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Kafkish

45 karma · joined October 18, 2021

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Kafkish··on Cheap antidepressant shows promise treating early Covid-19
Isn't this the same class of drugs that's been associated with sexual dysfunction in both men and women? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29024808
Kafkish··on Alphabet Third Quarter 2021 Results [pdf]
> Then again, many or most people still watch live sports and old school TV channels, which are chock full of ads. I cannot even stand too obvious product placement, much less ad breaks.

Everybody is different. Back in the early 2000s when I used to watch TV, I actually enjoyed ads, because they tended to be more entertaining than the TV shows themselves (remember the Budweizer lizards and eTrade babies). Even when online ads because popular, when they were still contextual, I really did not mind. It was only when ads began to follow people around online that I put an end to it.

But I still watch live sports - only online, since I no longer have TV service. I get around ads on NFL games by having more than one game streaming on different tabs, then switch to the one that's not in an ad break.

Online, there are no ads during football (the real one), tennis and volleyball matches, so I have very little to complain about.

Kafkish··on Is college worth it? A return-on-investment analysis
> If the person is a mature, informed, and energetic business go-getter...

But by the time most people get to college, they're still immature and not very well informed.

Kafkish··on Apple Is Normalising Surveillance
I think Google beat Apple to that by at least a decade. If you're not using an Apple product or service, Apple likely knows very little about you. Google, OTOH, knows a lot about you, whether you use a Google service or products.
Kafkish··on Project SPHINX – When the USSR tried to change the computer (2019)
You gotta at least get your facts right. The Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. The Pentium III was released within that same decade (Feb. 1999) [1], not "well over a decade after Soviet demise".

In the same manner that the US space program would have advanced without input from Wernher von Braun [2], the development of Pentium III would have happened minus Pentkovski, though their presence pushed development faster and in directions that the projects would have taken longer to reach without them.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentium_III [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wernher_von_Braun

Kafkish··on Project SPHINX – When the USSR tried to change the computer (2019)
But he was still good enough to lead the Intel team that developed the Pentium III, or is that an overstatement?

From his Wikepedia page:

> At the beginning of 1990s, he immigrated to United States where he worked at Intel and led the team that developed the architecture for the Pentium III processor

Kafkish··on Barcelona’s Bicibús: hundreds of families biking to school together
That, actually, is way more than the minimum recommended. See [1]. It took me about 10 minutes of jogging at least 3-4 times a week over several months before I got to the point where I can now jog 60+ minutes non-stop.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/17/well/move/exercise-heart-...

Kafkish··on Project SPHINX – When the USSR tried to change the computer (2019)
> as the Spanish Civil War shows the USSR wasn't great at letting allies stay independent

Same is true for the US. Allied countries whose leaders take decisions that run contra to what we want tend(ed) to be regime-changed and those leaders killed.

Kafkish··on Project SPHINX – When the USSR tried to change the computer (2019)
By all accounts, Soviet chip development was ahead of that of the US (Intel). Then one day a party official killed the project. At least the lead guy found his way to the US and to Intel and the rest, as they say, is history.
Kafkish··on Barcelona’s Bicibús: hundreds of families biking to school together
Arrakis? That's a fictional place, right?
Kafkish··on Barcelona’s Bicibús: hundreds of families biking to school together
Then the problem is not the heat, but your fitness level, which regular biking, jogging will improve. It did for me. After about 20 years of no exercise, just sitting in front of a computer, I decided last November to start exercising (jogging. Bad knees make biking a bad idea)

My 1st day out jogging, I could only go 0.5 miles non-stop before I almost passed out. Today I can do 5.5 miles non-stop. My cardiovascular system is in the best shape it has been in a long time. And I'm almost 60.

Kafkish··on Barcelona’s Bicibús: hundreds of families biking to school together
In the Dallas-Fort Worth area of Texas, the city of Richardson is very bike- and pedestrian-friendly. The area around the Univ of Texas at Dallas is especially so.
Kafkish··on Barcelona’s Bicibús: hundreds of families biking to school together
Sure, but on the return trip, you'd be heading home, so sweating should be no big deal.
Kafkish··on Barcelona’s Bicibús: hundreds of families biking to school together
How many places in the world would you get +35 Celsius (95 F) in the morning?
Kafkish··on Barcelona’s Bicibús: hundreds of families biking to school together
> the ride from start to finish lasts about 25 minutes.

