Random Thought

You got a good book there, ML.

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The MBombe was interesting, and I'm reading a lot of praise, so I checked a bit about its protection level 4. Well, it's good compared to contemporary products. But when I compare to the war reports of the vietnam war it would just do. There would probably no change to the number of vehicle loses, though. Firepower is only slightly higher, but overall less "guns". And it seems once again only the israelis would do very well with their Namer. We rally need to do something here.
Well, it does seem to show today's battles are not as intense or difficult. More like a walk than a battle.
To draw some comparison : today's protection levels vs vietnam battle threats.
level 4: 10 kg mine
level 5: 25 mm APDS-T @ 500 meters, Artillery 155 mm High Explosive at 25 m
vs typical vietnam road battle
90 kg mines
37 mm & 76 mm rifles, RPG-2, mortars & grenades

IEDs are the only "new" threat, but their ranged effect is limited.
I guess mercs need better stuff than what's commonly available.

It's rather short and easy to read.I have a similar book on the Celts.Also short and easy to read.

It looks like for now the chances of the NBA returning to Seattle soon have gotten a bit slimmer
but according to the paper Chris Hansen has been telling fans not to give up.That might mean he has something going that he's not quite willing to reveal yet.Probably a compromise of some sort.
But we shall see.
It could also mean that if the sale of the Kings goes completely askew that he might be looking at the possibility of buying another team and try to relocate it to Seattle,a very slim possibility at the moment.

I wouldn't rely on what he said there. That's a typical (business) statement. Most likely it's just to keep people's hope up but will end in nothingness.

Anyway, recently the "Mars One" projects announced that it will become a reality show to finance itself. Well, I wasn't quite convinced by their quick paced plan, even though it's not that impossible. Now, this really had been puzzling me. So I have been looking around and looking more closely. Sadly, I have to agree with Arstechnica's finding
http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/04/more-than-20000-people-apply-for-one-way-ticket-to-mars/
Looking at the roadmap plans
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_One
more things don't seem quite right.
For example sending 4 people in a 5 m capsule on a 6-7 months long journey. Sure it's cheap and possible but I think common people will go crazy.
For example there's no word on communication satellites. How can they have reality TV with out a sure communication line. They need at least 2-3 Mars orbit communications satellites and two Sun-Mars-Lagrange points satellites.
This seems more and more like either a scam or simply fail by default project.

other news:
American settlers turned cannibals
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-22362831

Toba super-volcano catastrophe idea 'dismissed'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22355515

Since I was part of a opensource car project I found a nice photo gallery for "recent" car designs.
http://www.heise.de/autos/artikel/Irre-Studien-der-vergangenen-Jahre-1844978.html

It's unlikely that Hansen was simply saying it for the benefit of Sonics fans.
The real problem of course is that Stern refuses to add any expansion franchises while he is still commissioner,let alone one in Seattle.

The idea that the Jamestown settlers resorted to cannibalism was in fact recorded by eyewitnesses but
before the evidence was literally dug up it was thought to be just a tall tale.
The settlers who came before the Second or Third Supply Fleet and survived the Starving Times and also
the later Indian Massacre were given the right to be called Ancient Planters.

Related to Mars One, forgot to mention that Opportunity recently came back online after Mars passed behind the sun.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130430102706.htm
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/03/130320192453.htm

toilet seat inside a troop transporter
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Toilettensitzmodul_im_GTK_Boxer.jpg
Now, that's one revolutionary, long awaited, and needed invention!
All the days of fear doing your business in the wild are over.
No more fears of insects, snakes, scorpions etc.

A buggy to combat fire in urban area 0.o
http://www.tuvie.com/amatoya-a-new-class-of-vehicle-to-the-field-of-fire-appliance-design/
With what looks like no more than 100-200 liters of water I kind of doubt it.

That last looks like something from a Sci Fi series.
Speaking of which have you seen Defiance,the new Syfy series on Monday nights?It looks like they're
using the same vehicles that were featured in Terra Nova or else something similiar.
Defiance is interesting because it is a mutlti-media deal where it's both a video game and a tv series.

I think someone got too much fantasy energy with that buggy.
The general rule in firefighting is to pour as much water to cool and drown the fire. Those 4 cannons are peashooters. Besides if it got to fight fires from two directions it's in bigger trouble. Firetrucks should save homes and support bush parachute firefighters....

