The engineering problem of sending a human to another planet is very different from that of sending a robot. And the resulting knowledge will be different too. Why not do both?

Just don't bother to go to movies. They're expensive, dumb, and annoying, with or without the foibles of your fellow movie fans.

The sound is louder, the previews are more irritating, and the movies are more mindless. This is fun? The occasional good flick can be viewed in comfort and privacy in your home theater (or other device) on your own terms.

Republicans, hell. I'm a hippie, and most of my brain is asleep most of the... What were we talking about?

So gamers think that they can make or break an OS? Methinks there is a somewhat exaggerated idea of gamer clout, as compared to the universe of people who buy computers. As the Big Dog says, do the arithmetic.

Obligatory angry flower: http://www.angryflower.com/bobsqu.gif

That works out to a radius of about 60 miles. Doesn't sound nearly as impressive as 12,000 sq mi.

In digital audio, nothing can be louder than 0dB. So, if you're an ambitious engineer, and want your song to sound louder than the rest, but you still can't go above 0dB, you employ tricks to make your song apparently louder. These tricks include compression (reducing dynamic range), but more sophisticated versions like multi-band compression where different frequency ranges are compressed differently, or look-ahead limiters that sample audio ahead of the playback to limit more smoothly. However, compression reduces dynamic range, throwing away information and resolution, and lessens fidelity. So if I'm an engineer and want to make a recording that sounds really good, with a wide dynamic range, it's not gonna sound very loud on the radio or CD player next to the other guy's highly compressed song. That means that in order to satisfy my client and have a song that's sufficiently "loud," I've got to compress the crap out of it. Of course, since no song can go over 0dB, that "loudness" is a subjective thing. Until now, it was difficult to come up with a way to measure it, and therefore a way to control it. Bob Ludwig is a famous mastering engineer, and to hear that he's involved with this effort tells me it's the real deal. I own a small recording studio, and I have to deal with clients all the time that want their music louder. Maybe I'll finally have some good tools to say "This is as loud as it's gonna get."

Back in the 70's, I lived in Bend, Oregon. I played in a country band (there wasn't hardly any other kind there), and we had a (very) funky gig in Prineville, highlighted by a scene I remember vividly still. An extremely large individual, dressed in flannel and overalls and looking and smelling thoroughly unwashed, came up to the stage and said, "Y'all know Home on the Range?" We tried to explain politely that it wasn't in our set list. After a little back and forth on the subject, he said, "Y'all play Home on the Range or I'm gonna come up there and mix it up a little." After a brief on-stage discussion we decided that the key of C was our best bet, and proceeded. That's gonna be some serious culture shock to a tiny rural bump on the map like that.

If my arithmetic doesn't fail me, that's over 1500 gallons a day. We live in a dry area, and last summer the two of us averaged well under 200 gallons a day and did just fine. Of course we don't water a lawn or maintain a swimming pool...