Posts by Psyx
1575 posts • joined Friday 4th June 2010 10:31 GMT
Re: Fixed it.
""Need" is highly dubious in this context."
Have you been to A&E or an inner-city classroom recently?
"So pretending that money earned in the UK using UK infrastructure is actually earned elsewhere and paying taxes in Ireland is the right thing?"
It is if you're an accountant working for the benefit of shareholders.
It's just not the most honest, honourable and morally decent thing to be doing.
I -personally- would not dream of short-changing the society which educated me, treated me when I was sick, supported me when I was impoverished and made my life far better than that of 99% of the planet. But businesses do not see themselves as indebted or bound to a society
Re: Legal opinion needed
"Yes, if Ford was inclined to do so they could ask for the video to be removed or for it to be put into their revenue streams. Although it depends on the video, what is said etc"
I'm not too sure.
After-all, if that was the case then surely aggressive companies could effectively censor all negative PR and reviews? The fact that they don't (because let's face it: Some would) is probably indicative.
"I doubt that that is the case."
Whereas I personally doubt that mega-corps send out legal requests without waving them at their legal department first.
"The resulting video is clearly a composite work (generated imagery on one hand and player input and commentary on the other). Copyright law is clear that each party retains its own copyrights in such cases."
Depends *where*, of course. I suspect that Nintendo have enough wit to have made sure what they are doing is legally correct or at least viable.
Morally a little questionable and a PR shot in the foot, but probably legally viable...
Re: Well
"How many of those 'scientists'..."
They have relevant degrees and are working in the field. They are scientists. Using inverted commas is just pathetic. Before we even get to what you are trying to put across you are already making yourself look pretty ignorant. Don't try to undermine the qualifications of those who are far better qualified than you. Unless you work in the field. Otherwise your opinion on their qualifications is utterly worthless.
"would be out of a job next year if climate change didn't exist? Unbiased? Perhaps the correct title should have been 97% of climate scientists are praying climate change is mans fault because they really want a google glass."
Yeah, How many Physicists would be out of a job too if their work was mooted, so that field must be bullshit too.
That's just weak. And biased. And downright ignorant.
So if I scrawl constructive criticism of the latest Dan Brown book on the front of your house and over your car bonnet with brake fluid, it should be allowed to stay there?
Re: Oh Lewis!
Bet you never made a bow that could kill at twenty paces either did you, killjoy?
Which - if anything - is an argument for controls on ammunition, rather than controls on 3D printers.
Re: Fraid not
"All it proves is that Prenda Law wasn't smart enough and rich enough to bribe the right (AKA cheapest) politicians."
What do politicians have to do with the judgements made under Common Law?
If you're going to slate your legal system, at least try to understand it first.
Re: unintended f*c*i*g consequences.
"Except when it comes to alcohol. And a few other things that I can't remember at the moment."
And sex, of course.
Re: unintended f*c*i*g consequences.
"My Dad told me he got a severely thick ear off his grandad once when my Dad, being a dopey teenager at the time..."
At Xmas my step-father told me how they used to make a somewhat more dangerous form of devil-bangers from .50 BMG ammunition thrown out of the planes by damaged American bombers coming in to land.
The HEI ammunition was best for it.
It made me pinching 12 gauge ammunition from Barber pockets and making explosives with it as a child look positively safe!
Re: OOPS!
"yes, we have only to look at Mexico, our peaceful neighbor to the south, to see what a total ban on private ownership does for the crime rate. "
Correlation is not causation.
Banning firearms itself didn't 'do' anything to the crime rate in itself in Mexico. You're making a ridiculous argument.
It was the turf wars of psychotic murdering assholes involved in the drug industry that caused the high rate of crime. Which of course was caused by overseas drug demand. And the total failure of law enforcement to enforce the legislation once in place due to corruption and poor quality of policing. And further worsened by the number of firearms being smuggled into Mexico along a porous border from the US.
You can't say 'firearm regulation doesn't work' if it's not enforced, if people are smuggling in weapons as fast as they are taken off the streets, and unless there is a concerted effort to get them off the streets. It's like saying 'dieting doesn't work' while sneaking off for a BigMac every lunchtime.
Re: OOPS!
"But that was then and before things like 9/11, 7/7 and now 4/15 (Boston)."
And yet after The Troubles, Guy Fawkes, and a bunch of airliners getting blown up in the 70s.
