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User: bigtallmofo

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  1. Color me unemployed then. on You're Only As Hirable As Your Google+ Circles · · Score: 5, Informative

    I deleted my Google+ profile a couple months ago when I posted (what I thought was) a private video to YouTube. It was a demonstration of a new feature I created in a website for a side-job of mine. Suddenly all my Google+ knucklehead friends started posting, "I don't get it - why is this funny?" and other stupid things.

    I don't want one company getting all of my data sharing it in ways they want to.

  2. After 3 iPhones, I switched to Windows Phone 8 on Microsoft Drops Price on Nokia's 41-Megapixel Phone · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The last 4 phones I've had were: iPhone 3G (AT&T), iPhone 4 (Verizon), iPhone 4s (Verizon), Nokia Lumia 928 (Verizon). The Windows Phone 8 phone is the best phone I have ever owned.

    The primary way it is better is that the screen is so much bigger. This is easy to dismiss, but it makes a ton of UI hacks done for the iPhone needless. For example, the fact that the address bar isn't on the screen all the time is a hack to compensate for the small screen. Then that leads to a need for the hack where you click the top of the screen in the browser to rapidly scroll to the top. Sometimes that's a nice feature, but only if your screen is so small that they can't always display the address bar unless you've scrolled all the way to the top. Sometimes it's the most annoying thing in the world - like when you've scrolled past 7 pages of information reading in the browser and then accidentally click the rapid scroll-up button. There is no rapid scroll-down button to undo that.

    How about moving an icon from one screen to another on the iPhone? What a pain. I would always have to use the very tip of my finger and then try to move the icon all the way to the left or the right and then most of them it would re-shuffle my icons in all kinds of unintended and undesirable ways.

    The integration to Skydrive is much better than iCloud as well. My Lumia 928 has 32 GB of storage but with SkyDrive I get an additional 125 GB (of which 25 GB was free). I can seamlessly access pictures, video and music right from it as long as I have a signal.

    The Nokia maps are the best maps application I ever used. Much better than either Google Maps or Apple Maps. Speaking of signal - the maps application have online and offline capabilities. So if I have no signal whatsoever there is a local copy of map data on my phone so I can still get directions.

    I could go on all day. But for every way that matters to me, the Lumia 928 is superior to every iPhone I've ever owned. iPhones just haven't improved significantly in the last several years. Sure there's Siri - who I once dictated the text message "OK I'll take a look" which got translated to "OK I'll fuck". I didn't find much use for that and my Lumia 928 has much better voice recognition.

  3. Dislike competition? on Microsoft Drops Price on Nokia's 41-Megapixel Phone · · Score: 3, Insightful

    6 years ago Apple came in and re-invented what a smartphone was. As a result, RIM is all but dead and we now have Android and Windows Phone 8 that are high quality smartphone offerings. Your comment adds nothing to the discussion - what is its point? You want Windows Phone 8 to die so consumers have less choice?

  4. Music to the ears of a .NET developer on Oracle Discontinues Free Java Time Zone Updates · · Score: 3, Insightful

    As someone who was been a .NET developer in C# since it came out, this is welcome news to see Java developers abandoning their platform in droves.

    Sorry to sound harsh, but I heard from so many middle managers and CIOs over the years, "Why don't you use Java?" "I noticed you don't use Java, what's wrong with you?" "What about Java?" "Have you looked into Java?" I had one snarky middle manager buy me a Java book for Christmas one year.

    Sorry, I don't use Java and every day more and more people are saying the same thing.

  5. 12 million crimes per year? on Cell Carriers Responded Last Year To 1.3M Law Enforcement Data Requests · · Score: 2

    According to the MPAA/RIAA, I alone am responsible for 12 million crimes per year.

  6. Re:K9 Web Protection on Ask Slashdot: Good Low Cost Free Software For Protecting Kids Online? · · Score: 1

    One more bump for K9... Has worked very well for a couple years now in our family. My oldest (of 3) is turning 8 in a couple months. All these thought experiments by teenagers in their parents basement about how you don't need filtering or that it's ineffective are ignoring how easy it is to stumble on porn or gore on the Internet and how unready a 7 year old is to see it.

  7. I've learned not to yell anything at cops on NH Man Arrested For Videotaping Police.. Again · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Once when I was 16 and a huge smartass, I yelled, "I smell bacon!" out the window of a car I was a passenger in. There was a cop on the side of the road that had someone pulled over. I see him drop everything, run back to his car and get back into it. I thought there was no way he would ever catch us, and anyway I thought yelling out the window was not illegal. He didn't try to catch us - instead he radioed ahead to someone else who pulled us over within a few minutes. The cop comes up to the car, says, "Which one of you yelled, 'I'm going to kill you fucking cops'"? We played it off like it was the radio and said nobody yelled that out the window. Anyway, they took all our names, made us get out of the car, the whole nine yards. For yelling, "I smell bacon" at a cop. I guess we were luck we didn't get beat up, tazed, maced and put in jail like this guy.

