1/23    Death Match: Fry's Electronics vs. Best Buy.  Any comparison?

1/23    Has anyone heard of a VC company called Pantheon Ventures?
        Know anything about them?

1/23    I'm bored at work.  I want to play classic Infocom games via telnet.
        Anyone remember the address?
        \_ telnet://zork@eldorado.elsewhere.org
          \_ Hot damn! I had no idea. HGTTG and everything.  Thanks motd!
              -- !OP

1/23    For something like an ansewring machine, where would it be cheaper..
        BestBuy or Target? (a cheap one that is)
        \_ You can get a POS $14.99 answering machine almost anywhere.  How
           important is it that you actually get your messages?
           \_ the cheapo ($20-30) AT&T branded solid state ones are nice.

1/23    What's wrong with blinfolding those Al Qaida captives at Guantanamo?
        We're just trying to protect their eyesights from the tropical sun
        since they used to spend their lives in caves.
        \_ Finally... someone who understands their plight... and of course
           the shackles on their hands and feet are because they are used
           to such an oppresive regime.
           \_ Are you saying we shouldn't even tie up their hands and feet?  I
              thought we're talking about prisoners here.
              \_ Uhm... It was a joke.  It was a joke replying to a joke.  This
                 whole thread and everything on it is a joke.  Relax.  Let it
                 go.  Be at peace.
        \_ The problem is that the blindfolds were made by child slave labor in
           Asia by Nike.  Why must you ask the obvious on the motd?  ObGoogle.
        \_ at least we don't cut off their hands, whip them
           and topple stone walls on top of them. - danh
           [moved. was misplaced]
        \_ Yea, they deserved it.  It's good to see US more and more like
           Singapore.  Detention without trial is necessary for those
           terrorist bastards, just like for Singapore's commie bastards.
           I say, humiliate them and let them rot in some island prison like
           Guantanamo or Sentosa for our entertainment.  We used to
           complain and complain about Singapore's Internal Security Act
           (detention without trial).  It's good to see that we are coming
           to our senses now that we are facing a real threat ourselves.
           \_ I hope you are detained and tortured without a trail.
              \_ without a trail, he'll need to use his orienteering skills!

1/24    Just got back from visiting Japan. They have anti-groping notices
        on the BART. What a fucked up country.
        \_ Damn, if I only knew groping was okay when I worked there 5 years
           ago ...
        \_ "on BART" not "on the BART"
           \_ "on the transit (system)" or "on transit (system)"?
               \_ "on Bay Area Rapid Transit" or "on the Bay Area Rapid Transit"?
               \_ Go to http://www.bart.gov and see their usage of "taking BART"
               \_ Does it really fucking matter?
           \_ Oh just get on the 880 and shut up about it, stupid nocal ho.
              \_ You mean "on 880" and "NorCal." LA-isms suck.
        \_ BART goes to Japan?
           \_ The Trans-Pacific tube is boring as shit.  Bring a book.
              \_ and damn those popping ears.
                 \_ the ear problem is nothing. don't want to relive the
                    popping rectum phenomenon again though....

1/24    What's a good WAP phone/service that'll work in Berk?
        \_WAP is ass.

1/24    From the minutes, "looks like the XCF is doing an intro to unix
        helpsession" -- wow, the XCF still does anything? Do they even
        have an office any more?
        \_ Yes, it does (insofar as eric@xcf is willing to take initiative
           and do something), and yes they do (346 Soda, <<311).

1/24    What are ".shs" files in NT?  I got such a file.  "assoc" says it's
        "ShellScrap".  What's that?  Thanks.
        \_ IIRC you can have "shellscraps" of executable code sort of like
           batch files.  I wrote one once for kicks but don't remember why I
           did that instead of a .bat.  Load it in notepad and see.

1/24    What's the encryption method soda accepts now?  SSH used to use
        blowfish now it's 3des.  How come it changes around?
        [motd format god was here. next time the motd delete god will be here]

1/24    Say the president dies: the VP becomes president, right? What then,
        is a new VP elected, or does everyone else in the cabinet move up
        a post?
        \_ The President appoints a new VP.
        \_ The president nominates a new VP.
           Congress needs to approve. See 25th Amendment.
           \_ which is how we wound up with a president who was never voted
              on by the people with Ford (not that they ever are voted on,
              due to the stupid electoral college system).
              \_ So you prefer a pure democracy?  Maybe you should go read
                 some what the founders of this nation had to say about that.
                 They said it much better than I ever could.

