* Posts by Blake St. Claire

384 publicly visible posts • joined 20 Feb 2008

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Quit that job and earn $185k... cleaning up San Francisco's notoriously crappy sidewalks

Blake St. Claire

$185K vs. $71K

The value of all the benefits, e.g. medical, dental, pension, etc., may indeed add up to $185K, but $71K in gross pay probably translates to $50K (or less) in net take home pay after taxes.

I rather doubt anyone can live in San Fran on $50K. In a house or apartment that is. Clearly a lot of people are living there now sans abode. Or maybe the plan is to hire some of those people who are currently living on the streets. And will still be living on the streets but with $50K in disposable income.

Blake St. Claire

I miss the good old days in San Fran

When you could find a spot in the parking lot at Fisherman's Wharf. And if not there, a spot on the street a little way down the Embarcadero.

And the Exploratorium was free, or free for a donation, and nobody enforcing the donation.

And you could hop on a cable car anywhere, not just at the ends after standing in line for an hour. And the price was the same as a bus ride.

And walk around without stepping in shit.

Yes, I'm that old. And still trying to figure out why San Fran as much appeal as it does. Don't get me wrong, I think it's a nice place, and has a lot of charm. But then, a lot of other places have a lot of charm too. I wouldn't want to live there today.

Space, the final Trump-tier: America to beam up $8bn for Space Force

Blake St. Claire

Re: What are the five existing armed forces?

LMGTFY:

Army

Navy

Air Force

Marines

Coast Guard

Space Force uniform should be an orange jumpsuit. Nothing would give me more pleasure than to have Twitler model it for us in Leavenworth.

Twitler announced the first mission will be to the Sun. Asked whether it wouldn't be too hot, he said they'll go at night. Sarah Sanders later said that claims the Sun is hot are Fake News.

UK's first transatlantic F-35 delivery flight delayed by weather

Blake St. Claire

> 6,440km (4,000 mile) flight, ... one would expect there to be a minimum

> of two refuelling points on the journey from their current location on the

> US Marine Corps airfield at Beaufort, South Carolina, to RAF Marham in

> Norfolk.

Srsly? They're flying non-stop from Beaufort, NC? And will fly right over Boston/Logan and Bangor Intl.

Bangor even has an ANG base if they had some some qualms about flying military aircraft into a commercial airport. Although there's nothing wrong with that, per se, AFAIK. That would cut about 800nm off the trip and probably eliminate one aerial refueling.

WRT the idea of crating them up and shipping them. If "A ship in port is safe. But that's not what ships are built for." then I'd claim that a fighter jet in a crate is also safe, but that's not what fighter jets are for. If you're worried about a bit of egg on your face if you splash one, better to put them in a crate. (And then have egg on your face for a different reason.)

Linus Torvalds decides world isn’t ready for Linux 5.0

Blake St. Claire

Re: Wrong again, again.

> OpenSuse with version numbers 10, 11, 11.1 , 11.2, 12, 12.1, 42, 42.1, 42.2, 16.

There is an OpenSUSE 13. Leap 42 is in lieu of 14 (thank you Douglas Adams), and Leap 15 was just released. There is no 16 yet. And SUSE SLE 10, 11, 12, and then 15.

The real Ubuntu versions are 12.4, 12.10, 13.4, 13.10, 14.4, 14.10, etc. Those A...Z names are just nicknames.

Why do I know this crap? $deity only knows.

Penis pothole protester: Cambridge's 'Wanksy' art shows feted

Blake St. Claire

Re: One F35's worth

Yes, a small crack soon leads to its destruction.

Say what you want about what your roads are built on top of, but you don't have a monopoly on deep potholes. We too get bent rims too from deep holes. Broken springs though, not so much of those.

Blake St. Claire

One F35's worth

I'd wager that for the price of one F35 on HMS Queen Elizabeth you could fix every pothole in the UK; twice.

But over on this side of the pond, here in the pothole capital of the US, I've replaced bushings, and struts, but I've never broken springs or wheel bearings. What do they make springs out of over there that they're so fragile?

