Posts by Vladimir Plouzhnikov

Re: They boldly go

Sorry, the link in my post above was dodgy...

Here...

Re: Maybe it's an age thing

The "withdrawal symptoms" are there because there is a real addiction to start with. What the research misses in my opinion is that the addiction is not for just any "content" - it's for communication with others.

I doubt that pushing ads and stupid videos to a person craving for a message from a friend, lover, spouse, whoever, will do anything like making them more receptive to ads etc. Could have exactly the opposite effect...

Depends on the personality of the target, perhaps. Maybe they should screen for personality types in such research...

@ Destroy All Monsters

stop driving in Mother Russia Suburbia

But... but... I just renewed my cyclist hunting licence! You know how expensive that is? So many applications and such a small quota...

@Payne: tsk, tsk, threats, I see... Well, your Romanian friend - nothing that a wheel wrench won't fix, you know...

Re: and you started out with nothing

I'd rather trust a man who doesn't shout what he's found,

There's no need to sell if you're homeward bound.

If I chose a side,

He won't take me for a ride.

@Khaptain

I agree that doing something like that is asking for trouble. Also, like you, I don't understand why would anyone do it through a site like that.

What I disagree with, however - is justifying a questionable act or a crime by attacking the character of the victim.

It's like saying "I disapprove of the victim's behaviour and therefore I don't consider the perpetrator's action as damaging".

For example, imagine "victim" = woman; "perpetrator" = rapist... That doesn't sound nice, does it?

Re: If....

Perhaps they should be blindfolded while still in the womb! Taking into account what they'll have to go through on their way out...

Re: I find it quite amazing....

Oh, AC, reading your words is like having a breath of fresh air :D

It's the same kind of dumb rebellion that made punk popular - "we can't play shit and we're proud of it!"

Equally, the audiopunks today: "the crappier the sound, the prouder we are! Cause - audiophiles!"

Well, let them, it's their loss.

Re: Superpowers

when the rocket it was on recently blew up.

Which one was that?

Re: Bravo

♫ The chances of anything coming from CERN were a million to one they said ♪

"I watch black holes fly south across the Autumn sky,

And one by one they disappear..."

Re: Kobo keeps you free

I find this argument specious - that Kobo is less restricting than Amazon's Kindle because more stores use the DRM which Kobo is set for.

DRM is DRM - if your Adobe access licence gets revoked your Kobo's access will be cut off from all of those stores and your books will become unreadable, most likely too.

So, the real comparison should be which system's DRM are the easiest to remove. Once they are removed it doesn't matter which store the books are coming from for either device...

Re: Refreshing to read ... TRUTH

Nah, they're all wrong... It's Putin flying on his unicorn wot did it!

Re: "Earth" is a frequency!

Frequency measurements must surely be in Beats per Apple.

Re: Home Taping Is Killing Music

Yep! And cheers to that!

Reverse argument

"Philae, which apparently does all the science, as being male while the female Rossetta is merely there in a support role."

How about men working their tits off, doing all the hard work, while women stand in safe distance, giving them orders?

Re: I hope the woman in the photo gets happy soon

Oh, c'mon, stop flirting, you two!

This is a serious forum - not a dating site! :D

@Lodgie

Did you actually read the article or only the title?

Re: I like the look of that very much indeed!

Sliders? Pah! Those are rockers!

Well, at least some of them...

Re: Picture Caption

"How do they know there are algae in the crater?"

They don't. They were only sure about at least one alga being there...

Re: I wonder who buys these things

What's the point of that?

There is an old joke about a Russian coming back from a trip to London and saying to his friend: "hey, look - I've got this tie on Oxford Street for 50 quid, not bad, ah?" And the friend replying: "Vasiliy, you're such a schmuck - you could have bought exactly the same tie, just round the corner, for 150!"

Re: raise them young

I, for one, don't think this is some kind of an underhand manipulation. Sounds a pretty straightforward proposition to parents - buy a second kindle for your child and we will try to make it more enticing for the kid to read books on it. Fairly honest, as far as marketing attempts go and would be a win-win if works.

In my case, my kids still prefer multi-screen dead-tree readers for books, so it won't be an option for me just yet...

It is a pleasure for people who like music. Those who take music as a source of rithmic background noise to accompany whatever else is it they've happened to be doing - might as well like the new "service". Poor sods :-P

Re: Hmm

Can anyone enlighten me?

Well, basically, that means the difference is so miniscule as to be irrelevant. They are talking about an improvement in test scores by 3% or 4% (absolute) for the lowest scoring 25% of pupils even in the case where there may be a vast gap between the good and bad scoring pupils' results.

Let's say Johnny Aintgood scored 40% in a test whilst being allowed to use his smartphone for underage-drink-sex. Well, the same Johnny would have scored maybe 43%-44% with the ban.

When you look into all the scaremongering claims about the dangers of AIs and the doom of humanity and stuff - it all boils down to fear of an inferior half-arsed AI given too much power than that of a superior super-intelligent AI which is just so much better than humans.

So, it's really the fear of us, inept humans, making a machine too stupid to coexist with us willingly. Meh.

Look at the Avengers: TAOU - it's the manifestation of that fear. An existential threat - a robot with an AI so dumb you could make a Hollywood movie out of it...