While they had the visually challenged rodents available, one of the female researchers has conducted further experiments involving removal of their tails to see what effect this has on their running speed.
Why not? If the ISPs, all ISPs, set a maximum of, say, 1 outgoing email per second for all of their general users, wouldn't that make a zombied PC too slow to be viable? If not, how about 1 per 5 seconds? Or 10?
It wouldn't affect personal users in any serious way, and genuine bulk mailers can make specific arrangements and be held accountable.
My DBX-102 is still going strong after about 10 years, but it's mostly just a watch these days, since the Palm in my pocket sort of makes the addressbook and calendar a bit redundant.
This model wasn't available in Australia, and I had a US colleague coming over for a visit soon, so I asked a friend there to buy me one and give it to said colleague to bring with him. This was in the days before easy international bank transfers and Paypal and such, children, so we arranged payment in Berocca.
(You can't get it in the States, and my friend had got himself hooked and was jonesin' for that fizzy vitamin B.)
So, I bought USD100 worth of Berocca at the supermarket (checkout chick never batted an eyelid) and sent it back with the slightly apprehensive mule.
I've only replaced the battery twice, and each time I got a new appreciation for the ability of my Palm to Hotsync to a PC...
Am I the only one around here who is tired of reading all of this WikiPedia this and WikiPedia that stuff? Aren't there any other websites to talk about?
I've nursed a grudge against Tandy/Radio Shack for many years, so their current woes fill my small soul with spiteful glee.
Back in the 70s, they moved into Australia and tried to buy their way into market dominance, mainly against a local company, Dick Smith Electronics. DSE got hold of documents that showed that RS were prepared to lose a lot of money (by local standards) to wipe out the competition, then make it up with monopolistic pricing.
It didn't work, not least because they tried to simply transplant an American store to an Australian shop without taking local conditions into account. The publicity from DSE's protests didn't help them, either. Nor did the crap that they were selling!
Ironically, both Tandy Australia and Dick Smith Electronics were bought by Woolworths Australia (a big supermarket-based chain) in 2001. They still operate seperate shops, but there's a lot of overlap of product.
(Not completely on-topic, but moderators please note that I've just admitted to carrying a grudge for over thirty years. Mod me down if you like...) 8-)}
At one time, I'd've pointed out the difficulty of getting unauthorised physical access to a PC's USB port in any sort of secured environment.
Then a friend went to his local bank branch to get a personal loan. His salary records were all on his USB memory device (he works for an ISP who really try to avoid paper if they can)and he was allowed to plug his mempory card in to the loan officer's PC and run Acrobat to show her the documents.
Yep, on a bank PC, inside the firewall, with a USB stick of completely unkown provenance.
I bet their IT security guys would've had a fit, if they'd known!
In fact, many wall-warts operate by rectifying the AC to rough DC, then using a DC-DC converter on it.
The converter works at a much higher frequency than the 50/60Hz mains, typically several hundred kHz, which keeps the values (and therefore size and cost) of the inductors and capacitors down.
As more and more portable devices can be charged by plugging them into a USB port, a cheap hub (use the old USB1.1 model that's been replaced!) becomes a sensible charging centre for several devices.
So, tell us exactly what you want this device to do, and the clever (and honest!) nerds of/. will give you expert advice as to why it's a silly idea that you should drop immediately.
And even if it sounds like a really good idea, I don't want anyone running off to the patent office or anything, OK?
---
I'm not an electronic engineer, but I play one at work.
I was amused when PTerry was talking about the smug way in which the Hollywood ponytails dangled what they considered a huge payment in front of him, assuming that the starving writer would faint dead away at seeing that many zeroes in front of the decimal point.
He shrugged and told him how much more he'd earned from royalties that month and they first goggled and then shut up!
Oh, absolutely! I've used some and I've even written some, back in the day. A lot of it sits on isp.com/~username sites, which doesn't require any payment model.
There's still the requirement for some sort of payment, though, to maintain large software aggregation sites. Ads on the site are one option, or a mixture of free and fee software (with the site taking a cut of the fees), or there's this spyware/adware route.
Sorry if I gave the impression that there's no other way to get free software from a programmer to a user!
