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User: Jon+Luckey

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Comments · 208

  1. Got to go on New Wonder Weed to Fuel Cars? · · Score: 2, Funny

    "Jatropha, an ugly, fast-growing and poisonous weed that has been used as a remedy for constipation...

    I can hardly wait to be stuck in a traffic jam where the smog could instill yet another kind of 'need to go' to the situation.

  2. Re:Oh Please on Nuclear Info Kept From Congress and the Public · · Score: 4, Informative

    We are supposed to believe that 9 gallons of enriched Uranium won't go into chain reaction but if you spill it onto a floor where it spreads out the chances of a chain reaction increases?

    No, we're supposed to believe that an improperly sealed transfer line could allow sufficent uranium to accumulate in two possible places over the course of multiple transfer operations.

    Report PDF

  3. Re:When you buy a new PC... on Man Sues Gateway Because He Can't Read EULA · · Score: 4, Funny

    ... that have the EULA in print?

    Actually, thanks to this guy, every Gateway purchaser will have to listen to a .WAV of the EULA played through the speakers (including the motherboard P.O.S.T speaker) as well as read it on the screen.

  4. Teddy Bear Head on "Bear" Robot to Rescue Wounded Troops · · Score: 1

    Looks like someone was recalling the pictures of Harry F Harlows famous experiments with monkeys feeling loved, comforted and unthreatened.

    If they'd READ about his experiments, they'd have covered the robot in comfy cuddly cloth.

    Then again that might br hard to keep clean under battlefield conditions

  5. Re:E-MAIL????? on Microsoft Details FOSS Patent Breaches · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'm wondering what patents Microsoft could be holding regarding email, which is several decades older than Microsoft itself.

    Maybe they patented automatic execution of trojan programs, when email is displayed in a preview pane.

    I'm pretty sure they came up with that first.

  6. Results of data mining on NY Times To Data-Mine Its Visitors · · Score: 1

    FROM: IT Data Mining Project
    TO: Marketing
    RE: VIP!

    Just a quick preliminary result that is too important to wait for the offical report.

    One of our readers, 'Anonymous7' is virtually a demographic by him/herself.

    Uses the internet from all over the world, on thousands of machines, reading our paper hundreds of times a day!

    Surely this person must have a major impact on data processing purchases worldwide.

    Surprising though, the person seems naive, computer security wise, because their password is the same as their user name.

    Leverage our connection to this VIP with our advertisers at once!

  7. Re:The arresting officers on Student Arrested for Writing Essay · · Score: 2, Funny

    Ok, this is the essay in question.

    Could have been worse.... It might have mentioned ZOMBIES!

  8. Google parallel on Students Sue Anti-Plagiarism Service · · Score: 1

    IANAL, but I don't see turnitin making copies, but they are using a copy given to them.

    Google's main product is searching web sites. Therefore it has to read in sites and construct a search database for them. It doesn't have to distribute copies (leave aside that they sort of do by having an option for you to get the cached copy from them). Their product is basically a search against a database they have stored internally. Certainly the 'fair use'-ish extracts help the user quickly prune the resulting data, But thats not the main part of the search.

    Turnitin may not even expose the cache they search from even to the extent Google does, so they are not making copies. They are using copies. Who made thos copies? The teachers submitting the papers to Turnitin, by the act of transmitting them to Turnitin. Perhaps that copying gets a pass under 'Educational Use'.

    But if Turnitin get tagged for this, It may set a precident that could be used against google.

  9. Re:Come on MPAA... on MPAA Fires Back at AACS Decryption Utility · · Score: 1

    As long as I can point a camera at my TV, or a microphone next to my speakers, copy protection is just not going to work

    Don't think they're not working on that too.

    Basically they want to have your cameras and microphones detect when they are sensing restricted content, then shut themselves off.

    So when you are trying to record baby's first steps, and the camera shuts down because Starwars is playing on the living room TV, oh well, too bad.

  10. Re:please... on Vanishing Honeybees Will Affect Future Crops · · Score: 1
    In english: The bees help the plants have sex.

