* Posts by Rattus Rattus

1068 publicly visible posts • joined 15 Oct 2009

Down Under gamers get closer to 18+ rating

Rattus Rattus

Too little too late

Oz gamers are already used to bypassing stupid laws laws by ordering (more cheaply too) from overseas, faking country-of-origin on digital delivery stores and just plain old piracy. The government's foot-dragging over the years has helped drive the decline of local games retailers.

Engineering student cracks major riddle of the universe

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@ Someone Else

"how the Tea Party can find enough mass to hold it together?

Oh, that's an easy one. It's a simple matter of density.

SendSpace

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After reading the title,

I was hoping this app would be something like a reverse version of Awesome Drop. Something where I can quickly set up a one time connection to whatever PC I'm using at the time and dump files straight across to it from my phone. Been looking for something like that for a long time.

Remastered 4K, 3D Titanic steams towards cinemas

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@Adus

"The point is, people who can enjoy a movie in 2D without any ill effects can not enjoy a 3D movie in some circumstances."

So go see your films in 2D and stop bitching about them also being available in 3D for those of us who do like that.

That said, if 3D's not done properly, right from the start of filming, it's shit. And I wouldn't go see Titanic whether in 2D or 3D cos it's also shit. However, can the whingers please shut the hell up about how other people watch their films. I've never seen a 3D film in any of my local cinemas that wasn't also available in 2D, so it's not like you're missing out.

PARIS team to tackle the ultimate post-pint snack

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WTF?

The mere thought of most of the foods people have been mentioning makes me feel a bit ill. All that grease... <shudder> I eat salads, vegetables and lean meat by preference, why am _I_ the one who's a bit overweight? Is that fair, I ask you?

Rattus Rattus

re: "They call the resulting putty-like 'product' - cake"

Nah, that's gotta be a lie.

Mumsnet founder: Our members are 'very keen' on PORN ...

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re: "hats to jerk off"

No, no, you need a helmet for that. With chin strap and reinforced mouthguard.

(with thanks to Henry Rollins)

Stargazers spot dark energy

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WiggleZ Dark Energy Survey?

"Beep beep, chugga chugga, big red cosmological constant?"

Sleazy Aussie 'hot babes' network goes MIA

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"Bro" Australian?

Nah. It's certainly a very New Zealand word, but the only times I ever hear it used here in Australia is by Kiwi immigrants.

Software pirates should offer up more booty, says BSA

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re "will get a lot of criminals off the streets for a long time"

No it won't, they'll still be in their offices lobbying for higher fines.

Facebook planking game claims its first victim

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Thank you, Acton Beale

for single-handedly improving the human race's gene pool by removing yourself from it.

Google lobbying to make driverless cars legal in Nevada

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Pfft!

They don't know what high petrol prices are.

Use of Weapons declared best sci-fi film never made

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Yes,

I thought Look to Windward would be far more easily filmed than most of Banks's books. Since the Mind in question is motivated by it's historical part in the Idiran war, and the war forms an important historical event in the background to the story, it would also make a good followup to a film of Consider Phlebas.

Rattus Rattus

re: "I didn't really like Consider Phlebas, can't remember why"

Maybe because Horza was a bit of a whiny emo?

Judge approves handover of BitTorrent IP addresses

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"seeking the identity of anybody who downloaded the Sylvester Stallone movie The Expendables"

...to apologise for it?

Star Wars: From dream sci-fi bride to perfect Blu-ray wife

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The final nail in the Star Wars coffin

for me, was Mass Effect. Similar feeling setting, but much better characterisation, story and technology. I'll still watch the Star Wars films on occasion, but they no longer hold my interest for long.

Natty Narwahl: Ubuntu marine mammal not fully evolved

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Unity

I tried out Unity on my netbook for a while. God it sucked, I've gone back to Gnome 2. I don't like Gnome 3 so far, and I don't like KDE. I guess for my next desktop I'll either return to a shell window or I might try Enlightenment again.

