1 Million litres may be a decent start, but it sure isn't much. There's a corn-fuled ethanol producing plant in Kansas that produces 26 million gal of ethanol a year, and that hardly makes a dent
I'm not sure I see your point. You're saying we'd need to find 26 municipalities with wastewater treatment plants to convert to algae farms, which would be part of the requisite wastewater treatment solution as well as producing fuel, in order to match one plant which requires farmers to go out and actively produce feedstock for at added expense? That's more than just 'decent' in my book. And imagine what your municipality would say if you told them they could offset the costs of fuel and wastewater treatment at the same time - ka-ching!
If we were smart we would pull a brazil and start producing more corn to use as ethanol. They will be oil-independent by next year. Sugar-based ethanol is something like 8 times more efficient then corn-based. Shows what we know right?
Taking advantage of existing feedstock (read: waste) beats growing feedstock for most efficiencies. And if you want to look for more viable biodiesel feedstocks, there's a wide number - rapeseed, mustard, jatropha, and palm oil. See the table at Wikipedia. Note that algae wins hands down over crops.
I'm not gonna mention the half-assed motion sensor implementation...
Let me offer a contrary view: I'm looking forward to the half-assed motion sensor implementation.
First, let's deal with half-assed. Is Eye Toy half-assed? Yes. Is it fun when it works? Sure. It wasn't an original idea, but it was an attempt to take controls "to the next level," a layer of experimentation that I commend.
Now, as far as motion sensors go, I can't wait to see. If it works half-assed, and is able to take advantage of my tendency to move the way I want my 'mech to move, that's great. Just a little help would be nice.
I'm not a hard core gamer by any definition; I play in sporadic mini-obsessions. But I do think there's more to the future of gaming than better graphics, and playing with controls - even half-assed attempts - is a great direction in my book.
Child pornography is illegal - and vile. Possession of child pornography is illegal - and vile.
And a Jamaican would tell you that homosexuality is illegal - and vile.
That is a flawed analogy. Child pornography involves the exploitation of someone too young to consent in any legal or psychologically valid manner - they simply aren't equipped to evaluate what's being asked of them and say no if Uncle John asks.
Homosexuality between consenting adults, on the other hand, involves... consent. This means it is not merely a shift along the same morally relative spectrum, it's a step over to the next spectrum - the spectrum where you are also allowed to vote, drive, buy alcohol, and get into a nudey bar.
Now, if Jamaica allows 6-year-olds to vote, maybe we've got an analogy, but right now this just looks like a strawman argument.
Bravo; you've made the most secure operating system available today. But, then, you have this firmly held belief that the rest of the world owes you something? That you're gracing the rest of the world with your glorious presence and regal software? That attitude is not welcome here.
Actually, no, he's not claiming that the world owes him something. He's claiming that his act of creation and contribution does not cause him (well, specifically, the OpenSSH developers) to be owe anything further to the people who take advantage of their contribution.
That is an entirely different issue.
"From the beginning of history, the two antagonists have stood face to face: the creator and the second-hander. When the first creator invented the wheel, the first second-hander responded. He invented altruism.
"The creator - denied, opposed, persecuted, exploited - went on, moved forward and carried all humanity along on his energy. The second-hander contributed nothing to the process except the impediments. The contest has another name: the individual against the collective." - Howard Roark in The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand.
SANS, a well-respected hands-on security training organization, has several courses on application-level security - Securing Oracle, Web Application Security Workshop, Secure Internet Presence LAMP, and.Net Security among them. These are aimed at programmers, not testers, but would be beneficial to anyone doing code audits and blackbox testing of applications.
Not quite what you asked for, but maybe something you'll want to look into.
You better re-examine your idea of security here. For starters, your ISP that you connect your server to can easily store both sides of a conversation...it has to pass through their server *both ways* for you to communicate.
Well, no.
If you truly run your own mail server, with MX records rather than using your ISP's POP box as a store-and-forward, then it isn't going through their server. Technically;>. The only real difference this makes is that your communications clearly fall under the Pen Register rules rather than the Wiretap rules when the authorities try to legally obtain info about your communications.
