Posts by Jon Tocker 305 publicly visible posts • joined 6 Jul 2007
"...there is not an opportunity for a virus to be loaded," he said. Yes the drive is formatted but I have never heard of a virus that lives in the master boot record."
Oh get real!
Seagate's been around like FOREVER - including back in the days of the stoned virus and other *boot sector* viruses. Obviously this guy is 17 years old and somehow recently promoted to a senior position.
Perhaps one of the grown-ups should take this padawan aside for a quick history lesson.
I'm all for the taser in principle - a (mostly) non-lethal way of dealing with DANGEROUS opponents.
I have no problem with cops tasering a drugged up aggressor who poses a direct threat to them or others.
I don't even have problems with the cops tasering any dickhead stupid enough to refuse to keep their hands in sight when ordered to do so - the cops deserve to be able to defend themselves from the risk of a cowardly attack using a concealed weapon.
What I do not agree with is tasers being used to torture a person who has already been subdued and cuffed as demonstrated in that video clip.
It was sickening. The "campus cops" in that clip had already wrestled the guy to the floor for being "armed" with a smart mouth and a propensity to ramble. There was no need to "disarm" him by repeatedly tasering him into submission.
That whole bunch of rentacop pigs should be hogtied and repeatedly tasered.
The taser is supposed to be a tool to protect cops and the public from [potential] danger - an alternative tool to a 9mm Glock or whatever other sidearm your police force prefers - it's not a tool for shutting up lippy people who're already lying on the floor in cuffs.
I was around to read your post - Chuck Norris has failed to dispatch me to the hereafter.
Chuck Norris: Two speeds...
but only one facial expression.
My other fave short film critique was: "Charles Bronson displays all the emotions from A to B."
Still, that's one more letter than Chuck's ever achieved.
A stupid cretin who couldn't act his way out of a paper bag - so he roundhouse-kicks his way out instead. If he had taken up macrame rather than martial arts, the silly dork would have remained in total obscurity where he belongs.
Go and watch a Chuck Norris movie - any one - or even one episode of the retarded "Walker. Texas Ranger" series and that's all you ever need to know - you will have then effectively seen everything he's ever made and every facial expression he is capable of.
The critique/plot synopsis I read for one of his many dreary movies was:
"Chuck Norris does head kicks. Again."
'nuff said, really.
His main notable claim to fame is that he makes Charles Bronson and Keanu Reeves look capable of portraying emotion.
As the content of the so-called internet humour in the article, I've heard funnier jokes from four-year-olds.
Graham Dawson and Jason Irwin:
Quite right. My keyboard is currently positioned so that the Ins, Del, Home, End, Pg Up, Pg Dn and cursor control keys are centred on the monitor, leaving the alphanumeric keyboard hanging off to the left so there's room to the right on the pissy little height-adjustable tray for my mouse.
A brief experiment in repositioning the "right-handed" keyboard so the alphnumeric area is centred on the screen puts the numeric pad where my mouse usually resides on the right and leaves plenty of space on the left for the mouse.
One of those "left handed" keyboards would suit me perfectly - I would no longer be working with my torso twisted to the left to reach the alphakeys while my head is turned to the right (relative to my torso) to see the screen.
Although I can do pretty much everything except write with either hand (not exactly fully ambidextrous) and I've been able to adapt to a variety of left- and right-handed configurations when servicing other people's machines, I do have better mouse control with my right than my left so swapping the mouse across is not ideal (I'm trying it now and, although I can function, it's not as fluid. A left-hander would probably find it fairly comfortable if they prefer to use the mouse in their left hand.)
Ben Saxon:
I've been saying that for years! I don't see the logic in doing something as basic as strumming with your main hand and trying to do the fiddly fretwork with your off hand. Even picking or flamenco style work on the strings is more basic than some of those chord patterns. I've seriously considered reversing the strings on my mandolin to make it easier to do chords (using my more nimble right hand).
I guess those who first designed the lute (or its predecessors) must have been masochists, wanting to do the fiddly bits with their off hand.
Or was it a case of one of those creative "lefties" creating the first one and arranging it so the nimble left hand did the hard work while the right hand did the easier stuff and then some "righty" came along, saw it being played and didn't think to restring and flip the thing over when using it (probably assuming in his arrogance that the lefty was a righty...)
Years ago, while working for [large Tertiary Education provider] I took a call from one of the staff in one of a clump of prefabricated buildings off to one side of the campus - could not log in, "server not available" type of message. Got them to check a couple of things and then told them I'd look into it.
