First of all, learning and understanding what it is to be human shows that we are creatures who literally NEED to create and share.
On the other hand, it could be argued by the same token that internet sharing and lolcatz-esque memes are actually a drug that latches onto that need, corrupting it and distracting us from the act of creation by giving us a false sense of achievement through constant sharing. If we take pride in posting other people's creations, we cheat ourselves of the urge to create something unique ourselves.
After all, why should I suffer hours of preparation to put something on the net and get a few dozen views, when for a few minutes work I can copy someone else's file and get a million views?
I suspect that they use more than just a plain hash. Even if you just use hash plus explicit filesize, you've narrowed down the chance of hash collisions massively.
Variable scope is a strange concept to get used to at first. It seems cluttered if you're used to explicitly defining your variables, then having those variables only available in that function. Having variables available to scopes nested in your scope is very flexible and lends itself to writing some beautiful code.
Yes, scoping is very powerful, and almost all languages use it for very good reason. The point is that in JavaScript the easiest scope to use is the effective global one (yes, it's a property of the "window" object, but as far as the programmer's concerned, "window" is "main"). The easiest thing to use should always be the safest -- the programmer should always have to make an active choice to do something the more dangerous way.
"Environment variables" must exist, whether as a passed object (which my university lecturers favoured) or as bog-standard global variables. But as soon as environment variables are available, lazy programmers will use them as global variables. Attempting to engineer mechanisms to prevent this happening is a complete waste of time, and only makes programming more complicated. You can't just make the "wrong way" harder -- you've just got to make the right way a little easier than the wrong way. Grainger's Aurora seems to follow that principle quite well -- whereas functional programming tried to force you not to update values (destroying data) unnecessarily by making it practically impossible to do so, Grainger simply makes non-destructive data processing one step easier than destructive data processing: the only destructive action is an explicit update with the result of a non-destructive process.
The default "lazy" state is therefore the right one, so the appropriate behaviour is rewarded. Doing unnecessary destructive changes takes the programmer longer and makes the code less clear, so will naturally be avoided. But crucially, programmers are still able to do whatever they want, when they want.
Hydro destroys river ecosystems. For an extreme example of the effects of damming on waterways, look at France. It's a mass of hydroelectric plants and drinking water reservoirs, and its major rivers have almost all been canalised, with a network of locks and sluices to reduce winter flow to ensure that the water level is high enough for navigation during the summer months. Fish stocks in the French rivers are dangerously low, with the Atlantic Salmon now all but unknown to French anglers.
All human activity has an impact, and there is no such thing as "clean" electricity.
Clouds are not made of water vapour, but of water. Liquid water droplets suspended in mid-air. Water vapour is a gas, and is indeed a greenhouse gas. Greenhouse gases allow certain infrared wavelengths through, but block others: specifically they allow the light of the sun in, but reflected/radiated heat from the Earth is kept in.
Or to put it another way, on the eleventh of September 2001, the world changed, and everything that was once "youthful indiscretion" is now the sign of a terminally warp mind that has as its sole aim the downfall of humanity and everything that is good in this world. It's not only the individual that suffers for this, but society as a whole - how many of the "greats" of the computer world broke systems in their school days? And now we wouldn't let them work with computers at all. No wonder technology's stagnating....
For that to hold, the company has to expressly forbid using the laptop for personal purposes, otherwise (as previous cases have ascertained), there is reasonable grounds to expect that the device will store personal information.
It buys only the state-required minimum insurance.
...quad erat demonstrandum. Let people go cheap, they'll go cheap. Remove the regulations, and they won't even have that basic level of cover.
The problem here isn't "regulation" it's "inappropriate regulation". I agree that when regulation simply protects vested interests, it's bad. But that doesn't mean we'd be better off without regulation at all.
This is a bunch of bullshit. There isn't any way to apply for a license to operate a UAV for profit legally. You can't do it even if you had all the money in the world.
There is, and the FAA note that only one company has ever been licensed.
If you had argued that that method of applying is heavy-handed or unfair... well then you'd be agreeing with the judge. I am not standing up for the current regulations -- just stating that in principle, making a distinction between amateur and professional use is perfectly justifiable.
