Posts by Pascal Monett

"The company's Beta rocket can loft heftier loads"

Except that it doesn't exist yet, so technically it can't lift anything right now.

Firefly has a plan for a rocket that can lift heavier loads and is working on it. Whether that rocket ever comes into existence is another question entirely.

Finally, I note with interest that Firefly's Alpha rocket is not in the list of orbital launchers maintained by Wikipedia. I wonder why ?

Hasn't this already been researched ?

We have satellites in geostationary orbit that already have to be hardened to function properly. And that giant open nuclear furnace in the sky creates a much harsher environment than a functioning nuclear power station.

All the computer equipment on the ISS is hardened, if I'm not mistaken, and it is well inside the Earth's magnetosphere.

I agree that we haven't yet created nuclear plant robot butlers, but I would have thought that the process of hardening electrical equipment didn't need that much research any more.

"a bit like life in general"

Please don't say that.

I need life to return to a point where my daughter can get work again and where I can bring my wife to the restaurant now and again.

Satellites in lunar orbit

Do those satellites need to be smaller that what we're using in orbit around Earth ?

Due the Moon's reduced mass, of course.

I'm guessing that we can do geostationary around the Moon, but they might need to be at a lower altitude. In any case, I'm sure they'll get the details worked out. We've been managing satellites for long enough to know what to do. One might even say that there are no new technical difficulties in this project. The biggest hurdle will be, as always, getting the sats into space. Once they're there, the rest should not be a problem.

Making Python faster

If Python is based on C, which is the fastest programming language after pure Assembler, then how can you make it faster ?

You can make any code slow if you write it badly, but there is no compiler optimization for a programmer who doesn't know how to code.

"And then there’s the Digital Yuan"

So, in essence, China is banning competition to its own funny money.

Par for the course, I guess, even though I completely agree with the ban and think all Western countries should do the same.

As for blockchain, could someone please tell me how that non-scalable technology is going to improve any economy whatsoever ?

"less intrusive and more tolerable"

There is only one solution to this : stop trying to use targetted advertising.

First of all, you're targetted adverts are laughable. Either you're showing ads on something I just bought, or you're showing ads on stuff other people bought concerning the stuff I just bought.

True targetted advertising would be you recording that I just bought a light bulb, then six months later, suggesting that I might want to buy a replacement (because light bulbs are shit these days). Or if I buy a lawnmower online (because I've obviously had an aneurysm), then you wait a year and show me ads for lawnmower repairmen in my area.

If you could actually be arsed to do something useful, I might not mind so much the massive invasion of my privacy, but you can't.

So just do regular advertising. Stop trying to track me since you can't actually make it meaningful.

Of course, the hit on your bottom line will be massive, but, to paraphrase, frankly my dear, I don't give a damn.

The platform is the problem

You have a tiny screen, a minimal amount of input vectors, and less power than what it takes to make a cup of coffee.

With those limitations, you're not going to implement a wearable version of LibreOffice. What can you possibly create that will have any interest whatsoever ?

You basically can't connect to the Internet, the power drain will kill the thing in no time.

Watch a video ? Are you kidding me ?

MP3 ? Nope. Not until you have a wearable mini fusion reactor.

Tell time, alert to emails with a Blutooth link to your phone that is in your pocket or beltpouch, use existing sensors to give information on temperature and humidity, maybe heart rythm, and that's just about the limit. No wearable is going to do anything meaningful if it's not paired with a smartphone - that's where the power is.

There's not much room to get all hot and bothered.

"delivering linear scalability"

Okay, I readily admit that I am not a hardware CPU geek with full credentials, but how is it justified to say that ARM CPUs scale linearly and imply that x86 CPUs don't ?

The wiki page on ARM does not mention scalability in any way.

I've seen server motherboards with 4 CPU sockets for x86 CPUs. It seems to me that that means they scale.

Could someone enlighten me ?

"Google declined to comment [,,] about how this add-on slipped through the net"

It slipped through because the net has links that are a mile wide.

Let's be clear : Google is not there to curate the content of its Store, it's there to make money. Anything goes until someone complains. That's when Google reacts and goes fishing for a reason not to remove the app.

In this case, it didn't find any, so it removed the app.

But if you think Google is going to pre-emptively deprive itself of revenue when nobody has noticed anything, I have a bridge to sell you.

Money laundering, sure

And then spout some R&D expenses that look like real money.

And then mention a public event sponsored by and in the only interest of Apple, which has fuck all to do with the 30% extortion rate of the Apple Store (and I don't care if Apple is not the only one, it's extortion, period).

Since you're full of bullshitnumbers, how's about you give us the cost of actually running the Apple Store - which has no need of R&D - vs the returns you get from it ?

Hmm ?

Yeah, fat chance, I know.

I have said and I maintain : 5% is more than enough.

"[Umbrella companies are] allowing themselves to operate outside the law"

This is textbook capitalism. Never mind that the law is imperfect, this is the demonstration that capitalism does not, in fact, regulate itself. It operates at the very limit of what is legal, forget about moral.

Capitalism requires regulation. In this case, a company that purposefully waits until the employee can no longer easily go before a judge should be automatically fined the amount of money withheld, forced to pay said employee and pay the bill for treating the whole affair.

It is incredible that there are people who actually dream up these kinds of schemes, but the only reason they succeed is because the law is not clear enough about penalites.

Clear that up and the hustlers will have to comply. You need to nail them to the wall first, though.

2% of Indonesia’s GDP

That's nothing to sneeze at. And that's a lot synergy, going forward.

This group appears to have already sewn up a neat package with financial and delivery across the board. Amazon, you've got a threat on the horizon.

"You have NO privacy. Get over it"

Scott, I think that you are going to learn the hard way that privacy is on the rise now. You're part of the clique that has been plundering our lives gratis for long enough, and telling us to just accept and bend over is, quite frankly, more than insulting.

Nice redirection on the government though, unfortunately the government is less than half of the problem. Google, Facebook, Apple and Android are not government institutions, or maybe you forgot that when you tried to blame the current situation on the electoral process.

But don't worry, we are on the path of corralling you Big Tech guys back into the pen you belong. It will take some time, granted, but GDPR has already shaken up your world in a major way, and it's not going to stop soon.

Privacy will be ours, get over it.

NHS Digital is without a CEO right now

According to Wikipedia, they're looking for a new CEO to replace Mrs Wlkinson who is already gone. I'm not sure that that is a good sign.

For the rest, the wiki paints a reassuring picture of the organization, but hey, it's a UK Gov IT project, what could possibly go wrong ?

"web tracking beacons cunningly disguised as funny little animated images"

I always marvel at the intelligence of people who can purposely lie in order to get money.

Giphy is a company that wants to track you, just like Google. In order to do so, they imagined chat images, because everyone likes to add an emoticon now and then.

They made them funny, which makes them appealing, increasing their chance of use.

But all of this is to enhance their tracking ability, siphoning your private life to sell it to ad companies.

Giphy is a bunch of vampires.

Not surprising that El Zuck wants to get his hands on it.