This family will take home the prize on all the "Funniest Home Videos" shows every time. The funniest moments with my kids always happen when we're not using the camcorder.
That's a very uninformed statement. Skype is far from desperate. Did you see how much money eBay bought them for? Skype-to-Skype calls are free, and the more people that use Skype, the cheaper it gets. Call quality is very good, there are no restrictions on call length, it includes conference calls and video, instant chat, file sharing, etc.
The largest problems with Skype are security-related. Hackers can use Skype to relay TCP communications, effectively hacking networks from inside the firewall. And since the communication to the Skype client is encrypted and obfuscated (and it is very difficult to determine which traffic is actually Skype traffic), you can make it impossible to trace the traffic back to the hacker. Here's a link to a Black Hat Europe presentation on the subject:
The thing most people outside the US seem to forget is that approximately half of us in the US tried to oust that idiot in 2004, and more than half of us tried to keep him out of office in 2000 (he didn't win if you count the actual votes). Half of us are as angry about the current government as you are, and lately even the people who voted for him are having second thoughts about him.
The problem can be summed up in this bumper sticker I recently saw: Right is wrong. Left is stupid.
That may not be true in other countries, but it definitely seems to be true here. Our election system is a farce of democracy, and we're stuck with those two choices: wrong and stupid. Hell, the media hand-picked John Kerry to run against Bush in 2004 because the Democrats here followed like sheep where the media pointed. The favorite in the primaries was turned away because the media (who likes Bush very much right now) turned against him. The current administration keeps telling other countries they need to be more democratic, all while they're tightening the screws on legislation to ensure that their party stays in office. It's enough to make half of us ashamed to be Americans. Most of the other half are clueless as to what is going on. (Actually, most of our half are, too.)
What pile of money? Programmers working in the game industry generally make a lot less than programmers working in other parts of the industry, and they generally get abused a lot more by their employers. Many game developers make a salary that would come very close to minimum wage if they were paid the same amount as an hourly rate (plus overtime). To make matters worse, most startup game companies fold as soon as, or even before, their first game is published. This is true even for popular games. So you get practically no money, get worked into the ground, and have almost no job security.
For the most part, the only developers willing to put up with this are really young and just begging to be exploited. Some think it's "cool" to work at a game company, and that it will hardly feel like working (which is far from true). Some seem to think they'll become rich and famous, but that almost never happens to game developers. It has happened for some game designers (i.e. Will Wright, Sid Mieir, John Carmack), but that's not who we're talking about. Yes, I know John Carmack is primarily referred to as a developer, but if his game design for Doom hadn't been awesome, no one would know his name.
I do graphics/game development as a hobby in my spare time (sponeil.org), so I'm not just blowing smoke. I've gotten a number of job offers from game companies, and most of them have made me laugh. Some offers have actually been less than 1/4th my current salary (which I only have to work 40 hours a week for), brimming with the promise of lots of overtime followed by being laid off.
Exactly! I was going to make a "well-duh" post, but I guess it's pointless now. As a software developer, I can honestly say that only the software developers at my company need that extra horse-power. Unless they're trying to play the latest games on their work computers. Did the article mention whether people need better graphics/sound cards for their work computers?;-)
We should send a space probe up there to steer the asteroid toward Earth. If we can manage to steer it to land in my back yard, I'd be a trillionaire. It might literally kill two birds with one "stone" by knocking down my house, which needs a lot of work.;-)
Let's just hope he doesn't make a divot
on
Golf in Space
·
· Score: 1
If he does, he'll have to stamp it back down with his foot really hard.;-)
If you don't know much about the ion engine used in Deep Space I, look here before posting.
The article mentions that this new thruster design's "fuel efficiency" is comparable to the ion engine. This means that it has to propel about the same amount of ionized gas away to get the same amount of thrust (presumably at a similar velocity). However, I didn't see anything about "energy efficiency". Does it require a lot more electricity to get the same amount of thrust? For a space probe, 100kV is a LOT. The Deep Space I probe had solar panels that generated 2.5kV, and it didn't even have enough electricity to run its ion thruster simultaneously with most of its other systems. Sure it would be nice to have the option to accelerate more quickly, but will there be enough electricity available to take advantage of it for long periods of time?
