I do my fireworks in the UK, peak season tends to mean damp evenings, hmmm, even summer evening shows mean condensing moisture in the air. New Year shows mean possibly rain, possibly snow. We always use flash tape to protect against sparks/ ash/ other misfire accidents and then plastic bag against moisture. Guess depends on where you do your shows. One year I was on the Isle of Skye and we had horizontal rain for 12 hours, luckily dropped off just before the show. But heck, mod grandparent up, or original poster got his facts wrong - ash falling into live mortar tubes? they must have flash taped all their stuff, surely?
Detonation, which is what an explosive does, is defined as supersonic flame travel.
..but the chemicals used as both in fireworks as both a propellant and a firing charge are defined as "low explosive" rather than "high explosive" because they *ignite* rather than *detonate*. They are "explosives" but they burn but do not "detonate". Is this correct?
Like other people, I found michael's choice of word curious: the first time I have ever seen the noun architect used as a verb. The curiosity of the expression took my attention away from his main argument.
I feel the Plain English Campaign offers a useful guide "We define plain English as something that the intended audience can read, understand and act upon the first time they read it". So, perhaps you are right for the majority of people. But I had to pause a while and think about what michael meant.
I agree with you that some nouns become accepted as verbs.
I'd like to ask the author 'michael' why he chose to note that he had been compelled to "architect" a response , rather than "write" a response? I'm afraid from this point my gut response was that 'michael' might be a bit pretentious and hence his writings not to be trusted. Please help me here folks, maybe I am being unfair..what's the difference between "writing" a response and err, "architecting" a response?
I'd be really interested to hear from Slovenian posters about the economic state of their country, being described as "developing". Last time I was there (1999) it seemed a lot more developed than large parts of the USA (statement not flamebait). Can more informed posters contribute? noting that it was part of the former Soviet Union doesn't wash as a response, so was Estonia and I believe Estonia is now one of the most wired up countries in the world...
IMHO, nope. A *technical* dead-end maybe. But more of a *springboard* in terms of providing Scaled and the X-Prize with publicity, the private spaceship world with confidence, and Scaled with potential future earnings.
If SS1 wins the X-Prize:
1. X-Prize and private spacecraft get interesting
2. Scaled might be onto a commercial winner offering space hops to rich tourists and university researchers and make enough money to have a go at building the world's first private orbital craft.
If the x-prize is won, you can't tell me somebody won't have a go at building a private orbital craft. C'mon, I bet there were slashdotters out there saying "100km private spacecraft - can't be done!"
I'd suggest giving doctors in developing countries equal access to medical research to allow them to save lives and retrain would be useful for example...
correct, *but* the fact that this technology exists, that we or other people use / abuse it, means we should enter into reasoned debate about what we consider appropriate and responsible use. To absolve ourselves of any responsibility for the technology we create, and not enter into moral debates over good and bad usage is foolish at best and dangerous at worst. I am sure most slashdotters will have opinions over who should have 'open source' and 'free' access to nuclear weapons technology, for example (USA? North Korea? al-Quaeda? Mickey Mouse?)
India just had its national elections and *one billion people* voted electronically. Why don't the Florida authorities ask the Indian Government for advice? We've heard few complaints from India so I assume it must have been a pretty successful system (can anybody comment on this?).
hmm.. . every time a post about the developing world comes up somebody asks "don't they need food and clean water first"? In some places yes (and basic schooling is still needed in some parts of USA and other developed countries as well by all accounts, what's the average reading age in your local low-income area?) but for many places basic needs are addressed and its higher level issues that have to be resolved.
I agree, which is why I get real confused about people complaining about speed cameras in a variety of areas. There's one near my house, monitoring a 30mph speed limit, about 200 metres from a school. Why do people get upset the police etc want them to travel at less than 30mph near a school? I'm trying to work out if people have a philosophical issue with what speeds they should be allowed to travel at, or whether the issue is about allowing another individual to monitor whether they obey an agreed maximum speed (i.e. allow the idea of society applying laws to them).
Surely your model assumes 1. you are a good driver, but more importantly 2. everybody else is a highly competent road user. I'd suggest your model falls down with other road users of varying qualities.