Before I could move, the phone rang again, different user from same "prefab", same problem, rapidly followed by a call from a different prefab in the cluster, this time network connectivity had suddenly dropped off. Then another call from yet another prefab.
By this stage I was thinking the router had hung and needed a restart so I escaped from my desk before the phone could ring again and headed across the campus to check out the situation.
I mounted the steps up the hill to the long wooden walkway that connects the prefabs together - the long wooden walkway with the data cables connecting the prefabs to the rest of the network stapled to the wooden frame just beneath the roof - and saw that part of the roof was now a couple of feet higher than it should have been...
...due to the actions of a bright yellow hydraulic digger that was being used to tear the roof up and off the walkway.
I eyed the carnage, utterly aghast, for a moment then did a brisk about-face and headed back to the office.
I told my boss that there was an issue he really had to have a look at and led him back to the walkway.
My boss stared at the demolished walkway for a short while in stunned silence and then my (extremely Fundamentalist Born-Again Christian) boss said "The Property Manager needs a bullet."
Regrettably, no bullets or BOFH-like strategies were employed but I gather the Property Manager came away from his meeting with my boss with a firm understanding of why it pays to consult the IT Department before ordering things to be ripped apart with excavation machinery.
Nah, the lead shielding would tip the weight over the 4kg barrier.
I'm sticking with my cunning plan to make a TNT-based battery - 1.5lb of TNT leaves me with a 7.3lb margin for casing and whatever technology I need to release the stored energy s.l.o.w.l.y as electricity rather than in one impressive (devastating?) rush of heat, light and noise.
Wonder how I'd go about recharging it?
"1920 Watt hours is just over 6.9MJ. 1kg of TNT has about 4.2MJ of energy. So the device they're asking for really does contain as much energy as a bit over three and a half pounds of TNT."
And the battery is supposed to weigh no more than 4kg (optimistic for such a high output) which is nearly 9 pounds (8.8, to one decimal place) so TNT, at a mere 1.5 pounds (approx), is the clear winner in the energy density sweepstakes (and can probably release it a lot faster, though some batteries can be pretty impressive if "disposed of incorrectly")
"France is about to fall in Hell and release Gas"
I bloody-well hope so!
Not content with sending cowardly sneaks into our country to blow up a Hippy Ship (and a sleeping hippy) safely berthed in our harbour and then "copyrighting" the name "Kiwi" for one of their poofy wines, they're now stealing the "moku" (Maori facial tattoos) to advertise their poofy designer clothes - the time is long overdue for the whole nation of effete, thieving, gutless-coward frogs to fall into a lake of molten magma and perish...
Before they steal something else of ours to advertise or name some disgusting-tasting, over-priced, under-sized "Cordon-Bleu" dish involving something generally considered to be inedible and a couple of artistically-arranged strips of something green (or red) that may possibly have once come from a vegetable.
It happens here in NZ.
We are "allowed" to defend ourselves using "reasonable force".
However, being a trained martial artist makes you a weapon and so using a martial art constitutes unreasonable force unless you warned them before hand - and if you do that, the prosecution lawyer in your trial will claim you incited the other to attack you by proclaiming your fighting ability (yep, the poor attacker is not responsible for his actions, you forced him to attack you by bragging about how good you are...) or claim you were "threatening" the poor attacker with violence.
In a lot of cases, a *jury* will let you off by reason of self-defense, but you still have to go through the whole "be arrested, get out on bail, get a lawyer, defend your actions in court" crap while the attacker gets assistance because he came from a "broken home" or some such shit.
Bear in mind that a 6'10, 250-lb gang member with steel-capped boots is "unarmed" and a 5'6" weedy bloke with a black belt in pretty much anything is "armed". "Armed response" is not permitted against said gang member because it's not like he can *kill* you using just his strength, mass and a pair of steel-caps, is it? How dare you use a weapon (martial arts) against such a minor threat.
About the only means of defense you're allowed to use without prosecution is to run away - but you'd better stop when you reach a busy road and let the bugger catch up and beat you because if you were to run across the road and he tried to chase you then was struck by a car and injured, it'd probably be your fault...
Re: SEP
It worked OK for the Doctor, Martha and Captain Jack when the Master had the whole planet looking for them (always works for the TARDIS and it always works for Martha (and apparently Captain Jack) when the Doctor is around...)