No, I haven't watched Defiance. I was tired and thought monday night had nothing interesting other than the Amanda Berry kidnapping case, amazing creepy case. So I went to sleep early. Now, that you mention it I see there's a game for it coming. Hmm.

There's a revolutionary camera telescope is about to be available
Canon EF 200-400 f/4L IS 1.4x:
http://www.juzaphoto.com/article.php?l=en&t=canon_200-400_hands_on_preview
Rumors has been going around for years for this
very compact, smooth zooming & with an embedded teleconverter
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleconverter

Edit:
Cray now sells a supercomputer for $500 grands.
http://www.hpcwire.com/hpcwire/2013-05-07/cray_expands_xc30_line_with_air-cooled_option.html
Well, the basic design is, actually, a bit old.
Imho, for consumers anything above 20 grands is way too luxurious.
I guess 100 grands is fine for "small" business but 500? that business must make like millions a year to pay all bills/personnel.

Yeah,probably not meant for the average mom and pop buisness then.Though if the new internet sales tax is passed in Congress a lot of online buisness might want something like that to help handle all the
new taxes they have to figure out.I still don't understand what that means though.If I order something from Rightstuf would it mean I pay Washington State or Iowa Sales Tax?Does it mean you pay the sales tax where the online store is headquartered or where you live?And what about States that have income tax but no sales tax,how does that work?Is all confused.

Reminds me of the age old interstate tax discussion....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_taxes
http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2013/05/06/online-sales-tax-effects/2115913/
Well, as I understand it you pay the local store's tax.
But that alone would mean some states where the overall tax is lower get better business. So there should something like the interstate tax coming into it again. *shrugs*

Regarding the Defiance vehicle, it's certainly seem appropriate for the setting, although, I would doubt some advanced part's avaiability.
You might be interested in Darpa's XC2V challenge
http://www.dvice.com/archives/2011/03/darpa-announces.php
gallery of entries
https://forge.localmotors.com/pages/project.php?cg=7540
In the end, none of the Halo-warthog or deviantart.com-esque ones made it but a smart and practical design by Flypmode.
http://www.cardesignnews.com/site/process/design_contests/display/store4/item223224/

Recently Darpa also announced the winner of the phase 1 competition for
an IFV
http://www.gizmag.com/darpa-fang-winner/27213/
After spending 14B USD on FCS, the ICV and another 29B USD on GCV, Darpa seemed to have felt unsatisfied.
According to track record, the M113, the Bradley, the Stryker have all similar fatal flaws in the beginning. I kind of think it won't be different this time either.

Well, the only thing I don't like about these kind of competition is the low return winners get for something that's worth dozen of billions. The majority of people don't get a thing despite generating numerous ideas that may be taken up later or in other projects.
All these competition is stirring my mad scientist blood. *WHAHAHA*

I wonder if it will eventually have a civilian application like the humvee.I could see it eventually being used for hunting purposes.

I have been banging my head on trying to get past a brick wall in part of my Irish ancestry.
The problem is the family I am trying to get information on is named KENNEDY,which is quite
common as you know.
On the positive side:
1.They were from Dublin
2.They were Protestant
3.They belonged to the Gentry
4.Several male descendants were Clergy
5.The surname MITCHELL is some how associated with this family
6.They appear to have been an armorial family as a grant of confirmation of arms was given to
two members of the family
7.They might have originally been from Scotland

One other thing the mother had the maiden name of LE BAN,but I couldn't get anything on that tact
either.This is why genealogy can be so nerve wrecking at times.

"Clergy" is the best point to start searching since they are the ones with the most records available.
Mitchell is too uncertain, and I just found out GENTRY is also a name. o.0 I have the feeling it stands for something else.

interesting example:
http://familytreemaker.genealogy.com/users/g/r/i/Bruce-Griffith-VA/WEBSITE-0001/UHP-0173.html
[if something pops up just close it]

After looking around some more it seems to me LE BAN is a title which would fit the "armorial family" bit. Also associated with some land as in a lordship.
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ban
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ban_%28title%29
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Ban-Saint-Martin
So Imho, instead of naming her the document just called her something like "the lady/princess" (similar to how the japanese would just calling her directly/indirectly oujou-sama)

