* Posts by Che Gannarelli

5 publicly visible posts • joined 30 Apr 2008

Mixed reviews for semen-based recipe book

Che Gannarelli

@Danny

Such characterizations leave a nasty taste in the mouth!

RISC daddy conjures Moore's Lawless parallel universe

Che Gannarelli
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Excellent article

I'm in nanotech, in an area where all research justifies itself by vague aspirations to have impacts in quantum computing. Every talk to every audience seems to begin with the Moore's Law plots, as a justification for a new paradigm, to continue the trends beyond the small-transistor, high heat concentration limit. This is in itself a bit of smoke and mirrors, as QC won't necessarily be faster, or indeed practible, for all problems. The thing that interests me most is the absolute faith that Moore's Law can and must continue, with the almost faith-based (I really liked that observation) assertion that we must be able to nail QC, because otherwise Moore's Law will collapse, and that that is somehow unimaginable.

Research: Wind power pricier, emits more CO2 than thought

Che Gannarelli

Re: Burn hydrogen

Aside from the suggestion of hydrogen as a means of storage, which has been responded to, a poster above spoke of the idea of simply burning hydrogen as a primary power source. Sadly, hydrogen is not available on Earth in a form that can be burnt. It's generally taken from water by electrolysis, which takes as much energy as is released by burning it. As such, hydrogen burning is used where it is necessary to store power in a fuel cell. It's not a primary source. You'll only get net energy out by doing something else to your hydrogen, like fusing it to form Helium.

On hydrogen storage, as fraught as it may be with difficulties, there's massive amounts of work going into it for the purposes of fuel cells. Wouldn't write it off.

Hacker cops to $70k botnet rampage

Che Gannarelli

@Edward Pearson

Slow down a minute, mate. I'm with you to a point here. The effectiveness of prison is certainly questionable, and it's always sad to see anything that looks like revenge justice; the suggestion that he's not going to loose enough important, young years in jail being particularly regrettable.

However the idea that the kid is responsible for nothing more than hubris in daring to oppose some form of authority is wrong. He's been doing material damage, and they state the costs. I don't know what a similar sentence would be for physical criminal damage of comparable value, but it wouldn't be light. Which is not to say that the sentence is right, but rather to contest the suggestioin that he's guilty of nothing more than hubris.

Ian McKellen to reprise Gandalf

Che Gannarelli
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No complaints at all

Anything in this vein could be seen as caching - sorry, cashing - in (couldn't resist, AC). As Stef said, the intervening period in the legendarium is full of interest, and a good writer could do plenty with it. As for the Hobbit being more of a children's story, Tolkein's notes and the LOTR itself create a context for those events that permit the telling of the tale in a way far more consistant with LOTR. And I have to say that you couldn't do much better than Jackson and del Torro to achieve that.

To draw on the reference to Lucas's failings, that's a pretty irrelevent comparison in my book. The world is full of wonderful writers. Lucas's own failings don't speak in the slightest to the likelihood of this film working.

Which isn't at all to say that they can't cock it up. Of course they can.