When I was a kid, my dad made me spend hour after hour knocking the cores out of laminated transformers with a 15 lb. sledge so that the copper wire was free.
I also had to sit and cut the plastic off of foot after foot of copper wire with a utility knife and leather gloves so we could recycle the copper wire for cash.
At last, I can now put these valuable skills on my résumé! I just hope my career in technology doesn't come around full circle...
Also, by converting proteins to crystals, it enables us to arrange them into superstructures which can be rapidly oxidized in a fused silicate tube and subsequently internally analyzed by lung tissue.
My god, with this technology, we could manufacture the purest Methamphetamine known to man.
Party at Imperial College London tonight! Thank meth Doctor Stephenson!
Ok, so I don't know a ton about nuclear medicine, I know just enough to be dangerous. Protein crystallization allows us to see it's structure whereby we better understand its function.
The reason this bit of news is so big is that it will (hopefully) allow researchers a way to quickly look at the structures of proteins in such as (in the second link) infectious diseases transmitted by prions, or protein particles. Prions seem to be pure protein; they contain neither DNA nor RNA.
If we can understand the shape and formation of proteins, we can understand how viruses and cells work because proteins are the building blocks. Viruses are obviously first on the chopping block as they are the smallest and infect millions of people world wide (AIDS, influenza, the common cold, etc.).
Mr. Nash, you used to work on Microsoft's marketing team and now you're in charge of security technologies, have you ever been to a conference or held a press release where every single person seems to be convinced Microsoft is evil or makes non-secure products (like this parent's author)? How do you deal with something like this? Do you try as hard as possible to convince them otherwise or do you instead try to focus on the better points of Microsoft's products?
Mr. Nash, what are the greatest differences and similarities between Microsoft Corp. and Data General Corp., your two most recent employers? Most importantly, how drastic were the changes you saw (not necessarily changes due to job function but changes in general)? What do you like the most and what do you hate the most?
This isn't a question, it's obviously a little of both. Sacrifice some information about the sites you visit to allow those who run the servers (anyone, really) some feedback and statistics.
It's simply the user's choice as to whether or not the pros outweigh the cons. And I'm sure the massive response that ensues on Slashdot will reveal that everyone values these pros and cons differently.
Doesn't seem to be much argument other than I think they should have a very simple way to disable this if the user so chooses. As with the iTunes fiasco, I would recommend Firefox be distributed with this option disabled.
Sure if it's your keyboard you know if its been cleaned or freshly splattered. With someone elses keyboard you are taking a large risk.
You seem to be implying that at some point in time, it's alright to lick a keyboard depending on the user and whether or not said keyboard has been cleaned.
Why one would need to lick a keyboard, I'll never know.
Maybe they don't want to come into work the next day? Maybe you lost a bet? I'm not sure...
What has caused such an occurance in your life, Chineseeyes?
If you delve deeper into the Customize Talk site, you'll find a page that has instructions on how to fiddle with the interface of your Google Talk Client using a resource hacker.
Another option would be joining Google Talk Open asking if anyone has perhaps a cut and dry simple version of Google that does what you're asking.
Hope this helps you in your quest for the featureless talk client. I think GAIM can be configured to be pretty minimal but I don't think it gets stripped down as far as you seem to have in mind.
For those readers interested in customizing Google Talk, I would suggest looking at Customize Talk. It has a lot of great downloads.
If you want to be able to chat to your friends on AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo Chat, Jabber, IRC, Gadu-Gadu, SILC, GroupWise, Zephyr or Google Talk, then I suggest you download GAIM which works on virtually any platform. There are some configurations that need to be set to connect to Google Talk networks.
And, if you're really into this stuff, join the Google Talk Open Group on Google Groups and help people fix bugs or figure out how to kill bugs that you might have!
My goodness. It seems you are suggesting the (us) government is not getting carried away, while they are, in fact, already carried all the way.
Oh, after reading about other governments present and past, the U.S. government is by no means "all the way."
"All the way" is Slashdot's server's IP log being requisitioned by the government whereby, shortly after, you and all your family members and friends are nowhere to be found. Afterall, the easiest way to maintain 100% public approval is simply to remove the nay-sayers without anyone else knowing.
I think we're still a ways away from that point...
Here's a blog related to this ACLU Vs NSA lawsuit.