Donald Trump jumps on anti-tech bandwagon, gets everything wrong

Blake St. Claire
Holmes

Twitler? Factually challenged? No shit Sherlock.

You seem to be trying to imply that this is surprising.

He's got a beef with Amazon paying low taxes? Using WaPo's losses to offset Amazon's profits?

This from the guy who claimed to pay no taxes? And how exactly was he managing that, if not using losses in one place to offset profits elsewhere?

Or is "being smart" all it takes. I don't remember seeing a box to tick on my tax form labeled "credit for being smart – 100% of what you would otherwise owe." TurboTax doesn't seem to know about that box either.

Hey girl, move a little closer. 'Cause you're too gun shy. Hush, hush, bye says Pai

Blake St. Claire

Morals. Ethics. His Testicles.

All locked up in a desk drawer.

What's more shocking, IMO, is that he had to be told – seemingly after the fact – he couldn't have the gun.

Fer Chrisakes I had to take an ethics course when I joined and retake it again every year at my company, and I know from that that I can't give, and gobmint employees can't accept gifts^h^h^h^h^h bribes. And I"m pretty sure those gobmint employees get some similar kind of indoctrination when they come on board. Did he sleep through it?

OK, who is shooting at Apple staff buses in California? Knock it off

Blake St. Claire

Right to Bear Arms

> to take more direct action and is exercising their right to bear arms to make a point.

If they were only bearing their arms this wouldn't even be a story.

Shooting said arms at buses is not a right guaranteed by the Constitution.

At last, sex trafficking brought to an end with US House vote on new internet law (Yeah, right)

Blake St. Claire

Re: The House passed it?

You're missing the point. Next the Senate has to pass the exact same bill. Usually it takes several go-arounds before both houses pass the exact same text. Only then can it go to the Prezident for his signature. It might be a while.

As I said, I'm not holding my breath.

I'm pretty sure this was covered in fifth grade civics and again in eleventh grade. Were you not paying attention? (And yes, I'm presuming you're an American.)

Also he might like punishing Blue States, but this helps the little guys (or gals) at the expense of scumbags, so I'm not so sure he'll just sign it. Maybe his head will explode from thinking about it. We can hope.

Blake St. Claire

The House passed it?

Yawn.

Call me when the Senate and House have both passed the reconciled bills and Twitler has signed it.

Not holding my breath.

Symantec ends cheap Norton offer to NRA members

Blake St. Claire

awwww, poor precious snowflakes can't stand the heat

NRA is happy when things go their way.

But not when the shoe is on the other foot?

Live by the sword, die by the sword. Or in this case by the AR-15.

NRA gives FCC boss Ajit Pai a gun as reward for killing net neutrality. Yeah, an actual gun

Blake St. Claire

Re: @Kaltern

> Or they make their own ammo

Brass has a typical lifespan of about 10 reloads. And we could stop selling 5.56 NATO brass to civilians at the same time too.

Blake St. Claire

Re: We have the clueless leading the blind...

@ bombastic bob

Re: > and NOBODY can pay extra for a 'fast lane'.

and: > That's right. We'll all just FLY COACH.

Nobody is stopping you from buying your own T1 or T3 line. Go right ahead. Net Neutrality isn't stopping you.

Please go educate yourself about what Net Neutrality really is.

Bombastic is particularly apt, IMO.

What did we say about Tesla's self-driving tech? SpaceX Roadster skips Mars, steers to asteroids

Blake St. Claire

Re: Tax write-off

You get tax write offs for sending your stuff to the (celestial) dust bin?

Does everyone get to do that, or only the 1%? Because I have lots of stuff I could dispose of, and if I can get a tax write off for doing it, so much the better.

Admittedly putting my old stuff out on the kerb isn't nearly as exciting as shooting it into space––

European court: Let's not kid ourselves, Uber. You're a transport firm, not a 'digital service'

Blake St. Claire

Non-professional drivers?

Oh, are they not paying the drivers now?

FWIW, over here on the left side of the pond, I see cars with both Uber and Lyft stickers in the window.

