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User: Wolfier

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  1. Re:WTF? on Takedown Letters For WP7 Tetris Clones · · Score: 1

    No matter how you would like to view things, this is not the intent of copyright. Copyright does not protect ideas. Even Patents don't. Let me say it one more time:

                                              The Copying Of Ideas Are Completely Legal And You See It Everyday.

    If the mere copying of ideas were against copyright, any company that makes pretty much anything is liable for lawsuits.

  2. Re:Worldwide death toll on Oxford University Tests Universal Flu Vaccine · · Score: 1

    Agreed. Wish I had some mod points to mod this up. If not being killed in traffic accidents, the people who cause traffic accidents will kill themselves and/or people around them one way or another. Human incompetence in incurable.

  3. Re:Worldwide death toll on Oxford University Tests Universal Flu Vaccine · · Score: 1

    The people who die in car crashes probably have a better average quality of life and higher average remaining life expectancy than the typical person who dies of flu.

    They also are more likely to be jackasses, too. So I'd much prefer a prevention of flu than fatalities from traffic accidents.

  4. WaveBlaster? Urgh on The Secret of Monkey Island Shows Evolution of PC Audio · · Score: 1

    It sounded aweful in most anything compared with the Roland SCC-1, which IMHO bests the CD quality audio. The maker of that video seemed to be fooled by its slightly newer age.

  5. Here's what they should have done. on Judge Orders Gizmodo Search Warrant Unsealed · · Score: 1

    Hogan: took pictures of the phone intact, and return phone to owner ASAP.
    Gizmodo: buy said pictures from Hogan, publish story.

    Everyone is happpy, well, except Apple - but then, all of the above steps are legal so there wouldn't be anything they could do.

    Some people just don't think with their brains.

  6. Re:From TFA... on Review of HTC Desire As Alternative To iPhone · · Score: 1

    Don't you think, that the reason iPhones are close to perfect, is because of the super-tight approval process.... Not only in the App Store, but also in the build and design of it.

    Don't you think, that the reason iPhones are close to perfect, is because of the super-tight approval process.... Not at all in the App Store, but only in the build and design of it. There, fixed it for ya.

  7. Re:Okay... on Canada's Top Court Quashes Child Porn Warrant · · Score: 1

    > Having only one but not the other leads to other legal avenues

    So having only Mens Rea but without Actus Reus still "leads to other lebal avenues"? Is it equivalent to committing a thought crime?

  8. Re:cancer worries on Doctors Skirt FDA To Heal Patients With Stem Cells · · Score: 1

    A 90 years old wants to walk again after years of immobility probably wouldn't care any cancer that may or even WILL come up 10 years down the road. However, a 25 years old probably has a different opinion.

    This is the problem. FDA either approves or disapproves a treatment for everyone, it doesn't say, "if you think you have maybe 10 years to live anyway this should be okay".

  9. Re:As someone who was a victim of a frivilous laws on RIAA Insists On 3rd Trial In Thomas Case · · Score: 1

    At the very least it'll bring down frivolous lawsuits from individuals against individuals and the number of these lawsuits will drop.

    Lawyers will also be a lot more likely to defend individuals against corporations in a frivolous lawsuits if the loser pays, because they can use judgement to see how likely the case can be won.

    Without a loser-pays system, it's a matter of when, not if, that the individual defendants will run out of resources. With a loser-pays system, sure, there's a risk, but even being a risk is a lot less probable than surely running out of resources.

    This is especially true in a case like this one, where the chances of the corporation winning is exactly nil - the purpose of this third trial is nothing but to squeeze the defendant dry - RIAA doesn't care even if it loses.

    In other words, a loser-pays system will take away much of the incentive that makes corporations think they can screw someone over by dragging on a suit they know they cannot win.

  10. Time to start encrypting emails. on Iran Suspends Google's Email Service · · Score: 1

    I haven't in the past, but I guess it's a good time to start doing so.

  11. Re:Compliance Rates & Hands-Free Use on Phone and Text Bans On Drivers Shown Ineffective · · Score: 1

    > Right-of-way is an implied system, not a hard set of rules.

