Despite the outcry of many, I find this yearâ(TM)s April 1st theme enjoyable. Black Hole is one of those films that is bad on many levels and yet still an enjoyable viewing experience. Perhaps it is just the strange repetitive Yah-Yah-Yah-Yaaaaah-da-da-da background music that makes it so borderline creepy and memorable -- very un-Disney like.

It gets all weird and religiously allegorical at the end while at the same time paying an homage to 2001 a Space Odysseyâ(TM)s final scenes. I usually just quit insisting the ending make any kind of scientific sense and just accept it as a Deus Ex Machina.

To be honest, I was a bit surprised that it apparently it must be considered essential for nerd viewing (else it wouldnâ(TM)t be skewered in this year's collection). Still hoping for a clever Blade Runner entry.

I like it too. I can honestly say I haven't watched or read 30% of the movies or books that were presented, so it gives me something to add to the list of things to do.

it's probably one of the least "junk" april 1 themes played out - as in having useful value after april 1. I mean, I've heard about it, but I never actually watched the movie, read the book or other activity, and I have to admit, these capsule summaries certainly pique my curiosity.

Then again, I guess /. is against anything cultural. Even nerd/geek culture..

The thing that many people seem not to realize is that, with legitimate and really important requests, you can get all signoffs in quite a short notice. The reason why most things take a while to authorize, is because everybody does it on their time and they have many to check. I already said it in a an other comment, but diverging from procedure is never a good idea, especially when something has to be done quick.

Even with urgent requests, approvals can come by right quick.

The thing is, if the CEO or whatever needs something urgently, they know the process and they can make sure to pressure everyone else involved in the approval process to actually process that one approval ASAP.

I've seen it done in well under an hour from request to final submission - the CEO just makes sure everyone is lined up to approve it. And this is in a serial approval process - you have something that needs approvals, and it goes up the chain - no one can sign out of turn.

Normal approvals generally take a week or so, because everyone does it at their leisure. But in emergency situations, you can be sped up significantly.

2GB? You gotta be kidding. Windows crawls with 2GB. It might be okay for 6 months or so, but if you do anything or install anything real, you'll go crazy waiting for the hard-drive.

Well geez, I paid $100, bought an HP Stream 7 and it only has 1GB of RAM. And it's plenty speedy.

In fact, for Windows 8.1 and Atom, it's surprisingly fast.

The only thing is, for $100, the Stream 7 can run like crap and I'd still like it - it's a $100 friggin' PC running full Windows. Heck, I have Steam running on it!

This thing though is $500. A bit pricey for a Atom based tablet, I think.

Every time I've known I was going to turn in my notice, I end up going through everything and cleaning out any personal stuff and clean up my mailbox before the letter ever gets put in. You never know if you'll be given the opportunity to do that once your notice is in. If there's anything that needs to be saved, it's a good idea to keep a rolling backup of it now on everyone. That way, when someone turns in their notice (whether everything is above board or not), you have everything you need and you're not scrambling to catch it before the employee deletes it.

Exactly. It's also why locking the gate after he turns in notice is pointless - if the employee REALLY wanted to screw with you, they'd have done it BEFORE the letter was handed in.

The vast, vast, vast majority of employees who voluntarily resign will not hurt their soon-to-be-ex-employer. You're resigning, usually out of free will, and burning bridges is not something you do, period. Doesn't matter if your boss was a jerk or an asshole, making a big "scene" while leaving is a really good way to end up unemployed when your new employer finds out.

By all means do it when layoffs are happening - emotions are running high and people will feel the need to destroy at least their computers, at least in the beginning until the laid off people calm down. Of course, most reasonable employees will feel ample regret if they actually did this in the end, but during this emotional period, yes, it can and does happen.

Presumably the guy resigning is leaving after finding a better job elsewhere. He's not going to risk early retirement at his new employer. (Employees talk and word gets around fast if someone decided to destroy data when they leave, and eventually it'll reach your new employer.).

Nothing changes before or after the letter gets handed in. If you're worried that you lock down PCs after the letter is handed in, then all the destruction will happen before.

I have never been able to stand more than 5 minutes of a MOOC video before telling myself 'OK, I'll find a proper textbook.'.
I usually have a basic view of the MOOC topic ; at least the textbook allows me to skim it and dig deeper on the points that I'm interested in.
Just sitting at my desk and watching a video is usually boring and requires to watch the complete segment before realising it was not what I was looking for.

The same goes for all these video tutorials : why bother making a 5-min youtube video on some software installation when a one-page text with command lines would be appropriate?