It does still go through their network. But that's a (slightly) different matter. Yes, they can still sniff the traffic both ways. This is where StartTLS comes in. If your mail server offers StartTLS, and the remote mail server is willing to try it, then everything except the EHLO of the SMTP transaction is encrypted just as HTTPS web pages are.
You can easily set up most mail servers to run "Opportunistic" StartTLS. That is to say, "Offer it, and take advantage if someone else offers it, but don't require it." For the purposes of encryption, it doesn't matter that most people will use self-signed certificates. (Yes, that kills authentication.)
You can also require StartTLS, but that would impact your ability to send and receive mail to sites not configured to do StartTLS. (But for the paranoid, it bears mentioning.)
Google quickly found a few sites for various mail transfer agent configurations:
Exchange (no good link, and may not allow opportunistic)
In short... my mail server secures mail with anyone else who cares to do so. If you are enough to run your own server, consider caring enough to offer and take advantage of StartTLS encryption.
N.B. - If self-signed certs are a pain (and they are), look into CAcert.
It is best when freshly ground and french-pressed.
Allow me to present another viewpoint.
I agree it is best when freshly ground. I would expand to say that it is better than best when freshly roasted and freshly ground. A good home roaster can be purchased for $75 - $200, and an excellent one for $600-$700. I got both of mine (beginner, then a better one after I killed my first) here. That's where I get my green beans, too.
As far as brewing goes, the french press is good. However, you should also consider the vacuum pot. An example would be the Bodum Mini-Santos which makes 25 oz (two tall mugs) of coffee. There's also a larger version. The coffee you can get out of a vacuum pot blows away any other method of brewing I've ever tried - french press, drip, drip with gold filter, percolator, boiled 8).
will only be actionable if it turns out to be orders to go blow up more buildings full of people.
I'm glad you think so, as that's the justification the Administration is using for their actions:
"I would argue that the actions that we've taken there are totally appropriate and consistent with the constitutional authority of the president.... You know, it's not an accident that we haven't been hit in four years," the vice president said... (CBS News)
Why get a warrant, whose purpose is to legitimize trials, to do these taps if it isn't headed for trial in the first place???
The purpose of a warrant is not (and, may I say again, not) to legitimize trials. The purpose of a warrant is to ensure that wiretaps are not abused; it's called checks and balances of power. You may have heard of Watergate. I understand it's a very nice building in Washington where the Democrats had their campaign headquarters during the Nixon administration - oddly enough, the very administration that Cheney claims was the last administration with the (to his mind) appropriate level of executive power.
You still haven't answered my question. If a valid legal method for getting warrants after-the-fact exists, why isn't the administration using it? Are they afraid their wiretaps are based on shoddy justifications? Perhaps they feel the fact of the wiretaps would get leaked and reflect poorly on them (cf. irony)?
The "well warrants aren't really needed unless you plan to go to court" argument would work in Russia, but the last time I checked the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States was still intepreted as protecting citizens against unreasonable searches, and the court systems (one of the three branches of government, yes?) have consistently interpreted warrants as the appropriate method for making sure searches remain reasonable. Even retroactive warrants.
The administration had used two basic defenses: "We need to react fast," and "We have all the power we say we have, because we're the Executive branch." The first is invalidated by $1805(f). The second is a perfect case example of why the tripartite system of checks and balances was put into the Constitution - to protect us from idiots like this.
(Having said that, I'm hoping the checks and balances start kicking in. They're a bit overdue at this point).
Open your eyes. The Bush administration has redefined this into a question of whether warrantless wiretapping is justified or not. The real question is, if we take as a given that it is justified, what is their reason for ignoring the established legal route to doing so? I can think of many answers to that, and none of them reflect well on the administration.
The more expensive channels are the more popular channels. You realize that they do that so the sports watchers subsidize the home and garden channels, and not the other way around, right?
I've heard that, but I don't buy it, and I've never seen hard data to support it. The less popular channels run commercials just as well as other channels do, and if they command lower rates, well, they also happen to have lower costs (e.g., Sears doesn't need to be paid off in order for This Old House to run, but by contrast, the NBA takes a nice meaty cut of any game that gets aired (er, cabled)).