Really, 9/11 has zero bearing. It's a kid. And not even technically a real explosive. Policing and Prosecution alike need to apply the law with a degree of common f**king sense, rather than with the obstinate wankery of a recently divorced traffic warden with trapped wind.
Re: Fair Game is a much better expose..
"so you have to spend well over 50% of your time watching your back from treachery by your own people."
Only putting 50% of your effort into the job isn't good enough. You have to put in 100% and take the shafting.
Re: @ Angry Quaker
Plenty of munitions have 'use by' dates.
Why do you think the US tosses so many Tomahawks around after a 'dry' war-free period?
Re: Too much in too small a space
Of course, you know more about the entire project sat in your armchair than all the people with Phds working on it.
Bullets fly so fast because they are dense and fast. They travel much less further than they could because they are fired at a shallow angle. Add a guidance system and you can loft them at a more optimum trajectory like a arrow, overcoming any deficit due to lower mass. Put in some dense material such as tungsten or DU and you can partially overcome any shortfall due to not using lead, anyway.
In short, I'm pretty sure the well-paid people have thought a bit more about it than even you, so I don't see the point of rubbishing a project that we know barely anything about.
Re: "Jackal" eat your heart out.
"Well, given that the record for sniper hits is documented at 2815m, increasing the range to 3km doesn't sound like much of an achievement."
Smug stat; moot point.
It was a highly trained sniper, using a large AMR, and wasn't even a first-round kill. That's of very little comparative value. Whereas a good shooter with a firearm of much more reasonable size and calibre can wax someone 1km away without much fuss. Using extreme examples isn't really of much use to anyone.
I'm pretty sure .50 HMG gunners in SF roles have mowed plenty of people at more than 3km anyway.
Re: "Jackal" eat your heart out.
"and that means there's not a politician in the world will be safe. Has Obama authorised this project?"
That's a stupid-ass comment.
Sniper rifles can already hit people over a Km away and have been able to do so for years, and yet politicians aren't being gunned down by them in droves. What makes you think that increasing that range to maybe 3km will make a lick of difference.
Re: Inertial? no way -"Still, it would be WAY better to have that for a grenade launcher."
"Far more people in history have been killed with small, cheap weapons that with large, complex ones. If you must develop these things, make it so only governments can afford them."
You mean like AK-47s and RPG-7s?
Don't lay the blame at cheap weapons solely on America's doorstep when plenty of other people are selling even cheaper ones. Most of the weapons being used in worldwide conflicts today have never been near CONUS.
Re: Quite
"Answer, "Tea please!" means "I desire some tea.""
To be fair; that's informal. You'd say that over a friend's house, not to paid staff, where it'd seem a little abrupt.
Re: Quite
"From the point of view of transactional efficiency, it's actually far more efficient for you to say thank-you beforehand, rather than to say please, and then waste time saying thank-you afterwards..."
Efficiency has nothing to do with manners, though.
If you look at the *entire* transaction, the British way is massively laden with politeness, with there being about 5 exchanges of it. Anthropologically it's due to our culture being very class-based but pretending we're not and hence not wanting serving staff to feel they are less than equals, hence treating them over-politely.
I recommend reading 'Watching the English'.
Re: Little Mss. Manners
"Makes me wonder if it has something to do with the different views on society in the states and the older and more densely populated European/Asian countries. The USAsians divide people into "Me" and "Everybody else" while Europeans have more complicated and graded relationships with persons. The tribe model is still a part of the mindset."
Americans have a class structure and social models, too. It's just you don't notice them because it's second nature to you. In very simple terms, the key determinant in American class is personal wealth and earnings. There's more to it than that, but it's a good starting indicator.
Re: Quite
The first key thing to remember in fitting in with American culture and not looking like a bit of a boorish dick is that a (partially) shared language is NOT carte blanche to assume the etiquette is remotely similar. In the words of Akbar: It's a Trap!
"USians still haven't learned to eat properly..... I've not met one who knows how to use a knife and fork at the same time..."
Maybe because half of America considers it downright rude to do so?
I don't practice spitting in public - and so am not very good at it - for similar reasons.
Re: The double edge of mental illness
Maybe if the entire culture *except you* is doing it, it's not them who are mentally ill...?
Re: It is worse in NZ
So basically you'[re one of the immigrants who doesn't want to accept local culture that half the people on the thread are sneering at?
