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User: monoi

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Comments · 44

  1. Obvious business fit on Cisco Planning To Acquire Skype · · Score: 1

    Skype leeches a little bit of bandwidth from a lot of organisations, which causes them all to need slightly more/bigger routers than they would otherwise.

    Cisco sells routers.

    What's the betting that the Skype protocol will get a bit less efficient each year from now on?

  2. Re:Hmm, I wonder on After a Decade, Digital Radio Still an Also-Ran In UK · · Score: 1

    You need to look a bit harder, like for all of five seconds: non-portable for £20, portable for £30. Of course, that's still pretty expensive compared to FM.

  3. Re:P!=NP on Knuth Plans 'Earthshaking Announcement' Wednesday · · Score: 2, Informative

    Except that one of Einstein's most lasting and relevant contribution to modern Physics is in fact general relativity, in the form of the Einstein field equations. Which he published (correctly) in November 1915, when he was 36.

  4. Re:Dang on The Hobbit On Hold · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Not an especially good one. And I say that as a Tolkien fan.

    If you're about ten (which I think was Tolkein's intended audience) then as I recall it's fantastic compared to the other books offered to you at that age.

  5. Re:Fusion isn't hard. on North Korea Announces Achieving Nuclear Fusion · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Actually, that's also possible. In theory, it could even be done without a fission primary.

    Now, doing it in a controlled and sustained way, that's a bit more difficult.

  6. Re:Boeing says it's not a good idea. on Was Flight Ban Over Ash an Overreaction? · · Score: 1

    Some great photos in there.

    You don't have to be an aero engineer to know that you don't want your engine looking like that.

  7. Re:Example of "help" provided on Former Nurse Charged With Aiding Suicides Via Web · · Score: 2, Informative

    I don't think she "committed" to dying until she stood on the bridge above the Rideau and decided to fill her lungs with water.

    Here's a quote from the mother of the other guy;

    Mark had had a nervous breakdown and he was depressed and incredibly susceptible. This person was there whispering in his ear every time he logged on. In the last email, this person claimed to be a nurse, saying he had medical training, and proposed a suicide pact.

    Emphasis mine. The point being, he helped these people make that "commitment".

    To put it another way: humans who are not ill have a minimum responsibility not to aggravate the illness of others.

  8. Re:CGI scripts on Proof of Concept For Ajax Without JavaScript · · Score: 1

    The site advocates doing all the processing on the server, rather than offloading it to the client via JavaScript... can we spot any flaws there?

  9. Example of "help" provided on Former Nurse Charged With Aiding Suicides Via Web · · Score: 5, Informative

    From here:

    Kajouji: I am planning to attempt this Sunday.

    Cami: Wow. You want to use hanging too?

    Kajouji: I’m going to jump.

    Cami: Well, that’s okay, but most people puss out before doing that. Plus, they don’t wanna leave a terribly messy mess for others to clean up.

    Kajouji: I want it to look like an accident. There’s a bridge over the river where there’s a break in the ice. The water is really rough right now, and it should carry me back under the ice, so I can’t really come up for air. And if drowning doesn’t get me, hopefully the hypothermia will. Is there anything you want to do before you go? I’m trying to get my affairs in order—cleaning my room, paying off my loan.

    Cami: I’ve got everything ready to go. My mom will get my insurance and money, so there will be no worries there. I’ve got my funeral s--- all taken care of. Got rope and stuff ready. Do you have a webcam?

    Kajouji: Yes.

    Cami: Well, if it comes down to hanging, I can help you with it with the cam. Proper positioning of the rope is important.

    Kajouji: Thank you.

    Cami: That method is so fast and certain, I can’t think of another way for me. I don’t want to feel nothing.

    Words fail me, really.

  10. Personally... on MIT Researchers Harness Viruses To Split Water · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    ...I think millions of rogue strands of the same basic stuff that codes for our existence, is a perfectly sensible thing to start making machines out of. And when that stuff randomly and regularly mutates, and is known to put its own survival above our own, even better!

  11. Re:Who cares how? The better question is why the b on How Did Wikileaks Do It? · · Score: 1

    The world is far from garbage. This is mainly due to people who take action upon their beliefs, whatever those beliefs might be, despite the endless ranks of know-everything-do-nothing fools who sit on internet messageboards and whine about it.

  12. Re:Who cares how? The better question is why the b on How Did Wikileaks Do It? · · Score: 1

    Probably the same part of "If you don't like their site, nobody is preventing you from setting up your own." that you're struggling with.