The real problem is inappropriate use of media.

Video, text, pictures/photos all are appropriate, depending on what you're doing.

A picture or illustration is ideal if you need to show something visual - like a map. Doing so in words makes text verbose and inevitably, unclear. (Remember the saying a picture is worth a thousand words?). however, that doesn't mean you simply put up a gallery with no explanatory text. Pictures don't convey actions, but they help illustrate. A tutorial showing screenshots with explanatory steps between each screenshot is way more useful than a tutorial without (even ASCII art is still an illustration), or a tutorial consisting of just pictures.

Likewise, video has its place. It's use is to show people an action. Not action as in "click this button", but complex actions that cannot be shown by a mere image and explanatory text. Perhaps a part is particularly hard to remove and requires a tricky amount of manipulation - text and illustrations help, but it should ALSO be supplemented with a video showing it visually. Note: you need ALL THREE methods for this - video alone is insufficient. Text with video isn't sufficient either (you cannot follow the text and video simultaneously), and video and pictures isn't sufficient either (see text and images).

Oh, and no, videos must be properly produced with proper sound tracks and narration. And even more importantly, angles must be the same between the illustration and video. Sorry, but if the only place you can film from is upside down, then you should show your illustrations from that POV as well so users can correlate the illustration with the action. If alternative POVs are more appropriate, you must illustrate the POV shown in the video so users do not waste the entire time trying to figure out the POV.

Text is descriptive. It tells what to do.
Illustrations, photos, pictures are visual. They show things at static points in time and are useful tor pointing out, illustrating actions, or providing visual information.
Videos show action that cannot be captured by mere text nor illustrations. Perhaps a location is tricky to get to - a drawing can show you where it is, but it can't show you how to get there or what you should see. (Not without a lot of shots sequentially taken, that is). Oh, and videos must be long enough to show a lead in (how you got there), the action, and a lead out. Jumping right into the action is bad when viewers are trying to orient themselves at first. If you're showing a jumping action to reach a hidden room, you need to start from a familiar room, pause there for a couple of seconds to let viewers get bearings by showing landmarks, then proceed.

Truth is, you need all three media to teach or do anything effectively. The real problem is too much over-reliance of one medium or another - typically too much video, not enough text nor illustrations. No media is perfect - they all have their shortcomings and one cannot be substituted for another.

Text is always a must. If anything it's the backbone of the whole thing and it serves to tie the other media together to form the cohesive unit of what you're trying to communicate. You cannot use the other media without text. Next level up is illustrations, pictures, photos, and other static displays. Again, text must tie together the visual display - the visual cannot exist on its own. And a visual is not a substitute for text - if you're describing a series of steps or a location, it has to be written out, then called out on the visual.

Finally, comes the video, which should be used sparingly and appropriately. It's inappropriate to show the whole thing as a video when most of the steps are static (meaning static graphics are more ideal). Complex actions are suitable for video as long as properly decorated.

Of course, this is VERY HARD WORK. Most people are lazy which is why we get the crap we do. It takes real work to put together something appropriate and it cannot be slap-dashed together in a few hours.

You can get more selling a device yourself for sure. But that's a lot of hassle, ant not everyone has eBay accounts.

That's really the reason why there's a big discount between what you can get off eBay, Craigslist or Kijiji over just doing it at Apple.

There's a risk vs. reward (you could post it and no one replies, scams, etc), so it depends how many dollars you want for that, versus how much are you willing to give up so someone else "can do it for you". Plus, it also costs time - you have to drive to the transaction location or your local PD and wait for the seller (who might bail on you, meaning you stand around for half an hour).

or you can just eat the difference and bring it to Apple and have it immediately swapped out. Presuming you already had in mind the iPhone you wanted, this brings you a small discount.

This runs contrary to any experience I've had with Apple, especially in their retail stores. If I can't walk in and try something without booking an appointment, it'll be awhile before I get around to buying one.

Try buying an iPhone. Only on launch day is it generally a free-for-all with long lineups. After that, it's pretty much make an appointment to buy iPhones. And that's to purchase - you can have them set up as well, but if you just want to be in and out, you need to make a reservation.

It's really a way to control demand because supplies will be short at first, especially since Apple doesn't have enough data to figure out which ones they need to make. You'd think maybe the Apple Watch Edition ($10K+) wouldn't sell too many, but Apple has been surprised before and quite possibly each store might only get 2 or 3, only to sell out consistenly. And maybe the Watch Sport (cheapest version) sells poorly over the Watch.

