Posts by Mike

US denies entry to security researcher

Physically carrying document, not smart

"Hackers" and other individuals with interesting documents, should know better to carry around documents like that.

An NRA inspired right wing government has made them so sickly paranoid, that a customs officer can further his/her career by stopping "suspicious" content, and adding it to their portfolio. When you enter, you must not offer anything of value to the customs department. If there's nothing to "take", you'll probably be free to go.

Try *that* point of view on for size - fits like a glove...

So why on earth would anyone carry around anything that isn't encrypted the heck out of?

US patent system braced for a shake-up

Bring to the discussion this document:

I'm very disappointed with the patent system myself.

Here is a document that Phil Salin wrote years ago, and is still completely valid. Unfortunately, the guy is no longer alive, and I don't know anyone else that speaks so clearly about the patent topic.

Take some time, read it thoroughly, it really could be one of the most important things people will learn about patents. The patent office should really pay very close attention as well.

http://www.philsalin.com/patents.html

Wal-Mart denies cheap HD DVD deal

Plain DVD with DIVX can do HD

I've seen 2 nice quality planet earth episodes in HD on divx quality, that fit on one 4.7GB dvd.

So that's about 2GB per hour to do 1080p HD.

Why is the industry trying to rip us off with those "blu-ray" and "hd-dvd" formats which are expensive and unnecessary, while all they really have to do is to modify a plain dvd player a bit and equip it with a dvi/hdmi output.

Perhaps *this* is what they have done, and it's not really "HD-DVD", but plain divx HD quality-ish DVD, which 'd be fine.

Hawking amazed by weightlessness

Let's send him to actual space

If we all offer like $20, we might be able to send him into actual space. I bet he would love to reflect on life and his ideas while gazing out in actual space for a while. Let's give him that experience.