I've lurked at /. without posting for ages, mostly because I just don't have the time to interact like I used to.

But I've been clicking through the old RSS feed more and more lately, and when I saw the PAX Plague thread today, I came over to comment, since I'm kind of affected by the whole damn thing. I thought I'd take a look around since I haven't been here in awhile, and I saw that there are freaking ACHIEVEMENTS associated with our accounts. It's silly, and I'm sure it's been here forever, but I thought it was awesome and I was delighted when I read it.

I didn't realize how much I missed Slashdot until I spent some time here today, and I bet that anyone who joined in the last 2 years doesn't even give a shit about my stupid comments or anything, but it felt good to come back here, and feel safely among my people again.

It has come to my attention as I watch TV and listen to the radio that many people have lost the ability to understand numbers. Specifically keeping things in perspective.

Recently on the Drudge Report there was a giant bold 120 dead concerning this Pig Flu nonsense.

120 isn't hardly news. In fact more people died around the world in the time it took me to write this sentence from AIDS.

The media likes to scare people. They like to throw around numbers. I am going to help you. Buy a bag of Jelly beans. Seriously.

Ok Now count how many J-Beans you have (you chocoholics can use M&Ms if you perfer). Regardless of how many you have this is you POOL. The pool is all mighty in separating nonsense from reality.

Ready? Lets say 5000 people died in the USA from this new virus. Is that a lot? Lets use the pool to figure that out.

First off there are 300,000,000 people roughly in the United States. I want you to take the number in your pool and divide 300,000,000 by it. This is the number of people per J-Bean. Simple Right?

Here is the sanity test when ever they start throwing around numbers. Does the "GIANT EVIL NUMBER OF DEAD, DYING ETC" cause you to remove a single jelly bean? One. If I have 100 jelly beans That means that before I have to remove 1 jelly bean 300,000 need to die for JUST ONE jelly bean to go away.

This is sainty. This is reality. 5000 people isn't a disaster, a pandemic or an outbreak. Thousands will die from the every day flu this year, thousands will die from car accidents, hell last I checked more then 500 people alone this year will die from trying to get high on paint fumes.

180 dead from a new Pig Flu? More people will die from falling down stairs in the USA this year. Over 200 will die from suicide, and several thousand will die from homicide.

You can live in fear people. You can watch big flashing headlines and talking heads on TV telling you the universe is about to explode. Reality is where the rest of us can rest easy.

And remember... as a wise man once wrote on the cover a book.... Don't Panic...

First of all, I don't want this published to the frontpage...
Having said that, I have a quick question. I'm a Java guy that manages a few younger java guys. I have been asked to tech a .net guy that (according to his resume) has managed over 30 developers. How do I tech a guy like that? Do I just stick with OO/patterns questions? I know how to tech a java guy, but one that has more experience than me is a daunting task...

fyi - can't multiply cause of work, so I've become a twitter man... that's where I do my updating... if you twitter, my id is my last name...

Yeah, really.

Only took that organization like five years to see what the rest of the football world sees... 'bout time!

New job (back to consulting) and current client blocks 'social networks', so I may have to make my return here until the situation changes.

What really sucks is hurricane ike destroyed Cincinnati, and I've been without power at home since Sunday, so even if I wanted to blog on multiply, I can't...

Stay tuned, I suppose...

The primary cancer eating at America is the population, as a whole, no longer possess the skills and mental tools to discern perception from reality.

They cannot read an article, pick apart the fact, fiction, opinions, and speculation and draw a conclusion of their own. They either agree or disagree rather then view an draw a conculsion of their own.

It's sad. We get "McCain sucks" or "Obama sucks" but when asked why, their response is "They voted against X,Y, and Z." Then when asked if they knew why they voted against those, they break down and say, "I don't know". Then when pressed again with the question, "Then how do you know voting against it was a bad idea?", they will summarize the bill's name and say, "how can anyone vote against X,Y, or Z"

Again, ask "How do you know that anything in the bill X, actually addressed X? Did you read the purposed bill?" You'll get a "no". There is no reasoning, or perhaps massive ignorance on how politics function. Did Senator A vote for X in order to get Senator B to vote for Y? Have we lost our understanding of politics? Or have we lost out very ability to reason though a problem?