If you can make the thruster run continuously for millions years, the craft it's pushing should reach ludicrous speed (assuming it doesn't smack into one of those pesky KBO's first).;-)
Because nerds almost universally think volcanoes are cool. Or at least, photos and video footage of eruptions are cool. It's kind of like watching light sabers cut through something in Star Wars.;-)
I imagine companies would have to pay ISP's as much (or more) to get decent access than they currently have to pay Google to get decent ad space. My wife recently set up her own e-commerce site selling fair trade gifts for children (noblepiglet.com), and the Google ad site recommended that she start off spending $43,000 per month on Google ads to get her site noticed. She set up a less expensive pay-per-click scheme. Google has been charging her $30-$80 per month, and she can't find her own site on Google unless she searches directly for the terms "noble" and "piglet".
There are no "good" and "evil" companies. There are only "private" and "public" companies. A public company is required by law to screw everyone else to the benefit of their shareholders. A private company can screw just about anyone they want, but they are not required by law to screw anyone.;-)
This is funny all by itself.;-)
It's also why I believe every vessel sent into space should have its own little ion drive as a backup. (If the robot was supposed to land on the asteroid without the mothership, then I would count it as a vessel.) I don't know what technical problems it would cause or how much it would cost, but I doubt the mothership could've propelled the little robot with so much force that it couldn't recover with a few days/weeks using of continuous acceleration. Unless of course, it smashed into another asteroid before it had a chance to slow down or turn around.
Mass transit is poor because gas prices have been kept artificially low for generations in the US. A good chunk of the federal taxes we pay goes toward keeping gas prices as low as possible, so we pay extra for the gas whether we use it or not. Plus, most people would have to pay twice as much to ride public transportation, and it would take twice as long to get to their destination, so who would use it when it can be avoided?
Worse yet, most US cities and towns have "grown up" around the car because gas has been kept so cheap. The design of our cities (with way too much sprawl) makes good public transportation very impractical. I live in Atlanta, and people commute to work here every day from various towns in 5 different states (Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, plus North and South Carolina). Many drive as far as two hours each way every day to combine affordable housing with a well-paying job. Many of them are dumb enough to drive all that way in a truck or SUV. When gas prices go through the roof, we'll be royally screwed, and it'll be our own fault.
You have to watch out for some of the 6200's. Some are a step down from the 6600's and others are a step up from the 6200 TurboCache versions. Even though they're not TurboCache versions, they are actually slower than the original 6200. It's a shame that they're not marked as being different from the others.
If you want silence, there are some fanless 6600's on the market. They may use too much power to run in a Shuttle, though.;-)
One reader compared it to building furniture in that both types of products can be utilitarian and artistic at the same time. To extend that comparison, furniture building shops can be any size, from one person building furniture as a hobby all the way up to global companies with factories all over the world. The same is true for software development shops.
Only the smaller furniture shops rely on the builders to design their own furniture. The larger shops hire designers to do that. Many of those designers are artists who do not know how to build furniture. The same is true with software development shops.
I don't mind violent video games, but this guy from Columbine has no clue. Hearing such ridiculous arguments will only make people sitting on the fence think the other side sounds more reasonable.
Among games that caused a public outcry, my favorite was the original Carmageddon. It may sound horrible to get style points for squishing pedestrians, animals, and other vehicles in weird and interesting ways, but it was an incredibly silly and fun game. Arguments that a game like that would make teens want to run down pedestrians in real-life were ludicrous.
Pretend violence doesn't make people more violent, real violence does. I can remember the media circus that happened after Columbine, and I can remember thinking that the media coverage itself could cause a rash of similar incidents. The Columbine shooters wanted notoriety and to get everyone's attention in a big way, and they got it in spades. For a time, they literally changed the world in some ways. Other malcontent and disturbed teens considering suicide could see this and decide to attempt the same thing. After all, most teens who attempt suicide are looking for attention.