Regarding wearing motorcycle kit: Works for me at least twice a day - had loads of people stare *straight through me* for several seconds before proceding to drive into my path.
Fortunately I'm smarter than Wells' Invisible Man and keep a close watch on my surroundings...
He has a point. Such halls are at least in part funded by local councils to whom we as individuals - not the church - pay taxes/rates etc. That's everyone - Christians, Jews, Muslems, Atheists and Pagans alike paying for that building.
One of the local church halls here used to rent out its rooms to at least one Martial Arts club and martial arts are usually big on embracing the meditation/spirituality of nonChristian beliefs - more to Aikido or Tae Kwon Do than running around practicing rolls and throws or kicks and punches.
As to getting one's knickers in a twist about "baby yoga", FFS, a price-inflating name ("Exercise classes $30 per hour", "Yoga classes $100 per hour") attached to a few stretching exercises for toddlers does not constitute subverting their minds to Hindu ideology.
Christianity in some sectors is still very much a child - it is, after all, less than 2000 years old (some sects much younger than that) and it's not too surprising that some churches are still feeling threatened by older, longer established religions. Give these buggers a break - it's hard being a pack of Johnny-come-latelys and coping with the apparent presence of a much older faith.
Stuart: Frigging brilliant, mate!
Rachel: Right On!
Anon (re: Both?) Excellent.
Our kids watch DVDs and play computer games when the weather is not conducive to outdoors stuff (they also have a lot of more conventional toys to strew across the floor and kill unsuspecting or unobservant parents) and they also enjoy playing on their trampoline or swing/slide set or walking to the nearby park to play on the larger adventure playground when weather and time permit. The 5-year-old also rides a motorcycle (2-wheeler, not a quad) and rides his bicycle on the local BMX track, likewise when time and weather permit.
They also go on car trips to the beach when we can afford the time and petrol when the weather is good.
But as has been pointed out, there is not always the time between getting home after work and the kids' bed time to take a walk to the park, play a while and walk back. Are the kids to have no time with family except for on fine weekends?
I think video games can be better for family bonding than a movie as the games are interactive and can be done together whilst a movie requires everyone to shut up and pay attention. Honestly, how many fathers yell "Good on ya! Way to go, you're really watching that movie well. Good skills!" ?
At least with video games - even Krash Bandicoot - you can cheer your kids on and compliment their skills.
According to the wikipedia article, New Zealand does not use the EURion constellation in its notes but we have similar note technology to the Aussies - polymer notes with "clear" windows (picture inside them), lots of colours and complicated designs.
According to http://www.rbnz.govt.nz/currency/money/polymer.pdf published by the Reserve Bank of NZ, the notes have the following security features:
"1. Each polymer note has two transparent windows. One of the transparent windows is oval-shaped and sloping and has the denomination numerals
embossed in it. The other clear window is in the shape of a curved fern leaf.
2. There is a fern immediately above the clear fern-shaped window. When you hold the note to the light, the fern should match perfectly with another fern
on the other side.
3. You should easily be able to see a shadow image of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II when you hold the note to the light.
4. Each note has an individual serial number printed horizontally and vertically.
5. Polymer notes have raised printing, which stands up on the surface and can be felt when you run your fingers over it.
6. Tiny micro-printed letters “RBNZ” should be visible with a magnifying glass.
7. Under an ultraviolet light the polymer note appears dull. Most commercial papers used in forgeries will glow under an ultraviolet light. However, polymer
notes contain special inks, which make particular features glow under an ultraviolet light. For example, the front of each genuine note has a fluorescent
patch showing the denomination numerals, which can only be seen under an ultraviolet light."
And the special "Millennium Edition" of the $10 note had, in addition to all of the above:
"One of the security features on the $10 millennium notes is a special "see-through" window. If you fold the bank note over and look through the clear window at the map of New Zealand next to the canoe, the letters `Y2K' become visible.
Another innovative security feature is the two silver ferns within the clear window, which reflect rainbow colours when you tilt the note to the light."
After all that, EURion constellations would be a bit of overkill.
That, and replacing the two most circulated notes ($1 and $2) with coins, makes it pretty damned hard to forge our currency. (And very easy to blow $20 in "loose change" a week without realising you've done so.)