This is a complete break down of normal human reasoning. We cannot collectively separate sound bytes from the actual context of a sentence. We demand change, we are promised change, we cry out for reform for what ever cause suits you, yet we go to the very people that got us in the trouble in the first place and expect them to change what they active worked to create... Total breakdown of human reason. You wouldn't ask the arson who just burnt down your house to help put the fire out right?

Without the ability to reason we are rapidly regressing back to animals, reacting out of a mental reflex, rather then reasoning through an obstacle,problem, or issue.

The very understanding of a difference is slipping. I do not like Ocra. Because I do not like Ocra, why would I have any dislike of people who like Ocra? Would I personally develop a hatered of people with a taste for Ocra? Would I ride around with a sign that say "John Doe Sucks!" simply because John Doe like Ocra? Why then would I develop a dislike of an political canidate mearly because I disagree with them? Why would that factor in personally? At most I might have a sign that reads, "Don't let John Doe cook unless you like Ocra." I can't say Obama sucks or McCain sucks because, quite frankly, I've never met either of them. Reason tells me that I can't develop a personal dislike for someone mearly because I may disagree with them. Reason tells me that I cannot judge a person on the color of their skin, but rather the content of their character. So would I not judge a canidate personally not by their approach to solve health care but by the content of their character? There is no rational way someone can tell me that I am supposed to dislike someone, or say someon is stupid or evil, because one may want to raise taxes to provide health care while another may want to let market pressure and incentives improve health care. Both want to fix it, each may have a different approach. Regardless of approach, what rational person develops hate over a difference of views?

Reason tells me that most special interest groups are made up of people that got organized and petition the government. Moveon.org is a special interest group, the NRA is a special interest group, so is the Red Cross, Catholic Charities, Shriners, Rotatry Club, VFW, and the Scouts. I certainly don't want them silenced as I am a member of several special interest groups. Those that tend to cry out loudest against special interest groups are simple those that aren't part of one. You local church is a special interest group, your local chamber of commerce is too. Our ability to reason has slipped that we cannot see the problem is the CONDUCT of special interest groups, not the existence of those groups themselves. We generalize because we no longer have the capacity to dissect a problem, find the root cause, and address it. We find even our idiology and problem solving skills are disposable. The VCR has a frayed power cord? We throw the whole thing out rather then just fix the cord. A canidate has a flaw? We discard the entire individual. They disagree with a single viewpoint and we discard the whole. This has to stop or we are in serious trouble... Politics is the process of compromise and debate, not mandate and partisan dictatorship.

If the behavior of the American public doesn't frighten you as we move through this election, go rent Idiocracy and tell me, how far away are we? In many ways, we are already there...

Growing up, I was a big fan of workstation class machines. This persisted all through highschool and college, and for a while, a bit afterwards.

For instance, I left highschool with a Sparc IPX and a Sparc 10, but no car. Goofy priorities, I guess. When I was in school I picked up an SGI I^2 High Impact. I outfitted my SS10 with dual SunVideo cards, a dual-proc upgrade, a couple different framebuffers (TGX, ZX, etc).

The Math Department of my school auctioned its entire remaining inventory of NeXT workstations -- which I bought in its entirety. In addition, I picked up a color Turbo, an NCD X-Terminal, a few VT100 clones, etc.

Now, I've moved a lot since then. I sold my SS IPX to get some other hardware. I gave my SGI machine to a friend that had never used SGIs or IRIX before. I sold my Color Turbo to a guy who might make better use of it. The X-term ended up with a friend I think.

I divested half of my NeXT lab -- including the monitors -- to people that wanted to play with them. I have 3 non-functioning 030 cubes left, and with a sheet of plain glass, they make up one of my coffee tables. I also have my SS10, which I cannot let myself get rid of because of all the money I dumped into it.

