Hover (www.hover.com) is great. No bait and switch tactics, spamming you on your way to checkout, sleazy superbowl ads or other gimmicks. And you get private listings included in the base price. They aren't the cheapest, but they are competitive. They will even switch you over for free.
Thorium is far more abundant than uranium, it can't be used for weapons production and a Thorium reactor would produce almost no waste. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LeM-Dyuk6g
When he was 1 second old he was in his first year and his first decade. Exactly 10 years later he was nine years old and in his second decade. 70 years after that he was: 1.) 79 years old. 2.) in his 80th year 3.) In his 9th decade. It has to be so because he had been alive 8 decades and one second.
To further belabor the point: A second after his birth, he was in his first year. 10 years later he was simultaneously:
1. Nine years old.
2. In his 10th year
3. In his 2nd decade.
As soon as he's over 80.0000 years old, even if by a second, he's in his 9th decade.
Not to belabor the point, but he actually was "in his 9th decade" the second after he turned 79 years old, for the same reason that you are "in your first year" a second after you are born.
I agree that we should push forward on all fronts with renewable energy. But Thorium-based LFTR reactors solve most of the problems with nuclear energy, including the two biggest bug bears of them all: nuclear waste and safety. There is practically no waste in LFTR and the fuel is fantastically plentiful compared to Uranium. There are huge Thorium deposits right now. And LFTR reactors are virtually melt-down proof from the get-go. Where uranium reactors "want" to blow up by default, LFTR reactors are amazingly safe. Watch the link and the other Google Tech Day presentations. LFTR reactors have already been tested and they WORK. The military is responsible for taking us down the dead end of using Uranium for power just because it can be used in weapons. LFTR is better technology and can't be used to make bombs. Thorium CAN be the solution for our total energy needs for the foreseeable future, and will be a great adjunct to renewable energy when something like solar finally emerges. You can build lots of solar cells with safe, cheap, clean LFTR power, and then who cares if solar isn't quite as efficient. It can be used in locations that need it most right away.
...and leave a legacy that will improve life in smaller countries, he should champion the development of cheap, abundant, safe nuclear power in the form of the Liquid Flouride Thorium Reactor (LFTR). Thorium is far more abundant than Uranium and the plants are potentially much smaller and cheaper.
Obviously, dueling with pistols in the 18th and 19th centuries is well known. My point is that the quick drawing hired gun pulled his gun, shot his victim and the whole thing was over in 20 milliseconds. You could have a loaded gun pointed right at him with your finger on the trigger and still lose by a wide margin. Watchthevideo. Especially that last one.
The truth is that the duel at "high noon" is a myth perpetuated by spaghetti Westerns. An actual quick draw expert can shoot you several times and re-holster his weapon before you even have time to blink. It only takes about 20 milliseconds for them to get a shot off, while human reflex time is typically about 150-300 milliseconds. A real gun slinger could kill you even if you had already drawn your weapon and had your finger on the trigger. With such a person facing off on main street would be laughable.
Most of the kits you find at Radio Shack are firmly rooted in the 60's and 70's, where the most high tech item in the kit is the venerable old 555 timer and maybe a transistor plus 50 cents worth of resisters and a couple capacitors and an LED or two.
One who dismisses discrete electronics in favor of microcontrollers and other "high tech items" has left the path of enlightenment. At some point, you are going to want to use that microcontroller to actually control something.
Well, diversity is our strength with this approach, grasshopper, because no component is excluded merely because microcontrollers are included. Sing Cumbayà with me because it's actually a good thing that we don't have whip out our 20-year-old copy of CMOS Cookbook anymore to make something useful happen.
Learning electronics is about having fun, and with microcontrollers you can have lots of fun fast. And you don't have to give up making spaceship sounds with a 555 timer, either. You can just add the sounds to your spokePOV and really impress your neighbors (and your kids).:-)
Oh, and if you've got a Harbor Freight near you, pick up one of their digital multimeters. Check their flier because they perpetually have one on sale for 3 or 4 bucks. (Tip: test the multimeter before you leave the parking lot to avoid a trip back to exchange it.)
Most of the kits you find at Radio Shack are firmly rooted in the 60's and 70's, where the most high tech item in the kit is the venerable old 555 timer and maybe a transistor plus 50 cents worth of resisters and a couple capacitors and an LED or two. (A notable exception is their Parallax What is a Microcontroller) kit. What makes this a kit for grown ups is the solderless breadboard which can be used to hook up virtually any component instead of just a few using snaps or wires-and-springs). So if you have to have it today, you could do a lot worse than the Parallax kit. Just enter your zip code to see which store near you has it in stock (call to avoid the inevitable "...Bill have you ever heard of this?"), and you'll be in business for about $80.
