, so what do I know). Perhaps there is an implied right to the public use of the air in a building that, while not freely "open to the public" per se, is also not "closed off" private, either?

    Would a retail store be prevented from doing the same thing?

  4. Re:My RAID horror story on Ask Slashdot: What To Do After Digitizing VHS Tapes? · · Score: 1

    Fortunately, I had a backup.

    Well, good, because (as anyone who is considering running RAID should know) RAID is not a backup! "RAID" and "backup" are mutually exclusive. As you point out, RAID is only useful when you need high availability and ability to recover from drive failure with minimum fuss. Your horror story was caused by trying to build a RAID5 array (only one drive's capacity of redundancy) on a computer where the loss of either of 2 controllers meant the loss of the entire array. And using cheap controllers, on top of that.

    Backup is for when your primary copy (whether it is a single drive or a RAID, it is still a "single" copy) fails for any reason at all.

  5. Re:What whas the problem in the first place? on TrueCrypt Author Claims That Forking Is Impossible · · Score: 1

    the developers do not understand the code and its more trouble to try to unravel a poorly written software project than to do it over again.

    Don't remember what podcast I was listening to, but someone was saying that he read the source code and found it to be *beautifully* written! Although I certainly have no skill to confirm this, "beautiful" is not an adjective to be used if he thought it couldn't be understood or needed "unraveling".

  6. Descent destroyed my ability to do PC gaming on It's Time For the Descent Games Return · · Score: 1

    I was in with DOOM when it came out. My residence had a 6 PC computer lab that I helped administrate (Windows 3.1 and Novell Netware 3.12: *ouch*), and in early '95 I installed a 4-user game of DOOM for the first multi-player deathmatch any of us had played. I was reasonably skilled, but other guys (who played way single-player more than I) schooled me.

    Still, it was fun and I enjoyed the heck out of DOOM. Although it was "3-D", the entire map of the playing area was flat, and it wasn't too difficult to keep my bearings of where I was and where I needed to go, which it turns out is a requirement for me to playing FPS games because..... ... the next year Descent came out, and its *legit* 3-D! Holy crap, the tunnels and passageways branch out and curve in every direction! I can't figure where I am, there's no "up" or "down"! Arrgh!!!! (and shoves keyboard and mouse back in frustration). Let the young whipersnappers do this, I'm out! (I was 24 at the time :-P )

    I've not played FPS since. I now understand that most games since have been closer to DOOM than Descent (in this regard), but I discovered this too late: 2 decades have gone by, and now the complexity of gameplay and controls is beyond my ability to climb the learning curve. I'm officially old!

  7. Re:Still sucks to own a phone in Canada on CRTC Unveils New Wireless Code To Protect Canadian Customers · · Score: 1

    Just getting another Wind customer's opinion (I've only been able to identify 2 among the people I know)....

    Both the Wind customers I know in the Toronto area complain about rotten coverage, even within Toronto boundaries. Phone calls drop regularly while driving down the 401. Data stops inexplicably for minutes at a time. There are more "dead" areas, and going down in the basement of their homes inevitably leads to zero signal. One has an older Blackberry Bold, the other a Nexus 4.

    What's your experience? I can't "try out" Wind and see for myself without buying a phone outright first. Have you had better luck?

  8. Re:India ? on Hospital Resorts To Cameras To Ensure Employees Wash Hands · · Score: 1

    I agree that desperate measures are needed. Too many people needlessly get infections when proper cleanliness on the part of hospital staff would have prevented it. (Full disclosure: my father died in hospital. He had major surgery on his heart, then caught MRSA following surgery. The guy in the same room as him brought the infection in, the room was put under "infection protocol" meaning the staff and visitors are supposed to follow cleanliness guidelines and wear disposable garb, but he got it anyways. He was gone barely a week after his "successful" surgery.)

    Since this first experience, I've observed hospital staff and visitors in many similar situations with other sick relatives. In *every* case, in multiple hospitals, there was blatant disregard for the policies of cleanliness by nurses and families of patients. If you complain, you're marked as a troublemaker as treated with hostility by the (admittedly overworked) staff.