And from that blog, there's a great site with all the documents which raise concern. There's a lot of info on there if you're really serious about reading up on what resources the ACLU is using to run this case.
Now, I'm sure there's much to be debated about whether or not the ACLU should be taking this action and suing the NSA. Frankly, I'm not sure if this lawsuit is called for or not. It could just be a waste of a government agency's time but the courts will throw it out if that is the case. I'm pretty sure it's not--I'm pretty sure this will be heard in a court of law but the ACLU just won't get anywhere.
Now, I've heard a lot of talk among people of the ACLU being a crazy leftist organization that's terribly out of touch with reality. But, no matter who you are, you have to admit that the ACLU prevents you from losing anything that might be considered a civil liberty.
No one can argue, this group pushes back so hard against the government even when it comes to something like domestic spying on a relatively small part of the population. They put forth such an effort that I'm sure if any member of the government is about to make a decision about our rights they are probably thinking, "If I do this, the ACLU is going to be all over me in the press..."
And that's why I love the ACLU. Because I can sit on my fat ass and not have to worry about the government getting carried away.
It doesn't come from one user. It comes from a whole nest of people standing around the entrances to high level instances with character names like lxpndxttt.
You should see the number of people on my ignore list.
/w masklinn take me on MC, k thanks /w masklinn take me on MC, k thanks /w masklinn take me on MC, k thanks /w masklinn take me on MC, k thanks /w masklinn take me on MC, k thanks /w masklinn take me on MC, k thanks /w masklinn take me on MC, k thanks...
Apparently there is a common belief among English speaking players that most non-English speakers
are gold farmers and are only playing for commercial gain.
And that's why English speaking players feel that Chinese speakers are probably
just farmers selling gold to players in the states for money. Because if all
they wanted was the game, they would be playing on the
many servers in China
that Blizzard has licensed The9 to run.
I never have problems with French speakers on my server, why are they capable of
sticking to their own servers unlike the Chinese on my server?
If they weren't farmers, they'd be on their native language server.
In fact, as I
understand it, it costs less for a Chinese
version of WoW and to play it monthly.
My ancestors (parents and grandparents) are a naturally inquisitive people. Any attempt to teach them things about computers may only leave them more confused and full of questions.
You are about to undertake a Herculean task in that you are now required to omit certain things which we may all know. I think your strategy should concentrate on figuring out how simply you can describe something without causing more confusion and questions.
I would suggest analyzing The New Way Things Work by David Macaulay because he does a good job at using simple illustrations and brought me up to speed on a lot of engineering ideas when I was only in fifth grade. I would try to mimic him and use his level of detail as a template into what the common person is ready to ingest.
Perhaps you should also change your strategy from "What do I include?" to "Where do I draw the line?" Start with a computer and describe the monitor, mouse, keyboard, box, printer, etc. in a high level. These are the obvious things you see. Then you can take and chapter by chapter explain each component down to as much detail as you want to. I would then have a chapter on communications and the internet that doesn't go all the way down to protocols.
Allow me to illustrate what kind of people you should aim this book at in this telephone call between me and my mother:
Me: Ok, tell me what the screen says now. Mom: It's blue. Me: What do you mean "it's blue"? What does it say? Mom: It says, "9F D8 34 7B..." Me: Um, that's ok, ma, I don't speak hex. Mom: "... FA 25 3C A2..."
One more thing, I shudder at the possibility of the history of computers being taught to my parents. This is more information that isn't really pertinent to what a layperson needs to know about computers. I would suggest delving into this as little as possible but historical facts always make reading interesting if you want to include little side notes.
As with most projects undertaken--keep it simple, stupid!
As CmdrTaco, I'm sure you have money coming out of your ears that you've harvested from the pseudo-religion that is Slashdot.
But for those of you with fewer fiscal resources, I will tell you the stories of my friend and me, a.k.a. The Master Rebaters.
My story is a simple one. I love music. I have over 1,000 CDs and have spent a lot of time meticulously ripping them with my friend CDex. So, I have some 350-400GB of data that I would like to archive. There are a multitude of possibilities but, since I'm short on cash, I opted for a simple $13 RAID 1 controller... I know, I know, I'm going to catch hell for using such a crappy generic product. And I know many people who will tell you that VIA is crap when it comes to RAID controllers. Maybe you're one of them. If you are, I hear that the brand Promise provides excellent RAID controllers, you'll just pay a whole lot more for them. A couple of these babies in RAID 1 and you're set.