I've made my peace with using the remaining NeXT cubes as furnture. I'm not sure what to do with the SS10 - it uses a lot of power, it's very loud, and I can't think of much interesting to do with it. It's utterly worthless on ebay.

I think I still have my Apple ][+ somewhere. It's the machine I learned to program on.... :)

What do you do with old computers that are "special", but that you don't have a computing need for?

Yes, yes yes! It has finally happened. According to slashfilm, Uwe Boll has mentioned that if an online petition gets to 1,000,000 votes he'll stop making movies. For all of humanity, please go sign this petition! Last I saw, it was only to 96,543... we need more signatures!

whyBecauseIsaidSo

This comes from shadow wrought, stoolpigeon, JC, Smitty, and originally, I think, RM6f9

Post a comment to this thread, and I will:

1. Tell you why I befriended you.
2. Associate you with something - fandom, a song, a color, a photo, etc..
3. Tell you something I like about you.
4. Tell you a memory I have of you.
5. Ask something I've always wanted to know about you.
7. In return, you must post this in your Journal/Blag/whatever.


Update: Ahh, the 2 minute rule... killing my productivity from answering all these... I'll get to you eventually, but it'll be off and on over the next day or two. Sorry!

A google search for a transitional fossil of whales led me to this piece of creation foolishness:

This is hilarious when you compare the skeleton in question to the skeleton of a crocodile, a beaver, or a river otter.

If you live in the western US, more than 100 miles from a major city, over-the-air TV can be very limited, available only via a weak signal, or entirely unavailable. There, your only choice is satellite.

DBS vs. FTA
The question is, do you want to pay $50 a month to a direct broadcast satellite (DBS) service like DirecTV and Dish, or do you want to be free? DBS providers will give you a large number of channels, but I find 95%+ of my TV viewing is shows available on local broadcast channels anyhow. That leads us to free-to-air (FTA) satellite.

Over in Europe, Asia, Africa, there are a large number of channels broadcast unencrypted. The western US, however, is the absolute ass-end of the world... separated from the rest of the world by the two largest oceans in the world, and, with such a minuscule population density that practically nobody is interested in serving the area. See previous point about TV reception.

FREQUENCIES/LNBF
Point being, with FTA in North America, there isn't a big selection. As a rule of thumb, as an English speaker with a KU band receiver, you can really only expect to get PBS, news, and shop-at-home channels. Things get more interesting, however, in the C-band... There you have a much larger selection of channels, intended to be picked up by cable companies and the like, and include all the major broadcast networks. Even though just about all growth is in the KU band, it's clear there is still a lot of life left in the C band. I recommend a dual, C/KU LNBF. You really don't even need to worry about noise and gain figures for LNBFs these days, unless you're looking to pick up seriously fringe signals.

PICKING A DISH
The second issue is size. I don't consider a dish a good purchase if you can't take it with you when you move elsewhere. The only way to guarantee your future land-lord/neighborhood association/etc. absolutely can't forbid you from installing a dish is to follow FCC rules and buy one that is no larger than 1 meter in diameter. Fortunately, this isn't 80s technology anymore, and 1 meter is perfect sufficient for C-band reception. Furthermore, you can get just a bit more signal if you go with an offset dish, rather than an old, standard, parabolic dish, as the LNBF is not located where it blocks signal reception. Since you're size-limited, it's better to buy an offset antenna, and get the maximum amount of signal possible. In most cases, there is effectively no price difference.

RECEIVERS
Analog has nearly gone the way of the dodo. 4DTV/VideoCipherII is popular in North America, and a good option if you want to get all the standard "cable" channels (for a lower price than cable or DBS, but otherwise, there's practically no FTA content, so it's quite safe to skip it. That just leaves one option, the one that has quickly taken over most satellite transmissions, worldwide: DVB-S... For about $40, you can get a nice PCI DVB-S card, and turn any old PC into a TV tuner, or DVR. But, if you're not very technologically competent, there are also $150 "FTA receiver" set-top-boxes that will do the job as well, if less flexibly.

