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User: Zenaku

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Comments · 553

  1. Re: Well... on US Near Bottom In Life Expectancy In Developed World · · Score: 1

    What country are you in? I'm in the U.S. and Stevia is not disallowed. It just isn't the artificial sweetener most product manufacturers happen to use. Zevia brand soda uses it. (You can find it at Whole Foods, and most co-op type stores around me carry it as we'll, but if that isn't the case you can buy it by the case on Amazon. It's even available as a Subscribe and Save item).

    I haven't run across many other products that have chosen to switch to it, but it isn't illegal or anything.

  2. None on Study Claims Human Intelligence Peaked Two To Six Millennia Ago · · Score: 1

    Rounding to the nearest whole number, zero percent.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2012

  3. Re:Old news? on New Evidence That the Moon Was Created In a Massive Collision · · Score: 1

    Self-replying here, but I just looked up the equations for the 2-body problem, and sure enough, you are right. The math makes it perfectly clear, where intuition falls on its face.

  4. Re:Old news? on New Evidence That the Moon Was Created In a Massive Collision · · Score: 1

    Wait is that right? It's true that the barycenter of the earth-moon system is inside the earth, and that the moon is moving farther away.

    But does increasing the distance cause the barycenter to move outside the earth? I would intuitively think the opposite, that as the distance increases it would induce less "wobble" in the earth, moving the barycenter closer to earth's center.

    But I'm no physicist, and I'm not saying you're wrong. Just wondering if someone could explain to me how distance effects the barycenter in a 2-body system.

  5. Re:Hopeless... on Tech Industry Reps To Speak Before Congress About SOPA · · Score: 1

    I'm guessing the answer he was looking for is "Guns. Lot's of guns."

  6. Re:5000 soldiers on US Troops To Leave Iraq By End of Year · · Score: 2

    You didn't RTFA (standard practice) but you didn't RTFS either. The whole reason this is news is because the US will NOT be leaving 5000 troops behind. The administration was unable to reach an agreement granting immunity to US troops, and so will instead be leaving behind only about 150, to "assist with arms sales."

    None of the articles I read mentioned contractors, though, so your number on that is probably not far off.

  7. Re:Justice is served on iPhone 4 Prototype Finder Gets Probation · · Score: 1

    I think you are misinformed. That conversation took place between Steve, and the Gizmodo writer who bought the phone. (And you're simplifying it quite a bit at that -- Gizmodo told Steve they would return the phone if Apple would publicly claim it as their property, which Apple was not willing to do).

    This story is about the person who found the phone in a bar and sold it to Gizmodo to start with. I'm pretty sure that person never spoke to Steve Jobs.

  8. Re:MITT ROMNEY 2012! MITT ROMNEY 2012! MITT ROMNEY on A Third of Sun-Like Stars May Have Warm Earth Analogs · · Score: 1

    Excuse me, but if you believe the biblical record, Jesus reanimated the dead (Lazarus), and later returned from the grave himself. He was obviously a Necromancer.

  9. Re:Einstein replied "Check your measurements, son" on CERN Experiment Indicates Faster-Than-Light Neutrinos · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I agree that the most likely cause is that the detector is closer to the emitter than they think it is. Even if the distance between them is what they think it is, however, it wouldn't mean that the particles traveled faster than c, as some here are implying. It would only mean that our prior measurements of the value of c were slightly off, and we now have a better measurement.

  10. Re:Einstein replied "Check your measurements, son" on CERN Experiment Indicates Faster-Than-Light Neutrinos · · Score: 2

    Its not a contradiction if causality doesn't hold! We haven't had any evidence until now, but now that we have it, we will present it 40 years ago. :)

  11. Re:Science vs Religion: Contradictions? on Evangelical Scientists Debate Creation Story · · Score: 1

    I can only speak for myself, but I do not hate the concept of god. Nor do I hate the concept of Spider-man, nor the concept of mermaids.

    In fact I rather like the concept of god. I generally enjoy the stories and films that feature god, even ones from the bible. God is one of my favorite fictional characters. Not as high on my list as Spider-man, but definitely on the list.

    The difference is I don't confuse the concept with reality.