I'm waiting for the $5 coin to be released when they decide that money is not circulating fast enough and elect to turn another note into "annoying change" to be blown on vending machines. The one- and two-cent coins went the way of the Dodo ages ago and the 5-cent coin has recently followed them, so the time is probably ripe for a 5-dollar coin to be minted under the feeble excuse that "the notes are getting costly to replace" when what they mean is "you're not spending the buggers fast enough, lets make you WANT to get them out of your pocket..."
Right, ignoring the fact that every bit of footage I've ever seen of a Moller "craft" was either firmly on the ground and showing off its moving bits or wobbling erratically upwards a couple of feet while tethered to a crane "for insurance purposes/safety reasons", lets assume that, by some miracle, they get these things to work and address some of the hype:
They aim to create affordable (to the average citizen) flying cars that will alleviate traffic conjestion by creating successively larger layers in which to travel.
The average citizen.
Are they effing nuts? If these things worked, they would be AIRCRAFT and require a trained pilot, not the average dickheaded citizen that runs motorcycles, other cars, vans and even full-sized buses off the road and says "sorry, mate, I didn't see ya". FFS, the average consumer can't spot hazards (other vehicles, pedestrians, buildings etc) in the largely 2-dimensional environment of the roads, let alone in three dimensions!
But, argues Moller, the vehicles would be totally computer controlled and guided by GPS so the average citizen would merely be a passenger, they'ed get in, enter the destination and the flying car would deliver them to their destination. I'm sure I even saw some crap about the possibility that you could ease parking woes by sending it home on autopilot and call it to come and pick you up later.
Well, GPS units guiding drivers into public toilets aside and ignoring the inherent waste in having your aircraft fly you to work, fly home, fly back to work, drop you at the pub, fly home, fly to whatever brothel you managed to crawl to in a drunken stupor and then fly you home again, these things are still (hypothetical, highly conjectural, pie-in-the-sky) AIRCRAFT and would require a human operator to perform an in depth pre-flight check and (honestly) deem the craft fit for takeoff and would have to routinely undergo rigorous airworthiness tests as required of planes and helicopters.
Like the average citizen of today diligently checks lights, tyres, brakes etc etc every time they use their vehicle and always ensures their current vehicles are strictly up to warrant of fitness standard and never drives knowing a tail light is out or with an expired warrant of fitness.
Enough accidents are caused by bald tyres, shitty brakes, buggered steering, stuffed wheel bearings or brake lights failing to activate and warn the (tailgating idiot) driver behind, without putting the average citizen in charge of maintaining (or paying for the maintenance of) a complicated aircraft that is likely to fall out of the sky due to faulty bearings in the turbines.
And of course, the whole "running out of gas" on the way to work is going to have dire consequences - the damned thing may well be programmed to make for the nearest service station once it hits a certain level of fuel but as the old proverb goes: "you can lead a dickhead to a service station but you can't make him fill the tank."
The cost in fuel has already been covered so I won't go into that here (and for all we know, they might discover a way to make eco-friendly flying car fuel using harmonious energies from amethyst crystals to irradiate organically-grown mung beans - like, WOW!)
Aerodynes/Ducted Fan Vehicles/Vectored Thrust Vehicles/Personal VTOLs are grist for the mill in any good SF or Cyberpunk story and I'd like to see someone come up with a viable, usable design but I would not expect to (nor want to) see it in the hands of the average citizen.
As aircraft, they would be expensive and limited to military, police, rescue services, commercial transport and a few personal craft owned by the extremely rich - pretty much as fixed wing and gyro aircraft are today.
...to take care of the dust: just ramp the little robots up to whatever top speed you can crank out of them and aim them at a large enough nearby rock to cause them to bounce abruptly, thus shaking the dust loose from cameras/solar panels.
I've had similar experiences when hitting rocks at speed on various motorcycles that have managed to dislodge far heavier objects than dust particles...
But here it is:
If I choose to purchase apples from the local greengrocer and stick a percentage of those on the roadside with a sign saying "Help Yourself" then people are permitted to do so. If I choose to pay for broadband and then broadcast access to said broadband out to whoever happens to be passing though, then people are permitted to help themselves as well.
If a law is passed forbidding me to give away apples I have purchased at my gate and I persist in doing so, then it's my responsibility if I continue to do so and people take them. If the ToS I have agreed to in signing up with my Telco says I must not share WiFi access out to the public and I do so, then that likewise is my responsibility.
Running Windows is like said passer-by having a 1-year-old in tow who sees the shiny red apples and can't resist helping him/herself, but that's OK because I left them there to be taken. Like windows helping itself to any open wifi connection...
