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cobrausnon The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

Sure, the problem is 'solved' until you are the one stuck trying to defend yourself without the proper tools because others wanted to not own a gun and have less of a chance of ever being caught in a situation where that decision would impact them. I consider each and every crime against a forcibly disarmed citizen to be an order of magnitude more a tragedy.

cobrausnon ARM’s Rebuttal to RISC-V: “The Case for Licensed Instruction Sets”

Yeah, sure, your one cherry-picked use case is awesome. To counter that, I recently tried putting together a wiki server using apt-get, and for some reason the apt-get installed an out of date version of the software that didn't work with the apt-get version of apache I was using, so I ended up having to manually download it anyway and patch a bunch of configuration files. The windows version just used an installer that set it all up right with a few clicks.

Maybe now you've 'outgrown' video games you can outgrow thinking that your user experience is authoritative. Better, nicer, whatever, these are all just words people use to praise things that they like.

But saying Linux / Unix has a lower barrier to entry than Windows is the kind of thing only a long-time Linux user can say with a straight face. Unless you are talking about money, and then, well... yeah.

cobrausnon Food Babe’s Ingredient Attacks Draw ‘Quackmail’ Backlash

If it was an attractive, well-muscled man who went by 'Food Hunk' and he used his appearance as part of his shtick, I don't think it would be changed much. But I don't think it has quite the same draw.

cobrausnon The New York Times Calls for Marijuana Legalization

We are already dealing with those problems, legal or not. At least if we legalize and tax it we have a means of paying for it.

cobrausnon The New York Times Calls for Marijuana Legalization

Because you basically just advocated prohibition of alcohol, drugs, and tobacco, and included in your list of reasons 'I don't like the smell'.

Never mind that prohibition was already tried and already failed.

cobrausnon Diary of an atomic bomb technician

They treat you like an idiot when you first get in because for all intents and purposes that's exactly what you are, and exactly what they have to work with - a kid who will be entrusted with quite a bit of power, and you have to learn to respect the chain of command and listen to orders to avoid costly (and potentially life-threatening) mistakes. I hear that as you gain responsibility and rank a lot of the stupid things about the military start to be less of your concern, but I never stuck around to find out.

cobrausnon The ship that failed to change the world

The bottom of the ocean is generally a very good 'containment system'. That's not to say there won't be environmental damage, but we do have some examples to go off of to indicate how much.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Thresher_(SSN-593)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sunken_nuclear_submarin...

cobrausnon The ship that failed to change the world

What I was always told when I worked as a nuclear power operator in the Navy is that it's not so much that the people could not be found and trained, it was that on anything smaller than a carrier the engine room crew ended up being half the crew of the ship. The larger engine room crew size necessitated designing the entire ship around a larger ship crew, which introduces a whole lot of other logistical and practical concerns.

cobrausnon No skin thick enough: The daily harassment of women in the game industry

We are specifically discussing the games industry, which has a much higher than average rate of bullshit that gets hurled at the devs from across the internet. There are links scattered all over this discussion thread that show that.

If the argument is that women receive more than men on average and that the threats include sexual violence (which it rarely does against men), I won't argue that.

cobrausnon No skin thick enough: The daily harassment of women in the game industry

http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidthier/2012/04/23/game-devel...

"Sometimes, things get worse than just angry emails and tweets – one developer said that the threats that made him lose sleep were the ones that involved his children. Sometimes people start saying that they know a developer’s home address. Bowling says that he started receiving suspicious packages – never a good sign in the modern era."

cobrausnon No skin thick enough: The daily harassment of women in the game industry

I follow a few twitter accounts of a few prominent game devs (both male and female), and I've noticed that the more attention (i.e., followers) they have, the more regularly you can expect to see threats and insults as a reply to practically anything they say. I think the same kind of people that would troll a male dev by calling him a 'fag' would probably be the same kind that would issue a rape threat to a female dev, and probably think there is nothing wrong with either.

On an related note, if I do ever make games, I won't have a public twitter account, facebook account, or personal blog. Something about the nature of that industry just brings out the worst in people.

cobrausnon Elevator Hacking: From the Pit to the Penthouse [video]

Well currently in many cities, shortly afterward some engineering department would move in next door and make that area prime spot for tech collaboration and study, and after a while the Latino Studies department would have to be relocated off campus.

cobrausnon Rhode Island unintentionally decriminalized indoor prostitution in 2003

You don't even have to go that far - Nevada decriminalized prostitution a while ago, IIRC.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Nevada#Legal_si...

cobrausnon Wayback Machine points to pro-Russia rebels in downing of MH17

Accusations of false flag this early are just a smokescreen, someone trying to muddy the waters due to political sympathies - until someone takes advantage of the situation, one can't reasonably claim false flag without sounding like a loon. I'm not saying false flag doesn't or can't happen, just that you at least need to have a bit more information come to light before you can take it seriously as an option, and you need to see how those with a lot to gain take advantage of the event.

