I used to look up directions on mapquest or google maps. I would study the recommended route, but also the alternative possible routes, and the general surrounding topography and major roads before i took off. That way if i took a wrong turn on the way, i would still have a general idea of where i was and where i needed to go.
Then GPS happened. At first i loved it and used it all the time. But the first time my GPS stopped working on-route, and I realized i had no clue where i was and had to pull over to restart the GPS device and hope it regained connection so i could continue my route, i realized how dependent i had become .
Nowadays i study the map before taking off like i used to, i make sure i understand the general path. "e.g. your going to take this major highway south, take this exit, and go east on this road until you are in this neighborhood, the house you are going to is somewhere in the neighborhood" So basically when i drive these days i already know where i am going, the GPS is only to tell me the best route to the major highway, or how to navigate the neighborhood to get to the exact house im going too. This way if the GPS putzes out on me on-route, i don't have to pull over, i can just keep driving until GPS kicks in again.... or i get to that neighborhood and then call my friend and ask them how to get to her exact house.
No longer must i use google chrome on my linux laptop to watch netflix!!!
Now using a linux OS for my home media server makes sense, now that it can download movies/tv shows and play them using the builtin free software bittorent client, and VLC, it can also play netflix and youtube on a television as well. Now the only thing i need windows for is my gaming machine.
This is a VERY interesting point of view that I haven't heard/thought of before. But do you have any evidence/articles that indicate regulatory capture? I certainly know of UBER fighting regulators that where previously captured by local taxi companies, and the regulations that gave those local taxi companies unfair market advantage. Other than getting regulators to create a new type of service (TNC or 'transportation networking companies') that regulates Uber/Lyft differently than local taxi's, i haven't seen any evidence of regulator capture. Of course, we may disagree on the actual definition of 'regulator capture' would be interested to read your definition as well as any links you have to back up your opinions.
All the ratings from every single viewer watching every single show and the best algorithm to process that data in the world won't help if you don't have a wide enough variety of content to recommend to your users.
At one point in Netflix's history, the number of 'Action movies with a strong female lead' on netflix was so low, but they knew that's what I liked, they started recommending to me rom-coms such as 'Bridget Jones Diary'
I think Lyft, Uber spending money on research and development of autonomous vehicles is awesome, and we should encourage them (and Google) to do even more.
That said, I got the opinion that Uber's business leaders thought self-driving cars where not just far-off rnd, but rather a vital investment to get a return on within a few years so they could start replacing human drivers ASAP.
This sends bad signals across the marketplace. It implies Uber's current business model is unsustainable (which may be true according to recent slashdot posts) It also implies that Uber doesn't care about their current drivers, or labor as a whole, it also reeks of desperation. Market signals are important, if they don't course-correct soon they could find themselves with angry investors, boycotting consumers, and no additional venture capital.
The womens Bra was NOT invented by the undergarment industry in the 1800's. They where just making undergarments that people had been wearing for the last 50 years. A woman running a small business in NYC making dresses invented the Brazier so her dresses would look better on her customers. After a year she was selling and making more braziers than dresses. Eventually she bought a factory and started manufacturing and selling braziers across the country. By the time they started gaining mass appeal, the existing undergarment industry tried to launch a advertising campaign against them, but it was too late.
This pattern repeats throughout history. Small business invent products that become whole new industries, and literally create new jobs that didn't exist before. This is what politicians are talking about when they say 'Small businesses are the lifeblood of the economy, they are the true job creators" its not just a good sound bite, its actually true. In the brazier example, the existing undergarment industry didn't really suffer, they where still producing underware worn around the buttocks area by both men and women. However sometimes these new growing small businesses will cannibalize existing big ones who failed to see the demand in the market for the new product and go out of business.
Once upon a time Netflix was a small business. They created a whole new industry, new jobs that didn't exist before, and cannibalized BlockBuster. Of course movie theaters are next. Of course they didn't innovate for 50 years, they had no incentive to do so so long as the Hollywood studios has iron grip on Washington politicians and could push the TV networks around with their Hollywood prestige and money
But now the Hollywood studios have started turning their backs on movie theaters. TV Networks are no longer small fry, and the theaters that are making money are the ones actually innovating (Ever heard of alamo drafthouse? Cheap tickets and decent food+beer served to you while you watch!) I won't be surprised if movie theaters become niche in the future. it would just be so much better to watch the latest marvel movie day one on my couch on my screen with my favorite beverage and meal.
There are certain kinds of people that like to shout out loud, at the actors in the theater. There are those who like to talk amongst themselves whilst watching a movie, occasionally conducting a kind of running commentary on the movie while they are watching it
I AM NOT ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE. But maybe if movies came out in theaters and netflix on day one, all those people could watch it together at home and i can enjoy the movie at the theater in peace, or vise versa.
Last year non-profits and private businesses invested 2.3 BILLION dollars to basic research. Source: http://www.sciencephilanthropy...
