Posts by sisk 2455 publicly visible posts • joined 17 Mar 2010
How is a democratically elected government continually able to act against the interests of it's citizens and in favor of big-shots, and get away with it?
The elections are an illusion. The US has become an oligarchy. Everyone who appears on the ballot has already been approved by the powers that be. The people have little real choice about who gets elected and the politicians know this. Given that knowledge why would they give two shakes of a rats rear end what we think?
I'm guessing he's a youngin'. That or his parents never let him drop a quarter into an arcade machine growing up.
Here's a tip ya whipper snapper. If we hadn't had Pacman and Galaga and Pong, or if they weren't awesome in their day, you wouldn't have Call of Duty and Skyrim and whatever else it is that the kids play these days.
I'll be over here....playing Galaga on MAME. Don't go running of with my cane, and keep off my grass you darned kids.
Actual games, the ones made for consoles have evolved far beyond the good ole Pacman days.
Hence my reference to casual games. :-) Oddly enough, from what little I've seen of it, the net profit is much higher with those < $5 games on phones than on console games. They have a far larger target audience and the development costs for them is generally a fraction of a percent of what they pour into developing the top console games.
Has anyone else noticed how much these classic games have in common with the biggest casual titles of today in terms of gameplay? Seriously, give Pac-Man a graphics makeover and he'd be right at home with the likes of Angry Birds and Flappy Bird and Temple Run. Funny how the most profitable games today aren't much more complex than the ones they were making 35 years ago.
The 10th was never meant to imply the states were sovereign in any way
Actually that's exactly what it was meant for. A little history lesson: pre-Civil War it was "The United States are...". Before that this nation was a loose collection of semi-independent states. The intent behind it is very clear if you look at the letters and journals and things of that sort from the men who wrote it. They believed that there had to be a balance between state power and Federal power to keep both honest.
it in no way limits Congress' power to regulate ALL commerce of the USA as it sees fit.
It specifically denies Congress any powers not specifically granted to it elsewhere in the Constitution. Nowhere in the Constitution is Congress granted power over intrastate commerce, only interstate commerce. So yes, it does limit what commerce they can regulate.
Except that some judge about 70 years back reinterpreted it to say they can regulate intrastate commerce (specifically a farmer who grew wheat that he then kept to feed his own chickens) on the flimsy grounds that it might affect interstate commerce and we started down the slippery slope to the 10th being the completely meaningless paragraph that it is today.
History. It's important ya know.
To be fair the feds have constantly abused the interstate commerce clause to the point that the 10th amendment (the one that limits Federal authority) is basically dead. The US would be better off if more states made a habit of ignoring that particular clause, at least where it's being obviously abused to expand Federal power into areas that it's not supposed to be mucking about in.
So of course the cartel of copyright-holders always lobby to prevent out-of-copyright music from existing.
Not quite. The cartel is benefitting from the efforts of 1 company. Disney has lobbied hard to have copyright periods extended every time the copyright for Steamboat Willy (the first Mickey Mouse flick) was about to expire. The fact that music is lumped in the same copyright category as film is just convenient for RIAA. IIRC they've been through four or five rounds of bribing lobbying Congress to extend the protection.
You know there really should be a law that when all parties who contributed to an work - be it a book, movie, or song - are dead that the copyright be voided. It's just not right for people who contributed nothing to it to be making money off of it 50 years after everyone who touched or invested in it is dead.
My phone has had a kill switch that I set up myself for years now with an app called TotalCare. Send the right text from the right number and it can do a whole plethora of useful things, one of which is to wipe the data and brick the phone. More usefully, it can reply with its current GPS coordinates.
When mine was stolen I sent it a command adding the number the officer taking the report gave me to the whitelist and then gave him the command to make it reply with GPS coordinates. I got my phone back in about 2 hours.
Just look at the propensity for some people (my wife, for example) to get frustrated and throw controllers.
Incidentally we have his and hers controllers for all our consoles. My wife isn't allowed to touch my controllers. I make her use her own, which unsurprisingly giver her tendency to hurl the things across the room when the game's not going her way, have to be replaced fairly regularly. My kids learned very quickly that this is unacceptable behavior when they started doing it. 7 years on I still haven't had any luck making my wife understand it though.