I watched a few eposodes of Defiance. Can't say it's very good quality show or anything new - another post-apocalyptic wild-west and very american aliens
The problem of the show - if you ignore sci-fi wannabe setting it's your typical wild west show with tons of same cliche. It reminds me of "Firefly" a bit

Speaking of US - what do you think about popularity of anime in US atm? Found this article while browsing various statistics:
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2011-04-15/america-2009-anime-market-pegged-at-us$2.741-billion

It seems anime market in US was getting smaller over tha past 5-7 years. Although seeing what stuff was popular explains it - i guess dumb/purely entertaining anime meet have severe competition while more meaningfull stuff doesn't find it's way to masses easily.

Doesn't look so american to me like Avatar did, but yeah, it's a western. I think it's kind of better than say Terra Nova since it seems more "lifely" but less real.
Firefly, Farscape, Galaxy Rangers, Alien Nation, etc... but Quantum Leap was nice.

I think the real problem isn't obvious in that news article. One being the "fair" american trade where e.g. Bandai US had to pay to have their show aired, and them and others going out of business. Many anime titles were no longer available for a time etc. Then there's all the american anime-copy-style shows that have appeared. Of course not to mention a lot has been taken in into movies, TV shows.
I would say things have become diluted while the original japanese anime got less sale. The ones these days seem all dumped down, have a lot of unnecessary fan service, have more lolies, and kind of look more like generic american shows in the past. I think that's the real problem. I rather buy a classic than one of the new ones...about 3x times more classic than new.

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OK, some of the interesting/weird news bit.
Some interesting/funny examples
http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/05/weird-science-takes-antibiotics-to-ward-off-a-case-of-idiocy/

Recently there's an effort to crowdsource people to evaluate things for emergency situations
main site
http://veri.ly/
news bit
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23427-nowhere-to-hide-the-next-manhunt-will-be-crowdsourced.html

Look at what kind of a slave "owner" you are.
http://slaveryfootprint.org/

Btw. what do you think of this on Mass Effect
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/05/the-simple-lesson-i-learned-from-369-hours-of-mass-effect/

Yes,I am aware that Gentry is also a name,but it also means someone who was a member of the landowning class but not a noble.

Now as far as Defiance goes,yeah,a lot of shows like it are really Westerns with Sci Fi settings.
Which having grown up on classic tv Westerns such as Bonanza and The Rifleman I really have no
problem with.After all even Star Trek was supposed to be Wagon Train to the Stars.

As far as the anime stats goes,it looks a bit dated as the last year given is 2008/09.
Someone really should do an update to see if and how the stats might have changed in the past
four or five years.Also I doubt that it shows the actual state of the anime industry as things can change rather rapidly in either direction in any industry.

Some years ago i'd be surprised to see any of the more "meaningfull" and "dramatic" anime to be popular in US because of the same stuff that was happening with movies. It changed however as my overall impression of hollywood stuff improved from totaly dumb/entertainment/poor acting/no drama/no moral stuff to something more grown up and smarter. I think the first time i felt it is when i seen "Watchmen" with my nephew - "another marvell/superhero crap" i thought and then it really broke a stereotype or two in my mind. Movies for masses kept getting better slowly and my hopes are still high after some recent stuff i seen and since it reflect state of it's audience then i guess it matured (intellectually, in tastes etc.) during these years. Anime should appeal more to this audience now than 7-10 years before

So what is the attitude toward anime in your parts? Do you have "specialized" stores for it or does it sell along with all the other videos? In here it's mostly "specialized" with the exception of most well known anime movies

No specialized stores for anime or manga here.The closest we got is The Comic Shop that basically
sells all types of comics related stuff including manga.Otherwise nothing close.I either order from
Rightstuf or buy at Barnes & Noble.
Though on the other hand it is interesting to point out that Spokane is home of school for college
age Japanese women to hone their English language skills.

Well, some can be found in (some) normal bookstores in the "graphic novels" section. Generally, normal people still think it's kid's stuff.
From experience, once they actually watch one they either don't like it or they are surprised/amazed. It depends on the show the watch of course.

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It seems there are already about 80000 people who signed up on the MArs One project. Even if it really gets on the way I still think some people are going to have a harsh encounter with reality. Reminds me of what people would do just to get down in history. For the sake of the participant, let's hope the first one won't also become the first space crime.

