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User: timeOday

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  1. Re:"print" vs "digital" is pointless distinction on Ask Slashdot: What Good Print Media Is Left? · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Your point is only true in theory, but not in fact. Because of how it evolved, the Internet broke the culture of willingness to pay for journalism. This has turned out to have some bad consequences - namely a decline in quality, and the dominance of ad-supported information, and unthinking acceptance of the ad-supported press.

  2. Re:Another thing on U.S. Biomedical Research 'Unsustainable' Prominent Researchers Warn · · Score: 1

    I do think the west, especially the US, is likely headed for a period of slower growth than we're accustomed to, or perhaps worse, stagnation or decline. This is because globalization (which many think is a dirty word, but I think is fantastic) is spreading the wealth over more of the human race.

    This may seem to contradict the other current trend of concentration of capital, but historically they've gone hand in hand.

    Not just historically, but currently. Inequality within nations is increasing, but inequality between nations is shrinking:

    But the majority of the people on the planet live in countries where income disparities are bigger than they were a generation ago.

    That does not mean the world as a whole has become more unequal. Global inequalityâ"the income gaps between all people on the planetâ"has begun to fall as poorer countries catch up with richer ones. Two French economists, FranÃois Bourguignon and Christian Morrisson, have calculated a âoeglobal Giniâ that measures the scale of income disparities among everyone in the world. Their index shows that global inequality rose in the 19th and 20th centuries because richer economies, on average, grew faster than poorer ones. Recently that pattern has reversed and global inequality has started to fall even as inequality within many countries has risen. By that measure, the planet as a whole is becoming a fairer place. But in a world of nation states it is inequality within countries that has political salience, and this special report will focus on that.

  3. Paper Forms on Slashdot Asks: How Do You Pay Your Taxes? · · Score: 2

    If you just have one or two W2s and 1099 I find paper to be the easiest. I tried the eFile system and it requires you to type in all the codes on the W2s which is torture. 45 minutes and I'm done.

  4. Re:Debian is teriffic on Lucas Nussbaum Re-Elected As Debian Project Leader · · Score: 3, Funny

    I'm sure they've issued some updates since then.

    Only on Testing and Unstable. Ha ha, that's a Debian joke.

  5. Debian is teriffic on Lucas Nussbaum Re-Elected As Debian Project Leader · · Score: 5, Informative

    Debian never does anything that really jumps out at you. The more time passes, the more I appreciate that and realize how valuable it is. Gentoo and Ubuntu were cool for a while, but here it is 2014 and I'm back with Debian, same as 10 or maybe even 15 years ago.

  6. Re:That isn't what a CSci degree is for on Bachelor's Degree: An Unnecessary Path To a Tech Job · · Score: 2
    That's exactly the point of the article.

    Of course, the minimum necessary requirements are actually irrelevant in a competitive environment where there are a surplus of over-qualified people.

  7. Re:Not just an RC Plane on FAA Shuts Down Search-and-Rescue Drones · · Score: 1

    Quadcopters don't have the range, speed, or flight duration for SAR.

  8. Not just an RC Plane on FAA Shuts Down Search-and-Rescue Drones · · Score: 2

    So it's difficult to argue that his flights are more dangerous than what goes on every weekend at RC modeling sites throughout the United States

    I can't fully agree with that. RC planes don't tend to fly out of range because they have to be in sight. A remotely piloted drone is not flown in light of sight, so it could more easily be controlled up to altitudes that might pose a danger to aircraft, or out of radio range.

    Not saying they should have shut this guy down, or that taking 9 years to make rules is acceptable. A SAR drone is almost certainly flying where there isn't much risk of crashing into anybody anyways. But keeping signal strength down into valleys would really present some challenges.

  9. Re:Conflict of interest on NSA Allegedly Exploited Heartbleed · · Score: 2

    How do you propose to separate them? Offense and defense are not really two separate things; if you can do one, you can do the other.

  10. Re:Are we sure it is JUST like a fighter jet? on Fruit Flies, Fighter Jets Use Similar Evasive Tactics When Attacked · · Score: 1

    Check the list of agencies sponsoring the research. This is just a little game you have to play to do research in the US.

  11. Re:Why? on $250K Reward Offered In California Power Grid Attack · · Score: 5, Insightful
    "More easily", sure. But if somebody is willing to cut cables and shoot guns at equipment, it is more reasonable to worry about catching them afterwards than preventing it. Making the entire grid literally bullet proof is a preposterous idea.

    I've been thinking about this a lot as I listen to Kevin Mitnick's autobio, Ghost in the Wires. He devotes his entire life to circumventing various defenses, then laughs at everybody for being 'so easily' fooled. His entire view is basically juvenile - that everything (such as the phone system) just naturally exists and ought to be perfect, so it's amazing if he can prove otherwise. When in fact nobody ever said it was. All the stuff that exists and usually works is just the product of mostly ordinary people doing their 9-5 jobs and trying to keep the wheels turning until their shift ends so they can go home and do something else.

