Posts by Marvin the Martian

Bad, weak troll.

"Anything on at X" being "the absolute worst ever in this galaxy"? Sad.

90%?

I give this proposal 85%.

[Arbitrarily, you lost the 5% from "perfect"(i.e., 90%) for punctuation.]

True dat,

and that's why you're an avid reader of the unbiased Conservapedia.

Re: Bus-powered?

all of 'em?

Speaking of Cool...

So what are the energy costs?

It's a bit silly to go to all these efforts for calculating cost of performing, but skipping the energy cost? Especially as you note that the seemingly-well-performing ones (wife's desktop, hydra-with-cooler) are clearly power hogs.

It is probably easy to get figures for the home computers (go to Maplin's/Radio Shack, buy power monitor for 15 or so quid), but the larger ones may be tricky to find? If not, it's an easily added column that would actually tell us something. The rest of the TOC (maintenance personnel + parts, expected lifespan) are too vague to add.

Re: "The cops out here have a carpenter on staff to replace doors they mistakenly kick in. "

It's skilled trade jobs. Also, maybe a bootmaker for cops who mangle theirs in the process.

Because he had his gills stuck inside the larger shark?

Alternatives?

Please list those alternatives to Mathematica's symbolic computing engine again? R? Gnuplot?! Octave!? "even emacs calc-el can do more"?? Ah, indeed, Macsyma is in your list, and does part of what Mathematica can on that topic.

The simple statement is that you need to have the entire above list to cover most topics handled by Mathematica. So it's all different interfaces and languages, and on the whole each to less depth.

R would be a possible exception, but then R is an emulation of S.

MB Air copy? Not the keyboard though!

The black-on-metal keys are what a PowerBook G4 looked like...

Wasn't that the nineties?

I remember in the late nineties a spate of wooden computer attributes --- keyboards, monitors, mice etc. Expensive-ish, low four figures for keyboards (peanuts compared to ugly bling-encrusted ones).

backwards music?

What happens if you switch earbuds? The music sounds as played behind you instead of in front of you -- so what? That happens anyways in many cases (see: car stereo).

It's not as if the music will suddenly play backwards (revealing satanic messages, unavoidably).

You can also play it for real instead.

I once encountered a moose running on the motorway just S-W of Stockholm.

Nokia should re-name their salesmen.

Nokia should officially title their salesmen "turd polishers", as it exactly describes the job and what's going wrong with the company.

There should be more balanced reporting.

Logically, every time someone is fatally stabbed on the upper body, El Reg should report "lack of boobage kills victim". Whether male or not.

It's a poisoned pawn strategy

The champion/patentholder of DC made sure the electric chair used AC --- to try to get AC a reputation of being dangerous and hence irresponsible.

So maybe here it's mostly an effort to make Windows look less bad, to get it off...

Or in other words,

"I reject your reality and substitute my own"

--Adam Savage

Stylish, like "burgundy" coloured?

That first Macao's not got a burgundy liner --- that's red. Virgin Media Red.

And with the black background and the white accents/lettering, the colour scheme is perfectly reproduced... if you're some kind of design-illiterate geek.

@Leona A: "tough on the causes of crime"

In this case, an envious classmate.

He's not shot, hence your statement is invalid.

No, no, just turning off your fridge/freezer will already save you 10-12% --- no impact on house temp. Get a very small TV and monitor (actually, netbook if you still have a desktop), that's another 4-5% -- no impact on house temp. Well, a bit, but it's all waste heat you cut out. Next steps will be bit more drastic, pedal-powered washing machines etc.

The reason the costs fall by only 7% is that you have to buy lots of replacement stuff (like broken bikes to convert your washers with). You'll get warm hammering stuff together and swearing when you hit your fingers. Nicely toastily warm.

Easy-peasy.

These one-in-a-million chance thingies keep happening about one time in ten; million is the new ten.

It's not like they've observed 5million tsunami waves to get a 50% chance of recording one, as would be with the old, big, millions.

@Ian Stephenson

So Groupon on their own invents a train ride and it's then the business' operator idiot who's at fault? I like the mechanics of your world.

And for the rest: Newsflash! Magic does not exist! Ergo, no magical train rides for you.

"Skinflints"

Well do something about it. For example, write your MP that you want to pay more taxes to get better skilled GCHQ keyboard botherers.

I was wondering about that.

Because it's not toads, but the absence of toads that predicts quakes. [By that measure, we've been in earthquakes here since forever!] Or a crash of the local population from 0 to 0 (-100%! also -50%, or any other number)... so you cunningly add toads.

Hm. Do leopard geckos also predict quakes? They're much easier to keep.