Also, an economist recently did an inflation-adjusted comparison of basic RND expenditures before and after 1960's (when American government got REALLY into Science expenditures) guess what? We had MORE money being spent on RND before the government got involved than we did 50 years later. Source: https://www.amazon.com/gp/prod...
So companies DO spend money on basic research and there is evidence that they spent more in the past than they did once government got involved. This actually makes a lot of sense. If i was running a company that built nuclear reactors, and I was considering investing in fusion tomahawk reactors, but then read in the newspaper that the Government was investing 2.5 billion into fusion reactors, why would i "waste" my precious RnD money if the government is already doing it? In fact, the worst case scenario from such a hypothetical is because of political influences, the government spends the 2.5 billion not on a fusion reactor most likely to succeed, but a less promising model, being proposed by a CEO that's golf buddies with a few senators. After 2.5 billion dollars and 4 years the research program has dismal results, and because of that, no nuclear reactor companies will invest in fusion research for another 10 years.
as for the folks at the NIH, i'm personally not a fan due to the fact that they have been stonewalling medical cannabis research for years, and funded junk science to try and prove that cannabis, ecstasy, and psilosybin mushrooms cause brain damage/schizophrenia.
I will quote my source directly on why the NIH research is only 12.5% useful:
For every 100 research projects, only half lead to published findings. Of those 50, half have significant design flaws, making their results unreliable. And of those 25, half are redundant or unnecessary because of previous work. That’s how you get to 12.5 percent. Source: https://nihrecord.nih.gov/news...
Uhh... no. I do not serve the military. I am extremely anti-war. My opposition to the State Department is I see it as an extension of the Neo-Cons (you know, the group that controlled George Bush and pursued military intervention in Iraq?) I equate "State Department " with "War Department" or the "Department of promising money to countries that do what we want, and threatening military action against those who don't"
And though i am NOT A TRUMP SUPPORTER, i am very mad at the state departments attempts to thwart his negotiations for peace with Russia [this is my personal interpretation of recent events, yours may be different, reporting on this issue has been dismal from both mainstream and underground press]
I do not like the knee-jerk reaction to call myself ignorant. People are exposed to wildly different information sources, philosophies, and editorial opinions throughout their lives. I believe my opinions are founded on a solid ground of research, i have just been exposed to different information sources, philosophies , and interpretations of recent events than you have.
Doesn't mean the amount or quality of science research will go down. If anything the amount and quality will go up as private interests start allocating resources to those science projects most likely to make a big return on investment. I for one want to get the government out of as much science funding as possible, According to this article https://mises.org/blog/trumps-... the NIH science research alone is 87 percent waste. Also I don't like science being guided by political interests. I remember learning how the government paid scientists to 'prove' that cannabis damaged brain cells. So one particular scientist pumped so much cannabis smoke into monkeys mouths that they passed out from oxygen deprivation. Then when he dissected the monkey brains later, surprise surprise! evidence of brain cell death! This "Cannabis kills brain cells" research paper was cited by other researchers and considered legitimate for decades....
So yeah, get the government out of science research. If this bill didn't also allocate a ridiculous amount of money to the military (our largest money pit in the US) I would root for it!
Oh yeah and i'm not in favor of the State Department either. I don't think they do as much 'diplomacy' as they say they do. Its really just the 'Department of Neo-cons'
I'm sorry. "All vaccines are safe and effective" right? We know this because of science right? Just like the scientist who pumped monkeys with so much marijuana smoke they passed out from oxygen deprivation, just to prove to the American Government that "Marijuana kills brain cells." Just like the Lead industry had everyone in America thinking lead was safe and cheap for use in children's toys? (fortunately that misinformation didn't last more than a decade)
Anytime there is a bandwagon, i'm just the kind of person to run away from it screaming. And i feel this way about vaccines too. I don't like the groupthink that encourages governments to make vaccines mandatory. I like even less how big pharma is making more and more vaccines (of questionable efficacy, such as the HPV vaccine) and then lobbying government to make them mandatory too. This reeks of corporatism at its worst. Maybe all the commentators on this article are right, and all vaccines ARE safe and effective and "Herd Immunity" is a valid theory that applies to humans and I will be endangering my child by not vaccinating them until they are at least one year old, and then asking hard questions of my doctor regarding EXACTLY which vaccines they are giving to my child and WHY.
or maybe, in a decade or too, we will find out that Big Pharma was using money to finance bad science to push more and more vaccines on everyone. Just like we found out the Sugar industry managed to distract nutritionists from the dangers of sugar in the 80's and sent us on an anti-fat, anti-cholesterol crusade for two decades. Just like the American Government funded junk science that 'proved' cannabis was lethally dangerous, or would cause mental disorders, or brain disease.
I'll be downvoted to hell for this, but i felt this comments section needed at least ONE well worded logically reasoned argument against the popular opinion.