My friend, however, opted for a huge and expensive RAID 6 array controller made by Promise. Then he waited and waited until there was a 250 GB Maxtor rebate at CompUSA or Outpost and went in and bought five with cash. Then he filled out the rebates for relatives and played the waiting game. Huge initial investment but he received a lot of money back slowly. Result, a 1.1 ~ 1.2 TB RAID array. He got a lot more storage and more efficient use of the disks since a RAID 6 with striping allows for drives to be rebuilt in the array.
What he wasn't planning on was the logistics of what he would have to do to his Antec case as a result of all these drives. Fans. Airflow. Heat. These all became huge issues for him--especially in the summer. I'm not sure what your situation is with a case but I made no alterations to my case.
Now, there's a lot of things I skipped over that you can take into consideration, like SATA or ATA? 7,200 RPM or 10,000 RPM? 8MB or 16MB buffer? Striping size? etc. Honestly, those issues aren't worth my time to mess with. Sure sure, I'm losing precious ms seek/read time on my disks but I'm not that motivated.
In the end, if you're only looking for half a TB, do what I did. Those 500 GB drives will only get cheaper and if one blows, just pop another in. And if you really need that room to grow, grab the nice RAID controller that supports RAID 0-6 and just use two 500GBs leaving the other three slots open for the future when you might buy them and RAID 6 it.
While this judge's message may seem absurd, remember to pay royalties when you code a progress bar in your application.
That's right, a whole lot of people owe William S. Andreas and Jeffery P. Foster of IBM a whole lot of money.
Oh, and this was filed in the U.S. but approved by a European patent office so I don't think it's fair for this judge to bash only us Yanks.
My church had a fundraiser once and I believe they used a progress bar on a website to track their earnings... I should e-mail Mr. Andreas and Mr. Foster--the Catholic Church has got deep pockets!
Say, have any of you Java swing programmers ever typed
? Because I was thinking of starting a patent lawyer career, I just need you to reply with your name, contact information and the application you used it on and distributed.
The climate centres around the world, which are the equivalent of the pathology lab of a hospital, have reported the Earth's physical condition, and the climate specialists see it as seriously ill, and soon to pass into a morbid fever that may last as long as 100,000 years. I have to tell you, as members of the Earth's family and an intimate part of it, that you and especially civilisation are in grave danger.
I don't want to start a flamewar but isn't he being a little melodramatic?
First off, the "climate centres" around the world aren't the equivalent to a pathology lab. This is a bad analogy. Pathology is a science that is fairly solid. There is a pathogen or there isn't, we may miss it but we sure are good at diagnosing it if you have it. More importantly, pathologists can agree with each other.
With the status of the environment, no one agrees with anyone else. The world is ending on one end while the U.S. government isn't too concerned with it at the time. James Lovelock is certain we're doomed while Michael Chrichton is giving speeches detailing environmentalism as a religion.
Who do we believe? The physician or the author? I don't think either are adequately qualified to make the call.
I can understand articles urging us to cut back on emissions or asking everyone to support the Kyoto Treaty. What I don't understand is how this article can be constructive. I read it and it tells me to drive to Wal-Mart as fast as possible and buy a gun and five shells so that I can rob said Wal-Mart of all guns and shells for my basement armory.
Can anyone please tell me what Mr. Lovelock hoped to gain from this article other than creating hysteria among his fans and receiving "nut job" status from those who disagree with him?
The Revenge of Gaia' is published by Penguin on 2 February.
Oh, I'm sure that will be a fair and unbiased scientific look at the state of the environment that everyone will love. Why must people make such polarizing comments? Can't they see how many people they alienate with one fell swoop? He could have gotten the same message across without the drama.
I used to make duct tape wallets in high school but had a very bad experience with them. Most duct tape has a shiny backside that isn't very cohesive with the sticky substance on the underside. What happens is when these overlap or your design depends on these two surfaces to stick together, you get a mess.
