KGIII

That's actually pretty horrible. Gotta be honest.

HN has enough people who could design a protocol and hardware to do exactly that with wifi. HN can't adequately explain dark matter, except to say it is a placeholder and to define how we observe the effect. Anything more than that is conjecture and anyone who says otherwise is a dirty rotten liar.

Really.

I hate the name Dark Matter. It's a horrible name.

But, someone here understands electromagnetism well enough, pulse signaling, electronics, binary, spectrums, radio, whatever. They could build some sort of mesh network to do exactly that. They could probably build it with COTS and do it for pretty cheap - and write you a damned good paper.

Don't have a damned clue what Dark Matter really is. Nope.

Edit: Hell, now that I think about it, someone here would probably set that up on like their ham radio stuff at 600 baud just for fun and make it all operate out of terminal.

That's a compliment, really. There'd be a Show HN and someone would tell them it had an Emacs shortcut.

That would absolutely explain why I've never seen it. In my generation, if I invite people out, I expect to pay the bill. There is no bill splitting. If I'm paying someone, I've probably got cash.

Yeah, I even have a landline. I did mention I'm old. ;-)

Some of the trendier merchents have Square in my neighborhood. I'm in NW Maine. I just bought some alpaca wool and the nice lady swiped my card through a Square device attached to her phone. The pie lady takes Square too. I think the new coffee shop, down in the village, now has a real merchant account, but they did use Square. I've never even seen Venmo.

Err... I'm old, but we have hip and trendy tourists?

Ah well... Another anecdote for ya.

I'm pretty sure the two names of 'dark matter' and 'dark energy' have caused more confusion than anything else in modern science. They were horrible choices that were worse than even the 'god particle.'

Horrible. Explaining they are placeholders has actually eaten up a fair amount of my time. I'm betting I've probably spent days, if we total the hours up, explaining just that. (I like to go make science simple for people. Having to explain that it is a placeholder doesn't make it easy. So much wasted time.)

Bethany Hughes, BBC Doc... probably pirated...

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=R5vuTpN4WUI

Well worth watching, very related.

One of the great benefits about living where I do (Maine) is that so much land is open for public use. I don't want to derail the thread so I will simply point out that it is really easy to cede your land to a trust, in many areas where that's actually beneficial. Some trusts are set up to accept donations in cash, as well. So, either way helps preserve land for public access in perpetuity.

Not Federal and I am going to just quietly link to an option.

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

If it helps, my first computer contact was an HP 9100 in '72. I just hated it and would avoid them for years afterwards. ;-)

See, now you're just being dishonest. I'm not even sure why?

I really, really shouldn't engage you further, but I'll try one more time.

No, the law isn't that 'over there.' The law isn't that anywhere. Nowhere on the planet can you modify your electronic devices 'however you want' and have it covered by warranty. To give a really simplistic example, you can not just start swapping out resistors and replacing them with alternatives and be covered under any legal system on the planet. Go ahead, run 440 volts into your phone and tell 'em you expect it to be covered by warranty. I'll wait for your court case. Provide documentation.

Yes, tampering. I'm now even more certain of my use of the word. The very first definition works just wonderfully. Yes, when you crack open that phone case and think you're a master at reflow with your toaster oven, you're making it worse.

I'm really, really trying to be charitable. At this point, you've been openly dishonest and made outlandish claims. No, no your legal system doesn't allow that. Go ahead, snap a few resistors off, pump 12v AC into your phone, and try for a warranty claim. I'll wait.

Seriously, that's not even a moral arguement to be made. You can't just do 'whatever you want' and expect warranty coverage - anywhere on the planet. Not in my country, not in your country. If you think you can do it in your country, consult a qualified legal professional.

Whatever you want includes things like smashing it open with a hammer and hooking it up to your car's alternator in a crazed PCP frenzy. That ain't legal anywhere.

If you rein in the ad industry, you're just going to be stuck with a bunch of ICOs. Kinda bleak, really.

> Why not?

From your post above...

> whatever I want to do

I think we are done here. That's not how society works. You don't just get to do whatever you want to do and expect the manufacturer to still cover the warranty. They warranty it for an express set of conditions, for express purposes, as is understood by a reasonable person (a legal concept). If you tamper, see a dictionary, with the device then it is not their responsibility to cover it. That's actually pretty much how the law already is. Your house example is kinda silly. It's a house, not an electronic device.

I'd love to agree with you but reality suggests otherwise. If you overclock your CPU, as a rough example, they aren't gonna let you RMA it. I don't blame them. Swapping out user serviceable parts, as a reasonable person might do, is an obvious exception. You might want to try looking at it as a reasonable person (the legal concept) would.

You really seem to have a bit emotionally invested in this so I'm going to respectfully bow out now.

I am famous to maybe six people. So, it's not much. However, I wanted to add an account to this.

I can tell you the exact moment, problem, response, and teacher - that changed my life forever. It was at that single moment that I understood mathematics. I wasn't suddenly good at it. No, I still pretty much sucked at math. But, I understood it was a language and it was descriptive.

Many years later, that same teacher would be there to help me celebrate defending my dissertation. I didn't actually march, I was already to busy by the time spring rolled around. He's an old man, now. I still stop in and we are still fast friends.