    If I define a rule as something that carries a punishment when you violate it, then right-of-way is a hard set of rules. Even if your jurisdiction does not define it, your car insurance company most likely does. At least where I live, when a collision occurs, one driver must be at fault. Who's at fault is determined by right-of-way rules.

    Some right-of-way rules in the laws are not highlighted as such, so they may be difficult to spot. For example, if a pedestrian gets killed crossing the road where he should not be crossing, provided that the driver is in compliance with the laws, the pedestrian is totally at fault thus the driver can go home-free.

    Generally, if you're in compliance to laws in terms of passing, cutting lanes, signalling, turning, and stopping, you're in compliance with right-of-way rules.

    > If someone decides to give up their right-of-way to you, then you are entitled to slowly and safely proceed to accept the right-of-way from the other motorist.

    Although an intention to give up a right-of-way is easy to see, it is impossible to prove after an accident has happened. What if the other driver changes their mind, and you run into an accident as a result? Good luck proving that they have yielded their right-of-way.

    When I decide to give up my right-of-way, I do it in very defined situations (like when 2 lanes must zipper-merge), and in a bounded manner. e.g. I limit myself to allow 1 or 2 cars, but no more, to merge in front of me at a busy parking lot exit to not agitate drivers waiting behind my car.

    > If two motorists get in an accident because of right-of-way issues, most officers would at the very least give the driver with the right-of-way a warning to not insist on their right-of-way (as most states laws have a clause to this effect).

    This is interesting, please cite some such laws - especially after you've said that right-of-way is an "implied system, not a hard set of rules". As far as I understand, insisting on right-of-way does not break any law.

    The law is sharing-the-road codified. I believe one should not break the law, but also not do more than what the laws tell us to. The "above-and-beyond" thing, when applied to traffic laws, is a cause of a lot of accidents, and if people follows the rules as literally as possible and drive as much like robots as possible, I believe there'll be a lot fewer accidents.

  12. Re:Compliance Rates & Hands-Free Use on Phone and Text Bans On Drivers Shown Ineffective · · Score: 1

    This is mostly the way I strive to drive - and may I add one thing, since I saw your word "indecisive".

    Be decisive.

    (everything below - when I write "you" I don't literally mean "you")

    It means, for example, whether let or not let another person to merge. Whether to pass or not to pass. Whether to run that amber or not.

    From what I've seen, a lot of accidents are made when people act half-way during a binary decision - if you let him merge, make enough room. If you don't, don't give him the false illusion that he has room to merge. The in-between action is to leave *just* enough room while thinking, and it's the most dangerous action.

    Another example, if you want to pass, clearly speed up and pass. If you don't, stay back. The in-between action is to stay at the other car's blind spot while thinking - again, the most dangerous action.

  13. Re:Compliance Rates & Hands-Free Use on Phone and Text Bans On Drivers Shown Ineffective · · Score: 1

    Very true. I'm now forced to work with one such person at work. :(

  14. Re:Compliance Rates & Hands-Free Use on Phone and Text Bans On Drivers Shown Ineffective · · Score: 2, Interesting

    What they don't realize is that these qualities are exactly what a good driver isn't. Good drivers are defensive drivers who have a larger awareness of the roadway than just simply their selfish needs to get to point B as quickly a possible; good drivers tend to "share the road" with other motorists. Collisions are caused by conflicts in the roadway. Aggressive drivers who think they are good drivers cause more conflicts than defensive drivers. When you get two aggressive drivers causing a conflict at the same time, you have an accident. (I'm not saying that this is how all accidents happen, just preventable ones)

    I agree with most of the points except the tendency to "share the road". Some do it to an extreme - driving 20% slower than the speed limit (or the speed everyone else is driving at), letting anyone get in front of him/her. This agitate drivers who normally would not be agitated, and causes a lot of passing, which in turn causes accidents.

    Another example, some people insists on yielding even when they have the right-of-way. I always insist that they keep their right-of-way and go first.

    We don't need people with a tendency to "share the road", or people who are polite and courteous.
    Instead, we need people who understand right-of-way, who signal before switching lanes, who don't have a sense of entitlement in conflict with right-of-way ("WHY DON'T YOU LET ME CUT IN??" "Because according to the Law, you don't have the right to cut in, so wait!!"), who drive at a speed in line with everyone else on the road, and did I mention right-of-way???