I will admit, i pulled '1,000' pictures a day out of my ass. But it still seems pretty reasonably to me, its 30 seconds an image. If its a picture of a dog then thats only 1s to analyze and move on, but then you come to someone who posted a picture of their 8 year old in a swimsuit. Is that okay? Better ask the manager. Thats more than 30 seconds. Manager says its okay. 15 pictures later and its a pic of an 8 year old in a swimsuit lying on his back smiling at the camera. That was probably innocently taken by the parent, but could be loved and shared by pedophiles. Does it count as pornography? It could be 2-15 minutes discussing with colleagues or management on what the rulling for that pic is.
So at the end of the day i think an average of 30 seconds a picture is pretty good guess.
Everyone I know in the American Game industry submits their games to be rated by PEGI, not the BBFC.
and PEGI is weird, it is quasi-private, quasi-government controlled (By EU politicians, not necessarily a particular state)
So it's really hard to say weather video game expression is considered 'protected free speech' in the EU. Also because Germany has such strict censorship laws, and developers only have so much money, Britan ends up getting games censored by Germany's laws.
One game that was shipped in the EU had a 'video montage' playing in the background. One of those clips was of an enemy getting shot in the head with a railgun. It looked frickiin AWESOME, but Germany was like 'this is a no go' we had 3 months to ship, not enough time to make one video play for germany and another for every other region. So we edited the video for ALL EU countries that we shippped to. No glory headshot for the EU, all courtesy of Germany.
You can still make a game with tits and violence, get rated 'MO' (Mature only, similar to "NC-17" or "Rated X" in movies)
And sure, walmart won't sell your game, but you can sell it on a website, you can sell it on Steam. In that case you probably won't even bother getting rated in the first place and just remain 'N/A'. You see there is no law in America that says you MUST be rated or you can't sell your product. In Australia if your game isn't rated, you can't sell your game in Australia. (which is why they get so few games every year)
I assume EU countries have similar legislation, and even if they don't, they COULD implement such legislation at any point because the ratings organization are run by the govt, whereas when California tried to impose legislation requiring extra 'sticker warnings' be attached to Rated M games, one of the best legal defenses was that the MPAA wasn't a govt organization, therefore the govt couldn't pass laws based on its decisions
There is no free speech in Germany. You can't publish games about killing nazis (with the Nazi swastika logo) in Germany. I would know, having published video games in that region. You might also be surprised to know that the United States, Canada and Mexico are the ONLY regions in the world that consider video games 'expressions of free speech' and therefore beyond government censorship/regulation? In these regions the ESRB rates video games, like the MPAA (movie ratings) they are determined by a private entity funded by a coalition of video game publishers and developers. The system is far from perfect but it means all the censorship is coming from the industry itself, fueled by fears of consumer outrage should they release violence and boobies in a 'Rated E for everyone' video game. The governments of these regions cannot pass a law like the one in Germany, there is zero percent government censorship.
In Japan, U.K., Germany, Italy, France and Spain (regions I have shipped games in) these games are 'rated' by an organization controlled by the government. They can be and often are subjected to the political forces of the week. What is and is not allowed is often arbitrary, obtuse, and games are regularly given harsher ratings for espousing political or social beliefs that the government of the year doesn't like. (Not to mention governments of the past, which may have encoded banned images/thoughts into law)
When i first realized this information, it dawned on me how fragile freedom is. As westerners we tend to take it for granted and think that all the developed nations are abundant with freedom. When you look really closely though, freedom is a rather precious, fragile, and rare commodity in the world, deserving of our protection.
When is facebook going to admit that it is physically impossible to filter out all the kiddie porn?
According to this website https://zephoria.com/top-15-va... there are 300 million pictures posted EVERY DAY. Even if someone can review 1,000 pictures a day facebook would have to hire 300,000 people to ensure none of the pictures posted are 'kiddie porn'
And computer scientists know there is no automated way to screen these photos without generating false positives. Even an algorithm that was 99% accurate, would mean 1% of 300 million pictures, or 3 MILLION pictures would get falsely reported as child pornography and taken down every single day. And let me tell you, our image recognition algorithms are nowhere near 99% accurate.
And lets not forget that the line between photography and pornography of children is very grey. Legal definitions tend to be very generic or subjective, neither of which are handled well by algorithms that want discreet and objective measurements to work well. We can't as humans even agree on what is considered 'Pornography' or not, a U.S. Supreme court justice once famously said "I know it when i see it"
I expect the politicians to not understand they are asking facebook to draw 3 blue lines with a red marker. I'm surprised facebook isn't educating these politicians to understand that some laws are impossible to enforce. Instead of going after those who post kiddie porn pictures, they should be looking at going after the people who originally took/created the kiddie porn pictures.
As a programmer, i have had to read a many white papers and technical specifications. For a work project I started writing a perl script that used XMPP protocol to send messages to co-workers on a OPENFIRE server. For this I had to read the XMPP specifications, and OH MY GOD are they the most beautifully written and clearly explained technical documents I have ever had the privilege of reading:
https://xmpp.org/rfcs/rfc6120....
