SunTzuWarmaster's Friends

Murder for Popularity

Posted by takyon on Thursday March 29 2018, @02:50PM (#3111)
6 Comments

Crazed girls flood Parkland school shooter Nikolas Cruz with fan mail

Mass murderer Nikolas Cruz is getting stacks of fan mail and love letters sent to the Broward County jail, along with hundreds of dollars in contributions to his commissary account.
Teenage girls, women and even older men are writing to the Parkland school shooter and sending photographs — some suggestive — tucked inside cute greeting cards and attached to notebook paper with offers of friendship and encouragement. Groupies also are joining Facebook communities to talk about how to help the killer.
The South Florida Sun Sentinel obtained copies of some of the letters showing that Cruz, who had few friends in the outside world, is now being showered with attention.

End-To-End Encrypted Social Networks

Posted by takyon on Wednesday March 28 2018, @04:32AM (#3106)
10 Comments

Tresorit Launches Campaign To Build An End-To-End Encrypted Social Network

Sociall.io

The new technology that aspires to #DeleteFacebook for good (Mastodon)

At the end of these charts, you can see a small spike in Diaspora users.

It might all be in the name. People/"dumb fucks" will sign up for a "Facebook", but "Prevaat"?

Trump's Stormy Shark Week

Posted by takyon on Monday March 26 2018, @10:54AM (#3103)
12 Comments

Stormy Daniels, Donald Trump, and Shark Week: ‘He made me sit and watch’ (archive)

Clickbait? Sure. But reading about the history of "Shark Week" in that context really makes something click.

Stormy Daniels describes her alleged affair with Donald Trump (w/ transcript)

"Wow, you-- you are special. You remind me of my daughter."

Yet Another American Football League

Posted by takyon on Thursday March 22 2018, @10:42PM (#3094)
6 Comments

Yet Another American Football League: The Alliance of American Football

Another New Football League Says It Will Start Play in 2019

The N.F.L. is under pressure from falling television ratings, lawsuits over its handling of concussions, and fan opposition to player protests during the national anthem.
Yet investors keep lining up to help start new football leagues. On Tuesday, the longtime N.F.L. executive Bill Polian and the television and movie producer Charlie Ebersol became the latest entrepreneurs to join the fray when they unveiled plans for the Alliance of American Football.
There have been several short-lived football leagues before, including the United Football League, United States Football League and XFL. Like others before them, Polian and Ebersol say they have a formula for success. They have acquired investments from Silicon Valley firms that will allow their eight-team league to start playing a week after the Super Bowl in February 2019. Their partners include CBS, which will show a few games on its main channel and some on its cable network. They will also launch a smartphone app on which fans will be able to stream games and play fantasy football.
The league will also aim for two-and-a-half hour games (N.F.L. games generally last at least three hours). To achieve that, there will be no kickoffs or extra points — only 2-point plays — and a 30-second play clock, as opposed to the N.F.L.'s 45-second clock. There will also be no television timeouts, which will lead to about 60 percent fewer commercials.

Also at Variety.

Previously: As National Football League Ratings Fall, Could the "XFL" Make a Return?

Ask Soylent about laser engravers!

Posted by Runaway1956 on Thursday March 22 2018, @03:19PM (#3093)
19 Comments

So, I want to engrave some things. Most of these things are going to be iron, steel, or aluminum tools, but I'd also like to engrave some less durable items, such as plastics. I've done a couple searches, and I'm looking at engravers ranging from about $80 (US$) all the way up to about $180,000. I suppose that if I searched, I could find some cheaper, and almost certainly more expensive.

So, I'm looking - and all that I can really see, is how ignorant I am. I have almost zero idea what it is that will make a long-lasting engraver. Will one of those ultra-cheap engravers from China last for ten years of light-to-moderate use? Probably not - but what do I know? Is it necessary to spend thousands of dollars for the same thing? Newegg has a variety of engravers, for less than $400, but the biggest, most powerful among them has a disclaimer:

Engraving Material Note:
1.can engraving materials:wood,bamboo,plastic,paper,leather,bank card,rubber
2.can not engraving material:metal,stone,ceramic,shell,light-reflecting material,transparent material

Seems pretty obvious that I need something bigger, and more expensive, than a $400 engraver. Can engraving metal, dammit!

Does anyone here have experience with non-industrial laser engravers? (Industrial? Quarter million dollars entry level?) Power ratings, sizes, brands, whatever - any information is welcome!

NASA Briefing on TESS Exoplanet Mission, Mar. 28, 1 PM EDT

Posted by takyon on Thursday March 22 2018, @01:05AM (#3091)
0 Comments

NASA to Discuss Upcoming Launch of Next Planet Hunter

Join NASA at 1 p.m. EDT Wednesday, March 28, as astrophysics experts discuss the upcoming launch of NASA’s next planet hunter, the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). Reporters can attend the event in person at the James Webb Auditorium at NASA Headquarters in Washington or participate by phone.
The briefing will be broadcast live on NASA Television and the agency’s website.
Scheduled to launch April 16, TESS is expected to find thousands of planets outside our solar system, known as exoplanets, orbiting the nearest and brightest stars in our cosmic neighborhood. Powerful telescopes like NASA’s upcoming James Webb Space Telescope can then further study these exoplanets to search for important characteristics, like their atmospheric composition and whether they could support life.

Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite.

John Oliver's Gay Bunny Book Outsells VP Pence's Daughter's

Posted by takyon on Tuesday March 20 2018, @06:38PM (#3089)
8 Comments

John Oliver’s Gay-Bunny Book Is Outselling the Mike Pence Book It’s Trolling

John Oliver’s Marlon Bundo Book Sells Out In A Day; Another Printing In Works

A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo

Worst Pence bashing since Trump:

“Trump thinks Pence is great,” Bannon told me. But, according to a longtime associate, Trump also likes to “let Pence know who’s boss.” A staff member from Trump’s campaign recalls him mocking Pence’s religiosity. He said that, when people met with Trump after stopping by Pence’s office, Trump would ask them, “Did Mike make you pray?” Two sources also recalled Trump needling Pence about his views on abortion and homosexuality. During a meeting with a legal scholar, Trump belittled Pence’s determination to overturn Roe v. Wade. The legal scholar had said that, if the Supreme Court did so, many states would likely legalize abortion on their own. “You see?” Trump asked Pence. “You’ve wasted all this time and energy on it, and it’s not going to end abortion anyway.” When the conversation turned to gay rights, Trump motioned toward Pence and joked, “Don’t ask that guy—he wants to hang them all!”