Frankly, I don't know what the Telcos are moaning about - I pay $x for an agreed service and if I exceed the cap I pay extra to cover it. If passing people piggy-back of a connection I have made public, they are doing so on MY DIME with MY PERMISSION. They're not "stealing" it as I HAVE PAID FOR IT.
Honestly, it's not like more bandwidth is used than is being paid for. If I elect not to secure my access point then I'm inviting people to use my connection.
Like Phil, I tend to have various levels of passwords depending on the site. Important ones are always unique and my secure passwords tend to be random-seeming (unless you happen to know which line(s) of which poem/song or which inspirational quote I'm using. Mixing in a few numbers and capital letters also helps and I've been known to throw in punctuation marks if I know the software can handle them.
Matt's suggestion for harvesting would not grab anything too critical from me but I'm quite prepared to believe he'd get a "percentage" of useful passwords owing to the number of dumb buggers who think "secret1" is quite adequate for home and work computers, all forums, "exclusive" pron sites, on-line banking etc etc
Very Cyberpunk/After the Holocaust/Nuclear Aftermath.
Gangs roaming the landscape scavenging the metal out of anything they can find, like in all the "best" post-apocalypse movies.
The irony is, if they bugger up enough of the infrastructure, they could probably create the "collapse" that would plunge civilisation into the anarchy usually portrayed in such movies.
Great premise for a new film: the collapse comes when thieving mongrels do more damage to the telecommunications infrastructiure, power networks and rail services than the various companies can afford to repair in a timely fashion. Our information/electricity-dependant society goes down the gurgler and those same gangs are then roaming the devastated landscape scavenging any metal they can find. Real "Mad Max" potential.
Saying "oh, well, they can just run cable to the door to discourage copper thieves" but in reality that costs in materials and labour - both of which have to be paid for which means the telco takes a loss and then charges its customers more for the upgraded lines.
In reality, such theft means a serious impact on us, the consumers and a lot of extra work (read more expense as extra contractors are called in and more material is ordered) for the telcos etc who already have a scheduled upgrade plan to follow and now have to contend with unsheduled upgrades in order to keep the infrastructure working.
In previous posts, deaths have been mentioned due to exposed live wires and missing manhole covers. The potential is there for deaths to occur because someone couldn't phone the ambulance in time or their home medical alarm could not be monitored etc.
I'm not seriously suggesting that stealing copper is going to reach the point that it threatens the stability of our society, but it certainly can and does have a serious impact.
Perhaps a few huge-looking cyborgs stomping around the place with huge effing guns and just shooting the thieves on sight would be a suitably "post-apocalyptic"-style deterrent to repeat offending...
Just the sort of stylish thing you need for when striding purposefully down the corridors of your Nautilus submersible or piloting your Cavorite-powered spaceship to the Moon or Mars and for tackling large steam-powered mechanical spiders in the desert.
Just the thing for us to use to expand the British Empire further into the frontier of space. God Save The Queen! (Victoria, of course).
Too bad the bloody colonists have it...
I expect to see one in LXG II - I think Fantomas could have a serious accident halfway through the movie and be fitted with one before the final reel.
"Matt Helm!"
'kin Oath! Matt Helm rocked!
I actually like most of the Bond films and the Bourne movies - they are good entertainment with great action.
I think it's terribly unprofessional of Matt Damon to diss the Bond movies and pointless to diss the nature of the character - Bond is FICTIONAL, ffs! And has been portrayed in a variety of different ways by different actors,
As to the stag party - I think I have to agree with those who said John Steed... He'd make sure no one missed out on the action
Rest assured that when you place a phone order for eggs and vinegar, it will be logged and your dossier will be sent up to Floor 13 or wherever.
Same for all you buggers ordering lemons - we know what you're up to! What's the bet you have an electric iron or a hot plate in your possession as well. Thought so...
And as we all know, motorcyclists are worse subversives than those "UnAmerican" homosexuals back in McCarthy's time so anyone mentioning anything to do with motorcycles over the phone can be logged as well - that'll teach ya to go out and have fun on the weekends while I'm stuck in a grey room listening in on bored housewives, you free-spirited bastards!
Now we have the entire population tapped, what shall we do to catch those bloody terrorists that keep refusing to discuss their plans in plain English over our tapped telephone lines? They're outsmarting us at every turn.
Future phone call.