And developing apps using the XMPP protocol was super easy and fun. Sadly, the protocol was mostly abandoned due to lack of features we have seen in proprietary implementations. E.g. XMPP clients don't have universal support for in-lined pictures and video (showing someone embedded youtube video or the picture instead of http://imgur.com/aabbbaa or http://youtube.com?watch=blah) It has no support for video messaging (it was build for chat and IM) nor does it have support for screen-sharing. Also if you close your XMPP client and someone sends you a message, you don't get that message when you log in again. Some servers implement an extension that kinda does this, but because its not an official part of the XMPP protocol its spotty and unreliable. Various XMPP clients tack one or multiple of these features onto the XMPP spec, but this fragmented support tends to drive people away instead of too it.
But if ALL you want is a protocol for real-time chat rooms and instant messaging of text-only, man is XMPP fantastic, cheap, easy to use, and reliable.
I understand where you are coming from, but to say that engineers have NO authority/control/ or influence over some of these decisions i feel is a falsehood.
Once I was asked to apply DRM to the CD Distribution of a video game I was working on. I refused to complete the assigned task, and even said something to the effect of "Get Some other immoral engineer to do it, because i won't apply DRM to our product on ethical grounds" Eventually my Tech Director called me into a room with the Director and President of the company and asked why I "Refused to follow simple instructions to complete this task". I calmly explained to everyone in the room that I objected to it on personal, moral and ethical grounds. I explained why DRM makes our product inferior, and also mentioned that there was backlash against DRM in the gaming community and that adding the DRM to our product could hurt sales, technical performance of the game, or both.
The president was shocked, had obviously not hear these arguments before. Exclaimed that if EA was doing it and earning the IRE of consumers, then we shouldn't. That game ended up shipping without DRM
What I don't understand is how I constantly read articles like this on slashdot and yet there are still thousands of people that don't think 'Government is too big' or "Police have too much power" or "our Justice system has become corrupt" or "We have too many laws on the books" or "Decades of 'Tough on Crime' politicians have destroyed peaceful society"
Is it just my own confirmation bias at work, or do the "Pro-Big Government" People see something I don't?
In the tech area, I get the feeling that a LOT of computer scientists and engineers don't contemplate the moral implications of the software/hardware they are designing. Weather its GPS apps designed so badly using them while driving would definitely cause a crash, programmers working on data mining analytics for credit card companies, or smarter and smarter cars that are increasingly insecure and easy to hack, I think more thought about consequences needs to be done by the people making this software/hardware and not just pushing moral authority/decisions on middle or upper management. I'm not saying I want these designers to convert to a particular religion, studies show that just talking about the ten commandments can effect peoples decision making minutes later.
So maybe having a member of the congregation in the corner will subtly influence people in good ways
I have only used 2 IBM products in a professional setting, one of which was ClearCase (the other I forget)
In both cases the tech was horribly out-of-date. Seemed like it was programmed in the 1980's, i originally assumed both software packages where free. Then i found out the company actually pays HUDGE contract money out to IBM to support these products that haven't been updated (from my perspective) in over ten years. Turns out the company keeps paying IBM because of vendor-lock-in, their data is basically held hostage because IBM refuses to program ways to migrate it out of the IBM proprietary format.
totally anecdotal, but i was told by a senior engineer that "IBM doesn't make software anymore, they just keep taking payments from these gigantic legacy contracts, occasionally fooling a new company into signing up based on the name recognition of IBM"
Actually no,.Torrents often expire as both leechers and seeders remove them from their bittorent queues. You can't download 'Avatar: The Last airbender: The Movie' because it bombed in theaters so no one bothers to seed it anymore. Also the legions of fans that gladly ensure all episodes of the Cartoon are available for free downloading don't bother doing the same for the horrible movie.
Also try downloading a good movie (even a REALLY good movie) from the 1930's or 1940's that isn't on AFIS "Top 100 movies of all time" list. You can't do it, there just isn't the demand+supply available. But if a movie studio put ALL their movies ever made available for sale online like I suggested, they would get a lot of money from old people that want to re-watch these old movies they loved or share them with friends, and movie history buffs would also love to watch these for the first time and blog about them
There is a hudge untapped market here for old movies that the studios aren't taking advantage of, and because of copyright term lengths, they won't let anyone else provide such a service. I'm pretty sure they would make millions if they stopped trying to fight piracy and just sold their back catalog online legit.
Batteries don't generate power, so how would they help Australia's Power grid woes?
Is the idea to 'charge' the batteries from the electric grid during non-peak hours, and then discharge them back into the grid during peak hours? Basically that solution would not be 'adding' electricity to the grid, but would be helping smooth out the troughs and peaks of energy capacity, which i guess to a suburbanite they don't care as long as it keeps the lights on?
Or does Australia have some massive solar plants that i don't know about? Solar plants that generate electricity during the day when energy is needed the least, so that the batteries can charge then and discharge during the peak hours?
Is there enough lithium on the planet for this kind of energy solution to be deployed across the world?
