Re: Can't Iran indict the USA
Whataboutism is never pretty.
26667 publicly visible posts • joined 7 Jun 2007
A rubber ruler (or a simple piece of elastic with equally spaced tic marks) is a useful tool when installing railings, siding, fence posts, and anything else that requires even spacing in an uneven space. When stretched, the distance between tic marks all expand equally.
"I don't see how adding blockchain into the mix is going to suddenly make those messages easier to process."
It doesn't. Adding more layers also makes things more complex, and thus less secure. But at least some management will get larger bonuses this year ... and middle management will be able to play with pretty powerpoint presentations, as will whoever is in charge of press releases. And ElReg will be able to write about it, and we will be allowed to comment on it. And all of it eats tons of electricity, contributing to minimizing my heating bill this coming winter.
Blockchain is an ecosystem in a jar.
The two biggest problems in IT security today are the same as they have been for the half century or so that I've been making money in the IT world, and probably go back to the dawn of time.
The first is convincing management to throw enough money (resources) at the problem to have the correct hardware for the situation ... AND the staff to run it properly.
The second is the big problem ... over 95% of the userbase is incapable of wrapping their tiny collective hive mind around the concept of security.
Sometimes '95 seems like just yesterday ... About six months ago I was looking at the album cover for The Stooges Funhouse (autographed by Iggy and framed, on a friend's wall) and realized it had been well over half a century since I first heard it.
Current tunage: Bob Dylan "You're no Good"
Because as we all know, animals in the wild just choose a beautiful, comfy spot, lie down, and simply go to sleep, never to wake up again.
Would do these bleeding hearts good to see what happens when a varmint finds its way into a chicken coop. RealLifeInTheWild ain't pretty ... and from what Ive seen, the hounds do a faster job of the inevitable than many other forms of death.
Note that in reality Mufasa would have probably eaten his sprog ... fuck off, Disney.
"If I had been unfortunate enough to be born into the Royal Family I would not have been able to pursue my love of Computers"
If you had been unfortunate enough to be born into the Royal Family, your circumstances would have been completely different. Chances are you would never even have thought of making the above statement. The very concept would have been outside your ken.
I stuck out the meaningless bit. These is nothing fortunate, nor unfortunate, about being born. To think otherwise is to believe in "luck", which doesn't exist.
"It's not the people who are expensive to maintain, its the buildings."
Don't forget the grounds. It costs an arm and a leg to keep those lawns maintained, the trees and bushes pruned, the reflecting waters filtered, to say nothing of the trampled petunias replanted, the fag-ends swept up, the chewing gum scraped up, and all the other ravages brought down by the well meaning public oogling their heritage.
I hold a UK driver's licence. I didn't have to take a test to receive it.
Back in days of Yore, before TheInternet (really!) I had a California driver's license with a motorcycle stamp, and also an International license. My insurance guy in Blighty told me that I could get a break on my insurance rate if I obtained a British one. So I headed off to the MOT(?? is that right?) to take care of it. They looked at my existing paperwork and just rubber-stamped the application to drive manual transmission cars and motorcycles. Up until that point, I had no idea that you Brits had separate tests for automatics and manuals.
Severalth generation Californian here, so I'm hardly a Monarchist. However, I have spent a good deal of my life in DearOldBlighty ... long enough to know what a truly great head of state and ambassador she was this last near century.
The world has lost one of the great ones.
Condolences to the Family, and to the Nation.
Rest in Peace and God Save The King
Put out a "MANDATORY! MUST ANSWER BY THURSDAY COB OR YOU'RE FIRED!" 20 question corporate questionnaire. Most of the actual questions are unimportant, except include a block of three that says "how important to you are MS Word, Excel and Powerpoint", with 1 being not at all, to 5 being absolutely vital. Fire everybody who answers 3, 4 or 5 to the Powerpoint line, and also fire everybody who doesn't return the questionaire at all.
You'll have just cut the 20%, almost all mostly useless middle management, with no loss to your company.
Throw away the rest of the answers. Note: This will only work once.