Also, I don't think packaging can be called 'subsidizing'. 'Subsidizing' would be money from sports channel subscribers being used to support home & garden, without input from the non-sports viewers. The current system artificially raises home & garde user rates to the level of sports channel users. The home & garden people end up paying the max, which cannot be called a subsidy. I think the proper term would be 'fleecing'.
Then the content providers will start charging Bell South to allow users of the Bell South internet service to access their web sites. It's already started. The content providers know that they're in charge. There are so many ISPs out there that the ISP needs the content more than the content providers need any single ISP. Bell South will figure this out, or they will lose customers. Once again, the free market works.
Unfortunately, the cable companies have already figured out what the step after that is. They jack the customer's prices up. They're so sorry they have to charge you extra, but that's because your package includes premium content channels. They're so sorry that ESPN happens to be in the same package as the Home & Garden network - really, if they could, they'd split those up so that people with zero interest in sports don't need to pay for the most expensive channels.
Seriously. Look at the 'channel packages' your local cable provider offers. Every one of them contains a number of diametrically opposed interest channels, so that people end up paying more for packages because of channels they'll never watch.
It's nice that it has Ethernet, but can you do anything useful with it or will it be heavily DRM'ed?
Yep - not ever have to worry about running a phone line over to the TiVo, or think about when the phone is tied up, or get incensed at the stupidity of transferring data over POTS ever again.
Even if you couldn't transfer video with it (and I'm sure you'll be able to) the update capabilities make it worth it.
You can find mind-numbing levels of information and speculation about CWT's Missouri plant at BioDieselNow.
There's been two clear problems with the plan so far as I can see: Firstly, their business model assumed that the use of animal waste as feedstock was not long-term feasible (concerns over Mad Cow disease). If animal remnants stopped being used as feedstock, there would be no competing market for them, and therefore their price would drop, or they might even be paid for taking away the waste and destroying it. That didn't happen.
Secondly, the plant did generate odor complaints from the area residents, enough to require remediation. I'm sure that's long-term fixable, it just wasn't fully anticipated.
The other thing people should keep in mind is that as the need for petroleum alternatives grows, the impetus for solving existing problems will grow. Rather than depending on inefficient sources like Soy, future needs will probably be met by alternatives like algae (covered on/. here).
why does nobody consider that he might, very well, be implicated?
The addition of clearly (and ludicrously) fabricated information, specifically, the 10 years allegedly spent in the Soviet Union. Such a thing is easy to disprove - in this case, the guy was an editor for USA Today for many years. I know fact checking isn't what it used to be but I think they'd remember a ten year disappearance.
But you introduct an interesting point, which he also seems to have missed: critical thinking. When using ANY information on the web, we must apply critical thinking to it. How reputable is this source? Does it have a known bias that needs to be factored in? Is the information correlated by other sources, and if so, does it appear to be a single base source (look for similar text) or multiple sources discussing the same topic or event? Are there any internal inconsistencies, even small ones, that might indicate that it is made up? Does it make sense?
In the case of wikipedia: anyone can post. They can do it anonymously. That alone means information should be treated with at least some caution.
I was going to point out the role that anonymous pamphleteers played in kindling the American Revolutionary War, which I think we're safe in assuming John Seigenthaler Sr still recognizes as a good thing. But in researching references, I found someone who had already articulated this argument better than I could hope to:
If not for the use of pen names, our monetary system would probably be in pounds and shillings rather than dollars. The political debate that led to the American Revolution and the ratification of the United States Constitution was waged under pseudonyms, published not only in newspapers throughout the colonies, but in pamphlets that were widely circulated.
(Full article by Ken Anderson, Editor of the Magic City Morning Star, is here; it points out how many of the founding fathers 'posted anonymously')
It's too bad John Seigenthaler Sr. has his feelings hurt by what is an obviously untrue story about him. I'm a little suprised that someone with what appears to be both polititcs and journalism in his background is so easily perturbed such ludicrous accusations; both professions generally involve thicker skins than that. he's welcome to his opinion about the wisdom of allowing anonymity - but fortunately (in my opinion!), reality differs.