Slashdot Mirror
I used to look up directions on mapquest or google maps. I would study the recommended route, but also the alternative possible routes, and the general surrounding topography and major roads before i took off. That way if i took a wrong turn on the way, i would still have a general idea of where i was and where i needed to go.
Then GPS happened. At first i loved it and used it all the time. But the first time my GPS stopped working on-route, and I realized i had no clue where i was and had to pull over to restart the GPS device and hope it regained connection so i could continue my route, i realized how dependent i had become .
Nowadays i study the map before taking off like i used to, i make sure i understand the general path. "e.g. your going to take this major highway south, take this exit, and go east on this road until you are in this neighborhood, the house you are going to is somewhere in the neighborhood" So basically when i drive these days i already know where i am going, the GPS is only to tell me the best route to the major highway, or how to navigate the neighborhood to get to the exact house im going too. This way if the GPS putzes out on me on-route, i don't have to pull over, i can just keep driving until GPS kicks in again.... or i get to that neighborhood and then call my friend and ask them how to get to her exact house.
No longer must i use google chrome on my linux laptop to watch netflix!!! Now using a linux OS for my home media server makes sense, now that it can download movies/tv shows and play them using the builtin free software bittorent client, and VLC, it can also play netflix and youtube on a television as well. Now the only thing i need windows for is my gaming machine.
until SteamOS finally catches on
This is a VERY interesting point of view that I haven't heard/thought of before. But do you have any evidence/articles that indicate regulatory capture? I certainly know of UBER fighting regulators that where previously captured by local taxi companies, and the regulations that gave those local taxi companies unfair market advantage. Other than getting regulators to create a new type of service (TNC or 'transportation networking companies') that regulates Uber/Lyft differently than local taxi's, i haven't seen any evidence of regulator capture. Of course, we may disagree on the actual definition of 'regulator capture' would be interested to read your definition as well as any links you have to back up your opinions.
Then it will be Goodenough for me.
okay i'll show myself out, goodnight everybody!
All the ratings from every single viewer watching every single show and the best algorithm to process that data in the world won't help if you don't have a wide enough variety of content to recommend to your users.
At one point in Netflix's history, the number of 'Action movies with a strong female lead' on netflix was so low, but they knew that's what I liked, they started recommending to me rom-coms such as 'Bridget Jones Diary'
I think Lyft, Uber spending money on research and development of autonomous vehicles is awesome, and we should encourage them (and Google) to do even more. That said, I got the opinion that Uber's business leaders thought self-driving cars where not just far-off rnd, but rather a vital investment to get a return on within a few years so they could start replacing human drivers ASAP.
This sends bad signals across the marketplace. It implies Uber's current business model is unsustainable (which may be true according to recent slashdot posts) It also implies that Uber doesn't care about their current drivers, or labor as a whole, it also reeks of desperation. Market signals are important, if they don't course-correct soon they could find themselves with angry investors, boycotting consumers, and no additional venture capital.
Whoops! Lol yeah sorry about that.
The womens Bra was NOT invented by the undergarment industry in the 1800's. They where just making undergarments that people had been wearing for the last 50 years. A woman running a small business in NYC making dresses invented the Brazier so her dresses would look better on her customers. After a year she was selling and making more braziers than dresses. Eventually she bought a factory and started manufacturing and selling braziers across the country. By the time they started gaining mass appeal, the existing undergarment industry tried to launch a advertising campaign against them, but it was too late.
This pattern repeats throughout history. Small business invent products that become whole new industries, and literally create new jobs that didn't exist before. This is what politicians are talking about when they say 'Small businesses are the lifeblood of the economy, they are the true job creators" its not just a good sound bite, its actually true. In the brazier example, the existing undergarment industry didn't really suffer, they where still producing underware worn around the buttocks area by both men and women. However sometimes these new growing small businesses will cannibalize existing big ones who failed to see the demand in the market for the new product and go out of business.
Once upon a time Netflix was a small business. They created a whole new industry, new jobs that didn't exist before, and cannibalized BlockBuster. Of course movie theaters are next. Of course they didn't innovate for 50 years, they had no incentive to do so so long as the Hollywood studios has iron grip on Washington politicians and could push the TV networks around with their Hollywood prestige and money
But now the Hollywood studios have started turning their backs on movie theaters. TV Networks are no longer small fry, and the theaters that are making money are the ones actually innovating (Ever heard of alamo drafthouse? Cheap tickets and decent food+beer served to you while you watch!) I won't be surprised if movie theaters become niche in the future. it would just be so much better to watch the latest marvel movie day one on my couch on my screen with my favorite beverage and meal.
There are certain kinds of people that like to shout out loud, at the actors in the theater. There are those who like to talk amongst themselves whilst watching a movie, occasionally conducting a kind of running commentary on the movie while they are watching it
I AM NOT ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE. But maybe if movies came out in theaters and netflix on day one, all those people could watch it together at home and i can enjoy the movie at the theater in peace, or vise versa.