ENCRYPTION
Though I'm really not interested in it myself, I should at least mention that FTA is commonly used as a euphemism for illegally descrambling encrypted satellite TV signals. Now, DirecTV and 4DTV broadcasts are immune, partly because they are proprietary, and relatively few people have interest in. Dish Network, however, uses standard DVB-S equipment, and NagravisionII encryption, which can be decrypted with "softcam" programs that are available. Of course these things are difficult to find, due to the risk of lawsuits under the DMCA, but "softcam" software certainly exists both for computers (Windows and Linux) as well as "unofficial" firmware for damn near all "FTA" receivers. Yes, it is a bit of a shell-game, and no doubt the vast majority of FTA sales are based on this.

CHANNEL GUIDE
To see what satellite signals are freely available to you, visit lyngsat: http://www.lyngsat.com/freetv/United-States.html

Just be sure to take that listing with a grain of salt... Sometimes, that list shows signals available that are actually from satellites on the opposite side of the planet (see: Playboy One).

EQUIPMENT
You'll also need standard equipment like a dish rotator, that is strong enough to hold the weight of the dish, and communicates with the receiver in some standard they both understand, but that's pretty straight forward to check on. Not to mention good quality coax cable, and absolutely no splitters in-line, or else you'll cause some serious damage.

INSTALLATION
Buy a compass, and mount your dish so it has a perfectly clear view all across the southern horizon... If there's a tree or a building in the way, you've got almost no chance of getting any reception at all. You can mount it to your roof, or to the ground, but either way, make sure your mount can handle hundreds of pounds of force, without the dish shifting even a fraction of a inch, otherwise you'll have picture drop-outs when it's windy. Manage all of that and, barring heavy commercial air traffic, you should get a perfect signal, all the time. The dish is far larger than it needs to be for KU-bands, enough so "rain fade" shouldn't occur in even the worst storms.

Hopefully this was helpful for those of you considering purchasing a satellite dish. If you still have any questions, feel free to ask in the comment section.

Ron Paul has been getting a lot of attention as an "outsider" candidate, and in fact, even here at Slashdot I've seen a lot of Ron Paul in sigs.

So I decided to visit his web site and see what he's all about. Uhhhhhh... why is this guy getting so much geek attention? I can only assume that people are focusing on some single issue, and haven't checked what the guy actually *believes*. Much like people who support the Libertarian Party, actually, who have some seriously crackpot stuff in their platform. But I digress.

What's wrong with Ron Paul? Here's a sampling:

"So called free trade deals and world governmental organizations like the International Criminal Court (ICC), NAFTA, GATT, WTO, and CAFTA are a threat to our independence as a nation. They transfer power from our government to unelected foreign elites. [...] And a free America, with limited, constitutional government, would be gone forever." link

Sheesh. Sure, the value of trade deals is debatable, but the rhetoric above is just silly. "Gone FOREVER" OH NOOOOO!! Typical Politician fear-mongering, if not out-and-out crackpottery. So far, I'm not impressed.

I oppose legislation that increases the FDA's legal powers. FDA has consistently failed to protect the public from dangerous drugs, genetically modified foods, dangerous pesticides and other chemicals in the food supply. Meanwhile they waste public funds attacking safe, healthy foods and dietary supplements. link

Oh, geez. The FDA is certainly not perfect, but to say that the FDA "consistently" fails to protect the public from dangerous drugs is just a lie. If it wasn't for the FDA, we would be flooded with quack drugs. The Libertarian would say that the consumer should decide what's good and what's bad, but it's impractical for every citizen to have to review all the studies to know whether the thousands of drugs are effective or not. Again, I'll listen to how the FDA can be improved, but overblown words like the above don't give me confidence that there's any substance to the man.

And then, to top it off, he attacks *all* genetically modified foods broadly, showing that he has an anti-science agenda, and is completely ignorant of the issue.

I am committed to guaranteeing parity for home school diplomas and advancing equal scholarship consideration for students entering college from a home school environment. [...] I will veto any legislation that creates national standards or national testing for home school parents or students. link

I'm a supporter of home schooling, but let me get this straight. He wants home-schooled kids to have equal parity for diplomas, equal consideration for scholarships, yet doesn't think they should be be tested to see if they learned anything?? How is that supposed to work? And is the government going to force universities to accept home schooled kids with no testing?

