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User: nacturation

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  1. Re:How is this news? on VLC 0.8.6 Released · · Score: 1

    Because like oil, the whales, and oxygen, version numbers are a non-renewable resource! I guess that explains what happened to Netscape 5.
  2. ObBadJoke on Hans Reiser in Court Today · · Score: 1

    And remember, "Hans shot first!"

  3. Re:And I thought .... on Create Living Cells With an Inkjet Printer · · Score: 1

    I'm pretty sure it won't be from the Intelligent Design Printer company LOLOL Laughing Out Loud Out Loud?
  4. Re:Maybe because people turn it off? on Open Source CMS Solutions Based on Java? · · Score: 5, Funny

    I don't know about most people, but I always turn off Java in my browser. Well it's a good thing you leave PHP turned on in your browser.
  5. Re:Ok, bad guys, you heard 'em: they need more tim on No Fix for Word Next 'Patch Tuesday' · · Score: 1

    So be nice and give 'em a few extra days to come up with some patches (it's the sporting thing to do!!) After all, all that innovation makes it tough to respond quickly to threats to their legacy apps!! I understand the irony of your comment, but it is true. While the OpenOffice.org team might be able to come up with a patch to their word processor in a day (even in spite the amazing amount of innovation they do to make sure their office suite of applications looks and functions nothing like the competition) they don't have to worry much about things like backwards compatibility. So what if some small part of OOo breaks? I doubt they have thousands of test cases to run to ensure that it remains compatible with the hundreds of third party products and hundreds of thousands of end-user companies who depend on its functionality as an integration point to their applications. After all, every bug fix is simply a matter of modifying the source, recompiling, and packaging up the app right?
  6. Terminology on CSIRO Demonstrates Fastest Wireless Link Yet · · Score: 5, Funny

    Sorry, I just don't understand this DVD streaming thing. Can someone translate this into Libraries of Congress per second?

  7. Re:Umm... NaN? on Professor Comes Up With a Way to Divide by Zero · · Score: 1

    The way I see it, 100/0 is 100# where # = that funky nullity symbol.
    So 100/0 / (10/0 * 10/0) = 100# / 100# = 1.

    I still don't know how that's really all that useful over other methods like lim x as x -> 0 and all that. But I'd be surprised if hardcore mathematicians wouldn't have figured something out like that long ago if it could actually help solve impossible equations and cancel out in the end.

  8. Re:EA game on The Minds Behind the ARG Movement · · Score: 1

    I hadn't, but now that I've read it their sole comment was that it didn't work because it had a subscription. That's it. I think it's a bit simplistic and they're possibly ignoring other things that would make it not work because those are things that they can't avoid either. Anyhoo, I was just waxing nostalgic about Majestic a bit.

  9. EA game on The Minds Behind the ARG Movement · · Score: 1

    Anyone remember that game Majestic based on the movie The Game? They tried to do this but, unfortunately, having everything automated removes a lot of the surprise factor.

  10. Re:Google *does* pay itself. on Google's Silent Monopoly · · Score: 2, Informative

    Slots are not sold individually with a price tag on each. They are being auctioned in batch. Whoever pays most gets 1st, next guy gets 2nd, etc. When Google takes 1st slot for themselves they don't really lose much since they just shift everyone else 1 slot down and still take all their money. The top slot almost always has the best clickthrough rate. By pushing everyone else down a slot, not only do they push the bottom slot to the next page of results but the others get a slightly lesser clickthrough rate. Because companies pay per click, Google gets less revenue.
  11. Re:Greedy? on Take-Two Signs In-Game Ad Deal · · Score: 1

    So I have to buy the game and then sit through shitty popups with bee's that wont stop buzzing while I wait for it to load just so they can get even more money? I think you can stop at the first part of the question. No, you don't have to buy this game or any other. It's supply and demand. If consumers demand games which don't have ads, then that's where the money will be and companies will supply ad-free games. After all, if very few people buy games that have ad delivery systems, they're going to lose money and it'll be more profitable to leave the ads out.

    But if the in-game ads allow for companies to produce much more compelling content (even if it's just so that they can keep people playing to generate more ad views) then gamers win by having additional content they might not otherwise have received and such a game might actually sell more copies despite the ads because there's way more gameplay than an ad-free game has.
  12. Re:The limitations of Linux on Layoffs and CEO Resignation At OSDL · · Score: 1

    Open up a shell and try it yourself:

    kill -9 -1

  13. Re:Little revenue obtained making free software? on Layoffs and CEO Resignation At OSDL · · Score: 1

    Many of the biggest contributors to those projects are paid. I'd be interested to see some hard numbers for this. Take the amounts paid out to all contributors to a major project. Come up with some kind of estimate on the value of the contribution, even something as simple as lines of code. Now add up all the lines of code and then divide the total amount paid out by that number. You should have the average value of a line of code. It's all well and good that the big stars of a project get paid decent money, but they're paid that money because tons of others just aren't paid at all.
  14. Re:Tailgating is NOT the problem... on Detecting Tailgaters With Lasers · · Score: 1

    The problem is that there are people who tailgate even when there's only one lane with not even a shoulder to pull over to. And holding up traffic in the passing lane should be a ticketable offence... unfortunately, it's not where I live. More and more these days people don't understand the concept of "I want to pass you, please temporarily move over".