    "It's not such a bad life", thought the tree. "Sun. Fresh air. Time to
    think. Bees, too, in the spring."

    There was something lascivious about the way the tree said "bees" that
    quite put Granny, who had several hives, off the idea of honey. It was like
    being reminded that eggs were unborn chickens.

    -- Terry Pratchett, Equal Rites
  11. Re:Aren't there laws against this? on Software Deletes Files to Defend Against Piracy · · Score: 1

    Wiring your car seat to injure a car thief sounds like a good idea until it inadvertently blows the ass off a parking valet, that towtruck driver who's trying to help you out of the ditch, or perhaps your own teenage daughter who you asked to please move the car into the garage, sweetie...

    This is why you should use Trunk Monkey

  12. Re:bullshit or not on Google Apps Premier Edition Launches, Widely Used · · Score: 1

    English doesn't have a unique word for libre (e.g. free as in freedom). So I use libre instead

    unencumbered.

    But 'unencumbered software movement' sounds more like a description of comfortable underwear than a politcal philosophy regarding computer programs.

  13. "aside from generating press coverage" on John Edwards' Campaign Enters Second Life · · Score: 3, Funny

    John Edward's Second Life Campaign Headquarters Griefed

    MPGs at 11.

  14. Re:wireless fences on Using Technology to Improve Kindergarten? · · Score: 1

    You mean besides wireless fences, right?

    If you are using a proper Skinner box as your teaching technology, a wireless fence would be redundant.

  15. Re:9/11 caused net stoppage on Bird Flu Pandemic Could Choke the Net · · Score: 1

    ...the daughter of that friend came up and said that some airplane crashed into the wtc. i just shrugged and went on websurfing. nothing was slower than usual at all.

    Let me guess...

    http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&edition=us&q=my .pet.goat&btnG=Search

  16. Re:The important part is the proof! on To Media Companies, BitTorrent Implies Guilt · · Score: 1

    They use a Neb-Bot to scan ant automatically send accusations (a few dollars a day), then you and your service provider sorts it out. The time and cost is moved from them to others

    They probably do do this. And I hope that someday someone starts a business with a business plan similar to this (after running it by a lawyer of course):

    1) Make a DIXV consisting of a 'Fair Use' sized clip of a work, followed by a 115 minute review/dicussion of the work in question, by definition their own copyrightable work independent of the copyright of the work reviewed.

    2) Have a technically proficient Notary Public (or such) review the DIVX and determine the exact hash it would have under bit torrent. Witness and date that fact.

    3) Put up DIVX as torrent via a friendly ISP including in the name the work being reviewd. Keep a log to prove that the file being shared is always the one witnessed in step 2.

    4) Wait for take down notice by bot. ISP shuts down torrent.

    5) DIVX owner sends letter to sue ISP for big bucks.

    6) ISP official notes that DIVX is not what notice giver claimed it was. Making it actionable under DMCA Section 512 (f)

    7) ISP sues notice giver under DMCA 512 (f)

    8a) if win, PROFIT! ISP keeps 'fee', DIVX owner gets award.

    8b) if lose, ISP officially apologizes to DIVX owner. Owner accepts and settles for $1 out of court.

    It'd be the notice giver's own fault for losing if they did not take due dilligence for checking what they wanted taken down before makeing the misrepresentive claim. The cheap 'bot' solution would no longer be cheap.

  17. Re:Invalid metaphor on To Media Companies, BitTorrent Implies Guilt · · Score: 1

    can you do something questionably legal just so you can say "I'm just trying to catch people doing illegal things?

    Things technically legal, yes. Because by definition you can do legal things even if people question it.

    And basically isn't that exactly the sort of thing investigative reporters are famous for, setting traps for the unscupulous?

