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China

Submission + - Great Wall of China Actually Twice As Long (bbc.co.uk)

jones_supa writes: The Great Wall of China has been officially declared much longer than previously thought, the Chinese news agency Xinhua reports. Previous estimates of the wall's length were mainly based on historical records: a preliminary study released in 2009 estimated the wall to be 8,850 km long. Recent state survey results however indicate that the wall measures even 21,196.18 km. Tong Mingkang, deputy chief, said that the survey revealed a total of 43,721 heritage sites that included stretches of the Great Wall. Only 8.2% of the original wall remains intact, with the rest in poor condition, according to the report.

Comment Timex Expedition (Score 1) 466

My favorite watch is the Timex Expedition series. For a number of reasons. These are the analog watches that have a digital piece as well.

Here's my review (I wrote a week or so ago):
Waterproof. Indiglo is bright enough to be a makeshift flashlight. Mine is 5 years old, changed the battery 3 times. Dead accurate, never have to change time to match real life. Digital portion is great for 1) count down timer, 2) stop watch, 3) date (month and day), this is default display. Controlling the digital portion takes a little getting used to (particularly setting the count down timer), but you can memorize it quick. My original leather band ended up going nasty after about a year. I replaced it with a "canvas" band that cleans easy, is not organic (so it can't rot). Watch cost $40 and looks kinda stylish. Amazon Link

And now my rant about digital watches:
Digital is great, for stop watches and dead accurate timing. But when do you ever need to know that it is 10:52:18? 10:50 does fine. But if anyone asks you the time you are required to do additional thinking to give them that estimate, or you blurt out the exact time (reading directly from your watch, making you look like a nerd, and most of the time your watch is off by at least a minute, making you look like a dumb "know it all" nerd, who's wrong all the time). With an analog watch you also get relative time. When it's 10am, I can physically SEE noon. I can see 20, 25, or 30 minutes from current time very quickly with out having to do subtraction or addition. It's easier for a glance at the time (when you don't care), but when you do care, it's accurate to the second (with some extra thinking). That's why the timex is the perfect watch. It gives you the benefits of the digital (stopwatch, etc), but the ease of use of an analog.

Comment Re:Inevitable; they already exist for real rifles (Score 1) 263

They also have mounts for standard digital cameras onto traditional scopes. You can use the viewfinder or digital screen to view through the sights.

There is a person on youtube that documents bird and squirrel hunting through the use of high speed video on a consumer digital camera: www.youtube.com/user/EdgunUSA/featured ... His videos are pretty amazing, very informative too.

Comment More than just a breathalyzer (Score 1) 706

It's way more than just a breathalyzer. From TFA:

Police will begin issuing fines in France from the beginning of November, and it's interesting that the required "kit" includes not just a working breathalyzer, but a range of accessories that we should, as good citizens, always carry on board a car anyway: a first aid kit, fire extinguisher and and spare bulbs for both headlights and blinkers.

Also compulsory fare will be a warning triangle and a fluorescent safety vest carried inside the car for every vehicle occupant. Failure to comply will cost another EUR90."

Not a bad idea, but pretty crazy for them to mandate. Also, are they allowed to search your trunk to see if you have these items??

And here they state their intentions about the breathalyzer:

With drink driving penalties being so much more costly than the "no breathalyzer" fine, the idea is that drivers will inevitably self-test before driving, even if they then risk a fine for no breathalyzer at a spot check - at least they'll be under the limit.

They are making some bold assumptions about drunks.

Comment Re:Requires root (Score 2) 82

Root is no longer required: http://gizmodo.com/5883913/google-wallet-has-been-hacked-again-now-you-should-panic

However, I did just get off the phone with Money Network (the company that manages the Google Prepaid card on Google Wallet. After speaking with them and doing a little reading, I discovered that the phone owner is not liable for fraudulent charges. You must notify them as soon as possible though (855-492-5538, toll free).

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