Be nice to have something kind of the opposite to this for your mobile. You DON'T hear ANY ambient noise. In fact, it'd be nice if your mobile emitted some kind of field like the Babylon 5 "private conversation booths". No more hearing people shout "I'm on the bus". Even better, no more having to shout "I'm on the bus".
I used to work on the same floor as a developer who was working on this exact technology. Pretty sure it's still confidential, but it worked quite well. He would gather 20 or thirty of us and we would all have conversations around him, then he would speak into the device for about thirty seconds...then voila! when we all stopped talking he would play his speech back. While it didn't quite sound like a sound booth, it sounded like the "background" conversation was going on two rooms over instead of all around him. I believe the limiting factor was "porting" said technology to cell phones without much real processing power.
So if you're proposing, who's remains do you use for the diamond?
...
"Honey, I love you so much I had your father whacked and made his remains into this engagement ring, we can set a date for the wedding based on how long your mom would like to live before she's on your finger too"
Quoth the article "There are interesting similarities between the RIAA's campaign, Prohibition, the War on Drugs, and the 'War on Terrorism.' ".
Really well put, what do all of these things have in common, they will all, in the end, be failures. I've gone in to this a thousand times before, but sometime soon governments/organizations will have to learn that no matter how hard you try you cannot manipulate everyone into thinking the way you want them to. There is an innate ability in some humans to make their own decisions, and although it is more sparce today than say 20 or 30 years ago, there are those who use this ability and formulate their own decisions. The gov't/RIAA hate this.
During prohibition there was a massive (failed) propaganda campaign. The war on drugs, I think everyone who realizes that it is easier to buy pot/coc/crack/heroin/pcp/lsd than alcohol on a sunday in most states will agree that this has been/is/will continue to be a failure. I know I'll get at least ten proud citizens that will argue with me on this one, but the War on Terrorism will fail too.
The reason the war on terrorism will fail is because we (the US) are using the wrong methods. Again we've fired up the propaganda machine, I saw an interview with the new "Big Cheese" of Fort Bragg. In it, he said the reason that terrorists attack is because they are "jealous of our way of life". This could not be a more callous, arrogant, and ethnocentric lie. These terrorists, especially the 9/11 group and friends, weren't jealous of our way of life. They were irrational because they were religious extremists and a 1,000 years ago christians returned to a land they had given up years ago, slaughtered indiscriminantly, and claimed to have "retaken the holy land", which coincidentally, is the muslim holy land too. So began the feud between the extremist muslims and the extremist christians. Fast forward a few hundred years and we see that even though the US has a supposed separation of church and state (don't even get me started on that nutcase holy roller 10 commandments uber-conservative closed minded judge in Alabama) the US gets involved in this war and picks (of course), the judeo-christian side. That series of events is (predominantly) why the 9/11 attacks happened. Back to the war on terrorism failing, so we're attacking this thing in the wrong way. The gov't is spreading falsities about the people involved, we're insulting everything from their land, to their culture, to their names, which does not bode well for diplomacy and mutual respect. To add insult to injury, we're killing anyone who gets in our way while we try and kill a few of our personal favorites as well. The apparent reasoning behind the killing is the "cut off the head and the body dies" logic, which DOES NOT WORK WITH NON-CENTRALIZED organizations. Due to this piss-poor technique, the war on terrorism will, in the end, create MORE TERRORISM.
It's a similar logic failure which is afflicting the RIAA's battle. Rather than scaring users into paying full price and not pirating, they're simply angering and frustrating them into adapting to new ways to achieve the same result, sometimes worse. I wasn't boycotting the RIAA until about 5 months ago, so from me alone they've sold around 15-20 less CDs (for some reason some indie bands end up on RIAA labels), and I've increased my downloading (and uploading) levels, yeah, good strategy here.
Yeah I'm with you there. The second my car starts reporting my speeding habit is the second I learn to disable the reporting.
Judging by the diagram in the article, the only way to get caught speeding is to have your vehicle communicate with the sensor. I wonder how long it would be until you could buy such a "chicken wire and aluminum foil" product on ebay.
