I guess this article should really be under "It's funny. Laugh.". Using animals' movement to power a nightlight (which presumably has to be on for upwards of 10 hours a day) is about as good an idea as teens4christ. Still, it's a neat way to teach kids about dynamos and the like, I'll grant them that! Anything that gets kids interested in science can only be a good thing.
The fact that it's really only workable via a web interface with a daemon in the background may not be the best way of doing things. Still, I have tried it out and it seems to be the closest thing to what I thought of.
It's an established technology. That's good. What I'm looking for now is a push-based P2P system; one which allows you to subscribe for content and will then automatically download new content as it's propagated through the network. We've had stories on Slashdot before about sites' popular RSS feeds saturating bandwidth - well, this would be a perfect solution. Are there any plans to retrofit push functionality into BitTorrent to help alleviate the stress of releasing new content? BitTorrent doesn't gel with RSS at the moment because there's no way to automate serving and/or obtaining RSS files. It all has to be done manually, which is no better than just refreshing a web page.
...you could just use the time you'd spend setting this crap up to discuss the code with your coworkers and get ideas on how to fix problems. But that's just me. I'm sure most people would rather watch a lava lamp than code.
It's just another communication medium, like any other. Once it hit the mainstream, it was inevitable that it accumulated the same proportion of gossipy girls and malicious bullies. There's nothing special about the Web or IM.
I see complaints that people are too irresponsible to drive in two dimensions, let alone three, and so forth. I don't think that this will be a problem. Considering how much space each individual car will be able to have if we extend to three dimensions, allowing them to get tens of metres into the air, there'll be even more room than usual and so less likelihood of collision. Yes, terrorists could crash the flying cars, but that can be done anyway. Besides, they could always use light aircraft instead.
To make Windows secure, that is. I know lately that Microsoft-bashing has gone from being the in thing to being "trolling", but it's true. Just because it's become less fashionable to say so doesn't change the fact. I don't understand how Windows users can continue to use these machines. I live in a relatively remote area of Japan, and yet somehow within 4 minutes after hooking up my brand-spanking new machine to the Internet, I started getting Code Red connection attempts and repeated assaults on various four-digit ports. I guess they don't respect geographic boundaries either. By the way, this all happened while I was downloading XP2/SP2. It's not going to help when we don't even have time to install it before getting our machines "owned".
I've always criticised Linux users for being sloppy and the like, but the operating system itself is at least rock solid. It rarely crashes, it has a decent windowing system, and I don't see advisories for it on Bugtraq every 8 hours. Windows is easy to install, but it's all too easy for someone else to compromise. Ease of use is nice, but I think I'll take peace of mind with GNOME on Fedora Core.
I hadn't realised that there were sufficiently many fundamental changes to a 64-bit system as compared to a 32-bit system that meant that a virus written for one wouldn't work on the other. What's so different? How does a different integer or word size affect the functioning of a virus so greatly, when interoperability is such a priority?
Are you familiar with Elliot cycles? Probably not. He came up with an idea like this around a decade ago. (Reading back issues of NewScientist can do wonders for you knowledge like this.) These ideas keep getting thrown around but never come to fruition because at their core they are inaccurate. As simple as that. Whether it's based on power laws, or assumptions about the nature of price spikes (up-up-down-up-up-down), trying to reduce markets to mathematical patterns invariably fails.
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I guess this article should really be under "It's funny. Laugh.". Using animals' movement to power a nightlight (which presumably has to be on for upwards of 10 hours a day) is about as good an idea as teens4christ. Still, it's a neat way to teach kids about dynamos and the like, I'll grant them that! Anything that gets kids interested in science can only be a good thing.
The fact that it's really only workable via a web interface with a daemon in the background may not be the best way of doing things. Still, I have tried it out and it seems to be the closest thing to what I thought of.
It's an established technology. That's good. What I'm looking for now is a push-based P2P system; one which allows you to subscribe for content and will then automatically download new content as it's propagated through the network. We've had stories on Slashdot before about sites' popular RSS feeds saturating bandwidth - well, this would be a perfect solution. Are there any plans to retrofit push functionality into BitTorrent to help alleviate the stress of releasing new content? BitTorrent doesn't gel with RSS at the moment because there's no way to automate serving and/or obtaining RSS files. It all has to be done manually, which is no better than just refreshing a web page.
...you could just use the time you'd spend setting this crap up to discuss the code with your coworkers and get ideas on how to fix problems. But that's just me. I'm sure most people would rather watch a lava lamp than code.
It's just another communication medium, like any other. Once it hit the mainstream, it was inevitable that it accumulated the same proportion of gossipy girls and malicious bullies. There's nothing special about the Web or IM.
I see complaints that people are too irresponsible to drive in two dimensions, let alone three, and so forth. I don't think that this will be a problem. Considering how much space each individual car will be able to have if we extend to three dimensions, allowing them to get tens of metres into the air, there'll be even more room than usual and so less likelihood of collision. Yes, terrorists could crash the flying cars, but that can be done anyway. Besides, they could always use light aircraft instead.
To make Windows secure, that is. I know lately that Microsoft-bashing has gone from being the in thing to being "trolling", but it's true. Just because it's become less fashionable to say so doesn't change the fact. I don't understand how Windows users can continue to use these machines. I live in a relatively remote area of Japan, and yet somehow within 4 minutes after hooking up my brand-spanking new machine to the Internet, I started getting Code Red connection attempts and repeated assaults on various four-digit ports. I guess they don't respect geographic boundaries either. By the way, this all happened while I was downloading XP2/SP2. It's not going to help when we don't even have time to install it before getting our machines "owned".
I've always criticised Linux users for being sloppy and the like, but the operating system itself is at least rock solid. It rarely crashes, it has a decent windowing system, and I don't see advisories for it on Bugtraq every 8 hours. Windows is easy to install, but it's all too easy for someone else to compromise. Ease of use is nice, but I think I'll take peace of mind with GNOME on Fedora Core.
I hadn't realised that there were sufficiently many fundamental changes to a 64-bit system as compared to a 32-bit system that meant that a virus written for one wouldn't work on the other. What's so different? How does a different integer or word size affect the functioning of a virus so greatly, when interoperability is such a priority?
Are you familiar with Elliot cycles? Probably not. He came up with an idea like this around a decade ago. (Reading back issues of NewScientist can do wonders for you knowledge like this.) These ideas keep getting thrown around but never come to fruition because at their core they are inaccurate. As simple as that. Whether it's based on power laws, or assumptions about the nature of price spikes (up-up-down-up-up-down), trying to reduce markets to mathematical patterns invariably fails.