  12. Re:Not impressed. on The Graffiti Drone · · Score: 2
    What would be a good UI for this? Too automated, and it's just a big inkjet printer. (You will see research papers doing that in the next few years, I'm certain.) This is fine except the art wouldn't really be getting anything new from the medium, just printed in a different way.

    But joysticking in 3d to operate on a 2d canvas doesn't seem right either.

  13. Re:Problems? on Under the Chassis: A Look At Tesla's Battery Shield · · Score: 1
  14. Re:not developed by a responsible team? on Theo De Raadt's Small Rant On OpenSSL · · Score: -1, Flamebait
    No more irresponsible than writing the software in C in the first place. If you wanted checks like this universally enforced, you would use a language that doesn't require you to remember to do them every single time. The heartburn that comes with higher-level languages is exactly the type of heartburn that caused this check to be disabled.

    I don't put much stock in retrospective finger-pointing. Almost all bugs are trivial in retrospect.

  15. Re:And the advantage of this is? on Navy Debuts New Railgun That Launches Shells at Mach 7 · · Score: 1
  16. Re:So.... on Land Rover Demos "Transparent Hood" · · Score: 2
    Costs a little more, but the F35 Joint Strike Fighter actually has this capability:

    "These helmets are designed to utilize cameras on the outside of the aircraft to project the pilot's surroundings onto his mask. This way, if the pilot needs to look at the ground directly below him, he no longer has to roll the aircraft. He can simply look straight down, essentially looking through the floor and his own body!"

    Not just visible light, either, so you can see at night and through clouds...

    It's not on a HUD though, you have to wear the helmet mounted display system.

  17. Re:Inherent bias on Isolated Tribes Die Shortly After We Meet Them · · Score: 1
    It is known from archeological evidence that diseases from Europe wiped out over 80% of native Americans post-Columbus:

    "Using an estimate of approximately 30 million people in 1492 (including 6 million in the Aztec Empire, 8 million in the Mayan States, 11 million in what is now Brazil, and 12 million in the Inca Empire), the lowest estimates give a death toll due from disease of an astonishing 90% by the end of the 17th century (nine million people in 1650). 10% were killed by fighting. " (wikipedia)

    These are known not to have been little tribes that died off all the time like you are imagining might be the case. So unless things are somehow different for these last remaining tribes, "first contact" amounts to holocaust.

  18. Re:Good luck sony/toyota... on Sony and Toyota Bring Real-Life Racing Into the Game World · · Score: 1

    I don't think I understand what you mean? All they did is build an import function for an auto datalogger into Gran Turismo.

  19. Re:Big Whoop on Evidence Aside, FBI Says Russians Out To Steal Ideas From US Tech Firms · · Score: 2

    The issue is that deteriorating relations reduce the negative consequences of negative actions. You don't have much incentive to play nice any more. Like how an employee who was trusted yesterday can be escorted from the building today, because he was let go.

  20. Re:The value of a Stradivarius on Elite Violinists Can't Distinguish Between a Stradivarius and a Modern Violin · · Score: 2

    The value of a Stradivarius lies not in the sound it produces but in its provenance.

    But the provenance is only of value because of the superior sound. Paintings by my grandma are 'rare,' but not valuable.

    Of course this is all old news in the art world. Painters are "great" because of their great works. Their works are valuable because they are by great painters. Yet forgeries are indistinguishable from authentic works on artistic merit, so verification is turned over to chemical composition of paint and canvas, documented history, etc. In other words, it's all completely irrational and merely an consequence of some particular biases that humans have.

  21. Re:Sounds scary on New Service Lets You Hitch a Ride With Private Planes For Cost of Tank of Gas · · Score: 1

    You are dead wrong. Commercial aviation is FAR safer than civil aviation. The difference is so large that baggage inspections and terrorism in general aren't even significant to the discussion.

  22. Abuse of press credentials on Interview: John McAfee Answers Your Questions · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The abuse of medical and press credentials is really bad. It subjects actual professionals to accusations of spying and troublemaking, and restricts their access.

  23. Re:Bad Neighbors on Japan Orders Military To Strike Any New North Korea Missiles · · Score: 1

    Amen, Japan would have at least cultured the savages.

    You seem to have read The Rape of Nanking backwards.

  24. Re:Misleading headline on TCP/IP Might Have Been Secure From the Start If Not For the NSA · · Score: 1

    No, no, it was ME. I was the one who didn't invent the correct algorithms and share them with the inventors of the Internet. I didn't do it at all!

  25. Re:Are all NP-hard Problems equivalent? on P vs. NP Problem Linked To the Quantum Nature of the Universe · · Score: 1

    Keep in mind words like "no harder" are pretty misleading to a non-theorist, since the known classes of computational complexity are so loose in the first place. IIRC the transformation need only be polynomial, right? So, two problems could be of "equal" difficulty when one is literally a zillion times harder than the other (since a zillion is only a constant), or even n to the power of a zillion (since that's "just" a polynomial). Computational theory is practically blind to constants, but you know what, there are a lot of particles in the universe, they could conceivably brute-force some awfully big problems.