All she has to do is win, and that gives legal grounds for everyone else of the 1000 unfortunate souls to follow suit.
So, RIAA, when you can't sue the network or the users, what exactly are you going to do, will you finally ADAPT? Or will you try and buy/strongarm your way into another tactic to hang on to your ancient business model?
Survival of the fittest in action, unless the RIAA trims the fat, they're on their way out.
"if they choose to contact the individual or institution and there was just a flaw in the code that made it think that it was cracked when it was infact legit, all the acused would have to do to clear their name is prove that they have a legaly purchased copy"
In the US, we have a "innocent until proven guilty" court system, where the burden of proof is not on the accused to prove they are innocent, but on the accuser to prove that they are not. Secondly, it might not be that easy for a user to prove they have a legit copy. A few examples of this would be if the user's machine was compromised, and the key stolen and distributed, or if the user was part of a large corporation and had no idea of anything to do with the installation of the software, or if the user had bought a used computer with the software already on it.
"it's not like it gives out top secret information"
Again, wrong. RTFA, "The message goes on to detail the users IP, a timestamp, the product in question, the users PC name, username, and MAC address. " This information could be VERY harmful in the wrong hands. With a known IP, timestamp, PC name, username, and even MAC it is now very easy to locate a user's physical location within an organization. With some social engineering and a bit of luck, you can now do all sorts of nasty things (sneak a keystroke logger and BOOM, they're 0wn3d!) to someone. Also dangerous, since MACs are bound to the hardware, if someone could reverse lookup a certain piece of hardware bound to a MAC and then find a vulnerability in the hardware, they're in. And since I doubt this information is encrypted, and since it is obviously sent over the public internet, the right person sniffing the right packets can now grab all of it.
More importantly, I doubt that this "feature", if you can call it that, is well publicized. This is very important because without knowledge of such practices it could be hard for a sys/netadmin to account for the grossly insecure transmissions.
Man, you're so right. They RUINED the LOTR trilogy for me by releasing these stupid books when I was younger and I read them. I mean, the books had almost everything that was in the movies, why would I want to go see the movies now? That made the movies absolutely suck because they were "spoiled".
As an avid outdoorsmen and survivalist, I can say you're on the right track here but there are a few things neccesary to your survival that you're neglecting.
A non-electric cooking solution is probably something that most people should have anyway. As someone already mentioned, cooking with gas is a much better way to cook due to predictability and fast reaction to change. Gas service is available in most suburban and rural areas, however it may be impractical for those in the city. For those who are some reason bound to their electric stove, or for those who want to be prepared for emergencies, camp stoves are an excellent alternative. Cheap camp stoves can be found at walmart, like this one. That stove relies on propane for its fuel and is a bit bulky for some. For those who are interested in a portable and extremely flexible solution there are several backpacking stoves which burn just about anything. The MSR XGK Expedition advertises that it burns anything from white gas to jet fuel, including auto-grade gas and kerosene, and it only costs $109.95, really not too bad of a price for something that could be invaluable in a blackout.
While a warm meal is a wonderful "bonus" during a disaster, it's really not too much of a requirement. Considering most "disasters" seem to last around a week, one could easily survive on other forms of nutrition for that long. It's always a good idea to keep a few powerbars, clif bars, or other form of highly compacted nutritional bar around. More important than food though is water. Even if the worst case scenario were to hit and you were caught totally off guard with no food in the house, you can survive for quite some time on your lovehandles, thunder thighs, and beer (or geek) gut, as long as you've got WATER. Again for the camper/hiker/backpacker there are tons of great portable water filters out there that should make damn near anything drinkable. If you're planning on staying at home a filtration pitcher is a good thing to have, unlike faucet based filters, you can use the pitcher with water collected from any source (rainwater if need be).
