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User: MightyMartian

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Comments · 19,559

  1. Re:Duh on U.S. Measles Cases Triple In 2013 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    What if I told you I was the Emperor of Andromeda and that my farts didn't stink and every time I touched a dollar bill, it turned into a bar of gold?

    Talk is cheap, mate, and even if, on the outside chance you aren't some stupid antivaccer trying to make your objections sound the least bit rational, then I'd say the weight of your fellow biologists outweighs any particular claim you may make, and it is them you would have to debate, and it is them you would most likely get used to.

    Oh, and stay the fuck away from my kids, you arrogant asshole.

  2. Duh on U.S. Measles Cases Triple In 2013 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It goes without saying that the moronic get what they deserve, though sadly, when herd immunity is compromised, sometimes the innocent (those who cannot be inoculated) pay the price too.

  3. Re:mitochondrial dna! on Oldest Human DNA Contains Clues To Mysterious Species · · Score: 1

    Besides, we all know those Neanderthals mean were the one's hitting our ancestral women on the heads, dragging them back their caves, and spreading their DNA. :P

    I thought that was Congressman. Evolution is spool confusing.

  4. Re:Denisovans? on Oldest Human DNA Contains Clues To Mysterious Species · · Score: 1

    I love a log of Niven's writing, and try very very hard to ignore the whole Pak Protector aspects of his stories, though it is awfully bloody hard with the Ring World material.

  5. Re:What a joke on How Much Is Oracle To Blame For Healthcare IT Woes? · · Score: 4, Insightful

    As much as I loathe guys like Mark Zuckerberg, I'll wager giving some of his script monkeys a few months to come up with a functional ACA website, and they'd probably do it, using largely open source tools to pull it off.

  6. Re:It's Microsoft's fault on IDC: PC Shipments Decline Worse Than Forecasted, No Recovery Expected · · Score: 2

    I can verify this. My suppliers are hitting me with emails and sales calls, and when we talk about new PCs, the first words out of their mouths are about how they will happily ship with Windows 7 licenses.

  7. Re:Simply no need to buy as many anymore on IDC: PC Shipments Decline Worse Than Forecasted, No Recovery Expected · · Score: 1

    Yes, that would help, but because PCs now have smart devices as competition, software companies are being forced to code with an eye on limited resources.

  8. We're still running mainly Windows Vista workstations at work. We are making a move to replace the last XP machines (about eight or nine of them), but other than that it's basically going to be playing the attrition game. Most of the computers are dual core processor systems with 2 or 3gb of RAM and 200gb hard drives, more than enough to run browsers and Microsoft Office. Most of my suppliers are desperate to get me to buy new systems, and one of their carrots is they'll ship them out with Windows 7, not exactly boding well for Windows 8 future.

    On the other hand, I did do the upgrade to Exchange 2010 to get better support for all the iOS and Android smart devices the staff are using. I get more requests these days to set up smart phones and tablets than I do to configure workstations. It's not that the PC is dying in our organization. Quite the opposite, they're still getting used, but feature-wise they really all plateaued about three or four years ago, and short of a motherboard smoking, I really won't get any bang for our buck by buying replacements.

    I know that the suppliers I usually deal with are pestering me a lot, desperate to get sales up. They're just not moving PCs in the enterprise market any more. Even worse, some of the manufacturers are literally competing against themselves. I can buy HP and Dell refurb Windows 7 machines that are a couple of years old for like $150, with Windows 7 Pro license included. The last three computers I bought to replace failed hardware were Dell refurbs. At $150, if they last a year, I figure I've done pretty well, and the oldest of them is sitting at about 18 or 19 months.

    Where we once looked at about a three, maybe four year cycle of PC replacement, we're now talking of pushing well past the halfway mark of this decade. Notebooks and laptops will probably have a shorter lifespan simply due to the rigors they go through, but still, we have four year old laptops still in the field.

    We can't be the only ones pondering such a replacement cycle, and that's just got to be freaking manufacturers out.

  9. I call BS on this. I highly doubt there has been a major push towards build-your-own PCs. Frankly, I think we all have to deal with the fact that smartdevices have kicked the piss out of PCs.

    Case in point. We have a three year old laptop which we turn on maybe a couple of times of week. Both the wife and I have 7" tablets (I have a Nexus 7 and the wife has a Kobo Arc). These little critters do the bulk of the surfing and email at home.

  10. Re:but what about cheap disk? on How the LHC Is Reviving Magnetic Tape · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It depends on the optical disc. If you fork out the money for an archival media like gold CDs or DVDs, then you can probably expect something like 20 to 40 years. All in all, from what I've read, tape still is king in long term storage.

  11. Re:maybe on How the LHC Is Reviving Magnetic Tape · · Score: 2

    I don't think "cheapness" is the problem being solved. More important for an organization like the LHC is archival reliability. Tapes can lost a long time while retaining their data integrity. I honestly doubt even high end hard drives can make that claim.

  12. Re:but what about cheap disk? on How the LHC Is Reviving Magnetic Tape · · Score: 2

    I've always insisted on a tape backup system. Hard drive backups certainly have their place, but tape cannot be beat for long-term archival storage. One of our weekly offsight backups goes into a safety deposit box, where sits a duplicate tape drive. I don't want to be searching around for a replacement while my organization is down and out due to some cataclysmic failure.

