I think it's a bit different from DejaNews for a few reasons.
With all due respect, I think you're looking at Usenet through a post-DejaNews filter. I spent a lot of time on Usenet back then, and, honestly, the discussions sound exactly the same to me.
While people understood that anybody could save a post that they were interested in, nobody anticipated that anybody could save Usenet in its entirety. Just as on IRC, anybody could save any transcript that they want to—that is not what's disconcerting. Usenet was understood to be an ephemeral medium; news servers had a capacity of a few days to a month or so, and after that your words were gone (again, with the exception of people going out of their way to save bits and pieces). Nobody used to worry about what they said on Usenet showing up when employers did background checks, etc.
And your objection that the IRC effort was clandestine... DejaNews was the same way. They pieced together old archives from various news servers, and were doing it without warning. By the time anyone knew about DejaNews, they had an archive going back years. (And, don't forget, posting under your real, full name and real email address was routine back then.)
But it was designed in the 1970s and the world has moved forward a bit, and with IRC being design by commitee, IRC just hasn't kept up.
I think by "1970s" you mean 1988, and by "commitee" you mean "a guy".
Anyway, didn't anyone learn from DejaNews? The response to this IRC transcript thing sounds exactly the same as when people on Usenet suddenly discovered that the stuff they wrote on their "ephemeral" public medium was being archived.
Facebook or Skype, I'm getting bored with all of the 'users opt in to closed system, are surprised when it acts in the interests of those who run it rather than those who use it' stories.
If you don't like it, you could always stop reading Slashdot.
I'm still waiting for the time when I send in an email and actually get an answer back that has anything to do with what I asked.
I've had no problem with Netflix in this regard. Here is an example dialog:
Me:
I'm fortunate to work near a big USPS processing plant, so I return my movies using the blue mailboxes there. They provide three mailboxes, labeled as follows: * METERED * LETTERS * LARGE ENVELOPES
Which of these should I be using to return movies? I've been putting them in the "LETTERS" box, and they've gotten to you promptly, but I'm not sure it's the right choice, and I don't want to disgruntle any postal workers.
Their response:
Hi Xxxxxx,
Thanks for your inquiry.
That is a great question. Though I have found that any of those options will work, we recommend dropping them in the "Letters" drop off. This will insure that it goes through the proper channels.
Thank you again for contacting us.
If you have any further questions or concerns, please feel free to contact us.
Thanks, Xxxxxx Netflix Customer Service
The response was relevant, and I got the impression that a human actually read my question. This has rarely happened to me with other companies.
As far as I can tell this does not apply to handheld cameras in any way, so tourist activity should be unaffected.
Why on earth do you presume that "tourists" don't use tripods? What about somebody doing macro photography of flowers or insects in Central Park, for example?
The hassle of resetting the date every time is widely compensated by that warm feeling you get when you notice that your microwave has adjusted the time on it's own...
Actually, that warm feeling is the door seals leaking.
"Google takes the position that everything may be freely copied unless the copyright owner notifies Google and tells it to stop," Mr. Rubin said. Microsoft, he said, asks the copyright's owner for permission first.
I just checked search.msn.com and it has a cached copy of my webpages. I don't remember Microsoft asking me for permission. (Not that I mind, but it's at odds with Rubin's statement.)
If push came to shove and people really wanted the benefits of gas flames for cooking, what about building a hydrogen stove that electrolyzes water on the spot? You'll use electric power albeit less efficiently, yet you'll have the fast heat that can be applied to any surface from a flame.
It would be simpler just to buy an electric induction cooktop, which already exists, and and has a very fast response time, like gas. There are some limitations, like the pots having to be made of compatible materials, but most of the better cookware lines are designed to work.
Thus, a good approximation (I don't claim it to be the most accurate) of its associated error is 1/sqrt(x), and thus x +- x/sqrt(x) is a proper way for indicating the average x. In this specific case, it is 13600 +- ~110.
That doesn't make sense. The dimensions don't work out; you get miles +/- sqrt(miles), suggesting an error. Suppose their results to different units: "Americans drove an average of 71,808,000 feet in 2005, or 264,000 feet less than in 2004." Now, your estimate of the error is 1/sqrt(71,808,000) = 1.18e-4, and x/sqrt(x) = sqrt(x) = 8473. Since 264,000 / 8,473 = 31.1, we would conclude that it's a 31-sigma result. Same data, just expressed in different units, but a completely different conclusion. Obviously, something's wrong.
What you seem to be thinking of is the fact that if you make N measurements of a quantity, each of which has an independent, normally-distributed error of sigma_x, and average those measurements, the standard deviation of the error in the mean will be sigma_x/sqrt(N). Note that N is dimensionless, so sqrt(N) is also dimensionless, so the units of this expression are the same as sigma_x, and hence the same as the quantity we're measuring.
Thus, the statistical error in the number reported here depends on the error in a single measurement (which could be taken to be the standard deviation of the number of miles people different people drive in a year) divided by the square root of the number of people participating in the survey.