  12. Re:Fake? on GPGPU Bitcoin Mining Trojan · · Score: 1

    Ugh. This thread is stale at this point and I know I should just walk away. As you said, we're having a purely semantic argument.

    But the thing is, the semantics of words like "illegal" and "illegally" are extremely well established, and you've got them wrong. When you say that a person has done something illegally, you are saying that the doing of that thing constitutes a crime -- that performing that act explicitly violates some statute.

    There are no laws against generating bitcoin or emailing your grandmother. Those acts themselves can never be done "illegally." If I break into your house, beat you senseless with a lead pipe, use your computer to email my grandmother, and then swipe your cash and run off with it, I will be charged with (and guilty of) several things when I am caught: breaking and entering, trespassing, aggravated assault, unauthorized use of a computer, and robbery. But not with emailing my grandmother. There is no law against emailing my grandmother.

    Anyone with even the tiniest exposure to matters of law can understand the distinction here. And I'm not saying that you don't, by the way -- I know that you understand my contention just as I understand yours and we are in disagreement over semantics. And if you want to assign a meaning to the word "illegally" that differs from the accepted meaning that's your business.

    But don't act like the rest of us are the ones being obtuse.

  13. Re:Fake? on GPGPU Bitcoin Mining Trojan · · Score: 1

    So illegally using someones machine to generate bitcoins is not illegal generation of bitcoins?

    That is right -- it is not. Illegally using someone's machine to generate bitcoins in not "illegal generation of bitcoins." It is "illegally using someone's machine." It isn't that fine a distinction. Using someone's machine without permission is illegal, regardless of what you do with that machine. Generating bitcoins is legal, regardless of whether you committed some other crime in your pursuit of that goal.

    Let me ask you this -- is illegally using someone's computer to email your grandmother "illegally emailing your grandmother?"

  14. Re:We need to do more preparations on Sun Unleashes Most Powerful Flare Since 2006 · · Score: 2

    8 minutes is how long it takes *light* from the sun to reach us. A solar flare takes considerably longer, on the order of a couple days.

    Think about it. If the flare itself traveled at the speed of light, we wouldn't even know it had happened until it hit us.

  15. Re:and what's "First Earth" ?! on First Earth Trojan Asteroid Discovered · · Score: 1

    I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you aren't trolling:

    A Trojan Asteroid would be full of Greeks in the same way that the Trojan Horse was full of Greeks.

  16. Re:No rage, just a lost customer. on Netflix Deflects Rage Over Price Increase · · Score: 1

    I agree about redbox being reasonable competion, just forgot to mention them. Although the selection with redbox is limited to fairly recent films, whereas Netflix's mail service (unlike the streaming) is pretty damn complete.

    To your other point, cable companies have had PPV for a long time, and even "free" On Demand for a while, but in my experience it has only been since the rise of Netflix that the On Demand offerings have begun to offer much selection. Just a few years ago, my cable companies On Demand menu contained a handful of new releases, and a couple dozen randomly selected older films. Now, the list of available movies is much longer, and almost all of the popular cable shows are available on demand as well.

  17. Re:No rage, just a lost customer. on Netflix Deflects Rage Over Price Increase · · Score: 1

    No, I'm saying that Blockbuster wasn't _really_ competition, in the sense that it wasn't really a fight. Not from Netflix's perspective, anyway, from Blockbusters perspective it was the fight of their life. In my view, they weren't joined by a newcomer, they were just flat out replaced.

    Netflix came along and offered an alternative product that was better and achieved the same purpose. They didn't open a rental store across the street from Blockbuster and out-compete them on those terms, they replaced the entire video rental paradigm with a whole new business model.

    I admit this is a fuzzy point, and just my own opinion on what constitutes "real" competition. But I hope you get what I'm saying. They "competed" in the same way that the automobile competed with the horse and buggy. Blockbuster didn't stand a chance of holding onto the market with the traditional brick and mortar stores, and by the time they put out a copycat DVD-by-mail service they were already circling the drain.

  18. Re:The update does not make sense on Netflix Deflects Rage Over Price Increase · · Score: 1

    Yeah, this change is great for those who don't use one service or the other.