For a long while, Scotland had controls on "hackney carriages" (taxis that pick you up off the street) but not "private hire cars" (prebooked hires). This changed when a rash of crimes were committed by individuals and gangs using radio scanners to intercept dispatch orders. Some of them were just pinching business from the company in question, others were mugging or sexually assaulting the fares.
In Glasgow, a taxi driver recently had his license temporarily revoked for kicking a group of tourists out for speaking in their own language in the back of his cab.
That's not to mention the problems of uninsured drivers and excess working hours leading to dangerously tired drivers in unregulated markets. Regulating taxis and private hire vehicles certainly is a safety issue.
Nope, I don't agree at all. I have been to many cities where ride sharing is legal (such as the jeepneys of Manila). The result is more convenient travel and lower prices. Taxis are just a price fixing scam.
Ride sharing is legal in most places. It's driving for profit that's a problem. For example, the site BlaBlaCar is very popular. They allow the driver to charge money to recuperate costs, and in order to avoid anything that may be considered "profit", they limit the amount a driver can collect to the business milage rate specified by the HMRC (UK tax department). If I could claim £10 tax relief if the journey was for business purposes, then the government recognises the cost of the journey as £10.
As for competition, the problem with any unregulated market is the "drive to the bottom". Is it cheaper to hire an uninsured, inexperienced driver in an unmaintained car, or an experienced driver in a well-maintained vehicle with fully comprehensive insurance? Food regulations were first introduced in the UK to deal with "adulterated" ready-made foodstuffs during the industrial revolution. Real food was too expensive, so meat pies were padded out with sawdust -- price competition trumped quality, particularly when the negative effects weren't immediately obvious to the customer.
1) The FAA does not understand the difference between a drone (which does not require visual contact with the operator to be flown) and a toy airplane (which cannot be controlled out of sight of its operator).
Many model aircraft pilots now wear goggles and use a camera to fly by first-person-view. Raphael Pirker is one of them. This is a fairly recent development, and regulators need to adapt to it. However, for the moment, the knock-on effects in terms of range and "busy-ness" of the surrounding landscape make it a pretty practical way to make a distinction between "drone" and "model aircraft".
Not really. A model plane is not a regular aircraft, but it is an "unmanned aircraft system", and he was using it commercially i.e. to shoot an advertisement video. Sounds to me that the FAA is right to assert that this falls under their regulation.
However the article implies that there is more to the case: "As a general matter, the decision finds that the FAA's 2007 policy statement banning the commercial use of model aircraft is not enforceable". In other words, the judge didn't say that the rule was not broken, but that the rule itself is poorly drafted.
Yup. The way I read it, the judge thinks the UAV designation doesn't fit the model plane in question. I mean, the only FAA-licensed commercial drone flyer is operating over vast tracts of Arctic tundra, whereas Pirker's craft flies above him in a relatively small radius where the radio signals are received. The safety mechanisms on a long-range drone are entirely inappropriate to something that never even goes a mile away from the operator.
It makes you wonder what defines a model plane?
I could envision a big gray area surrounding that question.
That seems to be the nub of the case -- the judge seems to be of the opinion that the definition of UAV is targeted at bigger, longer range craft. If the FAA had had a specific regulation for small, short-range craft, I doubt the judgement would have favoured Pirker....
Why should buzzing a crowd be okay, but buzzing a crowd FOR PROFIT be illegal?
That's an easy one. In many fields, it is considered onerous to regulate hobbyists because the cost of registration and testing would be prohibitive. If you're making a living doing something, if you can't make enough money to cover the costs of proper training, regulation and insurance, then it's not a viable business.
Obligatory car analogy: in most places, it's legal to give your friends a lift in your car on a normal driving license, but you'll need a taxi license to take paying passengers. This, I hope you'll agree, is fair, as it aims to protect the public without encroaching on personal leisure-time liberties.
Another analogy: public parks. Many cities are now introducing bye-laws/ordnances to stop trainers running profit-making bootcamps etc without a permit. This is because these commercial users are typically much heavier users than members of the public, and therefore use up more of a limited resource, increasing grass damage and ground compaction. Even where the space isn't otherwise needed, there is still the issue of their activity and noise affecting nearby park users. Airways are also public space, and it's fair to the owners (everyone) that those extracting commercial value are controlled and perhaps even pay back in.