Trying to think if I've seen cars with both Uber and Ola stickers when I was in India.

Quentin Tarantino in talks to make Star Trek movie

Blake St. Claire

> Dr. Who + Star Trek crossover. Heh.

No, not really what I had in mind. More for having a laugh at the expense of the culturally ignorant over on this side of the pond; who don't or won't get the joke.

> With plenty of hookers. and blackjack. and Daleks.

Hookers and blow: good. Daleks: bad. See above.

Blake St. Claire

> Hugh Laurie as the doctor

I'd rather see David Tennant or Peter Capaldi.

More than half of GitHub is duplicate code, researchers find

Blake St. Claire

Re: Forking right! ?

> I can't actually delete/erase my fork,

Sure you can. Go to the repo settings, scroll to the bottom. Push the delete button

Tesla buys robot maker. Hang on, isn't that your sci-fi bogeyman, Elon?

Blake St. Claire

Tony Stark?

All his fanbois who love to refer to him as a real life Tony Stark seem to be missing in action.

Is the FCC purposefully screwing up US school broadband projects?

Blake St. Claire

Re: Socialism

> I have 200mbps supplied by a cable provider because of open war

> amongst the telecoms companies.

And what do you pay for that? I have Comcast and Verizon FIOS available to me, but I can't get broadband-only FIOS service at even the lowest speed tier for less than $75 per month. Even harder is to get it unbundled from a phone and cable TV, the former I don't need, the latter I don't want.

There isn't even a hint of competition.

I call crack pipe.

Apple Cook's half-baked defense of the Mac Mini: This kit ain't a leftover

Blake St. Claire

Re: Pity

> Build in wireless dongles for keyboard and mouse...

I have a pair of late 2012s, one on my kitchen counter, one on my TV; they have bluetooth. I use Apple's bluetooth keyboard and mouse on both.

What I'd like to see is Apple support the LG Ultrawide monitors natively. I'm tired of having to patch my system after every OS update.

Please replace the sword, says owner of now-hollow stone

Blake St. Claire

>According to the legend, the wizard Merlin embedded a sword into a

>stone, swearing that whoever pulled it out again would become king of

>all England Britain.

and

>The sword was stuck in a bloody ANVIL

Meh. "...a great stone four square, like unto a marble stone; and in midst thereof was like an anvil of steel a foot on high, and therein stuck a fair sword naked by the point, and letters there were written in gold about the sword that said thus:—Whoso pulleth out this sword of this stone and anvil, is rightwise king born of all England."

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1251/1251-h/1251-h.htm#link2HCH0005

BOFH: Oh dear. Did someone get lost on the Audit Trail?

Blake St. Claire

We have dyed diesel in the US too

It's also used for farm gear and #2 heating oil.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heating_oil

Moon trumps Mars in new US space policy

Blake St. Claire

Re: He, who controls L1, L2, L3, L4 controls all space

> And what about the spice? Huh?

Today L1, tomorrow Arrakis.

But first we need to get Baron Harkonnen out of the White House.

Blade Runner 2049 review: Scott's vision versus Villeneuve's skill

Blake St. Claire

It's definitely worth seeing

I saw the original in the theater in 1982, and the "official" director's cut in the theater in 1992. Looking at wikipedia I find that I missed a chance to see the 70mm working print "director's cut" in 1990. Or not, maybe I just don't remember passing on it (had babies and didn't get out much.) I liked the 1982 version. In 1992 I thought the 1992 version was better.

I liked 2049. The plot hangs together better than the original and there are some interesting twists that keep you guessing. The visuals are stunning. It dragged a bit toward the end.

Overall thought, definitely worth seeing IMO.

Beach, please... Billionaire VC finally opens way to waves

Blake St. Claire
Holmes

Obvious man is obvious

> based on usage charts that his team compiled – which conveniently showed the beach is

> not visited very often.

Bleeding obvious, isn't it? It's hard to visit when the gate is locked closed. I'm sure that fact wasn't lost on the judge either. Sherlock icon, as in "no shit Sherlock."