My girlfriend is a good, but cautious driver. 10 years (her total time of driving) without any traffic infringment. She gets very freaked out when people speed right up close to her, and go past her at high speed. Sure, you may be a numero uno Formula One racing driver in control as you go past her at 140 but if this puts her off her driving you are still partly responsible for causing a crash.
Also, what about little kids running out into a street to chase their lost football? Do you promote the idea of competant drivers being entitled to travel at high speeds through urban/suburban areas?
I can't remember who started the use of this term but it's often used in discussions about global development - social and economic. Rather than East / West or Developed/ Developing, the terms North/ South are used to indicate that by and large the world is divided into a more developed "North" and a less developed "South". So you get the bizarre situation of countries like NZ and Oz south of the equator being referred to as North. Yup, I agree, it's daft. It's a kind of short hand expression. Alternate short hand expressions to divide the world on economic and social groupings?
...but if you get to Bletchley Park, for goodness sake don't mention the film U-571:-) the retired UK military people who are the tour guides get a bit twitchy that Hollywood makes out it was the US Navy and not the Royal Navy (UK) who grabbed vital code books from a sinking U-boat (which I think was actually U-110). (actually they are quite relaxed and happy to correct/ give more info , plus the U571 film makers donated a couple of huge u-boat props which are in the grounds of BP).
The work has been done at Bletchley Park by volunteers. Normally the Colossus machine is being rebuilt there and you can watch the guys working on it and ask them questions. I was at Bletchley Park (home of Station X, the UK codebreaking centre in World War 2) yesterday, brilliant, well worth a visit. It's run as a trust, by volunteers. They need your support. Bletchley Park receives no public funding. To date, the Trust has raised over 1 million in its fight for survival. A further 4.5 million is needed now to fund essential staffing, building refurbishment, infrastructure, planning and marketing costs. They are just about to lose 20 acres of the site to a private developer building a housing estate, and half the original Huts are falling down. The hut Alan Turing worked in has some of its windows covered with chipboard because the windows are broken and they don't seem to have the money to replace them. The paint is peeling and the wood is rotting, the wall round it has fallen over in parts.
The code breakers in these small prefabricated huts probably shortened the war by two years and saved hundreds of thousands of lives. Surely us geeks can help save this site and remember their contribution? If you can't get there to volunteer, maybe use their online form and give them a small donation? Their website is going to be slashdotted at this rate, so how about slashdotting their intray with donations?
In the real world more the 70 percent of farms are "online"
With all due respect I'd beg to differ. This may be true of the "North" (USA, Europe, Australia, NZ), but if you mean '70% of the total number of farms / farmers in the world' , I'd guess to disagree. Sub-Saharan Africa, India, China...
"Open Source software...should be *paramount* on people's mids."
It's good we've got geeks to worry about this. By all means push hard on this issue - and use your skills to help improve the world - but for a large number of people in the world paramount issues in their mind are:
- can I get enough/clean water to drink
- can I get enough to eat to live
- can I find shelter
- can I be safe from war or the after effects of war
Don't forget the big issues. Some of these may be solved by software, but remember the global context.
...here in the UK it is more like 5 dollars a gallon of petrol at the moment. But I'm happy cycling 8 miles to work and back each night, after all day in front of a computer 45 minutes of a bit of gentle exercise is a great way to de-stress. Felt like hard work to start with but now, it's pretty good. Aged 37 so I'm starting to have to keep fit rather than just be fit:-)
Bijker (!) wrote a really good book which discusses the evolution of the bicycle, some of the false starts and ideas which got dropped if you're interested in the history of the bike. Some cool old photos and like all other technologies, shows that it is more than engineering or logic that dictates the evolution of artefacts.(Bijker, W. E. (1995). Of bicycles, bakelites, and bulbs: Toward a theory of sociotechnical change. Cambridge, MA and London, England, The MIT Press.)
I was in Washington DC once, and a French person asked me what time it was in broken French. I told her and she didn't understand, so I told her in French and was greatful.
I asked for the time in France in broken France and was spit on. It doesn't get any clearer than that.