The framers of the Constitution never in their worst nightmares imagined that the words, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech......." would be used to ban children from praying in school, prohibit courthouses from displaying the Ten Commandments, or prevent citizens from praying before football games. The original meaning of the First amendment was clear on these two points: The federal government cannot enact laws establishing one religious denomination over another, and the federal government cannot forbid mention of religion, including the Ten Commandments and references to God. link

First of all, he's being disingenuous here. Nowhere are children "banned" from praying in school. What is banned is the SCHOOL leading prayer. That he doesn't seem to understand this (or is lying about it) is incredibly worrisome.

And then he doesn't seem to understand that freedom of religion means the government cannot advocate one religion over another, and in fact, should not be advocating religion at all. I don't feel like quoting more, but he then goes on to attack the idea of the separation of church and state. I think it's pretty clear that he's not going to be a big advocate of atheist rights.

This isn't everything I find disturbing. To be fair, I did see a lot I liked about the man (as I can say about any of the candidates, of any party). But as near as I can see, he is not deserving of the reputation that he seems to be building.

Can anyone tell me why they support Ron Paul, especially in light of the above?

Both ignorance and misinformation abounds about the coming switchover to HDTV in the US. I will cut right to the facts.

Right now all major TV stations have two transmitters, their old/original, and a new, secondary for their DTV broadcasts, which is always lower power, on UHF. As of February 2009, they will be shutting off one of the two, and broadcasting digital-only. The FCC has allowed them to select which of the two they wish to continue using. At this point, it's largely settled. VHF-low is going away.

ANTENNA SELECTION:
Practically all broadcasters on VHF-low (channels 2-6) are dropping their existing channel assignments, and switching to a higher (UHF) one. There are very few exceptions. There are also (much lesser) signs of broadcasters leaving VHF-high (7-13), but for the time being, there are lots of VHF-high channels, so you will need an antenna that can receive channels 7-13.

Also important is the fact that ATSC doesn't handle multi-path interference (ghosts) very well. Unlike current analog NTSC, it won't just make the picture look worse, if it's significant, it will prevent you from getting a picture at all. If you are in a city with tall building or big hills/mountains around, this is very important in the selection of an antenna. Older and more common (rectangular) VHF antennas are less directional, and can do little to suppress multi-path interference.

Also important: The FCC is removing UHF channels 52-69. There will no longer be TV broadcast in that range.

STRONG SIGNAL (0-20 miles):
If you are just a few miles from all the TV stations you want to receive, and there are no obstructions in the way, you would probably do well to just get a TV-top antenna that does both VHF and UHF (rabbit ears for VHF and a loop or bow-tie for UHF).

MEDIUM SIGNAL (20-40 miles):
If you use an older rectangular VHF antennas, multi-path interference on VHF signals can pose a problem. Don't get an antenna that is large, and/or highly directional with high gain (db) or else it will be unnecessarily difficult to install and aim the antenna. Hopefully all the channels you want to watch are coming from the same general direction, otherwise, you'll need a (low-end) antenna rotator to get a good signal or possibly two antennas pointed in different directions. I suggest a Winegard 4400 (4-bay) for UHF, and possibly an AntennaCraft Y5-7-13 for VHF-hi. To connect them, DON'T USE A REGULAR SPLITTER or you'll ruin your reception for no good reason. You want a $2 UHF/VHF combiner, commonly made by Pico Macom/Blonder Tongue/Holland/etc.

WEAK/FRINGE SIGNAL (40+ miles):
The most popular type of UHF antennas, yagis with corner reflectors (they look like big metal arrows), design is such that they perform poorly at lower UHF channels, and best at the highest UHF channels. One of the antennas I was considering buying only starts to perform well at UHF channel 50, channels which won't be around in a year.

