The fact that this guy is still alive kind of blows a hole in all those Jason Borne-esque conspiracy theories. I think that if the US really did have secret assassins and super-spies all over the world, that they could activate at any time for any reason, people like Julian Assange would be all kinds of dead.
An xkcd stick person is just as recognizable out of context as a Penny Arcade character
I seriously doubt that. Even a passive fan of PA would know those characters out of context; they are very distinctive (primarily because they are modular and mostly a copy/paste job from previous strips). But one would have to read xkcd regularly to notice one of those stick figures as different from something a child drew.
Same applies to web comics. The aged xkcd comic has virtually zero artwork at all (much less 'quality' artwork), yet it has one of the highest readership counts of any web comic. It's because it uses very intelligent humor (most of the time) and it targets a very large, but very specific, audience.
The food inspection system in the US is better than any the Earth has ever known. I think that qualifies as "good".
I am totally with you on War.
I don't know where you live, but in the US all workers on gov projects (including public roads) must be paid a prevailing wage. Doesn't mean the workers are necessarily well paid, but it means they make the same or more than any private road builders in the State. This keeps a private road builder from low-balling a bid and hiring $8/hour people that would make "bargain basement wages".
Do you think that, if a private corporation were to gain complete control over traditionally government responsibilities (which they would without regulation), they would not be "fucking around in a financially wasteful fashion with entitlements"? I think those fantastically large bonuses and golden parachutes executives get (even when they ran a company into the ground) would count as entitlements. And "quashing civil rights and criminalizing activities that have no victims"? Private organizations like the RIAA do exactly that.
Indeed. QOOP, Blog2Print, etc have alone printed thousands (if not tens of thousands) of different books for individuals; who then publish their own work. Maybe those don't "count".
I have heard that the Nobel prize people will call and ask someone if they would accept the prize if it were offered them. If they say yes, then it's "Great! You have been offered a Noble Prize in %category%!". But if the potential winner indicates they are not really interested in material prizes, they just never offer the prize at all. That way they can say no one has ever turned down a Nobel.
I wonder if the Firefox people do the same thing in reverse. They would call the potential bounty winners (maybe just those in $1000+ range) and say something like "Hi there. This security bug you found might be worth a decent size bounty. If we offered it to you, would you actually take our money or or do something noble and selfless like allowing us to donate it? ". If the winner says they would probably just donate it, then it's all "Super! We will donate it! You're the best". If they take the money then it's "No problem. We offer you $50 for this.".
Of course I seriously doubt this happens at all. But it's fun to start vicious rumors about non-profits >:)
And, just because I have karma to burn, your comment title is poorly formed. In would be more correctly worded as:
"Badly written summary", "Poorly written summary", or in a pinch, just "Misleading summary". The phrase "Bad summary" would be more appropriate in a phrase like "Did you just poo on the carpet Summary? Bad Summary! Bad!">
I await your various "Hey jackass! That's how language changes...blah blah" responses.:)
WoW has rules against using scripts, bots, and 3rd party programs to play for you. Failure to abide by the rules get you banned.
The stock market trading system has no rules against scripts, bots, and 3rd party programs to buy millions
Every time I think about how WoW regulates the artificially increasing of fake wealth while the stock market has no regulation regarding the artificially increasing of actual wealth, I die a little inside.
Depending which 'authoritative' historian one chooses to believe, not even kind of clos. Stalin's regime is said to have 'officially' killed more than 10 million, and is estimated to have killed dozens of million more 'off the books'.
Do they mean it's traveling a straight line? Or do they mean it's is moving in such a way so as to collide with us when we come around to a certain point in space?
