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User: Zak3056

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Comments · 1,771

  1. Re:WTF? on NASA IG Paints Bleak Picture For Agency Projects · · Score: 1

    Here's the 1% of the 1% of the 1%. This family controls about $1 trillion in assets. It's time to tax the shit out of them. When you can donate a castle to charity, you have too much money. That smells of a tax dodge.

    For the sake of argument, let's say we did what you suggest--hell, that we went even further than that and we took every red cent that they "control." We would pay for this year's budget deficit, and that's about it. Now what?

  2. Re:Not true. on Ohio Judge Rules Speed Cameras Are a Scam · · Score: 1

    I drive a lot in Germany, it is a joy to drive there because there are no speed traps, as a consequence people obey the law _more_ because the traffic signs mean something, you see a sign for 100kph then you go 100 because the road or conditions will not allow that speed (god help you if you get a ticket because you really fucked up).

    I've never been in a car in Germany where the (German) driver drove 100kph in the 100kph zone. Ever. Typically, "100kph" means "120kph" at a minimum, unless there's a speed camera nearby, in which case they slow down just to pass the camera, then speed back up.

    One thing I will say is that they NEVER, EVER speed through a residential area. When the 50 or 30kph signs show up, they WILL honor them (within 10% at any rate), and I do find that a refreshing change from the US where people by and large just don't give a fuck.. I used to live across the street from a school, and the road ended in a T-intersection (a concrete wall, to be precise) and it never ceased to amaze me how fast people would drive past my house. I lived on one corner, the T-intersection was at the other corner, the block was about 200 yards long, and tires would SCREECH at both ends.

  3. Re:Remember Steam on New Sony Patent Blocks Second-hand Games · · Score: 1

    Quit using google and start looking it up directly in the legal databases that most civilized countries provide.

    It's about time people started learning that Google and Wikipedia are pretty poor ways to go about getting information when you can go direct to the damned source.

    Just throwing this out there but maybe AC doesnt have an expensive subscription to LexisNexis and the like?

    I'm guessing the GP was very much aware of that, and was calling the US uncivilized. Which, in this case, I can't help but agree with. If "ignorance of the law is no excuse" then it's a piss poor system that makes you have to pay to read the law (which court decisions are, i.e. "case law.")

  4. Re:So Proud of Gun Ownership on New York Paper Uses Public Records To Publish Gun-Owner Map · · Score: 1

    It's actually illegal to buy a gun outside your State of legal residence unless:

    1) it is a private sale, not innvolving a licensed dealer (you want to buy a gun from your uncle, no problem, you go into a gunshop, no sale)

    or...

    the sale is executed through a gun dealer local to you. I had to do this once when I saw a really sweet Mauser hunting rifle while traveling. Only way to actually buy it was to arrange with the gunshop that had it to ship it to a gunshop local to where I lived, and do the actual sale there. And pay sales tax twice, essentially, plus dealer markup twice.

    You're actually wrong on both counts. It's unlawful for an unlicensed person to transfer a firearm (be it handgun or longarm) to an unlicensed person who is not a resident of their state, and it is perfectly lawful for an unlicensed person to acquire a longarm (though not a handgun) from a licensee in any state. See the BATF FAQ.

  5. Re:So Proud of Gun Ownership on New York Paper Uses Public Records To Publish Gun-Owner Map · · Score: 2

    We have no guarantee of privacy in this country. Nowhere in the constitution is privacy even mentioned.

    While I'm not a fan of abortion, I'll point out that Roe v. Wade rests on the right to privacy, "whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the district court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy."

    I also would point out that "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects" sounds an awful lot like privacy to me.

  6. Re:Lousy ideas on Using Technology To Make Guns Safer · · Score: 1

    It was "standard" in my concealed carry class along with "night shooting" (lights out) and lift to fire (from the table to shoot)

    As addressed in my comment, you are one of the 'many shooters" who have been "exposed to the concept." I'll ask directly:do you habitually practice these techniques? The answer may be yes (I know several people who do), but the most likely answer is "no." I still stand behind my statement that this is not the "standard training for putting down a threat."

