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Nerdfest

238 karma · joined March 23, 2011

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Nerdfest··on The EU Wants a Universal Mobile Charger, but Apple Doesn’t
I seem to remember Tesla opening up a bunch of patents. As a guess, that should be near the top of the list
Nerdfest··on Resignation Letter
I've seen some pretty right-wing stuff on WSJ in the last few months.
Nerdfest··on Spleeter – Music Source-Separation Engine
Hey, don't knock him. I'd never thought about it before. Being taught or corrected is great as long as people aren't dicks about it. Even then it has some value :)

I shall use this knowledge and endeavour to share it where possible.

Nerdfest··on France rules Google must pay news firms for content
Damn, did we ever get that one wrong.
Nerdfest··on Gavin Newsom Declares California a ‘Nation-State’
This is not power. This is aid, planning, money, and ideally to show some semblance of leadership.
Nerdfest··on Exercise by club swinging in the 19th century
Excitedly read title of article. Disappointed upon discovering it's not that type of club, nor that type of swinging.
Nerdfest··on Germany and US wrestle over coronavirus vaccine: report
Unfortunately, the businessman involved is a moron.
Nerdfest··on Electrons can travel in groups of 2 or more at a time in 1D conducting systems
1D is a line or vector, I believe. A waveguide for atoms would probably still be considered 1D I guess.
Nerdfest··on 'I hope the concept of cultural appropriation is a passing fad' (2016)
I should also add that I remember seeing some poll of Americans and this sort of "political correctness" or whatever you wish to call it, was the primary reason people said they voted for Donald Trump. Nothing official, some news station or something, but still. It's not harmless.
Nerdfest··on 'I hope the concept of cultural appropriation is a passing fad' (2016)
As with so many things these days, the internet gives people the ability to speak to millions of other people. The idiots and extremists seem to garner more attention, and therefore, generate ad revenue; so they have an even louder voice. I don't think there are actually more idiots and extremists, but merely that the few that exist can get together and try to indoctrinate others into whatever bent world-view they have. He says while typing in the comment section ...

(commented in the wrong place earlier)

Nerdfest··on 'I hope the concept of cultural appropriation is a passing fad' (2016)
As with so many things these days, the internet gives people the ability to speak to millions of other people. The idiots and extremists seem to garner more attention, and therefore, generate ad revenue; so they have an even louder voice. I don't think there are actually more idiots and extremists, but merely that the few that exist can get together and try to indoctrinate others into whatever bent world-view they have.

He says while typing in the comment section ...

Nerdfest··on U.S. job openings post biggest drop in more than four years
Why? That seems like it would cause a lot of very oor people to suffer even more.
Nerdfest··on Will alleged CIA misbehavior set Julian Assange free?
What's best for you and what will give more financial reward are not always the same thing.
Nerdfest··on I went to see a movie, and instead I saw the future
Google does tend to be at the leading edge of stuff, both good and bad. This one, as a 'nobody user' sucks.
Nerdfest··on Lessons from the Cuckoo's Egg
An awesome book that does still teach a lot of valuable lessons. Sadly, pretty much the same lessons it taught back when it was written. Maybe more people should actually read it.
Nerdfest··on Black boys don’t need more discipline, they need mentors (2018)
I'm guessing the justification was intentional maliciousness.
Nerdfest··on Please Don’t Abbreviate the Year ‘2020’ on Checks and Legal Documents
Why the hell shouldn't they worry about practicality?
Nerdfest··on Please Don’t Abbreviate the Year ‘2020’ on Checks and Legal Documents
I've had my rant at someone already this year. A lawyer posting about legal documents saying "make sure you put all four digits in to avoid confusion" and the giving an example like 03/01/2020.

Sigh.

Nerdfest··on EA is permanently banning Linux players on Battlefield V
The game client would be unmodified, with it running on an API layer that maps windows system calls to to their Linux equivalents. Their ant-cheat software finds this "suspicious" and boots the players.
Nerdfest··on What Happened to Software Development?
In my (probably worthless) opinion, the two big problems affecting software industry are:

- Organizations, especially large ones, now trust their process over their people. In the "old" days, when a production problem was identified and the prime developer knew what the problem was, it would be fixed, as directly and immediately as possible if there was high confidence. With less than high confidence, maybe a quick test in a test environment is done. In many places, this is now a multi-day, or even multi-week process now.

- Developers are not all doing it because they love it anymore. It's a high-ish paying job with lots of hiring being done. Many of the people writing code these days are awful programmers that in the long run cause a lot of damage. Many take away more than they add. In the earlier days, people coded because they wanted to.

The second problem is actually a big part of the cause of the first.

Perhaps I'm just bitter, but given the abundance of technologies, frameworks, libraries, services, etc, small teams of good coders can put together amazing pieces of work in a very short time. This almost never happens. It seems like complexity of large software projects has exceeded the ability of the current level of general expertise to maintain. It sure seems like we're close to that point.

I should add that I don't have the same opinions on most modern techniques. Agile can work very well. Code reviews and unit tests are a must. These are all tools that boost the quality and in the end, save time as well.

Nerdfest··on “I Screwed Up – Don't Fall for This Facebook Scam ”
If he didn't make a video that got some degree of internet traction, it's unlikely his problem would have been fixed.
Nerdfest··on Show HN: A guitar tab viewer that listens
I'm guessing that a few of us would be interested if you could build one. This sounds great.
Nerdfest··on Sweden Drops Julian Assange Rape Investigation
There was also some chatter about the woman being a former CIA operative. The whole thing has smelled so bad right from the start.
Nerdfest··on Farewell, Cortana
I seem to remember that even when Cortana is shut off, it was found to be listening and sending telemetry back to Microsoft. Based on their past behaviour, I'd guess that even is it is "removed", those elements will remain.
Nerdfest··on Steve Jobs Is Dead
This kind of thing is done on occasion. I remember the same being done to Newbridge at the start of the tech bubble, including short-sellers arranging damaging interviews with people who claimed they were executives with the company. It's far easier now with social media.

It's not just Tesla either Facebook, and I believe Microsoft as well were caught paying for entities to harm Google's reputation. There are vast amounts of money involved.

Nerdfest··on Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
This is a company that restricts what you can and can't install on your own device and you're surprised they're okay with authoritarianism?
Nerdfest··on Cases of Vaping-Related Lung Illness Surge, Health Officials Say
I keep seeing this headline, reading the articles and being disappointed that none of them seem to differentiate between cannabis/tobacco oil vaping (e-cigarettes) and dry-herb vaping. Dry her has no other chemicals, and no fillers. It just boils the THC/CBD and other cannabinoids out of the leaf. There is no smoke, and the vapour is pretty much colourless. It's very easy on the lungs and much better (and cheaper, I find) than smoking it.

Those oil based vapes just seem nasty. Smaller vaporizer though, I guess.

Nerdfest··on A Dallas-born citizen has been detained by CBP for over three weeks
It's not possible to enforce immigration policy the way some other people want without violating human rights.
Nerdfest··on ICE Used Facial Recognition to Mine State Driver’s License Databases
If hackers would target this sort of information when required, I'd be quite happy. For ISP collecting browsing data for example, grab a few politicians histories and publish them. Bonus points for doing it through completely legal means.
Nerdfest··on USG Says It's Not Required to Provide Kids in Custody with Toothpaste and Soap
Concentration camp experts disagree with you. Also, apparently those pictures are CBP provided photos that they think make them look good.
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