Hohmann transfers are a typical low-energy trajectory used when going to Mars. See this site for an easy tool to generate a time-table for leaving from Earth and arriving at Mars. The next good time for departure is July 9th, 2005, and you arrive on March 25th, 2006, taking approximately 6 and a half months. Of course, then you'd have to stay on Mars for the next window if you really wanted to be thrifty.
There are other faster alternatives that use more energy, and not all of these are prohibitively expensive.
I used to work at a fairly small company (less than 30 employees), and the "help desk" (customer service) reps were quite talented. I don't know what their degrees were in (or if they had degrees), but I'm fairly certain they weren't in computer science. This didn't matter since their job was to know how to properly use the product, not how to fix it. (When that became necessary, they passed the issues over to us, the developers.) Many of these employees seemed happy with their job and didn't seem to be just biding their time until they could find a "real" job. I would not qualify any of them as the "would you like fries with that" crowd.
Having said that, I do agree that if someone with a Ph.D. comes along, it's probably worth the risk of hiring him/her. Who knows what fresh ideas they'll bring with them. It's also possible that this is someone who hates the work of job hunting and will stay with you rather than spend time looking for another job. (I know someone like this, who is a hard worker, but just doesn't want to put forth the effort during his free time to find a job worthy of his education.)
They're battery powered, and these type of devices (Google on "deeply embedded networks") are typically turned on/off based on varying criteria in order to conserve power. To extend battery power, you can add more devices and use less frequent "on" cycles. Nevertheless, it would be very unlikely that they've been there since 1988 since (1) the technology is younger than that, and of course (2) the batteries are very unlikely to last that long. My impression is that the devices either have not been actually implanted yet, or have just been implanted. (I must have read a different article than you, because I saw no mention of 1988.)
The interesting cases will be bulk mailings by political partisans.
Presumably, these are bulk mailings being sent out by one politician spoofing as the other. At least I know that a bulk mailing would be the surest way to turn me against a particular candiate.
I'm fairly certain it's the uploading they're concerned with, and not the downloading. So, if you choose to share your music/movies with others, they can find you. If you make it impossible for them to find you, you will make it impossible for others to find you. Hence, you won't really be sharing anything. Naturally, you can still share with friends by e-mailing them the name of the file to download, etc., but that will greatly reduce the branching factor that the RIAA is so concerned about.
Re:Wait... so you're telling me...
on
A New Ice Age?
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· Score: 1
"The attitude of a lot of people here on Slashdot with regards to global warming amazes me. This is something that could possibly devastate society as we know it, perhaps not for us, but for our children or our children's children, but there's a great many people who either dismiss it as never going to happen or something that can be easily controlled without any major shifts in lifestyle or attitude."
But people on/. aren't the type who reproduce...
(Obviously, I'm being satirical.)
Slashdot Mirror
If you outlaw digital copying, then only criminals will have digital copies.
Hohmann transfers are a typical low-energy trajectory used when going to Mars. See this site for an easy tool to generate a time-table for leaving from Earth and arriving at Mars. The next good time for departure is July 9th, 2005, and you arrive on March 25th, 2006, taking approximately 6 and a half months. Of course, then you'd have to stay on Mars for the next window if you really wanted to be thrifty.
There are other faster alternatives that use more energy, and not all of these are prohibitively expensive.
I used to work at a fairly small company (less than 30 employees), and the "help desk" (customer service) reps were quite talented. I don't know what their degrees were in (or if they had degrees), but I'm fairly certain they weren't in computer science. This didn't matter since their job was to know how to properly use the product, not how to fix it. (When that became necessary, they passed the issues over to us, the developers.) Many of these employees seemed happy with their job and didn't seem to be just biding their time until they could find a "real" job. I would not qualify any of them as the "would you like fries with that" crowd.
Having said that, I do agree that if someone with a Ph.D. comes along, it's probably worth the risk of hiring him/her. Who knows what fresh ideas they'll bring with them. It's also possible that this is someone who hates the work of job hunting and will stay with you rather than spend time looking for another job. (I know someone like this, who is a hard worker, but just doesn't want to put forth the effort during his free time to find a job worthy of his education.)
They're battery powered, and these type of devices (Google on "deeply embedded networks") are typically turned on/off based on varying criteria in order to conserve power. To extend battery power, you can add more devices and use less frequent "on" cycles. Nevertheless, it would be very unlikely that they've been there since 1988 since (1) the technology is younger than that, and of course (2) the batteries are very unlikely to last that long. My impression is that the devices either have not been actually implanted yet, or have just been implanted. (I must have read a different article than you, because I saw no mention of 1988.)
Presumably, these are bulk mailings being sent out by one politician spoofing as the other. At least I know that a bulk mailing would be the surest way to turn me against a particular candiate.
I'm fairly certain it's the uploading they're concerned with, and not the downloading. So, if you choose to share your music/movies with others, they can find you. If you make it impossible for them to find you, you will make it impossible for others to find you. Hence, you won't really be sharing anything. Naturally, you can still share with friends by e-mailing them the name of the file to download, etc., but that will greatly reduce the branching factor that the RIAA is so concerned about.
"The attitude of a lot of people here on Slashdot with regards to global warming amazes me. This is something that could possibly devastate society as we know it, perhaps not for us, but for our children or our children's children, but there's a great many people who either dismiss it as never going to happen or something that can be easily controlled without any major shifts in lifestyle or attitude." But people on /. aren't the type who reproduce...
(Obviously, I'm being satirical.)