Unlike the PTO's examiners, who nowadays see applicants as their "customers", the commentors won't have a bias towards letting things slide. So they'll rightly shoot down most applications, and (assuming the PTO takes this seriously) grant rates will plummet. The PTO will regard this as a bad thing, and end the project.
The Series 2 has already been discontinued because it lacks an ATSC tuner. The Series 2 DT is marketed as "cable only". It's designed to control cable set-top boxes... whether it will control ATSC STB's, or whether Tivo will actually refuse to give you a digital OTA lineup for it, I don't know. (They do have the digital OTA lineups for use with the Series 3.)
P.S. Reading the rest of the comments, I see a lot of criticism of SciFi's Dune, so maybe it wasn't so well-received by Slashdotters. But, it did get a Hugo nomination...
Their record for miniseries is somewhat better than for "SciFi Original Movies". While I wasn't personally a huge fan of their Dune, it was very well-received. "Battlestar Galactica" 2.0 also started as a miniseries.
I remember when laptop RAM was nonstandard -- every manufacturer, sometimes every model had its own way to upgrade, if it had any at all. Now everyone uses SODIMM. Perhaps someday, laptop video will be standardized in the same way.
One reason we have a noon/midnight-based clock instead of sunrise/sunset-based is that sunset and sunrise times vary throughout the year, but midnight and noon are constants. And except for the latter-day deviations introduced by time zones and, yes, daylight saving time, local noon is easily determined by obversation, even with no instruments.
For me, most of the time, it's two: One window is gnome-terminal, and the other is Firefox. This has been my pattern for the last year or two... I used to use screen, so I kept everything in one terminal; but nowadays I just open a new one when needed. (Pros: gnome-terminal's scrollback works. Cons: Can't detach and reattach on another terminal.)
Examples of where some experts were wrong about the limits to technology does not imply that there are no limits to technology. Some expert assessments regarding the limits may be wrong, while others are right.
"They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown." -- Carl Sagan
The sad thing is that Flashblock doesn't even work properly if you don't have Flash (or some flash-capable plugin) installed. You still get all the annoying puzzle piece prompts... At one time, I actually built a null flash plugin to use in conjunction with Flashblock. That was the only way to get FB's arrows (and nice transparent backgrounds) to show, and to supress the puzzle pieces.
Yeah, sure, maybe FTL could happen -- but as things stand, there's no reason to believe it. And I don't. Current physics says it's impossible (read the fine print from those who suggest otherwise), and there's simply no reason to expect that to change. It's nothing but wishful thinking, and a plot device.
I think it's equally silly to project the barbarisms of our own past (and sometimes present) onto a more technologically advanced alien culture. Culture and technology develop in tandem; while I'd be foolish to say that it was a lock step, or that I know how an alien society would develop, I just don't buy the idea of a huge moral gap. The more advanced your technology, the more potential for self-destruction; the more potential for self-destruction, the more self-restraint you have to employ. Hotheaded cultures wouldn't make it to the stars.
Alien invasion makes for fine entertainment, for primitives like us. But that's all.
The human race is nowhere near capable of interstellar travel, and I don't believe it will even survive much longer without becoming more rational, much less reach the stars. Forunately, I also believe that -- overall -- we are becoming more rational. I'm an optimist.
That was possibly the dumbest thing I've ever read on Slashdot, but let me take the premise seriously for a second: You're right -- aliens will never kill humans (or, more precisely, will never invade Earth). Why? Because it would be insanely expensive, slow (there's no FTL in the real universe), and provide no return on the investment. If they're short of resources, they can get them elsewhere for less trouble -- there's nothing special on Earth, from any possible alien perspective, except for our biology and culture. If they want lebensraum, they can get it more cheaply by terraforming or building space colonies. (Yes, without magical FTL, interstellar travel is that expensive.) There's just no money in interstellar invasion. The only possible motive for an alien attack would be irrational xenophobia... and I don't believe that any species rational enough to manage the near-impossible task of interstellar travel could be that irrational.
My questions: 1) Is Pirate Party USA going to be a real political party, as in Sweden? 2) Will it be possible to join the Pirate Party while still being registered in another party, so I can still vote in primaries? (If it's a real political party, I'm thinking it won't be possible... that's the reason I'm still a Democrat, and not a Green or something.)
I love the wording on that site... the device overcomes "the newest video stabilization problems", and it "eliminates the distorted signals which are often [misinterpreted] as" Macrovision. (I see now that it actually says "mis-interrupted", but that's not the part I loved.)
Slashdot Mirror
I vote for "doofi".
For NetBSD/Alpha, you might consider getting an account at freeshell.org.
Unlike the PTO's examiners, who nowadays see applicants as their "customers", the commentors won't have a bias towards letting things slide. So they'll rightly shoot down most applications, and (assuming the PTO takes this seriously) grant rates will plummet. The PTO will regard this as a bad thing, and end the project.