    Also, if your "concealed carry" class (by which I assume you mean the class that many states mandate before you can obtain a carry permit) is teaching this, it's definitely not your run of the mill class, because no state requires such training, thus most classes (honestly, none that I have ever heard of in the state of Tennessee) don't teach it. If you're talking about a level I or II defensive handgun class, this is more normal, but I'll guarantee you spent a LOT more time on other things like basic accuracy, retention, malfunction drills, cover, etc, and did not spend the necessary time training muscle memory.

    "Shoot it to the ground" has been harped on in every defensive class I've ever taken. NOT, "Two to the chest, one to the head" or similar.

  7. Re:Lousy ideas on Using Technology To Make Guns Safer · · Score: 1

    2 attackers, "double tap" is the standard training for putting down a threat, you're short a round.

    I suspect you've never had any firearm training, and your statement that "I've never encountered a situation..." is just obfuscating the fact that you don't even have or use firearms.

    I'm throwing this back at you, AC, in that I doubt you've had any real firearms training, either. Double taps, failure drills, etc, are NOT standard training by any stretch of the imagination, and are typically only practiced by those who kill people and break things for a living. Police, regular military, civilians leaning armed self-defense, are typically trained to shoot center mass, and keep shooting until the target is no longer a threat (i.e. until they hit the ground). I'll grant that more advanced techniques are taught in more advanced classes (I've been through a few), and many shooters have been at least been exposed to the concepts and (briefly!) run through them, but this is by no means "standard."

  8. Re:If Woz can so can I... on Wozniak's Predictions For 2013: the Data Center, Mobility and Beyond · · Score: 1

    I agree with almost all of this, except for:

    • Tablets. These are not going anywhere, I think--we've finally hit the point where computing power, battery life, weight, etc have hit a "good enough" point and produced a genuinely useful, handy device. They will get lighter, and (once they are light enough and foldable) larger, and most people five years from now will not have a "PC" on the desktop.
    • Car interfaces. Nav systems are definitely obsolete (especially the "insert the DVD into the optical drive to use me" types), and these will go away over the next few years (but not THIS year--it will take a while for them to die). That said, while touch screens are suboptimal in cars, I expect to see more of them and not less. They're everywhere, and the lack of them will be seen as a cut-rate/budget/obsolescent option, and undesirable to most of the advertising influenced public.

    Final thought: when did slashcode stop properly handling the <UL> and <OL> tags?

  9. Re:Careful you don't run afoul on Murder Is Like a Disease (No, Really) · · Score: 1

    Its more likely this is actually modelling the passage of a new batch of guns through the criminal underworld.

    I always find it hailarious that you in the states cite the ability to own firarms as something that keeps you safe when your obscenely high murder rate points to the opposite in my opinion.

    The state of New Jersey requires one to have a permit to own firearms, and an additional permit to purchase a handgun. One needs to obtain a new permit for each handgun, there is a fee, a fingerprinting process.etc. Carrying a handgun in the state of New Jersey is effectively illegal, essentially requiring one to either be a retired police office, private detective, security guard, or politically connected.

    Yet somehow criminals manage to get firearms anyway. It's amazing to me, because of the laws I mentioned above--it's almost like these criminals have no respect for the law, and are just circumventing it (which is a rather fatal flaw in the "you need more laws" argument).

    That said, I agree with you that the murder rate in the US is abysmal. The sad truth is that we just seem to like killing each other--take away the guns, and we STILL kill each other at rates far exceeding the rest of the civilized world. Michael Moore touched on this in Bowling for Columbine, but instead of exploring the reasons, he decided to blame the whole thing on an old man with alzheimers disease instead.

    So, given the following: 1. many americans are violent, and 2. many criminals have or can easily obtain firearms, I propose that the law abiding should also be free to arm themselves, so as to afford some measure of protection.

  10. Re:Why does it matter if/when Apple knew? on Apple Claims Ignorance of Jury Foreman's Previous Tangle With Samsung · · Score: 1

    Shouldn't there be a (mis/re)trial regardless?

    On what grounds? That the Foreman was involved in a litigation two decades ago that had nothing to do with either party? Yeah... I can see that logic.

    I think the issue isn't that he was involved in litigation, I think the issue is that he concealed it, regardless of his motivation for doing so..