Plus, it also helps control scalpers to a small degree - just makes it a tiny bit harder if you want to order 10 of them.

They scalp iPhones - you won't believe the prices people will pay just to have a PHONE A MONTH EARLY.

Exactly where you draw the line isn't entirely clear. I'd have thought that an aircraft's cockpit would be a reasonable place to put a camera. I imagine the main objection from the union is that the airline will be looking over their shoulders the whole time, which could be dealt with by making it a rule that the recording only be in the black box and only accessible in case of an accident.

They're still opposed.

But they can be persuaded, for a few bucks.

You may not realize it, but pilots are in general some of the worst paid people given the responsibility - it's very possible the public transit bus driver earns more than the pilot!

In a regional airline, salaries are barely above minimum wage - $20,000/year is not unusual for someone "starting out" - after spending $50k+ on their own training (including the necessary hours to even get the right licenses - airlines don't pay for the ATPL). Even top end captain is rarely much above $60K, and most want to hop onto the heavies before that because you start at the very bottom again with the shit routes, shit times, and shit pay.

Oh yeah, you may also have to "commute" which can easily kill an entire day just flying standby from your home to where you're supposed to start your route. It's only the past few years that the FAA and other bodies have started including commuting time as part of the duty day calculation (notably because more than a few accidents have been caused by pilots basically only getting 1 hour of sleep the past 24). It's still unpaid, though, just like you don't get paid driving from your house to the office.

Once you have your 20 years, you probably have enough seniority to get 6 figure salaries ($130K or so) and left seat captain time as well as the ability to pick the nicer routes.

I can bet you the unions will use video cameras as a bargaining ticket to bring raises all around from "barely able to live" to at least livable.

And yes, more than a few people who earned big bucks have considered a career in flying - the basic rule is if you can cut back your standard of living significantly (you're basically going from a high pay to barely nothing), or have a spouse that earns enough to pay the bills for the first 5 years or so, it's potentially doable. But if you're going to miss the money or such, it's not worth it because pilots are really low-paid professionals.

For a few bucks more, they can add a separate standby power circuit, optimized for low power and high efficiency.

A few bucks is expensive. Sorry, even a few cents (the true cost) is expensive for a loss leader. Both the PS4 and Xbone have done what, over 10M units each? A $1 increase in BOM means $10M more spent making the things that sell for a loss.

Sorry, these things are built to a price. Admittedly, The Xbone is probably costing Microsoft less money than the PS4 is costing Sony, though price cuts probably made the losses larger.

If you examine the components, you'll find if there's a nickel to be shaved, it's been shaved at least at the time it was initially designed. Both are probably entered their second revision with more cost saving measures after seeing the general results of the first revision

Hell, even the packaging is shaved - cardboard gets thinner, things are stuffed closer than ever, and boxes even more user unfriendly.

WTF? "Sleeping" should draw way less. It doesn't take a lot of power to keep a couple of sticks of SDRAM alive. Okay, probably also the NIC and a MCU to monitor the remote. I bet your console is reporting to the mother-ship or something.

First off, a power supply is less efficient at the low end than at the high end. A 200W power supply may be 80% or 90% efficient when running at its design load of 150W, but when you want 5W in standby mode, you can easily get into the 50% or lower efficiency range.

And 5W is probably perfectly reasonable for keeping SDRAM alive and refreshed, the NIC and other bits alive. It's just the power supply is only 50% efficient, so it draws 10+W at the wall.

Or in other words "fuck you CAA you don't need £3000+ of training to fly a £1000 1kg drone"

Ha. Given how Europe is a mess with fees on GA aircraft (flying in Europe is pricey if you want to do GA thanks to tons of taxes, levies, fees, etc. Europeans are jealous as to how much flying in North America is better because there is so much less burdens).

You may not need UKP3000 in training, but I wouldn't be surprised if you're not hit with a UKP500/year license, a UKP100 take off and landing fee, airspace fees, etc. etc. etc.

Because Amazon Canada's selection is pretty terrible compared to Amazon USA.

Exactly.

Amazon Canada is the whole reason why Canadian online shopping is such a terrible experience.

First off - Amazon Canada is NO CHEAPER than retail. I'd find stuff cheaper at Future Shop/Best Buy than at Amazon. Most Canadian retailers are like that - online prices generally aren't great - if you're savvy, you can find it available at the brick and mortar cheaper and available right there. And, save the shipping since few Canadian retailers other than the big guys (Future Shop/Best Buy, Amazon, Walmart, etc) offer free shipping.