Last year non-profits and private businesses invested 2.3 BILLION dollars to basic research. Source: http://www.sciencephilanthropy... Also, an economist recently did an inflation-adjusted comparison of basic RND expenditures before and after 1960's (when American government got REALLY into Science expenditures) guess what? We had MORE money being spent on RND before the government got involved than we did 50 years later. Source: https://www.amazon.com/gp/prod...
So companies DO spend money on basic research and there is evidence that they spent more in the past than they did once government got involved. This actually makes a lot of sense. If i was running a company that built nuclear reactors, and I was considering investing in fusion tomahawk reactors, but then read in the newspaper that the Government was investing 2.5 billion into fusion reactors, why would i "waste" my precious RnD money if the government is already doing it? In fact, the worst case scenario from such a hypothetical is because of political influences, the government spends the 2.5 billion not on a fusion reactor most likely to succeed, but a less promising model, being proposed by a CEO that's golf buddies with a few senators. After 2.5 billion dollars and 4 years the research program has dismal results, and because of that, no nuclear reactor companies will invest in fusion research for another 10 years.
as for the folks at the NIH, i'm personally not a fan due to the fact that they have been stonewalling medical cannabis research for years, and funded junk science to try and prove that cannabis, ecstasy, and psilosybin mushrooms cause brain damage/schizophrenia. I will quote my source directly on why the NIH research is only 12.5% useful:
For every 100 research projects, only half lead to published findings. Of those 50, half have significant design flaws, making their results unreliable. And of those 25, half are redundant or unnecessary because of previous work. That’s how you get to 12.5 percent. Source: https://nihrecord.nih.gov/news...
Uhh... no. I do not serve the military. I am extremely anti-war. My opposition to the State Department is I see it as an extension of the Neo-Cons (you know, the group that controlled George Bush and pursued military intervention in Iraq?) I equate "State Department " with "War Department" or the "Department of promising money to countries that do what we want, and threatening military action against those who don't" And though i am NOT A TRUMP SUPPORTER, i am very mad at the state departments attempts to thwart his negotiations for peace with Russia [this is my personal interpretation of recent events, yours may be different, reporting on this issue has been dismal from both mainstream and underground press]
I do not like the knee-jerk reaction to call myself ignorant. People are exposed to wildly different information sources, philosophies, and editorial opinions throughout their lives. I believe my opinions are founded on a solid ground of research, i have just been exposed to different information sources, philosophies , and interpretations of recent events than you have.
Doesn't mean the amount or quality of science research will go down. If anything the amount and quality will go up as private interests start allocating resources to those science projects most likely to make a big return on investment. I for one want to get the government out of as much science funding as possible, According to this article https://mises.org/blog/trumps-... the NIH science research alone is 87 percent waste. Also I don't like science being guided by political interests. I remember learning how the government paid scientists to 'prove' that cannabis damaged brain cells. So one particular scientist pumped so much cannabis smoke into monkeys mouths that they passed out from oxygen deprivation. Then when he dissected the monkey brains later, surprise surprise! evidence of brain cell death! This "Cannabis kills brain cells" research paper was cited by other researchers and considered legitimate for decades....
So yeah, get the government out of science research. If this bill didn't also allocate a ridiculous amount of money to the military (our largest money pit in the US) I would root for it!
Oh yeah and i'm not in favor of the State Department either. I don't think they do as much 'diplomacy' as they say they do. Its really just the 'Department of Neo-cons'
I'm sorry. "All vaccines are safe and effective" right? We know this because of science right? Just like the scientist who pumped monkeys with so much marijuana smoke they passed out from oxygen deprivation, just to prove to the American Government that "Marijuana kills brain cells." Just like the Lead industry had everyone in America thinking lead was safe and cheap for use in children's toys? (fortunately that misinformation didn't last more than a decade)
Anytime there is a bandwagon, i'm just the kind of person to run away from it screaming. And i feel this way about vaccines too. I don't like the groupthink that encourages governments to make vaccines mandatory. I like even less how big pharma is making more and more vaccines (of questionable efficacy, such as the HPV vaccine) and then lobbying government to make them mandatory too. This reeks of corporatism at its worst. Maybe all the commentators on this article are right, and all vaccines ARE safe and effective and "Herd Immunity" is a valid theory that applies to humans and I will be endangering my child by not vaccinating them until they are at least one year old, and then asking hard questions of my doctor regarding EXACTLY which vaccines they are giving to my child and WHY.
or maybe, in a decade or too, we will find out that Big Pharma was using money to finance bad science to push more and more vaccines on everyone. Just like we found out the Sugar industry managed to distract nutritionists from the dangers of sugar in the 80's and sent us on an anti-fat, anti-cholesterol crusade for two decades. Just like the American Government funded junk science that 'proved' cannabis was lethally dangerous, or would cause mental disorders, or brain disease.
I'll be downvoted to hell for this, but i felt this comments section needed at least ONE well worded logically reasoned argument against the popular opinion.
