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Comment Re:Stop throwing good money after bad. (Score 1) 364

There are hundreds of billions of dollars of tribute payment from vassal states in the pretend buy of those aircraft. No matter how bad they are they need to be made and sold in order to collect those tribute payments. In fact the worse they are the more money the US will be able to collect of those vassal states as they pay through the nose in repairs, bug fixes and upgrades.

Comment Re:because it fucking is (Score 4, Interesting) 210

Let's check the differences. On a PC I can still watch a DVD on my big screen at the same time. Note the appear equally as large as my PC screen is far closer to me than my big screen TV. On my PC I can play a full range of FTP MMO, free flash games on the internet. I can browse the internet while watching TV. Never to forget I have a fully functional upgradable, dual bootable Computer and not just a games console. I can also buy much cheaper games without having to pay a quite expensive console tax and games discount sooner. With PC at a lan party everyone has their own screen so far better multi-player gaming. I have found every console port to be not that good games pretty much dumbed down PC games with clumsy controls.

When comparing a console to a PC, you are really only comparing the additional cost of turning a PC into a gaming machine versus the console and the loss of use of your TV or a second TV (youch, you have just paid for your PC gaming rig). Gaming consoles of course do suit a particular IQ range of the video gaming market, there is not doubt about that and I'll stop there.

Comment Re:seems like snowden did the exact same thing. (Score 1) 95

You just don't seem to get it when "endanger his country's ongoing intelligence operations" are criminal activities, they are 'CRIMINAL ACTIVITIES' and are by law required to be reported, to the public so that they can be investigated and prosecuted. Now the reported part has been done, but of course in a very blatant corruption of the law, the investigation bit is sort of happening but not happening whilst of course the prosecution part of not happening at all.

That was the whole idea to basically end, his country's ongoing 'illegal' intelligence operations. What the fuck do you not get about that!?

In a democracy the public has every possible right to know every action of their government if it will impact their vote, to with hold information that will impact the public's vote is a blatant anti-constitutional corruption of that democracy and those who do it should be investigated, prosecuted and imprisoned, every single last one of them, no matter how many thousands of those corrupt arse holes there are.

Comment Re:Kind of like supermarket loyalty schemes (Score 1) 353

I understand how it works. What you do is sell insurance to people who don't need it and when they do refuse to sell it to them any more. So now instead of health insurance you sell accident insurance only with activity insurance add ons. So for healthy young people who have undergone DNA testing and are deemed to be health risk free you provide accident only insurance but if they undertake any high risk activities you charge additional short term premiums, so snow skiing insurance, diving insurance, driving insurance et al. So insurance it's all about charging people who don't need it cheap premiums to make them feel better and when they do need it dropping them.

Of course for ignorant short term thinkers yes when your younger your insurance is cheaper but when you get older you're fucked and either can't get cover or end up paying through the nose for it. So with universal health care you are not paying for everyone else, you are paying to provide coverage for your own future come what may. Cheaper today is not cheaper tomorrow, saving pennies to spend pounds is stupid thinking.

Comment Re:One hundred *billion* dollars? (Score 2) 103

Large hybrid titling ducted rotor quadcopters with electric drives and inboard turbine generators. Don't they already make model aircraft that look much like that and perform pretty well. Just need to up scale it. Now if they want to save money, which really doesn't seem to be the objective. They need to separate out the airframe from everything else. Don't design a military aircraft, design an agile high speed civilian aircraft capable of carrying the final design load, of personnel, munitions and armour. The advantage you have something to directly sell into civilian market to save money. The body shape can then vary according to demand. That research of course has no impact on the remaining research which covers target acquisition and elimination. Survivability is quite simply tied to how much spare mass the design can carry, the more spare mass, the more you can convert that into armour.

Comment Re:Which raises the critical question: (Score 1) 415

When learning to code, compact code which is easy to read is the most important. Java was very verbose code requiring far more code to do the same thing. Doing loops is the most important thing in coding and how compactly and readably they are done, drives how learn able the language is. Ruby is very good at that and has the edge of Python in that regard. Ruby can achieve in one line of code what requires a whole paragraph of code in Java and that makes a big difference in understanding code. Being able to test individual lines of code also helps the learner.

Of course as thing advance the software engineer takes over with descriptions of actions and functions being coded in the background by the coding engine, now the quality of code that future coding engines produce will be an interesting thing.

Comment Re:It's Microsoft's fault (Score 1) 113

The problem is policing agencies have been left way behind and are still just barely catching up. This creates a problem private corporations have the computer skill but lack the legal propriety to conduct the policing role and shouldn't really be trusted with it as competitive pressure will not allow the impartial application of the policing role. Police agencies are woefully lacking in the skills, going so far as to actively avoid hiring the people that would be most useful in that role. It's likely that a specialist investigation only agency is required, pretty much an extension of communications authority agency.

Strictly investigation only, they would reach out to other agencies to conduct the arrest and of course those other agencies could reach out to the communications authority to conduct technical investigations. As a civilian agency the communications authority could hire the people most applicable to the job, most skilled at conducting technical investigation, most likely to find new investigative targets and of course most likely to establish communication link with the most affected companies in order to trigger new investigations.

People could call nickname them the Pooh Bears because of their love of honey pots.

Comment Re:Chasing Organised Crime (Score 1) 60

Not really, greedy and stupid go hand in hand. So they use the laziest easiest methods to lie, cheat and steal. The only skill they really make use of is the complete and total absence of conscience, although that is not really a skill more a birth defect of bad genes, very bad genes. Add in some IQ and the stop using phones but then they are far more destructive and become politicians and corporate executives.

Comment Chasing Organised Crime (Score 2) 60

Apparently those involved in organised crime are using the cheapest possible pre-payphones and sim cards swapping from one to another throughout the day. So police are looking for the odd phone out, coming from locations where tracked suspect persons are. So tracking all calls and eliminating the non-suspect ones to leave the ones they are looking for. So tracking the criminal activity associated with pre-pay phones and sim cards is a little more tricky than the movies make out.

Comment Re:That does it (Score 2) 116

Of course if you are entering a password whilst using an augmented reality device only you can see what you are doing and why you are doing it. So only way to defeat all those countless surveillance cameras http://www.telegraph.co.uk/tec... , http://www.nbcnews.com/id/4416.... Perhaps google glass isn't the problem perhaps the problem already exists.

Comment Re:Another child making unsupported claims (Score 1) 203

It's like a lot of these technological inventions coming up with the method is easy actually achieving it is harder. The quickest achievable one I can come up with is laser styled printer. Where the drum picks up the printing medium in a pass and you use a laser light to set and heat the medium in select areas and then apply it to the printing bed. As the drum makes each pass a layer is laid down, adhering to previous layers. Partially set printing media on the bed provides support for suspended parts, those parts as the same for the rest of of media are forced from the drum by the application of the appropriate charge at the appropriate location in conjunction with a charge in the printing media. All print media is partially set via electric current to provide support for set areas of print media, thus partial set media is recovered and recycled at the end of a print run. Thickness of each pass can be varied to accelerate printing.

So easy to came up with the idea, now putting it into practice is far more difficult including coming up with the printing medium. Of course the USPTO passes patents on far broader description with far less of an idea all to feed patent lawyers.

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