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User: ebrandsberg

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  1. Source of information is questionable on New Study Shows Marijuana Users Have Low Blood Flow To the Brain (eurekalert.org) · · Score: 5, Informative

    The Amen clinics have been accused of using questionable techniques (https://www.quackwatch.org/06ResearchProjects/amen.html and others, just google for information on them). This isn't to say that the data isn't true, but this result hasn't been confirmed by replication of the results by other researchers or more accurate scanning methods.

  2. Re:The popular vote plurality does not matter on Google Surfaces Fake News About Election Results (theverge.com) · · Score: 2

    And what of the people living in Rural NY State? Won't they be lumped together with the people in NYC? This is a bogus argument.

  3. Re:this has happened many times at Northrop Grumma on The NHS's 1.2 Million Employees Are Trapped in a 'Reply-All' Email Thread (businessinsider.com) · · Score: 1

    Back in I think 1996, when I was in the Air Force, a contractor sent to everybody on base the dancing baby animation. I think it was several megabytes in size. Nobody even had to reply to it for the mail system to crash.

  4. Re:The problem is the battery itself on Replacement Samsung Galaxy Note 7 Phone Catches Fire on Southwest Plane (theverge.com) · · Score: 1

    The phone had been turned off, and the plane hadn't departed yet. Also, the user had only used wireless charging previously (per the article).

  5. Re:happened to me on Cisco Blamed A Router Bug On 'Cosmic Radiation' (networkworld.com) · · Score: 1

    On a related note, there is the infamous (in narrow circles) issue of the serial consoles on old Unix systems. Many had an option to "press any key for boot menu" on the serial console. The problem was that the serial consoles would get enough static interference to occasionally detect a character while this option was available, and it would halt the boot process. On a datacenter reboot (usually due to power loss), a handful of servers would never come up because of this. It was far more reliable to require a particular character to be received to break the boot sequence, although there is a risk that even that could be triggered, but FAR less often.

  6. Re:And they chose a "worst case" time to do it! on Uber Starts Self Driving Car Pickups In Pittsburgh (techcrunch.com) · · Score: 1

    Not to mention the gridlock due to the Liberty Bridge fire and closure, if they work this week, I'll be impressed.

  7. Re:Not a taxi service huh? on Uber Starts Self Driving Car Pickups In Pittsburgh (techcrunch.com) · · Score: 1

    They aren't charging for this service when using these cars at this point. They are testing, and the rides are free. Your point is valid in the future however.

  8. What is the point to this? on Stanford Engineers Propose A Technology To Break The Net Neutrality Deadlock (phys.org) · · Score: 1

    This basically sounds like QoS, where if there is network congestion, certain traffic can be prioritized over other traffic. If there isn't congestion, I honestly don't see what the point is to this besides to get funding to develop this "ground breaking" technology from investors. The entire reason why ISPs want to break net neutrality is to get additional revenue streams from content providers to make their services more enticing over competition to the eyeballs served by the ISP. The description of this technology seems to violate the entire reason for net neutrality to be violated in the first place.

  9. Can you name one open water swimmer who won a medal in any prior Olympics? How about for Crew? I would say your long-term health isn't worth the financial benefits that the Rio open water sports provides you: http://moneyramblings.com/money-olympic-athletes-earn/.

  10. Re:Surprise! on Mozilla Seeks New Home For Email Client Thunderbird · · Score: 1

    This is why my mother-in-law uses it. It doesn't change without reason, and it just works for her. Too much software changes too often "just because". A long-term stable client is just what she needs.

  11. Re:270% efficiency on Gov't Researchers Develop Wireless Car Chargers That Are Faster Than Plug-ins (computerworld.com) · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If it charges at 3x the rate, that implies it's ability to pull power is at least 3x what the wired charger is pulling, and it would have to pull that from... a wired connection. This implies the main problem is that the car interface is simply designed to run at a lower power level than this wireless design, and this could be corrected by bumping up the wired interface charge capacity. This is just a case of leapfrogging specs, nothing more.

  12. Since they offshore the profit anyway... on Tim Cook: What's Good For the US Dollar Is Bad For Apple · · Score: 1

    why does it matter? If they are taking the dollars, converting them into Euros to pass through Ireland for their tax scam, then sending it down to the Cayman Islands, a strong dollar just means it converts into more Euros, right?

  13. Re:The tech was never important to me. on Allegations of Data Manipulation At Theranos (wsj.com) · · Score: 3, Informative

    The tech is actually already cheap. A local hospital performs a 35 point blood screening with most of the commonly done tests twice a year for $40 a shot, and they do this as a FUND RAISER. A link to the event from earlier this year (although very short on details): http://www.topofwv.com/ai1ec_event/blood-analysis-weirton-medical-center-2/?instance_id=

    The reason that the tests are so expensive in the Dr's office is that they run each one as a distinct test vs. using bulk analysis. They should NEVER just do a "cholesterol" test, but it is more profitable if they split it up.

  14. Re:While not an expert on Maybe You Don't Need 8 Hours of Sleep After All (theatlantic.com) · · Score: 1

    There is also an important issue about genetics. Some people don't require as much sleep as others: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/sleep-newzzz/201104/could-you-be-super-sleeper. I would have to ask--did they test if the people studied had genetic markers that flagged that they don't need as much sleep?