(Another possibility is that you're somehow thinking that distance driven is a Poisson process, but that doesn't make a lot of sense, since this isn't a counting problem. The fact that "distance driven" has units should make it pretty clear that Poisson statistics don't apply here.)
The USA is large, many are satisfied with exploring the internal variation and never ventures abroad (bar the occasional mexico/Canada vacation.
On a related note, I would point out that US workers get much less vacation time on average than Europeans. Among blue-collar workers, it is not unusual to get no paid leave, and even workers in well-paying salaried positions may get only 2-3 weeks of paid leave per year, which must be used for all time off, including illness, doctor's appointments, staying home for the plumber, etc. Because of the short duration of our vacations, many Americans are reluctant to travel overseas due to the expense and time of travel. It's hard losing three days of your vacation to flights and jet lag if you're only taking 7-10 days total.
And, as you say, many will be happy with the internal variation of the country. My list of places to see in California alone is constantly growing, not shrinking. (This is not to dismiss the value of overseas travel; I have certainly enjoyed my few trips to Europe, including my honeymoon.)
Ah, I see. The law requires a fee to be collected from the consumer at time of purchase. The post I was responding to made it sound like a fee was collected at time of disposal (I still read it that way).
The governator passed legislation that requires special disposal of the afforementioned products and of course, that disposal requires a fee that the consumer must pay.
I think you're misinformed. Last weekend, I took two CRTs and two UPSs to the e-Waste collection center at my city's landfill, and there was no fee whatsoever. There may be a fee where you live, but I don't think it's mandated by legislation.
There are lots of physics things that I'd like money to be spent on: space elvators, blimps, levies (nah no one is interested in keeping the waves out), http://www.monolithicdome.com/ , sustainable housing, and "alt" energy.
Who are these moderators and where do they come from? The post was obviously "funny" and not "insightful". Do these moderators actually think the mars rovers were created by aliens? If the rovers were not created by aliens, then I think it's safe to say, human traffic exists on Mars.
No, they're working around a perceived deficiency in Slashdot's moderation system. A "Funny +1" moderation doesn't increase the poster's karma, but an "Insightful +1" moderation does. This inconsistency can also lead to things like a poster's karma going down for getting both a "Funny +1" and "Overrated -1" moderation, just because two moderators disagree; many moderators consider this to be unfair.
Standard unleaded in the UK is 95 octane, which is a lot higher than the US I think.
Higher, but not by as much as it sounds. Different measurement methods (RON vs. R+M/2) are used in the two countries, so you can't compare the numbers directly.
If they did that, we'd end up with surgeons refusing to set the dinner table at home because it reminds them of work. Think of the consequences!
I was in the hospital over Thanksgiving one year, recovering from surgery. On Thanksgiving Day, my surgeon came in to check on her patients. I asked her if it was her job to carve the turkey for dinner. She said, "No, I'm too picky. I only use German instruments."
Slashdot Mirror
The date in the headline is early Thursday morning (03:30) UTC. That's Wednesday evening in the United States.
With all due respect, I think you're looking at Usenet through a post-DejaNews filter. I spent a lot of time on Usenet back then, and, honestly, the discussions sound exactly the same to me.
While people understood that anybody could save a post that they were interested in, nobody anticipated that anybody could save Usenet in its entirety. Just as on IRC, anybody could save any transcript that they want to—that is not what's disconcerting. Usenet was understood to be an ephemeral medium; news servers had a capacity of a few days to a month or so, and after that your words were gone (again, with the exception of people going out of their way to save bits and pieces). Nobody used to worry about what they said on Usenet showing up when employers did background checks, etc.
And your objection that the IRC effort was clandestine... DejaNews was the same way. They pieced together old archives from various news servers, and were doing it without warning. By the time anyone knew about DejaNews, they had an archive going back years. (And, don't forget, posting under your real, full name and real email address was routine back then.)
I think by "1970s" you mean 1988, and by "commitee" you mean "a guy".
Anyway, didn't anyone learn from DejaNews? The response to this IRC transcript thing sounds exactly the same as when people on Usenet suddenly discovered that the stuff they wrote on their "ephemeral" public medium was being archived.
But most Americans can't read Polish. Or is that the point?
What you seem to be thinking of is the fact that if you make N measurements of a quantity, each of which has an independent, normally-distributed error of sigma_x, and average those measurements, the standard deviation of the error in the mean will be sigma_x/sqrt(N). Note that N is dimensionless, so sqrt(N) is also dimensionless, so the units of this expression are the same as sigma_x, and hence the same as the quantity we're measuring.
Thus, the statistical error in the number reported here depends on the error in a single measurement (which could be taken to be the standard deviation of the number of miles people different people drive in a year) divided by the square root of the number of people participating in the survey.
(Another possibility is that you're somehow thinking that distance driven is a Poisson process, but that doesn't make a lot of sense, since this isn't a counting problem. The fact that "distance driven" has units should make it pretty clear that Poisson statistics don't apply here.)
And, as you say, many will be happy with the internal variation of the country. My list of places to see in California alone is constantly growing, not shrinking. (This is not to dismiss the value of overseas travel; I have certainly enjoyed my few trips to Europe, including my honeymoon.)