That one comment changed my life. There's a not insignificant chance that it has had a small impact on your life, assuming you've been impacted by modern traffic engineering, or in some pedestrian venues, or had some goods delivered. All that from a single comment that is entirely obvious, in retrospect.

We aren't going to fill the courts with that. If there's a manufacturing defect, return it before tampering with it. If it is a common defect, it will be covered by a recall and not a warranty.

Sorry, the line has to be drawn somewhere. You may be competent and I believe you are. However, Joe I Can Solder This With A Lighter is not qualified. We aren't going to tie up the courts determining the difference between you and him.

It's just reality. In principle, I would love to agree with you. However, much like we can't assume perfect information, we're not going to assume perfect repairs. The courts are too valuable to be wasted with frivolity.

Dialing in to the 1200 baud MODEM pool was both uneconomical and didn't even confer any great benefits. The 900 baud pool was only like a buck a minute and the 1200 baud pool was $4 per minute!

That said, I might actually have to get off your lawn. My first was a 900 baud cradle. Hayes, I think? Maybe Digital? That was a whole lot of years ago.

Too difficult to judge once it has been tampered with. The courts don't have time to judge each case on its merits and there's no reasonable surety that your modification didn't harm the product.

The line has to be drawn somewhere.

I'm not sure I'd call MIT 'hostile.'

I admit I'm heavily biased, but I'd say it is demanding. If universally demanding excellence is 'hostile,' then I guess I can agree with you.

There are many, many varied beliefs in Libertarianism - even within America and within the Libertarian Party. On the political compass, it is opposite authoritarianism. Taken to extremes, it is anarchy. It can have left or right components. It's quite a spectrum.

That said, the commons must be protected. The right to repair would qualify as the commons. At the same time, forcing companies to excessive standards isn't always the best answer. In a perfect world, we'd have perfect information and rational buyers. We don't have that.

As the other poster suggested, getting rid of the DMCA would be a good start. I'd say companies should not be allowed to actively prevent repair or modification, but doing so renders the warranty invalid.

I'm pretty far over in the left side. I'm probably best defined as a libertarian socialist, not too far from the social democrats of Europe.

I wonder if there is a competitive advantage to be had there? UMaine is a pretty good system. When I retired, I taught math at UMF for a little while, so I got to see the system from the inside.

UMF has one of the best teaching programs in the country. They even have a CS path that is judged well.

Maybe recruiting at the small State universities is a potential edge?

Capital gains are taxed at the same level as income tax, except when they are long-term investments, meaning longer than a year. The reason long-term investments are taxed at a lower rate is because you want to incentivize long-term investing as it increases stability.

Take that away and I have no incentive to invest in stability but have every reason to disrupt the market and take advantage of the swings. I'm not sure you want that.

Oh, I'm familiar with that. It's just that most don't take away the right to vote permanently. They take it away until you're done serving your sentence and then it is automatically restored. (See the link.)

A couple of States even allow inmates to vote while incarcerated. In my now-home State, inmates are encouraged to vote and sometimes politicians will even go campaign inside the prison. That's pretty rare, but has happened.

So, it's a temporary loss in most cases. Notably, Maine allows inmates to vote and Maine is overwhelmingly white. Vermont is the same way. In my quest for more information, I found some commentary about that aspect.

> we deny felons the right to vote in most states.

Only while incarcerated.

http://www.ncsl.org/research/elections-and-campaigns/felon-v...

I'll scrape the whole book and read it. Thanks! I know weather models still do it on supercomuters but understood the currently have plenty.

I look forward to reading the book.

I wonder why they think I was actually wanting the oversimplified stuff? I thought I'd made it clear that I wanted the technical details from their experience. Ah well... Your response is better than mine would have been.

I have done some COBOL and even some PASCAL. Yeah, I'm old.

I hired professionals in 1995. I was done doing any of the coding by 2000. I sold and retired in 2007.

I took only one course in C. Everything else was learned on my own, informally.

Rust is out because of their cultlike traits and their need to turn a language into a political statement. Elixir I know nothing about and an absolute necessity is a wide variety of educational tools, existing projects, libraries, and help sites where people are free to tell me when I'm being an idiot.

I learn best from people with exacting standards.

I'm not new to programming. I just haven't done much for a whole lot of years. Brainfuck, I'm familiar with it, is never the sanest choice.

I've narrowed it down to Python or Java. I've done C, C++, BASIC, QBASIC, Perl, PHP, and even some COBOL. I've played with a few others.

That's a pretty handsome sloth!

It appears to even be smiling. I am not sure why, but that made me feel better.

Instead of jumping to $500, is raising it by $50 an option?

If you jump to $500 and some pay, but not enough, then you revert to a lower number, people who paid $500 may feel slighted. Moving up at $50 reduces the impact and those who paid lower will feel like they got a bargain. Maybe...

Alas, HN only allows me to vote your comment up once.

I really love the detailed and expansive responses that some questions generate. Hopefully, they are of interest to more than just myself. I've been retired since 2007, so it is living vicariously through you folks - as I absolutely don't have to make these choices anymore.

A part of me wants to take on some big project, just to get back into it. I actually miss working. Go figure?

Thanks!

Still very strange that they even claimed the citation came from a very specific source. I'm mostly just curious, at this point.

Also, if we count all the various regulations, even at just the Federal level, I'm pretty sure that '300000' is not actually a big number. The US tax code is larger than that.

But, hey! It looks like a big scary number. So, there's that.