    When further Coupled with his statements to the press, which paint a picture of, at best, improper conduct in the jury room, I think it raises questions about how impartial the jury was, and it's worth the judge's time to consider the matter..

  11. Re:Why does it matter if/when Apple knew? on Apple Claims Ignorance of Jury Foreman's Previous Tangle With Samsung · · Score: 1

    If the connection between Samsung and this guy is so tenuous that he wasn't in their Little Black Book then its harder to suggest that he'd be biassed against them.

    I don't believe that is the point--the issue is that he lied (by omission) during jury questioning. His motives for doing so are less clear, and the Seagate connection has been suggested as a possibility. Regardless, it appears that the jury foreman (based on his own statements to the press) acted, at best, improperly... and that opens up the question, "was this a fair trial?"

    Meanwhile, remember that the jury also threw out some pretty silly patent claims by Samsung. There are no "good guys" in this case, so if you fancy a retrial, be careful what you wish for.

    I haven't stated a position on whether or not I "want" a retrial, and I think my (or your) wishes on the subject really have no bearing on the issue (as they shouldn't). I merely provided an answer to someone else asking "why isn't there a mistrial here?"

  12. Re:Why does it matter if/when Apple knew? on Apple Claims Ignorance of Jury Foreman's Previous Tangle With Samsung · · Score: 1

    Shouldn't there be a (mis/re)trial regardless?

    The issue is that Apple says that a mistrial is inappropriate, because Samsung "should have known" about this. Hence Samsung's response, "Well, when did YOU know about this?"

    It's win-win for Samsung, I think--if Apple knew about it, then they're shown to (possibly) have unclean hands. If Apple did NOT know about it, then it's absurd for them suggest that Samsung should have.

  13. Re:As usual, people don't understand the internet. on EU Passes Resolution Against ITU Asserting Control Over Internet · · Score: 1

    They could start by restricting the DNS servers people from a certain geographic area can access.
    So for Europeans, you have this, this and this DNS server. Try any other ip address and it's blackholed.

    I think you completely missed what the GP was saying. Sure, the ITU can decide that DNS servers will be regional. So they pass their resolution and go to, for example, Telekom in Germany, and say, "You will blackhole all traffic on port 53 sent to hosts outside of Germany." At which point, Telekom will reply, "Who the hell are you to decide this? Fuck off."

  14. "Stories?" on Bruce Perens Answers Your Questions · · Score: 1

    So, what's not right for Open Source? I helped to make feature films at Pixar and have an IMDB credit on two of them. While you can create stories in an Open Source paradigm, the best of them seem to be made in the conventional one. I believe that films should be playable on any device and should not be encumbered with DRM. I don't see a problem with an artist being paid for each copy of a film or music.

    Bruce, I'm wondering if you didn't really state this the way you meant, because it comes across as pretty strange in a historical context. Copyright is a relatively new construct, and most "stories" that come to mind really do have an "open source" lineage, if you will--they have been told, retold, embellished, modified, and retold again, with each new storyteller bringing something to the whole, creating something new which would have been impossible without the work of countless others before them. Using movie studios as an example, since you mention Pixar, look back at the last few decades and ask yourself: what, if anything, in cinema is truly new? Aren't we just telling the same stories over, and over again? Sure, we may tell them in new and interesting ways, but most of it is hundreds, if not thousands of years old at heart.

    I get the point that people who create things need to make a living, too (and I agree), but bringing that ideal into a conversation about "open source" seems forced, at best.

  15. Re:Need to take great caution with this on Seattle's Creepy Cameraman Pushes Public Surveillance Buttons · · Score: 4, Insightful

    A prosecutor and possibly a judge may argue that his actions differ from security cameras in the sense that a security camera is fixed in place and watches a predefined area to spot crimes and identify perpetrators.

    "Fixed in place" is (mostly) true, but "predefined area" does not have to be. PTZ cameras abound, also high megapixel cameras offer digital PTZ, so just because it's pointed at a fixed area doesn't mean that it's somehow limited. One extreme example is Avigilon, which offers a 29MP digital camera. Believe me when I say that the level of detail offered here, and what you can look at is fairly impressive (I've seen a nice demo setup where a single camera with a fairly wide lens is set up on a video wall offering a couple of dozen discrete views).

