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Comment Re:Linearization (Score 1) 553

by shma (#29146467) Attached to: Initial Tests Fail To Find Gravitational Waves
The equations describing gravitational waves do result from a simplifying approximation of Eintstein's equations, but it's the sort of simplifying approximation that really has to be quite accurate in many circumstances.

In fact, IIRC, it is the exact same approximation often used when looking at EM radiation from a source: the approximation is that the source is small, localized and far away from you.

Comment Google Works Fine (Score 3, Informative) 264

by shma (#29014465) Attached to: New Company Seeks to Bring Semantic Context To Numbers
Their example fails because they chose a number that has no significance on its own without including a unit of measurement. If you search 58.44 grams, instead of just the number, you get plenty of relevant results. And look at what happens if you take a famous unitless number from chemistry and do a google search. Again, plenty of good results.You can try it with the speed of light as well. A search for 3x10^8 yields nothing, but 3x10^8 m/s gives you the Wikipedia page for Speed Of Light. And as far as I can tell, Google gives you good results for useful numbers in Mathematics like the golden ratio. So I don't see what the problem is.

Comment Re:Decimated... (Score 1) 554

by shma (#28922319) Attached to: The Music Industry's Crisis Writ Large

Main Entry: decimate
Function:transitive verb

3 a: to reduce drastically especially in number (cholera decimated the population)
b: to cause great destruction or harm to (firebombs decimated the city) (an industry decimated by recession)
Music

The Music Industry's Crisis Writ Large 554

Posted by kdawson from the day-the-music-faded dept.
The NY Times has an opinion piece that makes starkly clear the financial decline of the music industry. It's accompanied by an infographic that cleverly renders the drop-off. The latest culprit accelerating the undoing of the music business is free, legal online music streaming. "Since music sales peaked in 1999, the value of those sales, after adjusting for inflation, has dropped by more than half. At that rate, the industry could be decimated before Madonna's 60th birthday. ... 13- to 17-year-olds acquired 19 percent less music in 2008 than they did in 2007. CD sales among these teenagers were down 26 percent and digital purchases were down 13 percent. ... [T]he percentage of 14- to 18-year-olds who regularly share files dropped by nearly a third from December 2007 to January 2009. On the other hand, two-thirds of those teens now listen to streaming music 'regularly' and nearly a third listen to it every day."

Comment Re:Mis-information modded 'Informative'? (Score 2, Informative) 144

by shma (#28743329) Attached to: The NSA Wiretapping Story Nobody Wanted

So you would consider allowing someone to sue a telecom for allowing the government listen in on his or her phone conversations to grandma more important than the new protections put into the bill, namely requiring warrants for any American that happens to be wiretapped and putting the court back in the loop for said warrants?

More bullshit. It was already illegal to spy on Americans without warrants, you idiot. That's why the Telecoms BROKE THE LAW when they allowed Bush to tap phones without warrants. That's why they needed votes from spineless politicians like Obama to grant them immunity.

Comment Re:Mis-information modded 'Informative'? (Score 1) 144

by shma (#28742871) Attached to: The NSA Wiretapping Story Nobody Wanted
Do you even read the fucking articles you post before you lie about what they say? Or even the damn title?

Obama's surveillance vote spurs blogging backlash:Sen. Barack Obama's vote for a federal surveillance law that he had previously opposed has sparked a backlash from his online advocates, who had energized his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Money Quote:

The Senate voted Wednesday on the bill updating FISA -- which had a provision to shield telecommunications companies that had cooperated in the surveillance. Obama joined the 68 other senators who voted to send the bill to the president's desk.

I don't give two shits about what failed amendments he voted for. In the end he was asked to vote on a bill that offered immunity for telcos and he did. If he cared the least bit about keeping the telecoms accountable, he would have voted against the bill itself. End of discussion.

What's even more frightening is that they modded you informative when it's public record that he voted to strip the immunity provisions out although the amendment failed.

What's frightening is that there are 4 people who modded you up without reading the article you posted.

Comment Re:He should'a known... (Score 1) 305

by shma (#28491259) Attached to: AT&T's Bad Math Strikes MythBusters' Savage

I can't believe no on Slashdot has pointed out that .015 cents != a penny and a half .015 dollars = a penny and a half.

No one pointed out the mistake because a) it is mentioned in the summary ("Looks like AT&T didn't learn from Verizon's inability to do math") and b) everyone here knows how to do elementary school arithmetic, so no one felt the need to point out the obvious.
It's funny. Laugh.

John Hodgman Asks Obama, "Are You a Nerd?" 147

Posted by samzenpus from the gooble-gobble-one-of-us-one-of-us dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "Watch a video of comedian John Hodgman speak after Barack Obama at the recent Radio and Television Correspondents Association dinner in DC and discuss the central question of our age: "how we can heal the great and shameful division that has plagued our nation for so long — the age old conflict between jocks and nerds" and ask Obama: Are you now, or have you ever been, a nerd?"
Education

Indian CEO Says Most US Tech Grads "Unemployable" 1144

Posted by kdawson from the you-stereotype-i-draw-distinctions dept.
theodp writes "When questioned about his firm's US hiring, Information Week reports that Vineet Nayar, the CEO of the Indian outsourcing giant HCL Technologies, showed he can stereotype with the best of them, telling an audience in NYC that most American tech grads are 'unemployable.' Explaining that Americans are far less willing than students from developing economies like India, China, and Brazil to master the 'boring' details of tech process and methodology, the HCL chief added that most Americans are just too expensive to train. HCL, which was reportedly awarded a secretive $170 million outsourcing contract by Microsoft last April, gets a personal thumbs-up from Steve Ballmer for 'walking the extra mile.' Ballmer was busy last week pitching more H-1B visas as the cure for America's job ills at The National Summit."

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