  15. Re:Will there ever be an end? on Detecting Tailgaters With Lasers · · Score: 1

    We've had velocity taxes for decades. Wow, so the orientation of your speed vector factors into the ticket? "But officer, I was going 55 mph at 90 degrees, and the speed limit clearly allows for 55 mph anywhere from 0 to 180 degrees." Here I thought it was only the speed component of your velocity that mattered.
  16. Re:You're talking about modding drivers on Detecting Tailgaters With Lasers · · Score: 1

    But run over my dogma and it's time to slow down, cowboy?

  17. Re:Synopsis on Google De-indexes Talk.Origins, Won't Say Why UPDATED · · Score: 1, Flamebait

    Either way, his view (and anyone's that believes in evolution) of origins is no less faith-based than the person who believes in creation, and consequently, is no less relgious (despite hysterical claims to the contrary). Not this crap again. Look, we can observe evolution today. It's a phenomenon that you can study and measure. Evolution is simply a change in species over time and you can run some experiments to observe it if you choose. Can I observe creation? Of course not... that happened billions of years ago. Since you can't do any creation experiments all you're left with is faith.
  18. Re:You love to whine, don't you? on Google De-indexes Talk.Origins, Won't Say Why UPDATED · · Score: 1

    It isn't a collection of incidental writings, and miscellaneous poems and mere metaphorical literature. Its a completely cohesive historical account, from the very beginning to the very end, about Jesus Christ, complete with historically accurate geneaologies, historically accurate geography, historically agreeing versions of events given at different times in history, historically proven prophecies galore, and historically consistent with archaeology. It seems fairly logical that if a world was created, that the way we would know that, outside of the obvious natural evidence all around us, is by an account left by the creator. The problem with this approach is that all the historical accuracies about it doesn't prove that the stories around the historical accuracies are true. I could write a nice little book about the World Trade Center towers being hit by planes and explain how George W. Bush was a supernatural man who used his mental powers to make some fundamentalists hijack planes and crash them into two buildings in New York on September 11, 2001. I can provide GPS coordinates of everything, aerial photographs, video, whatever.

    A few thousand years from now people can read my book and see that those GPS coordinates do correspond to New York, that there were two buildings called the World Trade Center, that George W. Bush did exist, that two planes did in fact crash into the WTC. But all that historical accuracy and verification still doesn't mean that George W. Bush is a supernatural man who used mental powers to coerce people into doing those things. No doubt someone will write a book about my book, perhaps called "Evidence That Demands A Verdict" and show all the evidence that backs up my supernatural Bush story and convince millions to believe in Bushianity.

    Anybody can wrap up historically accurate accounts of events with a bunch of religious ideology. That an account is historically accurate in no way validates the ideology that others inserted after the fact. It's like taking a true story and playing the telephone game for a generation or two. There's effectively zero chance that such a story won't be embellished.
  19. Re:You love to whine, don't you? on Google De-indexes Talk.Origins, Won't Say Why UPDATED · · Score: 1

    Base your questions and criticisms on Jesus Himself -- what are your criticisms of Him? If I come up with a list of criticism of Jesus, will you produce a list of criticisms of the Flying Spaghetti Monster?
  20. Re:Words are Meaningless - Public Utility on Google De-indexes Talk.Origins, Won't Say Why UPDATED · · Score: 5, Funny

    What you're missing is that Google gave him no clue/hint/guide/comment/help on why he was delisted. login: root
    password: ******

    Incorrect login for user "root". You got the first and fourth characters correct, and one other character was correct but in the wrong place. Please try again and/or make use of one of the following clues/hints.

    You can also try one of the following non-root accounts:
    1. admin (8 character password)
    2. backup (6 character password, all lowercase letters)
    3. johndoe (5 character password)
    4. maryjane (7 character password)

    Failing that, if you can't remember any passwords this server is located at 1234 Main Street, Anywhere, USA. The server rack key is located in the desk drawer on the second floor in the manager's office. You can boot with a Knoppix CD (inside the rack) and reset the password after mounting the hard drive.


    Often, helpfulness is at odds with security.
  21. Re:Words are Meaningless - Public Utility on Google De-indexes Talk.Origins, Won't Say Why UPDATED · · Score: 0

    Simply being a publicly traded for profit corporation doesn't mean that you're not a public utility. Huh? It doesn't mean that you're not a cabbage either. But I fail to see the usefulness of your statement. Proof of a negative and all that jazz.
  22. SpamAssassin on Software Used To Predict Who Might Kill · · Score: 1

    So SpamAssassin works this way. Any one criteria (such as from a dynamic IP address) generally isn't enough to consider email spam. You need to have a number of factors contribute both positively and negatively to the final score, after which it's considered spam. But this is for humans. Maybe the software is called PeopleAssassin?

  23. Re:I hate to (have to) ask... on What's the Coolest Thing You've Ever Built? · · Score: 1

    Hello? Say it! HAARRRRRR!!!!!

  24. Scale? on Solar Probe Films Plasma Loops, Sunspots in Action · · Score: 1

    Anyone know what scale that video is at? In other words, what's the real-world distance from the left edge to the right edge?

  25. Re:But how do I Ensure that my Insured Code is Leg on Insuring Contributed Code is Legal? · · Score: 4, Funny

    Insure legal code
    Lawyers battle like thunder
    Assured rest ensured