Not at all. I'm more than familiar with the practices in the '50s. I was puzzled because he specifically mentioned *Reagan*, who wasn't a U.S. President until 1981, and by that point it was my belief the practices had long-since been discontinued.

Huh?

I graduated high school just after Reagan took office, and never practiced the old 'duck and cover'. And that's after having been in nine different school districts in five different U.S. states during my stint in the public school system. What country were you living in back then?

Yeee-haaaaa!

Them Duke boys sure are in a pickle this time, ain't they?

I can't mod this up to the +5 insightful it deserves, but thank you! That is a brilliant synopsis of the situation.

You should look into the history of the word "Hack" ... it didn't originate with computers, but with model railroading and made the leap over into computers via MIT's model railroading club.

THANK YOU!

Because I read the summary and the first thing I thought was, "Oh yuck. Now I'm going to have to start drinking coffee."

“Flooding is probably not quite the right word to use in this case,” says Cary Fowler, who helped create the seed vault. “In my experience, there’s been water intrusion at the front of the tunnel every single year.” http://www.popsci.com/seed-vau...

I rested on the seventh day.

Some of that extra processing power is useful for more than just games. Blender, for example, is a 3D modelling, animation, and rendering package that will use the CUDA cores in these graphics cards to drastically speed up rendering calculations. This can be tremendously useful to someone doing 3D graphics or video editing.

You're thinking of "Destiny of the Daleks" with the Daleks pitted in a war of logic vs. logic against the Movellans. Supposedly the idea was that both 'robot' cultures were at a stalemate because each calculated the perfect maneuver and counter-maneuver and neither could gain the upper hand. The Daleks decided to unearth their creator, Davros, who had been buried in a cave-in at the end of "Genesis of the Daleks", hoping that he would endow them with some quality to defeat the Movellans. The Movellans had foreseen this move and were attempting to thwart the Daleks. In the middle of this, the Doctor and a freshly-regenerated Romana appear to rain on everyone's parade.

Logic is a little tweeting bird chirping in a meadow.

Logic is a wreath of pretty flowers which smell BAD.

Are you sure your circuits are registering correctly? Your ears are green.

A clue for you might have been that I mentioned Project Bento. That obviously indicates I'm current on SL technologies, and not 'defending it based on memory'. I didn't mention the name of the island because it wasn't necessary and I prefer to retain my anonymity -- something you should be able to appreciate, considering how you're challenging me namelessly. People actually *in* SL know where it is. I'm on friendly terms with every other builder on this island and there isn't a single bot in play. There are times, for example, when I'm the only soul within 65,000^2 meters -- though such periods are usually brief. I logged in just now and saw there are three people on the sim right now, besides myself, including a name I don't recognize.

That's just one island consisting of loosely-associated builders/owners. There are places I visit that are almost *perpetually* active most of the day, often with dozens of avatars at the same time ... for example Builder's Brewery. Some club-owning friends host parties that draw enough avatars to max out the entire sim ... though only for an hour or two. Second Life isn't deserted, but I *do* think it's spread out far too much for the population it has. Much of the mainland expanded during the hype years, only to become lots of abandoned parcels since. A lot of social activity migrated to the thousands of islands, which are often more difficult to find.

As far as what you can do in SL, I'm pretty sure 3D modelling, texturing, and animation remain relevant. As does scripting, hosting parties, role-playing, story-telling, and sharing art and music.

Funny, I'm still actively involved in Second Life and maintain a partnership in a large community build that sees hundreds of visitors a day. There's a fair amount of just chilling with friends, but we also routinely welcome newcomers. I'm also questioning this notion that something has "killed" Second Life. It's still around and still vibrant having just implemented a new avatar bone system known as Project Bento that allows for much greater avatar flexibility, facial rigging, additional appendages for non-human avatars, etc. So it's certainly not dead.

I think the perception of it having died comes from the hype generated starting around 2006. For several years, every big organization tried to find a reason to exist in SL, leading to ridiculous concepts such as Coke machines dispensing cans of soda; like avatars need to drink. Eventually people came to realize that SL wasn't the next World Wide Web as so many claimed it would be, and the corporate interest faded.

SL remains the leading virtual world, allowing an unfettered marketplace for content creation. It's a fun environment for meeting people, programming, 3D development, writing, and many other creative and technical activities.

As I recall, the ledger that was leaked also included a salary for Peters, which is a big no-no in these cases, and probably the thing that pushed CBS over the line -- well, that and financing a studio to make more productions. He wasn't taking a huge a cut, I think it was in the $30k region, but it definitely made the Axanar project more than a not-for-profit fan film.