That's about 50 minutes to and fro. That's all the exercise a child needs in a day. Wish they'll succeed in making it every day, instead of just on Fridays.

Kafkish··on Trump's new platform and the Affero General Public License of Mastodon
But those would then be immigrants, right? And likely will need to come in under H1B or something. How will owners of that platform react to hiring to immigrants?
Kafkish··on Trump's new platform and the Affero General Public License of Mastodon
Are you trying to tell me that the folks at Cyber Ninja, the firm that conducted the Arizona audit, are not competent?
Kafkish··on Trump's new platform and the Affero General Public License of Mastodon
No, but the platform is just part of the company - Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG). In the future, TMTG intends to take on all the major tech outfits on the planet - AWS, Azure, Netflix, you name it.
Kafkish··on Trump's new platform and the Affero General Public License of Mastodon
Best to be intolerant to, say, the Taliban, than to the Girls Scout.
Kafkish··on Trump's new platform and the Affero General Public License of Mastodon
By the time all this is settled, Trump and Co will learn a lot about software licensing than they thought was necessary. This is not a space where you can bully others, because the playing field is kinda level.
Kafkish··on Trump's new platform and the Affero General Public License of Mastodon
> Once caught in the act, Trump's Group scrambled and took the site down.

Did they take the site down because of licensing issue or because it was badly configured, so exposed it to bad actors? I think all evidence points to the latter.

Kafkish··on Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2021 edition
> The fact is: WSL saves time and makes installing Linux redundant and actually a waste of time.

If I ever need to run an OS that spies on me, I'll use Windows, then WSL to tun Linux. But I don't want that, so I run Linux. It's freedom, which is more important for me.

Kafkish··on Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2021 edition
I have a Dell Inspiron with AMD A12 processor that I bought with Windows preinstalled in 2019. Never even booted into Windows, just booted right into a USB stick and installed Elementary OS. Putting the system to Sleep was an issue, but now I have Linux Mint Cinnamon installed on it. No more issue with going to Sleep.

I can expect to use the laptop until it packs up.

Kafkish··on Major Linux Problems on the Desktop, 2021 edition
The thing is, Linux distros make it super easy to check if your HW will work. Just download the distro you want, transfer to a USB stick. Reboot your PC with it and check any connected HW. If it works with the live system, it will work when installed on the PC.
Kafkish··on Reasons to switch from Windows to Linux
> But for sheer feature richness, you've got to experience the two desktops associated with Linux, KDE and GNOME.

Are there only 2 desktops associated with Linux? Granted those 2 are from the early days, but there's a lot more. I'm writing this from a Linux Mint Cinnamon desktop, haven switched from a KDE distro because configuring a dual monitor setup on KDE doesn't work very well.

Kafkish··on Why can’t the world’s greatest minds solve the mystery of consciousness? (2015)
Point is, the tool is not suited for the job.
Kafkish··on Why can’t the world’s greatest minds solve the mystery of consciousness? (2015)
Because trying to understand consciousness with the mind is like trying to measure the circumference of the equator with a 12-inch ruler.
Kafkish··on Online abuse: banning anonymous social media accounts is not the answer
I just discussed this with a bunch of my friends. If you're having a high level technical exchange with somebody that you don't know, then you find out that that other person is a female, you're really impressed, that a girl will be that good at this very technical topic.

If, OTOH, you find out that that other person is a black guy (assuming you're white), you go through one of two reactions: If you're opinion of blacks is low, then you're really impressed. If you don't particularly like blacks (read: racist), then you're disappointed, and slightly pissed off - that that other guy knows more than you do, or know so much about a very technical topic, when he belongs to a group that you've been told are not very bright.

Humans are interesting creatures in this regards. That's why the right to remain anonymous online should be a given.

Kafkish··on Colin Powell has died
The 2003 Iraq war was, most people now know, based on a lie. What most people didn't know, and still don't know, is that Desert Storm itself was based on a lie. Like the 2003 lie, it backfired. It's a long story, but if reading what the US ambassador to Iraq at that time told Saddam will point you in the right direction. She's died years ago, but her name is April Catherine Glaspie [0]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_Glaspie

Kafkish··on Colin Powell has died
The key phrase back then was "anti-American". And if you criticized GW when he was leading those war efforts, you were guilty of treason. At least that was what Dick Cheney said.
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