Now, there may be some kind of duct tape out there that avoids this issue, I'm not sure. Maybe these guys would know which brand is best but my wallet nearly destroyed my license at the time. Essentially, you need to look for duct tape that will adequately hold against itself when you need it to. After years of sliding it in and out of my back pocket and sitting on it, the tape started to smear against the shiny part and separate. As a result, the goo (bottom ply) and meshing (middle ply) were slipping out from underneath the shiny part (top ply) and getting goo all over my cards and ID.
Essentially, it comes down to how many mils of adhesive you are working with. A lot of times, the more expensive stuff will have around 12 mils of glue which means that it is ideal for construction. However, this may result in more sliding and more goo seepage in your wallet. I would recommend something in between the range of 7.5 and 12 mils. You're not going to be concerned about tensile strength, just thickness and what the coating is on the back. If the coating is non bonding to the adhesive used, you don't want that tape!
The actual design can be very much up to you although the article does provide a link to a nice standard model. I would suggest to try to use as many whole pieces as possible and when you're thinking about the design, rely on adhesive/adhesive bonds instead of adhesive/polyethylene since the cohesion is vastly different.
So if you venture on this, for the love of god, RESEARCH THE TAPE! Honestly, I estimate the life of these things to be a month unless you want to also pay for a new license often. I think back to my dad's wallet which was this old beat up piece of leather with its seams showing. But he's had it as long as I can remember and that thing has taken a beating. There's a reason why wallets are made from leather.
Remember, if you can't fix something with duct tape and WD-40, you're just not trying hard enough:-).
If it's not stuck and it's supposed to be, duct tape it. If it's stuck and it's not supposed to be, WD-40 it. If it's not broken--keep me away from it!
My first ever encounter with this mentality was in high school when my music theory instructor told us that she loved her Mac and when I tried to argue with her about a number of things, she'd repeatedly reply with "No Mac has ever been hacked or had a virus on it."
Now, at the time, I was a young nooblet and probably should have let it slide but instead I snuck into her office and opened up her Macintosh's word editing software with the intent of some lil' bastardry. I found the option to replace a mistyped word with another that the user entered. After that, whenever she typed the word "the", it was replaced with "WARNING! VIRUS DETECTED! PULL PLUG FROM OUTLET AS SOON AS POSSIBLE!" Unfortunately, her son knew enough about computer to fix it so my fun didn't last very long (only one or two lunges at the wall).
Back to the issue--I think it is a grave mistake for anyone to ever feel 100% invulnerable when it comes to computers that are connected to the internet in anyway. I would diagnose this as a standard case of a false sense of security. This is something that has plagued many people throughout history and often led to their downfalls.
What message am I trying to get across to Mac users? First, realize you're not invulnerable. Second, just browse around and look at what's out there for you to use as anti-virus and virus blocking tools. And if you don't want to, read some horror stories, perhaps that will motivate you to become aware of possible worms in your Apple.
Slashdot Mirror
When I was a kid, my dad made me spend hour after hour knocking the cores out of laminated transformers with a 15 lb. sledge so that the copper wire was free.
...
I also had to sit and cut the plastic off of foot after foot of copper wire with a utility knife and leather gloves so we could recycle the copper wire for cash.
At last, I can now put these valuable skills on my résumé! I just hope my career in technology doesn't come around full circle
Party at Imperial College London tonight! Thank meth Doctor Stephenson!
Ok, so I don't know a ton about nuclear medicine, I know just enough to be dangerous. Protein crystallization allows us to see it's structure whereby we better understand its function.
The reason this bit of news is so big is that it will (hopefully) allow researchers a way to quickly look at the structures of proteins in such as (in the second link) infectious diseases transmitted by prions, or protein particles. Prions seem to be pure protein; they contain neither DNA nor RNA.
If we can understand the shape and formation of proteins, we can understand how viruses and cells work because proteins are the building blocks. Viruses are obviously first on the chopping block as they are the smallest and infect millions of people world wide (AIDS, influenza, the common cold, etc.).
Mr. Nash, you used to work on Microsoft's marketing team and now you're in charge of security technologies, have you ever been to a conference or held a press release where every single person seems to be convinced Microsoft is evil or makes non-secure products (like this parent's author)? How do you deal with something like this? Do you try as hard as possible to convince them otherwise or do you instead try to focus on the better points of Microsoft's products?