I'm curious... What country do you live in and from whom do you purchase, or harvest apparently, your groceries that aren't cornflakes?
The butcher I get most of my meat from doesn't bother with barcodes. He's an old fashioned sort and hasn't upgraded his cash register since the 80s. I think he finally replaced his scale a couple years back because he was having to calibrate the old one twice a day. I get my meat from him because the grocery stores around here have been caught replacing sell by instead of disposing of meat that didn't sell and I know he doesn't do that.
When I can I buy my eggs from some friends who keep chickens rather than from the store. They don't always have the excess to sell, but when they do their eggs taste better than the ones from the store, though they do tend to run a bit smaller. Needless to say they don't use barcodes, though the cartons they put the eggs in are reused from store bought eggs and usually have barcodes on them.
My problem with Amazon's plan is that when you've run out of something, you normally don't have anything to scan anymore, because the packaging has already gone in the trash.
A lot of people try to buy foodstuffs before they run out. Failing that you could always scan the package before you throw it away. You'd probably develop that habit fairly quickly if you were getting your groceries this way.
I looked at getting a smart watch. I was underwhelmed when I looked into what they could actually do. The things are essentially just watches unless paired to a smart phone, and if I'm carrying a phone anyway why would I not use its bigger screen to check the weather and my text messages? I could be convinced to buy one, maybe, if it were a phone in and of itself, but as just a second screen for the phone I'm already carrying? No thank you, not worth it.
I'm pretty sure MS will make more than $8 a pop from every Nokia phone sold
True enough, but $8 per phone sold from the dominant platform is probably still more total than what they're likely to get from Nokia phones. Nokia's barely a blip on the mobile radar these days.
But are they? That figure smells too much like the mythical Linux 235 patents they previously alleged they held.
They're probably the same patents, given that Android runs a Linux kernel. I've no doubt said patents exist. I could probably even name a couple of them. For example MS holds a patent on deleting files. Just try to enforce that one in court. I'm guessing the rest of them are about the same level of enforceability.
More interesting is the question just how much source code Tesla should be releasing under various open source licenses, but isn't
Legally speaking quite possibly none. All the services mentioned could very well be used out of the box to build a backbone on which they could run their own proprietary code without modifying any copyleft licensed code at all, thereby avoiding the legal need to contribute code back to the community.
I've got to say two things about this lunacy. First, I'm pretty sure if there were life on Mars we'd have found it by now. I know it's a big planet and all (actually it's quite a small planet, but there's a lot of surface even on a small planet), but we've been looking pretty closely at it for a long time.
Second, what possible motive could NAS or JPL have for covering up evidence of life on Mars? Seriously. Those accusations stink of the kind of ignorance that makes me want to reach for a clue-by-four.
I wasn't much older than that (8) when I first started finding holes in the password system on my dad's DOS based menu program. He gave up on keeping me out of the games with passwords and started hiding the power cord by the time I was 9. Mind you that menu program was pretty primitive and my dad's not exactly an expert at computer security (plus I was way ahead of the rest of my age group as far as computers). I'd expect better from a modern system.
And, he resigned, which was the absolute least he could do, considering the ramifications of his hateful bigotry.
And here we have the part of the issue that many gay rights supporters just don't get. The belief that marriage should be one man and one woman is not always 'hateful bigotry'. Sometimes it is, but there are many reasons why people have that view. Perhaps the most widespread is the idea (which I don't agree with, obviously if you look at my other posts) that marriage is a primarily religious institution and that most religions don't allow for it.
Further, the LGBT community is, on the whole, more bigoted towards those of religious bent than religious folks are towards them. If you want to see hateful then walk into a gay bar wearing a tee shirt with a religious slogan on it. You'd be lucky to get out of there without being spit on at the very least, even if you were a staunch ally of the LGBT community (and yes, I do speak from experience -- I was actually spit on twice and punched in the face once, all by different people, before I or any of the group of friends I was with realized why and then spit on again on my way out). Should someone guilty of that sort of behavior be forced out of their job? Because I've got to say that is, in my opinion, far worse than a donation to a political fund.
And to answer the obvious question, at that point in my life I was in the habit of grabbing whatever shirt was on top and not giving it much thought. I didn't even realize what shirt I was wearing.