But food and water are only one thing that you should be prepared with. Especially for the northerners, you should have some way of keeping warm. Now, if you're in a suburban or rural area, a woodstove may be the best way to "kill two birds with one stone", not only can they heat an entire house with flexible low-cost high-availability fuels, but in an emergency you can cook on them too. Regardless of what you're using to heat your home, there are a few simple items that can save your life in a "disaster" situation by keeping you warm. The first and maybe most important is a good sleeping bag. The body burns a ton of calories just trying to stay warm in cold weather, with food and water supplies possibly a concern, it is in anyone's best interests to stay as warm as possible. For those of you who are only looking at in-home emergencies, wal-mart sells cheap zero degree bags, and if your home should drop to below zero god help you. Anyone into camping/hiking or who would like something to keep in a car should check out a
He's right ya know. I have no sympathy for the phone company that overcharges me for everything from simply having a land line, to making long distance calls on that line, to TEXT MESSAGING on a cell phone. Really this is stupid, so I can call all I want at night, but if I send a little tiny text message, that somehow costs the phone company more money. Phone companies have been raping us for years, as far as I'm concerned they should hire some real managers, handle money wisely and light the fiber (it can be done), then after that MAYBE I COULD GET DSL IN MY AREA!!!
Re:Is that liquid cooling ?
on
Aquarium Modcase
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I'm way ahead of you there, been working on one for quite some time (with not too much success).
There are several issues with hamster cases. Firstly, hamsters/gerbils/mice/most rodents CHEW on everything, so I had to find a way to protect the pieces of the comp from the hamster (and vice/versa). Secondly, hamsters will even CHEW through most protection (including plastic), so I had to come up with yet another solution. Thirdly, hamsters need bedding, and they "go potty" in that bedding. Even in a well vented case, that leaves a lot of moisture in the air and degrades the integrity of the computer parts. However one cool idea i've had and got pseudo-working for the hamster cage is actually monitoring the speed that the hamster wheel is moving.
Fortunately I've been testing out the designs with old parts so it hasn't been that much of an expensive deal so far, however I'm approaching a long-term working solution, and will post pics/schematics when I'm done.
As a sidenote, I'm working on a REAL fishtank mod also. Someone had posted another design for a fishtank case where the tank is seperate from the comp, I'm working on a little more "integration" if you will. I'm also working on a lizard mod too, using the vent heat from the fans as a "heat rock" for the little guys. The lizard mod may be the first finished as lizards don't chew, thrive in the heat, can deal with certain cold cathode tubes for light, and don't require too much attention otherwise.
So what's the difference between friendster "fakesters" and real life fakesters? Think about it. In a bar there are always a few guys in there who are working it hard to be someone they're not, sometimes not even using their real names, they're often the ones surrounded by the simple-minded blondes who are attracted to their feaux persona. Same goes for friendster. Moving on, imagine if someone walked into a bar wearing a giant Oscar Meyer Weiner costume, immediately he would become the topic of conversation and a good number of people would approach him and become his "friend". This is the same thing that happens on friendster.
So maybe this phenomenon is a little more rampant because the anonymity of the internet allows people to drop a few inhibitions, but the concept is the same. Randomly deleting fakesters is a bad idea. The concept of charging for the service seems to be somewhat of a better idea. I know most of the/.ers will complain "it should be free" yadda yadda yadda, heard it all before. It would be nice if it were free, but I'm sure the folks who work for friendster would like a paycheck. Now, $8 a month seems a little high for friendster, if it were like $2, or even $5 I might consider paying for the service. Regardless, $8 a month is pretty good way to ensure the friendsters and fakesters who really serve some sort of purpose.
While you bring up a good point, one would hope the world would adapt. Desalization plants could easily bust out the water issue, and as for human waste, when treated it can actually be recycled as fertilizer (however current methods of this are horrible, as they treat everything that comes out of the sewer, including all the non-shit shit like toxic chemicals, heavy metals, oil, etc and that stuff is a lot more dangerous than shit shit), and as for trash, let's hope that we can break ourselves of some of the disposable society and go back to things like drinking out of glasses and washing dishes, and maybe recycle the rest.
When you consider lifetimes of 1000 years, this could make for one great "pyramid" retirement structure. Assuming people still pop out kids around every 25 years, by the time you die, you would have around 39 generations under you. If you figure that you have 2 kids, and each of them 2 kids, etc., that leaves you with
2 kids
4 grandkids
8 great grandkids
16 great-great-grandkids
32 great-great-great-grandkids
64 great-great-great-great-grandkids
all the way to...