I've thought about switching to FiOS, but it's cost prohibitive at $140/mo (for equivalent speed). I have yet to hit the cap for Comcast and frankly I don't know why. On top of my typical downloading, I do hours of high-res VTCs for work (why I need the fat pipe). And my family streams dozens of Netflix movies every month (many in full HD). Sometimes I think Comcast made a deal with Netflix and their stuff 'doesn't count' against the cap.
my first ISP cost me 80 per month for 80 hours, way back when
Given the massive increase in residential bandwidth since 'way back when', that's actually pretty good. Sure I have a great 50Mbps connection from Comcast. But Comcast has a 250GB monthly cap. So for my $70/mo I only get (presuming optimum throughput) about 12 hours before I am shutdown until the following month.
The only way I can see that happening nowadays would be if one were a legit employee of, say, Brinks for a few months. The person could have built a rapport with the maintenance people over time. Then, maybe, they could steal the truck without any immediate suspicion (but that's doubtful...professional security folks aren't as idiotic or careless as they are on TV). Of course they would have to somehow get around the GPS tracking system in such a way so corporate does not know it's been disabled. The GPS would alert corporate if they go off route or are unexpectedly delayed. Then they would have to get around the remote kill-switch put in all modern armored trucks. In short, they would have to be like one of those fictional 'master' criminals. If they were truly that elite of a thief, I seriously doubt they would be going after small-change ATMs.
Slashdot Mirror
My Motorola Cliq (which I really like) seems to be forever stuck at 1.5 (thanks T-Mobile). So I doubt I will ever get to see/use these features.
Is that not exactly what I said? However, xkcd is generally only funny/intelligent to a their target audience.
The fact that this guy is still alive kind of blows a hole in all those Jason Borne-esque conspiracy theories. I think that if the US really did have secret assassins and super-spies all over the world, that they could activate at any time for any reason, people like Julian Assange would be all kinds of dead.
I seriously doubt that. Even a passive fan of PA would know those characters out of context; they are very distinctive (primarily because they are modular and mostly a copy/paste job from previous strips). But one would have to read xkcd regularly to notice one of those stick figures as different from something a child drew.
One time, it came in perfectly for about three seconds. Change my life. My life.
It only took about three seconds for me to do the same thing....BOOM GOES THE DYNAMITE!
Same applies to web comics. The aged xkcd comic has virtually zero artwork at all (much less 'quality' artwork), yet it has one of the highest readership counts of any web comic. It's because it uses very intelligent humor (most of the time) and it targets a very large, but very specific, audience.
This bellyfeel is plusgood for now. But when those crimethinkeing unpersons become crimethinkers then it will be doubleplusungood.
The food inspection system in the US is better than any the Earth has ever known. I think that qualifies as "good".
I am totally with you on War.
I don't know where you live, but in the US all workers on gov projects (including public roads) must be paid a prevailing wage. Doesn't mean the workers are necessarily well paid, but it means they make the same or more than any private road builders in the State. This keeps a private road builder from low-balling a bid and hiring $8/hour people that would make "bargain basement wages".
Do you think that, if a private corporation were to gain complete control over traditionally government responsibilities (which they would without regulation), they would not be "fucking around in a financially wasteful fashion with entitlements"? I think those fantastically large bonuses and golden parachutes executives get (even when they ran a company into the ground) would count as entitlements. And "quashing civil rights and criminalizing activities that have no victims"? Private organizations like the RIAA do exactly that.
Or my favorite: "We now serving expresso!"
Did they catch him on tape playing games? Or did he confess? I can't imagine he would do that. Maybe the 3 that were recaptured were tattletales..
Homer: Ready!
Troy: First, patch the cracks in the slab using a latex patching compound and a patching trowel.
Homer: [to Bart] Hand me my patching trowel, boy.[Bart shrugs.] Hmm.
Troy: Now, do you have extruded poly-vinyl foam insulation?
Homer: No.
Troy: Good! Assemble the aluminum J-channel using self-burring screws. Install!
Homer: What do I do for-
Troy: After applying brushable coating to the panels...
Homer: Wait a minute-
Troy: You'll need some corrosion resistant metal stucco lath.
Homer: Wait a minute!
Troy: If you can't find metal stucco lath...