Here we have a community that is always preaching tolerance and their intolerance has just cost a man his job.
Shame on you. Not for your lifestyle (because, really, who cares who you sleep with?) but because you have just proven that you are every bit as willing to discriminate against anyone who disagrees with you just as much as you were once discriminated against.
I support the LGBT community's equal rights and will continue to do so, but this was an example of hypocrisy at its finest.
The biggest hurdles with supporting XP are with integration testing, compatibility testing, regression testing, and a whole slew of other issues around certifying patches. Microsoft maintains vast arrays of machines of varying configurations in order to certify that changes to the OS do not negatively impact drivers and hardware compatibility. In addition to maintaining compatibility with hardware, they must ensure that they don't break software running on their operating system which is potentially a larger issue than hardware compatibility. Best case scenario they have 100 engineers to maintain the infrastructure necessary to pull this off and that doesn't take into account the cost of the infrastructure itself.
As much as I like to rib Microsoft about it, I think the fact that they release updates that cause problems about every 3-6 months or so is a testament to how complex the testing needed to certify their updates is. They do employ mostly good programmers after all.
Second:
The logical step is to virtualize those XP machines and run them on a more secure operating system.
I could be mistaken, having never dealt with CNCs, but I would guess that CNC controllers require the same sort of hefty 3D processing that CAD programs need. Virtualization software isn't really designed to provide that sort of capability and none I've used can do so well enough to recommend it.
It's possible to get NetBEUI running on Linux. It's a hellacious headache to do and under normal circumstances I'd never recommend it, but you're talking about keeping $7m worth of hardware running so it's worth giving it a thought at least.
Really running XP, even without updates, probably is your better option for as long as it IS an option. Eventually though you're going to run into the problem I ran into with a local business who paid me for a while to come in every couple months and maintain their Win98 box (similar problem, their customer database wouldn't run on anything newer and couldn't be exported): The computer died from a hardware malfunction and Win98 wouldn't run on a new one. In their case, since it was one machine running one app with modest requirements, I was able to get them back up and running with a VM, but I'm guessing VMs won't be an option with CNC apps. They tend to pretty beefy.
Being pro-marriage does not imply being anti-gay,
True.
but those who lobby for gay-marriage are anti-family.
False.
If gays and lesbians want equality with marriage, then they should seek to build relationships with each other that prioritise a commitment to raising a family above their own sexual proclivites, even if it takes more than two people to achieve this.
There are many gay couples who want to do just that. There are also many more children awaiting adoption than there are straight couples looking to adopt. So by your own logic they should not only be allowed to marry, but they should be allowed to adopt.
That's it! I'm boycotting OK Cupid! I'm going to tell my wife to also.
....Oh.....wait....
Actually I may still have an account there from back before I met my wife. As I recall their gag surveys such as "Which Star Wars character are you" were more useful than their dating service. They never could find a match for me in a 100 mile radius. Then again the only online dating service I ever tried that did find a match for me at all tried to pair me with a woman with whom I'd already had a relationship that failed rather spectacularly.
If the management is forcing their beliefs on customers or taking a public stand on them, then yes, the customers have a right to go somewhere else. Chick-Fill-A and Hobby Lobby come to mind on this.
The difference is that where Chik-Fil-A and Hobby Lobby have made their founders' beliefs a matter of corporate policy Eich has kept a professional distance between Mozilla corporate policy and his personal belief. I resent this idea that because he agrees with traditional morality rather than the more contemporary moral view on homosexuality that he should be denied the position he has or that the company he leads should be boycotted when he keeps his personal views out of the company's operations. The man has his views and has a right to actively support them.
As long as he doesn't change the corporate policy in support of them (which he hasn't) these people boycotting Mozilla for the CEO's personal views are, in my opinion, out of line. That's just as bad as if some fringe religious group decided to boycott a company because the CEO was gay. They have the right to do it of course, and I wouldn't stand in their way, but that doesn't change the fact that it's a dick move.
Don't feel bad. I didn't watch it either. Suffice it to say that there's a reason that I'm one of the few in my family for 2 generations to not work in the medical field. (My parents and 3 of their collective 5 siblings are in the medical field, as is one of my two sisters. My baby sister is still in college majoring in biology. She may not go into medicine, but it'll probably be close enough.)