549,755,813,888 (38 great) grandkids.
So if ONLY THE LAST GENERATION of your family gave you $1 a year, you'd be a multi-billionaire. More realistically, assuming $100K/year is a very comfortable retirement, your investments would only have to last you 16 generations, or 400 years, then you could just collect from your descendents.
The only downside I could see to this is christmas cards and family reunions would be a BITCH.
"Can you seriously imagine what it would be like to work for 200 years, as opposed to 65?"
I see it this way, there are two reasons why people retire: 1 - they are tired of work 2: - they are unable, or hindered in their ability to work. Those people who don't like their jobs would probably fall into category 1, they would become tired of work. However added longevity including improved quality of life (21 forever if you will) would give these people the option to switch fields. With good investments you could probably take 30 or so years off between switches. This would create a scenario where you could have three different careers and retire three different times. For the other people who retire because of physical limitations due to age, hopefully the deterioration which prevents them from continuing could be eliminated and they could stay happily at their jobs.
With extended lifespans the workplace would adapt I'm sure. Vacation times may be measured in years, for every 10 you work you get 1 off, who knows what is possible. Something this article neglected was the added factor of biotechnology. Assuming that conventional medicine could keep you mentally and physically at 21 for all of your years, you would still probably forget memories from a few hundred years ago. However, the very real possibility of implants exists, so you may have all of your memories stored on a convenient.25' x.25' 80 exobyte implant.
I say cheers to immortality, then again I'm also an atheist and a nerd.
My mom is an antiques dealer, your example is especially valid there too. For anyone who's wondering why there are SO MANY people who deal in antiques and make a decent living, it's all about knowledge.
The average person knows far less about real value of antiques than they do about their computer(and we know how dumb the average lUser is). Many people hang on to items of little to no real monetary value (grampa's beer stein collection, mass-produced items, etc), but are fairly quick to part with "that old chair" or "that plate that doesn't match anything" when those are actually the things of value
TV shows such as "The Antiques Roadshow" only further the unfortunate misplaced optimism of the common person. At least weekly someone comes into my Mom's shop with something of mild collectible value (>$20) expecting it to be worth thousands because they've seen one too many fantasy stories on AR. However there is also the advantage to the dealers that most people don't know what they have. Many people who have just lost a relative will get rid of things at auction/yard sale/etc that are worth a ton.
A common example of this is a piece of furniture called a "dry sink". Before indoor plumbing was popular, people still needed something in which to wash dishes so they had dry sinks, which were essentially a large piece of wooden furniture with a zinc-lined basin at about waist level and usually a few drawers or cabinets underneath. People could pour water in the basin and use it for whatever while using the cabinets/drawers for storage. Many dry sinks were destroyed with the advent of modern day indoor plumbing, but there were still a few that remained in existence, collecting dust or being used for some other purpose.
When someone inherits a house, often they'll want to sell everything of value and throw away the rest so they can start anew. It is common practice for individuals to hire an antique dealer/expert to appraise/purchase whatever is valuable in the house. My mom was on one of these jobs and discovered in a house a dry sink that was being used as a COMPUTER DESK. While the computer was worth nothing (I was there, it was like a 75 mHz pentium), the dry sink was well finished, unmarred oak, still had all if the original fixtures, and the liner was nearly perfect. My mom easily dated it to around 1850, she ended up buying the piece for like $200, and sold it for over $2000 in less than a week.
While this is a rare occurance, it illustrates the point that certain "industries", especially those dealing with "synthetic" values thrive on the same principle of swap meets/UO trading.
Slashdot Mirror
Be nice to have something kind of the opposite to this for your mobile. You DON'T hear ANY ambient noise. In fact, it'd be nice if your mobile emitted some kind of field like the Babylon 5 "private conversation booths". No more hearing people shout "I'm on the bus". Even better, no more having to shout "I'm on the bus".