  8. Re:Economic Growth? on Bill Clinton Says 'Paint Your Roofs White' · · Score: 1

    Look up "broken window fallacy". You're advocating a form of it. In short not all money spends are equal. Some are more efficient than others. Spending money on inefficient cooling is very inefficient way of spending money and the economy is better served by more efficient types of spending.

  9. OMFG I want my 4 minutes back on A Court's Weak Argument For Blocking IP Subpoenas · · Score: 1

    I agree with you. Any time spent reading the original poster's comments is time wasted. I think that the OP really ought to get an MRI of his brain or at the least a CT Scan. He really might have some sort of brain damage (possibly a tumor) that is exhibiting itself in strange, eccentric ways.

  10. I have 3 XBox 360s but have never played a game on Microsoft's Xbox To Have Streaming TV Service? · · Score: 1

    I use TVersity to stream DivX, jpgs and mp3s, Hulu, YouTube, Joost, etc to any TV in my house by using an XBox 360 attached to the TV. It works fantastically. Another streaming service would be welcome as well, but to be honest, I already have over 2 TB of content on my local server for my family to watch including just about every kid's movie ever made along with every good kids cartoon ever made.

  11. How many kids do you have? on Ask Slashdot: Huge Digital Media Libraries · · Score: 2

    Your son isn't going to die if he sees some gore or some tits.

    I have two questions. How old are you and how many kids do you have? My guess is the answers are "young" and "zero". So I guess I should let my 6 year old son just watch ass-to-mouth porn then. I don't think so. Contrary to your simplistic world view, there are some things that children are not ready for. Even this weekend, I was watching Phantom Menace with my oldest son (he's 6) for the first time. It led to all kinds of very difficult questions about death that he was probably only ready for 80% of ensuing discussion.

    I'm currently 38 and I've had ready access to porn since I had my first 300 baud modem in 1986. I'm no prude and certainly don't think that children should be shielded from everything. But your speaking in absolutes that kids will either be ready to comprehend it or be disinterested in it just sounds pretty dumb.

  12. You misunderstood. on Secret Plan To Kill Wikileaks With FUD Leaked · · Score: 5, Informative
    You're right that Aaron Barr was hoping to profit from this, but he didn't write the quote you attributed to him. His coder wrote that, making fun of him because he thought of no way to profit from the dumb information that Aaron was making his coder collect. What is written before the quote you provided is:

    His programmer had doubts, saying that the scraping and linking work he was doing was of limited value and had no commercial prospects. As he wrote in an e-mail:

  13. DMCA to the rescue? on Woman Gets Revenge Courtesy of Google Images · · Score: 2

    My minor son's ex-girlfriend took a copyrighted picture of him (we own copyright) and uploaded it more than 60 times to a website

    This might be the first good time I can think of to use the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The mother should've sent a DMCA takedown notice to every company hosting the image including Google. Instead of going through barely monitored channels, it would have gone through the highest priority channels because if they don't respond to a DMCA takedown notice in a timely manner, they're liable for damages.

    Based on the things the sick girl wrote on the images, it would seem the parents have a good case for libel against her. Many of her joking accusation are provably false and disparaging.

  14. You're right -they should NOT have relied on Java. on Google Didn't Ship Relicensed Java Code After All · · Score: 4, Funny

    From any angle Android's Java reliance seams like a bad move.

    Any sensible move would have had them developing to a more open platform like .NET.

  15. I got a virus while using Chrome. on NSS Labs Browser Report Says IE Is the Best, Google Disagrees · · Score: 1

    Running Windows 7 x64 Professional on my HP netbook. Surfing using Chrome with no plugins on reddit.com. Thousands of other people did as well with various other browsers (see reddit announcement).

    It came in through an ad utilizing a Java exploit. I was only 1 minor release behind on updating my JRE. Since this incident and the 45 minutes it took me to get rid of the stupid thing, I now surf with Firefox + adblock + noscript addons. It's just not worth it. I used to be OK with ads and even clicked on them occasionally but forget it now.

    I have to say that was I absolutely shocked that Chrome let something like that through and that it was able to infect my system even though I never run as an admin user. Windows Security Essentials detected it but still let it infect my system and was unable to clean it out, so I ended up cleaning it out manually.

