The way I understand tinnitus, I don't think it would make a difference.

Here's what I know: Our inner ears contain hair cells which would normally be responsible for perceiving specific frequencies when stimulated by the basilar membrane inside the cochlea (which is simulated by the 3, tiny bones which are stimulated by the attached ear drum, which is stimulated by...you get the idea.). With tinnitus, however, some of these hair cells are damaged and can no longer detect vibrations. As a result, the accompanying neurons associated with those damaged cells become "hungry" for stimulation because the brain sends an increasing level of "outbound" signal since it never receives any "inbound" signal, thereby causing the ringing sound we hear...a "loop" of information, if you will. This is very similar to the phantom-limb pain we can feel after having lost an arm or leg; this situation also causes the associated part of the brain to stop receiving signals from the amputated or damaged limb and the increased level of outbound signal causes (severe, in many cases) pain. Tinnitus works the same way, but on a much smaller scale because fewer neurons are left wanting, plus we still have many hair cells remaining which function normally and help "drown out" the ringing.

So, by that rationale I imagine that the ringing would be much more apparent initially but would eventually be drowned out by the sounds perceived by the working cells, like heart beat, breathing and digestion. Then when those sounds are not enough, our brain starts creating "phantom" stimulus which causes the hallucinations.

In short, I would think the answer is no.

There's always one in every crowd...I assume you think we never landed on the moon, as well?

I actually meant to reply to a different guy. Sorry about that. Yours was funny...

I'm going to get off Slashdot until I have a bit more coffee

*not looking to

Sheldon Cooper, is that you? I'm to get into a geek-argument here...was a fucking joke

Maybe you're trolling, but I'm pretty sure that's what I said.

Before someone else posts it:

He clearly should have used the UP, UP, DOWN, DOWN, LEFT, RIGHT, LEFT, RIGHT, B, A, START to pick up a few more lives.

ba dum, bum

I think part of the problem is that the upper cadre have beat into these guys that the robots are crazy expensive and hard to obtain, therefore are perceived as rare and possibly irreplaceable. Maybe if we build several more and assigned, say, 5 - 10 to a unit then they wouldn't care as much if they are blown up.

On the other hand, I've build a very "close" relationship to my M-16, despite the fact that there are at least thousands available to me. You work with them and get to know their nuances and a familiarity is created that has taken time and effort to build.

I can certainly see it both ways

I'm confused as to why they actually needed to ask. Don't they have the ability to peek into the direction, ports/protocols and external addresses being used during transfers? I mean, if they can see a bunch of traffic on ports 568 or 119 from "newshosting.com", they can safely assume the user is leeching from a Usenet server, for example. I have to think there's at least one person who works for the ISP capable of running WireShark on a mirrored port and able to make sense of the data. Is it a privacy thing?

I completely agree and would mod you up if I had any points; Humans have accomplished these mile-stones (or baby steps?) and it shouldn't matter, over all, who has the biggest dick. Competition is a fantastic motivator, but shouldn't be the main purpose for advancing our species.

No one runs from you Petey, they just walk away from the ridiculous bullshit you spew. It is kind of nice to see that you're still using phrases like "ad hominem", "sockpuppet" and "P.S.=>", however.

And yes, I am attacking you on a personal level. I don't need to say anything about your completely ignorant statements regarding hosts file usage or the one program you wrote 10 years ago...plenty of people on the interwebs do that for me. I'd rather point out what a loser you must be to troll every forum (the ones you haven't been banned from, anyway) looking for anyone who might have the audacity to dare speak negatively of you so you can then reference multiple 3-year old posts and the names of anyone who have done you wrong (you act like a pissed off girl mad at her cheating ex-boyfriend the way you do that, BTW).

Oh well, at least you've provided me with some entertainment. :-)

Oh. My. God. I just laughed so hard I farted. It does my heart good to know that even after many years here on /. that douche bag is still the butt of jokes.

I have no interest in looking smart to anyone here just like I would have no interest in looking ethical. If I'm the owner of a company and have the ability to make more money by taking advantage of a loophole in whatever system, then I'm going to do it. Unless there's a legal punishment, then why not? If I don't then someone else will and in the business world the advantage goes to whomever does.

Unfortunate as is may be, nice guys usually do not finish first. Sorry.

I can't decide if the people who took advantage of the ranking system are to blame, or if the system itself is. I certainly can't blame anyone for trying to inflate numbers by utilizing a loophole left by Google or YouTube; I would probably do the same thing if it meant making more money. Even though I'm glad that Google and YouTube closed the "vulnerability", it does lend fuel to the idea that we're really just seeing the Internet that Google wants us to see.

It's not like they hacked the website to post links for Goatse and Lemonparty; they did so to remove the anti-American/European propaganda and replaced it with the truth about the horrible acts of violence bestowed upon those civilians by Al-Qaeda. But I guess it's their right to kill innocent people in the name of some imaginary fairy in the sky, and we should just mind our own business and stay the hell out of their country and off their servers.

Say what you want about the political aspects or reasons to "invade" or not to...I don't give a shit about any of it, but there's nothing that makes it OK to harm innocent people and then lie about it. Much of the indigenous population supports Al-Qaeda because of they're simply not aware that the terrorists cover up their own disgusting actions.