Wouldn't that be viewed as an unreasonable rule if the side facing the street is the side facing the equator?
Unreasonable? Perhaps. Unenforcable? Not at all. Keep in mind that cable is a viable option in most such developments so dish isn't "required."
Another common development rule is paint. You can paint your house any color you like, as long as it's on the list of acceptable colors. That's a bit unreasonable, don't you think?
Actually, they can, because when they sign the paperwork they enter into a contract, and are legally held to the terms of the contract, as long as it isn't an unlawful contract. There's nothing unlawful about any of these situations.
Please feel free to show me any FCC reg that says that no one has a right to limit where dishes may be placed. The FCC reg saying "Work it out yourself" doesn't count; in the cases we're discussing, they HAVE worked it out themselves - and those dishes better be on the back porch.
What if the apartment complex where you rented an apartment said that you can't use 900MHz cordless phones or WiFi?
What if the apartment complex where you rented an apartment said that you can't have a cat? Happens all the time.
What if your company's office complex said you couldn't bring in a T1, because they've got fiber throughout the building and offer a reasonable service? Happens in new office parks and certain metropolitan areas.
You either suck it, or you try to get away with it, or you leave. Them's the choices. And while cats smell a bit, they're easier to keep in the apartment and away from the landlord's notice than WiFi.
Just like a homeowners association can't make unreasonable rules against using a satellite dish on your home to reveive DirecTV.
Actually, they can. They can require they be out of sight from the street, and fine you for noncompliance. What if you need it on the front of the house to get line-of-sight to the satellite? Tough. Homeowners associations are actually much nastier than landlords and Massport combined 8).
...but its use is as a very efficient, portable medium in which to store energy.
Right, as above, the energy has to come from somewhere, and most of the sources are just as bad as burning gas in your car.
Maybe you can help with this question - I'm not being sarcastic like usual posts - isn't the "portable" issue somewhat of a problem? If we send tanker trucks with compressed hydrogen out on the roads to replace the gas tankers that are there now, aren't there serious dangers? Gas tanker accidents happen now and then, and fortunately most of them remain no more dangerous than environmental protection. The last natural gas tanker that had an accident on Route 128 in Boston resulted the police clearing all the houses and hotels for a 1/2 mile radius around the truck, and shutting down the highway for hours. The papers said that had the gas ignited, it would have effectively left a 1/4 mile crater.
And then add the actual cars. If every car accident involves a cannister of compressed hydrogen instead of gas, doesn't that mean that instead of crashes and possible fire we'd have crashes and possible explosion? I saw an accident last month where an SUV rearended a small sedan; the trunk of the sedan was essentially destroyed all the way up to the rear seat. I expect the tank was badly crumpled; if it contained hydrogen instead of gas it seems to me that would be dangerous.
Personally, I think we should aim for biodiesel instead. Lower emissions, biodegradable, can be domestically produced. Lower flash point than gas. No significant changes/reinvestment required to the fuel distribution and storage system.
I don't get Massport's claim at all. Continental and Massport are both using WiFi, which is 802.11. Massport claims that their system doesn't interfere with their system but Continental's does?
I don't believe Massport is claiming they have two services. I believe they're claiming that Continental's one system interferes with Massport's one system.
I don't see why the FCC is being called in, but I don't see why this is a "massport is evil" issue. Massport is the lessor. Continental is the lessee. Massport provides services to fliers and probably to other lessees as well, e.g. various vendors throughout the concourse.
When you lease, you follow the lessors rules. If this was an office complex no one would blink twice.
"might hopefully show that hydrogen is a more attractive fuel than petroleum-based fuels."
With 220v input, that's a lot of electricity being generated (most of it using fossil fuels), transmitted long distances (which, of course, wastes electricity) and then being used to... split water so it can burn. Great. You'd actually be incurring a lower energy load with a natural gas fireplace.
Hydrogen doesn't grow on trees - it takes power to make hydrogen. Hydrogen as a fuel is a boondoggle brought to you by the unlikely bedmates of ultra-environmentalists and big energy business - the latter who consider water the only acceptable emissions, and the latter who realize that pinning everyone's hopes on the ultra-shiny-modern "Hydrogen" genie is a good way to keep making money in the meantime.
