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Comment Re:Helium Leaks (Score 1) 297

by Score Whore (#45328291) Attached to: 6TB Helium-Filled Hard Drives Take Flight

I don't think I'm getting 5 drives for the price of 1. I think I'm buying five years worth of hard drive storage. If that means that they have to send me five (or ten) hard drives to deliver that amount, then that's their problem. If they have shitting engineering or shitty manufacturing, that's not my problem.

Comment Re:snapshots, but reverse from btrfs (Score 1) 285

by Score Whore (#45326887) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Simple Backups To a Neighbor?

I think you're confused as to the purpose of those checksums. They are to tell when the disk is corrupting your data. If I log into your server and write zeros over all of your files, when you read those zeros back BTRFS will be perfectly happy to tell you that it is reliably returning your zeros to you.

Comment Re:There are other applications (Score 4, Insightful) 291

by Score Whore (#45294961) Attached to: GPUs Keep Getting Faster, But Your Eyes Can't Tell

Not to mention that the world hasn't standardized on 1920x1080. I've got half a dozen computers / tablets and the only one that is 1080p is the Surface Pro. The MacBook Pro with Retina Display is 2880x1880. Both of my 27" monitors are 2560x1440. I don't have any idea what this dipshit is thinking, but his assumptions are completely wrong.
Education

Telegraph Contributor Says Coding Is For Exceptionally Dull Weirdos 453

Posted by Unknown Lamer from the more-like-exceptionally-exciting-weirdos dept.
mikejuk writes "The UK Government is trying to figure out how to teach children to code by changing what is taught in schools. The Telegraph, a leading UK newspaper, has put the other side of the case: Coding is for 'exceptionally dull weirdo(s).' The recent blog post by Willard Foxton is an amazing insight into the world of the non-programming mind. He goes on to say: 'Coding is a niche, mechanical skill, a bit like plumbing or car repair.' So coding is a mechanical skill — I guess he must be thinking of copy typing. 'As a subject, it only appeals to a limited set of people — the aforementioned dull weirdos. There's a reason most startup co-founders are "the charming ideas guy" paired with "the tech genius". It's because if you leave the tech genius on his own he'll start muttering to himself.' Why is it I feel a bout of muttering coming on? 'If a school subject is to be taught to everyone, it needs to have a vital application in everyday life — and that's just not true of coding.' Of course it all depends on what you mean by 'vital application.' The article is reactionary and designed to get people annoyed and posting comments — just over 600 at the moment — but what is worrying is that the viewpoint will ring true with anyone dumb enough not to be able to see the bigger picture. The same attitude extends to all STEM subjects. The next step in the argument is — why teach physics, chemistry, biology, and math (as distinct from arithmetic) to anyone but exceptionally dumb weirdos."
The Almighty Buck

Shutdown Cost the US Economy $24 Billion 767

Posted by Unknown Lamer from the congress-blames-lazy-workers dept.
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Time Magazine reports that according to an estimate from Standard & Poor's, the government shutdown, which ended with a deal late Wednesday night after 16 days, took $24 billion out of the U.S. economy and reduced projected fourth-quarter GDP growth from 3 percent to 2.4 percent. The breakdown includes about $3.1 billion in lost government services, $152 million per day in lost travel spending, $76 million per day lost because of National Parks being shut down, and $217 million per day in lost federal and contractor wages in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area alone. Hundreds of thousands of federal workers bore the economic brunt of the shutdown but small businesses also suffered from frozen government contracts and stalled business loans. With the deal only guaranteeing government funding through January 15, the situation could grow worse. 'This is a real corrosion on the economy,' says Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody's Analytics. 'If we have to go down a similar road in the near future, the costs are going to continue to add up.'"

Comment Re:A costly analysis (Score 1) 233

by Score Whore (#45148187) Attached to: Security Researchers Want To Fully Audit Truecrypt

Did you actually read what you quoted? Seems like either you didn't or you want to define "social welfare" in your own special way. It doesn't mean charity and it doesn't mean "agrees with your political views."

See, for example a social welfare organization: Organizing for Action, aka Organizing for America, aka. Barack Obama 2012 re-election campaign, aka Barack Obama 2008 election campaign. Same organization restructured repeatedly and finally into a 501(c)(4) tax exempt entity.

Additionally, you don't just get to claim to be a 501(c)(4) and start acting under that umbrella, you have to apply and get granted that designation. So your whole paragraph about organizations abusing this status is BS, not to mention the falsity when you suggest both "tea party and progressive" groups were equally targeted. The delays and intrusions were almost exclusively against conservative groups.

It's clear though that you're not actually interested in the truth, merely trying to obscure malfeasance and leverage the power of the state to manipulate the results of elections. I'll just finish by pointing out you are a partisan liar, your posts have the barest relation to reality, the IRS targeted conservative groups, it likely affected the 2012 election, and here is Wikipedia's summary of the scandal.

Comment Re:A costly analysis (Score 0) 233

by Score Whore (#45145405) Attached to: Security Researchers Want To Fully Audit Truecrypt

You are so insistent on maintaining your view that you intentionally avoid learning anything. I linked to a page on wikipedia that describes the different types of 501(c) tax exempt organizations. One of those types is a charity, 501(c)(3) which is religious and charitable organizations. Another one is 501(c)(4) which is not charitable. Organizing For America (the left-overs of Obama's campaign organization) is of this type. And it is exactly this status the the various groups you are castigating applied for.

