Posts by Benegesserict Cumbersomberbatch 1029 publicly visible posts • joined 25 Mar 2022
Sadly <a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Shot”>not true</a>. The only argument at the time was whether to use them as production allowed, or to save them up for use in Operation Downfall.
There were yield problems at the Hanford site due to the Wigner effect and excess <sup>240</sup>Pu, but they were mostly in 1946 and eventually solved or worked around.
From Windows' inception until the introduction of Windows 95 / NT4, the icon in the top left corner of all windows, the one used to access the application context menu, was a white square with an elongated horizontal rectangle in it - a visual reminder that the keyboard shortcut for it is Alt-Space. On. Every. Fucking. Window.
IIRC, the substance of that argument was: since it costs money to effectively speak to the electorate, restraining election funding is a restraint on free speech. We can't have that, naturally... and so the rent-seekers didn't so much get their foot in the door as render it permanently open with a flamethrower.
So now everyone who already has a ridiculous amount money uses it to buy the next round of politicians of whatever party brand. Always with one condition: Thou shalt not stop us making money. Be it IT, energy, health care, housing... you name the field, if it's essential to survival or making a living, some billionaire oligarch is there behind the scenes with his hand in your pocket, charging you just to do what you need to survive, and at a rate that increases higher than the cost of production.
Five hundred years ago that was called feudalism.
For all that her other points are valid, MyffyW's 4th reason is the only one I need.
Everyone wishes for a world where police are unnecessary. The reality is I'm comforted by the knowledge that, since they are necessary, my country's police have been trained in the law, and in human rights law specifically. And that if I had a problem with the police, someone is watching them, too, a lawyer is on my side, and an impartial judge is no more than 24h away..
Everyone wishes for a world where spy agencies are unnecessary, but I'm comforted by the fact that my country's spy agencies publically encourage IT security, but they have no say in what I choose to do with the internet. And that they don't have close personal and political ties with my country's police.
Sure, his Muskiness has unprecedented power to shape the public discourse in his private hands now. That's the first reason to be somewhere between vigilant and militant against him, whatever your politics might be, if you happen to disagree with his.
But suppose, instead of getting people to vote, you wanted to get people to buy your new widget. How much would you have had to pay hard cash to his Muskiness to purchase the sort of influence he just wielded? Because that is the size of the in-kind undeclared political donation he just made. That's the second reason, because, to start with, it's illegal. But unless someone can subpoena what might have simply been a quiet word in the ear of one of his senior engineers, there will be no evidence of the crime.
Now he will want to be paid for his generosity, in so many ways.
Fifteen years ago it absolutely would not have been the typical Qantas administrative response. Amazing how much damage a culture of no motivation but the dollar sign can to do an organisation once famous for its maintenance and safety record.
A software vendor has had a researcher's work withdrawn from publication because of a claim that their software was not validly licensed. The merits of the research remain unchanged. The ethics of the authors have been impugned and we don't have enough information to judge, because of the opacity of supposedly authoritative journals.
How do we know the software author's claim is valid, or straight defamation? Did the authors believe their own or their institution's licence was valid when they published? Has the publisher been threatened with legal action if they failed to impose the withdrawal? Is this a case of "nice research you're doing there, it would be a shame if anything happened to it"? Software vendors would have an interest in the chilling effect this would have on other authors, to make sure they pay, probably the expensive "you can be sure you publish academically if you've bought our premium edition" route.
Again, a close reading of history needed to tease out the subtleties.
Finland was the only democracy to ally with Nazi Germany. They fought together to expel the Russians from (then) Finnish territory in Karelia.
Finland did not participate in Barbarossa and when the Siege of Leningrad was taking place Finnish armies stood at the border and kept watch. Given their proven ability to take on the Red Army, Finnish support at that phase of the war might have been the difference between Leningrad being held, and it falling... which might have been the difference between Moscow being held, and it falling.
When Germany started to lose, the equation quickly turned to one of land and money for peace.
MariaDB [(none)]> DROP BEARS;
ERROR 1064 (42000): You have an error in your SQL syntax; check the manual that corresponds to your MariaDB server for the right syntax to use near 'bears' at line 1
I never did work out the right syntax to use near 'bears', I was running too fast.
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