Become a fan of Slashdot on Facebook

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror

Comment Re: Science (Score 1) 211

I'm being lazy and you can pick this apart all you want, but the evidence is that it worked and was very well into statistical significance range:

Interpretation
Our results showed that US counties with higher proportions of persons 12 years of age fully vaccinated against COVID-19 had substantially lower rates of COVID-19 cases and deaths—a finding that showed dose response and persisted even in the period when Delta was predominant.

From:
https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thelancet.com%2Fjour...
County-level vaccination coverage and rates of COVID-19 cases and deaths in the United States: An ecological analysis

Comment Re:Cold weather? (Score 1) 138

Rhesus Macaques are carriers of Macacine alphaherpesvirus 1, better known as B-Virus. In non-human primates, it's annoying, roughly the same as a cold sore in a human. In humans, however, it has something around an 80% case fatality rate with limited treatment options available.

The colonies are routinely tested for B-Virus by PCR, but it's possible that the virus is dormant in a given animal, resulting in a negative test. While that animal wouldn't be able to infect a human AT THAT MOMENT, they could start shedding virus at any time afteward. All Old-World Primates are assumed to be B-Virus carriers, with appropriate protection for the humans always exercised.

So, no, while they may not have been used in any procedures that would introduced a transmissible disease to them, they can be a threat to human health anyway.

Comment Re:US Politics has gone to shit (Score 1) 1605

"WASHINGTON, July 27 (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump told Christians on Friday that if they vote for him this November, "in four years, you don't have to vote again. We'll have it fixed so good, you're not gonna have to vote."

There are many ways to interpret this line. I like to think in 4 years we can vote again.

Comment Re:Irrational objections (Score 1) 90

Comment Re:Honestly I think we do have bots (Score 1) 166

Different web, different place. I miss the old /. with the longass threads of discussion and some well-considered answers that would go on for a page or two. Usually learned something, too, even if it was a perspective I didn't agree with.

We're all still on a list, yes. The intertubes don't forgive or forget. .....slashdotting: back in, eh, 97-98, one of my friends had a little site on the school's server. He gets a call from the admin screaming one day, saying that the traffic had gone up something like 100000x in 4 hours on his little page and he was shutting it off because it was eating most of the school's bandwidth and capacity. DDOS, indeed. WTF?
Yup, slashdotted. Still a funny memory.

Comment Re:Ran out of brakes... (Score 1) 351

Ah, the Audi 5000 mess:
https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.curbsideclassic.co...

TL;DR: It wasn't Audi. It wasn't even an engineering problem. It was the fact that it was unusually narrow spacing between the gas and brake pedals, and the fact they were nearly the same size. Great for heel-and-toe shifting, really bad for American drivers used the 9" wide brake pedal on a Buick. The car didn't have an override for the gas and brake being pressed at the same time, so even if someone was laying on the brakes, it was possible they were stepping on the gas at the same time. The harder they pressed the brakes, the harder the car would pull. The brakes would eventually overpower the engine, but not until the driver was scared somewhat shitless.

Audi was confused as shit about this problem originally, as the entire engine control system was the same as the cars sold in Germany, and they hadn't had a single reported case of this in the country. It was something that only was happening in the American market. Eventually they figured it out, but not until well after the PR damage was done.

Comment Re:Don't say gay (Score 1) 330

You weren't paying attention.

I had a Miss Bistany in 1st grade.
Later that year, the name tag was Mrs. Bistany.

Wasn't hard to figure out.

"Because they were professionals and stuck to their topics. Their private life was not a school to[ic."
The K-12 educator that manages to keep their entire private life separate from school is rare. College is different.

Comment Re:Don't say gay (Score 1) 330

"The teacher's job is to instruct in reading, math, science, etc."

On paper, sure.
In reality, a K-8 teacher is mom,dad,counselor,cook,friend,comedian,historian,protector,psychologist,teacher,confideant
This is not new. This isn't even 1930's new. This is one of the reasons that so many of the teachers found the underpaying job so, so, rewarding: it's never been just about the teaching.