Note, though, that this ruling isn't about the personal use vs commercial use argument -- the judge's decision was that the regulations for UAVs are not directly relevant to model aircraft (differences in size and flight range are not inconsiderable between commercial drones and hobbyist vehicles). As such, expect to see the FAA bring in new regulations for model aircraft, categorising model aircraft by top speed, effective range, fuselage size etc.
Note also that in most countries that do have specific provisions for model aircraft, Pirker would still have been breach of the law due to the proximity to the helipad. Not only that, but FPV flying (Pirker flies with a camera and head-mounted display) is technically illegal in most jurisdictions, because the designation of model aircraft mandates that the pilot must maintain direct line-of-sight with the aircraft at all times. The need to maintain line-of-sight kept issues of range as effectively redundant in the designation of model aircraft.
Yes, the fake cost centre trick, also used as a VAT (sales tax) dodge by Amazon Europe. If I order something from Amazon, I'm buying from Amazon Europe in Luxembourg (I think) -- I am in the UK. Amazon Europe "outsources" "fulfilment" of orders to subsidiary companies. My nearest fulfilment centre is an Amazon UK one 35 miles from my home. But I'm not buying from them, oh no. I'm buying from a company in Luxembourg that never touches the stock. Nice.
Starbucks have a good scam going -- they mandate that all shops must use official Starbucks coffee that's so expensive it sucks all of the profits out of the local companies and draws it all into Switzerland. Not sure if the coffee is ever landed in Switzerland or not.
Apart from the stupid confusion of countries (oops... ignorant European that I am) that was my point. The power structures weren't dismantled in a controlled fashion, just hit with a wrecking ball, leaving a pile of rubble.
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First of all, learning and understanding what it is to be human shows that we are creatures who literally NEED to create and share.
On the other hand, it could be argued by the same token that internet sharing and lolcatz-esque memes are actually a drug that latches onto that need, corrupting it and distracting us from the act of creation by giving us a false sense of achievement through constant sharing. If we take pride in posting other people's creations, we cheat ourselves of the urge to create something unique ourselves.
After all, why should I suffer hours of preparation to put something on the net and get a few dozen views, when for a few minutes work I can copy someone else's file and get a million views?
I suspect that they use more than just a plain hash. Even if you just use hash plus explicit filesize, you've narrowed down the chance of hash collisions massively.
Variable scope is a strange concept to get used to at first. It seems cluttered if you're used to explicitly defining your variables, then having those variables only available in that function. Having variables available to scopes nested in your scope is very flexible and lends itself to writing some beautiful code.
Yes, scoping is very powerful, and almost all languages use it for very good reason. The point is that in JavaScript the easiest scope to use is the effective global one (yes, it's a property of the "window" object, but as far as the programmer's concerned, "window" is "main"). The easiest thing to use should always be the safest -- the programmer should always have to make an active choice to do something the more dangerous way.
"Environment variables" must exist, whether as a passed object (which my university lecturers favoured) or as bog-standard global variables. But as soon as environment variables are available, lazy programmers will use them as global variables. Attempting to engineer mechanisms to prevent this happening is a complete waste of time, and only makes programming more complicated. You can't just make the "wrong way" harder -- you've just got to make the right way a little easier than the wrong way. Grainger's Aurora seems to follow that principle quite well -- whereas functional programming tried to force you not to update values (destroying data) unnecessarily by making it practically impossible to do so, Grainger simply makes non-destructive data processing one step easier than destructive data processing: the only destructive action is an explicit update with the result of a non-destructive process.
The default "lazy" state is therefore the right one, so the appropriate behaviour is rewarded. Doing unnecessary destructive changes takes the programmer longer and makes the code less clear, so will naturally be avoided. But crucially, programmers are still able to do whatever they want, when they want.
A lightning collector would never gather enough power to offset the energy used in its construction.
Clouds are formed as water vapour condenses, so the local humidity decreases as the clouds form.