I used to work on the same floor as a developer who was working on this exact technology. Pretty sure it's still confidential, but it worked quite well. He would gather 20 or thirty of us and we would all have conversations around him, then he would speak into the device for about thirty seconds...then voila! when we all stopped talking he would play his speech back. While it didn't quite sound like a sound booth, it sounded like the "background" conversation was going on two rooms over instead of all around him. I believe the limiting factor was "porting" said technology to cell phones without much real processing power.
So if you're proposing, who's remains do you use for the diamond?
...
"Honey, I love you so much I had your father whacked and made his remains into this engagement ring, we can set a date for the wedding based on how long your mom would like to live before she's on your finger too"
I pray to Joe Pesci that you are trolling.
Quoth the article "There are interesting similarities between the RIAA's campaign, Prohibition, the War on Drugs, and the 'War on Terrorism.' ".
Really well put, what do all of these things have in common, they will all, in the end, be failures. I've gone in to this a thousand times before, but sometime soon governments/organizations will have to learn that no matter how hard you try you cannot manipulate everyone into thinking the way you want them to. There is an innate ability in some humans to make their own decisions, and although it is more sparce today than say 20 or 30 years ago, there are those who use this ability and formulate their own decisions. The gov't/RIAA hate this.
During prohibition there was a massive (failed) propaganda campaign. The war on drugs, I think everyone who realizes that it is easier to buy pot/coc/crack/heroin/pcp/lsd than alcohol on a sunday in most states will agree that this has been/is/will continue to be a failure. I know I'll get at least ten proud citizens that will argue with me on this one, but the War on Terrorism will fail too.
The reason the war on terrorism will fail is because we (the US) are using the wrong methods. Again we've fired up the propaganda machine, I saw an interview with the new "Big Cheese" of Fort Bragg. In it, he said the reason that terrorists attack is because they are "jealous of our way of life". This could not be a more callous, arrogant, and ethnocentric lie. These terrorists, especially the 9/11 group and friends, weren't jealous of our way of life. They were irrational because they were religious extremists and a 1,000 years ago christians returned to a land they had given up years ago, slaughtered indiscriminantly, and claimed to have "retaken the holy land", which coincidentally, is the muslim holy land too. So began the feud between the extremist muslims and the extremist christians. Fast forward a few hundred years and we see that even though the US has a supposed separation of church and state (don't even get me started on that nutcase holy roller 10 commandments uber-conservative closed minded judge in Alabama) the US gets involved in this war and picks (of course), the judeo-christian side. That series of events is (predominantly) why the 9/11 attacks happened. Back to the war on terrorism failing, so we're attacking this thing in the wrong way. The gov't is spreading falsities about the people involved, we're insulting everything from their land, to their culture, to their names, which does not bode well for diplomacy and mutual respect. To add insult to injury, we're killing anyone who gets in our way while we try and kill a few of our personal favorites as well. The apparent reasoning behind the killing is the "cut off the head and the body dies" logic, which DOES NOT WORK WITH NON-CENTRALIZED organizations. Due to this piss-poor technique, the war on terrorism will, in the end, create MORE TERRORISM.
It's a similar logic failure which is afflicting the RIAA's battle. Rather than scaring users into paying full price and not pirating, they're simply angering and frustrating them into adapting to new ways to achieve the same result, sometimes worse. I wasn't boycotting the RIAA until about 5 months ago, so from me alone they've sold around 15-20 less CDs (for some reason some indie bands end up on RIAA labels), and I've increased my downloading (and uploading) levels, yeah, good strategy here.
QUIT MAKING BLANKET STATEMENTS that are obviously wrong
...
I got no problem stealin gum
Yeah I'm with you there. The second my car starts reporting my speeding habit is the second I learn to disable the reporting.
Judging by the diagram in the article, the only way to get caught speeding is to have your vehicle communicate with the sensor. I wonder how long it would be until you could buy such a "chicken wire and aluminum foil" product on ebay.
I no longer fear being called the biggest nerd alive by my friends.
I've said it before and I'll say it again.
All she has to do is win, and that gives legal grounds for everyone else of the 1000 unfortunate souls to follow suit.