  15. People isn't the issue, farming is on How California Is Winning the Drought · · Score: 5, Insightful

    California cities and towns only get 10% of the water. Farmland gets 80% (or somewhat less depending on how you account for it), yet only produces 2% of the state's GDP. The problem is that they are STILL growing the size of the agriculture sector, planting more almond trees for example, even while the existing almond trees are dying from salt poisoning. The reason the overall GDP hasn't been hurt yet is due to the fact that so much of the water is used for so little of the state's income. When the groundwater is all gone due to lack of planning, things may actually change.

  16. This is a good point. If it is significantly more expensive, say 1GB of this as a write buffer on a large SSD drive will make the NAND drive last nearly forever, as frequent writes can be buffered and only written to the nand when necessary. The biggest issue with NAND is when software constantly writes to the disk, and pushes the write wearing logic to the limit.

  17. Re:Blimey on German Scientists Confirm NASA's Controversial EM Drive · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You aren't following what he is saying--the research is saying is that THERE IS NO REACTION MASS. Per current physics, this device can't exist. That is why this is so big. No current physics explains it. It is not the opposite of a solar said, since the microwaves don't actual exit the device. If this device works, it does change everything, if only to point to new physics.

  18. The whole issue is going to get worse for Taxis on Uber Faces $410 Million Canadian Class Action Suit · · Score: 1

    Once automated cars are in place, companies can simply become dispatching services for privately owned cars. Don't want to pay for parking in the city after your car drops you off at work? Let it drive around town and make money for you, then pick you up at the end of the day to drive you home. Then, it can pickup your neighbors as they leave the local bar at night, and it is ready for you, charged up in the morning.

    The taxi industry has at most 5-10 years left in it. They should be petitioning that dispatch services need to own taxi medallion rights in order to dispatch for the next 10-15 years, so they can at least recoup some of their investment on the medallions by selling them to the new dispatch services.

  19. Re:Eliminate all tax withholding on FCC Proposes To Extend So-Called "Obamaphone" Program To Broadband · · Score: 1

    While most people will have no idea what you are talking about, the issue here is that there are "employment taxes" that are paid on a hidden side of your paycheck that covers social security and medicare that an employer needs to cover. These are the employer side of of the "payroll taxes". I agree that these should all be displayed on paychecks--100% of the cost that an employer is covering should be on the paycheck, taxable or not, simply so that an employee can understand what their benefits are and how much the company is paying to employ them. This should include if they provide lunch, snacks, etc. Nothing should be hidden--all costs for an employee's benefits should to the best of the companies ability be shown on a paycheck.

  20. Re:But I love it when slides are read to me on Why PowerPoint Should Be Banned · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The problem isn't that they are crappy presentations. It is how they are being TAUGHT to present. Sales people are intentionally leaving out information and glossing over facts, because facts can lose a deal. Oh, there are some major cases that some piece of software doesn't handle? Don't present that, that goes in a footnote in the readme file tucked away somewhere. Presentations where products are concerned are drafted and built to never EVER loose a customer, only convince people that the product is the best thing since sliced bread. They are designed to not raise questions, or inform beyond a simplified message. The product isn't the issue--it is how people are being trained to use it, and changing the way a message is presented won't change the message.

  21. from what I read... on Epic's VR Demo Scene For the GTX 980 Now Runs On Morpheus PS4 Headset At 60 FPS · · Score: 1

    the GTX 980 was doing 90 fps without 2 years of optimization while the PS4 is now doing 60fps. Now, they are extrapolating the 60fps to 120fps for VR. From the article:

    "But now Showdown can run flawlessly at 60 FPS on Sony’s Morpheus headset for PS4, says J.J. Hoesing, Senior Engine Programmer on Epic’s VR Team. The demo of course takes advantage of Sony’s ‘asynchronous reprojection’ technique to ultimately output at 120 FPS."

    Translation: Two eyes means two frames, so you get 120fps from 60fps. Right?

  22. Re:Wait, what? Even in offline mode? on iOS WiFi Bug Allows Remote Reboot of All Devices In Area · · Score: 2

    I would agree that this is very much the more interesting point, that if you have turned off the antennas, it is still listening. NSA, is this a feature for you?

  23. Re:There is other evidence on Sewage Bacteria Reveal Cities' Obesity Rates · · Score: 3, Informative

    The opposite has also been observed (http://gizmodo.com/the-secret-to-weight-loss-might-be-poop-transplants-fro-1265888152). As someone who is married to someone who has struggled with her weight for all her life, and has done everything including a strict 1000 calorie diet with very little results, I KNOW there is more to it than "just don't eat as much". The people that don't have the issue or haven't lived with it don't understand the issue, and assume that "it is their fault".

  24. Re: skynet on Should We Really Try To Teach Everyone To Code? · · Score: 1

    I'm currently in the process of building a company, and have the advantage of utilizing student labor as part of the development process. How I handled this was that I actually developed a template but static HTML website that provided the UI that I wanted. I then NEXT developed the "help page" for the UI, to explain how the interface worked in great detail. What I found vs. prior development was that be specifying how the UI should work from the user's perspective, things worked well. The things that broke were where my help documentation wasn't accurate enough. Develop your user documentation first, and the visual UI, and you may find the developers can figure out things from there.

  25. Re:Cause JP Morgan did 2 factor so well... on Why Gmail Has Better Security Than Your Bank · · Score: 1

    You do know that this was about system administration and not access to user accounts, and it was the LACK of two factor on a system that resulted in a hole. This actually supports the assertion that everybody should be using it.