Posts by John Smith 19

so IWF == ACPO of ISP's?

Unelected check

Unaccountable check

Policy set behind closed doors check

Actual *policy* IE the block list is *itself* secret check

What do you think?

This job seeems *infected*

Him *and* his predecessors have all been ignorant of the internet and wanted to control/throttle/censor it of *anything* they deem "Harmful."

I bet he's still a fan of the "Age rate *every* website" b***cks thought up by back bench bonehead Ms Perry.

Note that military batteries are *not* the the stuff you get at Tesco.

Like most military kit they are heavier lumps and usually rectangular. Completely incompatible with civilian hardware. I've seen prices for rechargeabless in the £100s range.

Personally I think they'd have done better with going the power MEMS route and building a battery form factor generator, preferably with *multiple* plugs. a package the size of a lunch box which could generate <= 100W for 24 hours (top up with more JP8 as needed) could go a *long* way.

Making a combined PV/thermoelectric/Cammo fabric that meets *all* the other specs for military protective "systems" will *not* be simple.

Kennedy is *huge*

I don't think 4.2g of *anything* goes very far, either for ground coverage or supplying the staff (All told I'd think it's not shy of 10000 people).

But this being a US *government* site I'd figure *all* the staff could be eligible for random drug tests.

@Morpho Devilpepper

"When did Assange suddenly gain the rights and privileges to speak on behalf of the entire nation of Australia for his own personal purposes??"

Well nations *do* claim the right to speak for their citizens and *supposedly * one of the benefits of *being* a citizen is that you will be protected from foreign governments basically *demanding* to have you handed over *without* evidence of an *actual* crime.

FYI one chunk of the US headless-chicken response was the realization that

1) He's *not* a US citizen.

2) Wikileaks is *not* based in the US

3)They *publish* stuff (which comes under the 1st amendment in the US, but see 2) they don't pay people to steal stuff for them.

The response of some US politician was less "sabre rattling" and more dummy throwing from their prams.

Basically the case would probably be nearer to the "Pentagon papers" case of files leaked to Jack Anderson, rather than Watergate.

IIRC The Pentagon blew the same smoke (Lives put at risk, opinions should remain secret forever etc) and wanted his arrest too.

I'd hoped the US under Obama would be *slightly* less mad than under the W but I guess there are still too many nut jobs in office (and too many more looking to get elected).

Sounds *something* like the IWF in the UK but for copyright

So to recap

Copyright *violation* is as bad as child pornography and needs a separate body to guard against it.

AFAIK Copyright violation remains a *civil* crime in Australia like everywhere else and it's up to the *producer* to chase them down. "Violation" just *sounds* really bad.

Aus ISP's are common carriers. It's *none* of their business what goes down their pipe (with the possible exception of spam from infected PC's).

I think the icon expresses my overall reaction.

Still going for the copyright violation is *theft* BS, eh

No It's a *civil* matter.

And how often does the actual *artist* see a cent of the money?

Icon says it all.

A note on Argon, nuclear reactors in space and alternative power sources.

IIRC Xenon has been the preferred fuel for ion engines in space. It's *much* easier to store than Helium (the smallest atom) and being larger than Argon *should* be easier to ionize.

However while Argon is likely to be harder to ionize (higher voltage power supply needed) it is also the most *common* noble gas in the atmosphere and perhaps most important of all, the *cheapest* as it's used in welding quite a lot.

Being cheap and readily available (I'd expect large welding supply stores to have at least some in stock) can pay dividends when your research is on a budget.

The problem with nuclear reactors in space (at least those in the *open* literature) is that they just are not *big* or current enough. The last *actual* US orbiting *reactor* was SNAP-10A in 1965, which was good for about 500W.

The proposed SP100 (100Kw) for SDI in the early 80's never got out of design. Los Alamos has been designing something called the SAFE400, designed to deliver 100Kw of electrical power, as a sort of private project of the director, and that's about it in the US (of course the NRO, USAF and USN *could* have one on every big sat they've been orbiting since the 80s and simply not *told* anyone. However the presence of high temperature neutron emitting IR sources *anywhere* in Earth orbit would be a pretty big hint *someone* was using them and the list of countries that could is a short one).