Mr. Nash, what are the greatest differences and similarities between Microsoft Corp. and Data General Corp., your two most recent employers? Most importantly, how drastic were the changes you saw (not necessarily changes due to job function but changes in general)? What do you like the most and what do you hate the most?
This isn't a question, it's obviously a little of both. Sacrifice some information about the sites you visit to allow those who run the servers (anyone, really) some feedback and statistics.
It's simply the user's choice as to whether or not the pros outweigh the cons. And I'm sure the massive response that ensues on Slashdot will reveal that everyone values these pros and cons differently.
Doesn't seem to be much argument other than I think they should have a very simple way to disable this if the user so chooses. As with the iTunes fiasco, I would recommend Firefox be distributed with this option disabled.
Why one would need to lick a keyboard, I'll never know. Maybe they don't want to come into work the next day? Maybe you lost a bet? I'm not sure
What has caused such an occurance in your life, Chineseeyes?
That's funny, it doesn't taste like McDonalds
If you delve deeper into the Customize Talk site, you'll find a page that has instructions on how to fiddle with the interface of your Google Talk Client using a resource hacker.
Another option would be joining Google Talk Open asking if anyone has perhaps a cut and dry simple version of Google that does what you're asking.
Hope this helps you in your quest for the featureless talk client. I think GAIM can be configured to be pretty minimal but I don't think it gets stripped down as far as you seem to have in mind.
For those readers interested in customizing Google Talk, I would suggest looking at Customize Talk. It has a lot of great downloads.
If you want to be able to chat to your friends on AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo Chat, Jabber, IRC, Gadu-Gadu, SILC, GroupWise, Zephyr or Google Talk, then I suggest you download GAIM which works on virtually any platform. There are some configurations that need to be set to connect to Google Talk networks.
And, if you're really into this stuff, join the Google Talk Open Group on Google Groups and help people fix bugs or figure out how to kill bugs that you might have!
"All the way" is Slashdot's server's IP log being requisitioned by the government whereby, shortly after, you and all your family members and friends are nowhere to be found. Afterall, the easiest way to maintain 100% public approval is simply to remove the nay-sayers without anyone else knowing.
I think we're still a ways away from that point
Here's a blog related to this ACLU Vs NSA lawsuit.
And from that blog, there's a great site with all the documents which raise concern. There's a lot of info on there if you're really serious about reading up on what resources the ACLU is using to run this case.
Now, I'm sure there's much to be debated about whether or not the ACLU should be taking this action and suing the NSA. Frankly, I'm not sure if this lawsuit is called for or not. It could just be a waste of a government agency's time but the courts will throw it out if that is the case. I'm pretty sure it's not--I'm pretty sure this will be heard in a court of law but the ACLU just won't get anywhere.
..."
Now, I've heard a lot of talk among people of the ACLU being a crazy leftist organization that's terribly out of touch with reality. But, no matter who you are, you have to admit that the ACLU prevents you from losing anything that might be considered a civil liberty.
No one can argue, this group pushes back so hard against the government even when it comes to something like domestic spying on a relatively small part of the population. They put forth such an effort that I'm sure if any member of the government is about to make a decision about our rights they are probably thinking, "If I do this, the ACLU is going to be all over me in the press
And that's why I love the ACLU. Because I can sit on my fat ass and not have to worry about the government getting carried away.
It doesn't come from one user. It comes from a whole nest of people standing around the entrances to high level instances with character names like lxpndxttt.
You should see the number of people on my ignore list.
And that's why English speaking players feel that Chinese speakers are probably just farmers selling gold to players in the states for money. Because if all they wanted was the game, they would be playing on the many servers in China that Blizzard has licensed The9 to run.
I never have problems with French speakers on my server, why are they capable of sticking to their own servers unlike the Chinese on my server?
If they weren't farmers, they'd be on their native language server.
In fact, as I understand it, it costs less for a Chinese version of WoW and to play it monthly.
My ancestors (parents and grandparents) are a naturally inquisitive people. Any attempt to teach them things about computers may only leave them more confused and full of questions.
..." ..."
You are about to undertake a Herculean task in that you are now required to omit certain things which we may all know. I think your strategy should concentrate on figuring out how simply you can describe something without causing more confusion and questions.
I would suggest analyzing The New Way Things Work by David Macaulay because he does a good job at using simple illustrations and brought me up to speed on a lot of engineering ideas when I was only in fifth grade. I would try to mimic him and use his level of detail as a template into what the common person is ready to ingest.
