Posts by John Brown (no body) 25334 publicly visible posts • joined 21 May 2010
True, but that's 100 people strapped into seats, probably not with much room to all get "loose" and have a zero G party. I'ts doable, at much less than Branson charges, and can reach proper orbit to boot, but I'd imagine it's for 20-30 people max and a few staff to keep people safe/clear of floating globules of vomit.
"Yet I bet not one senior member of staff in the post office has ever seen even a mild amount of discomfort as a result of this."
Why do you think this has dragged on for so long? All those with any level of reasonability have long moved on and can no longer be disciplined or penalised. Unless someone can show enough evidence against named individuals to bring a criminal case or provide enough cash (lots!) to bring a civil case, then no individuals will suffer for this debacle. Current PO management will pay up what they have to and apologise with a clean personal conscience on behalf of the business.
"So 'only' an additional ~54GW required. This is a substantial amount - no denying - but it's a lot lot less than the "triple" that you are claiming."
Not forgetting that you also need all the overhead cables and pylons to get the power where it's needed along with all the underground power cables to get around towns and cities that now need at least double what they are currently delivering.
"rent a car. "
When my company car is in for a service, the company hires a car for me from one of the major chains. It's never the class requested, always a "free upgrade. They never have enough cars ready. I can only imagine what it must be like in peak holiday season trying to get a short term hire at short notice.
"public slow chargers available along the kerb."
Charger rage! People who get home in time to grab a space at a charger then piss off home for the night, not moving it when charged because a) they don't care and b) finding another parking space anywhere near home after a few hours topping up is almost impossible.
"All in all, a good 5 hours of faffing around to fix something their on site support would have done in seconds had they not got rid of them."
On the other hand, though you may not have enjoyed the trip and the "wasted time", I bet it cost less than the annual salary of the now-redundant on-site support team :-)
Clearly a ransom demand by a blackmailer is NOT encrypted as the target has to be able to read it or at the very least, the victim wouold be sent a key for that specific email. But that ransom demand doesn't identify the blackmailer and likely doesn't lead to any genuine contact details at the email provider either though it does lead to the account. To identify the blackmailer, the cops need to attempt to get more in information. Tracking the IP address(es) accessing the account will probably lead anonymous VPN, possibly multiple layers of VPN and likely a dead end. That leaves trying to find some legal way to access the data in the mailbox or in transit to/from the mailbox.
The argument really is about whether it can be done at all in this specific instance and if so, what other fallout or collateral damage might occur.
How long ago was that? Back when I was at school, calculators were only just becoming affordable for some kids, they weren't generally allowed in class and certainly not for exams, but we always used 3.142 for Pi in both maths and physics. We were still using log table books.
Me too!
I wasn't sure what to expect from this flight. Taking off without a support tower looked interesting. The relatively slow flight up shows excellent control. I was a bit concerned when the first engine turned off and the inside of the ship caught fire, but noted that the unused engine gimballed out of the way, as did the 2nd engine when it in turn switched off.
And then there was the rotation into the the belly down configuration! It already looked like a "real" spaceship from 1950's SF, but seeing fly like something Flash Gordon or Dan Dare might be piloting was gobsmacking! I'd like to have seen the camera zoom out a bit to get an impression of how much cross-range it managed "flying" with it's "wings".
It did seem that the first engine to switch off seemed to be still pumping fuel out after de-ignition though. Maybe that's why there wasn't the fuel pressure for the landing?
"Nothing you can easily do about those soldered-in batteries though."
I've not looked, but I bet you can get external batteries for laptops like the "power bank" things they sell for phones. Possibly even designed to fit on the bottom or otherwise attach to the laptop or even specific models and connect to the charging port. Ostensibly for extra time away from power points, but might be cheaper, if uglier, than a proper replacement battery.
"This isnt a normal company though. You pay this company to shore up your cyber defences."
So, the real lesson to be learned here is not just that you need to keep on top of security at all times, but you most certainly don't get complacent even if you have just had your defences shored up by one of the leading players.
Noise cancelling, "Theatre experience", self-sealing memory foam ear pads? I wonder how many of these rich kids will self-Darwin crossing busy streets? It's been an issue since portable music players were invented of course, but at least with most earbuds you can still hear some of the outside world.
"because all the tech companies change dollar prices to pounds directly instead of applying exchange rates."
Primarily because UK prices include VAT while US prices don't usually include the many and varied sales taxes implemented in different states and cities. Likewise, they need to add in the cost of the warranty period, which is generally much longer in the UK and EU than in the USA. With the recent fall in the value of the £ against the $ over the last few years, I'm surprised the actual number isn't now higher in £ than in $ given the above.
On the other hand, I use those sort of shops on rare occasions for accessories, and that's generally why others are there too. There's usually at least a couple of phones on the work bench, but I wonder how much of the "repair shops" business is repairs and not sales of cases, chargers, screen prtectors and batteries?
The only hard figures I have are 1770 deaths for 2018 and 1752 for 2019. For 2020, I'm remembering Grant Shapps (in a Parliamentary Committee hearing IIRC) stating road deaths were down "70%", pro rata during at least the first part of the lockdown starting in march.
That is a very small number in the overall death rate, but there have been news reports claiming some decrease in non-COVID death rates, but it's likely we won't have any real hard and fast numbers until next year when the ONS does it's reports.
Having said that, the "excess deaths" number is calculated by looking at death rates higher than expected for the time of year based on the averages of previous years. So, again, we don't really know for sure what the actual excess death rates are yet because we don't know yet if this years "expected" deaths rates have changed.
Anyway, all that said, I accept your point that the figures/estimates/guess may well b e wrong, I Donald Trump your claim with "well, I said THOSE deaths dropped significantly, not necessarily that the number is significant in the grand picture :-p
"Had GMail created different domains at national level, for example,"
I have a .net domain. It confuses people when I give than a <some name>@domain.net. Many will ask if that's .com. Few of the confused wonder why it's not .co.uk. I suspect most people when given an email address will unthinkingly auto-instert .com at the end. In particular, people in the US who seem to think .com is the US TLD.
After all, The register was generally UK oriented originally so used .co.uk but is now far more global and has gone .com to reflect that.
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