Hell, saying Ukraine did this as false flag seems especially loony - Russia was drawing down it's forces on the border, down to about 1,000 soldiers (down from over 40,000). Why would they intentionally stir the pot when things were going as they needed them to?

cobrausnon Wayback Machine points to pro-Russia rebels in downing of MH17

Let me spell it out for you then - Ukraine had no interest in shooting down it's own cargo plane. Russia would not likely risk firing a missile from within it's own territory. Who does that leave us? Maybe the people who claim ownership of the space, have the means, and are tweeting about their supposed AN-26 shootdowns? If this is trolling, it's bad trolling.

cobrausnon Wayback Machine points to pro-Russia rebels in downing of MH17

You have it backwards. All the piles of evidence that they shot down the MA flight indicate they probably also had the capability two days ago to shoot down the AN-26, and therefore probably did.

cobrausnon Wayback Machine points to pro-Russia rebels in downing of MH17

Worth noting: Two days ago, an actual AN-26 cargo plane was shot down [1]. At the time, Ukraine assumed it had to be a Russian missile, because they did not think the rebels had the ability to shoot anything above a ceiling of about 2.5 kilometers. This seems to be confirming that the rebels are the ones doing the shooting. The intelligence agencies of the world are having a busy day, I'm sure.

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/15/world/europe/ukrainian-mil...

cobrausnon EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

I don't think they ever intended the 'well-regulated militia' to be an organized force. They used it in the way we mean 'militia' when we talk about middle eastern nations in conflict - armed locals organizing when they feel as though they need to.

cobrausnon I got invited to write for the Huffington Post today

I think the real point there is that the professors still get paid.

cobrausnon Rum Deal: America’s booze laws are terrible

A longtime wish of mine is that every law ever written came up for review every decade or so, providing ample opportunity to adjust and remove laws to fit changing cultural norms. There is probably a downside to this that I'm not seeing, not being a lawyer and all that.

cobrausnon Vodafone reveals direct government wiretaps

At the risk of further deviating this thread from the original topic and getting into extremely useless discussion territory, I would disagree that killing people in and of itself is an amoral goal, and even ordinarily peaceful people will often find there are circumstances that will cause them to agree with this assessment.

The large system designed to kill targeted groups of people efficiently, when it works as designed, doesn't actually spend much time (if any) actually doing that job. The mere existence of such a force should prevent that from happening (as it absolutely has for the most part). Having said that, there are circumstances when I absolutely expect them to do just that - if an aggressive foreign army were to roll into your hometown tomorrow, you would likely agree.

I realize that to the rest of the world right now we (i.e., the U.S.) are that aggressive foreign army, which is why I say the system is out of line - certain unilateral actions were a misuse of the system. This is why many people see no hypocrisy in 'supporting the troops', but being 'against the war'.

Anyway, not trying to say you are completely wrong and you should feel bad WHY DO YOU HATE AMERICA, just trying to provide some explanation of another viewpoint. As you said, it's about perception and morality - not surprising we end up with different stances.

cobrausnon Vodafone reveals direct government wiretaps

It's completely related, but you've got your 'feathers ruffled', so to speak. One can agree with (and support) a system in place for many reasons and still 'sleep well at night' when that system doesn't work out exactly as you'd like because of the other benefits. I (willingly) pay police salaries without considering myself morally culpable when they do something out of line.

cobrausnon Vodafone reveals direct government wiretaps

Not really sure that argument holds upon closer inspection. For example, I agree with the idea of rule of law without agreeing with all laws that get implemented. By your rules, I would have to agree with all laws if I agreed with any.

cobrausnon Gun homicides down dramatically, Americans unaware

Since you don't seem to understand much about guerilla warfare, let me pose to you a few hypothetical questions, which should also reveal to you why revolutions always end up being absurdly bloody affairs, and why I want no part in one.

Who would win, unarmed or lightly armed apache pilots at a bar, or a group of guerillas with AR-15s? Who would win, a supply convoy full of apache parts guarded by a few soldiers or a roadside bomb followed up by an ambush by guerillas with AR-15s? Who would win, the families of an apache pilot off-base for the day, or a guerilla with an AR-15?

cobrausnon Hacker Who Helped Disrupt Cyberattacks Is Allowed to Walk Free

Your morality, maybe. Criminals have their own morality, and making the snitch a violation of that morality seems pretty rational to me.

cobrausnon My No-Soap, No-Shampoo, Bacteria-Rich Hygiene Experiment

Negative - about as white as it gets (mostly German, some Netherlander / Irish ancestry, with a small touch of Native American). It undoubtedly has a genetic component, but I have to wonder how much of this is due to not regularly using antibacterial soaps everywhere like many people do.

cobrausnon My No-Soap, No-Shampoo, Bacteria-Rich Hygiene Experiment

More information than I thought I would ever give on HN, but I rarely use antibacterial soap on my entire body (I do shower daily). My wife finds it completely perplexing that I exhibit no body odor at most times, even when sweating heavily.

cobrausnon B-52 Bomber Gets Its First New Communications System Since the 1960s

In all seriousness, I think the plan was to make sure our bombs got dropped also. It's not MAD if you can't follow up on either the 'mutual' or the 'assured' part.

cobrausnon Inside the Building That's Calling Itself the People's Republic of Donetsk

I was once asked to acquire 'one yard of gig line'.

http://www.ask.com/question/what-is-a-gig-line

cobrausnon I Don’t Want to Hire Women

Not quite. They do require just enough skill and just enough technical learning to filter out most of the non-college educated population, but not enough to attract any college grads. So you end up hiring the people with the skill who are generally intelligent but don't always (as you said) make smart life decisions. Usually pretty awesome people with a few issues.

Disclaimer: Family business (that I am not part of, but do tend to frequent) is a machine shop.