Some vids of T-90 tanks...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJ5HcP8AuCs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=a0TqRtZ-UIc&feature=endscreen

As for mars - at least i can understand why so many people wanna try, i never thought there will be any shortge of voluneers with so many sci-fi fans out there

*Grr* Censorship these days on the web & TV is starting to annoy me.

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Nice vids!
What a waste of an M-1 could have given it to me.
I gather that's the latest MBT T-90 version?
I see the english wikipedia is way outdated/incomplete.
When it's under water can it actually see where it's going?
It doesn't look like there is a periscope but a snorkel.
Nice remote weapon, although, maybe a bit too high.
I wonder if the active defense can deal with the new RPG-7 that's suppose to defeat active defenses.

From what I see other than the russian "compact" tank design everyone else is kind of undecided on future tank designs. There is still no clear winning design yet. The recent competitions the DOD has been hosting are a sign of the search.
Looking at IFV requirements these days there's not much of a difference to battle tanks. Way too big and heavy. The british
want small ones with single crews but that's too costly (per soldier).
Going the way of mercs or specops vehicles are too restrictive to certain terrain. They are also too light armored or not good enough for battle.
There's no problem on the weapons side, though.
You can do well with cheap WWII/Vietnam era weapons and still be quite a threat. Some "experienced" people want mortars instead of guns and cannons because in Iraq/Afghanistan they needed to pop walls and homes...which i think is rather single minded cases. I think putting up some dump WWII rockets like the canadians would do it well and cheap. *shrugs*
Remote weapons and drones are a must in the future. So I kind of think it will end up being vehicles for transporting expansive super soldiers. I guess at least an infantry squad and a crew of 2/3.

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Yeah, well, there are 7 billion people so even 0.001% is more than enough. But I will keep to my knowledge boosted "healthy" survival instinct.
Until there's enough housing space on Mars I think I would be no longer alive to try it myself.

I'm hearing something interesting.
It seems the europeans are planning to get rid of the 1- and 2-cents coins for convenience reasons....no more carrying lots of coins.

Let's see, this means at first everything (prices) is going to be rounded up to the next 5 cents. This means every time you made a business you will loose 2.5 cents on average.
Every time prices go up they go up by 5 cents; accounting for cases below 2.5 and above 2.5 cents that's 3.75 cents on average you loose.
Prices change about every 6 months.
=> 3.75 + Capital-sigma(n-iteration * 5)

Let's say on working days on average you use a vending machine three times, have lunch once and go shopping/groceries once a day. You don't always go shopping on week-days/ends...so we don't count weekends extra.
=> 5 times a working day
Anything else left goes into spending on vacations.
Let's say you start working at 16-18 years of age until 66-68 years of age. Then every retired day you do business once a working day (eg bus/train tickets).
Let's say you live to be 86-88 years (average male)

Summing the loses up (simplified, 140 iterations):
Capital-sigma (3.75+700) * (5*26*50 + 1*26*20) = 4940325 cents = 49403 Euros
Hmm, quite a sum...

Do you think we will do away with paper money any time soon Almael?
Andrew Jackson was against paper money as he felt it to be totally worthless.He was also against the
idea of a National Bank.Wonder what he make of the Fed then.
I can see coinage replacing paper money one day.Though the problem is how to make it not so bulky.
I think we have the technology to do so that they lacked in the 19th century.

Looks like I made a little mistake in the calculation above, but the point of doing it should be obvious.

I hope cash won't get replaced. I'm sure banks and businesses want it all electronic. Work has been going on in this direction for a long time. It's just not safe enough (imho will never be). If you don't see your spending physically you will be spend more. I don't want to loose the felling of hurt spending big bugs.

Well, I doubt coins are going to replace paper money or vice versa:
1. you want some security measures for large bills
2. inflation will increase the needed value bills have to cover;
or big spending means a lot of coins
We have the dual coin-paper money system for these reasons.

I doubt it will be in any time soon.One of the problems with electronic money is that you can get
robbed without knowing it.I mean if you watch those commercials about identity thief all it takes is
one time and someone can drain your entire account without you knowing it.

Happy Late Memorial Day to everyone.