"Hey, mate, I screwed my secretary last night, don't tell my wife, eh?"
"Don't worry, your secret is just between you, me, 14 spooks and the 27 l33t |-|4X0rs that have intercepted the intercept..."
Maybe it's time to replace "Just between you, me and the walls..." with "Just between you, me, the spooks and the hackers..."
Everytime someone in a movie utters the words in my title, I scoff, laugh or mutter, "Yeah, right!"
Strangely enough, never heard anyone mention it outside of a movie - but then, Hollyweird is just one vast propaganda machine entirely staffed by Party-Faithful directors, producers and script writers who churn out screeds of "Greatest Nation on Earth", "Land of the Free", "The Whole World is Jealous of Us" crap despite all evidence to the contrary.
Jealous of the USA? I honestly pity its citizens. And articles like this one illustrate why.
Land of the Free? Wot a RIOT! Yorta be on stage, a routine like that!
The dust of the Twin Towers hadn't settled and the Bush Admin was saying "would You,The People, be willing to accept the loss of certain Constitutional Rights in order to prevent this happening again?"
And when the "temporary" post-Sept-11 licence to spy on the public runs out, a new law gets passed to allow them to continue to spy on the public. Oh, quelle surprise!
They rave about how great it is they have a Constitution and yet that document is completely ignored by The Powers That Be over and over again.
Honesty, they might as well burn it - it's been dead so long that cremation is the only respectful and honest thing to do.
As has been pointed out, the real terrorists are hardly likely to use any infrastructure that can be easily monitored so all this law does is enable the insanely huge number of spooks the USA has to spy on their *own citizens*.
And wouldn't it be handy to have everyone's dirty little secrets on tap if the need ever arose to apply pressure? "We know you've been evading taxes for years, only reason you're not in jail is because you might prove useful, now we need you so do what we want or it's off to federal prison..."
"Nothing to hide, nothing to fear?" yeah, right. Even if you aren't dodging taxes or organising a tryst with your secretary, who knows what might be deemed "subversive behaviour" by future administrations. Bear in mind that under McCarthy's regime, homosexuality was deemed to be a security risk. For all we know, some loony spook or future President might take it into his/her head to decide that all stamp collectors pose a significant security threat.
I see it as the duty of every honest and Constitution-loving US citizen to foul up the spooks' plans by randomly interjecting the words "bomb" and "jihad" into every telephone conversation they have - even if they're just ordering a pizza.
The more I read about the goings-on in the so-called "Land of the Free", the more I think that the average US citizen is probably becoming jealous of other countries like China (where at least the government is up-front and HONEST about being a dictatorship that grants no rights or liberties to its citizens)
So the cops are supposed to risk who-knows-what infection wrestling with this bloke?
Such great advice from some dork who's too gutless to sign a name.
Tell you what, have the guts to post your name and we'll send some violent drunk smeared with faeces and blood around your place and you can subdue him armed with nothing more than a pair of handcuffs.
Just write your will out first and ensure your life insurance policy covers you for lethal diseases, especially if you knowingly exposed yourself to the risk - some companies can be right "arseholes" about not paying out if you did not take due care in protecting yourself from risk.
Willing to give it a go?
What am I thinking, you're not even prepared to put your name to your diatribe against the police.
And I bet you'd be the first to put in a "serious assault" complaint if someone spat in your face owing to the danger of possibly infectious saliva.
Not deriding the "serious assault" charge as there are real health risks involved - just making the point that you're a hypocritical twat.
"According to this - http://leonid.arc.nasa.gov/aurigids.html - this is all going on 1130am UTC +/- 2 hours, so no luck in the UK I'm afraid."
Which means: Unless it's pissing down with rain or otherwise clouded/fogged over, viewing's going to be good in NZ.
"We expect the outburst to peak at 11:36 UT (4:36 a.m. PDT) +/- 20 minutes on Sept. 1st," says Jenniskens. "The whole event should last about 2 hours and be visible from California, Oregon, Hawaii and the eastern Pacific Ocean."
So that's about 11:36pm (+/1 20 mins) on Aug 31 - and Oh, gee, at that time I'll be up on a mountain-side well away from a lot of light pollution and with less atmosphere in the way of the view.
Here's hoping the weather is as clear on this year's "Cold Kiwi" rally as it was last year!
For crying out loud, just because you refuse to accept responsibility for your own actions and have to blame everything/everyone else for what you do, do not assume the rest of the world works that way.