Isn't one of the points of VOIP that you can take your number with you anywhere in cyberspace? Call from your house in the suburbs, your downtown office, or the Marriot three time zones away?
There's no reasonable way to require the service to map 911 services if they don't know where you are.
As for Vonage, there's a link on their home page for 911 Dialing. If you click on it, you see that it's an extra service and all the limitations are clearly laid out, including the need to update them with your location and the fact that it'll only call the current designated location.
The review looks nice, I'm convinced. If I want to buy an Areca card in the US, where would I go?
Google doesn't help. Pricewatch doesn't help. Tom's Hardware didn't provide an answer that I could see. Nothing on eBay but palm trees. What appears to be the US distributor has a "Where to buy" link that points to the Taiwanese site which points to... the US distributor.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm not sure I see your point. You're saying we'd need to find 26 municipalities with wastewater treatment plants to convert to algae farms, which would be part of the requisite wastewater treatment solution as well as producing fuel, in order to match one plant which requires farmers to go out and actively produce feedstock for at added expense? That's more than just 'decent' in my book. And imagine what your municipality would say if you told them they could offset the costs of fuel and wastewater treatment at the same time - ka-ching!
Taking advantage of existing feedstock (read: waste) beats growing feedstock for most efficiencies. And if you want to look for more viable biodiesel feedstocks, there's a wide number - rapeseed, mustard, jatropha, and palm oil. See the table at Wikipedia. Note that algae wins hands down over crops.
Let me offer a contrary view: I'm looking forward to the half-assed motion sensor implementation.
First, let's deal with half-assed. Is Eye Toy half-assed? Yes. Is it fun when it works? Sure. It wasn't an original idea, but it was an attempt to take controls "to the next level," a layer of experimentation that I commend.
Now, as far as motion sensors go, I can't wait to see. If it works half-assed, and is able to take advantage of my tendency to move the way I want my 'mech to move, that's great. Just a little help would be nice.
I'm not a hard core gamer by any definition; I play in sporadic mini-obsessions. But I do think there's more to the future of gaming than better graphics, and playing with controls - even half-assed attempts - is a great direction in my book.
That is a flawed analogy. Child pornography involves the exploitation of someone too young to consent in any legal or psychologically valid manner - they simply aren't equipped to evaluate what's being asked of them and say no if Uncle John asks.
Homosexuality between consenting adults, on the other hand, involves... consent. This means it is not merely a shift along the same morally relative spectrum, it's a step over to the next spectrum - the spectrum where you are also allowed to vote, drive, buy alcohol, and get into a nudey bar.
Now, if Jamaica allows 6-year-olds to vote, maybe we've got an analogy, but right now this just looks like a strawman argument.
Actually, no, he's not claiming that the world owes him something. He's claiming that his act of creation and contribution does not cause him (well, specifically, the OpenSSH developers) to be owe anything further to the people who take advantage of their contribution.
That is an entirely different issue.
"From the beginning of history, the two antagonists have stood face to face: the creator and the second-hander. When the first creator invented the wheel, the first second-hander responded. He invented altruism.
"The creator - denied, opposed, persecuted, exploited - went on, moved forward and carried all humanity along on his energy. The second-hander contributed nothing to the process except the impediments. The contest has another name: the individual against the collective." - Howard Roark in The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand.
SANS, a well-respected hands-on security training organization, has several courses on application-level security - Securing Oracle, Web Application Security Workshop, Secure Internet Presence LAMP, and .Net Security among them. These are aimed at programmers, not testers, but would be beneficial to anyone doing code audits and blackbox testing of applications.
Not quite what you asked for, but maybe something you'll want to look into.
Well, no.
If you truly run your own mail server, with MX records rather than using your ISP's POP box as a store-and-forward, then it isn't going through their server. Technically ;>. The only real difference this makes is that your communications clearly fall under the Pen Register rules rather than the Wiretap rules when the authorities try to legally obtain info about your communications.
It does still go through their network. But that's a (slightly) different matter. Yes, they can still sniff the traffic both ways. This is where StartTLS comes in. If your mail server offers StartTLS, and the remote mail server is willing to try it, then everything except the EHLO of the SMTP transaction is encrypted just as HTTPS web pages are.
