It reminds me one of my experiences

We were trying very hard to get our users not to bother the in situ support but to call the help desk, with users trying to call the in situ tech because they knew him personally.

One day, nearly at the end of the day, I got a call from a stressed user "My PC has caught fire!". I thought "Ok, she needs a replacement" and told her to call the help desk and got out.

When I was arriving home, it dawned on me that the user never did say that the fire was already out... and maybe she was asking advice on PC firefight. I thought to check what had happened next day, but later I thought that it was better not to raise the issue. To this day I still don't know.

Are you being a troll or (trying) to make a joke?

It says that you like really big explosions...

FUD.

The main cause of Spain current situation is a real state bubble that nobody wanted to expose years after it was evident. Massive investment in infrastructures with political aims (and total disregard of ROI) is second. Corruption is a distant third but helped the previous two.

It is not an issue with a few solar plants which at least produce energy.

Oh, my, I must have been sleeping a lot lately.

To think that I believed that we were still in 2012...

Seriously, the author of these "articles" should disclose how to find his drug dealer. Must be some serious stuff.

I remember a little essay from Isaac Asimov about religion and science.

He argued that the point were science really won was with the lightning rod. Up to that time, a few guys could debate about evolution or the motion of planets; 99% of the population did not care and just followed their preachers. Before lightning rods, those struck by lightning were punished by heaven. With the lightning rod, those that profited from science were safe, while those who tried to oppose science with religion were at risk.

Maybe it is time to ask legislators to be coherent, trust God and remove the lightning rods from their homes.

Because all of the XVIII century newspaper editors were spiritual being who disregarded money. Is that your point?

Also, I fail to see how a line saying "This news is republished from such other newspaper", or paying a fee to the original writer would have hindered the spread of the news (less important news could have been omitted, but not the headlines).

Yes, they had another set of ethics so in their eyes it was not bad. But to say that, without those ethics the news would have not spread that far is a big overstatement. Nowadays, all newspapers "copy" news from the press agencies by paying and giving proper citations and it seems that it works.

It is like saying that, because these newspapers printing blatantly one-sided and partisan reports about the facts helped the American Revolution, all newspapers today should never try to be impartial or objective.

The judge should keep his head and language cool, so neither of the parties can argue that they were unjustly treated and ask for a mistrial. It is like you bark back at a rude customer, it makes difficult to prove that you were right.

If the judge finds one or both sides deserve it, then he can present charges of "contempt of the court" or whatever fits. The judge is not at the court to get personal satisfaction, but to do his work.

Mars has no atmosphere/magnetosphere, so I think that even if it is farther away from the Sun it would be hit way harder than Earth's surface.

Wouldn't it be ironic if the game plot was about a society that degenerated in a post-apocalyptic nightmare after they failed to properly secure their backups?

Would not have been a job for the plaintiff? I mean, that it was they who had to demonstrate that you had exceeded the concurrent users limit? Of course, you would have had to submit to them all your logs, if you were required by the court.

LMAO.

Sorry, but first aid help is not brought to your home. You get to refugee camp, there you get aid.

So, no need for funky software to track parcel A from sender B to receiver C. You load a bunch of sacks in a truck/airplane, and unload where told. Or to check how much overtime has done employee D last week to calculate his paycheck.

Yes, they have some hardware. Lots of people have it, too. Unless UPS hardware is rugged to go through damaged communication lines, it is not that valuable. Unless UPS has strategic fuel and electricity reserves to operate it, it is not that important. Unless UPS personel can be expected to stay at their work places and don't go to their homes to protect their family / valuables / see what happened, they are not that reliable.

In the hour of need, an UPS could be a nice thing to have. But John Doe's truck would be equally as useful, because the wonderful organization of UPS is just not designed for that kind of situation and would be useless.

And BTW, forget about the 7 days issue. Once you have a generator big enough, adding days of autonomy is dirty cheap. You just need to add a few extra deposits of fuel, and it is not as if you are losing its value for holding there idle. Is a quick and cheap to look "ready for everythin".

They should really hurry themselves. Even in good conditions paper desintegrates slowly and, for what I have read, paper made since the 50s has a higher acidic composition that makes it even less durable.

Yes, because humanitarian aid, heavy repair machinery and qualified personnel will be delivered by UPS... go figure. Ah, and UPS workstations, communication networks (including wireless) and electricity and fuel will come from a diferent network that won't be affected by such an event.

The seven day figure is good for a minor local catastrophe event (a tornado, floodings, earthquake) or even just unreliable power suppliers. But the real reason is that, in case the shit hits the fan, UPS CIO can go to the board and claim that he had the datacenters protected against anything that could be expected.

A good sysadmin would worry about backups even after death... :-P