Vote now for the best sci-fi film never made

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@Kevin Johnston

Top ten? How about top forty-five?

Boffins pull plug on SETI alien-seeking antenna array

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That's fucking disgusting

We can spend shitloads of money bombing a second-world nation back into the third-world, or hand out trillions to bankers after they've already blown trillions on bad decisions, but we can't come up with a handful of change (by comparison) to do real, important work? Where the fuck are people's priorities?

BTW, I don't usually swear that much, but this kind of thing gets me really fucking angry.

If anyone knows of a public collection going around to raise funds for basic science, post it here and I for one will gladly donate to it. If part of the same fund is diverted to sending people round to bankers' houses to hit them in the kneecaps with a cricket bat, so much the better.

Rattus Rattus

Relevance

This post has none.

Portal 2

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Happy

"It's bEen a LOng tIMe"

More GLaDOS at last, I've missed her. Surely one of the best videogame villains of all time. I've completed it twice so far, and am considering a third time. A second playthrough is worthwhile for the developer commentary, which is something I'd like to see more devs include.

Internet child porn investigators net South Aust MP

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Decimate

I think you'll find only 1 in 10 of SA police even know how to spell decimate. Asking them to know what it means is way too much.

Calling all readers: Want some new icons?

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"A wanker icon. For wankers"

I don't understand - we already have two Steve Jobs icons.

The best sci-fi film never made: Also-rans take a bow

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While I am...

...a bit disappointed to see the work of Peter F. Hamilton and Alistair Reynolds failed to make the cut, I note with interest some of Iain M Banks's best work has not appeared on the runner-up list.

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Yep,

I've been using the comments on the previous artilce (and now the list in this one) to find stuff to add to my ebook reader.

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@Dr Dan Holdsworth

I really wish sci-fi films didn't get made with the public in mind at all. They won't appreciate good sci-fi, so why turn out shitty action flicks with a slight sci-fi flavour for them? I'd rather see sci-fi get made just for a niche audience - ie those who understand enough to appreciate good sci-fi.

It won't make a killing at the box office, though, so it'll never happen. Maybe someone should let execs know just how much geeks are willing to spend on a show if it's really good - first in the cinema, then buying the BluRay, any merchandising, etc. Over time, that'd add up to be way more than box office takings alone ever could.

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Eh?

Pandora's Star and Judas Unchained are in a totally different alternate-future to the Void trilogy. I don't get what you mean about context.

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@David Evans

What? Whatwhatwhat? The Forever War? Really? Oh, I hope he does it justice!

Pope says gravity proves technology can't supplant God

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Aw, bless 'im...

Still thinking he's relevant.

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re: Lay off everyone

"So much so in fact that it requires a 'many worlds' theory to account for the very existence of our planet. That taken into consideration, atheism and and belief in a higher power require approximately equal amounts of faith."

Not remotely. The odds for the existence of an Earthlike world are pretty good actually. The odds of the universe itself coming into being? We don't know. We don't have enough information. You really can't infer anything from that. And "we don't know" DOES NOT mean "God did it," it only means we don't yet know, and don't know if we can ever know.

Besides, even if "God did it," that just turns the question into "So where did God come from then?" Any answer to that can just as easily be applied to the beginning of the universe in the same way, without any need to invoke a "God" in the first place.

Equal amounts of faith? Not hardly. The God-botherers are the ones postulating the existence of a God in the first place, it's up to them to find hard evidence that he exists. The rest of us simply have more useful things to do. We don't need to prove nonexistence.

UK is fifth free-est nation on the internet

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Australia is more free than the UK?

Wow, guys, you really ARE in trouble.

Apple sues Samsung over Galaxy look-and-feel

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But if they do that,

then they can't make calls!

So, what's the best sci-fi film never made?

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@Mike Brown

Mass Effect would be a fantastic movie, and good news - it's already in the works, with Bioware staff involved in it. Although, I bet they're going to pretend Shepard was male...

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@Petrea Mitchell

There would be nothing "mini" about that series. Maybe as three seasons of a TV show?