Slashdot Mirror
While they had the visually challenged rodents available, one of the female researchers has conducted further experiments involving removal of their tails to see what effect this has on their running speed.
It wouldn't affect personal users in any serious way, and genuine bulk mailers can make specific arrangements and be held accountable.
Teach them not to write things like "learn them" if they're trying to be taken seriously...
I hope they've at least considered using duck tape for the robotic arm.
http://craphound.com/000187.html
The full text and a podcast version are there.
You need something to scan documents automatically? I think they're called "interns"...
The podcast is well done, as well, evn if the reader can't do accents!
I like Corey's work, but it's so based in contemporary issues I do wonder how quaint it's going to seem in not too many years!
It cost me about 15 tins of Berocca... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berocca
This model wasn't available in Australia, and I had a US colleague coming over for a visit soon, so I asked a friend there to buy me one and give it to said colleague to bring with him. This was in the days before easy international bank transfers and Paypal and such, children, so we arranged payment in Berocca.
(You can't get it in the States, and my friend had got himself hooked and was jonesin' for that fizzy vitamin B.)
So, I bought USD100 worth of Berocca at the supermarket (checkout chick never batted an eyelid) and sent it back with the slightly apprehensive mule.
I've only replaced the battery twice, and each time I got a new appreciation for the ability of my Palm to Hotsync to a PC...
OK... So, what's the latest at google.com?
Back in the 70s, they moved into Australia and tried to buy their way into market dominance, mainly against a local company, Dick Smith Electronics. DSE got hold of documents that showed that RS were prepared to lose a lot of money (by local standards) to wipe out the competition, then make it up with monopolistic pricing.
It didn't work, not least because they tried to simply transplant an American store to an Australian shop without taking local conditions into account. The publicity from DSE's protests didn't help them, either. Nor did the crap that they were selling!
Ironically, both Tandy Australia and Dick Smith Electronics were bought by Woolworths Australia (a big supermarket-based chain) in 2001. They still operate seperate shops, but there's a lot of overlap of product.
(Not completely on-topic, but moderators please note that I've just admitted to carrying a grudge for over thirty years. Mod me down if you like...) 8-)}
Then a friend went to his local bank branch to get a personal loan. His salary records were all on his USB memory device (he works for an ISP who really try to avoid paper if they can)and he was allowed to plug his mempory card in to the loan officer's PC and run Acrobat to show her the documents.
Yep, on a bank PC, inside the firewall, with a USB stick of completely unkown provenance.
I bet their IT security guys would've had a fit, if they'd known!
The converter works at a much higher frequency than the 50/60Hz mains, typically several hundred kHz, which keeps the values (and therefore size and cost) of the inductors and capacitors down.
As more and more portable devices can be charged by plugging them into a USB port, a cheap hub (use the old USB1.1 model that's been replaced!) becomes a sensible charging centre for several devices.
Teflon 2.0- Now so slippery that only iron-rich foods can be cooked in Teflon frying pans, held in place by the magnetic base.
Write Upside Down Ballpoint Pens 2.0- Now write Inside Out as well!
Tang 2.0- Now tastes sort of like real fruitjuice (mostly if you haven't ever actually tasted real juice...)
And even if it sounds like a really good idea, I don't want anyone running off to the patent office or anything, OK?
---
I'm not an electronic engineer, but I play one at work.
I need to get out more.
.gnitseretni yrev siht dnuof I
Apart from getting some cheap Irish labour, what's the big deal with having a Dublin office?
(Yes, the Cory from Boingboing)
http://craphound.com/000187.html
(with links to a podcast version as well)
Is it really that hard to understand Chris or George Reeves saying "Up, up and awaaaayyy!"?
Verbing weirds nouns.
He shrugged and told him how much more he'd earned from royalties that month and they first goggled and then shut up!
The body of this post has been left deliberately blank
There's still the requirement for some sort of payment, though, to maintain large software aggregation sites. Ads on the site are one option, or a mixture of free and fee software (with the site taking a cut of the fees), or there's this spyware/adware route.
Sorry if I gave the impression that there's no other way to get free software from a programmer to a user!
(Hey, you get wheat from wheat farms and pigs from pig farms, right?)