TXCHLInstructor 's Techdirt Comments

Latest Comments (141)

• On the post: Anonymous ISP Owner Speaks Out, As Feds Appeal Ruling Against Patriot Act

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 06 Nov, 2007 @ 12:39pm

  The US Constitution

  The Constitution of the United States is not a perfect document, but it sure beats what we are living under right now.
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  Concealed Handgun == Your Civil Right

• On the post: Videoconferencing Is A Nice-To-Have, Not A Need-To-Have

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 06 Nov, 2007 @ 05:26am

  Won't let you do anything else...

  >It also doesn't let you do anything else while you're on the phone.

  So being compelled to give your whole attention to the call is a minus? If the call isn't important enough to you to pay attention, why are you on it?

  
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  Texas Concealed Handgun License Courses

• On the post: Corporate Doublespeak: By Forcing Competition On The Market, We Will Need To Raise Prices

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 02 Nov, 2007 @ 06:30am

  Comcast & competitition...

  Nothing wrong with Comcast that a large, healthy dose of competition wouldn't cure in a heartbeat. I saw that they belatedly started cleaning up their act here in Dallas when Verizon FiOS started kicking their asses. What they are actually saying is *their* costs will go up, and their profits will go down if they actually have to compete with anybody. Or, even better yet, they could go out of business. Well, maybe they could stick around just to give Verizon, et. al., somebody to compete with (i.e., give them something to make them look good by comparison).
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  Texas Concealed Handgun License Classes

• On the post: Next In Line To Be Offshored To India? Butlers and Personal Assistants.

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 02 Nov, 2007 @ 03:58am

  Butlers?

  Butlers? I know that the technology is advancing rapidly, but I don't think I'd want an Indian butler answering my door for me, and I don't think that's feasible to do remotely just yet.
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  Weekend CHL Classes in north Dallas

• On the post: Daylight Savings Day Massacre… Part II

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 30 Oct, 2007 @ 05:12am

  Palm PDA

  My Palm LifeDrive cheerfully informed me on Sunday morning that it had automatically adjusted for DST. Not that I'm all that happy about the LifeDrive in general (ok, it sucks), but this one wasn't Palm's fault...

  DST is an idea whose time (pun intended) is long past. Leave the clocks one way or the other; I don't care which. The setting of the time is arbitrary anyway. But changing them twice a year is just plain stupid.

  Here's an idea: Vote for legislators who promise to abolish DST.

  --
  Concealed Handgun License Courses in North Dallas area

• On the post: Comcast Still Dancing Around Its Content Jamming Operations; What's Wrong With Admitting It?

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 23 Oct, 2007 @ 03:55am

  I was glad the day...

  A couple of years ago, I dropped Comcast for Verizon FiOS. Overnight, I lost the frustrations of having intermittent service, a 'help' desk 'technician' somewhere (I started scheduling at least an hour for my once-a-week or so call) in the 3rd world that had essentially no networking experience (and an accent so thick I had trouble understanding), and a connection that was so slow that about half the time, my 56Kbaud back-up dial-up account was *FASTER*.

  To top it off, I even saved a little money because FiOS has been on 100%, so I was able to drop the backup dial-up account. I'm not all that fond of Verizon, but FiOS has been a good product. Then again, just about anything would look good compared to Comcast, including dial-up.
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  Texas Concealed Handgun License Courses

• On the post: Ads On eBay Piss Off Sellers

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 11 Oct, 2007 @ 04:00am

  Nothing wrong with ebay...

  There is nothing wrong with ebay that a healthy dose of credible competition wouldn't cure in a heartbeat. Trouble is, there isn't any credible competition yet; many have tried, many have gone by the wayside.

  The internet presents an interesting phenomenon -- every niche has exactly one dominant player, and #2 is way back in the dust.
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  Texas Concealed Handgun License Courses

• On the post: $1 Million if You Can Prove $7250 Speaker Cables Are Any Better Than $80 Speaker Cables

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 10 Oct, 2007 @ 03:59am

  As a musician...

  As a former member of a Celtic band, I have been repeatedly surprised at the number of people who could not reliably distinguish the sound of a flute from the sound of a violin.
  --
  Texas CHL classes in North Dallas

• On the post: The Death Of Moore's Law Is Greatly Exaggerated

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 19 Sep, 2007 @ 11:37am

  Two major advances not yet achieved...

  Two major advances expected some time ago, but no yet realized:
  
  1) room-temperature superconductors, and
  2) true 3-dimensional semiconductors
  
  Either of these would accelerate the rate of increase of computing power vs. cost. A combination of the two would be a major revolution.
  
  But then, just 16 years ago, a 1-gigabyte hard drive cost over $1000. And semiconductor memory was around $3-5/Mb. I now carry on my person more hard drive space AND more random-access memory than existed in the whole world the year I was born.