    My feeling is that unless there is an infection which passes as easily as MRSA does, but also makes *healthy* people (meaning nurses and doctors) as sick as the patients, nothing will ever change without onerous big-brother-style solutions like monitoring. I feel guilty wishing for hospital workers to get sick and possibly die, but that sure as heck would successfully get the point across.

  9. No links to Penisland? on Ask Slashdot: The Search For the Ultimate Engineer's Pen · · Score: 1

    Maybe you won't find your ultimate pen there, but you gotta admit, "penisland.net" is a great URL!

  10. What motivates you? on Ask Slashdot: How Much Is a Fun Job Worth? · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This all comes down to if you want to play it safe (stability motivates you), or if you want to roll the dice and gamble (change motivates you).

    I speak from experience. I made a risky choice in 2000 and joined a startup, quitting a secure job at IBM that I would (in all likelihood) still have today. The job I went to paid better, was a lot of fun, exciting, challenging, and in the end a failure. My career has never fully recovered, and I am certain that had I stayed at IBM I would be finincially way further ahead than I am now. By all reasonalble criteria, I should regret my decision.

    Yet I *had* to do it: I crave re-invention and change. I wouldn't be happy stuck in the douldrums of a stagnant work environment. I work for myself now, but I have no problems envisioning myself going back to being a cog in a big machine again. I'm open to, and embrace, the possibilities.

    But as for you, you have to make that decision for yourself. The operative word about your job is not "fun", it's "happiness". You're in a fortunate position of being satisfied with your career, so you need to decide if you will regret not taking the opportunity to do more (and risk that you will fail). Good luck.

  11. Princess Anne of Great Britain on The Tricky Science of Olympic Gender Testing · · Score: 2

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1976_Summer_Olympics#Highlights

    Princess Anne of Great Britain competed in the 1976 Summer Games in Montreal (equestrian). Unsurprisingly, she happens to be the *only* female competitor to not have to submit to a "sex test" at that games.

  12. Re:EVIL-TOS: Not allowed to host any type of serve on Google Announces Plans, Pricing For Kansas City Fiber Network · · Score: 2

    Google will never innovate again. It's not allowed.

    Strange, I'd have thought that offering an fiber-based alternative infrastructure to a pretty good sized city would have qualified as pretty damn innovative. Who else is trying that?

    Google has been publicly traded for many years now, and as such "hostage" to outside investors. In that time they've started this project, the self-driving cars, Google Glass, and a bunch of other stuff that "hasn't been done before", certainly not to the scale that Google is attempting.

  13. Re:Another Perspective on How To Crash the US Justice System: Demand a Trial · · Score: 2

    Obviously, we need our law schools to start teaching the use of carriage returns!

  14. Re:U.S. law is the new international law on Megaupload.com Shut Down, Founder Charged With Piracy · · Score: 1

    Damn! You beat me to it, that was going to my comment! Tip of the hat to you, good sir!

  15. Re:What get's me... on Fake IPad 2s Made of Clay Sold At Canadian Stores · · Score: 1

    1. Crook buys real iPad with cash.
    2. Crook takes iPad, replaces clay in box, re-seals box to appear unopened.
    3. Crook returns new-looking tainted box, receives cash from store.
    4. Tainted box returned to shelf.
    5. Innocent buys tainted box
    6. Innocent discovers clay, goes back to store.
    7. Store stuck with clay and packaging.

    The sentence you quoted was for Steps 3-4, not 6-7.

  16. Re:Money on What's Keeping You On XP? · · Score: 1

    Nice. Insult the poster when he states something that is demonstratably correct, then offer absolutely no proof of your claim. Unlike you, some of us are willing to be civil in our discussion, and would even welcome the opportunity to be proven wrong when shown the evidence. By all means, please tell us how you can procure a legal copy of Windows 7 Ultimate on a non OEM machine for less than $46.99. I'm serious, that would be great information to have.

