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Comment Re:The fuzzy line between hobby and job (Score 1) 216

Your entire elaborate argument is based on a false premise.

As I said, the road damage is exponential with the weight. It is proportional to the axle weight to the fourth power.

Fuel economy is roughly linear with weight, or even less than linear (big rigs get much better MPG per ton than smaller vehicles). Therefore, fuel taxes don't begin to recover the extra costs of heavier vehicles.

Who has made the stupidest argument you've ever heard now? You might look in the mirror.

Comment Overblown nonsense. (Score 2) 99

From TFS:

...there's no clear way within the law to actually declare something in the public domain. Instead, the public domain declarations are really more of a promise not to make use of the exclusionary rights provided under copyright.

Ok, so the statement is about a clear way to put something in the public domain. Here's how you clearly put something in within the law: (1) You declare it public domain. (2) Now, keeping it there: You simply exercise a level of ethics even a 5 year old understands: You don't go back on your word, because (for one thing) that would make you a major fucktarded scumbag. (3) Whatever it is, is in the public domain, stays there, totally within the law, end of story.

Sometimes the ideas of law -- which is a hugely flawed instrument -- and the result of actions taken/not-taken get all confused in people's minds. If you want to put something into the public domain, do so, and subsequently just exercise a minimal level of personal honor, and you can be sure that your intent will carry through. The only one who can screw this up is you, and to do that you have to act in a particular way which guarantees you are knowingly acting like a dickhead. So when this clown tells you that you can't get it done, he is impugning your honor, not describing reality, and the only reaction you should have to that is annoyance.

Given that you are honorable and simply don't go back on your word, the user has nothing to worry about either.

So this really isn't about law. This is about your behavior.

Now, I grant you that most an entire generation having grown up with the idea that it's ok to steal IP, and the toxic idiocy of the "information wants to be free" crowd additionally muddying the waters, and the proliferation of people who just can't seem to keep their word, one might have reason to be cynical about this. But remember: TFS is saying that it is hard to put something into PD. It isn't. There's no reason you or I have to act without honor, and there are many reasons, starting from simply sleeping better at night, that we ought to act with honor.

Yes, I've got stuff out there that is PD. No, I will never, ever revoke that status. See how easy that is? 100% effective, too.

Comment Re:The fuzzy line between hobby and job (Score 2) 216

Your hypotheses that road damage is caused solely by the pressure on the top few millimeters of the road is highly questionable. The Prius is not going to be pounding down through the structure of the concrete nearly as much as your super-duty pickup hauling a huge boat.

I do agree that big rigs should be paying drastically more in fees than they do. However, industry lobbyists will always trump common sense.

Comment Re:Insurance (Score 4, Informative) 216

That falls into statistically normal usage. Being a commercial driver absolutely does not. Statistically, a commercial driver drives way more than a noncommercial driver, and they're much more likely to be sued, and for more money. It's absurd to argue that they should be able to drive on insurance rates calculated for statistical norms of noncommercial drivers. If you allow that sort of ignoring of statistics then you might as well get rid of all statistical tables period and charge every last person the same rate for all types of insurance.

Comment Insurance (Score 4, Insightful) 216

Why, exactly, should Uber drivers get to drive passengers using regular non-commercial drivers' insurance? Commercial insurance costs more because people who drive people around for a living are much more likely to cost the insurance companies more money. If you're letting them drive on non-commercial licenses than that means that regular drivers are subsidizing Uber-drivers.

Comment Re:They already have (Score 1) 667

There is no reason that we have to pick one and abandon work on the others. I don't see that the same resources go into solving more than one, except that the meteor and volcano problem have one solution in common - be on another planet when it happens.

The clathrate problem and nuclear war have the potential to end the human race while it is still on one planet, so we need to solve both of them ASAP.

Comment Re: The future is not UHD (Score 1) 332

Go to a friends house and turn on their flat-panel TV. 99% of the time, it will have frame-rate interpolation turned on; which basically means that any content they see on that TV will be at 60 or 120 Hz. Even movies shot at 24.

More and more often as I do presentations to executives, they don't understand why my TVs look so "juddery" compared to what they expect -- it's because at home they're watching everything at 120Hz.

So no -- most people are happy with high frame rate most of the time, and that percentage is getting larger quickly. I am a big 24fps fan, but I believe the days are numbered.

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