• On the post: Convicted Spammer Claims Anti-Spam Law Is Unconstitutional

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 13 Sep, 2007 @ 06:22pm

  (OT) Re: Re: Right to bear arms as well... (rabbit

  There are several states that forbid open carry, and a few that make ownership of a gun (except by police and politicians) illegal. The states that have repealed the second amendment also have the highest per capita gun crime rates.
  
  Here in Texas, since I am licensed, I can carry my handgun concealed, but not openly. In neighboring Louisiana, I can carry either openly or concealed.

• On the post: Convicted Spammer Claims Anti-Spam Law Is Unconstitutional

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 13 Sep, 2007 @ 03:49am

  Right to free speech...

  ...does not include the right to crap in my inbox. Or paint graffiti on my house (for the same reason).
  
  Lying about who you are in order to get into my house is criminal trespass. So is lying about who you are in order to crap in my inbox.

• On the post: New iPods Demonstrate BLS BS

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 10 Sep, 2007 @ 07:10am

  Price cut vs technology improvement

  The price of the iPhone was cut only 2 months after the intro, and no change was made in the iPhone at all. There is supposed to be a new model out Real Soon Now, and the fairly obvious deficiencies in the first model are the main reason I didn't rush out to buy one. The obvious contempt in which Apple holds its customers is the main reason I won't rush out to buy the next model, either.

• On the post: California State Senator Wants To Save You From RFID

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 01 Sep, 2007 @ 08:03pm

  Re: Silicon Valley ID tags

  I could microwave my company badge...
  
  Then I couldn't get into my work area, or even into the building without an escort.
  
  Real smart...

• On the post: Muni WiFi Takes A Beating

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 31 Aug, 2007 @ 10:07am

  Plenty of "hotspots"

  Just about every public library in the DFW area has WiFi, many with no restrictions and on 24/7. Just about every McDonalds restaurant around here has unrestricted WiFi. I've even seen many mom-and-pop restaurants advertising free WiFi. Starbucks still makes you pay for a subscription, but that may be on the way out, as the competition mounts.
  
  Unrestricted WiFi is getting to be pretty much ubiquitous without any special effort to implement a muniWiFi. So what was the point again?
  --
  www.chl-tx.com Texas Concealed Handgun License Training

• On the post: Banning Anyone Who Reviews Your Shop Online Isn't Likely To Generate Much Business

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 16 Aug, 2007 @ 11:39am

  That sign is in the category of ...

  ... low-IQ announcements.

  Very much like the "no guns allowed" signs I occasionally see here in the DFW area. The owner of the business is announcing to the world that s/he is REALLY stupid.

  --
  TX CHL Classes

• On the post: AT&T CEO: We Don't Promote $10 DSL Because No One Wants It

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 03 Aug, 2007 @ 07:18am

  Re: Standard business practice

  AT&T has been unexposed to any meaningful competition for most of its existence. As a result, its marketing is quite retarded. It has long been said that if AT&T bought KFC, they would market it as "Hot dead barnyard fowl".

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  Texas Concealed Handgun License Training

• On the post: Representative Actually Introduces Version Of Alberto Gonzales' Attempted Copyright Infringement Law

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 28 Jul, 2007 @ 07:32pm

  Re: US Constitution

  The Constitution may not be perfect, but it sure beats what we are currently living under.

  The Founding Fathers knew enough about democracy to make their government a Republic, NOT a democracy.
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  Texas Concealed Handgun License Courses

• On the post: No, Spying On Your Employees Won't Mean They Waste Less Time

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 25 Jul, 2007 @ 04:26pm

  Time wasting...

  I find that I am much more productive when there are fewer distractions. Now that there are fairly tight restrictions on what I can use the internet for, I am getting more done. YMMV, but for me it's a good thing.
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  Concealed Handgun License courses in Plano, TX

• On the post: More Delusion About The Popularity Of In-Flight Net Access

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 16 Jul, 2007 @ 04:23pm

  Withdrawal?

  One of the VERY few pleasures left in air travel is getting away from annoying cellphone users. And, I can manage to spend a few hours away from the Internet. I have other things I can do on my laptop if I so choose.

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  Concealed Handgun License Training in Plano, TX

• On the post: Now Here's A Surprise: 'Free Energy' Company Cancels Demo

  

  TXCHLInstructor ( profile ), 07 Jul, 2007 @ 08:31am

  Re: Hydrogen's where it's at

  You need to study the laws of Thermodynamics. Here's a layman's rendition:

  1) You can't win
  2) You can't break even
  3) You can't get out of the game.

  There's actually one more, called the 'zeroeth' law, that goes something like this: "Shit flows downhill".

  --
  Texas Concealed Handgun Classes

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