Why Uber isn't the poster child for capitalism you wanted

Blake St. Claire

Perhaps not, but upsetting the entrenched incumbents was definitely a win where I live.

Being able to hail a ride. Having drivers use a Nav for the (usually) most direct route. Being able to pay with a credit card. I can't tell you how many times a taxi driver told me "the machine doesn't work." Ever since Uber and Lyft appeared on the scene "the machines" all magically work.

I won't use Uber because of their shenanigans. I'd guess about half the cars I see have both Uber and Lyft stickers, so I don't believe I'm suffering by not using Uber. I do think everyone that's driving for them are being duped, but we'll have to wait and see how long it is before real self-driving cars are a real thing.

What's that, Equifax? Most people expect to be notified of a breach within hours?

Blake St. Claire

Re: Still not clear on the actual size of this breach

When first I checked my wife _was_ potentially at risk.

Checked back a few days later and now she isn't.

Which is it? I'll check back again in a few days.

Facebook posts put Pharma Bro Martin Shkreli in prison as a danger to society

Blake St. Claire

Re: Lovely, lovely man

> Not even Hermes could limbo dance under the bar this guy sets.

And some of us thought Twitler had already set the bar too low for that.

Surprising nobody, lawyers line up to sue the crap out of Equifax

Blake St. Claire

Re: Insider trading?

I think a number in the low 300s would be sufficient. (Just ask anyone with a 500 score how hard it is to get credit. Hint: next to impossible.)

A lifetime limited to _one_ "secured" credit card with a $250 limit. A checking account (you lot call it a current account) with a balance of $437.73 with $20 per month in fees. And a 1986 Ford Fiesta with 300K miles on it that burns oil and needs a clutch.

I presume you lot on your side of the pond are familiar with what a secured credit card is.

Violent moon mishap will tear Uranus a new ring or two

Blake St. Claire

New Uranus?

What happened to the old one?

Oracle staff report big layoffs across Solaris, SPARC teams

Blake St. Claire

RIF ins't Oracle-speak

RIF (Reduction In Force) is a pretty common expression on this side of the pond, although Layoff is perhaps the more commonly used term here. Or a furlough, for putting employees on leave while retooling a plant, as used to be common in the automotive industry. Now I think they just get laid off.

I never really did understand "redundant" as a verb for termination. For all anyone knows you could have been 'redundant' for years before anyone finally got around to terminating you.

Linus Torvalds passed a kidney stone and then squeezed out Linux 4.13

Blake St. Claire

Re: Is the sky falling? Or, ...

>I am a UNIX expert ... and could not do anything even close to what I had been doing/using since 1979

In a time of drastic change it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned usually find themselves equipped to live in a world that no longer exists. –– Eric Hoffer

or

In times of profound change, the learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists. –– Al Rogers

And I'm not sure what you're on about, netstat, ifconfig, etc., etc., all still exist in all the Linux distributions I use. Often in add-on packages. Given what you've said about the difference between SunOS, Solaris, AIX, HP/UX, *BSD, et al, I don't know why you'd have such a hard time with Linux.

User thanked IT department for fast new server, but it had never left its box

Blake St. Claire

credit for something I didn't do?

Sometimes.

More often I get blamed for something I didn't do. Which I have to then fix.

Oldest flying 747 finally grounded, 47 years after first flight

Blake St. Claire

>> ... Pan American Airlines, which flew it more than 18,000 times...

> That's a lot of flights. What could they have possibly been doing?

At one flight per day that's 49 years. Pan Am went out of business in 1991, so three flights per day for 20 years would more than cover it. If they count each leg as a flight, a R/T JFK to SFO with a stop in somewhere in the middle – which doesn't seem far fetched – is four flights per day right there.

Blake St. Claire

Puny fifth engine in that pic

I was living in Johannesburg (Sandton) in 1971 when SAA took delivery of its first 747. It brought its replacement engine with it, attached to the wing. Somewhere I have a picture of it flying over our flat on its approach to JNB.