    Rules above courtesy, period.

  15. Re:Happened to my wife... on Canadian Android Carrier Forcing Firmware Update · · Score: 1

    If the carrier did't put in the radio code and SPL firmware updates, which are not necessary to fix the emergency call issue, the phone would not brick because the FastBoot is not part of normal OS updates.

  16. Re:I stand corrected on Canadian Android Carrier Forcing Firmware Update · · Score: 1

    According to a lot posted on forums, no, they're requiring *everyone* to upgrade (or for those who already have the fix on unsubsidised phones, downgrade).

    Apparently they're not doing network resets anymore. I had to social engineer a bit to get mine done.

  17. Re:How ironic on Canadian Android Carrier Forcing Firmware Update · · Score: 1

    Maybe it's a collusion, or maybe it's simply because the market is not saturated yet, so the carriers are in no rush to compete for customers because there always are those who don't have a phone yet.

    I suspect when the saturation gets higher (which is happening), customers will switch carriers more aggressively (which is also happening). The hope is that after a year or so, the prospect of having anything like a collusion would make less sense than going all out and compete - because they'll hopefully be running out of new customers that don't require much effort to entice.

  18. I stand corrected on Canadian Android Carrier Forcing Firmware Update · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Thanks for letting me know Rogers is no longer the GSM monopoly here. Here is some more background information and more of my opinions below.

    The bug was, when GPS is turned on, calls to 911 can crash the phone. This bug was fixed in Android 1.6 and subsequent releases, which came out months ago. However, Rogers stated that there'd be no 1.6 updates to their customers (contrary to what Magic users in other countries can do).

    Data for all Dream/Magic users went down on Sunday, and will remain down until the update is applied. The reason for data shut down is that, apart from shutting down GPS, which a carrier cannot do remotely, shutting down data is also a work-around for the 911 call issue - so, this way it's guaranteed that 911 calls will always succeed from the moment they activated the block, thus, covering their ass from potential lawsuits.

    What's on the update:
    1. The 911/GPS crash fix in the main firmware.
    2. HTC's new Sense UI made for 1.5.
    3. New radio firmware
    4. New bootloader firmware

    #1 is the only necessary part to fix the 911 issue. #2 is of dubious usefulness to users, especially if it requires a full backup, that Rogers claimed can be done with "3rd party software" - but the software that can fully back the phone up are all root-user-only. How ironic.

    #3 and #4 are out of pure user control so customers can no longer unlock or root or run custom firmware. I have no complaint if it's for subsidised phones. However, unsubsidised phones (i.e. those we have paid a full price to buy) are also forced to update, even for people who run custom firmware that *already* has the 911 issue fixed.

    So we're given 2 carrots (911 fix and Sense UI) and 2 big sticks (useless control freak firmware updates).

    My opinion is, they could have rolled out a fix sooner - if a lone hacker can do it in his spare time, I'm sure a major wireless carrier can do it - the sooner the better, because there are people whose life might be at risk.

    Instead, Rogers probably spent a lot of time testing the unnecessary parts of the fix (Radio firmware and Bootloader), and also testing their totally useless "add-ons" (branding, partner bookmarks, unremovable links to Rogers Shop, "Ringback", Ringtone purchases, etc.) - without wasting time testing these unnecessary parts that provide negative values to their customers, especially those using unsubsidised phones, I imagine they could have rolled out the fix sooner - even for only ONE day, and putting less of our lives in danger. In my opinion, it's putting profits higher than customer safety.

    They say they cannot support rooted phones, but people are not asking for support. They're only asking to get the service they have paid for - "service" meaning usable bandwidth. Somehow these carriers or some backwards-thinking PHB inside still think they can provide something more than bandwidth, and forcing these extra "services" to unsubsidised phones somehow seem to have a priority even when customer safety is at stake.

  19. The perils of following an imagined trajectory on Cell Phones Don't Increase Chances of Brain Cancer · · Score: 1

    Disclaimer: I'm an avid mobile phone user.

    So it doesn't diverge from an extrapolation.

    Have they taken into account there could be a *decrease* of tumour over the years due to better health care and lifestyles (at least in part of the world).