This makes me wonder how expensive it would be to simply add a secondary lens/CCD to the side of the primary lens to take a second picture that will provide parallax information for depth. The secondary CCD could be smaller and cheaper because the resolution doesn't need to be as high. You may even be able to make it even cheaper by using a black-and-white CCD and comparing only the luminance values. I suppose this would only work well with a camera that has no zoom lens. Maybe you could just tape two digital cameras together and make sure you push both buttons really fast.;-)
I agree with you that the license is the key, but not in the way you think of it. As long as the Solaris license protects the corporations that you call malicious, I believe that there's a good chance that more commercial drivers and applications will be written for it. Having one distribution controlled by Sun will make it a lot easier for commercial companies to test their software and write installs that work smoothly for everyone. This will help them become stable more quickly than it takes them to become stable on Linux. I believe that Linux's largest weakness is the lack of centralized organization, standardization, and quality assurance. Having so many different distributions like RedHat, SUSE, Slackware,... (ad infinitum) has hurt Linux. Other splits, like KDE vs. Gnome, has hurt it even more. I also think that X-Windows should be replaced, just like Apple did with OS X.
I think the choice not to use Linux will be a no-brainer for most commercial server applications . What's less certain is how desktop applications will fare on Solaris. I hope they take off. I think Solaris could quickly become more of a threat to Microsoft than Linux could ever be. If nVidia puts some of its weight behind Solaris (and I think they would be foolish not to), I think it could become a better gaming platform than Linux fairly quickly. Once again, having a single distribution to test is a huge advantage both for nVidia and for the game companies.
I don't think this will win over any harcore GPL advocates, but there are not very many that are really hardcore. Most people just want convenience, and most people are willing to pay for it. Even many of those who claim to be hardcore GPL advocates dual-boot or have a second system for games. If Solaris beats Linux in popular game support, many of those may switch to Solaris and ditch the second OS. They may even complain about it as loudly as they complain about having to run two OS's now, but they'll do it. For those that switched to Linux just to get a free OS, the decision to switch to Solaris will be easy if it provides a better experience. The same will be true for many MS users who were afraid to try Linux.
Here's a paste from their site:
LEDs offer increased efficiency over incandescent bulbs. When comparing white light, LEDs offer more than two times better efficiency. For red, green, and blue lights, LEDs are more than 10 times more efficient.
Only the colored LED bulbs produce as much as a 200W incandecent bulb at 22 Watts. The white ones only produce as much as a 45W incandecent bulb. Always make sure you read the fine print.
The station is propelled backwards a small amount due to the KINETIC energy it imparts to the plasma beam, but that level of energy is INSIGNIFICANT. The station also imparts MAGNETIC energy to the plasma beam, but that does not propel the station backwards at all.
The ship is propelled forwards primarily due to the MAGNETIC energy in the plasma beam, not the KINETIC energy. It does this by creating an electromagnetic shield that repels all magnetically charged particles. This force is much stronger than the KINETIC energy.
Newton's 2nd law is preserved. The shield pushes the magnetized plasma particles away with enough force to accelerate the ship to high speed. Turn the shield off, and it won't go very far.
And anyone who thinks this plasma beam could scorch the Earth doesn't realize just how much energy the Sun blasts the Earth with constantly. The Earth has its own magnetic shield, and what little of the solar wind does get in is scattered in the upper atmosphere (i.e. auroras). Even though it's a more focused beam, the beam would be spread thin before it came close to the ground.
The biggest problem with this method is not being able to slow down if there's a problem at the other end. Even if there's not a problem at the other end, it would be like trying to throw a rock from here to Mars and expecting to hit a very small target precisely when it got there. Without course corrections on the way, it will miss by hundreds of miles. Even with corrections, it will very likely miss on the scale of hundreds of yards.
IMHO, they should use this only for acceleration. Add ion thrusters to the craft, and it can help accelerate the craft as well as decelerate it as it approaches Mars (making continuous course corrections if necessary). The last step would be a gravity-assisted deceleration to put the craft in orbit. It can meet up with the mag-beam station later, which will help to send it back to Earth quickly.
The ion thrusters would also be insurance against the station on the other side breaking down. It may take a few extra months to get home, but ion thrusters can provide continuous acceleration for years. You could put extra rations in the station itself. If and when it breaks down, the rations can be transferred to the ship for the longer ride home. If it doesn't break down, then the ship remains lighter and will be easier to send home.
Slashdot Mirror
This family will take home the prize on all the "Funniest Home Videos" shows every time. The funniest moments with my kids always happen when we're not using the camcorder.