The Series 2 has already been discontinued because it lacks an ATSC tuner. The Series 2 DT is marketed as "cable only". It's designed to control cable set-top boxes... whether it will control ATSC STB's, or whether Tivo will actually refuse to give you a digital OTA lineup for it, I don't know. (They do have the digital OTA lineups for use with the Series 3.)
Um, prove THAT.
P.S. Reading the rest of the comments, I see a lot of criticism of SciFi's Dune, so maybe it wasn't so well-received by Slashdotters. But, it did get a Hugo nomination...
Their record for miniseries is somewhat better than for "SciFi Original Movies". While I wasn't personally a huge fan of their Dune, it was very well-received. "Battlestar Galactica" 2.0 also started as a miniseries.
You don't really need Flash for YouTube video, just FLV -- already supported in several open-source players. It's just a variant of h.263, IIRC.
This case may or may not be real, but it's not much different from what I've heard from, e.g., some spammers attempting to defend themselves.
I remember when laptop RAM was nonstandard -- every manufacturer, sometimes every model had its own way to upgrade, if it had any at all. Now everyone uses SODIMM. Perhaps someday, laptop video will be standardized in the same way.
But not today.
Hawking's voice isn't prerecorded, it's synthesized as he uses the device.
Um, that should say "observation".
One reason we have a noon/midnight-based clock instead of sunrise/sunset-based is that sunset and sunrise times vary throughout the year, but midnight and noon are constants. And except for the latter-day deviations introduced by time zones and, yes, daylight saving time, local noon is easily determined by obversation, even with no instruments.
300 million people, according to the latest figures. Which makes it the third-largest country in the world.
For me, most of the time, it's two: One window is gnome-terminal, and the other is Firefox. This has been my pattern for the last year or two... I used to use screen, so I kept everything in one terminal; but nowadays I just open a new one when needed. (Pros: gnome-terminal's scrollback works. Cons: Can't detach and reattach on another terminal.)
The sad thing is that Flashblock doesn't even work properly if you don't have Flash (or some flash-capable plugin) installed. You still get all the annoying puzzle piece prompts... At one time, I actually built a null flash plugin to use in conjunction with Flashblock. That was the only way to get FB's arrows (and nice transparent backgrounds) to show, and to supress the puzzle pieces.
At least the Internet doesn't give you cirrhosis.
Presumably it was placed there by the Grand Galactic Inquisitor.
Yeah, sure, maybe FTL could happen -- but as things stand, there's no reason to believe it. And I don't. Current physics says it's impossible (read the fine print from those who suggest otherwise), and there's simply no reason to expect that to change. It's nothing but wishful thinking, and a plot device.
I think it's equally silly to project the barbarisms of our own past (and sometimes present) onto a more technologically advanced alien culture. Culture and technology develop in tandem; while I'd be foolish to say that it was a lock step, or that I know how an alien society would develop, I just don't buy the idea of a huge moral gap. The more advanced your technology, the more potential for self-destruction; the more potential for self-destruction, the more self-restraint you have to employ. Hotheaded cultures wouldn't make it to the stars.
Alien invasion makes for fine entertainment, for primitives like us. But that's all.
The human race is nowhere near capable of interstellar travel, and I don't believe it will even survive much longer without becoming more rational, much less reach the stars. Forunately, I also believe that -- overall -- we are becoming more rational. I'm an optimist.
That was possibly the dumbest thing I've ever read on Slashdot, but let me take the premise seriously for a second: You're right -- aliens will never kill humans (or, more precisely, will never invade Earth). Why? Because it would be insanely expensive, slow (there's no FTL in the real universe), and provide no return on the investment. If they're short of resources, they can get them elsewhere for less trouble -- there's nothing special on Earth, from any possible alien perspective, except for our biology and culture. If they want lebensraum, they can get it more cheaply by terraforming or building space colonies. (Yes, without magical FTL, interstellar travel is that expensive.) There's just no money in interstellar invasion. The only possible motive for an alien attack would be irrational xenophobia... and I don't believe that any species rational enough to manage the near-impossible task of interstellar travel could be that irrational.
Could someone elaborate on the "coup" Hannum says took place in 2000-2001?
My questions: 1) Is Pirate Party USA going to be a real political party, as in Sweden? 2) Will it be possible to join the Pirate Party while still being registered in another party, so I can still vote in primaries? (If it's a real political party, I'm thinking it won't be possible... that's the reason I'm still a Democrat, and not a Green or something.)
I love the wording on that site... the device overcomes "the newest video stabilization problems", and it "eliminates the distorted signals which are often [misinterpreted] as" Macrovision. (I see now that it actually says "mis-interrupted", but that's not the part I loved.)
Kinda pricey, though.