Repeat to yourself as many times as necessary: A tax exempt organization is not necessarily a charitable organization.

Whether you agree with the organizations or not, it should outrage you and make you want to throw up a little bit that federal government workers are using their power to influence the outcomes of elections.

Comment Re:A costly analysis (Score 0) 233

by Score Whore (#45144449) Attached to: Security Researchers Want To Fully Audit Truecrypt

If that's what you think is going on then you need to educate yourself. Start by learning the difference between the different types of tax advantaged organizations. Then stop making completely false equivalences; no one was claiming that their PAC was a charity.

In this day and age you've no excuse to be this ignorant. You could start here.
Government

Irish Government May Close Apple's Biggest Tax Loophole 292

Posted by Soulskill from the all-about-the-benjamins dept.
DavidGilbert99 writes "Ireland and its tax system came under some extreme scrutiny earlier this year when it was revealed that Apple funneled billions of dollars of revenue though three subsidiaries based in the country. Thanks to a loophole, none of these subsidiaries were tax-resident in Ireland, meaning they didn't even have to pay Ireland's relatively low 12.5% corporation tax rate. Worryingly for Apple, Ireland's finance minister may now shut this loophole. A measure within a new budget bill (PDF) would disallow Apple's status as a 'stateless' corporate entity for tax purposes. Apple will still be able to select a country like Bermuda as its tax residence, but it's a step in the right direction."
Wireless Networking

Unifying Undersea Wireless Communication Using TCP/IP 68

Posted by Unknown Lamer from the whales-need-internet-too dept.
Nerval's Lobster writes "Wireless and cellular networks cover beaches and extend over the ocean to ships at sea but not, so far, under the ocean. A team of researchers at the University of Buffalo believe they've solved at least the technical problem of how to push wireless networking signals for long distances through the deep ocean to connect offshore oil and gas platforms, floating and underwater tsunami sensors and other remote facilities without having to bounce signals off a satellite first. Radio waves tend to be smothered or distorted by travel through water; most ocean-based sensors use acoustic waves instead, which link sensors into underwater acoustic sensor networks (UWASN). The team designed a low-power IPv4/IPv6-compatible networking protocol that uses very low power, compresses headers, is tolerant of fragmented data and connection delays, allows bi-directional communication with (and reconfiguration of) existing underwater sensors and is compatible with standard TCP/IP networks and IP router proxies. The approach is more than a simple translation from one networking medium to another. It leaves the higher-level TCP/IP networking protocols intact, but adds an adaptation layer between the data-link layer and network layer that compresses headers, changes packet size, transmission time-out settings and other requirements to be compatible with slower underwater transmissions. The team tested the implementation using a Linux-based driver, both PC and ARM-based computers and a Teledyne Benthos SM-75 Modem. They sealed two network nodes in 40-pound waterproof cases, dumped them into Lake Erie near Buffalo and transmitted instant-messaging signals from the application IPTUX from one to the other. They were also able to transfer files using FTP from an underwater client to server."
Sci-Fi

Gravity: Can Film Ever Get the Science Right? 438

Posted by samzenpus from the suspension-of-disbelief dept.
dryriver writes in with a story lamenting the lack of accurate science in movies. "The relationship between science and science fiction has always been tempestuous. Gravity focuses on two astronauts stranded in space after the destruction of their space shuttle. Since Gravity's US release (it comes to the UK in November) many critics have praised the film for its scientific accuracy. But noted astrophysicist Dr Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, had several issues with the accuracy of Gravity's portrayal of space. Through a series of posts on Twitter, Tyson — who later emphasized that he 'enjoyed the film very much' — highlighted various errors. He noted the Hubble space telescope (orbiting at 350 miles above sea level), the International Space Station (at 250 miles), and a Chinese space station could never be in line of sight of one another. On top of that, most satellites orbit west to east, yet in the film the satellite debris was seen drifting east to west. Tyson also noted how Sandra Bullock's hair did not float freely as it would in zero-gravity. This is arguably not so much an error in physics, but a reflection of the limitations of cinematic technology to accurately portray actors in zero-gravity. That is, of course, without sending them into space for the duration of the film. The Michael Bay film Armageddon is known for its woeful number of inaccuracies, from the space shuttles separating their rocket boosters and fuel tanks in close proximity to each other (risking a collision) and to objects falling on to the asteroid under a gravitational pull seemingly as strong as the Earth's. More than one interested observer tried to work out how big the bomb would have to be to blow up an asteroid in the way demanded in the movie. Answer: Very big indeed. Nasa is reported to have even used Armageddon as part of a test within their training program, asking candidates to identify all the scientific impossibilities within the film."

Comment Re:strange article (Score 1) 139

by Score Whore (#45104449) Attached to: Stealing Silicon Valley

That education should happen on the first day they are working for you and if they aren't willing to follow procedures then they aren't aligned with your business interests and have no reason to be working for you.

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I tell them to turn to the study of mathematics, for it is only there that they might escape the lusts of the flesh. -- Thomas Mann, "The Magic Mountain"

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