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Submission + - Google and Facebook hypocrisy concerning the Verizon-AOL merger (forbes.com)

schwit1 writes: Their friends in Washington want the FCC to start interfering in Internet privacy issues. Convincing the FCC to issue new rules prohibiting Internet service providers (ISPs) from tracking consumers online would keep Verizon out of their markets and could have the effect of killing the deal even if antitrust regulators approve it.

If these groups(Google and Facebook) were serious about protecting consumer privacy on the Internet, they wouldn't be running to the FCC for special rules aimed only at Verizon. They would take their complaint to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The FTC is the primary agency responsible for consumer privacy issues and has been dealing with online tracking issues for years. The FCC has comparatively little experience in the area and a poor track record of enforcing and complying with privacy laws.

It appears these groups are complaining about Verizon at the FCC rather than the FTC in order to help their friends at Google and Facebook maintain their competitive lead in mobile marketing. It is no coincidence that these same groups pushed for the FCC to assume jurisdiction over Internet privacy issues during the net neutrality fight. The FCC could have adopted net neutrality rules without impinging on the FTC's jurisdiction over online privacy.

Submission + - Oculus Has No Plans to Block Virtual Reality Porn (variety.com)

schwit1 writes: Facebook-owned Oculus VR has no plans to prevent the adult entertainment industry from using its Rift virtual reality headset, which is scheduled to launch as a consumer product within the first quarter of 2016, according to Oculus founder Palmer Luckey.

Asked about plans to block any X-rated content or apps during a panel at the first Silicon Valley Virtual Reality Conference in San Jose, Calif., on Monday, Luckey responded: "The rift is an open platform. We don't control what software can run on it," adding: "And that's a big deal."

Luckey's remarks stood out as most of his fellow panelists tried to dodge controversial questions around topics like adult entertainment as well as motion sickness and other side effects of using virtual reality headsets.

Submission + - Newly Released Documents Indicate Key Hillary Clinton Claim on Emails Was False (theblaze.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Emails published by the New York Times Monday indicate that Hillary Clinton used more than one private email address during her time as secretary of state, contradicting previous claims from the Democratic presidential contender's office.

Multiple emails show Clinton used account "hrod17@clintonemail.com" while serving in the Obama administration as secretary of state.

Is hrod short for hotrod? I thought that was Bill's handle.

Comment Re:Happens all the time in California... (Score 2) 124

and some other tiny details, such as not having a handicapped shower open to the public

What kind of business is required to have showers?

...then got stung again a year later because even though he had plenty of handicapped parking... and he only had one handicapped spot...

You have an odd definition of "plenty".

He closed up shop, and now has an antique shop in rural Texas, and making far better cash there.

If his problem in CA was with the federal ADA, that law doesn't change in TX. (The various fringe theories of some Texans notwithstanding.)

Comment Re:Why? (Score 1) 289

the FCC unlawfully inserted itself between the State and the State's political subdivisions

Regardless of the merits of municipal broadband, and bought-and-paid for legislators, the powers of local governments are given by state constitutions and laws. The feds simply have no constitutional say in it.

They can stop states or local from outlawing various bands or having jammers, but they can't grant powers to localities against state wishes. The state authorizes the localities and gives them life.

Comment Re:I am not able to find that disproof (Score 1) 270

Well...ok then. "Statistically impossible" might be a better choice.

A (smallish) finite number of monkeys would be worse than a computer program to generate every possible text, since the monkeys rely on randomness and will repeat a lot of stuff, where an infinite number of monkeys will generate it in as long as it takes to pound out ~100,000 keys at random.

Still, the bottleneck is the evaluation function to sort out not just intelligible plays, but high-quality ones, applicable in both scenarios. This means humans for now, and far more than particles in the universe.

To be honest, the stench in a room filled with near-infinite numbers of computer and English geeks must be terrible.

Submission + - "Eco-friendly" Buffett Seeks to "Squash" Nevada Rooftop Solar (bloomberg.com)

schwit1 writes: Warren Buffett highlights how his Berkshire Hathaway Inc. utilities make massive investments in renewable energy. Meanwhile, in Nevada, the company is fighting a plan that would encourage more residents to use green power.

Berkshire's NV Energy, the state's dominant utility, opposes the proposal to increase a cap on the amount of energy that can be generated with solar panels by residents who sell power back to the grid in a practice known as net metering.