  17. Re:Why support the lawyers? on How Google Drove Samsung Away · · Score: 1

    Oh, and mod down the GGP post. Definitely *not* informative.

  18. Re:Why support the lawyers? on How Google Drove Samsung Away · · Score: 2

    Agreed. Citation *definitely* required for a comment like this one.

    I just did a quick search and found only this reference to any patent licensing agreement in February 2009, where Google paid Microsoft for their "ActiveSync" technology. Hardly enough to imply that Google has purchased a "Thou Shalt Not Sue Me over my Phones" license from Microsoft.

  19. Re:Be Deliberately Worthless on A Letter On Behalf of the World's PC Fixers · · Score: 1

    [pedantic] Chris O'Dowd is Irish. [/pedantic]

  20. Re:thank god. on Goodbye, HD Component Video · · Score: 1

    Why are we still fretting about analog inputs and outputs?

    Because there are early adopters out there that bought very high end TVs before HDMI was rolled out. I've seen people with perfectly good quality rear-projection screens (purchased in the late '90s) that can handle HD (1080i), but only has component inputs.

    There is no "capability" reason why a set like this couldn't show Blu-ray content at near-highest settings. However, turning off component HD output from a Blu-ray player effectively handcuffs it.

  21. Re:Are You Taking Notes, Ghyslain Raza? on "David After Dentist" Made $150k For Family · · Score: 1

    This has also been attributed to George Bernard Shaw and Mark Twain. Agreed, Churchill seems pretty unlikely to have been the one to say this.

  22. Re:OK... on IsoHunt Told To Pull Torrent Files Offline · · Score: 1

    I mean Pirate Bay got shut down because the US pressured the crap out of Sweden to do it, but I am sure there are plenty of places that could care less.

    The Pirate Bay is shut down? Really? If so there's another very similar looking site using the same URL! It even helped me download some files just last night!

  23. T-Mobile is in Canada? on Best Smartphone Plan Covering US and Canada? · · Score: 1

    Uhhh, no they're not! (Cannot find a link to disprove this, it's hard to prove a negative: please provide me with one that says otherwise)

    In fact, we're only now just getting our first carrier (Wind Mobile) that runs on the same GSM 3G frequencies as T-Mobile, and Wind is only in a few centres (they only launched a few months ago). Rogers & Fido (the main GSM carriers) and now Bell and Telus with their new network run on the same frequencies as AT&T. So if you brought a T-Mobile smartphone up to Nova Scotia, you would have no 3G coverage at all, and massive roaming charges to boot.

  24. Re:palin power on Huge Unidentified Organic Blob Floating Around Alaska · · Score: 1

    And the award for Most Awesome Tasteless Joke in this Entire Discussion goes to ..... MoldySpore!!!! (applause)

  25. Re:I Sympathize With Him But Too Idyllic on A Mathematician's Lament — an Indictment of US Math Education · · Score: 1

    The paragraph I quote is not the truth, it's wishing for the impossible. I wish I had a math teacher like this all my life but come on. The public school system is more worried about getting someone that actualy cares about the students at all. They can't even find those people let alone people who care about the students and live/eat/sleep/bleed math.

    As someone who went through teacher's college but realized that I was not capable of surviving the stresses of teaching in the public schools, I agree with this wholeheartedly. After my experience in school and in practicum classrooms, I feel that there are two kinds of teachers that can survive the system:

    • the brilliant, enthusiastic, respected "perfect" teacher: you know them when you see them, and there are a few of them in every school,
    • the less-than-perfect teacher who inevitably cannot stop students from falling through the cracks, and who really doesn't care (ie: it's just a job)

    Unfortunately for my potential career, I fell into the third category: the imperfect teacher who cared too much to be able to just forge ahead regardless of the failure to reach and inspire some students. I found the stress of lesson planning and instruction overwhelming, because I was hung up on trying to accommodate the students who had different needs and learning styles, as well as the different levels of ability. I believe that I was a fairly good teacher overall (and yes, I do love mathematics), but caring about the students really weighs heavily on you when you know you're not able to teach to everyone well.