But a much, much better option is to buy this starter kit and learn the hot new Arduino instead of the aging Basic Stamp. You'll need to start a junk drawer of components, including resistor assortment likethesefourkits. Local Amateur Radio HamFests and eBay are both good places to fill out your junk box.
No, you're reading the OLD schematics, my friend. Doc Brown ditched the old DeLorean internal combustion engine when he had it converted for flight.:-)
When I was fairly new to buying on eBay I read an article that maintained that sniping is evil. Influenced by the article, I placed a proxy bid early in an auction on an item that took special expertise to recognize as a good deal. (It was an expensive camera lens that needed repair. I consulted with a friend who was a camera technician before bidding) By bidding early, allowing eBay to proxy bid to my highest acceptable price, I inadvertently called attention to the item which then skyrocketed in price far beyond my highest bid. Was the person who nullified my bid by bidding past my highest acceptable price a shill or just a clueless buyer with "auction fevor?" It really doesn't matter. The net effect was the same: the price raised quickly to the point where the item was no longer a good deal. Ironically, the truly clueless then saw that there was a lot of activity on the auction and the lens sold for more than a similar lens would that needed no repair.
That was the last auction I have ever bid on an eBay auction without sniping.
eBay's proxy bidding system is prone to tampering by shills and idiots, making the system an economically infeasible to use in a couple of important ways. First, as noted in a previous article you are much less likely to win an auction if you don't snipe, wasting your time and effort. Secondly, adding insult to injury, you frequently will pay too much for the items that you do win. It is literally like tipping your hand in poker, allowing the other players to know your hand before having to place their bets. Whether the "idiots" are really stupid or just irrationally exuberant about the bidding process makes no difference, the net effect is that they act as unwitting shills for sellers. This is great for sellers and for eBay, but it's Not So Good for the buyer.
As an aside, when I am really keen to get a good buy on an item and I am willing to put a little time into the process in order to get a good price, I will use a feature on the sniping service I frequent called "Bid Groups." This is a system where I can schedule a (usually low-ball) bid on several very similar auctions and my sniping service will stop bidding after the first auction I win. Using this I usually lose five or six auctions in a row only to get a killer price on the one I win. As always, it's important to normalize the prices by taking into account shipping costs in the total price of each item because the $10 item with $20 shipping may not be a better deal than an identical item for $29 with $1 shipping, especially since sellers with sleazy, predatory shipping policies are best avoided.
This product will likely make the technology more accessible to the masses and might hopefully show that hydrogen is a more attractive fuel than petroleum-based fuels.
Hydrogen is not a more attractive fuel than fossil fuels (except in deep space) because it takes more energy to produce it than it delivers.
Slashdot Mirror
Hover (www.hover.com) is great. No bait and switch tactics, spamming you on your way to checkout, sleazy superbowl ads or other gimmicks. And you get private listings included in the base price. They aren't the cheapest, but they are competitive. They will even switch you over for free.
Thorium is far more abundant than uranium, it can't be used for weapons production and a Thorium reactor would produce almost no waste. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LeM-Dyuk6g
Yeah, not smart. You're right.
You're right. Dumb mistake on my part.
You are of course right and I am, of course and idiot. :)
When he was 1 second old he was in his first year and his first decade. Exactly 10 years later he was nine years old and in his second decade. 70 years after that he was: 1.) 79 years old. 2.) in his 80th year 3.) In his 9th decade. It has to be so because he had been alive 8 decades and one second.
To further belabor the point: A second after his birth, he was in his first year. 10 years later he was simultaneously: 1. Nine years old. 2. In his 10th year 3. In his 2nd decade.
As soon as he's over 80.0000 years old, even if by a second, he's in his 9th decade.
Not to belabor the point, but he actually was "in his 9th decade" the second after he turned 79 years old, for the same reason that you are "in your first year" a second after you are born.
I agree that we should push forward on all fronts with renewable energy. But Thorium-based LFTR reactors solve most of the problems with nuclear energy, including the two biggest bug bears of them all: nuclear waste and safety. There is practically no waste in LFTR and the fuel is fantastically plentiful compared to Uranium. There are huge Thorium deposits right now. And LFTR reactors are virtually melt-down proof from the get-go. Where uranium reactors "want" to blow up by default, LFTR reactors are amazingly safe. Watch the link and the other Google Tech Day presentations. LFTR reactors have already been tested and they WORK. The military is responsible for taking us down the dead end of using Uranium for power just because it can be used in weapons. LFTR is better technology and can't be used to make bombs. Thorium CAN be the solution for our total energy needs for the foreseeable future, and will be a great adjunct to renewable energy when something like solar finally emerges. You can build lots of solar cells with safe, cheap, clean LFTR power, and then who cares if solar isn't quite as efficient. It can be used in locations that need it most right away.