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@Jose Bernardo B R Silva

Farnham's Freehold irritated the hell out of me, as does around half of Heinlein's work. I think it's his staunchly libertarian protagonists, they're annoying as all hell.

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@Paul_Murphy

I think Nightfall would make a fantastic movie. Unfortunately, it's already been made, into a shitty movie.

XXX domain names go live

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India and Saudi Arabia...

...have already reportedly indicated that they will stand at the shoreline ordering the tide not to come in.

There, FTFY.

STONERS are DESTROYING the PLANET

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@AC again

I see, thanks for clarifying your point of view. I don't agree with you about what you consider substance abuse, but I do think you're on to a good thing with the natural highs.

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Thumb Down

@Slim Chance

So, are you going to volunteer to lead by example and give up all alcohol, or cigars, or coffee, or whatever your own preferred vice is? This just sounds like more of the "I don't use it, therefore nobody should be allowed to" nonsense spouted by the control freaks who want to ban everything in society.

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@AC

"OTOH, since I know plenty who enjoy a glass of wine or beer without ever getting drunk, but no one who smokes weed without getting high, the percentage of users to abusers is lower with alcohol."

By this sentence, you seem to be implying that any intoxication from a substance = abuse of that substance. I do not believe this is a valid link to make, especially in this context.

"Getting high" with weed is nothing like getting falling-down-drunk. It's much more similar to becoming mildly tipsy. You wouldn't consider drinking to that level to be alcohol abuse, would you? To be impaired by weed to the same level as impairment due to drunkenness, you would have to smoke most of an ounce all to yourself - a ludicrous amount of pot to smoke all at once, and certainly nothing you could consume in a short amount of time.

Since you have said you abused both alcohol and pot, perhaps it's simply that you cannot imagine any use that is not abuse? I smoke weed regularly and I would certainly not consider my low levels of use to be "abuse." It is, rather, a relaxing way to wind down at the end of a week, certainly more relaxing and "cleaner-feeling" than the times I've chosen to wind down with alcohol instead.

I'd say, rather than banning things, let people consume whatever intoxicants they choose, and stop funding the expensive, failing War on Drugs.

Microsoft breaks own world record for IE nonsense

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@Michael Cullen, re:720p video in a browser on a netbook.

"Try that with Firefox on Linux"

I already do, thanks. A nice smooth 24 fps. U mad, bro?

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True,

He's a marketroid, isn't he? Why expect him to understand anything that comes out of his own mouth?

Paramount to recount The Martian Chronicles

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@Martin Gregorie

Ooh, yes, the Engines of Light trilogy would be great on film. I'd also like to see Alastair Reynolds' Revelation Space series filmed.

MYSTERY of huge Canadian chicken-shed EXPLOSION

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Finally...

...found where Saddam had been hiding those WMDs.

Earthquake emergency drives Kiwi copyright bill

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All this will do

is help raise the popularity of encrypted, anonymous P2P software. You can't put the genie back in the bottle.

Office workers: 'The best way to upgrade a PC is to smash it'

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Re: Why use a sledgehammer?

The satisfaction?

No stranger to the moleskin trouser

Rattus Rattus

Good stuff

but too kind to .NET I feel.

GNOME 3: Shocking changes for Linux lovers

Rattus Rattus

Ew.

Time to upgrade my UI, I think - from Gnome to /bin/bash

Sex Party's down-under struggles with dominant Catholic priests

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@ZimboKraut

"If these sex party people feel like presenting themselves and telling the world, that they think everyone can screw around and get all sorts of STIs then that is their business and their oppinion, which I don't like, I totally disagree with, but I will respect it."

If you're going to comment on the Sex Party's policies, please ensure you have actually read and understood those policies before making your comment. This would show you just how much was wrong with that statement.

Open source .NET mimic lands on Android

Rattus Rattus

Last thing I need

is for my phone to catch mono. It actually sounds more like MRSA, or some flesh-eating infection.

If you want to write portable code, just don't use .NET!