  18. Re:Invalid metaphor on To Media Companies, BitTorrent Implies Guilt · · Score: 3, Insightful

    There was nothing legal about the torrents he joined with his modified client -- he was joining torrents for copyrighted material and got the notices

    Yet the very people who sent him the notices had agents also joined to that swarm. Applying your suggested standard would mean they were breaking the law. (actually that case is arguable, since sending false DMCA takedown notices is a violation in the DCMA too)

    I could easily see the experimenter claiming he was doing exactly the same thing as BayTSP, collecting data on BitTorrent swarms without actually sharing files. I suggest that he could even offer the data collected for sale. Say like (pinkie to smirked lips) $1 Million Dollars per IP address to establish his Bono Fides. :)

  19. Re:I can't see this really working... on Public Iris Scanning Device In the Works · · Score: 2, Insightful

    now, can you imagine a person's irises taking up more than 1% of the width of the picture, unless it were a rather close "headshot" type pose

    Ah, we're all safe until someone invents robotically aimed telephoto cameras.

    How hard is that?

  20. Alternate injection route on Remote Exploit of Vista Speech Control · · Score: 1

    So lets say guy leaves his Vista machine on 24/7 for 'Instant On' internet access.

    Evil dude calls guy when not home. Answering machine picks up, also playing sound outload in guy's house.

    Evil Dude: "FORMAT SEE COLON (pause) YES"

    two chances to initate exploit. Once during the call, and one when guy checks messages.

  21. Could be worse on Diebold Security Foiled Again · · Score: 1

    It could have been this Diebold key that provided access

    http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&lr= &q=GS-567331-1000_d.jpg&btnG=Search

    At least with the key under discussion, one had to do some metal work to duplicate it from a photo.

    For the key in that image, I suspect that the same trick using a bic pen to open that kind of lock would work.

    Hmm.... I wonder what that GS-567331 was supposed to open..... The page isn't working right now :)

  22. Re:Don't tell Microsoft! on Apple Charges For 802.11n, Blames Accounting Law · · Score: 5, Funny

    Microsoft add new features too. The security centre & windows firewall for one example.

    Wait! You forgot the most important new feature of all: Windows Genuine Advantage®

    Hard to picture how we could get along without it, these days.

  23. Error on 3D Printers To Build Houses · · Score: 1

    PC LOADWAL?

    What the $&%#%@ does that mean?!?!

  24. Re:Cool... hope it didn't cost too much on Pillars of Creation Destroyed · · Score: 1

    something, if they do it freely, they benefit from for what ever reason.

    So your claim apparenltly is that if a compulsive gambler, loses all his money, loses his job, his home, lets his family go into desperation, and dies penniless in a gutter leaving all his responsibilities for someone else to clean up after, it is somehow a 'benefit' because he was free to it?

    Mighty harsh defintion for a word derived from the latin for "good deed"

  25. Re:Cool... hope it didn't cost too much on Pillars of Creation Destroyed · · Score: 1

    In fact as it is being funded using tax you can 100% guarantee the benefits don't out weigh the costs, else you wouldn't need to force people to hand over their hard earned money, they would do it willingly.

    I think perhaps your model of human nature needs some work. After all, casinos make thier money by offering a service such that statistically benefits do not outweigh the costs. The so called "house percentage".

    And yet many people clamor to avail themselves of this service, gambling.

    So why can't the opposite case exist? Where the benefits do outweigh the costs, but some people try to weasel out of thier share of the cost.

    Want a more concrete example? A vaccination program can effectively eradicate a disease. (such as has been done Smallpox). So the smart choice is to have the program, right? Of course there will be some people who have a bad reaction to the shot, but the cost in human suffering would be less than not having the program at all.

    But unfortunately, some people will not see the decision matrix as VACCINATE/NOT VACCINATE, but as VACCINATE/NOT VACCINATE/VACCINATE EVERYONE BUT ME. For an individual, Option 3 is best, because it has the advantages of having the program, yet avoids the possibility of an adverse reaction. But if many people try for option 3, it becomes effectively option 2.

    So then force logically gets involved, even if its just 'Keep away from my family (who may be too young to get vaccinated yet) or I'll use force, you potentially contaminated unvaccinated SOB.'