llsf

840 karmajoined 10년 전

[ my public key: https://keybase.io/loicsf; my proof: https://keybase.io/loicsf/sigs/mY7YEs8SgvoA8n67h7FaP5ZnLw0o2_4sl-T-u3YhK9g ]

comments

그저께discuss

Oh memories of stacking those, and going to my friend's place to copy the latest games :) Remember how we were drilling holes to doubled the disk's storage capacity (from 720 to 1440) https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?t=47247

Before the floppy disks we were using cassettes... with our TO7 (circa 1983). It was slow by our current measure, but as kids we had time, I guess. The TO7 had even a lightpen to point at the CRC screen. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomson_TO7

My parents attic has still some of my old floppy disks, and even maybe some cassettes.

15일 전discuss

No need for maggots, I cannot get unpasteurized cheese of less than 60 days old here in US. So, you cannot have a real raclette here in US because authentic Reblochon cheese is illegal to import to the US because it is not aged long enough. Sure, you can an older Reblochon cheese, but it does not taste the same.

The most basic ingredients in food are not the same in US. For instance, sugar, flour even butter are different in US from Europe. So yes, you would have to import those ingredients (flour, butter, etc.). If you want to get close to the "authentic/original" food you try to replicate here.

26일 전discuss

I believe that us, Americans are pretty good at bending international food to our limited ingredients, our own favorite chemicals, sweeteners (corn syrup in everything), our flour and butter (good luck to make pastries like in Europe, with our poor flour and butter).

So I get it when Italians get offended by our poor rendering of carbonara... and feel that what we get here is off.

27일 전discuss

Around 2015, I was working for a company that processed coupons for large retail stores. We had lots of performance issues, mostly due to our centralized database at the time.

I was dreaming at the time to ship a mobile phone at every large store (e.g. Target) to process the data in-situ. It could hold its own database (partitioned for the tenant), it would have its own UPS (battery), and have enough CPU power to serve the POS requests of one store, even the largest ones.

A mobile phone would be our on-prem server.

27일 전discuss

The OS that would be put on those old phones, would be a bare minimal, stripped down OS. No need for managing screen, audio, radio/GSM/EDGE/3-4-5G.

Not sure about the IO interface, could reuse the USB, but maybe there is some internal (and standard enough) bus to reuse too...

지난달discuss

Thinking more on those 10% cap, it would allow scalpers to sell the original ticket to themselves, over and over, to eventually reach the price of the market.

Unless Ticketmaster takes a significant proportional bite at every resell, nothing prevents scalpers to triple the price of the original ticket, but reselling in a loop.

지난달discuss

I think that is the right way to give the enough price control to the artists. So, if The Cure wants to keep the ticket price low, they can.

지난달discuss

Maybe that is what we need in US too.

Matt Haney is trying to do something with AB 1720 (Resale Price Cap), and Ticketmaster is supporting it. https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml...

I am not sure why a bill would set some magic and arbitrary percentage other than 0%. This has likely be negotiated with the industry.

지난달discuss

Agree... and not defending Ticketmaster, but regarding scalpers in general, I am not sure why one would blame only the ticketing system.

If the artists are willing to say sell tickets for $50.00 and the demand is such that some resell to $400.00 the same seat. Is it the fault of the ticketing system ? Who is the victim ? - The artist who could have make more money (but then they could have price it better) - The fans who are basically competing to see that show ?

Scalpers are optimizing the market.

Maybe the solution to mitigate scalpers would be for ticket holders to only be able to resell their tickets through the same platform. Then the artist could decide if the fans can resell to the platform at face value, or for a profit. Then the artist could decide if the ticket can be sold by the platform with a markup or not.

Basically given the power and control to the artist.

2개월 전discuss

There are lots of often overlooked costs to own a home. I have been 15 years in my place, and now I get some advantages e.g. my loan is fixed so the monthly cost is roughly the same as 15 years ago... in a place like San Francisco, it is nice.

The property tax goes up slightly every year, but not faster than inflation.

There are recurring things to maintain (repaint every ~10 years), the roof has been patched about 10 years ago, might need a new coat eventually.

2개월 전discuss

THANK YOU!

This is a treasure trove. And glad you made the whole museum downloadable, so this treasure does not get lost.

3개월 전discuss

I agree... in early 2000, at Colombo (Sri Lanka) airport, they were calling my name, over and over, but never picked it up. I started to pay attention when some dispatched army guys (it was after the 2001 Tamil Tigers attack at the airport) were screening everyone at the airport asking for my name... ops sorry.

4개월 전discuss

Commercial satellites can get 30cm resolution images (military satellites can likely get even more high resolution).

The earth is vast, but once you pinpoint a carrier, a simple software loop should be able to track it for ever (those carrier do not move fast).

I cannot imagine this being remotely difficult for a state to have a constant pin on every large carriers sailing on earth. There even might be some civilian apps for that too.

But again, Strava and other connected + geolocation apps have been an issue for military personnel in general.

4개월 전discuss

Tracking an aircraft carrier should not be difficult for any state (satellite images). The fact that civilians can do it too now is interesting.

It would be another matter if that was tracking a nuclear submarine...

4개월 전discuss

You mean the thing that launched in 2023 and that is still not widely deployed ?

My BoA still prints checks and mail them to the US Bank across the street when I have to pay my HOA. So yes, why not FedNow... BoA and USBank ?

4개월 전discuss

In US also... but here in US, my bank (Bank of America) would print a check, put it in an envelop, send it to the other bank (e.g. US Bank). So, it is not instantaneous, but it is still free.

The drawback is when the US Bank office down the street that hosts the account closed for water damage, it stopped receiving the checks, and it took forever to bounce, so I had no idea that I was not paying my HOA... And this happened in San Francisco, California where the Bank of America and the US Bank are on the same street, a block away...

I cannot wait for FedNow or anything trying to fix this mess.

4개월 전discuss

Well the cap is only on the interchange fee, there are several other fees to add to it... example: https://www.adyen.com/pricing

Processing a Mastercard card is "$0.13 + "Interchange+" + 0.60%" where the "Interchange+" would be 0.30% for EU. So more like €0.10 + 0.90% so for €10.00 product, it would be €1 of fee (1.00%). Much less than here in US, but still not negligible for small businesses that run on thin margins (and 20% VAT).

4개월 전discuss

the "2% cash reward" and "miles" etc. is common here in US because our cards charge the merchants already a lot. So sure we all overpay everything in US because of the credit cards, but we get a small piece back.

Now, would it be nice to not overpay at the first place. Technically we could re-implement the whole thing (instant payout, fraud detection, etc.) like Brazil or India did. It would bring more than $100B back to the US consumers every year, that could be spent elsewhere.

4개월 전discuss

Same holding on the 13 mini, love the form factor.

5개월 전discuss

Did some modest development on Lambda Prolog back in 1999. I still have a vivid memory of feeling my brain expanding :) like rewiring how I approach programming and opening up new territory in my brain.

It might sound weird and crazy, but it quite literally blew my mind at the time !