"At the same time the governor is allowing the utilities to block people from easily deploying their own solar"
Not really. I had absolutely zero issues from the State or the PUC or PG&E when I installed mine. I even had quite a few tax incentives. Switching from the grid to my off-the-grid system consisted of having my insurance company inspect it, then literally throwing the switch, verifying that it was functional, and finally pulling PG&E's meter[0] and calling them to come get their shit off my property.
"Now we have a high speed fail rail that only serves the central valley."
We don't even have that. The first leg is partially under construction. Partly, I say, because the numpties in charge haven't even secured 52 miles of the right-of-way as of yet. Hell of a way to run a railroad, that.
Most of the rest of yours is hyperbole, and I'm not in the mood.
[0] Here in California, the homeowner is responsible for everything after the meter. After PG&E took all their stuff away, I decided to keep the transfer switch (I had to pay for it, might as well use it!) and added a way to truck in a second genset, just in case I ever need to take my kit off-line for a few days.
Here in Sonoma I have discovered that it is far more energy efficient to keep the place at a cool temperature constantly than it is to allow the place to warm up when I'm away, and then try to cool it back down when I return. Granted, I have very good insulation, but so should everyone else.
"Xcel confirmed to Contact Denver7 that 22,000 customers who had signed up for the Colorado AC Rewards program were locked out of their smart thermostats for hours on Tuesday"
So presumably, the smart people went down to their local hardware store and purchased a cheap chinesium thermostat (~$20) to replace the obviously b0rken-by-design so-called "smart" one, right?
Yes, we can, and are. It has only been recently that it makes sense for the average homeowner, at least from a TCO perspective.
The cost of admission is very high ... but once installed, you can pull the meter and ignore the grid for the rest of your life.
I'm projecting my setup will have paid for itself in about ten years (guessing at PG&E rate increases). After that, it'll have another 20 years of life in it with one battery swap, and possibly another 15 or so after that with another battery swap.
My costs were lower than yours might be ... When I rebuilt this house, I made provisions for a solar plant on the roof, including wire. And I did the installation myself, minimizing labo(u)r costs.
My AC runs off the inverter. The inverter doesn't give a shit if the power comes from the PVs, the generator, or the battery.
However, for the most part we don't use the AC. The GSHP keeps the house at a nice, toasty 70F (21C) pretty much constantly. I expect the AC to kick in on Sunday, Monday & Tuesday, when it's supposed to be around 105F (40C).
What the fuck do MAGA (Muppets Annoying Genuine Americans) have to do with intelligent people pointing and laughing at California's joke of an energy policy? Has anyone noticed the dams silting up yet? And now we're going to get another 5 years of Nuclear (in you FACE, Gavin!), but after that no more nukes (none even on the drawing board[0]). But we're working on Wind! (Never mind that ALL of the good places for wind generation are already full[1].) And we'll have better batteries RealSoonNow! Honest! Really, We're Working On It! Etc. Etc. Etc. ... During the meanwhile, let's build another hundred or so natural gas plants to keep us going ...
I'm ever so happy that I told PG&E and the PUC to fuck off ... The idiots running things couldn't organize a piss-up in a winery.
The heatwave California is heading into (today through next Tuesday or Wednesday) is absolutely nothing new. It is normal, it happens every year. In fact, there are typically six to ten of them every year. It is the fifth so far this year. (I'm in Sonoma, California.)
"our utility will pay me $2 per Kwh to adjust my A/C thermostat to reduce overall power use."
So the more you use, the more the utility will pay you? That sounds kind of stupid ... Surely they can't be paying you according to how much you DON'T use ... Consider that you didn't use 450 GWh this afternoon, and you won't again tomorrow.
[0] Not only are there no new nuclear plants on the drawing board, as of 1975 it is actually ILLEGAL for an energy company to start planning a new one here in California. No shit! The mind absolutely boggles ...
[1[ Except the Coast ... but the California Coastal Commission will never allow wind plants on or near the coast. So there goes 850 x 40 to 100 miles or so of prime wind ...
"Or maybe (more likely) it's just a piece of well intentioned ill thought out knee jerk legislation in an election year."
FTFY.
And yes, of course it is. And it needs to be stomped on before it becomes a law ... but I'm fairly certain that idiot Gavin is going to sign it. Unless Moonbeam calls him up and makes him see sense ...