  16. Isn't it 17.34%? on Apple 1 Computer Sells For $210,700 · · Score: 1

    Please excuse me if my formula is incorrect but 666.66 x (1.18 ^ 36) = 258,021.96 which is significantly higher than $210,700.

    To solve, use:

    210,700 / 666.66 ^ (1/36) = 1.1733775686728221274377171681115 - 1 = 17.34%.

  17. The Web: Just like the Magna Carta on Like Democracy, the Web Needs To Be Defended · · Score: 1

    FTFA:
    The Web is now more critical to free speech than any other medium. It brings principles established in the U.S. Constitution, the British Magna Carta

    From the Magna Carta:
    If anyone who has borrowed a sum of money from Jews dies before the debt has been repaid, his heir shall pay no interest on the debt for so long as he remains under age, irrespective of whom he holds his lands. If such a debt falls into the hands of the Crown, it will take nothing except the principal sum specified in the bond.

    He's right! The web is just like the Magna Carta.

  18. Newsflash! on Like Democracy, the Web Needs To Be Defended · · Score: 1

    Inventor of World Wide Web says World Wide Web greatest invention ever.

  19. Re:The Phone Book is dead on Is the Number Up For the Residential Phone Book? · · Score: 1

    People are now unreachable unless you have a prior relationship and they expect you to call them.

    Good.

    How do you find the phone number of your neighbor with a spotlight aimed at your window at 2:00 AM?

    I'd put a towel in front of the window, go to sleep and talk to him about it in the morning.

    I didn't see a single thing in your examples that led me to believe a printed phonebook is necessary. The world will be so much better off without such printed phonebooks.

  20. This fooled a human? on Chatbot Suzette Wins 20th Annual Loebner Prize, Fools One Judge · · Score: 3, Funny

    bigtallmof - what do you think of slashdot?
    [ Af:0 At:7 Sp:0] I use Slashdot for my topical stories reading.
    bigtallmof - what do you think of slashdot?
    [ Af:0 At:8 Sp:0] I have heard of the slashdot website but don't know much about it.
    bigtallmof - what do you think of slashdot?
    [ Af:0 At:8 Sp:0] Usually I don't.
    bigtallmof - what do you think of slashdot?
    [ Af:0 At:9 Sp:0] Not much.
    bigtallmof - what do you think of slashdot?
    [ Af:0 At:10 Sp:0] It doesn't concern me.
    bigtallmof - what do you think of slashdot?
    [ Af:0 At:13 Sp:0] This is fun. I don't think about it at all.
    bigtallmof - what do you think of slashdot?
    [ Af:0 At:13 Sp:0] Do you prefer getting your news online or from tv?

  21. Re:No college degree here on You Are Not Mark Zuckerberg, So Stay In School · · Score: 1

    When was this?

    I first became a computer consultant in 1989, started my own company in 1992, sold it in 1998 and went off to work for corporate America. I became CTO of a publicly traded company for the first time in 2006.

  22. Re:Personality matters on You Are Not Mark Zuckerberg, So Stay In School · · Score: 1

    danaris said...Personality matters in these things.

    bigtallmofo originally said...In my experience, smarts coupled with people skills and a strong work ethic will open just about any door for you

    We are in agreement. Definitely need people skills and a good personality to start your own business.

  23. No college degree here on You Are Not Mark Zuckerberg, So Stay In School · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I didn't spend a minute in college. I became a computer consultant right out of high school at 17, started my own consulting company at 20, sold it at 25 and started working for corporate America.

    Since then, I've risen to the highest ranks of IT (including CTO of a mid-sized publicly traded company).

    In my experience, smarts coupled with people skills and a strong work ethic will open just about any door for you regardless of degree or lack thereof. One of the biggest problems I see though are people generally overestimating their "smarts". Generally I think if you are not widely considered very intelligent by everyone you regularly interact with, including those people that don't necessarily care for you, then you are probably better off getting a degree.

  24. Capitalist Response on PayPal Freezes Cryptome's Account · · Score: 1

    When will someone come out with a viable competitor for PayPal so that we will finally have a choice?

    I suspect it will happen when it becomes profitable to do so. Until then, we'll just complain about PayPal.

  25. My First Hard Drive on Write Bits Directly Onto a Hard Drive Platter? · · Score: 1, Interesting

    My first hard drive was a 40 MB Seagate ST-251 MFM hard drive. I almost got the ST-225 when I was buying the parts for my first IBM-compat from JDR Microdevices.

    I'm still very thankful that I didn't go with my alternate plan of getting the Lt. Kernel 20 MB hard drive for my Commodore 128. I imagine I wouldn't quite have the career I have today had I gone in that direction.