So, RIAA, when you can't sue the network or the users, what exactly are you going to do, will you finally ADAPT? Or will you try and buy/strongarm your way into another tactic to hang on to your ancient business model?
Survival of the fittest in action, unless the RIAA trims the fat, they're on their way out.
"Damn, now we have to buy off ANOTHER government, time to sue more file sharers and blame it on them"
You're wrong, for several reasons.
"if they choose to contact the individual or institution and there was just a flaw in the code that made it think that it was cracked when it was infact legit, all the acused would have to do to clear their name is prove that they have a legaly purchased copy"
In the US, we have a "innocent until proven guilty" court system, where the burden of proof is not on the accused to prove they are innocent, but on the accuser to prove that they are not. Secondly, it might not be that easy for a user to prove they have a legit copy. A few examples of this would be if the user's machine was compromised, and the key stolen and distributed, or if the user was part of a large corporation and had no idea of anything to do with the installation of the software, or if the user had bought a used computer with the software already on it.
"it's not like it gives out top secret information"
Again, wrong. RTFA, "The message goes on to detail the users IP, a timestamp, the product in question, the users PC name, username, and MAC address. " This information could be VERY harmful in the wrong hands. With a known IP, timestamp, PC name, username, and even MAC it is now very easy to locate a user's physical location within an organization. With some social engineering and a bit of luck, you can now do all sorts of nasty things (sneak a keystroke logger and BOOM, they're 0wn3d!) to someone. Also dangerous, since MACs are bound to the hardware, if someone could reverse lookup a certain piece of hardware bound to a MAC and then find a vulnerability in the hardware, they're in. And since I doubt this information is encrypted, and since it is obviously sent over the public internet, the right person sniffing the right packets can now grab all of it.
More importantly, I doubt that this "feature", if you can call it that, is well publicized. This is very important because without knowledge of such practices it could be hard for a sys/netadmin to account for the grossly insecure transmissions.
Man, you're so right. They RUINED the LOTR trilogy for me by releasing these stupid books when I was younger and I read them. I mean, the books had almost everything that was in the movies, why would I want to go see the movies now? That made the movies absolutely suck because they were "spoiled".
Seriously one of the best comedic and insightful posts on /. in a long time
As an avid outdoorsmen and survivalist, I can say you're on the right track here but there are a few things neccesary to your survival that you're neglecting.
A non-electric cooking solution is probably something that most people should have anyway. As someone already mentioned, cooking with gas is a much better way to cook due to predictability and fast reaction to change. Gas service is available in most suburban and rural areas, however it may be impractical for those in the city. For those who are some reason bound to their electric stove, or for those who want to be prepared for emergencies, camp stoves are an excellent alternative. Cheap camp stoves can be found at walmart, like this one. That stove relies on propane for its fuel and is a bit bulky for some. For those who are interested in a portable and extremely flexible solution there are several backpacking stoves which burn just about anything. The MSR XGK Expedition advertises that it burns anything from white gas to jet fuel, including auto-grade gas and kerosene, and it only costs $109.95, really not too bad of a price for something that could be invaluable in a blackout.
While a warm meal is a wonderful "bonus" during a disaster, it's really not too much of a requirement. Considering most "disasters" seem to last around a week, one could easily survive on other forms of nutrition for that long. It's always a good idea to keep a few powerbars, clif bars, or other form of highly compacted nutritional bar around. More important than food though is water. Even if the worst case scenario were to hit and you were caught totally off guard with no food in the house, you can survive for quite some time on your lovehandles, thunder thighs, and beer (or geek) gut, as long as you've got WATER. Again for the camper/hiker/backpacker there are tons of great portable water filters out there that should make damn near anything drinkable. If you're planning on staying at home a filtration pitcher is a good thing to have, unlike faucet based filters, you can use the pitcher with water collected from any source (rainwater if need be).