That's a very uninformed statement. Skype is far from desperate. Did you see how much money eBay bought them for? Skype-to-Skype calls are free, and the more people that use Skype, the cheaper it gets. Call quality is very good, there are no restrictions on call length, it includes conference calls and video, instant chat, file sharing, etc.
The largest problems with Skype are security-related. Hackers can use Skype to relay TCP communications, effectively hacking networks from inside the firewall. And since the communication to the Skype client is encrypted and obfuscated (and it is very difficult to determine which traffic is actually Skype traffic), you can make it impossible to trace the traffic back to the hacker. Here's a link to a Black Hat Europe presentation on the subject:
http://www.secdev.org/conf/skype_BHEU06.handout.pThe thing most people outside the US seem to forget is that approximately half of us in the US tried to oust that idiot in 2004, and more than half of us tried to keep him out of office in 2000 (he didn't win if you count the actual votes). Half of us are as angry about the current government as you are, and lately even the people who voted for him are having second thoughts about him.
The problem can be summed up in this bumper sticker I recently saw:
Right is wrong. Left is stupid.
That may not be true in other countries, but it definitely seems to be true here. Our election system is a farce of democracy, and we're stuck with those two choices: wrong and stupid. Hell, the media hand-picked John Kerry to run against Bush in 2004 because the Democrats here followed like sheep where the media pointed. The favorite in the primaries was turned away because the media (who likes Bush very much right now) turned against him. The current administration keeps telling other countries they need to be more democratic, all while they're tightening the screws on legislation to ensure that their party stays in office. It's enough to make half of us ashamed to be Americans. Most of the other half are clueless as to what is going on. (Actually, most of our half are, too.)
What pile of money? Programmers working in the game industry generally make a lot less than programmers working in other parts of the industry, and they generally get abused a lot more by their employers. Many game developers make a salary that would come very close to minimum wage if they were paid the same amount as an hourly rate (plus overtime). To make matters worse, most startup game companies fold as soon as, or even before, their first game is published. This is true even for popular games. So you get practically no money, get worked into the ground, and have almost no job security.
For the most part, the only developers willing to put up with this are really young and just begging to be exploited. Some think it's "cool" to work at a game company, and that it will hardly feel like working (which is far from true). Some seem to think they'll become rich and famous, but that almost never happens to game developers. It has happened for some game designers (i.e. Will Wright, Sid Mieir, John Carmack), but that's not who we're talking about. Yes, I know John Carmack is primarily referred to as a developer, but if his game design for Doom hadn't been awesome, no one would know his name.
I do graphics/game development as a hobby in my spare time (sponeil.org), so I'm not just blowing smoke. I've gotten a number of job offers from game companies, and most of them have made me laugh. Some offers have actually been less than 1/4th my current salary (which I only have to work 40 hours a week for), brimming with the promise of lots of overtime followed by being laid off.
Exactly! I was going to make a "well-duh" post, but I guess it's pointless now. As a software developer, I can honestly say that only the software developers at my company need that extra horse-power. Unless they're trying to play the latest games on their work computers. Did the article mention whether people need better graphics/sound cards for their work computers? ;-)
We should send a space probe up there to steer the asteroid toward Earth. If we can manage to steer it to land in my back yard, I'd be a trillionaire. It might literally kill two birds with one "stone" by knocking down my house, which needs a lot of work. ;-)
If he does, he'll have to stamp it back down with his foot really hard. ;-)
Price fixing!
If you don't know much about the ion engine used in Deep Space I, look here before posting.
The article mentions that this new thruster design's "fuel efficiency" is comparable to the ion engine. This means that it has to propel about the same amount of ionized gas away to get the same amount of thrust (presumably at a similar velocity). However, I didn't see anything about "energy efficiency". Does it require a lot more electricity to get the same amount of thrust? For a space probe, 100kV is a LOT. The Deep Space I probe had solar panels that generated 2.5kV, and it didn't even have enough electricity to run its ion thruster simultaneously with most of its other systems. Sure it would be nice to have the option to accelerate more quickly, but will there be enough electricity available to take advantage of it for long periods of time?
If you can make the thruster run continuously for millions years, the craft it's pushing should reach ludicrous speed (assuming it doesn't smack into one of those pesky KBO's first). ;-)
Individuals and small companies turn out really crappy software products, too.