  13. Re:Maybe, but... on Piracy Offers Heavy Metal a New Business Model · · Score: 4, Informative

    That's because Metallica are a bunch of whining undertalented primadonas. Metallica, the original Nickelback.

  14. Re:Were they doing anything illegal? on NSA Planned To Discredit Radicals Based On Web-Browsing Habits · · Score: 2, Interesting

    One wonders if the beast is an inevitability of technically advanced civilizations. You look at what the people of North Korea or a Belarus tolerate, when all logic says that those regimes are so awful and incompetent that the people should rise up and cast down the tyrants.

    As much as I like to think humanity is on an upward course, I'm truly beginning to think the Enlightenment was a brief, anomalous period that, if its effects haven't ended, are on a continuing decline. Science has been brought into disrepute because it disagrees with the the money men. Liberties have been compromised at every turn with excuses that range from "Oh God, Terrorists" or "But what about the children!!!" to the more naked "We do it because we can." Our art has been dumbed down to the point where culture is defined by the latest Lady Gaga wig or some guy throwing his own excrement at at a wall is called art. Sure we have lots of technical advancements, but even there, the drive to fund basic research is dying in the West as short-sighted politicians try direct funding towards limited and specified goals; in no small part, I think, because the money men that own them don't like it when basic research turns up the error of their ways.

    I feel like the West is declining, even as Asia and Latin America, however haltingly and unsteadily, are literally shooting for the stars. Sure, they may be a half century behind us in some respects, but they're closing the gap rapidly and seem to have the drive that the West once had. Look at geopolitics. The West decolonized Africa, and now China is recolonizing it.

    Maybe that's the natural order. One civilization fades and another takes its place. The West has had its time in the sun, as the Song, Romans, Akkadians, Egyptians and Athenians did in their day, but those outside the walls are quick to learn and have the hunger to use it.

  15. Re:Were they doing anything illegal? on NSA Planned To Discredit Radicals Based On Web-Browsing Habits · · Score: 1

    It's difficult to imagine how the NSA can possibly survive all of this.

    Difficult to imagine, but sadly that's just probably because of my own cognitive shortcomings. I'm sure they will survive and thrive. After all, with this kind of information at their disposal, the NSA can go far beyond the poisonous atmosphere that J. Edgar Hoover created around Washington in his day. The NSA will likely own almost everyone in Congress, if they don't already.

  16. Re:Another cure that is worse than the disease on Spamhaus Calls for Fining Operators of Insecure Servers · · Score: 1

    I'll agree to the fine, providing there is an equally onerous one for every RBL's that wrongfully put IPs on their lists.

  17. Re:shame on Jury Finds Newegg Infringed Patent, Owes $2.3 Million · · Score: 1

    The problem isn't just parents, it is also that we allow sociopaths to pass the bar exam.

  18. Re:Well, isn't this nice on Why Scott Adams Wished Death On His Dad · · Score: 1

    But that is the issue. A lethal dose,of morphine means you fall asleep and die relatively peacefully. Why should the law force me to pick between two horrific choices?

  19. Re:Well, isn't this nice on Why Scott Adams Wished Death On His Dad · · Score: 1

    Providing I've made my wishes known long before, why should,the law make my suicide, assisted or otherwise, a criminal act?

  20. Re:Well, isn't this nice on Why Scott Adams Wished Death On His Dad · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You've clearly never been around someone in the final stages of dementia.
    I can tell you this, I'll be checking out before I get to that point.

  21. Re:hrm on Geeks For Monarchy: The Rise of the Neoreactionaries · · Score: 1

    Good grief, read some history. The Sovereign cannot use the vast bulk of these powers unilaterally, but only on the advice of Her Ministers.

    I urge anyone here wanting to understand the Queen's powers should read Bagehot's The English Constitution. The Queen has the right to be advised, to encourage and to warn.

  22. Re:hrm on Geeks For Monarchy: The Rise of the Neoreactionaries · · Score: 3, Informative

    While it is theoretically possible for the Sovereign to veto a bill by refusing Royal Assent, the incidents since 1689 are pretty rare. Queen Anne vetoed the Scottish Militia Bill,. In the 1930s the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta used the Sovereign's right to delay assent over a series of bills designed to limit press freedoms.

  23. Re:hrm on Geeks For Monarchy: The Rise of the Neoreactionaries · · Score: 1

    Absolute Monarchy died in england when James II tossed his Royal Seal in the Thames and fled to the continent. The general outlines of the British constitution were drawn up 1688-1689 when William and Mary were offers the throne in exchange for granting assent to the Bill of Rights 1689. This act made lawful the notion of Parliament's supremacy. It would take another century or so, until George IIII's madness and the incompetency of Prince George as regent for the notion of "government of parliament" to come to fruition, but basically, since 1689, the Sovereign has only been allowed to use his or her still substantial royal prerogatives with the at least tacit approval of Parliament.

    The number of instances since 1689 of a Monarch directly exercising prerogatives like delaying or vetoing legislation without the advice of their ministers is exceedingly rare. There are exceptions, such as the 2011 UK election where no party gained a majority in the House of Commons, and the Queen's reserve power to pick Her government became active.

  24. Re:So long on BlackBerry's CFO, CMO, and COO Leave Company · · Score: 1

    Governments are not businesses.

  25. Re:First sandwich on Geeks For Monarchy: The Rise of the Neoreactionaries · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Good grief. Eugenics on top of autocracy. Nazi Germany, here we come.