1/24    What's the typical annual return for bonds these days?  I just noticed
        that the annual return for my money market fund fell from 4.41% in
        last April to 1.57% in last December.  Thanks.
        \_ http://www.bankrate.com
           \_ I can't find bonds on that site, only money markets, CDs,
              savings, etc.
        \_ No such thing as "typical" bond return.  There are so many
           different type of bonds.  You can check the Lehman Brothers
           Aggregate Bond's index for return on ALL bonds.
           \_ Also, bond funds go up and down like stocks right?
              \_ A bond fund isn't very much like a bond.
                 \_ Isn't it kind of cumbersome for individual investors
                    to buy bonds directly (except for those EE, I
                    government savings bonds?  When most people talk
                    about buying bonds, they are talking about bond
                    funds right?
        \_ bond.  james bond.
           \_ shaken, not stirred.

1/24    What is the best DSL/cable/etc. service south of campus?
        \_ DirecTV is not bad compared to PacBell except that you need to
           power-cycle their gateway once a week on the average. It costs the
           same, you get a static IP address, and you avoid using the satanic
           PPPoE.
           \_ thanks!  i would like to avoid the monsters. static IP wahoo!
           \_ PacBell no longer does static IPs?
                \_ not in the basic service.  -tom
           \_ um, is it any harder to share a line with multiple comps?
              \_ no
           \_ It has no start-up cost but after 6 mo. locks you in to
              a $49.99 per month.  They sell one-year contracts...so
              actually it's cheaper, but evidently less flexible (PacBell
              has start-up and starts at $49.99/mo.)
              has start-up and starts at $49.99/mo. but was recently
              $39.99/mo. -- shouldn't DSL be getting CHEAPER??? wtf! iprotst!)
           \_ goto circuit city, and ask for DirectTV promotional offer.  You
              may $9.99/mo for the first three monthes, then $49.99/mo. 1 year
              contract; no ativation fee; $19.95 quick starter fee; 24.99
              shipping and handling fee.  Only at participating locations.  I
              went to one, they do offer the package, however the employees
              there do not seem all that ethusiastic about selling it.  Looks
              like they are not making money with that offer which ends at the
              end of Jan.
           \_ what is the latency on DirectTV DSL connections?? Good luck
              trying to edit the motd
              \_ Good enough to edit motd and do a -lot- of work over ssh.
                 -DTV DSL user living in berkeley
              \_--- http://soda.CSUA.berkeley.edu ping statistics ---
              61 packets transmitted, 61 packets received, 0% packet loss
              round-trip min/avg/max/mdev = 27.533/56.400/223.502/45.142 ms
        \_ I use ATT @home (or whatever its technically called now). Aside
           from the recent inanity about Excite going bankrupt (which was
           handled surprisingly well, at least for me) I have had no
           problems. They don't "promise" you a static IP, but mine hasn't
           changed in the last year that I've had service. Cost is some-
           where arounr $45/mo. (recently went up as well) and they used
           to have a free installation, 3 months free plan. Check their
           website for current promotions.
           ...they also have digital phone that I've been meaning to try
           which seems like a good deal.                - rory
           \_ It ain't static no more.  Fuck you AT&T.
              \_ I switched to http://sonic.net (ADSL) for this reason.
              \_ It's always been DHCP but the numbers don't change once
                 assigned.  Welcome to the real world.  Thank you AT&T for my
                 dynamically assigned static IP and for the number of ninnies
                 who left the network because they think they're not getting
                 one.

