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Comment Re:It's for the best (Score 1) 225

by RandomFactor (#45830709) Attached to: Public Domain Day 2014
Or a 4x4









(There's one scene where you can spot a set of 4x4 tracks off in the distance in that ST movie. One of the guys in the old BBS scene used "Why does God need a 4x4?" for his tagline for a while as a result. Ahh the good old days...)

Comment Re: This is what a libertarian believes (Score 1) 60

by RandomFactor (#45809305) Attached to: How the Dark Lord of the Internet Made His Fortunes
Yeah. Not so much.

Libertarian view : If someone is committing murder, rape, robbery, theft, fraud, arson, trespass, etc. — then it is proper to call on the government.

There really should be a term for the common practice of creating a flawed statement, ascribing it to someone, and then using it to make them look bad.

Submission + - 2013 – a year with minimal extreme weather events in the US (thesiweather.com)

Submitted by bricko
bricko writes: 2013 – a year with minimal extreme weather events in the US

http://thesiweather.com/2013/10/18/1100-am-2013-a-year-with-minimal-extreme-weather-events-in-the-us/

There have been many forecasts in the news in recent years predicting more and more extreme weather-related events in the US, but for 2013 that prediction has been way off the mark. Whether you’re talking about tornadoes, wildfires, extreme heat or hurricanes, the good news is that weather-related disasters in the US are all way down this year compared to recent years and, in some cases, down to historically low levels.

Tornadoes
To begin with, the number of tornadoes in the US this year is on pace to be the lowest total since 2000 and it may turn out to be the lowest total in several decades. The table below lists the number of tornadoes in the US for this year (through 10/17) and also for each year going back to 2000.

Source: NOAA, http://www.spc.noaa.gov/climo/online/monthly/newm.html

Year # of Tornadoes
2013 771
2012 1119
2011 1894
2010 1543
2009 1305
2008 1685
2007 1102
2006 1117
2005 1262
2004 1820
2003 1374
2002 938
2001 1219
2000 1072

Wildfires
Second, the number of wildfires across the US so far this year is on pace to be the lowest it has been in the past ten years and the acreage involved is at the second lowest level in that same time period (table below).
(Source: National Interagency Fire Center; http://www.nifc.gov/)

2013 Fires: 40,306 Acres: 4,152,390
2012 Fires: 67,774 Acres: 9,326,238
2011 Fires: 74,126 Acres: 8,711,367
2010 Fires: 62,471 Acres: 3,233,461
2009 Fires: 78,792 Acres: 5,921,786
2008 Fires: 80,094 Acres: 5,254,109
2007 Fires: 85,822 Acres: 9,321,326
2006 Fires: 96,358 Acres: 9,871,939
2005 Fires: 66,552 Acres: 8,686,753
2004 Fires: 63,608 Acres: 8,097,880
*2013 data through 10/16

Extreme Heat
In addition to wildfires, extreme heat is also way down across the US this year. In fact, the number of 100 degree days across the country during 2013 is not only down for this year, but it is perhaps going to turn out to be the lowest in about 100 years of records (chart below).

Comment Re: What an idiot. (Score 1) 233

by RandomFactor (#45808965) Attached to: Convicted Spammer Jeffrey Kilbride Flees Prison
Vigilantes would be far far far more likely to go all Charles Bronson on some poor slob who's only crime was having a known email address than an actual spammer.

This is why vigilante justice is inappropriate in the case of spam.

Not because it would be 'disproportionate' - Spammers routinely and intentionally destroy entire human lifetimes in aggregate. (This is a role reserved for overly intrusive government and local cable providers.)

Submission + - Any concerted effort to revive Usenet? 4

Submitted by taxman_10m
taxman_10m writes: I've felt for a long time that Usenet as a repository for technical knowledge was better than Stack Exchanges, Reddits, Google+ Communities and various assorted blogs and message boards. Particularly Google+ Communities. Recently info on modifying an Acer Chromebook to run full Ubuntu was moved to such a community. I can't be the only one that finds the layout to be an utter abortion, can I? I'm curious if there is any effort underway to bring back Usenet. One of the big downfalls of Usenet mentioned is spam, but certainly there are ways to deal with that now. If such a movement to bring back Usenet doesn't exist, I'd like to get the discussion started here.

Submission + - Stretch or Splat? Physicists debate death by black hole (npr.org) 1

Submitted by gbrumfiel
gbrumfiel writes: For decades, researchers have thought they understood how black holes kill. Once you slip beyond the event horizon, the theory goes, gravity grows so strong that it spaghettifies you. But that version of events seems to violate Quantum Mechanics, which says that information must be conserved. NPR reports on the debate surrounding a new theory. The theory suggests that to conserve information, space itself must end at a black hole's edge. Anyone who falls "in" the black hole actually goes splat instead. Their information is carried away in quantum-entangled radiation from the edge of the hole. But is it really a hole if it doesn't have an inside? Discuss.

Comment Re:So make the power reliable... (Score 1) 293

by RandomFactor (#45805351) Attached to: Power-Loss-Protected SSDs Tested: Only Intel S3500 Passes
Double check you have a true 'online' UPS not a (much cheaper) stand-by power device.

Also make sure you don't plug in your laser printer to it...that's a classic fail.

I've lost power numerous times over the years and continued right on working. Even gracefully informing people online that I needed to disconnect due to power being down at my house.

Submission + - Cracking Atlanta Subway's poorly-encrypted RFID Smart Cards is a Breeze (clatl.com)

Submitted by McGruber
McGruber writes: Seven metro Atlanta residents are facing theft, fraud, and racketeering charges for allegedly selling counterfeit MARTA Breeze cards (http://clatl.com/freshloaf/archives/2013/12/27/marta-breeze-card-hackers-arrested-and-charged-with-racketeering). Breeze cards (http://www.breezecard.com/) are stored value smart cards that passengers use as part of an automated fare collection system which the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA, http://www.itsmarta.com/) introduced to the general public in October 2006. Breeze cards are supplied by Cubic Transportation Systems (http://cts.cubic.com/), an American company that provides automated fare collection equipment and services to the mass transit industry.

At the time of this slashdot submission, the Wikipedia page for the Breeze Card (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeze_Card, last modified on 2 August 2013 at 14:52) says:

The Breeze Card uses the MIFARE smart-card system from Dutch company NXP Semiconductors, a spin-off from Philips. The disposable, single-use, cards are using on the MIFARE Ultralight while the multiple-use plastic cards are the MIFARE Classic cards. There have been many concerns about the security of the system, mainly caused by the poor encryption method used for the cards. See Security of MIFARE Classic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIFARE#Security_of_MIFARE_Classic) for details.


Submission + - The universe may be finite and bounded afterall. (johnhartnett.org) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The question is discussed whether the universe is finite or infinite, bounded or unbounded. In modern science it is presumed to unbounded and since the discovery of the accelerating universe, for which the Nobel Prize was awarded in 2011, that it is also infinite. However Hartnett has found that using the cosmology of Moshe Carmeli that the same equations that successfully fit the observational evidence in the cosmos can also be derived from a finite bounded universe. This means our location is space may indeed be special after all. The work was published in the International Journal of Theoretical Physics titled “A valid finite bounded expanding Carmelian universe without dark matter” (Int J Theor Phys (2013) 52:4360–4366).

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