It may surprise you to learn that a knife did not force, convince, coerce or other wise lead Jack the Ripper into carving up a number of sex workers in Whitechapel.
Submachineguns did not suddenly materialise in Africa and force people to use them and they do not force people of any age to use them.
Nor does the existence of a debugging tool that can find and exploit weaknesses force someone to then release those exploits on an unsuspecting public.
If you believe that inanimate objects can **make people do things** you are in dire need of medication. Seriously. As in: get help.
Tools do not talk to people, tools do not control people. They are harmless and inert until such time as a person picks them up.
That's when the **person's** potential for help or harm is manifested by the use to which the **person** puts the tool.
At home, I have a large number of tools which I use - knives (of varying size and sharpness (while sitting at my desk at work I have 3 knives on my person and a retractable box knife in my desk drawer - as they have yet to make a single tool that has all the various attributes I desire), hammers, "hacking tools" and so on. Over the years I handled a large number of firearms - including pistols and submachineguns - and have have owned a number of rifles - which I have even used to euthanase ailing animals, dispose of pests and hunt food.
Not one of those tools have ever convinced or coerced me to use them to harm another person because I am mentally stable and I know I am in charge of my own actions. I am also an ethical person and have no need or desire to stab, bash or shoot anyone nor any need or desire to hack into anyone else's computer system for malicious purposes.
Perhaps if you realise that the existence of strife in Africa (and other places) prompted some people to choose to settle the issue with violence and they then decided to get hold of machineguns as an appropriate tool to acheive their ends, rather than putting the blame on the existence of the firearm, you might have a more realistic outlook on life.
Likewise, in the case of the debugging/exploit making tool, yopu need to realise there are people out there who choose to harm other people by hacking their systems and they will seek out and use this and other tools to achieve that end. Fortunately, there are also those out there who choose to use such tools to torture-test systems to find weaknesses in order to plug them before something critical is compromised.
It's personal choice, not the existence of the tool, that matters.
Damn, you've shattered my illusions - I was going to post telling JAB that I was suitably impressed - only 9 steps between forming the sub-committee and "err, what was the question again?" seemed far more efficient than anything we have over here.
@Rob Beard: "Swirly thing Alert!"
Of course, we may have to just change that damned bulb and go to "Red Alert"
@adnim
Dubious indeed - from the stories I've heard, being owned at DEFCON is par for the course.
Going to DEFCON and ***not*** being owned (short of leaving all technology at home and resorting to paper and pen) - now THAT would be a trick...
Or wander in there with a nice portable honey-pot and go home with a new collection of 'sploits and intrusion techniques to pin up on your wall
Odd, because I'm a natural righthander and I can read upside down almost as fast as I can read the right way up (handy when the person opposite you has the newspaper lying flat on the table - I usually finish the articles before they do), likewise mirror writing, and reversed order. Perhaps it's a "geek thing" in my case.
I'm also somewhat ambidextrous - can't write very well with my left hand but I can swap hands for most common household tasks.
I use a bow, rifle or pistol with my right hand but (because my right eye is weaker and has difficulty focussing) I tend to angle my wrist when holding a pistol so I can sight it using my left eye - I have to shut my left eye and really force myself to focus when aiming a rifle or bow with my weak right eye. Can hold and fire a rifle with my left (to use my good eye for sighting) but it "feels wrong" and I cannot instinctively aim and shoot with my left.
Daniel Ballado-Torres and LaeMi Qian are on the ball and demolish the "this would still work" argument for good.
We're talking Gods-know-how-many, moving tiles of an indeterminate size - too big, and they're going to be permanently jammed down by the sheer number of people crossing the space as Ballado-Torres pointed out; too small, well... imagine people treading on more than one tile, putting uneven force on them - toes being bent up or ankles twisted as one tile sinks faster than the other. Imagine women in stiletto heels toppling as a small part of the floor shifts under foot...
And how far are these things supposed to shift? Do you really want your heel to drop 10-15cm (4-6") while the toe of your shoe remains at the default height? I'm assuming less than 10cm shift is not going to grab a lot of the power output of a human walking. Even a 5cm (2") drop is likely to make for tricky going.
And, of course, if you don't lift your foot high enough when you step, you won't clear the surrounding raised tiles, resulting in a potentially hazardous trip (possibly fatal if near the top of some stairs or the edge of a railway platform).