1/24    I have a few notebooks that are collecting dust. Is there a way to
        expand my desktop by utilising the LCD?
        \_ expand your mind by utilising LSD, instead -- it has more
           universal effects on your operating system as well as
           solving all issues with the desktop display
        \_ There are hacks to do this with VNC, but then you're essentially
           sending all of your video over net.
        \_ I've found notebook drives and components to generally deal with
           heat a lot better--if you can ventilate them well, they make ace
           firewalls/routers running *BSD/Linux, or low-footprint servers
           (you don't need any no-monitor hacks as with other headless PCs
           running *nix.)  Make sniffers or similar network diagnostic tools
           out of them, or if they're very old, use as portable serial
           consoles.  Another possibility is as portable xterminals, or as
           "disposable" email/browsing stations (one in the car, one at
           work, etc.)  Maybe put NFS/Samba/FTPD and use as a portable
           fileserver/client.  Laptops are not something you should let go
           to waste :-)  -John

1/24    Anybody tried those dental whitening trays?  What brand do you use?
        I'm wondering if they'll do something nasty to my gums.  Any bad
        experiences with them?  Thanks.
        \_ I tried the ones you can get for $24.95 at Long's Drugs and
           they did nothing. Then I went to the dentist and got a custom
           tray for $250, with some industrial stength whitener. It helped
           a bit. And you can buy more bleach from EBay for $15.
        \_ I went to the dentist five years ago and got a custom tray and some
           Colgate whitener for the upper teeth only.  That costed about $200.
           I finished the whitener in a few months and didn't get any refill
           afterwards.  Today my upper teeth still look whiter than my lower
           ones.  One side effect was that once a day or so I felt sharp pain
           in my teeth that lasted a couple seconds, even though I wasn't
           eating or brushing my teeth.  But that went away after I stopped
           using it.  The other side effect was that my gums hurted felt a
           little burnt, but that's probably because I had receeding gums and
           I don't think other people will have this problem.
           using it.  The other side effect was that my gums felt a little
           burnt, but that's probably because I had receeding gums and I
           don't think other people will have this problem.
           \_ my boyfriend got the custom tray from the dentist a couple of
              months ago, it cost $300 (both top and bottom teeth). It
              worked pretty well. same pain symptoms as described above. the
              brand was discus dental. i'm curious if any of the drugstore
              stuff actually works, though. -soda gal
              trays or whitening strips actually work. -soda gal
        \_ I tried them once, but I accidentally left them on for a day
           longer than I should have and they became freakishly white.
           I went on a date and she turned on a blacklight and they shone
           like mothers! -ross
           \_ Yes, your teeth will black light if properly cleaned of coke
              residue.  Sure.  Right.  Got that.  Check.  Okey dokey!

1/24    Anyone have any ideas and/or pointers of how to crack Yahoo IM offline
        messages and archived chats and conferences without knowing the
        password of the account that you are trying to snoop on?
        \_ No, but I'm sure google does.  -John
        \_ If google doesn't help you could try cracking it yourself.  I'd
           make my own logs with my own account and see what comes out.  Use
           long strings of each character in the alphabet, 1 per log, etc.
           I know they used to send everything over the net in clear text so
           I doubt the archive encryption is tougher than rot13 or des.
        \_ never used it but try http://www.elcomsoft.com/aimpr.html

1/24    Need a keyboard shortcut for volume and other stupid M$ Winblows
        stuff. Whats a good memory resident shareware?
        \_ this won't let you adjust volume directly, but it'll let you use that
           otherwise generally-useless Windows key:
                http://www.copernic.com/winkey

1/24    When people talk about 1st tier and 2nd tier schools, what exactly
        does that mean? Does first tier mean top 10, 2nd tier top 20, and
        so on so forth?
        \_ I will now offer a working definition:
           Tier one is the set of grad shools that do not have some
           significant difference between themselves and the best school(s)
           in the field.  Tier two schools have some significant way that
           they are not as strong as the tier ones , but are roughly on
           the same plane, and still good.  how big these sets are
           depends non how fine a distinction you look at.  I would say that
           in physics, there are about 6-10 first tier schools and mabye
           15 or so second tier schools, depending on who you ask.
        \_ I use 1st tier to mean top 20 and 2nd tier to mean #20-50.
           \_ you're claiming that there is no formal definition?
              \_ "formal" requires an authority. i'm sure someone out there
                 has declared themselves an authority and picked a definition.
                 _very_ probably, there're more than a few such someones, and
                 their definitions differ.
              \_ When using "tier" definitions, I would propose that there
                 is no exact number, otherwise people would USE that figure.
                 Tier is nebulous enough to mean top three to top 20.
        \_ some other people say top tier is top 10.  2nd tier is 10-20 or
           10-30 or so.  That's just another person's sense/opinion.
        \_ And who defines what # a school gets anyway?  It's all subjective.