Posts by Pascal Monett 19002 publicly visible posts • joined 10 Apr 2007
I seem to recall that a simple white noise generator (check V for Vendetta, among others), aka the go-to spy covert-conversation-protector, is largely enough to confuse a microphone while retaining human ear's capability of listening to one's neighbour.
Have physics changed, or has that always been a red herring ?
It never ceases to astonish me how software vendors (Borkzilla, Oracle, etc) redefine the business environment without for one second asking businesses if that is what they need.
More astonishing is the fact that businesses appear to not mind very much, given the lack of lawsuits over being forced to change when no change was needed from a business point of view.
And we're not talking about mom&pop shops, we're talking about Fortune 1000 companies. How is it that nobody among those CEOs called up Larry and said "Are you done fucking with my business ? I've got money to make and markets to corner, I don't have time to waste lining your wallet" ?
And I'm supposed to believe that these Fortune 1000 CEOs have no clue as to what they got themselves into ?
That is a hard pill to swallow.
I would contend that there is actually a need for regime change in the USA.
For far too long has the political pie been carved out between Dems and Repubs, and the latter are going decidely loony.
You need another political party to shake up the house of cards you've got going over there. It's starting to smell bad.
I would agree with you completely if not for that fact that, if those workers got a job at Amazon shifting boxes, it's likely that they didn't find a job anywhere else.
I doubt very much that any Amazon employee set out one morning with the urge to get a job where pissing in a bottle to not take a break is almost a routine procedure.
So, yeah, I'm all for making robots to handle dull, repetitive tasks, but what happens to the people who lose their jobs to it ? Are they going to be able to find work somewhere else ?
And if they could, wouldn't they already have ?
You can lift a finger, and banks will fall over themselves to loan you billions more.
I fully understand the financial operations involved, and I get why the banks are willing, but honestly, with his fortune, shouldn't the banks just be : "meh, you've got the money, finance this yourself" ?
But of course, that's not the kind of world we live in.
I would tend to agree. It's a game. It doesn't need to be 100% photorealistic.
It does, however, need to be optimised to not create lag simply because there's too much to render.
When I'm playing Minecraft, or Diablo III, I'm not interested in realistic. When I'm playing 7 Days to Die, I find the world quite realistic enough.
We're good on realism, I think. Let's get this thing optimized even more to up the framerates. There's never enough of those.
All these online repositories are teaching us security in a way a classroom just couldn't.
There's nothing like real-life situations to raise awareness, and the Internet makes security a 24/7 affair.
I guess in ten years' time, there will be exhaustive classes on security, full of "lessons learned" (or an Internet Security For Dummies* book), that will actually be useful enough to ensure that people who take them will know all of what to avoid.
* : yes, I know, there is one already. What I mean to say is that, in a decade or so, we'll likely have enough experience to ensure that all aspects are covered, including online repositories, stacks and other VMs. We're not done finding out how our data can be hacked, is what I'm saying.
The fact remains that a URL is not much help when your desktop is screwed to the point where it cannot connect to the Internet.
Once upon a time, documentation was a local affair, and it was more or less useful following how much work was put into it.
Nowadays, it's just a throwaway thought and you've got to scour the Web's technical forums and pray that enough people have had your problem so that somebody might have been good enough to post something somewhere that is actually a solution.
But actual help from the original vendor ? Or some technical specifications that are up-to-date ?
Rarer than hen's teeth, these days.
Warning that costs are high, the workforce is scarce, etc . . all of that is just laying down the groundwork for when the Texas plant will never open.
Or, when it does, it will be with reduced capacity and it will stay that way for all the years TSMC has tax exemptions for.
Then it will more everything back to Taiwan.
Just you watch.
As per the article : "[eBay] cooperated fully and extensively with law enforcement authorities throughout the process".
I'm going to leave eBay the benefit of the doubt. A former FBI goon turned security officer obviously forgot that he wasn't working for the FBI any more, and used the usual procedures a tad too automatically.
That says a lot more about the FBI than it does about eBay.
Oh I am certain that Google is absolutely right. AMP is definitely here to help make the web better - for Google.
The only way I would even start trusting Google on this matter is if it were proven that ad revenue on AMP pages was entirely sent to the original page owners.
That is obviously not what is happening. Google found a way to host popular pages on its own servers specifically in order to deprive web sites of ad revenue and rake it all in.
Somehow, I feel that that should result in a class action lawsuit - except hold the lawyers to a fixed revenue, not a (lion's) share of the spoils.
If it's already illegal, then what's the problem ?
The employee leaving goes to a competitor, Infosys sues alledging the non-compete clause, judge throws it out of court. End of story.
Logically, the lawyer Infosys contacts will say so and not take the job.
Why is this an issue ?
So, entangled atoms can be engraved in a silicon process.
Who knew ?
I would have thought that you needed to do something to achieve entanglement. If they have actually found a way to entangle atoms in an engraving process, well congratulations.
Somehow, I am doubtful though.
Come on, that was a bit harsh.
NASA has had plenty of successes, some of them downright awesome. Wasn't there this thing with the telescope last year where NASA learned to maneuver it using solar wind ? Is that not a bloody awesome success ? Don't its rovers regularly exceed their life expectations by years at a time (um, when they land successfully, that is) ?
It's called rocket science. It's difficult.
I think we can cut them some slack.
Well, truth be told, gold does have intrinsic value in specific areas, namely space (satellites/telescopes) and medical (I'm thinking dentures, but surely there are other applications). Also, sometimes gold can be used in computing for, again, very specific cases.
So gold is shiny, but not only.
I'm thrilled that you have enough vocabulary to know the word "fiat", but do you know what it means and what that implies ?
It means that the State (or Country) guarantees the money and its value. It also means that the State will track down thieves and bring them to justice.
<sarc>Except when the thieves are operating in Wall Street. Those guys can steal all they want, it's legal.</sarc>
DeFi cannot turn to the State to recover anything. DeFi has no case because nothing was hacked, some smart ass just gamed the system. He actually followed the rules and used them to his advantage. There is no judge in the civilized world that will blame that guy for anything.
One more thing about fiat currency : it has two thousand years of experience being attacked, taken at gunpoint, broken into and stolen in various ways, and the sum of its rules are designed to thwart all possible attacks.
Funny money is relearning all the lessons - the hard way.
That's why I do not install any Google products (Chrome, Earth, . .) on my home PC.
Install Google Earth and you'll find yourself with Chrome in short order, because Google has decided that you can't possibly want Google Earth without also wanting Chrome.
Your opinion ? Google doesn't give a flying one.
Remove Chrome ? You'll get it back whether you like it or not.
So, since I have to have GMail for my professional laptop, I use Chrome for accessing GMail (I'm already effed there) and I can install Google Earth as well because it's already too late.
Yep, that's about right. You can't move jobs oversees during 50 years then complain that nobody home knows how to make anything anymore.
Remember those 50 years of cost-cutting and employee trimming and executive bonuses ?
This is what they have cost you.
Enjoy.
(P.S.: can be applied to all "First World" countries)
Yep. Apple is notoriously bad for business networks and integration. Having a Windows network is bad enough, a hybrid Windows-Apple networkd must be exercise in frustration.
Apple shines, however, in creation and the arts in general, which are mostly solo endeavours.
So, you're saying that climate change isn't happening ?
Back in the 1980's, I clearly remember trudging to school in winter through 10-20cm of snow for weeks on end.
This winter, we got barely 1cm of snow and it lasted a day.
I think there's a change, there.
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