    But I think most people are probably like me. I use both, and tend to use them for different things. I use the streaming way more often, and mostly for television shows. Episode after episode, no waiting. But the streaming library sucks for movies. There's very little in there that I want to see and haven't already seen. So I use the DVD portion of the plan to get films I actually want to watch.

    Additionally, even for TV shows, the streaming catalog is. . . unstable. A few weeks ago a program I had been watching daily was suddenly yanked from the streaming catalog. I was in the middle of a season, dammit! So into my DVD queue it went. Where would I have been if I only had the streaming plan? Pissed off in cliffhanger-land, that's where.

  19. Re:How to destroy your internet based business on Netflix Deflects Rage Over Price Increase · · Score: 1

    It comes from the other end of the price spectrum. My old plan was 1 DVD at a time, plus unlimited streaming -- 9.99 a month. To get the same service, I would now be paying for the unlimited streaming plan(7.99) and the 1 DVD at a time plan (another 7.99) for a total of 15.98. That's a fraction under a 60% increase.

  20. Re:No rage, just a lost customer. on Netflix Deflects Rage Over Price Increase · · Score: 2

    Until recently they had no competition. Did you mean Blockbuster? Please. A traditional video rental store is no competition for Netflix, at least not anymore than the yellow pages are competition for Google.

    They are only now facing real competition, from Hulu, amazon, google, and on-demand services offered by cable companies.

    I'm not happy about the price increase, but I am hopeful that it allows them to work out better content deals.

  21. Re:Horribly Summary on Company Fined €25,000 For Altering Wikipedia · · Score: 2

    The link goes to a google translation of the article, so I'm guessing the summary was "translated" from the original as well.

    I agree, it's completely unintelligible. I only get that one company is suing another over a Wikipedia edit. I think that the defendant company removed the plaintiff company from a list of companies providing some service. I think all the she and her stuff must be because of gendered nouns in the original language.

  22. Re:How Microsoft of Them on Facebook Blocks Google+ App, Google Removes Twitter From Real Time Search · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Facebook started out by being only available to students attending a few select schools, but I don't think that is "effectively invite only." The difference is that when one is a full-time student at a university, the vast majority of your friends and acquaintances are also students at that university. It wasn't open to the public, but for those it was open to, it was also open to a great many of the people they would want to interact with.

    With Google+ the sample of people you could network with is essentially random. I would like to try it, but I haven't scored an invite, and even if I did -- I only know one other person who has been able to try it.

  23. Re:Just like Animal Farm.. on Time To Close the Security Theater · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You must watch a lot of Fox News.

    Congress does participate in Social Security. What made you think they do not? They pay income and FICA taxes on their salaries just like anyone else.

    As for "ObamaCare," you are probably right that it wouldn't have been passed if Congress were forced to participate, since that would mean giving up their free government health care and being forced to buy private insurance instead.

  24. Re:Did you really need to ask that question? on Climate Skeptic Funded By Oil and Coal Companies · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Don't be stupid. I think I'm with the vast majority of the lefties on these issues, and my position is nothing like the hypocritical straw man you've constructed.

    Both tobacco and marijuana should be perfectly legal to purchase, and to use in the privacy of your own home. Both should be illegal to smoke in a public building. You have the right to decide for yourself what to put in your body; you don't have the right to put it in mine.

    Since I don't think that is too complicated for you to have understood, I can only conclude that you were being deliberately obtuse.

  25. Re:I need circles indeed. on Facebook More Hated Than Banks, Utilities · · Score: 1

    Listen, I am not going to get in an argument about whether anything on facebook is user-friendly or not, but the fact that you were not aware of it doesn't mean it is poorly implemented or hidden.

    There is a big button at the top of the friends list page that says "Add List." on it. When you post something, there is a drop-down immediately to the left of the "Share" button to choose who can see it. And when this highly requested feature was finally added, there were plenty of news articles about it on all the tech blogs, including slashdot.

    Just because you make your living in web development and this feature somehow escaped your attention despite all the hype about it (and despite the lack of it being your apparent number one problem with facebook) doesn't mean it is user-unfriendly. It just means that you can "make a living" at something and still fail to pay attention.