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Comment Re:bad summary (Score 4, Informative) 121

Very old timers remember using DKBTrace before it turned into POV-Ray. I actually called the "You Can Call Me Ray" BBS that originally hosted all of this, too. It's nice sometimes when a project like this from a completely different era is still alive and kicking.

Comment Better quality from game consoles (Score 1) 255

I just recently started using my Xbox 360 for streaming Netflix, primarily because it supports 5.1 sound but also because of the better interface. My blu-ray player will do streaming also, but is rather more limited and only does stereo. The downside though is that Microsoft requires you to have an Xbox Live Gold account to do this, which is a whole other subscription on top of the Netflix subscription.

Cellphones

Florida Reduces Penalties For 'Sexting' Teens 295

SonicSpike sends word that Florida has changed how law enforcement deals with teenagers who send racy pictures to each other over their phones. Quoting CNN: "Before Saturday, a Florida teenager who sent or received nude photos or video could have been charged with a felony and forced to register as a sex offender. But a new law, recognizing the proliferation of cell phones and computers, eases the penalties for 'sexting' infractions. A first offense is punishable by eight hours of community service or a $60 fine; the second is a misdemeanor and the third is a felony. ... Under House Bill 75, teens who receive explicit images won't be charged if they took reasonable steps to report it, did not solicit the image and did not send it to someone."
Robotics

How Do People Respond To Being Touched By a Robot? 137

An anonymous reader writes "You know it's coming, and for the forever-alone crowd, not soon enough: robots that physically interact with humans. Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have found in a study that people generally had a positive response toward being touched by a benevolent robotic nurse, but that their perception of the robot's intent made a significant difference. 'Even though the robot touched people in the same way,' said a team lead, 'if people thought the robot was doing that to clean them, versus doing that to comfort them, it made a significant difference in ... whether they found that contact favorable or not.'"

Comment Alamo Drafthouse (Score 4, Informative) 434

Case in point: The Alamo Drafthouse. They play first run movies (as well as cult films and other such), serve food and alcohol, and have actual pre-show video entertainment (not commercials). If a movie isn't playing at the Drafthouse, I generally don't bother going. It's not worth putting up with general obnoxiousness of the large corporate theater chains like Cinemark.

Comment Re:I don't have a degree... (Score 1) 844

$87k here, and no degree either (I dropped out of college three separate times). Finding that first programming position was quite difficult. It was mostly a matter of finding a company willing to pay me little (~$30k) in exchange for the fact that I had no job experience and no degree. Once I had two years work experience there (with a couple of raises), I moved to another company and doubled my salary overnight.

The lack of a degree never really came up again, once I had a good amount of work experience. There are some positions where having a degree is an absolute requirement, but most of them are with state level government or similar... and are probably places I wouldn't really want to work anyway.

Comment Re:I see the other end of this problem rather ofte (Score 1) 888

Why would I need to do any of this? Cast members are performing on stage in a public place, with no reasonable expectation of privacy whatsoever. Audience members are allowed to take all the photos they like as well. Should every audience member also be required to jump through these hoops before being allowed to post photos they took online somewhere?

Comment I see the other end of this problem rather often (Score 5, Interesting) 888

I'm a long-term Rocky Horror Picture Show cast member, and I run a web site for our local cast in Austin. I've been running this web site for over a decade now.

Cast members are frequently very interested to see photographs of themselves performing in the show. And since it's Rocky Horror, they're usually wearing lingerie of some sort. At the time the photos are posted, they're invariably very excited about this. Especially because I take pride in my photography, and most people haven't seen photos of themselves prior to this that someone had actually put significant work into.

A few years later though, these same people have frequently quit the cast, possibly graduated from college, and moved on to other activities. They may decide they want to apply for jobs in education, as music minister of a church, etc. They do some vanity searching on Google and are shocked... shocked I tell you!... that the Rocky Horror cast web site is still online and kicking with what had been posted some years previously.

Now keep in mind this is a hobby web site that I do purely for the enjoyment of myself and other cast members. It's done in my spare time, and I've always paid for it out of pocket.

I'm sure I could honor requests to remove all of these photos, but I simply don't want to. It involves a lot of time and effort on my end, to accomplish something that's actively taking away from things I take pride in myself. I get probably a half dozen requests per year on average at this point all basically saying the same thing: "Take down my photos now! You're causing damage to my reputation!". At some point I just had to say to hell with them all and whip up a form letter response saying "Sorry, but I'm just not going to do anything about it".

Security

How Much Does a Reputation For Security Matter Anymore? 98

dasButcher writes "We often hear that businesses risk their corporate reputations if they don't have adequate security. It's been a common refrain among those selling security technologies: protect your data or suffer the reputational consequences. But, as Larry Walsh points out, the evidence is against this notion. Even companies that have suffered major security breaches — TJX, Hannaford, etc. — have suffered little lasting damage to their reputation. So, does this mean that reputational concerns are simply bunk?"

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