Still, quite an accomplishment this.
Lucy certainly heard something. Most likely the origin was biological though. I've no doubt that metal in the body can pick up radio waves. Actually doing anything with them is another matter, and allowing people with metal fillings to interpret them with no additional electronics is pure fiction.
I find it funny that people expect others to respect their beliefs and choices but think it's ok to demand that someone be fired for having the opposite view. Gay rights activists contributed funds against Prop 8 but you'd be lynched if you suggested that any of them should be denied employment for doing so. Traditional marriage activists should have just as much protection.
For the record, I support gay marriage. It's none of my business who you choose to spend your life is, regardless of what my religion says about the matter.* I also support the right of those who disagree with me to be heard without consequences, something not very common amongst gay rights activists.
*We all know what the Bible says on the matter, but since we have freedom of religion that has no place in the law or in the bedroom of someone who doesn't believe in it. Besides I could give a lengthy theological rant about why the people who rail against gay marriage should spend less time looking at others and more time taking care of their own sins.
I can see where the judge is coming from, but given the role that search results play I think the case could also be made that suppressing search results goes a bit beyond editorial rights. I've honestly never thought about it before and I'll need some time to consider and properly form an informed opinion on the matter.
Regardless though I've got to wonder exactly what the plaintiffs think a US court is going to be able to do about a search engine that answers first, foremost, and possibly only to the Chinese government filtering their search results.
A couple years ago I read a study that originally had the goal of studying the effects of pornography on boys. They had to alter the study because they couldn't find any high school boys who hadn't been exposed to porn for their control group. They couldn't even find a single boy for the control group in six months in looking before they gave up. That speaks volumes to me.
Even most altcoins require a GPU these days to make any profit really. Any SHA-256 based coin you're going to need a whole array of ASICs, and by the time you get one that you've ordered the difficulty will have gotten up to the point that you'll have a hard time making your money back on it.
You can still mine Primecoin and Quarkcoin and the like on CPUs, but good luck getting enough of them to be profitable. Last time I looked a Quarkcoin was worth about 8 cents and Primecoin were worth a fraction of a penny each. And you'd likely never see one of either using a phone as your miner.
I can prove it. In the weeks leading up to the 2012 election FB informed me that one of my friends liked John McCain. Two things are wrong with that. First, this man was like a second father to me. I'm familiar with his political leanings and he was unlikely to vote for either of the two major parties. Even if he did, he'd not have made it public knowledge who he was voting for till after the fact.
Second, note that I'm using past tense here. That's because he died in a motorcycle wreck a little over a year before FB tried to tell me that he liked John McCain.
So, yeah. Facebook lies when it tell you what your friends like. The proof doesn't get much more rock solid than a dead guy who never discussed politics until after an election was over telling you who you should vote for.
I disagree. What is needed is T&Cs that are written in language that you don't have to be a lawyer to puzzle out. I'm pretty good at reading legalese but even I get a headache trying to go through FB's T&Cs. I doubt there are many minors who would be able to work out what they're agreeing to at all.
Mainstream sociologists today disagree with you Jake. Some people get the majority of their social contact online. My wife is a good example. She's epileptic, so she can't drive. She's a stay at home mom because with the current competitive job market no one wants to hire someone who might have a seizure while at work. She has nothing in common with anyone who lives within walking distance of us, and, to be blunt, go near most of them with our children anyway.* All that adds up to her not getting out of the house very often.
*We're a single income family and I work for a school district in a state controlled by the TEA party. Guess what kind of neighbors we have.
Have you played minecraft TSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Ye gods I hate that sound. Especially when you're busy filling in the hole that the one a few seconds ago made (which is inevitably when the one that was hiding on the other side of one of my farms decides to come give me a hug).
In my humble opinion if you don't hate creepers you just haven't played enough Minecraft.
A while back I was looking at an Android powered HUD designed for sports gear. I forget what company it was, but it was only around $300 for the model that could be attached to normal sunglasses. Supposedly, according to a few forum posts, it was possible to get it reasonably close to Glass capabilities. I almost bought it, but the other half gave me the look when I started talking about it and I decided it wasn't worth the impending fight.
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