You can easily set up most mail servers to run "Opportunistic" StartTLS. That is to say, "Offer it, and take advantage if someone else offers it, but don't require it." For the purposes of encryption, it doesn't matter that most people will use self-signed certificates. (Yes, that kills authentication.)
You can also require StartTLS, but that would impact your ability to send and receive mail to sites not configured to do StartTLS. (But for the paranoid, it bears mentioning.)
Google quickly found a few sites for various mail transfer agent configurations:
In short... my mail server secures mail with anyone else who cares to do so. If you are enough to run your own server, consider caring enough to offer and take advantage of StartTLS encryption.
N.B. - If self-signed certs are a pain (and they are), look into CAcert.
I agree it is best when freshly ground. I would expand to say that it is better than best when freshly roasted and freshly ground. A good home roaster can be purchased for $75 - $200, and an excellent one for $600-$700. I got both of mine (beginner, then a better one after I killed my first) here. That's where I get my green beans, too.
As far as brewing goes, the french press is good. However, you should also consider the vacuum pot. An example would be the Bodum Mini-Santos which makes 25 oz (two tall mugs) of coffee. There's also a larger version. The coffee you can get out of a vacuum pot blows away any other method of brewing I've ever tried - french press, drip, drip with gold filter, percolator, boiled 8).
I'm glad you think so, as that's the justification the Administration is using for their actions:
"I would argue that the actions that we've taken there are totally appropriate and consistent with the constitutional authority of the president. ... You know, it's not an accident that we haven't been hit in four years," the vice president said... (CBS News)
The purpose of a warrant is not (and, may I say again, not) to legitimize trials. The purpose of a warrant is to ensure that wiretaps are not abused; it's called checks and balances of power. You may have heard of Watergate. I understand it's a very nice building in Washington where the Democrats had their campaign headquarters during the Nixon administration - oddly enough, the very administration that Cheney claims was the last administration with the (to his mind) appropriate level of executive power.
You still haven't answered my question. If a valid legal method for getting warrants after-the-fact exists, why isn't the administration using it? Are they afraid their wiretaps are based on shoddy justifications? Perhaps they feel the fact of the wiretaps would get leaked and reflect poorly on them (cf. irony)?
The "well warrants aren't really needed unless you plan to go to court" argument would work in Russia, but the last time I checked the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States was still intepreted as protecting citizens against unreasonable searches, and the court systems (one of the three branches of government, yes?) have consistently interpreted warrants as the appropriate method for making sure searches remain reasonable. Even retroactive warrants.
The administration had used two basic defenses: "We need to react fast," and "We have all the power we say we have, because we're the Executive branch." The first is invalidated by $1805(f). The second is a perfect case example of why the tripartite system of checks and balances was put into the Constitution - to protect us from idiots like this.
(Having said that, I'm hoping the checks and balances start kicking in. They're a bit overdue at this point).
Of course not.
I do expect that they'll follow the established legal method of reporting said warrantless wiretaps within 72 hours as established by FISA (specifically see S 1805(f), "Emergency Orders").
Open your eyes. The Bush administration has redefined this into a question of whether warrantless wiretapping is justified or not. The real question is, if we take as a given that it is justified, what is their reason for ignoring the established legal route to doing so? I can think of many answers to that, and none of them reflect well on the administration.
I've heard that, but I don't buy it, and I've never seen hard data to support it. The less popular channels run commercials just as well as other channels do, and if they command lower rates, well, they also happen to have lower costs (e.g., Sears doesn't need to be paid off in order for This Old House to run, but by contrast, the NBA takes a nice meaty cut of any game that gets aired (er, cabled)).
Also, I don't think packaging can be called 'subsidizing'. 'Subsidizing' would be money from sports channel subscribers being used to support home & garden, without input from the non-sports viewers. The current system artificially raises home & garde user rates to the level of sports channel users. The home & garden people end up paying the max, which cannot be called a subsidy. I think the proper term would be 'fleecing'.