...and leave a legacy that will improve life in smaller countries, he should champion the development of cheap, abundant, safe nuclear power in the form of the Liquid Flouride Thorium Reactor (LFTR). Thorium is far more abundant than Uranium and the plants are potentially much smaller and cheaper.
You're right about my misuse of the term Spaghetti Western. Thanks for pointing that out.
Obviously, dueling with pistols in the 18th and 19th centuries is well known. My point is that the quick drawing hired gun pulled his gun, shot his victim and the whole thing was over in 20 milliseconds. You could have a loaded gun pointed right at him with your finger on the trigger and still lose by a wide margin. Watch the video. Especially that last one.
The truth is that the duel at "high noon" is a myth perpetuated by spaghetti Westerns. An actual quick draw expert can shoot you several times and re-holster his weapon before you even have time to blink. It only takes about 20 milliseconds for them to get a shot off, while human reflex time is typically about 150-300 milliseconds. A real gun slinger could kill you even if you had already drawn your weapon and had your finger on the trigger. With such a person facing off on main street would be laughable.
Most of the kits you find at Radio Shack are firmly rooted in the 60's and 70's, where the most high tech item in the kit is the venerable old 555 timer and maybe a transistor plus 50 cents worth of resisters and a couple capacitors and an LED or two.
One who dismisses discrete electronics in favor of microcontrollers and other "high tech items" has left the path of enlightenment. At some point, you are going to want to use that microcontroller to actually control something.
Well, diversity is our strength with this approach, grasshopper, because no component is excluded merely because microcontrollers are included. Sing Cumbayà with me because it's actually a good thing that we don't have whip out our 20-year-old copy of CMOS Cookbook anymore to make something useful happen.Want to interface with a $5 surplus LCD display? No problem with an Arduino. Try that with a 555 timer. Want to interface with a cheap GPS module? No problem with an Arduino. Let's see you do that with discrete components.
Learning electronics is about having fun, and with microcontrollers you can have lots of fun fast. And you don't have to give up making spaceship sounds with a 555 timer, either. You can just add the sounds to your spokePOV and really impress your neighbors (and your kids). :-)
Oh, and if you've got a Harbor Freight near you, pick up one of their digital multimeters. Check their flier because they perpetually have one on sale for 3 or 4 bucks. (Tip: test the multimeter before you leave the parking lot to avoid a trip back to exchange it.)
But a much, much better option is to buy this starter kit and learn the hot new Arduino instead of the aging Basic Stamp. You'll need to start a junk drawer of components, including resistor assortment like these four kits. Local Amateur Radio HamFests and eBay are both good places to fill out your junk box.
Some good resources:
o The Arduino Home Page
o Peter Anderson's Arduino page (the whole site is great, and most can be adapted to the Arduino)
o Sparkfun Tutorials (and don't miss out on their store that has all the good stuff)
o The Electronic Goldmine is a great resource for odd surplus electronics.
No, you're reading the OLD schematics, my friend. Doc Brown ditched the old DeLorean internal combustion engine when he had it converted for flight. :-)
Since the /. effect has shut down the original site, check it out on youtube
And you're typing on a computer that was manufactured by your buddies in the "Resistance" in Iraq made out of rocks, dirt and camel shit, right?
That was the last auction I have ever bid on an eBay auction without sniping.
eBay's proxy bidding system is prone to tampering by shills and idiots, making the system an economically infeasible to use in a couple of important ways. First, as noted in a previous article you are much less likely to win an auction if you don't snipe, wasting your time and effort. Secondly, adding insult to injury, you frequently will pay too much for the items that you do win. It is literally like tipping your hand in poker, allowing the other players to know your hand before having to place their bets. Whether the "idiots" are really stupid or just irrationally exuberant about the bidding process makes no difference, the net effect is that they act as unwitting shills for sellers. This is great for sellers and for eBay, but it's Not So Good for the buyer.
As an aside, when I am really keen to get a good buy on an item and I am willing to put a little time into the process in order to get a good price, I will use a feature on the sniping service I frequent called "Bid Groups." This is a system where I can schedule a (usually low-ball) bid on several very similar auctions and my sniping service will stop bidding after the first auction I win. Using this I usually lose five or six auctions in a row only to get a killer price on the one I win. As always, it's important to normalize the prices by taking into account shipping costs in the total price of each item because the $10 item with $20 shipping may not be a better deal than an identical item for $29 with $1 shipping, especially since sellers with sleazy, predatory shipping policies are best avoided.
You just wanted to type the word "rectal."
Hydrogen is not a more attractive fuel than fossil fuels (except in deep space) because it takes more energy to produce it than it delivers.
But here on the home planet no non-nuclear means is known to make terrestrial hydrogen that does not consume considerably more energy than it delivers.
Political arguments aside, hydrogen pollutes more not less because using it consumes more energy than it delivers.