I will admit, i pulled '1,000' pictures a day out of my ass. But it still seems pretty reasonably to me, its 30 seconds an image. If its a picture of a dog then thats only 1s to analyze and move on, but then you come to someone who posted a picture of their 8 year old in a swimsuit. Is that okay? Better ask the manager. Thats more than 30 seconds. Manager says its okay. 15 pictures later and its a pic of an 8 year old in a swimsuit lying on his back smiling at the camera. That was probably innocently taken by the parent, but could be loved and shared by pedophiles. Does it count as pornography? It could be 2-15 minutes discussing with colleagues or management on what the rulling for that pic is.
So at the end of the day i think an average of 30 seconds a picture is pretty good guess.
Everyone I know in the American Game industry submits their games to be rated by PEGI, not the BBFC. and PEGI is weird, it is quasi-private, quasi-government controlled (By EU politicians, not necessarily a particular state) So it's really hard to say weather video game expression is considered 'protected free speech' in the EU. Also because Germany has such strict censorship laws, and developers only have so much money, Britan ends up getting games censored by Germany's laws.
One game that was shipped in the EU had a 'video montage' playing in the background. One of those clips was of an enemy getting shot in the head with a railgun. It looked frickiin AWESOME, but Germany was like 'this is a no go' we had 3 months to ship, not enough time to make one video play for germany and another for every other region. So we edited the video for ALL EU countries that we shippped to. No glory headshot for the EU, all courtesy of Germany.
According to wikipedia, Brazil has a ratings organization run by the government, under the 'Ministry of Justice' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
You can still make a game with tits and violence, get rated 'MO' (Mature only, similar to "NC-17" or "Rated X" in movies) And sure, walmart won't sell your game, but you can sell it on a website, you can sell it on Steam. In that case you probably won't even bother getting rated in the first place and just remain 'N/A'. You see there is no law in America that says you MUST be rated or you can't sell your product. In Australia if your game isn't rated, you can't sell your game in Australia. (which is why they get so few games every year)
I assume EU countries have similar legislation, and even if they don't, they COULD implement such legislation at any point because the ratings organization are run by the govt, whereas when California tried to impose legislation requiring extra 'sticker warnings' be attached to Rated M games, one of the best legal defenses was that the MPAA wasn't a govt organization, therefore the govt couldn't pass laws based on its decisions
There is no free speech in Germany. You can't publish games about killing nazis (with the Nazi swastika logo) in Germany. I would know, having published video games in that region. You might also be surprised to know that the United States, Canada and Mexico are the ONLY regions in the world that consider video games 'expressions of free speech' and therefore beyond government censorship/regulation? In these regions the ESRB rates video games, like the MPAA (movie ratings) they are determined by a private entity funded by a coalition of video game publishers and developers. The system is far from perfect but it means all the censorship is coming from the industry itself, fueled by fears of consumer outrage should they release violence and boobies in a 'Rated E for everyone' video game. The governments of these regions cannot pass a law like the one in Germany, there is zero percent government censorship.
In Japan, U.K., Germany, Italy, France and Spain (regions I have shipped games in) these games are 'rated' by an organization controlled by the government. They can be and often are subjected to the political forces of the week. What is and is not allowed is often arbitrary, obtuse, and games are regularly given harsher ratings for espousing political or social beliefs that the government of the year doesn't like. (Not to mention governments of the past, which may have encoded banned images/thoughts into law)
When i first realized this information, it dawned on me how fragile freedom is. As westerners we tend to take it for granted and think that all the developed nations are abundant with freedom. When you look really closely though, freedom is a rather precious, fragile, and rare commodity in the world, deserving of our protection.
When is facebook going to admit that it is physically impossible to filter out all the kiddie porn? According to this website https://zephoria.com/top-15-va... there are 300 million pictures posted EVERY DAY. Even if someone can review 1,000 pictures a day facebook would have to hire 300,000 people to ensure none of the pictures posted are 'kiddie porn'
And computer scientists know there is no automated way to screen these photos without generating false positives. Even an algorithm that was 99% accurate, would mean 1% of 300 million pictures, or 3 MILLION pictures would get falsely reported as child pornography and taken down every single day. And let me tell you, our image recognition algorithms are nowhere near 99% accurate.
And lets not forget that the line between photography and pornography of children is very grey. Legal definitions tend to be very generic or subjective, neither of which are handled well by algorithms that want discreet and objective measurements to work well. We can't as humans even agree on what is considered 'Pornography' or not, a U.S. Supreme court justice once famously said "I know it when i see it"
I expect the politicians to not understand they are asking facebook to draw 3 blue lines with a red marker. I'm surprised facebook isn't educating these politicians to understand that some laws are impossible to enforce. Instead of going after those who post kiddie porn pictures, they should be looking at going after the people who originally took/created the kiddie porn pictures.
As a programmer, i have had to read a many white papers and technical specifications. For a work project I started writing a perl script that used XMPP protocol to send messages to co-workers on a OPENFIRE server. For this I had to read the XMPP specifications, and OH MY GOD are they the most beautifully written and clearly explained technical documents I have ever had the privilege of reading: https://xmpp.org/rfcs/rfc6120....