Perhaps you should also change your strategy from "What do I include?" to "Where do I draw the line?" Start with a computer and describe the monitor, mouse, keyboard, box, printer, etc. in a high level. These are the obvious things you see. Then you can take and chapter by chapter explain each component down to as much detail as you want to. I would then have a chapter on communications and the internet that doesn't go all the way down to protocols.
Allow me to illustrate what kind of people you should aim this book at in this telephone call between me and my mother:
Me: Ok, tell me what the screen says now.
Mom: It's blue.
Me: What do you mean "it's blue"? What does it say?
Mom: It says, "9F D8 34 7B
Me: Um, that's ok, ma, I don't speak hex.
Mom: "... FA 25 3C A2
One more thing, I shudder at the possibility of the history of computers being taught to my parents. This is more information that isn't really pertinent to what a layperson needs to know about computers. I would suggest delving into this as little as possible but historical facts always make reading interesting if you want to include little side notes.
As with most projects undertaken--keep it simple, stupid!
Yeah, I know I'm late to get on this but
As CmdrTaco, I'm sure you have money coming out of your ears that you've harvested from the pseudo-religion that is Slashdot.
... I know, I know, I'm going to catch hell for using such a crappy generic product. And I know many people who will tell you that VIA is crap when it comes to RAID controllers. Maybe you're one of them. If you are, I hear that the brand Promise provides excellent RAID controllers, you'll just pay a whole lot more for them. A couple of these babies in RAID 1 and you're set.
But for those of you with fewer fiscal resources, I will tell you the stories of my friend and me, a.k.a. The Master Rebaters.
My story is a simple one. I love music. I have over 1,000 CDs and have spent a lot of time meticulously ripping them with my friend CDex. So, I have some 350-400GB of data that I would like to archive. There are a multitude of possibilities but, since I'm short on cash, I opted for a simple $13 RAID 1 controller
My friend, however, opted for a huge and expensive RAID 6 array controller made by Promise. Then he waited and waited until there was a 250 GB Maxtor rebate at CompUSA or Outpost and went in and bought five with cash. Then he filled out the rebates for relatives and played the waiting game. Huge initial investment but he received a lot of money back slowly. Result, a 1.1 ~ 1.2 TB RAID array. He got a lot more storage and more efficient use of the disks since a RAID 6 with striping allows for drives to be rebuilt in the array.
What he wasn't planning on was the logistics of what he would have to do to his Antec case as a result of all these drives. Fans. Airflow. Heat. These all became huge issues for him--especially in the summer. I'm not sure what your situation is with a case but I made no alterations to my case.
Now, there's a lot of things I skipped over that you can take into consideration, like SATA or ATA? 7,200 RPM or 10,000 RPM? 8MB or 16MB buffer? Striping size? etc. Honestly, those issues aren't worth my time to mess with. Sure sure, I'm losing precious ms seek/read time on my disks but I'm not that motivated.
In the end, if you're only looking for half a TB, do what I did. Those 500 GB drives will only get cheaper and if one blows, just pop another in. And if you really need that room to grow, grab the nice RAID controller that supports RAID 0-6 and just use two 500GBs leaving the other three slots open for the future when you might buy them and RAID 6 it.
What fails? The old IBM Deathstars. Beware!
While this judge's message may seem absurd, remember to pay royalties when you code a progress bar in your application.
... I should e-mail Mr. Andreas and Mr. Foster--the Catholic Church has got deep pockets!
That's right, a whole lot of people owe William S. Andreas and Jeffery P. Foster of IBM a whole lot of money.
Oh, and this was filed in the U.S. but approved by a European patent office so I don't think it's fair for this judge to bash only us Yanks.
My church had a fundraiser once and I believe they used a progress bar on a website to track their earnings
Say, have any of you Java swing programmers ever typed
JProgressBar myJPB = new JProgressBar();
? Because I was thinking of starting a patent lawyer career, I just need you to reply with your name, contact information and the application you used it on and distributed.
First off, the "climate centres" around the world aren't the equivalent to a pathology lab. This is a bad analogy. Pathology is a science that is fairly solid. There is a pathogen or there isn't, we may miss it but we sure are good at diagnosing it if you have it. More importantly, pathologists can agree with each other.
