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Comment Re:It's not Waymo's fault (Score 1) 114

You shouldn't worry about getting rear ended. That's the worry of the person behind you. It's their fault if you get rear ended.

Have you ever been rear-ended? I have, twice. Both times while I was stopped at a red light, so fault was absolutely incontestable. It's their fault, but you end up without a car. Sure, their insurance has to pay, but they only have to give you what it's worth, not what it will cost you to replace it, and the difference is significant. Not to mention that you could be injured. Your hospital bills will be covered, but you were still injured and have to deal with pain, the recovery, and maybe even some amount of permanent damage. My neck has never been quite right after the second time I was rear-ended.

Comment Re:Update (Score 1) 16

What conspiracy? China has announced they plan to land humans "around 2030", and the progress they have shown on a lander suggests that they are on track for that. They have heavy lift rockets capable of performing the mission with lunar orbit rendezvous (the same as NASA is planning), and they have already soft landed probes and rovers on the moon. They have a history of sticking to their announced timescales, which tend to be conservative.

Therefore the question is if NASA can get there first. Starliner is floundering, SpaceX's Starship is ambitious and they have a lot of work to do (man rating, in-orbit refuelling, and likely an unmanned trip around the moon). Then Blue Origin or SpaceX need to demonstrate a working lander, and that likely means an automated landing and return to orbit before a crew can go. NASA also needs to demonstrate lunar orbit rendezvous for whatever craft they end up using too.

It's December 2025, so they probably have around 4-5 years maximum, although China may go even sooner.

Comment Re:It's not Waymo's fault (Score 1) 114

I can tell you exsctly how many human drivers would respond in a situation like this, because I've seen it happen and have heard about it enough times: the driver would have accelerated away from the incident at high speed.

They would have done that after slamming on the brakes in a vain attempt to avoid hitting the dog, possibly losing control of their vehicle, and possibly causing a collision with other cars or objects. If their reaction failed to cause a serious accident, then maybe they'd have sped away.

Comment Re:Closed source software and assets are a bitch. (Score 1) 32

There weren't even that many good ones for Latin languages, until Google started releasing some under free licences.

Microsoft actually released a set of "Core Fonts for the Web" back in 1996, which while proprietary was available for free distribution with certain caveats.

Linux systems all had a way to get them - they often consist of a script to download the original font packages and then extracted them for use on Linux desktops. This greatly improved the typography so it was popular on Linux systems to install them. But you had to do it as the end user and the license restricted providers from pre-installing them.

They're not longer readily available but have been archived so many times there are many sites still hosting them. Apple licensed the fonts from Microsoft so Macs have them installed by default.

Google however was the first to make a bunch of open-source fonts.

Comment Re:One dog and one cat... (Score 1) 114

Many millions of those miles are on roads that never have animals on them.

Until last month, Waymo only allowed their cars to drive on city streets, no freeway driving. Even now, freeway usage is limited, only for selected riders (I'm not sure what the selection criteria is).

So, basically all of Waymo's millions of miles are on streets that often have animals on them.

Comment Re:Shuld the sue Waymo? (Score 1) 114

if it were a medical study on, for example, a robotic surgical system with 10% of the mortality rate of a human surgeon, there would still be concern if, every now and then the system removed a patient's appendix at random during heart surgery.

Sure, there would be concern, but unless you're dumb you will still pick the option with the 90% lower mortality/harm rate. Yeah, it's good to investigate and fix the problem (assuming fixing the problem doesn't increase the mortality rate), but you should still use the provably better option.

Comment Re:Wow! (Score 1) 88

It's only recently did tattoos go from underground shame to acceptance by most of the public. Probably started around the 90s, and from there the popularity of them took off.

Before that, usually a person with a tattoo was someone mixed up in bad dealings you wanted to avoid.

But since general perception has changed, they've gotten a lot more accepted and more people get them in places that are a lot more visible (people who got them usually had them hidden under clothing). In more conservative circles, this is still the norm and most hide it under clothing for work.

The real problem with tattoos is they're permanent, and I can't really tell you anything I liked 10 years ago I still like today, which means "forever" is kind of reserved for something I'm not quite sure what yet. Sure you can get tattoos removed, but that's often far more painful and far less effective than not getting it in the first place.

Then there's the body issue - well, a Navy sailor who get a ship tattooed on their body puts on a few pounds and the tattoo they got when they were young and fit looks gross and distorted once they are in their 40s and has a beer belly. Or as someone wrote, "A ship with a bulbous bow, now has only grown more bulbous over the years".

It's just something I haven't gotten because "forever" is a long time. And I'm sure tattoo artists have lots of stories of girlfriends now enemies they had to alter.

Comment Re:Unleashed animal runs into street? (Score 1) 114

The real question is if it simply failed to notice the dog or if it noticed the dog and didn't even attempt to stop.

Also, why it didn't attempt to stop (if it didn't). If it didn't attempt to stop because it correctly determined that attempting to stop would risk causing a more serious accident with other vehicles on the road, that's not only good, it's better than the vast majority of human drivers.

Comment Re:Apple does not preload apps (Score 1) 42

Only mediocre U2 albums.

That wasn't preloaded. Apple just added it to everyone's account back then.

It only got loaded because you sync your phone or iPod and because it was new, it automatically transferred over.

Last time I got a new phone, the very first time I opened the App Store it asked if I wanted to load on a bunch of apps as they were included but not pre-loaded. The last time Apple was asked to pre-load apps, that's what they did - they waited until the user clicked on App Store then presented them with the option to install the app (or not).

Nothing was pre-loaded, just if you had a certain model of phone they asked you (just once) if you wanted to add those apps to your phone. If you said no, you could always manually install them later.

Comment Re:Closed source software and assets are a bitch. (Score 2) 32

There aren't many good open source fonts for Japanese. There weren't even that many good ones for Latin languages, until Google started releasing some under free licences.

By "good" I mean good coverage of all characters, proper keming, good hinting so that they render well and consistently on screen and in print, etc. It's a lot of work, and Japanese has a lot of characters.

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