Unfortunately, the cable companies have already figured out what the step after that is. They jack the customer's prices up. They're so sorry they have to charge you extra, but that's because your package includes premium content channels. They're so sorry that ESPN happens to be in the same package as the Home & Garden network - really, if they could, they'd split those up so that people with zero interest in sports don't need to pay for the most expensive channels.
Seriously. Look at the 'channel packages' your local cable provider offers. Every one of them contains a number of diametrically opposed interest channels, so that people end up paying more for packages because of channels they'll never watch.
It's nice that it has Ethernet, but can you do anything useful with it or will it be heavily DRM'ed?
Yep - not ever have to worry about running a phone line over to the TiVo, or think about when the phone is tied up, or get incensed at the stupidity of transferring data over POTS ever again.
Even if you couldn't transfer video with it (and I'm sure you'll be able to) the update capabilities make it worth it.
You can find mind-numbing levels of information and speculation about CWT's Missouri plant at BioDieselNow.
There's been two clear problems with the plan so far as I can see: Firstly, their business model assumed that the use of animal waste as feedstock was not long-term feasible (concerns over Mad Cow disease). If animal remnants stopped being used as feedstock, there would be no competing market for them, and therefore their price would drop, or they might even be paid for taking away the waste and destroying it. That didn't happen.
Secondly, the plant did generate odor complaints from the area residents, enough to require remediation. I'm sure that's long-term fixable, it just wasn't fully anticipated.
The other thing people should keep in mind is that as the need for petroleum alternatives grows, the impetus for solving existing problems will grow. Rather than depending on inefficient sources like Soy, future needs will probably be met by alternatives like algae (covered on /. here).
The addition of clearly (and ludicrously) fabricated information, specifically, the 10 years allegedly spent in the Soviet Union. Such a thing is easy to disprove - in this case, the guy was an editor for USA Today for many years. I know fact checking isn't what it used to be but I think they'd remember a ten year disappearance.
But you introduct an interesting point, which he also seems to have missed: critical thinking. When using ANY information on the web, we must apply critical thinking to it. How reputable is this source? Does it have a known bias that needs to be factored in? Is the information correlated by other sources, and if so, does it appear to be a single base source (look for similar text) or multiple sources discussing the same topic or event? Are there any internal inconsistencies, even small ones, that might indicate that it is made up? Does it make sense?
In the case of wikipedia: anyone can post. They can do it anonymously. That alone means information should be treated with at least some caution.
I was going to point out the role that anonymous pamphleteers played in kindling the American Revolutionary War, which I think we're safe in assuming John Seigenthaler Sr still recognizes as a good thing. But in researching references, I found someone who had already articulated this argument better than I could hope to:
(Full article by Ken Anderson, Editor of the Magic City Morning Star, is here; it points out how many of the founding fathers 'posted anonymously')
It's too bad John Seigenthaler Sr. has his feelings hurt by what is an obviously untrue story about him. I'm a little suprised that someone with what appears to be both polititcs and journalism in his background is so easily perturbed such ludicrous accusations; both professions generally involve thicker skins than that. he's welcome to his opinion about the wisdom of allowing anonymity - but fortunately (in my opinion!), reality differs.
Wouldn't that be viewed as an unreasonable rule if the side facing the street is the side facing the equator?
Unreasonable? Perhaps. Unenforcable? Not at all. Keep in mind that cable is a viable option in most such developments so dish isn't "required."
Another common development rule is paint. You can paint your house any color you like, as long as it's on the list of acceptable colors. That's a bit unreasonable, don't you think?
Actually, they can't.
Read up the FCC regs, bub.
Actually, they can, because when they sign the paperwork they enter into a contract, and are legally held to the terms of the contract, as long as it isn't an unlawful contract. There's nothing unlawful about any of these situations.
Please feel free to show me any FCC reg that says that no one has a right to limit where dishes may be placed. The FCC reg saying "Work it out yourself" doesn't count; in the cases we're discussing, they HAVE worked it out themselves - and those dishes better be on the back porch.
What if the apartment complex where you rented an apartment said that you can't use 900MHz cordless phones or WiFi?
What if the apartment complex where you rented an apartment said that you can't have a cat? Happens all the time.