Re: Maybe
"Being outside of the culture does get you some leeway when abroad in some surprising ways sometimes."
It does, but it has to work in conjunction with an understanding and sympathy to local custom, or at least a basic willingness to be polite. The slightly comical, trying to be polite, open, slightly reserved but cheerful Brit persona cuts one an awful lot of slack internationally - be it in the boardroom or around a Bedouin campfire - but it wouldn't cut ANY ice at all if you were attired in an England shirt and asking for chips, while patronising the locals.
In short: Basic manners and a willingness to treat people fairly can often shine through and provide leeway, even if one is not familiar with the exact local etiquette.
Re: Maybe
"Bull I know plenty of Brits who have made a good life abroad and live within the culture"
They tend to be an exception case. Most Brits living abroad long-term coral themselves into little alcohol-centred Ex-Pat groups and defiantly demand roast dinners and 'proper beer' from their walled communities. It's really sad to see people willing to earn their wage from another nation, but totally unwilling to in any way blend with local culture or people. Truth is that despite our multi-cultural national identity and the fact that a few British people are blisteringly good at fitting in elsewhere and being accepted, the majority of Brits abroad seem to be close-minded ass-hats, as I'm sure most Ex-Pats will attest to.
Re: Maybe @psyx
"Surely someone should have said to him, when greeting in South Korea you should use both hands or something like that? doesn't the South Korean president have advisors who are there to ensure visits go well?"
Maybe they assumed that such a pivotal figure already had someone to tell HIM that, or already had manners?
To me it comes back to it being the visitor's role when visiting someone important in a formal setting to bother reading a guide to etiquette. It's not hard.
"they should respect our culture as much as we would respect theirs when we visit their country..."
I'm not about to let the manners or attitude of a person being rude affect my manners towards anyone else in the world, though. One can't say "It should be fine to not respect other people's customs because some people don't respect mine".
Re: Maybe
"anyone from a different culture coming to this country should not try an impose their mores/culture upon us. However in the UK we have become so tolerant with the strange behaviour of immigrants that we have lost our own identity and sight of what it means to be British."
I think you'll find that by definition, being British means moving here from somewhere else and then a generation later getting stuffy about people moving here and not respecting our ways.
Being British is about being multi-cultural. That's who we are. Ironically, it is the very people harping on about 'being British' and being arsey with other cultures who are the least British of all of us.
Re: Maybe
I take teabags with me too, because everyone else's are swill. But that's rather a different matter to not bother learning manners.
Re: I can be paranoid.
"Where and when in time did I state I was fine with teenagers getting shot in the face?"
Well, you don't make mention of teenagers serving the armed forces in capacities other than the one you complain about, leaving the reader to assume that you're ok with those. That and my blood had already hit boiling point due to the complete lack of clues that you might have been being sarcy.
"There is one thing, lack of real world experience."
In my experience, that makes them more loyal and patriotic, rather than less so. Speaking for myself, I was naive and fervent at that age, and bent over backwards to serve my nation; never for a moment planning to do anything else with the next 20 years of my life. Older people are far more jaded and less reliable, in my experience. Just try asking me to catch a bullet for my country now, and you'd be told to get knotted!
As regards their size; Air Force guys don't have to be huge. They are being trained and hired for their skills not brawn, and only the USMC has the 'we're Marines first, and also trained for other stuff' regimen. And it doesn't matter how big you are: No amount of muscle stops a rifle bullet. Frankly, being a smaller target is a better defence than being 6'2".
Re: Maybe
"Certainly in the UK, we have to break backs to accommodate foreign culture and its ways, "
Bull.
Speak many languages, do you?
Understands the rudiments of other world religions and basic manners in other cultures?
Frankly, Brits are an embarrassment overseas, overladen with Imperial arrogance and an utter unwillingness to adapt to the manners of others.
Re: Maybe
"The Koreans should be a little more understanding, especially considering he is a 'foreigner' to them."
Frankly: Balls.
It takes little effort and a passing familiarity with the idea of good manners to spend about half an hour reading up on basic etiquette when visiting another country. The idea of not bothering to do so before meeting a Prime Minister is staggeringly rude.
He is foreign to them, but they are foreign to him. The remiss is his, as the visitor.
Basic. Fscking. Manners.
"We in the West have to be tolerant in this age of multiculturalism and have to bend over backwards to accommodate every 'johnny foreigners' foibles."
Wow. That's amazingly bigoted.