    Also, I would argue with the logic that "to spot crimes and identify perpetrators" holds any real water. I can cover my neighborhood with cameras just to be a nosy ass, without any real contribution to security.

    While I think this guy's actions are assholish at best, he does raise an excellent point.

  16. Re:Not that patents are valid on To Mollify Google on Moto Patents, Apple Proposes $1/Device Fee · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Google has yet to bring a product to market that the market really wants.

    If I may quote Monty Python's 'Life of Brian': "All right, but apart from the sanitation, medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us? "

    Honestly, if you can't find anything that Google has brought to the table that the market "really wants" you just aren't paying attention.

  17. Re:Seriously? on Pandora Shares Artist Payment Figures · · Score: 1

    I'm actually confused by the claim that FM/AM radio pay nothing to performers, since I'm pretty sure that they did pay ( see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Society_of_Composers,_Authors_and_Publishers ).

    "Composers, Authors, and Publishers" aren't performers. Granted, someone can be both a performer and an author, but they don't have to be. As such, the statement that performers don't get paid for radio performances is not refuted by this.

    .

  18. Re:Depressing, isn't it... on NASA's First New Spacesuit In 20 Years Is Its Own Airlock · · Score: 1

    Private companies are not even at Gemini level; that's about NASA's 45 years ago, so I'd say you are a bit overenthusiastic, don't you think so?

    To be fair, I don't think NASA is at that level anymore, either.

  19. Re:Ugly..... on NASA's First New Spacesuit In 20 Years Is Its Own Airlock · · Score: 2

    I order 25 black shirts every couple of months and hence I always know what to wear

    I knew Steve Jobs wasn't dead!

  20. Re:Paging Doc Brown on Record Setting 500 Trillion-Watt Laser Shot Achieved · · Score: 1

    What does this translate to in jiggawatts?

    500,000. Aren't SI units wonderful?

  21. Re:Fusion Ignition on Record Setting 500 Trillion-Watt Laser Shot Achieved · · Score: 4, Funny

    One application of this type of engineering is to serve as an ignition swith for a fusion energy plant.

    They should totally tell the guys at the National Ignition Facility about this. </sarcasm>

  22. Re:Finally someone who gets the real issue on The Google Transparency Project Transparency Project · · Score: 1

    The Tor project is designing ways to pass Tor in what looks like regular https traffic. It won't help North Koreans, but it does help (right now) Chinese people.

    In an environment where its use can be dictated, DPISSL defeats this.

  23. Re:Ya Don't Say! on MemSQL Makers Say They've Created the Fastest Database On the Planet · · Score: 2

    I find it funny how easy it is to order an AMD system with 256GB of ram (or even 512GB, just much more expensive) yet the Intel ones all seem to max out at 192 or really, really expensive 384GB.. I know it has to do with the memory controllers, but our loads are very, very memory dependent..

    The Dell PE820 (a 4-socket intel server) supports up to 1.5TB of RAM. With 2-CPUs, though, it's only 768GB...

  24. Re:75 MHz 286 on GNU/Linux Running On An 8-Bit Processor · · Score: 1

    286 is 16bit I believe? I believe this is the first time anyone has actually run the linux kernel on less than 16bit which is the base the first linux was designed to run on.

    From the summary, Linux is actually running on an emulated 32-bit ARM, it just so happens that the emulator is running on an 8-bit CPU.

  25. Re:There's this little problem with Ender's Game on Teacher Suspended For Reading Ender's Game To Students · · Score: 3, Informative

    Ender is a school child who kicks another school child to death in the school bathroom. Nobody has any question that it's happened, but not much seems to happen to Ender because of it.

    Nothing happens to Ender, legally--he's a child, and has been placed in that situation by the authorities, who are pretty much hoping for the response that they get. Later on (either at the end of Ender's Game, or in Ender's Shadow) it's revealed that Graff was indeed court-martialed for the deaths of both Bonzo and Stilson, though he is acquitted because of his statements that the war would have been lost if not for his actions in turning Ender into the weapon that humanity needed.

    Graff aside, Ender did most certainly suffer for those deaths, and the billions more that he caused. Mentally, emotionally, and, later, being equated to another Adolf Hitler by the very people he saved.