  13. Re:Who cares how? The better question is why the b on How Did Wikileaks Do It? · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Unless you're funding them through your tax system (and you're not), what right have you got to tell them what they should and should not do?

    If you don't like their site, nobody is preventing you from setting up your own.

  14. Sounds fine to me on Finland To Try Scanning Snail Mail · · Score: 1

    With the exception of contracts and suchlike (which would obviously be outside this scheme), I can't think of anything sensitive that I receive by snail mail these days.

    Everything I really care about the security of (bank statements, personal messages etc) comes over the web, via TLS.

  15. Re:Great! on Open Source, Open Standards Under Attack In Europe · · Score: 4, Funny

    "I'm a PC and the Windows 7 Browser Selection Tool was my idea!"

  16. Poor misguided fools on Auto-Scanning the Names People Choose For Their Wireless APs · · Score: 1

    001 [We love sexy men]

    Now, I may just be speaking for myself here, but it seems to me that your WiFi SSID is probably not the best place to go advertising for sexy men. Men with poor complexion, men with occasional lapses in personal hygiene, men with crazy caffeine habits, yes. Sexy men, not so much...

  17. Re:Being naive, I lost a lot of money that year on Dot-Com Craze Peaked 10 Years Ago This Week · · Score: 1

    Have you ever considered a career as a canary in a coal mine? You'd make millions.

  18. Re:Pretty balanced view on Another Study Attacks Violent Video Games, Claims To Be "Conclusive" · · Score: 1

    To be honest, the article was so lacking in facts that I just read it as an op-ed piece and responded accordingly. If there was a scientific article in there somewhere, then the scientist in question needs either to go on a "communicating science" course. Or perhaps, to stop going on them.

    Really, what is the value in a meta-analysis anyway? To amplify all the biases in the original analyses?

  19. Pretty balanced view on Another Study Attacks Violent Video Games, Claims To Be "Conclusive" · · Score: 4, Insightful
    From TFA:

    "These are not huge effects -- not on the order of joining a gang vs. not joining a gang," said Anderson. "But these effects are also not trivial in size. It is one risk factor for future aggression and other sort of negative outcomes. And it's a risk factor that's easy for an individual parent to deal with -- at least, easier than changing most other known risk factors for aggression and violence, such as poverty or one's genetic structure."

    As a parent, that seems a pretty fair and balanced analysis to me. And yes, I have been known to play GTA myself. As an adult.

  20. Re:Summary writer is a full blown moron on Simon Singh To Appeal In UK Court Today · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    So China has incorporated the European Convention on Human Rights, then?

  21. For anyone else who thinks 24 deg sounds hot on HP's New Data Center Cooled By Glacial Wind · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ...then this is an interesting read.

  22. Re:You should sell your computer for the homeless on Are Silicon Valley's Glory Days Over? · · Score: 1

    Of course you're right and I'm a hypocrite to some significant degree, but it doesn't change the fact that a balance can be struck between complete selfishness and complete altruism. You don't want to strike it, you like getting more than your fair share and you don't give a damn about other people less lucky than you. That's fine, good for you! Sleep well.

  23. Re:No, not well. on Are Silicon Valley's Glory Days Over? · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Secondly, if that 2k a year is not coming out of his pocket, then whose pocket is it coming out of, mine? So that's great, my dream of sending my son to college or even having a retirement just evaporated so I can foot the bill for someone else's problem.

    What a lovely country you live in, filled with wonderful human beings like yourself who would happily let a stranger suffer so that they could buy a bigger TV. How glad I am that I won't ever live there, and you probably won't ever leave. It's a great deal all round.

  24. Re:Son of WGA on Anti-Piracy Windows 7 Update Phones Home Quarterly · · Score: 1

    You've all forgotten the Critical Update Notification Tool, then?

  25. Re:Seems reasonable on Call For Scientific Research Code To Be Released · · Score: 1

    The point I'm trying to get across is that the reason for computer simulation is often as much to test (and perhaps supercede) known models as to "get a number out". So, if the only testing option is to compare against another model, then that's really no option at all.

    Document thinking and code? Fully agreed. Release the code? With you 100%, anyone who refuses is an intellectual fraud. Code audits? Yup, they ought to be routine in my opinion (and I'm pretty sure they aren't)

    However, none of those address your original claim, which is that all code is genuinely testable in the usual sense ("You just need to re-run the program with a specified set of inputs and check the output"). I think that in this special case, which is the case that TFA discusses, that is just not true.

    For 99.9999% of other problems you are indeed totally correct however, and I agree. Also, none of this excuses the rank laziness and ignorance of many academic programmers.