One bad experience defines a country for you?... oooh:-) isn't that called racism or something? I once sat next to an American guy on the train, he smelt really bad and was rude to me. Therefore all Americans are rude, smell really bad and don't wash. Spot the faulty logic...
do you have a solid ref- apart from sci-fi? No disrespect intended but anybody can write anything in sci-fi, do you have a link handy to any military/ scientific work done in the past? (nice photos of course welcomed cos it's Friday afternoon at work...time for slacking off:-) )
"Google (and the entire internet) are accessible from the comfort of our homes"...assumes ubiquitous home internet access. Not necessarily true for all now, or for some time to come.
why May 1 as the 'traditional' day of protest?
on
Swedish Pirate Demo
·
· Score: 5, Informative
... because in 1889, The Second International organized in Paris and set May 1 as a day of international labor solidarity, to support US trade unionists. European socialists like Engels decided it was important to publicise the plight of poor working conditions in the USA.
Slashdot Mirror
I do my fireworks in the UK, peak season tends to mean damp evenings, hmmm, even summer evening shows mean condensing moisture in the air. New Year shows mean possibly rain, possibly snow. We always use flash tape to protect against sparks/ ash/ other misfire accidents and then plastic bag against moisture. Guess depends on where you do your shows. One year I was on the Isle of Skye and we had horizontal rain for 12 hours, luckily dropped off just before the show. But heck, mod grandparent up, or original poster got his facts wrong - ash falling into live mortar tubes? they must have flash taped all their stuff, surely?
By 2050, a team of fully autonomous humanoid robot soccer players shall win a soccer game..
Well I think if it comes down to penalties against England, they might not have to wait until 2050... has Beckham's shot come out of orbit yet?
Detonation, which is what an explosive does, is defined as supersonic flame travel.
I feel the Plain English Campaign offers a useful guide "We define plain English as something that the intended audience can read, understand and act upon the first time they read it". So, perhaps you are right for the majority of people. But I had to pause a while and think about what michael meant.
I agree with you that some nouns become accepted as verbs.
I'd like to ask the author 'michael' why he chose to note that he had been compelled to "architect" a response , rather than "write" a response? I'm afraid from this point my gut response was that 'michael' might be a bit pretentious and hence his writings not to be trusted. Please help me here folks, maybe I am being unfair..what's the difference between "writing" a response and err, "architecting" a response?
I'd be really interested to hear from Slovenian posters about the economic state of their country, being described as "developing". Last time I was there (1999) it seemed a lot more developed than large parts of the USA (statement not flamebait). Can more informed posters contribute? noting that it was part of the former Soviet Union doesn't wash as a response, so was Estonia and I believe Estonia is now one of the most wired up countries in the world...
Hearsay? or do you have a reference? would be interested to know. Cheers.
If SS1 wins the X-Prize:
1. X-Prize and private spacecraft get interesting
2. Scaled might be onto a commercial winner offering space hops to rich tourists and university researchers and make enough money to have a go at building the world's first private orbital craft.
If the x-prize is won, you can't tell me somebody won't have a go at building a private orbital craft. C'mon, I bet there were slashdotters out there saying "100km private spacecraft - can't be done!"
I'd suggest giving doctors in developing countries equal access to medical research to allow them to save lives and retrain would be useful for example...
correct, *but* the fact that this technology exists, that we or other people use / abuse it, means we should enter into reasoned debate about what we consider appropriate and responsible use. To absolve ourselves of any responsibility for the technology we create, and not enter into moral debates over good and bad usage is foolish at best and dangerous at worst. I am sure most slashdotters will have opinions over who should have 'open source' and 'free' access to nuclear weapons technology, for example (USA? North Korea? al-Quaeda? Mickey Mouse?)
India just had its national elections and *one billion people* voted electronically. Why don't the Florida authorities ask the Indian Government for advice? We've heard few complaints from India so I assume it must have been a pretty successful system (can anybody comment on this?).
hmm.. . every time a post about the developing world comes up somebody asks "don't they need food and clean water first"? In some places yes (and basic schooling is still needed in some parts of USA and other developed countries as well by all accounts, what's the average reading age in your local low-income area?) but for many places basic needs are addressed and its higher level issues that have to be resolved.