Then there's taxes, you're not saving there either since everyone charges at least GST or HST. And many places insist you pay PST as well. So shipping and taxes, which means it has to be either hard to find locally, or at a really good price.

Occasionally, shopping at Amazon.com, despite the shipping and import charges, comes out cheaper.

I know I just had that happen to me - Amazon.com in the end charged me $42 for an item with EXPRESS (2 day) shipping. In Canada, it was $60 with STANDARD shipping from a zShop. That $42 was what it came out to in Canadian dollars it was $35 US or so.

Online shopping in Canada is not necessarily cheaper or more convenient - either Canadian retailers know how to adapt to an online world, or online Canadian retailers are just plain terrible.

Hell, even Best Buy/Future Shop isn't necessarily terrible... I've lost out a few times because they beat Amazon pricing, and even my preferred online retailer can't beat their price.

(Nevermind that Best Buy/Future Shop are one of the few retailers that let you buy online and return/exchange in store to save shipping costs)

That MPEG2 had hundreds of patents would suggest that there is a problem. That makes it sound as if basically every step had at least one patent, possibly more. If that's the case, then meaningful competition is going to be impossible.

Every standard has patents. When you make standards by committee, whether it be video encoders, Wi-Fi, Ethernet, what have you, it's really a give-and-take of patent and technology holders trying to squeeze their thing into the standard. Sort of the "I'll let your patent go in, if you'll vote for mine in too"

Now, MPEG patents are typically not a problem - because MPEG set up the MPEG-LA that serves as a patent pool - instead of trying to negotiate with 500 patent holders on licenses, you go to the pool administrator, pay the appropriate fee according to the fee schedule and walk away with the licenses.

It's why you rarely see patent holders suing licensees over patent violations - Motorola suing Microsoft being about the only one for h.264 - every other licensee has paid MPEG-LA and thus licensed the appropriate patents.

Cellphone companies, though, haven't created a patent pool which is why you have everyone suing everyone else.

This HEVC alliance will be interesting because it'll be interesting if them and the MPEG-LA will respect each other's licenses. If not, this could easily tank HEVC if people can't figure out how they're supposed to license the patents. VP9 could easily squeeze in the gap despite HEVC being acknowledged as the next-gen codec - but if the licensing agreements can't be worked out between MPEG-LA and HEVC-A, then people wouldn't dare use it.

You don't need to have the best quality or be the cheapest, even from a customer perspective. As long as you offer the best value for money. Ikea does pretty good there as long as you know what to buy there and what to avoid.

Exactly. Though, I've done other flat packs and by far Ikea is the best. Their furniture might not be the cheapest, last the longest or be the best, but if you're talking flat pack, they are. And yeah, you could get better, but they're usually something that's pre-built and you have to move it as-is. At least flat pack you can break down into sub assemblies that are 100 times easier to move.

And it's incredible - the non-Ikea flatpacks I had were just awful - the holes would NEVER align, they were usually the wrong size for the dowels (too big or small) and when you're done it either was wobbly (see holes), or the entire panel was misaligned and thus you had gaps. It's as if they laid it out in a computer and never bothered trying to assemble it. Or even just seeing if comes close to resembling what it was supposed to be.

It's not like Ikea uses better materials - they pioneered the use of particle board, but that desk... it fell apart in short order. I've got Ikea stuff bought at the same time that's still around made from particle board.

No, putting IKEA stuff together is fun. I've never understood that complaint, and I'd guess that many of the people repeating the meme have never bought anything from IKEA.

I've usually enjoyed it - it's a good puzzle. And you have to admit that the instructions are designed to not use words (which have to be translated) and try to be as neutral as possible while still explaining what to do in across cultures, languages and history. Whoever draws those instructions might actually have insights into the human race.

About the only time I don't like them is when they don't clearly illustrate which way a piece goes around. For the spatially challenged, this can mean they put it all together only to have the wood exposed instead of veneer.

You'd think maybe a red X on the part that's going to end up in a hidden location, followed through with the illustrated X would help identifying which way it goes.

Because smart people don't seem to want the job.

Let's not make the equivalence between tech savvy and intelligence, because /., is a perfect example of people who claim to be intelligent, yet painfully ignorant at the same time.

Just because you can use a computer doesn't mean you know how the world works. Heck, tech-savvy people are among the worst people in the world for a job that requires extreme interaction with people who are unpredictable, where how you say something is extremely important (more than what you say), and where how you dress and appear is critical.