I just don't buy that audio can't be used. With an array of high quality microphones spread over an area fed into a software radio and some pretty hefty computing power you should be able to look for the rhythmic audio that your typical copter type drones will generate. Because even if they change the size and shape of the rotors all that does is change the frequency not the amplitudes you will see from the rhythmic action.

With some proper math and the right computing power you should be able to identify drones pretty rapidly with fourier analysis and the same microphone array could use Doppler effects to calculate position, and the directional vector. Combine this with some systems to double check such as heat, RF and conventional high band doppler radar and you should have a system that will get 99% of the drones and even provide targeting to a shoot down type system.

The key here is you need some pretty dam good microphones spread over a pretty large area feeding into a pretty massive computer array. It wouldn't be cheap or easy. The easy thing is use a doppler radar system that cross-checks it against RF emissions to eliminate birds. But IMO the best system would use all three, high band doppler radar, RF emissions and audio (and maybe even heat). With three cross checks you should be able to get pretty good accuracy.

The 2lbs would kill you dropped 10' if and only if the 2lbs is relatively compact dense, durable material like say a steel ball, if that 2 pounds is spread over 1 square foot and made of plastic it's probably not going to kill you or even put you in the hospital (though you may end up with a concussion).

Size and shape matter quite a bit in such a discussion and you can't talk about that without also talking about the accuracy of dropping such an object because a 2lb steel ball isn't going to be that big and trying to land that right on someone's head with a radio controlled drone is going to be pretty fucking hard even without wind.

They KNEW he was DPR because he solicited advertisements for the site in various places including USENET using traceable accounts when he set it up. How they found the server is an open question but not really an issue given the other evidence they already had including the seized laptop. They probably had him under surveillance for months.

They had a lot of evidence he was DPR and he's admitted it in filing since. Regardless of his trial arguments that he wasn't running the site anymore there was plenty of evidence he was.

How they found the server and copied it before they got him is an open question but it's probably a very small piece of evidence for how they got him. They didn't get him by getting the server, they got him the old fashioned way. Even if the server was gotten through NSA help it wouldn't have impacted the conviction. My bet is that they did something like they did with DPR 2.0, they infiltrated or compromised the site enough to get it to install a homing beacon and reveal it's true location.

DPR 2.0 was more careful and couldn't be tied as easily so they infiltrated the sites support and developed enough information to identify him. The problem with these sites is that to really make them function you need to use javascript and running javascript on TOR is a big no no. It's right in basic warnings they give you when you download TOR that you should under no circumstance allow javascript to run because it can do a lot of things that will identify you. All the feds had to do with Silkroad 1 and 2 was hack in enough to get a rouge script running that would identify the server and anyone that connected to it.

Doing TOR security properly isn't trivial, it's actually quite hard. And building a secure website is even harder when it has to be secure against ever sending data out over the general internet. On top of that you can't use JS or allow any of it to run and you have to watch security like a hawk because if your security isn't PERFECT you are done. Perfect security is very very hard.

I had the exact same reaction. I prefer low sugar (or commonly called bitter) chocolate. Chocolate and coffee are about the same bitterness, if you can drink coffee black but don't like unsweetened or low sugar chocolate you are crazy. If you can't consume either without a huge dose of sugar and cream (what makes milk chocolate) you are frankly a pussy.

You don't need a pile of sugar and cream added to something like coffee or chocolate to enjoy it. A lot of people like low sugar or unsweetened chocolate just fine.

Most non-scientists in the US don't either. The young earth creationists are a VERY small group, I'd guess less than 0.5%. They are generally very vocal and congregate to "discuss" this view so it makes them seem larger than they are.

Every time the USPTO tries what you suggest they get sued by every applicant and quickly exhaust their entire budget in legal fees. Congress wouldn't provide additional money for a legal defense fund so they just started approving basically everything.

The FBI and NSA got his ear directly, as in every single day they can tell him lies and he has no other source because they sit on the cabinet and no one else does that will counter the lies. You simply can't trust a sitting president on this because he's under the direct influence of the FBI and NSA.

The only reason the Reagan tax cut didn't destroy the country was because "read my lips" George HW Bush re-raised the top bracket and stabilized revenue vis-a-vis borrowing.

That account surplus ignores debt repayment. The debt is there. They default and they can't borrow money again until the debt is paid. Look at Argentina, it's been a decade and they haven't been able to borrow a dime on the international markets and they are 3 or 4 times the size of Greece with substantial natural resources to export. Now that the Chinese economy is slowing down (and reducing resource imports) they are under immense pressure.

Ask yourself this, what would happen to an economy if you could no longer purchase oil, gas or any other petroleum product because you can't borrow the money to buy it. This is what Argentina is deathly afraid of right now and Greece should be terrified.

The fed didn't borrow money. They printed it and used their newly printed money to purchase government debt. Other than that glaring and idiotic mistake everything else you said was wrong.

Default is a credit death sentence. Please understand, sovereign countries can NOT declare bankruptcy and refuse to pay. The debt has to be paid unless you can get the creditors to be magnanimous and forgive a portion of it. Otherwise, until you pay it back you will be bared from all credit. Greece has already gotten their "haircut". They will have to pay back every dime or they will never borrow money again unless they can get the ECB or IMF to agree to another haircut which isn't going to happen.

You should see what default did to Argentina. It destroyed the country and it continues to wreck havoc on the economy a decade later. Small countries like Greece have to borrow money because they generally import most of their products and obtain most of their foreign currency through tourism. If you shut of debt they will be unable to purchase anything on the foreign market without first obtaining equivalent amounts of foreign currency first. Even with a very strong tourism industry and positive cash flows from the tourism this will be very painful for every single Greek.

Sovereign countries cannot just decide not to pay debts. There is not bankruptcy. Greece has one choice, here, pay the money or default on payment and pay the money later after suffering for several decades. There aren't other options in this world.

Which is the reason there was recently a story about a photographer that claimed copyright on a photograph that a monkey took of itself using the photographers camera. There was no copyright on the photograph because the one that took the photo isn't eligible for copyright.

Just as in this case, even if the school owns the camera, the paper and all the developing gear the student still owns the copyright. The only possible way the school could even hope to claim copyright would be by declaring that the student was doing work for hire. Needless to say the courts aren't going to look on that line of thought very highly given the lack of paycheck and the compulsory nature of school.

We aren't inventing better idiots. Designers continually fail by underestimating the ingenuity of idiots.

Don't think anyone would be stupid enough to plug it in backwards and pound it in with a hammer? You've just underestimated the idiot.

Designers and engineers are generally too logical to see all the failure paths that someone could take because they don't make the assumption that it will be installed upside down or with a hammer. It's the simple illogical design processes that prevent these extreme events, such as making the part fit in only one direction (sizing the part such that it cant physically fit or be connected) or such as USB C making it fit either direction. These design strategies appear to make the design illogical or more expensive for no logical reason so they aren't implemented by the logical engineer/designer. But these illogical processes are how you prevent the ingenuity of idiots from getting the better of you.

Didn't work very well, the first half the thread is discussing emacs.

Assuming any politician would be either susceptible to or even acknowledge a connection or hypocrisy in position is beyond foolish. They will take the position that nanny state is bad while in the same breath calling for drug regulation. The hypocrisy or incoherency of the position is irrelevant and always has been because the average American is perfectly happy with a nanny state government as long as it is only nanny'ing issues they want such as what (or who) people do in their bedroom and what substances they injest.