I agree, which is why I get real confused about people complaining about speed cameras in a variety of areas. There's one near my house, monitoring a 30mph speed limit, about 200 metres from a school. Why do people get upset the police etc want them to travel at less than 30mph near a school? I'm trying to work out if people have a philosophical issue with what speeds they should be allowed to travel at, or whether the issue is about allowing another individual to monitor whether they obey an agreed maximum speed (i.e. allow the idea of society applying laws to them).
My girlfriend is a good, but cautious driver. 10 years (her total time of driving) without any traffic infringment. She gets very freaked out when people speed right up close to her, and go past her at high speed. Sure, you may be a numero uno Formula One racing driver in control as you go past her at 140 but if this puts her off her driving you are still partly responsible for causing a crash.
Also, what about little kids running out into a street to chase their lost football? Do you promote the idea of competant drivers being entitled to travel at high speeds through urban/suburban areas?
I can't remember who started the use of this term but it's often used in discussions about global development - social and economic. Rather than East / West or Developed/ Developing, the terms North/ South are used to indicate that by and large the world is divided into a more developed "North" and a less developed "South". So you get the bizarre situation of countries like NZ and Oz south of the equator being referred to as North. Yup, I agree, it's daft. It's a kind of short hand expression. Alternate short hand expressions to divide the world on economic and social groupings?
...but if you get to Bletchley Park, for goodness sake don't mention the film U-571 :-) the retired UK military people who are the tour guides get a bit twitchy that Hollywood makes out it was the US Navy and not the Royal Navy (UK) who grabbed vital code books from a sinking U-boat (which I think was actually U-110). (actually they are quite relaxed and happy to correct/ give more info , plus the U571 film makers donated a couple of huge u-boat props which are in the grounds of BP).
The code breakers in these small prefabricated huts probably shortened the war by two years and saved hundreds of thousands of lives. Surely us geeks can help save this site and remember their contribution? If you can't get there to volunteer, maybe use their online form and give them a small donation? Their website is going to be slashdotted at this rate, so how about slashdotting their intray with donations?
In the real world more the 70 percent of farms are "online"
With all due respect I'd beg to differ. This may be true of the "North" (USA, Europe, Australia, NZ), but if you mean '70% of the total number of farms / farmers in the world' , I'd guess to disagree. Sub-Saharan Africa, India, China...
Indeed many have problems gaining regular and guaranteed access to water.
"Open Source software...should be *paramount* on people's mids."
It's good we've got geeks to worry about this. By all means push hard on this issue - and use your skills to help improve the world - but for a large number of people in the world paramount issues in their mind are:
- can I get enough
- can I get enough to eat to live
- can I find shelter
- can I be safe from war or the after effects of war
Don't forget the big issues. Some of these may be solved by software, but remember the global context.
Bijker (!) wrote a really good book which discusses the evolution of the bicycle, some of the false starts and ideas which got dropped if you're interested in the history of the bike. Some cool old photos and like all other technologies, shows that it is more than engineering or logic that dictates the evolution of artefacts.(Bijker, W. E. (1995). Of bicycles, bakelites, and bulbs: Toward a theory of sociotechnical change. Cambridge, MA and London, England, The MIT Press.)
I was in Washington DC once, and a French person asked me what time it was in broken French. I told her and she didn't understand, so I told her in French and was greatful.
I asked for the time in France in broken France and was spit on. It doesn't get any clearer than that.
One bad experience defines a country for you?... oooh
do you have a solid ref- apart from sci-fi? No disrespect intended but anybody can write anything in sci-fi, do you have a link handy to any military/ scientific work done in the past? (nice photos of course welcomed cos it's Friday afternoon at work...time for slacking off :-) )
"Google (and the entire internet) are accessible from the comfort of our homes"...assumes ubiquitous home internet access. Not necessarily true for all now, or for some time to come.
... because in 1889, The Second International organized in Paris and set May 1 as a day of international labor solidarity, to support US trade unionists. European socialists like Engels decided it was important to publicise the plight of poor working conditions in the USA.
Well said. Mod parent up. Same result with replacing "women" with "Americans".