But food and water are only one thing that you should be prepared with. Especially for the northerners, you should have some way of keeping warm. Now, if you're in a suburban or rural area, a woodstove may be the best way to "kill two birds with one stone", not only can they heat an entire house with flexible low-cost high-availability fuels, but in an emergency you can cook on them too. Regardless of what you're using to heat your home, there are a few simple items that can save your life in a "disaster" situation by keeping you warm. The first and maybe most important is a good sleeping bag. The body burns a ton of calories just trying to stay warm in cold weather, with food and water supplies possibly a concern, it is in anyone's best interests to stay as warm as possible. For those of you who are only looking at in-home emergencies, wal-mart sells cheap zero degree bags, and if your home should drop to below zero god help you. Anyone into camping/hiking or who would like something to keep in a car should check out a
He's right ya know. I have no sympathy for the phone company that overcharges me for everything from simply having a land line, to making long distance calls on that line, to TEXT MESSAGING on a cell phone. Really this is stupid, so I can call all I want at night, but if I send a little tiny text message, that somehow costs the phone company more money. Phone companies have been raping us for years, as far as I'm concerned they should hire some real managers, handle money wisely and light the fiber (it can be done), then after that MAYBE I COULD GET DSL IN MY AREA!!!
I'm way ahead of you there, been working on one for quite some time (with not too much success).
There are several issues with hamster cases. Firstly, hamsters/gerbils/mice/most rodents CHEW on everything, so I had to find a way to protect the pieces of the comp from the hamster (and vice/versa). Secondly, hamsters will even CHEW through most protection (including plastic), so I had to come up with yet another solution. Thirdly, hamsters need bedding, and they "go potty" in that bedding. Even in a well vented case, that leaves a lot of moisture in the air and degrades the integrity of the computer parts. However one cool idea i've had and got pseudo-working for the hamster cage is actually monitoring the speed that the hamster wheel is moving.
Fortunately I've been testing out the designs with old parts so it hasn't been that much of an expensive deal so far, however I'm approaching a long-term working solution, and will post pics/schematics when I'm done.
As a sidenote, I'm working on a REAL fishtank mod also. Someone had posted another design for a fishtank case where the tank is seperate from the comp, I'm working on a little more "integration" if you will. I'm also working on a lizard mod too, using the vent heat from the fans as a "heat rock" for the little guys. The lizard mod may be the first finished as lizards don't chew, thrive in the heat, can deal with certain cold cathode tubes for light, and don't require too much attention otherwise.
So what's the difference between friendster "fakesters" and real life fakesters? Think about it. In a bar there are always a few guys in there who are working it hard to be someone they're not, sometimes not even using their real names, they're often the ones surrounded by the simple-minded blondes who are attracted to their feaux persona. Same goes for friendster. Moving on, imagine if someone walked into a bar wearing a giant Oscar Meyer Weiner costume, immediately he would become the topic of conversation and a good number of people would approach him and become his "friend". This is the same thing that happens on friendster.
So maybe this phenomenon is a little more rampant because the anonymity of the internet allows people to drop a few inhibitions, but the concept is the same. Randomly deleting fakesters is a bad idea. The concept of charging for the service seems to be somewhat of a better idea. I know most of the /.ers will complain "it should be free" yadda yadda yadda, heard it all before. It would be nice if it were free, but I'm sure the folks who work for friendster would like a paycheck. Now, $8 a month seems a little high for friendster, if it were like $2, or even $5 I might consider paying for the service. Regardless, $8 a month is pretty good way to ensure the friendsters and fakesters who really serve some sort of purpose.
And just to piss of the Friendster folks...http://www.friendster.com/user.jsp?id=2339 91 last name, McGuire :).
Yes, Tiny Personal Firewall.
"If you'll excuse me, I'm going to go read Aesop's Fables and take everything literally so I miss the point of the stories entirely."
I'm glad someone else said something along these lines, I was tired of being the asshole who debunks the bible
I believe the word you're looking for is "invincible", you're welcome
While you bring up a good point, one would hope the world would adapt. Desalization plants could easily bust out the water issue, and as for human waste, when treated it can actually be recycled as fertilizer (however current methods of this are horrible, as they treat everything that comes out of the sewer, including all the non-shit shit like toxic chemicals, heavy metals, oil, etc and that stuff is a lot more dangerous than shit shit), and as for trash, let's hope that we can break ourselves of some of the disposable society and go back to things like drinking out of glasses and washing dishes, and maybe recycle the rest.