Because nerds almost universally think volcanoes are cool. Or at least, photos and video footage of eruptions are cool. It's kind of like watching light sabers cut through something in Star Wars. ;-)
I imagine companies would have to pay ISP's as much (or more) to get decent access than they currently have to pay Google to get decent ad space. My wife recently set up her own e-commerce site selling fair trade gifts for children (noblepiglet.com), and the Google ad site recommended that she start off spending $43,000 per month on Google ads to get her site noticed. She set up a less expensive pay-per-click scheme. Google has been charging her $30-$80 per month, and she can't find her own site on Google unless she searches directly for the terms "noble" and "piglet".
;-)
There are no "good" and "evil" companies. There are only "private" and "public" companies. A public company is required by law to screw everyone else to the benefit of their shareholders. A private company can screw just about anyone they want, but they are not required by law to screw anyone.
This is funny all by itself. ;-)
It's also why I believe every vessel sent into space should have its own little ion drive as a backup. (If the robot was supposed to land on the asteroid without the mothership, then I would count it as a vessel.) I don't know what technical problems it would cause or how much it would cost, but I doubt the mothership could've propelled the little robot with so much force that it couldn't recover with a few days/weeks using of continuous acceleration. Unless of course, it smashed into another asteroid before it had a chance to slow down or turn around.
Mass transit is poor because gas prices have been kept artificially low for generations in the US. A good chunk of the federal taxes we pay goes toward keeping gas prices as low as possible, so we pay extra for the gas whether we use it or not. Plus, most people would have to pay twice as much to ride public transportation, and it would take twice as long to get to their destination, so who would use it when it can be avoided?
Worse yet, most US cities and towns have "grown up" around the car because gas has been kept so cheap. The design of our cities (with way too much sprawl) makes good public transportation very impractical. I live in Atlanta, and people commute to work here every day from various towns in 5 different states (Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, plus North and South Carolina). Many drive as far as two hours each way every day to combine affordable housing with a well-paying job. Many of them are dumb enough to drive all that way in a truck or SUV. When gas prices go through the roof, we'll be royally screwed, and it'll be our own fault.
You have to watch out for some of the 6200's. Some are a step down from the 6600's and others are a step up from the 6200 TurboCache versions. Even though they're not TurboCache versions, they are actually slower than the original 6200. It's a shame that they're not marked as being different from the others.
;-)
If you want silence, there are some fanless 6600's on the market. They may use too much power to run in a Shuttle, though.
That post was from me. The preview button reset my login info. Come on webmaster, that is a very simple thing to fix.
Hamster power is where the real future is!
One reader compared it to building furniture in that both types of products can be utilitarian and artistic at the same time. To extend that comparison, furniture building shops can be any size, from one person building furniture as a hobby all the way up to global companies with factories all over the world. The same is true for software development shops.
Only the smaller furniture shops rely on the builders to design their own furniture. The larger shops hire designers to do that. Many of those designers are artists who do not know how to build furniture. The same is true with software development shops.
I don't mind violent video games, but this guy from Columbine has no clue. Hearing such ridiculous arguments will only make people sitting on the fence think the other side sounds more reasonable. Among games that caused a public outcry, my favorite was the original Carmageddon. It may sound horrible to get style points for squishing pedestrians, animals, and other vehicles in weird and interesting ways, but it was an incredibly silly and fun game. Arguments that a game like that would make teens want to run down pedestrians in real-life were ludicrous. Pretend violence doesn't make people more violent, real violence does. I can remember the media circus that happened after Columbine, and I can remember thinking that the media coverage itself could cause a rash of similar incidents. The Columbine shooters wanted notoriety and to get everyone's attention in a big way, and they got it in spades. For a time, they literally changed the world in some ways. Other malcontent and disturbed teens considering suicide could see this and decide to attempt the same thing. After all, most teens who attempt suicide are looking for attention.
1) Slashdot it. 2) Some other form of DDoS attack. 3) ...
