Check your hardware, including your pfsense and cablemodem.

I'm on Comcast, and I run three VPNs over my residential connection -- SSL outbound from an internal NAT client to my work network for about 8 hours a day, plus a nailed-up outbound IPSEC tunnel to my personal server in Chicago, and I also have a listener for inbound OpenVPN sessions. All this and I've been doing about 100GB/month in torrents, yet my connection is rock solid.

The "ride-sharing" services believe that smart phones are the enabling technology that explain why Things are Different Now and taxi laws should no longer apply. I would guess the rationale for this is the same. Of course a lot of people already had cell phones way back in the dark ages of Kozmo.com (2000 or thereabouts), but I'll grant relatively few people had GPS, especially linked to their phone, which would be very useful for automated dispatch optimization. Combining trips would be the key for making this viable.

Because your immune system is likely to kill you when it kicks into hyperdrive to clear the pathogens from your system:

The presence of microbial pathogens in the bloodstream triggers systemic inflammation and can lead to sepsis, which often overcomes the most powerful antibiotic therapies and causes multiorgan systems failure, septic shock and death. Sepsis afflicts 18 million people worldwide every year, with a 30-50% mortality rate even in state-of-the-art hospital intensive care units, and its incidence is increasing because of the emergence of antibiotic-resistant microorganisms.

The use of magnets here is not magical, just a way to pull out the nanobeads. They are coated with a human-derived factor that does all the hard work of pathogen selectivity:

These capture agents are composed of magnetic nanobeads coated with a genetically engineered version of human MBL that binds to a wide variety of pathogens and is easily manufactured but lacks key functional domains that could complicate therapy.

Via DSLreports:

I reached out to Comcast and was told by spokesman Charlie Douglas that the report is "wildly inaccurate."

"The anecdotal chat room evidence provided is not consistent with our agents’ messages and is not accurate," said Douglas. "Per our own internal review, we have found no evidence that these conversations took place, nor do we employ a Security Assurance team member named Kelly.

Douglas proceeded to state that "Comcast doesn’t monitor users’ browser software or web surfing and has no program addressing the Tor browser. Customers are free to use their Xfinity Internet service to visit any website or use it however they wish otherwise

Well, this nicely wraps-up my 16 years of involvement with /.

See you on SoylentNews.

an apartment where she does share the building with up to 15 other families.

That doesn't preclude installing an antenna, it just reduces your options. Multi-floor apartment balconies and/or windows usually get pretty good TV reception. If previous occupants had DBS dishes mounted, you can stick an antenna on that J-channel. And landlords are usually reasonable. You can always ask for permission to install an antenna, explaining the non-destructive mounting option (chimney straps, non-penetrating root mount, etc.) you'd like to use, and promise it'll be less unsightly than what you'll do if they refuse.

It could be technically the landlord's roof, not mmell's.

As long as mmell doesn't share the roof with other tennants, he has the right to mount an antenna up there.

Law of the land since 1996:

http://www.fcc.gov/guides/over...

Speaking of technical, it was only recently you can easily find actual frequencies used by TV stations (needed if you are using UHF wireless mics). After the DTV transition, I could not find actual frequencies used which drove me nuts because those that say it is same as NTSC are wrong

Umm, tvfool.com has had that info forever.

I linked to the FCC's DTV transition plan in my journal about OTA TV in 2007:

http://slashdot.org/journal/18...

Specifically:
"FCC DTV tentative frequency assigments"

http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs...

If you're talking about the center frequency, that's a very simple conversion. The Linux DVB package contains two text files listing center frequencies:

us-NTSC-center-frequencies-8VSB
us-ATSC-center-frequencies-8VSB

ATSC eg.:
A 57028615 8VSB
A 63028615 8VSB
A 69028615 8VSB
A 79028615 8VSB
A 85028615 8VSB

Sadly, even if we move to picocells, the antennas will still need to be "visible" and will still have some "size" to them due to the frequencies they need to handle.

Actually, wavelength at 800Mhz is only about 1ft (~30cm), so that's practical to hide. Hell, you could disguise it as a chimney or some other roof penetration.

My plan would be to mount them on telephone poles wherever available. There, they could just use business-class cable/DSL/FIOS service as the backhaul. Maybe that possibility would encourage Verizon to expand their FIOS deployment, since the big money is in cellular. AT&T's U-Verse fiber network could support it, too. Sprint/T-Mobile would be at a disadvantage, but maybe deals with local cable companies would help both sides compete. After all, where you need several picocells is right where there are already large populations, and already have wired options installed.

With that plan, cellular data could actually be both faster and cheaper than wired internet access.

I certainly don't need the mod points, but it's damn sad to see the ass-backwards moderation on this story.

This factually incorrect nonsense is +5:
* http://slashdot.org/comments.p...

While my correction actually got modded down:
* http://slashdot.org/comments.p...

Similarly with this thread, I'm clearly the only one who has provided information specific to the situation, and my comments get ignored, while generalized rants with terrible info are +5.

It's a crushing disappointment to see just what /. has turned into... I can only hope SoylentNews does better.

dial-up and ISDN have always referred to specific technology. Broadband has meant "not dial-up" and "fast".

Broadband has "always referred to specific technology" too.

4K camcorders!

The best part is hearing the lamentations of software patent attorneys and rejoicing in the sounds of their despair.

I can imagine plenty of uses for this in automated systems such as video system or other data gatherer. And even if it's to be used to record manually-triggered output, there's much to be said for the concept of "so much freaking storage that I can pay for this once and never have to think about it again over the lifetime of the equipment I'm using it with".

That's like saying you can take a car so long as you own the slim jim you use to get in it. You didn't make the asteroid, or oil deposit, or whatever it is. You have no inherent right to it.