While the billionaire's famed holding company has reaped tax credits from investing in wind farms and solar arrays, net metering is often seen by utilities as a threat. Buffett wants his managers to protect competitive advantages, said Jeff Matthews, an investor and author of books about Berkshireâ¦

In an April presentation to investors, NV Energy laid out its strategy for addressing the growth of home solar. The utility said it would "lobby to hold the subsidized net-metering cap at current 3 percent of peak demand"...

Sellers of rooftop-solar panels are pushing Nevada legislators to raise the cap, and one plan called for the ceiling to be lifted to 10 percent. Nevada State Senator Patricia Farleysaid she is proposing that Nevada's utility regulator study the issue before lawmakers act.

"Across the country the utility industry is pressuring regulators and elected officials to limit solar energy's growth, and the same thing is happening in Nevada," said Gabe Elsner, executive director of the Energy & Policy Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based clean energy think tank. "NV Energy is trying to protect their monopoly by squashing competitors."

The bottom line: it's all about the bottom line for Buffett.

Comment Re:All about tha Benjamins (Score 5, Insightful) 143

General skills, aka the ability to succeed in society without reverting to drug abuse, are considered when a company is hiring.

Chemcial tests can't tell whether a person is absuing drugs, only if they are using them. (It is a prohibitionist fiction that the use of certain drugs is inherently abuse.)

If the only way you can tell whether someone is using drugs is through chemical tests, ipso facto it is not affecting their performance on the job.

Comment Re:Cost bigger issue than sonic boom (Score 1) 73

We also get a sonic boom every few weeks (Beersheba Israel, and we got them when I lived in Haifa as well). It's less noise than a car going by, and lasts for less time. I'm sure if you buzz a shack at Mach 2 the boom would be deafening, but typical combat aircraft at typical don't-SAM-me altitudes don't make much noise. I've also had the pleasure of hearing the double sonic boom from the STS orbiters coming in to land over Florida. I don't know how fast they were going, but even those booms, though a bit louder I think, were no big deal.

Submission + - Kim Dotcom calls Hillary Clinton an 'adversary' of Internet freedom (cnet.com)

An anonymous reader writes: CNET reports, "Kim Dotcom ... says he views Hillary Clinton as an enemy of online freedom. ..... The subject of Clinton's candidacy came up when Dotcom was asked about a tweet he sent last year in which he said he called himself "Hillary's worse nightmare in 2016." He revisited that statement ... saying that Wikileaks founder Julian Assange would probably be a bigger headache for Clinton. "I'm aware of some of the things that are going to be roadblocks for her," he said, declining to be more specific. He said he hoped to provide some transparency and hoped to expand the influence of the Internet Party, the political party he is hoping to bring to the US." Breitbart adds, "As for why Kim and Assange might feel antipathy toward Hillary, Kim explained, “Hillary hates Julian she’s just an adversary of, I think, internet freedom.” A conflict between Assange and Clinton may have plenty of personal motivations, but it also seems inevitable in some sense. Hillary is obsessive about maintaining control of information. She created a personal server located in her home to handle all of her emails as Secretary of State, something no other Secretary has ever done. She then deleted all the contents of that server after self-selecting the emails she believed were work-related. More recently, she has refused to speak to the press for more than three weeks, even as she runs for President. By contrast, Assange has made a career out of parceling out what was once secret information. "

Submission + - What IS this strange sound from the sky? (dailymail.co.uk) 1

schwit1 writes: Noise heard across the globe for nearly a DECADE — but nobody has an explanation. A mysterious noise from the sky is continuing to baffle people all over the world — as well as giving those who hear it sleepless nights.

Sounding like a trumpet or a collective from a brass section of an orchestra, a selection of videos shot from the Canada to Ukraine, via the U.S., Germany and Belarus show strange goings on above us.

Submission + - House Science Committee approves changes to space law

schwit1 writes: In a series of party line votes, the House Science Committee has approved a number of changes to the laws that govern the private commercial space industry.

Almost all of the changes were advocated by the industry itself, so in general they move to ease the regulatory and liability burdens that has been hampering the industry since the 2004 revisions to space law. While it is very unlikely commercial space can ever get free of strong federal regulation, these changes indicate that they can eventually get some of the worst regulations eased.

Comment Re:"Cashless" is meaningless (Score 1, Informative) 294

You worthless, echo-chamber, meme-regurgitating sack of shit. India requires expats returning to pull all foreign accounts back into India at the theft-based government exchange rate. You get ripped off and the government gets your dollars.

Why do brain-dead buffoonery like you always think the opposite of pituitary gland tumor gigantism in government is solved by an anarchy? What lovely straw men you set up in your economic disasterbation fantasies!

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