Homer: Uh-huh?
Troy: Use carbon-fibre stucco lath!
Homer: Ohhhh!!
Troy: Now parge the lath!
Indeed. QOOP, Blog2Print, etc have alone printed thousands (if not tens of thousands) of different books for individuals; who then publish their own work. Maybe those don't "count".
I have heard that the Nobel prize people will call and ask someone if they would accept the prize if it were offered them. If they say yes, then it's "Great! You have been offered a Noble Prize in %category%!". But if the potential winner indicates they are not really interested in material prizes, they just never offer the prize at all. That way they can say no one has ever turned down a Nobel.
I wonder if the Firefox people do the same thing in reverse. They would call the potential bounty winners (maybe just those in $1000+ range) and say something like "Hi there. This security bug you found might be worth a decent size bounty. If we offered it to you, would you actually take our money or or do something noble and selfless like allowing us to donate it? ". If the winner says they would probably just donate it, then it's all "Super! We will donate it! You're the best". If they take the money then it's "No problem. We offer you $50 for this.".
Of course I seriously doubt this happens at all. But it's fun to start vicious rumors about non-profits >:)
And, just because I have karma to burn, your comment title is poorly formed. In would be more correctly worded as:
:)
"Badly written summary", "Poorly written summary", or in a pinch, just "Misleading summary". The phrase "Bad summary" would be more appropriate in a phrase like "Did you just poo on the carpet Summary? Bad Summary! Bad!">
I await your various "Hey jackass! That's how language changes...blah blah" responses.
WoW has rules against using scripts, bots, and 3rd party programs to play for you. Failure to abide by the rules get you banned.
The stock market trading system has no rules against scripts, bots, and 3rd party programs to buy millions Every time I think about how WoW regulates the artificially increasing of fake wealth while the stock market has no regulation regarding the artificially increasing of actual wealth, I die a little inside.
My nerd detector just exploded.
No silly....I would remove it as soon as I saw it come up on Google Earth. The officer would show up and hilariousness would certainly ensue.
I would love to lay a giant sheet of light blue plastic (like a huge tarp) and just wait for the government to show up.
Depending which 'authoritative' historian one chooses to believe, not even kind of clos. Stalin's regime is said to have 'officially' killed more than 10 million, and is estimated to have killed dozens of million more 'off the books'.
You know, the Nazis had lawyers too. Not saying Wikipedia supports Nazism, but why is no one asking these questions?
Do they mean it's traveling a straight line? Or do they mean it's is moving in such a way so as to collide with us when we come around to a certain point in space?
No counselor. This is an entirely different phenomenon.
I've thought about switching to FiOS, but it's cost prohibitive at $140/mo (for equivalent speed). I have yet to hit the cap for Comcast and frankly I don't know why. On top of my typical downloading, I do hours of high-res VTCs for work (why I need the fat pipe). And my family streams dozens of Netflix movies every month (many in full HD). Sometimes I think Comcast made a deal with Netflix and their stuff 'doesn't count' against the cap.
Given the massive increase in residential bandwidth since 'way back when', that's actually pretty good. Sure I have a great 50Mbps connection from Comcast. But Comcast has a 250GB monthly cap. So for my $70/mo I only get (presuming optimum throughput) about 12 hours before I am shutdown until the following month.
The only way I can see that happening nowadays would be if one were a legit employee of, say, Brinks for a few months. The person could have built a rapport with the maintenance people over time. Then, maybe, they could steal the truck without any immediate suspicion (but that's doubtful...professional security folks aren't as idiotic or careless as they are on TV). Of course they would have to somehow get around the GPS tracking system in such a way so corporate does not know it's been disabled. The GPS would alert corporate if they go off route or are unexpectedly delayed. Then they would have to get around the remote kill-switch put in all modern armored trucks. In short, they would have to be like one of those fictional 'master' criminals. If they were truly that elite of a thief, I seriously doubt they would be going after small-change ATMs.