With the status of the environment, no one agrees with anyone else. The world is ending on one end while the U.S. government isn't too concerned with it at the time. James Lovelock is certain we're doomed while Michael Chrichton is giving speeches detailing environmentalism as a religion.
Who do we believe? The physician or the author? I don't think either are adequately qualified to make the call.
I can understand articles urging us to cut back on emissions or asking everyone to support the Kyoto Treaty. What I don't understand is how this article can be constructive. I read it and it tells me to drive to Wal-Mart as fast as possible and buy a gun and five shells so that I can rob said Wal-Mart of all guns and shells for my basement armory.
I'm not sure whether to read this as honest opinion or a hilarious satire reminiscent of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.
Can anyone please tell me what Mr. Lovelock hoped to gain from this article other than creating hysteria among his fans and receiving "nut job" status from those who disagree with him? Oh, I'm sure that will be a fair and unbiased scientific look at the state of the environment that everyone will love. Why must people make such polarizing comments? Can't they see how many people they alienate with one fell swoop? He could have gotten the same message across without the drama.
I used to make duct tape wallets in high school but had a very bad experience with them. Most duct tape has a shiny backside that isn't very cohesive with the sticky substance on the underside. What happens is when these overlap or your design depends on these two surfaces to stick together, you get a mess.
:-).
Now, there may be some kind of duct tape out there that avoids this issue, I'm not sure. Maybe these guys would know which brand is best but my wallet nearly destroyed my license at the time. Essentially, you need to look for duct tape that will adequately hold against itself when you need it to. After years of sliding it in and out of my back pocket and sitting on it, the tape started to smear against the shiny part and separate. As a result, the goo (bottom ply) and meshing (middle ply) were slipping out from underneath the shiny part (top ply) and getting goo all over my cards and ID.
Essentially, it comes down to how many mils of adhesive you are working with. A lot of times, the more expensive stuff will have around 12 mils of glue which means that it is ideal for construction. However, this may result in more sliding and more goo seepage in your wallet. I would recommend something in between the range of 7.5 and 12 mils. You're not going to be concerned about tensile strength, just thickness and what the coating is on the back. If the coating is non bonding to the adhesive used, you don't want that tape!
The actual design can be very much up to you although the article does provide a link to a nice standard model. I would suggest to try to use as many whole pieces as possible and when you're thinking about the design, rely on adhesive/adhesive bonds instead of adhesive/polyethylene since the cohesion is vastly different.
So if you venture on this, for the love of god, RESEARCH THE TAPE! Honestly, I estimate the life of these things to be a month unless you want to also pay for a new license often. I think back to my dad's wallet which was this old beat up piece of leather with its seams showing. But he's had it as long as I can remember and that thing has taken a beating. There's a reason why wallets are made from leather.
Remember, if you can't fix something with duct tape and WD-40, you're just not trying hard enough
If it's not stuck and it's supposed to be, duct tape it. If it's stuck and it's not supposed to be, WD-40 it. If it's not broken--keep me away from it!
This article was dead on.
My first ever encounter with this mentality was in high school when my music theory instructor told us that she loved her Mac and when I tried to argue with her about a number of things, she'd repeatedly reply with "No Mac has ever been hacked or had a virus on it."
Now, at the time, I was a young nooblet and probably should have let it slide but instead I snuck into her office and opened up her Macintosh's word editing software with the intent of some lil' bastardry. I found the option to replace a mistyped word with another that the user entered. After that, whenever she typed the word "the", it was replaced with "WARNING! VIRUS DETECTED! PULL PLUG FROM OUTLET AS SOON AS POSSIBLE!" Unfortunately, her son knew enough about computer to fix it so my fun didn't last very long (only one or two lunges at the wall).
Back to the issue--I think it is a grave mistake for anyone to ever feel 100% invulnerable when it comes to computers that are connected to the internet in anyway. I would diagnose this as a standard case of a false sense of security. This is something that has plagued many people throughout history and often led to their downfalls.
What message am I trying to get across to Mac users? First, realize you're not invulnerable. Second, just browse around and look at what's out there for you to use as anti-virus and virus blocking tools. And if you don't want to, read some horror stories, perhaps that will motivate you to become aware of possible worms in your Apple.