Microsoft president exits US govt's digital advisory board as tech leaders quit over Trump

Blake St. Claire

I know it's considered poor taste to correct people's spelling mistakes

But the correct spelling is "Nazi."

Not "Alt Right."

Steve Bannon is a Nazi. They guy that drove his car into the crowd and killed Heather Heyer is a Nazi. Donald J. Trump is a Nazi.

Thank you.

No, the cops can't get a search warrant to just seize all devices in sight – US appeals court

Blake St. Claire

In Salina Kansas you're safe.

It's the geographical center of the lower 48. One or two steps off the spot though and you're fair game.

In all seriousness, here's a map:

https://www.aclu.org/sites/default/files/styles/scale_1200w/public/wysiwyg/constitutionfreezonemap.jpg?itok=umNWZ7vX

Dear racist Airbnb host, we've enrolled you in an Asian American studies course

Blake St. Claire

Re: Contrition

> Strange - "Barker" doesn't sound like a Native American name, and they're the only

> ones who can legitimately claim to be "not foreign"

Gotta wonder what you're smoking. Even the so called Native Americans came to the Americas from somewhere else.

Hence why I like the Canadian term "First Nations."

Now Uber sued for textual harassment

Blake St. Claire

Holy Shit

If Uber were public I'd be shorting their shares like there's no tomorrow.

Darkness to fall over North America from a total solar eclipse

Blake St. Claire

Darkness fell over America in November

It hasn't gotten any lighter.

Utah fights man's attempt to marry laptop

Blake St. Claire

Re: OK Computer

>>Sticky issue.

>Ewww.... use soap and water please.

Bleach.

Chipotle: Hackers did to our registers what our burritos did to your colon

Blake St. Claire

I'm a little unclear about what POS means

Piece Of Shit or Point Of Sale.

Or both.

The revolution will not be televised: How Lucas modernised audio in film

Blake St. Claire

THX name derived?

>While it is sometimes hinted that the "THX" name is derived from Holman's initials (plus

>an "X" because it looks cool) sci-fi movie buffs will be aware that THX is an obvious

>reference to Lucas's first film, THX 1138, a soporific low-budget cult dystopian slow-burner

>from 1971

1967. Electronic Labyrinth THX-1138 EB

Also the license plate (number plate to you lot) on the '32 Ford Deuce Coupe in American Graffiti – THX 138 – which began filming in 1972. And one or two oblique references in Star Wars.

So, THX derived from Holman's initials? Pipe Dream as far as I can tell.

Industrial Light & Magic: 40 years of Lucas's pioneering FX-wing

Blake St. Claire

Re: Ugh, that's what I forgot to do yesterday, watch Star Wars

> I bought the "original" Star Wars trilogy only to find it was the awful Special Editions..

> Seems you can no longer buy the proper versions.

Look for Team Negative1's Star Wars Silver Screen Edition mp4. It's transferred from an original 1977 35mm theater print someone discovered in a closet somewhere and then digitally restored. Apparently they even did a Blu-Ray disc.

I can't help you with episodes V and VI though.

Swamp-draining Trump pushes ex-AT&T lobbyist to oversee AT&T mega-merger

Blake St. Claire

You misspelled Twitler

I can see how it'd be easy to do.

Wait – we can explain, says Moby, er, Docker amid rebrand meltdown

Blake St. Claire
Headmaster

Nice try

Moby (Dick) the whale, was a sperm whale.

If I'm not mistaken, the whale in your picture is a baleen whale.

Boss swore by 'For Dummies' book about an OS his org didn't run

Blake St. Claire

Re: But the real issue is

> Hershey's Kisses as evidence

That'll serve you right for buying pretty much anything Hershey makes – I won't touch it myself. I prefer Ghirardelli chocolates. And real Cadbury chocolate, not the crap Hershey sells here under license.

Why you brits look for the cheapest crap there is when you come over here is beyond me. Staying at cheap hotels because they've got free breakfast and then whinging about the bacon? For God's sake, go somewhere that's got good bacon if you want good bacon. Likewise don't buy the Hershey's shite. Oh, sure, the good stuff'll cost more. You get what you pay for.

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