When you consider lifetimes of 1000 years, this could make for one great "pyramid" retirement structure. Assuming people still pop out kids around every 25 years, by the time you die, you would have around 39 generations under you. If you figure that you have 2 kids, and each of them 2 kids, etc., that leaves you with
So if ONLY THE LAST GENERATION of your family gave you $1 a year, you'd be a multi-billionaire. More realistically, assuming $100K/year is a very comfortable retirement, your investments would only have to last you 16 generations, or 400 years, then you could just collect from your descendents.
The only downside I could see to this is christmas cards and family reunions would be a BITCH.
"Can you seriously imagine what it would be like to work for 200 years, as opposed to 65?"
I see it this way, there are two reasons why people retire: 1 - they are tired of work 2: - they are unable, or hindered in their ability to work. Those people who don't like their jobs would probably fall into category 1, they would become tired of work. However added longevity including improved quality of life (21 forever if you will) would give these people the option to switch fields. With good investments you could probably take 30 or so years off between switches. This would create a scenario where you could have three different careers and retire three different times. For the other people who retire because of physical limitations due to age, hopefully the deterioration which prevents them from continuing could be eliminated and they could stay happily at their jobs.
With extended lifespans the workplace would adapt I'm sure. Vacation times may be measured in years, for every 10 you work you get 1 off, who knows what is possible. Something this article neglected was the added factor of biotechnology. Assuming that conventional medicine could keep you mentally and physically at 21 for all of your years, you would still probably forget memories from a few hundred years ago. However, the very real possibility of implants exists, so you may have all of your memories stored on a convenient .25' x .25' 80 exobyte implant.
I say cheers to immortality, then again I'm also an atheist and a nerd.
500 years of cognition free stupor? SIGN ME UP!
"Does anyone know of any common Windows software that turns off XP's firewall?"
Yes, Windows
:)
My mom is an antiques dealer, your example is especially valid there too. For anyone who's wondering why there are SO MANY people who deal in antiques and make a decent living, it's all about knowledge.
The average person knows far less about real value of antiques than they do about their computer(and we know how dumb the average lUser is). Many people hang on to items of little to no real monetary value (grampa's beer stein collection, mass-produced items, etc), but are fairly quick to part with "that old chair" or "that plate that doesn't match anything" when those are actually the things of value
TV shows such as "The Antiques Roadshow" only further the unfortunate misplaced optimism of the common person. At least weekly someone comes into my Mom's shop with something of mild collectible value (>$20) expecting it to be worth thousands because they've seen one too many fantasy stories on AR. However there is also the advantage to the dealers that most people don't know what they have. Many people who have just lost a relative will get rid of things at auction/yard sale/etc that are worth a ton.
A common example of this is a piece of furniture called a "dry sink". Before indoor plumbing was popular, people still needed something in which to wash dishes so they had dry sinks, which were essentially a large piece of wooden furniture with a zinc-lined basin at about waist level and usually a few drawers or cabinets underneath. People could pour water in the basin and use it for whatever while using the cabinets/drawers for storage. Many dry sinks were destroyed with the advent of modern day indoor plumbing, but there were still a few that remained in existence, collecting dust or being used for some other purpose.
When someone inherits a house, often they'll want to sell everything of value and throw away the rest so they can start anew. It is common practice for individuals to hire an antique dealer/expert to appraise/purchase whatever is valuable in the house. My mom was on one of these jobs and discovered in a house a dry sink that was being used as a COMPUTER DESK. While the computer was worth nothing (I was there, it was like a 75 mHz pentium), the dry sink was well finished, unmarred oak, still had all if the original fixtures, and the liner was nearly perfect. My mom easily dated it to around 1850, she ended up buying the piece for like $200, and sold it for over $2000 in less than a week.
While this is a rare occurance, it illustrates the point that certain "industries", especially those dealing with "synthetic" values thrive on the same principle of swap meets/UO trading.