Clearly you're not bending over backwards at all if you refer to the rest of the planet like that and consider that learning basic etiquette is somehow a massive burden that is taking a step too far.
Re: I can be paranoid.
Quite.
Apparently, in Vietnam, the average age of the combat soldier...
Re: I can be paranoid.
"Is giving teenagers complex scenarios and classified military intelligence a good idea, or should we wait until they reach the age of 20?"
What on earth are you on about? How does this exercise hand them classified intelligence in the first place. They're protecting a dummy network; not one populated with anything of value.
"but when you train the minds of teenagers in cyber intelligence, it has both good and bad consequences."
That's massively bigoted. There is nothing that makes a teenager more likely to go rogue than anyone else.
You seem fine with allowing teenagers to join the grunts, be handed automatic weapons and suck a bullet in the face for your nation, but you don't want them learning anything useful, in case they aren't trustworthy.
Unbelievable. Do you realise just how many of the people guarding your arse and keeping your gas prices nice and cheap are under drinking age?
Re: Now i hate apple....
"apple say that if I discontinue siri they will delete all my data."
And anonymous data isn't 'yours', to their mind.
Posted in Ants have careers; you don't want them
Re: They Were Tired
"I sure hope if aliens come and want to monitor us, they don't stick something weighing 35 lbs on my back!"
No, they've got the weight of tracking devices/smartphones down to a much more reasonable level...
Posted in Ants have careers; you don't want them
Re: If you had to work close to her fat highness
Personally, I always view getting further away from the boss as a promotion!
I seem to recall that some species of ants very much have a career dead-end, with a handful (probably not literally) of older ants staying outside the nest each night during colder weather in order to seal the nest shut overnight so that it keeps warm... thus condemning themselves to dying of exposure.
"cost of projectiles
high rate of fire"
Neither of those things allows you to swat aircraft at Standard Missile type ranges, though. And the new weapon development cost alone will far exceed the cost of the number of Standard Missiles the USN is likely to blaze through in the next 20 years.
The rate of fire thing is still a huge issue too, I believe.
"when I can shoot hundreds of rail gun projectiles for less than the cost of a single missile."
Shame they take up so much more room and weigh more.
"guided munitions from rail guns are within the realm of possibility. but a frangible projectile that became hundreds of hypersonic pellets after being fired would do massive damage on an air craft - sort of a super phallanx. or CiWS"
We've yet to build guidance that can handle that kind of acceleration, AFAIK. And frangible projectiles aren't going to have a 10nm range due simply to basic ballistics.
I like railguns, but they aren't a magic wand or super-weapon. They aren't really anything yet, especially a rival to guided munitions - either air or surface launched.
Re: I find it interesting...
"Firstly, in the US, "ponce" doesn't mean anything in particular. Secondly, the US Navy probably doesn't really worry about about a handful of sniggering Brits."
I suspect that's not true, and that the ratings could be quite easily goaded into fisticuffs over it!
Re: It's Ok
They so Ownedly...
You forgot to mention the additional risks posed by appalling driver education, drunk Westerners, total lack of any clue about what the orange flashy things are for, no peripheral vision, rear-view mirror set up as a vanity mirror to adjust headwear, 'InshAllah' attitude towards wearing seatbelts, etc etc...
Having punted into one of those myself, I must say that they are amazingly effective at bending chassis.
Re: 911
"Aren't the UK cars tuned though?"
No. Not any more. Massive urban myth.
"It's the only way they can catch the younger members of the Saudi royal family. Women of course are not allowed to drive cars, restricted visibility of the burka could lead to loss of life."
Why bother catching them? It's not like they don't get away with it... because they're Royal.
And the idea that female arab dress affects visibility is a joke: What exactly do you think a keffiyeh does for peripheral vision?
Re: How Exactly Is This Going To WORK ???
It's like napalm, but smells nicer.
"A battleship with lasers and rail guns would again rule the waves as it could sink anything"
So?
The US can already do that, having the only real Navy on the planet.
The job of carrier battle groups is to project power. That means more than 50m away.
Granted, a rail-gun that is accurate enough *might* be able to displace strike aircraft in SOME circumstances, but Aircraft carriers are NOT going to die because of lasers.
And why would you use small railguns for AAA when missiles still work and are guided. Just because you can throw a slug at mach 10, it doesn't mean it automatically hits aircraft 30nm away.
Source != Analyst