This makes me wonder how expensive it would be to simply add a secondary lens/CCD to the side of the primary lens to take a second picture that will provide parallax information for depth. The secondary CCD could be smaller and cheaper because the resolution doesn't need to be as high. You may even be able to make it even cheaper by using a black-and-white CCD and comparing only the luminance values. I suppose this would only work well with a camera that has no zoom lens. Maybe you could just tape two digital cameras together and make sure you push both buttons really fast. ;-)
I agree with you that the license is the key, but not in the way you think of it. As long as the Solaris license protects the corporations that you call malicious, I believe that there's a good chance that more commercial drivers and applications will be written for it. Having one distribution controlled by Sun will make it a lot easier for commercial companies to test their software and write installs that work smoothly for everyone. This will help them become stable more quickly than it takes them to become stable on Linux. I believe that Linux's largest weakness is the lack of centralized organization, standardization, and quality assurance. Having so many different distributions like RedHat, SUSE, Slackware, ... (ad infinitum) has hurt Linux. Other splits, like KDE vs. Gnome, has hurt it even more. I also think that X-Windows should be replaced, just like Apple did with OS X.
I think the choice not to use Linux will be a no-brainer for most commercial server applications . What's less certain is how desktop applications will fare on Solaris. I hope they take off. I think Solaris could quickly become more of a threat to Microsoft than Linux could ever be. If nVidia puts some of its weight behind Solaris (and I think they would be foolish not to), I think it could become a better gaming platform than Linux fairly quickly. Once again, having a single distribution to test is a huge advantage both for nVidia and for the game companies.
I don't think this will win over any harcore GPL advocates, but there are not very many that are really hardcore. Most people just want convenience, and most people are willing to pay for it. Even many of those who claim to be hardcore GPL advocates dual-boot or have a second system for games. If Solaris beats Linux in popular game support, many of those may switch to Solaris and ditch the second OS. They may even complain about it as loudly as they complain about having to run two OS's now, but they'll do it. For those that switched to Linux just to get a free OS, the decision to switch to Solaris will be easy if it provides a better experience. The same will be true for many MS users who were afraid to try Linux.
Here's a paste from their site:
LEDs offer increased efficiency over incandescent bulbs. When comparing white light, LEDs offer more than two times better efficiency. For red, green, and blue lights, LEDs are more than 10 times more efficient.
Only the colored LED bulbs produce as much as a 200W incandecent bulb at 22 Watts. The white ones only produce as much as a 45W incandecent bulb. Always make sure you read the fine print.
The station is propelled backwards a small amount due to the KINETIC energy it imparts to the plasma beam, but that level of energy is INSIGNIFICANT. The station also imparts MAGNETIC energy to the plasma beam, but that does not propel the station backwards at all.
The ship is propelled forwards primarily due to the MAGNETIC energy in the plasma beam, not the KINETIC energy. It does this by creating an electromagnetic shield that repels all magnetically charged particles. This force is much stronger than the KINETIC energy.
Newton's 2nd law is preserved. The shield pushes the magnetized plasma particles away with enough force to accelerate the ship to high speed. Turn the shield off, and it won't go very far.
And anyone who thinks this plasma beam could scorch the Earth doesn't realize just how much energy the Sun blasts the Earth with constantly. The Earth has its own magnetic shield, and what little of the solar wind does get in is scattered in the upper atmosphere (i.e. auroras). Even though it's a more focused beam, the beam would be spread thin before it came close to the ground.
The biggest problem with this method is not being able to slow down if there's a problem at the other end. Even if there's not a problem at the other end, it would be like trying to throw a rock from here to Mars and expecting to hit a very small target precisely when it got there. Without course corrections on the way, it will miss by hundreds of miles. Even with corrections, it will very likely miss on the scale of hundreds of yards.
IMHO, they should use this only for acceleration. Add ion thrusters to the craft, and it can help accelerate the craft as well as decelerate it as it approaches Mars (making continuous course corrections if necessary). The last step would be a gravity-assisted deceleration to put the craft in orbit. It can meet up with the mag-beam station later, which will help to send it back to Earth quickly.
The ion thrusters would also be insurance against the station on the other side breaking down. It may take a few extra months to get home, but ion thrusters can provide continuous acceleration for years. You could put extra rations in the station itself. If and when it breaks down, the rations can be transferred to the ship for the longer ride home. If it doesn't break down, then the ship remains lighter and will be easier to send home.