What if your company's office complex said you couldn't bring in a T1, because they've got fiber throughout the building and offer a reasonable service? Happens in new office parks and certain metropolitan areas.
You either suck it, or you try to get away with it, or you leave. Them's the choices. And while cats smell a bit, they're easier to keep in the apartment and away from the landlord's notice than WiFi.
Just like a homeowners association can't make unreasonable rules against using a satellite dish on your home to reveive DirecTV.
Actually, they can. They can require they be out of sight from the street, and fine you for noncompliance. What if you need it on the front of the house to get line-of-sight to the satellite? Tough. Homeowners associations are actually much nastier than landlords and Massport combined 8).
Right, as above, the energy has to come from somewhere, and most of the sources are just as bad as burning gas in your car.
Maybe you can help with this question - I'm not being sarcastic like usual posts - isn't the "portable" issue somewhat of a problem? If we send tanker trucks with compressed hydrogen out on the roads to replace the gas tankers that are there now, aren't there serious dangers? Gas tanker accidents happen now and then, and fortunately most of them remain no more dangerous than environmental protection. The last natural gas tanker that had an accident on Route 128 in Boston resulted the police clearing all the houses and hotels for a 1/2 mile radius around the truck, and shutting down the highway for hours. The papers said that had the gas ignited, it would have effectively left a 1/4 mile crater.
And then add the actual cars. If every car accident involves a cannister of compressed hydrogen instead of gas, doesn't that mean that instead of crashes and possible fire we'd have crashes and possible explosion? I saw an accident last month where an SUV rearended a small sedan; the trunk of the sedan was essentially destroyed all the way up to the rear seat. I expect the tank was badly crumpled; if it contained hydrogen instead of gas it seems to me that would be dangerous.
Personally, I think we should aim for biodiesel instead. Lower emissions, biodegradable, can be domestically produced. Lower flash point than gas. No significant changes/reinvestment required to the fuel distribution and storage system.
I don't get Massport's claim at all. Continental and Massport are both using WiFi, which is 802.11. Massport claims that their system doesn't interfere with their system but Continental's does?
I don't believe Massport is claiming they have two services. I believe they're claiming that Continental's one system interferes with Massport's one system.
I don't see why the FCC is being called in, but I don't see why this is a "massport is evil" issue. Massport is the lessor. Continental is the lessee. Massport provides services to fliers and probably to other lessees as well, e.g. various vendors throughout the concourse.
When you lease, you follow the lessors rules. If this was an office complex no one would blink twice.
...and coal, and atoms, and hydro.
"might hopefully show that hydrogen is a more attractive fuel than petroleum-based fuels."
With 220v input, that's a lot of electricity being generated (most of it using fossil fuels), transmitted long distances (which, of course, wastes electricity) and then being used to... split water so it can burn. Great. You'd actually be incurring a lower energy load with a natural gas fireplace.
Hydrogen doesn't grow on trees - it takes power to make hydrogen. Hydrogen as a fuel is a boondoggle brought to you by the unlikely bedmates of ultra-environmentalists and big energy business - the latter who consider water the only acceptable emissions, and the latter who realize that pinning everyone's hopes on the ultra-shiny-modern "Hydrogen" genie is a good way to keep making money in the meantime.
Excuse me while I gag...
That's not nausea you're feeling -
That's your mouth filling with the aching taste of blue.
Isn't one of the points of VOIP that you can take your number with you anywhere in cyberspace? Call from your house in the suburbs, your downtown office, or the Marriot three time zones away?
There's no reasonable way to require the service to map 911 services if they don't know where you are.
As for Vonage, there's a link on their home page for 911 Dialing. If you click on it, you see that it's an extra service and all the limitations are clearly laid out, including the need to update them with your location and the fact that it'll only call the current designated location.
The review looks nice, I'm convinced. If I want to buy an Areca card in the US, where would I go?
Google doesn't help. Pricewatch doesn't help. Tom's Hardware didn't provide an answer that I could see. Nothing on eBay but palm trees. What appears to be the US distributor has a "Where to buy" link that points to the Taiwanese site which points to... the US distributor.