Hydro destroys river ecosystems. For an extreme example of the effects of damming on waterways, look at France. It's a mass of hydroelectric plants and drinking water reservoirs, and its major rivers have almost all been canalised, with a network of locks and sluices to reduce winter flow to ensure that the water level is high enough for navigation during the summer months. Fish stocks in the French rivers are dangerously low, with the Atlantic Salmon now all but unknown to French anglers.
All human activity has an impact, and there is no such thing as "clean" electricity.
Clouds are not made of water vapour, but of water. Liquid water droplets suspended in mid-air. Water vapour is a gas, and is indeed a greenhouse gas. Greenhouse gases allow certain infrared wavelengths through, but block others: specifically they allow the light of the sun in, but reflected/radiated heat from the Earth is kept in.
Indeed. The US car makers being well-known for their "gas guzzlers", so-called because of their wonderful efficiency ratings....
That's why proper art thieves always steal to order.
Or to put it another way, on the eleventh of September 2001, the world changed, and everything that was once "youthful indiscretion" is now the sign of a terminally warp mind that has as its sole aim the downfall of humanity and everything that is good in this world. It's not only the individual that suffers for this, but society as a whole - how many of the "greats" of the computer world broke systems in their school days? And now we wouldn't let them work with computers at all. No wonder technology's stagnating....
For that to hold, the company has to expressly forbid using the laptop for personal purposes, otherwise (as previous cases have ascertained), there is reasonable grounds to expect that the device will store personal information.
It buys only the state-required minimum insurance.
...quad erat demonstrandum. Let people go cheap, they'll go cheap. Remove the regulations, and they won't even have that basic level of cover.
The problem here isn't "regulation" it's "inappropriate regulation". I agree that when regulation simply protects vested interests, it's bad. But that doesn't mean we'd be better off without regulation at all.
This is a bunch of bullshit. There isn't any way to apply for a license to operate a UAV for profit legally. You can't do it even if you had all the money in the world.
There is, and the FAA note that only one company has ever been licensed.
If you had argued that that method of applying is heavy-handed or unfair... well then you'd be agreeing with the judge. I am not standing up for the current regulations -- just stating that in principle, making a distinction between amateur and professional use is perfectly justifiable.
For a long while, Scotland had controls on "hackney carriages" (taxis that pick you up off the street) but not "private hire cars" (prebooked hires). This changed when a rash of crimes were committed by individuals and gangs using radio scanners to intercept dispatch orders. Some of them were just pinching business from the company in question, others were mugging or sexually assaulting the fares.
In Glasgow, a taxi driver recently had his license temporarily revoked for kicking a group of tourists out for speaking in their own language in the back of his cab.
That's not to mention the problems of uninsured drivers and excess working hours leading to dangerously tired drivers in unregulated markets. Regulating taxis and private hire vehicles certainly is a safety issue.
PS. I see from your link that they're thinking of banning the Jeepneys due to shonky business practices. Race to the bottom...?
Nope, I don't agree at all. I have been to many cities where ride sharing is legal (such as the jeepneys of Manila). The result is more convenient travel and lower prices. Taxis are just a price fixing scam.
Ride sharing is legal in most places. It's driving for profit that's a problem. For example, the site BlaBlaCar is very popular. They allow the driver to charge money to recuperate costs, and in order to avoid anything that may be considered "profit", they limit the amount a driver can collect to the business milage rate specified by the HMRC (UK tax department). If I could claim £10 tax relief if the journey was for business purposes, then the government recognises the cost of the journey as £10.
As for competition, the problem with any unregulated market is the "drive to the bottom". Is it cheaper to hire an uninsured, inexperienced driver in an unmaintained car, or an experienced driver in a well-maintained vehicle with fully comprehensive insurance? Food regulations were first introduced in the UK to deal with "adulterated" ready-made foodstuffs during the industrial revolution. Real food was too expensive, so meat pies were padded out with sawdust -- price competition trumped quality, particularly when the negative effects weren't immediately obvious to the customer.
One of two possibilities:
1) The FAA does not understand the difference between a drone (which does not require visual contact with the operator to be flown) and a toy airplane (which cannot be controlled out of sight of its operator).
Many model aircraft pilots now wear goggles and use a camera to fly by first-person-view. Raphael Pirker is one of them. This is a fairly recent development, and regulators need to adapt to it. However, for the moment, the knock-on effects in terms of range and "busy-ness" of the surrounding landscape make it a pretty practical way to make a distinction between "drone" and "model aircraft".