    My view as, following the existing trend cannot imply "cell phones don't increase chances of brain cancer". Maybe it's just offset by decreases due to some other reasons.

  20. Re:Already banned in China on A Look At the Safety of Google Public DNS · · Score: 1

    Think about it this way. You know, given the Chinese obsession over the number 8, there must be some way to make better and more profitable uses of 8.8.8.8, so they have reserved that.

  21. Re:Start complaining, "free" software people on OS X Update Officially Kills Intel Atom Support · · Score: 1

    > Emulate Atari, Commodore 64, or NES games

    My brother does it all the time. He's not a computer junkie by any measure.

    > Connect to my Netscape dialup ISP

    Had no problem doing this even in 2003.

    > Run Internet Explorer

    Great. It's a feature.

    > Run Microsoft Office so I can update my resume

    No problem doing this with Wine.

    > Let me select a hundred songs from a window, and play them in order. Instead it tries to play all 100 at the same time?!?!?

    Again, no problem doing this since 1998.

    I think you need to give Ubuntu live CD a try.

  22. I do something similar, but better. on Best Tool For Remembering Passwords? · · Score: 1

    I create a simple HTML page with a Javascript.

    The HTML lets me input the site name, and a master password. And then the Javascript will generate a password for me.

    The Javascript algorithm is simple, it involves some summing, modulos, lengths, and Base 36 conversion at the end to give me an alphanumeric password. So far works all the time. I can specify the length of the desired password. If a number is required and the password does not contain it, I simply append a "0" at the end.

    You can also play with CSS to make your password field invisible, etc. The only caveat is you want to copy some junk to the clipboard afterward to erase the copied-and-pasted password.

    I made the algorithm so simple I could reimplement it from scratch on an Excel spreadsheet with built-in functions, no VBA.

    The key to create your own algorithm is that, you're trying to make a simple hash. Try to make it so that changing one character either in the site name or the master password would make the entire password look different, not just a single character at some corresponding position.

    If you don't want to bother with your own algorithm, you can just md5sum a concatenation of the site name and master password. I don't like this method because the master password must either be stored in a file or typed in the command line, which will be in the command line history, which may get backed up by mistake if you're at work and don't clear your history quickly. Also, md5sum may not be available on every computer - my own algorithm is easy enough to be constructed from scratch in a minute or 2.

  23. Re:And then what? on Apple Pulls C64 Emulator From the App Store · · Score: 1

    How about Javascript? AFAIK Safari on iPHone even supports Canvas. Wouldn't that create an alternate platform anyway?

  24. Re:Nothing will happen on Lawsuit Claims WGA Is Spyware · · Score: 1

    > but that is due to poor laws rather than any inherent problem.

    What if the corporations themselves have a hand in making the laws poor in the first place?

    IMHO, that would make it an inherent problem. At least I think if corporations are stripped the right to making any political contributions or donations, we'd end up with better laws.

    Another way around it, is to make all political contributions anonymous, such that there is no way the receiver would know who donated to them, and for what reason.

  25. Re:Nothing will happen on Lawsuit Claims WGA Is Spyware · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I completely agree with your point of view.

    Therefore, the solution should not be vengeful actions on persons until evidence is gathered on the questionable conducts.

    Instead, the only suitable course would be to put an end to the failed experiment called "corporate personhood". A corporation is by the laws of nature not the same as a person. Therefore what works on a human being (rights, responsibilities, awards, punishments) are totally meaningless to corporations, or at least have their very definitions entirely twisted.

    If corporations are to be granted human-like rights, there should be a separate constitution for them so that laws made to enforce responsibilities and rights of corporations would be well-defined.

    For example, currently corporations can donate to political courses just like individual persons can. This makes no sense because corporations' concern (mostly, profit maximization, either short term or long term) is entirely different - in fact a lot of the time are totally at odds with individual persons' concerns. Do corporations need to eat? No. Do they have a health that can deteriorate if they ingest something poisonous? No. Can they have children that they care a lot? No. Do they have concerns about privacy? Yes, but if you snoop on them like they do on you, it'll be labeled as industrial espionage.

    There are numerous examples to show that corporations will do whatever it can when they can get away with it. It's just "corporate nature". What a wonderful world it'd be if these desires weren't usually in conflict with desires of real persons.