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cronix

Re:Blockbuster Video VHS insert template on Sunday August 18, 2024 @12:45PM (#41283423)
It took about 3 seconds to check. Pop open the case the tapes came in and look at the plastic window and you can easily see both reels. If the tape was all on the left reel, it was rewound. Just about all rental places did this when you returned the tape. Audio cassette tapes were the same way. The VHS cassette was basically just a larger version of an audio cassette with wider and longer tape.

Pic of rewound VHS: https://www.becomingminimalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/0...

Re:John Walker, founder of Autodesk, has died on Thursday February 08, 2024 @02:27AM (#39299301)
I fell in love with 3D Studio in the 90's. It was so intuitive to use compared to Lightwave3D for someone who didn't know what they were doing, but very curious and wanting to learn. A big challenge was getting it to run in windows 3.1 when that was released, but it did. Ah, and having to create a RAM drive to put the video into so you could actually watch it in real time without buffering at 320x200 (i386 days).
Re:The California Town Owned by a New York Investment Firm on Sunday January 07, 2024 @11:11PM (#38908177)
And now US Steel is owned by Japan!
Re:Hard disk LEDs and noisy machines on Friday January 05, 2024 @05:25PM (#38885846)
One of the biggest "steps" I experienced was when SSD'd first came around. Suddenly "slow db queries" ran at light speed instead of taking 5+ seconds. It was quite physically noticeable and now it's not. You have to run EXPLAIN on everything to be sure.

Going back a bit further, I fondly remember my dad yelling "did you PARK the hard disk?" whenever he heard me power down the old TRS80 with "state of the art" 5 meg HD physically bigger than my first PC (which had a 40meg HD - dad was jealous). If you didn't manually issue a park command, the read/write head could flop around and cause damage if you bumped or moved the HD.

You can track them with sites like FlightAware or FlightRadar24. Just zoom in to where your house is. Click on a plane. If it's not on the map, it likely isn't broadcasting ADSB

https://www.flightaware.com/

https://www.flightradar24.com

> China permitted more coal power plants last year than any time in the last seven years, according to a new report released this week. It's the equivalent of about two new coal power plants per week. The report by energy data organizations Global Energy Monitor and the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air finds the country quadrupled the amount of new coal power approvals in 2022 compared to 2021.

> That's despite the fact that much of the world is getting off coal, says Flora Champenois, coal research analyst at Global Energy Monitor and one of the co-authors of the report.

> "Everybody else is moving away from coal and China seems to be stepping on the gas," she says. "We saw that China has six times as much plants starting construction as the rest of the world combined."

https://www.npr.org/2023/03/02/1160441919/china-is-building-...

I'm not sure new laws will matter much considering they've been breaking the existing laws through creative interpretation.
It works 24/7
The first ones certainly weren't as you describe, but then again they were purely a phone, and nothing else. Not even basic texting. Certainly no data. Their only drawback was their enormous size and the high per minute voice charges.
Re:Web FM synthesizer made with HTML5 on Monday October 30, 2023 @12:37PM (#38071828)
On an old macbook pro 2013...no clicking in Firefox...

This is really cool. The only thing I found kind of odd was you click the down arrow to increase the program number instead of up.

I use both
Wouldn't it be trivial for HN to automatically create an alternative archive link?
All I had to do was update the rules for Adblock Plus free version. I'd been getting the warnings for several days, then yesterday it would only let me watch 3 videos. I then updated AB+ rules and nothing pops up and things just play like "normal."
Also due to chemicals in car tires which eventually washes off the roads and into streams, rivers, oceans.

https://www.washington.edu/news/2020/12/03/tire-related-chem...

Re:Starlink Direct to Cell on Wednesday October 11, 2023 @08:17PM (#37852057)
> This is for very low bandwidth text communications when you're out in the country and can see the sky.

From the graphic in the article:

> Text: 2024

> Voice and Data: 2025

> IOT: 2025

Re:LARPing and Violent Extremism on Sunday September 24, 2023 @05:51PM (#37637541)
The answer is probably the same as why Hollywood uses them in movies. For realism.
Return To Sender. Oh, wait...
Re:SpaceX sending iPhone Emergency SOS satellites to space on Saturday September 02, 2023 @12:45PM (#37363139)
Starlink recently partnered with KDDI in Japan to do the same thing for the main island and surrounding islands.

https://www.rcrwireless.com/20230831/carriers/kddi-partners-...

Re:Oregon Decriminalized Hard Drugs on Tuesday August 01, 2023 @09:25PM (#36965764)
It also doesn't cover the cost in terms of tying up a major resource: Paramedics, Police and Fire.

Overdoses are at an all time high in Portland. The entity that responds usually gives the person overdosing Narcan, addiction help is then offered for those who recover and 99% of those offered recovery options refuse.

https://www.wweek.com/news/city/2023/08/01/overdose-911-call...

Firefighters (and others) are quitting due to the trauma of responding to these calls over and over and over, with no concrete progress. It takes it's toll mentally to respond these calls which are taking up and increasing percentage of the calls they have to respond to.

https://www.kgw.com/article/news/local/the-story/portland-do...

The main failure of this experiment, imho, is the missing component of forcing detox/rehab/etc when x amount of drug related crimes are committed. The measure explicitly said the addict has to seek the help on their own volition. That might work for alcohol and cannabis, but the vast majority of opioid based drugs are so addictive they can't even fathom not getting their next high or life without it.

As a recent convert to solar, we no longer have any electric bill, period.
I see spelling mistakes all of the time in print media, and they've had spellcheck for 30+ years.
There's also the county government layer that cities must adhere to in addition to state/national.
Re:The Mao-Kissinger Meeting of 1973 on Saturday June 10, 2023 @01:51PM (#36272865)
> towards the end of his life there was only one person that could understand him, his secretary or nurse or someone like this

> Mao had been in poor health for several years and had declined visibly for at least six months prior to his death. There are unconfirmed reports that he possibly had ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease.[1]

[1] https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_Zedong

Very true, but the point is it just shows there's a lot we don't know still that an advanced civilization might and likely have already discovered and learned to harness/control.
> That assumption is based on my knowledge of physics

based on your knowledge of known physics. We're still adding to the periodic table...

In the late 80's/early 90's, it was one of the few ways to run large videos (for the time) without stuttering bc hard drives were too slow.
Re:The planning of U.S. physician shortages (2020) on Saturday June 03, 2023 @11:47AM (#36177599)
I've heard of the "tech bro" stereotype (and seen it many times first hand), but struggle to recall a "doc bro" or equivalent one. I've also never heard of the term "culture fit" when discussing a potential hire in the medical industry like I do tech, software specifically. I wonder if the majority of the types of people who go into tech are different than the majority that go into medicine.

> It's interesting that places value seniority and experience so much more in medicine vs tech

I don't think the tech world devalues seniority as much as they despise people older than them and not of the same generation(ish).

All big generalities and of course don't fit every situation/company/person.

That's because it's an archive of that blurb from the rarbg site.
Re:Fitting 44% More Data on a C64/1541 Floppy Disk on Monday May 29, 2023 @12:03PM (#36115185)
You mean they could have fit Ultima 3 on 3 floppies instead of 4? I think of all of the swapping I had to do back then.
Auto's manufactured pre-1986 are legal for civilian ownership and use, assuming 1) you are legally allowed to own a firearm, 2) It is not illegal to own an automatic weapon in your state/jurisdiction 3) fill out the ATF Form 4, 4) pay the tax stamp and 5) you can afford a $20k+ gun and ammo. They aren't cheap because they are rare. There are approx 700k in existence in the US.

https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/may-machine-guns-be-transfer...

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