I saw a 'gator right at the edge of the VAB parking lot last month. In a drainage ditch, up to the fence, cars parked right on the other side.

With luck, they'll start incorporating our radio transceivers. I hear that SpaceX flies with several USRPs now, so that's not completely unrealistic. That might be as close as I can get. Anyone who can get me a base invitation, though, would be greatly appreciated and I'd be happy to do some entertaining speeches while there. I need a base invite for Vandenberg, too. I got in to the official viewing site for the first try of the last launch (and that scrubbed too), but this next one is on Pad 6.

I was in Florida to speak at Orlando Hamcation and went to see the DISCOVR launch at Kennedy Space Center. I paid $50 to be at LC-39 for the launch, an observation tower made from a disused gantry on the Nasa Causeway between the pads and the Vehicle Assembly Building. A crawler was parked next door! A hot sandwich buffet, chips, and sodas were served. It was cold and windy! I watched for a few hours and unfortunately the launch scrubbed due to high stratospheric winds.

The next day, Delaware North Corporation, which operates tourism at KSC, decided not to open LC-39 or the Saturn 5 center for the launch. This was the third launch attempt and I guess they decided most people had left. I was annoyed.

The closest beach was going to be closed in the evening, it's a sensitive ecological area. I ended up seeing the launch from Jetty Park. This turned out not to be such a great location, the tower wasn't visible at all and the first 10 seconds of the rocket in flight were obscured before we saw it over a hill.

What's a better viewing location?

Taking on the 1938 German army would have been a relative cakewalk. The problem with Dunkirk (wasn't that a great victory?) is that the British stayed on the defensive, and by definition it's impossible to win whilst playing defense.

Add the Czechs and their surprisingly good army, and the Little Maginot Line (the Germans tested the fortifications after invading and found them shockingly sound) , and 1938 Germany has big problems. Its army gets bogged down in Czechoslovakia while the British drive for Berlin.

People always bring up this "educated, balanced" riposte to Chamberlain's infamous act. It's bullshit. Let's put the dagger in the back of this theory once and for all: you know who Chamberlain saw fit NOT to invite to the Munich conference? The Czechs! He gave them the middle finger and handed them a fait accompli. Don't even get me started about the great betrayal of Poland, a nation Britain was pledged to defend and yet did fuck-all to help. Fuck Chamberlain and fuck appeasement.

Explain Harry Mudd and the Sirius Mining Corporation.

At least Star Trek solved the "endless assloads of free money from somewhere" problem that is endemic to socialism. On Earth in 2015, the rub is that eventually, you run out of other people's money. With replicators and antimatter energy, that's not an inconvenient truth any more.

Jeez, where did that come from? Did a football player rape you or something? You need to call the cops, or at least a counselor. Oh, and move to France, they have intellectuals on TV that debate topics. I think you're just in the wrong country and need to leave.

Achieving socialism by the capitalist road never works, friend. Give it up, it will just come back ten times worse.

There are whole huge swathes of blogspot.com that are tranny porn and the like. Not surprised they claimed it as 'identity' or whatever. I mean, their entire identity is sexual. I like sex too but damn it doesn't define me as a person. We all have other interests outside the ol' bedroom. How'd we get into Google fiber?

Inconvenient truth ahead: trigger warning.

Nobody wants to see old wrinkled women on the big screen. Even old wrinkled women. Hollywood caters to a global audience these days, and the feelings of western leftists aren't really relevant any more. Sorry it didn't work out for you.

INT. RORITOR BUILDING BOARD ROOM
BIG STUMMIES SCIENTIST: Well, Ive been working on a thing. It's, uh, sorta like Stummies.
DON: Go on. I like what I hear.
BIG STUMMIES SCIENTIST: It's exactly like Stummies.
DON: And the twist is?
BIG STUMMIES SCIENTIST: It's a much bigger pill.
DON: I like a lot. Is it ready for production?
BIG STUMMIES SCIENTIST: Yes sir, it's ready to go.
DON: Yeah, have there been any side effects?
BIG STUMMIES SCIENTIST Yes sir, a few side effects.
NATALIE: Well that's OK. As long as there's no flipper babies, right Don?

Everyone LAUGHS.
BIG STUMMIES SCIENTIST: Well, there have been a few flipper babies.

CUT TO:

INT. RORITOR BUILDING HALLWAY/ELEVATOR
Marv and Chris are coming out of the elevator. The Big Stummies Scientist is is hysterical and is being carried away by two security guards.
BIG STUMMIES SCIENTIST: AHHH! It was only a couple of flipper babies!

Test equipment is allowed to transmit and receive on those frequencies. If it looks like a radio, it can't. I have a number of cellular testers hanging around here that can act like base stations, mostly because I buy them used as spectrum analyzers and never use the (obsolete) cellular facilities. Government has different rules regarding what it can and can't do in the name of law enforcement, although FCC has been very reluctant to allow them to use cellular jammers.

If you can afford it, something from Ettus would better suit your application.

We think after we build this new PCB we can go for the croudfunded manufacturing run. It's mostly surface-mount, and we expect to sell assembled boards in this run, and then the next version will be fully-packaged radios.

Hi AC,

Matt Ettus has a story about a Chinese cloner of the USRP. The guy tells Chinese customers that it is illegal for them to buy from Ettus, they must buy from the cloner instead. Then, when they have problems and require serivce, he tells them to get it from Ettus. Who of course made nothing from their device sales and can not afford to service them.

This is not following the rules of Open anything. It's counterfeiting.

So, sometimes it is necessary to change the license a little so that you will not be a chump. I discussed the fact that the hardware is fully disclosed but not Open Hardware licensed with RMS, the software is 100% Free Software, and there is a regulatory chip you can't write. We can go for Respects Your Freedom certification that way..

I've paid my dues as far as "Open" is concerned, and Chris has too. This is all we can give you this time.

The case selection was so that we'd have at least one case that would work. We did not take much time on it. We'd be happy to have other people designing and selling cases.

The version after this one requires cases that look like real radios. That is going to be a bigger problem. We don't yet have a mold-design partner, etc.

We implement it as a chip that intercepts the serial bus to the VFO chip, and disallows certain frequencies. On FCC-certified equipment we might have to make that chip and the VFO chip physically difficult to get at by potting them or something. This first unit is test-equipment and does not have the limitation.