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orc

32 karma · joined March 22, 2009

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orc··on How well does Khan Academy teach?
This is an important point. I've always found lecture to be a very inefficient method of teaching. Why not switch to an entirely written format? You can say a lot with diagrams and pictures. Good exercises and well explained solutions are also very important. Also if it's all text then you can easily search for keywords.
orc··on HTML/XML Parsing with Node & jQuery
Hm.. I tried doing this on windows but it turned out to be a lot of work to get it setup correctly. npm is hard to install on windows, and the jquery project depends on contextify, which has a binary. It does have a windows build though: https://github.com/Benvie/contextify
orc··on HTML/XML Parsing with Node & jQuery
Wow, I was just thinking this morning how awesome it would be to make a desktop app that could crawl websites with jquery. And since node.js has a windows installer, it sounds like a much better solution than the C# HtmlAgilityPack I've been using.
orc··on $1 chip tests for HIV in 15 minutes, fits in your wallet
Wow. Yeah, that's pretty misleading. Hope they have a big warning label to go with it.
orc··on $1 chip tests for HIV in 15 minutes, fits in your wallet
"Researchers at Columbia University claim the mChip has a 100 percent detection rate, although there's a four to six percent chance of getting a false positive"

That sounds like a negative result DOES mean you don't have it, but a positive result DOESNT mean you do.

Edit: I guess this is just misleading and you actually can get false negatives.

orc··on The Hot/Crazy Solid State Drive Scale
I've had an Intel X-25M for over a year now and it's been amazing performance wise. In that same time span my 1TB data drive did die. The only problem I've had with the SSD is that it about twice a month it will randomly freeze. The hard drive light is solid on, and I have to just reset my machine. Not a big deal though because the SSD starts up so fast.
orc··on Why programmers are not paid in proportion to their productivity
If they pay you and let you buy the MacBook, it's after tax.
orc··on Neil Gaiman: Why defend freedom of icky speech?
I am disappointed by this: "Lesser protection of commercial speech"

I would like it to be illegal for a news organization or an advertisement to lie to or mislead the public.

If you survey 1000 doctors, and 4 say yes, you better not put "4 out of 5 doctors surveyed" in your ad.

orc··on Neil Gaiman: Why defend freedom of icky speech?
I like how you dismiss the argument as invalid. I want to read more about this kind of reasoning, and I found this site: http://www.logicalfallacies.info/
orc··on John Carmack on government
That's a little ambitious. 3 years of medical school before they graduate high school? How about we catch up to the rest of the world first. The US K-12 education system is actually not that good. http://www.ecs.org/html/offsite.asp?document=http://nces.ed....
orc··on "HTML5" versus Flash: Animation Benchmarking
Yes. I was pretty astonished by this comment: "At the moment I can see 3 viable alternatives to Flash for animation: HTML, Canvas and SVG"
orc··on Apple iPad? How about a little German innovation instead
If I was going to read an entire book on a monitor, it would have to be e-ink.
orc··on Apple iPad? How about a little German innovation instead
It says they're trying to compete with the kindle too, but I couldn't tell if the WePad can do e-ink?
orc··on Don't become an expert
I think this is an important question - do you "NEED" to become a 10,000 hour "expert" ?

I would never want to stereotype the entire population of earth and say that you're a failure if you're not an expert at something. Is it good to be an expert? Of course. But it's not required - there are many paths to life.

orc··on HTML5 Theora Video Codec for Silverlight
Microsoft has no part in this. Highgate Media Suite is creating the Ogg Decoder as a Silverlight library.
orc··on Lies, Maths, And Health Insurance
The real question here is, of those .5% who had their policy cancelled, how many of them actually lied about a preexisting condition that they then filed a claim for? Because if there's even ONE person who had their policy cancelled unjustly, then that is one person too many.
orc··on I Quit The iPhone
I think that's an interesting point - should articles be flagged based on source?

In most cases, the answer is no. But for a source that has proven time and again to produce content that makes you feel stupider after reading/viewing it, then I think a flag based on source is justifiable. I'm not saying whether Tech Crunch fits this category, but I'm sure we can all think of some sources that do.

orc··on The dangers of operating a Tor exit node
So are you saying that 90% of the people who want privacy want it for illegal reasons? Then you won't mind if I read all your email?

That's what I thought.