Unfortunately ftp has far from died. There are so many other organizations I deal with that haven't been hit with the ssh/sftp clue stick and can't do anything other than ftp. Or worse still, ftps which is a firewall administrator's nightmare.

We even deal with one company who not only refuses to use sftp, but they refuse ftp in passive mode and want us to connect to an ftp server of theirs that only supports active mode. Their admin reckons ftp in passive mode is insecure and won't deal with sftp. Sigh. They are of course a Windows-only shop. Most of the companies who are stuck on ftp are Windows shops.

While I don't know whether "rebirth of VR" is hype or not I can say this.

Elite Dangerous through the Oculus Rift is mindblowing. VR that came before simply doesn't compare, it's like trying to compare a modern Lamborghini with a model T.

Actually that model works very well. In many countries the internet provision is better and cheaper with more ISPs to choose from than in the US.

I live on a small island with 80000 inhabitants. We have an incumbent telecom company which owns the last mile, but they must sell that last mile wholesale. As a result, we have not one but four ISPs we can choose from at a decent price, and you can get at least 50Mbit/sec service pretty much everywhere despite the rural spread-out nature of our population.

We don't get the terrible Comcast-only situation many in the US have to deal with.

If it works in Kerbal Space Program, what the hell, go for it :-)

Signing certificates are normally encrypted. Stealing the file will do no good unless you know the decryption passphrase. For example, to get a package into our local debian repository such that it can install/upgrade in our production environment, you'd not only need the gpg signing keys, but the 60+ character passphrase (which is NOT written down) to go with it.

> Would you want to hire someone who was convicted of violent assault?

It depends why. Were they the initiator of agression, and beat up their spouse? Perhaps not.

Were they defending themselves from a bully? Yes, I would hire them.

A 40 year old who was convicted at age 17 when he flew off the handle for some reason, but has not been in trouble since? Yes, I would hire them.

Except ccc.de isn't actually blocked. I'm visiting a friend in the UK right now and have no problem reaching ccc.de through PlusNet nor do I have any trouble reaching it through an EE mobile internet connection.

If the roads are very much from safe, why is the UK's road safety record so much better than most other developed countries?

It's over 100% because the %age shown on the site (if you read the FAQ) is %age of domestic demand. If production is >100% it means they are exporting power.

Wiritng cursive has crossed the line for decades (just teach them so they can write legibly, which is still required - but all that cursive shit, no).

However long division and other things such as doing multiplication by hand are important skills that should still be taught: it internalizes the idea that a big difficult calculation can be made easier by turning it into several smaller calculations. It's a bit like learning asm in computer science - you're (probably) never going to use it in the real world but it's important to know in the understanding of how a computer actually works.

If anything I think schools need to be able to get more people to be able to do mental arithmetic and estimation. If you understand these even if you only ever use a calculator it gives you the skills to sanity check the result (how many times have I thought "that's not right" after entering something into a calculator because it disagreed with a mental estimate, then discovered I had miskeyed a number, especially on a touch screen)

France right now, at this very second, is fuelling 98% of their demand with nuclear.

http://www.gridwatch.templar.c...

I guess these psycopathic British drivers is why Britain has some of the safest roads in Europe and the world (with around only half the fatalities per million kilometers compared to the US or Canada)

The car industry conspiracy doesn't hold any water - French carmakers are famous for making really good small diesel engines.

I don't think so. The French make awesome small diesel engines, if this disadvantages anyone it will be the French.

In 2014, I have driven more than 45 miles from my origin on exactly two occasions, and one of those was in a rented long wheelbase van.