With that in mind, I recommend an 8-bay antenna instead... One of the top performers which is also far less expensive than other 8-bay antennas is the Winegard 8800. 8-bays perform quite well at the lower range of UHF frequencies from 14 to 50. A few 8-bay antennas claim to get good VHF performance, but it's all misinformation (which I also fell for). At best, they only barely outperform the most basic rabbit ear designs, If you're far enough from UHF stations that you need an 8-bay, you'll also be far from VHF stations, and need a GOOD VHF antenna to bring in the signal. A barely-capable-of-VHF 8-bay simply doesn't have enough gain to get decent VHF reception. A $20 VHF-high antenna will blow them all away. Use a VHF/UHF combiner, NOT a standard splitter to connect them.

VHF-hi needs much smaller and cheaper antennas, and VHF-low is almost gone, except in Alaska, where stations are keeping their low VHF stations due to terrain.

There's one other advantage that multi-bay antennas have over yagi/corner reflectors. If you are renting an apartment, you are allowed to install any antenna you want, provided that it resides entirely on your property. Being able to mount a long yagi/reflector without it sticking out (no longer your property) is pretty unlikely, unless you have a huge balcony. Multi-bay antennas are quite flat, and even just an outside window ledge could be used to mount it legally. Just make sure it's mounted securely, because they are heavy. If there's no location for installation outdoors, you could also install it on the inside of a window, facing out, perhaps hidden from view by your curtain... a yagi would have to stick out, halfway across the room.

INSTALLATION:
There's no substitute for putting your TV antenna on a nice long pole, hooked up to your HDTV tuner, and walking around your house with it until you find a location that gets a strong signal on all the channels you care about. A simple procedure, but a lot of time-consuming work. An antenna can be mounted up to 12' above the top of your roof without requiring you to apply for any permits, and in general, the higher your UHF antenna is, the stronger the signal.
Stay far away from power lines. Be sure to ground both the antenna pole and the coax cable outside of your house to prevent lightning damage.
Large multi-bay antennas are very heavy, so be sure to get heavier gauge pipe for mounting it.
If you are in a fringe area, and your cable runs aren't pretty short, you'll need a mast-mounted signal preamplifier. Lower noise (2.0db) is better, and only slightly more expensive than the rest. Gain (eg 15db) will hardly be an issue UNLESS you have extremely long cable runs... Only then, a second amp might help.

I'm looking forward to HDTV, not for the resolution, but because 95% of the shows I care about are on broadcast TV, and signal quality (fringe area) is the only reason I consider cable/satellite. DVRs, Netflix and Hulu obsolete most of the need for cable, and the sudden and total deterioration of the quality of original programming on the major cable networks sealed pay-TV's fate, IMHO.

If you still have any questions about the basics of digital TV, feel free to leave a comment, and I'll get to it. Coming up next time (soon!) similar tips for satellite reception...

Sources:
FCC DTV tentative frequency assigments: http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DA-06-1082A2.pdf
Antenna performance comparison: http://www.hdtvprimer.com/ANTENNAS/comparing.html

Products Linky:

UHF/VHF combiner: ... Pico Macom "Tru Spec" UVSJ

Winegard UHF 4-bay 4400: http://www.solidsignal.com/pview.asp?p=hd-4400&d=winegard-hd-4400-4-bay-uhf-prostar-1000-high-definition-tv-antenna-%28hd-4400%29

Winegard UHF 8-bay 8800: http://www.solidsignal.com/pview.asp?p=hd-8800&d=winegard-pr8800-8-bay-uhf-prostar-1000-high-definition-tv-antenna-%28hd-8800%29

AntennaCraft VHF-hi y5-7-13: http://www.solidsignal.com/pview.asp?p=y5-7-13&d=antennacraft-by-radioshack-y5-7-13-highband-broadband-vhf-yagi-tv-antenna-for-channels-7-13-%28y5-7-13%29&sku=716079000987

AntennaCraft VHF-hi y10-7-13: http://www.solidsignal.com/pview.asp?p=y10-7-13&d=antennacraft-by-radioshack-y10-7-13-highband-broadband-vhf-tv-antenna--%28y10-7-13%29&sku=716079000994