That's racism, you know that right?
That was a satirical comment, you know that right? Chrisq was mocking mass hysteria....
Not really. A model plane is not a regular aircraft, but it is an "unmanned aircraft system", and he was using it commercially i.e. to shoot an advertisement video. Sounds to me that the FAA is right to assert that this falls under their regulation. However the article implies that there is more to the case: "As a general matter, the decision finds that the FAA's 2007 policy statement banning the commercial use of model aircraft is not enforceable". In other words, the judge didn't say that the rule was not broken, but that the rule itself is poorly drafted.
Yup. The way I read it, the judge thinks the UAV designation doesn't fit the model plane in question. I mean, the only FAA-licensed commercial drone flyer is operating over vast tracts of Arctic tundra, whereas Pirker's craft flies above him in a relatively small radius where the radio signals are received. The safety mechanisms on a long-range drone are entirely inappropriate to something that never even goes a mile away from the operator.
It makes you wonder what defines a model plane? I could envision a big gray area surrounding that question.
That seems to be the nub of the case -- the judge seems to be of the opinion that the definition of UAV is targeted at bigger, longer range craft. If the FAA had had a specific regulation for small, short-range craft, I doubt the judgement would have favoured Pirker....
Why should buzzing a crowd be okay, but buzzing a crowd FOR PROFIT be illegal?
That's an easy one. In many fields, it is considered onerous to regulate hobbyists because the cost of registration and testing would be prohibitive. If you're making a living doing something, if you can't make enough money to cover the costs of proper training, regulation and insurance, then it's not a viable business.
Obligatory car analogy: in most places, it's legal to give your friends a lift in your car on a normal driving license, but you'll need a taxi license to take paying passengers. This, I hope you'll agree, is fair, as it aims to protect the public without encroaching on personal leisure-time liberties.
Another analogy: public parks. Many cities are now introducing bye-laws/ordnances to stop trainers running profit-making bootcamps etc without a permit. This is because these commercial users are typically much heavier users than members of the public, and therefore use up more of a limited resource, increasing grass damage and ground compaction. Even where the space isn't otherwise needed, there is still the issue of their activity and noise affecting nearby park users. Airways are also public space, and it's fair to the owners (everyone) that those extracting commercial value are controlled and perhaps even pay back in.
Note, though, that this ruling isn't about the personal use vs commercial use argument -- the judge's decision was that the regulations for UAVs are not directly relevant to model aircraft (differences in size and flight range are not inconsiderable between commercial drones and hobbyist vehicles). As such, expect to see the FAA bring in new regulations for model aircraft, categorising model aircraft by top speed, effective range, fuselage size etc.
Note also that in most countries that do have specific provisions for model aircraft, Pirker would still have been breach of the law due to the proximity to the helipad. Not only that, but FPV flying (Pirker flies with a camera and head-mounted display) is technically illegal in most jurisdictions, because the designation of model aircraft mandates that the pilot must maintain direct line-of-sight with the aircraft at all times. The need to maintain line-of-sight kept issues of range as effectively redundant in the designation of model aircraft.
Yes, the fake cost centre trick, also used as a VAT (sales tax) dodge by Amazon Europe. If I order something from Amazon, I'm buying from Amazon Europe in Luxembourg (I think) -- I am in the UK. Amazon Europe "outsources" "fulfilment" of orders to subsidiary companies. My nearest fulfilment centre is an Amazon UK one 35 miles from my home. But I'm not buying from them, oh no. I'm buying from a company in Luxembourg that never touches the stock. Nice.
Starbucks have a good scam going -- they mandate that all shops must use official Starbucks coffee that's so expensive it sucks all of the profits out of the local companies and draws it all into Switzerland. Not sure if the coffee is ever landed in Switzerland or not.
As another poster commented -- it doesn't mean much in the abstract. Make an example of a well-known company, and people can relate to it better.
Apart from the stupid confusion of countries (oops... ignorant European that I am) that was my point. The power structures weren't dismantled in a controlled fashion, just hit with a wrecking ball, leaving a pile of rubble.