Then bear in mind that these things are mechanical and subject to wear - a LOT of wear, especially in extremely busy places, which means they are going to have to be taken out of service frequently and repaired or replaced - the electricity required to keep them maintained would probably outweigh anything produced from them (or were they planning on manufacturing and repairing them with hand tools?) never mind the hours of work for the service people (fixed sodding cobblestones and standard tiles are enough of a maintenance nightmare) and the inconvenience to pedestrians as there would always be repair/replacement going on at some section of the floor...
So yeah, let's replace a cheap, easily maintained (relatively easily) and stable fixed floor with a treacherously shifting surface made up of expensive-to-produce (energy-wise as well as dollar-wise) objects and call it energy efficiency.
I think, contrary to what some have posted, that Lewis was being overly charitable in the article - as the phrase "total drooling f***ing morons" is absent from the descriptions of the students and the cretins who gave them an award for the scheme.
Spare us from those who live in bizarre fairylands where small efficient and indestructable micro-generators spontaneously materialise out of thin air!
Those of us who live on planet Earth where things wear out and actually take energy, money and physical resources to produce will just have to come up with finding practical answers to the problems of energy demands rather than stealing large amounts of energy from location "A" to make it appear that location "B" is making a small saving...
Not good, but as has already been said - it's not without risk (nothing's without risk, actually, they could have all been mown down by cars while crossing the road or killed in an industrial accident at plastics factory) and they still have a better Industrial Safety record than their competitors.
Three deaths after two successful sub orbital rocket flights is pretty good compared with NASA's bloody history (not to mention the Soviets' kill count). NASA, not satisfied with three-at-a-time with the Apollo missions had to build the shuttle to enable them to take out seven at a time...
Giles is quite right - alcohol is never "purchased", merely "rented" and 105K pounds is a hell of a rental price for an evening. They'd be lucky if 100 pounds worth of the stuff actually left the club's premises before making its own way to the same sewerage treatment plant as the rest of it.
Personally, I'll stick with the "lower rent" stuff and in lesser quantities...
From my observation of (and lengthy debates with) those who subscribe to the notion that the Earth was created only a few thousand years ago, their sole argument against evolution is that the Earth has not been around long enough for speciation to occur.
They are generally quite prepared to accept natural selection and adaptation within a species (and loudly proclaim that it is not "evolution") but "speciation" could not have occurred as "the Earth has only been in existence a few thousand years".
It is vitally important for them to claim this as they know that if the Earth had been around for as long as science claims, then there has been plenty of time for speciation to have occurred.
So, they trot out psuedo-science about the changing speed of light to account for the "apparent age" of distant stars being greater than their "true age of merely a few thousand years" and jump on the "carbon dating is inaccurate" bandwagon to "prove" the scientists are way off in their dating processes.
I have actually been told that "God deliberately altered the speed of light to allow the light of distant stars to get here in only a few thousand years".
So apparently God has deliberately mucked about with things such as fossil records, Carbon-14 decay rates, the speed of light to make the Earth (and the universe around it) appear far older than it really is...
Who is it that is supposed to be "The Prince of Lies"?
They also tend to loudly proclaim that evolutionists cannot conclusively point to the fossil record and demonstrate the exact link between apes and humans etc, ergo evolution is "unprovable". They loudly shout down any explanations to the effect that the fossil record is incomplete due to adverse conditions as "copping out".
Yet:
Where are the fossil records to support their claims that humans and dinosaurs co-exisated a few thousand years ago? Where are the Jurassic human fossils?
At least there is an observable trend in the fossil record (incomplete though it may be) to support the evolutionist take. There is no evidence at all in the fossil record of humans and dinosaurs cohabiting to support the absurd claims of the Recent Creation crowd.
Surely, if it a "cop out" to claim that a fossil record spanning MILLIONS OF YEARS is bound to be incomplete, there must be complete fossil records of humans living amongst the dinosaurs a mere few THOUSAND years ago (or did "God" deliberately destroy all the human fossils as part of his huge deception to make the universe and the Earth seem much older than they really are?)
So: pseudo science, convoluted explanations of changing constants, spurious attempts to discredit any scientific method at odds with their worldview and a lot of loud shouting of "COP OUT" in the hopes that people will be too busy defending their own stance to realise that there is absolutely no evidence for the Recent Creation idea.
They know full well that the only way they can cling to their beliefs is to convince everyone that the world is far too young for speciation to occur - I often wonder who they are trying hardest to convince...
Me, or themselves....
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