The US bought 6 TOPAZ reactors in the early 90s (and AFAIK still has them) but I don't think they bought any *fuel*. However even if they were good to go they would deliver about 5Kw

each.

Bottom line. No one is going to design, build and qualify a space nuclear reactor in the timescale needed (although a space reactor design in the 100Kw+ range, which gave more power than all but the *biggest* solar arrays, *would* be a good idea to have on the shelf for the future)

Ground based turbo generators in the 200Kw range are used for emergency power and typically fueled by gasoline or natural gas. Assuming sea level air has a density 1.22521 kg/m3. and 20% of that mass is O2 then LOX is 4562x more dense (per cubic metre). It *should* be possible to build a power pack (LOX/fuel tanks, turbo-generator, controls) into a package you could stow on the Shuttle.

While it would be enough to *start* the engine it's *very* doubtful to get the kind of run time that would be needed to show up any flaws that *only* shoe up in long term tests (936 Hrs, possibly with a re-start following flip over at the half way mark if you really want to go to Mars)

BTW the way to avoid the exhaust interfering with the thrust measurements is to fit the exhaust pipe with a T end piece that exhausts in equal and opposite directions, canceling any thrust.

Wiring this thing *directly* to the ISS power system and directly mounting it to the structure is *much* the simplest option.

He almost made it.

They're less than six months to the end of the programme.

There are *many* hazardous chemicals used in and around the Shuttle. It's an odd way to die. That said some of those gantries are high and I suspect winds can be quite gusty.

No doubt the accident report will explain everything.

80% good enough for a court of law.

Icon says it all.

Shurley not a *proper* LP article

He doesn't say they'd be better off buying American *anywhere*.

Could it happen in the UK?

I mean customers (gasp) *suing* companies over what they expected to get.

Throttling is well known already.

The idea of it being a Ponzi (pyramid) scheme is interesting.

Business uses revenue from current sales to finance growth in capability to suppy.

IIRC isn't that how Apple started their funding? Issue an arrest warrant for Steve Wozniak?

Overall Thumbs up. Suppliers should stop offering stuff they can't *deliver*

@Elmer Phud

Do not feed.

Maximum credible accident*

Loosing *all* cooling water pump power while all your reactors are shut down.

Where on the planet could such a ridiculously improbable even take place?

Oh wait.*

*Mine will have a copy of John Howlett's "Maximum credible accident" in it.

BTW If I were going for the nuclear option today I'd go molten flouride Thorium hands down.

Why stop at one.

Surely they should form a *squadron*.

You can guess what old cartoons are on that DVD.

When you can't sell something to another country because someone *elses* government says you can't

*Your* government is no longer in charge. They are.

A "Eurofighter" that *cannot* be sold to *anyone* without the US governments permission is "Euro" in *name* only.

A note on staff costs

The average UK weekly salary is £499 according to

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=285

Assuming you worked from 18 to 70 your *lifetime* salary would be £1 349 296

On the claimed cost of one aircraft at £216m that would pay off 160 workers.

Or nearly 34 years of the RBS bosses bonus for 2010 (£2m in cash, £4.5m in shares).

it's one hell of a lot of money. Still "There's always an enemy, you just need to know *where* to look for them."

Incidently JPL have also looked at this technology

Some JPL landers and probes operate in *very* dusty environments while others are just flat out hostile (Venus having roughly the conditions inside a sulphuric acid reactor) so they are quite keen on putting the tricky stuff inside a pressure hull with a bunch of "robust" but perhaps not too sensitive sensor heads outside

There are various PDF's on the technology around ultrasound, power ultrasound and coupling through walls.

Still pretty clever.

This is *so* wrong.

It's clearly a case of ELF abuse.

I know. I've had a lousy day.

A note on con-sultants.

The answer is *always* "yes" unless they work out the customer wants it to be no.

10 years on and this is *just* a problem?

Icon says it all.

Orbital rockets don't have many moving parts.

They're *solid* propellant. As simple as fireworks, and *almost* as controllable.

Unfortunately the bits that *do* move don't seem to work very well.

They were "Mastering the internet"

How much more "expanded" a role can you get?