And developing apps using the XMPP protocol was super easy and fun. Sadly, the protocol was mostly abandoned due to lack of features we have seen in proprietary implementations. E.g. XMPP clients don't have universal support for in-lined pictures and video (showing someone embedded youtube video or the picture instead of http://imgur.com/aabbbaa or http://youtube.com?watch=blah) It has no support for video messaging (it was build for chat and IM) nor does it have support for screen-sharing. Also if you close your XMPP client and someone sends you a message, you don't get that message when you log in again. Some servers implement an extension that kinda does this, but because its not an official part of the XMPP protocol its spotty and unreliable. Various XMPP clients tack one or multiple of these features onto the XMPP spec, but this fragmented support tends to drive people away instead of too it.
But if ALL you want is a protocol for real-time chat rooms and instant messaging of text-only, man is XMPP fantastic, cheap, easy to use, and reliable.
I understand where you are coming from, but to say that engineers have NO authority/control/ or influence over some of these decisions i feel is a falsehood.
Once I was asked to apply DRM to the CD Distribution of a video game I was working on. I refused to complete the assigned task, and even said something to the effect of "Get Some other immoral engineer to do it, because i won't apply DRM to our product on ethical grounds" Eventually my Tech Director called me into a room with the Director and President of the company and asked why I "Refused to follow simple instructions to complete this task". I calmly explained to everyone in the room that I objected to it on personal, moral and ethical grounds. I explained why DRM makes our product inferior, and also mentioned that there was backlash against DRM in the gaming community and that adding the DRM to our product could hurt sales, technical performance of the game, or both.
The president was shocked, had obviously not hear these arguments before. Exclaimed that if EA was doing it and earning the IRE of consumers, then we shouldn't. That game ended up shipping without DRM
What I don't understand is how I constantly read articles like this on slashdot and yet there are still thousands of people that don't think 'Government is too big' or "Police have too much power" or "our Justice system has become corrupt" or "We have too many laws on the books" or "Decades of 'Tough on Crime' politicians have destroyed peaceful society"
Is it just my own confirmation bias at work, or do the "Pro-Big Government" People see something I don't?
In the tech area, I get the feeling that a LOT of computer scientists and engineers don't contemplate the moral implications of the software/hardware they are designing. Weather its GPS apps designed so badly using them while driving would definitely cause a crash, programmers working on data mining analytics for credit card companies, or smarter and smarter cars that are increasingly insecure and easy to hack, I think more thought about consequences needs to be done by the people making this software/hardware and not just pushing moral authority/decisions on middle or upper management. I'm not saying I want these designers to convert to a particular religion, studies show that just talking about the ten commandments can effect peoples decision making minutes later.
So maybe having a member of the congregation in the corner will subtly influence people in good ways
I have only used 2 IBM products in a professional setting, one of which was ClearCase (the other I forget) In both cases the tech was horribly out-of-date. Seemed like it was programmed in the 1980's, i originally assumed both software packages where free. Then i found out the company actually pays HUDGE contract money out to IBM to support these products that haven't been updated (from my perspective) in over ten years. Turns out the company keeps paying IBM because of vendor-lock-in, their data is basically held hostage because IBM refuses to program ways to migrate it out of the IBM proprietary format.
totally anecdotal, but i was told by a senior engineer that "IBM doesn't make software anymore, they just keep taking payments from these gigantic legacy contracts, occasionally fooling a new company into signing up based on the name recognition of IBM"
Actually no, .Torrents often expire as both leechers and seeders remove them from their bittorent queues. You can't download 'Avatar: The Last airbender: The Movie' because it bombed in theaters so no one bothers to seed it anymore. Also the legions of fans that gladly ensure all episodes of the Cartoon are available for free downloading don't bother doing the same for the horrible movie.
Also try downloading a good movie (even a REALLY good movie) from the 1930's or 1940's that isn't on AFIS "Top 100 movies of all time" list. You can't do it, there just isn't the demand+supply available. But if a movie studio put ALL their movies ever made available for sale online like I suggested, they would get a lot of money from old people that want to re-watch these old movies they loved or share them with friends, and movie history buffs would also love to watch these for the first time and blog about them
There is a hudge untapped market here for old movies that the studios aren't taking advantage of, and because of copyright term lengths, they won't let anyone else provide such a service. I'm pretty sure they would make millions if they stopped trying to fight piracy and just sold their back catalog online legit.
Batteries don't generate power, so how would they help Australia's Power grid woes?
Is the idea to 'charge' the batteries from the electric grid during non-peak hours, and then discharge them back into the grid during peak hours? Basically that solution would not be 'adding' electricity to the grid, but would be helping smooth out the troughs and peaks of energy capacity, which i guess to a suburbanite they don't care as long as it keeps the lights on? Or does Australia have some massive solar plants that i don't know about? Solar plants that generate electricity during the day when energy is needed the least, so that the batteries can charge then and discharge during the peak hours?
Is there enough lithium on the planet for this kind of energy solution to be deployed across the world?