Comment Re: Don't say gay (Score 1) 330

Disney isn't the first, or last, for any of that kind of public-private game. This isn't exactly the same thing, but I'm too lazy to really find the right links now:
https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Frethinkq.adp.com%2Fartif...

We do have a long, storied, history in the USA about companies in then-remote areas setting up shop with very "special" rules. Disney was smart enough to capitalize on that for decades after building in the middle of Alligator Alley.

Comment Re:Different brand (Score 5, Funny) 160

Gotta argue the Audi thing from as objective as a point as I can. Or not:

Base Model A3 or A4 - Should have bought an Accord, but wanted 4-wheel drive because.....reasons.....and more cupholders. Not a status symbol.
A6 or A8: Yup, asshole car of choice. That's a long, low, status symbol car. Kinda like the M5.
Q-anything: Status symbol. Should have bought an Outback or a CR-V.
A1 or A2: Fun, cheap, practical. Not a bad car if you can get one. Not a status symbol.
TT: I work in personal grooming

S-model cars: Depends on which one.
S7: Yup, status.
S4: Well....It's kind of like an M3. Might be status, might be someone who understands what brake fade is and how to induce it.
S6: You wanted an M5, but your stock broker has one already and you didn't want to show your envy
SQ-anything: Status symbol. Should have bought an Outback or CR-V
TT-S: I work in personal grooming

R-model Cars.....
RS-6: Because long, low, expensive, and angry makes you happy. Kind of like your SO.
RS-4: Beware the RS-4 owner. One of the sweetest sounding V8's ever stuffed in a modern car. The owner is a *driver*
RS-3: Hard to call this one. Could be a status thing that didn't want an M2 or M3, but could be a proper driver. If they use turn signals, you'll know.
TT-RS: I'm dating a hairdresser and can't drive away fast enough.
R-8: It's a supercar. 90% status. 10% sheer terror.

Audi. There you go.
Brought to you by Volkswagen. We do diesel well! :)

Comment Re:without driving it? (Score 5, Interesting) 113

I'll answer that: me.

I'd classify myself as a "car guy". I do my own wrenching, worked as a mechanic for a while, have the big ol' set of tools (though in a Craftsman box, not a Snap-on), and have a special love/hate of VW products....like I think anyone who works on them does. I'd normally never even consider buying a car sight-unseen. Until last year.

We live in the NorthEast United States. My wife, with a short commute and Level 2 chargers at work for free, decided that it was time for her 2016 VW Golf to go. The perfect car presented itself after a short search: 2017 VW eGolf. Produced 2014-2019(?), it was all of the Golf goodness, but battery powered. Has a range of ~100 miles. It was, effectively, the test platform for what became the now-produced ID.4.

Here's the problem: VW never sold them in this part of the country. Something like 90% of them were sold in California, so they're literally not on the used car lots in this part of the country. The closest one was something like 1000 mile drive from here. Even if we went out there to get it, getting it home would be an adventure unless we shipped it.

Enter Carvana. They had a half-dozen available; the prices were reasonable. We picked the colour and options we liked, and for 750 bucks delivery fee and a week later, the car, which was originally titled in California, showed up in front of our house on a little rollback. The deal was this: you had 7 days and 300 miles to test drive the car. If you didn't want in that period, you called them up and they'd come get it. You'd be out 500 bucks for shipping fees if you did that, but that's it. For a car that we wouldn't have access to otherwise, 500 bucks was a reasonable chance to take.

Turned out that the car was even nicer than the pictures let on. Granted, this isn't a tuner kind of car, so if we were looking at WRX EVO's or something, I'd have been way more wary of it having the shit beaten out of it. But, those are available here though conventional means. The eGolf wasn't.

This, I think, was Carvana's key bit of power: access. For run-of-the-mill cars, who cared. For the harder to find cars, but not the exotics that have their own following, they made it very easy to have access. Cars like the eGolf, Like the Fiat 500's Abarths, like Audi TT's, like the WRX's. Not rare cars, but not common on the used market in the less populated areas of the country. They found a good niche that was underserved in the car world.....and then screwed themselves.

Slashdot Top Deals

Never tell people how to do things. Tell them WHAT to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity. -- Gen. George S. Patton, Jr.

Working...