Are people really THIS STUPID?!?!?!

Image via CrunchBaseI participate in Yahoo! Answers, where members post questions to be answered by other members. And some of the questions are real "howlers". here's one:

Where Can i Download A free Legal Keygen or serial number?

For those who are not familiar with software, most software will NOT work unless you enter a serial number when you install it. A "keygen" is a program written by hackers that can generate such serial numbers randomly. As you can imagine, such programs cannot be legal, as it cheats the software maker out of their money.

Which makes the question above beyond ridiculous and into totally moronic scale.

However, that's not the worst offender. Here's one better.

Will someone please help me hack someone else's Yahoo! Mail password?

No, I'm not making this up. This person claims to be helping a female friend who suspect her husband is seeing some other woman and using Yahoo! mail as contact. Does this person not even THINK that 1) this is illegal 2) Yahoo's use policy specifically forbids any sort of this behavior, and 3) Yahoo! Answers may NOT be the best place to ASK such questions?

Will the REAL Miwok Indians please stand up?

Image via WikipediaNow that Red Hawk Casino is open by "Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians", another Miwok Indian is getting sued by this band... With a casino feeding their coffers, they can afford to.

So what's the suit about? This man, a Mr. Caballero who CAN trace his ancestry back for 100 years in El Dorado county as a Miwok Indian, through BIA and other records, claims to be the tribal historian of SSBoMI. The SSBoMI, on the other hand, don't want him to use the name SSBoMI and claims "copyright infringement". They claim that they don't doubt that he is Miwok, but he's NOT "Shingle Springs Miwok". Though he claims he is, and he represents 400 other Miwoks in the county.

However, now that a bigger issue has been raised... That perhaps SSBoMI are NOT Miwok Indians at all.

Read the comments section and make up your own mind.

BART Police Rant

Image via WikipediaBy now the whole nation has heard... How a BART Police officer, arresting some rowdy folks New Year's Eve, ended up shooting a young man who's already on the ground and being restrained, in the back. The man later died in the hospital. The whole thing was caught by multiple cellphone cameras and witnesses.

Now the officer has resigned from BART Police so he cannot be compelled to testify against himself.

One theory is that he mistaken his regular duty pistol for the taser, though how can one be mistaken for the other boggles the mind.

A truly WTF situation.

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• BART Officer Quits

Pre-Christmas Rant

Image via WikipediaIt's but a few days before Christmas, and I was at my favorite Starbucks (actually, I take that back, I don't have a favorite, just a most often visited, as they are open 24 hours, almost always have a seat, and have plugs for my laptop AND WiFi). When I realized the door was nearly blocked by some protesters. Upon closer look apparently these folks are carpenters, claiming that Starbucks had used contractors who didn't pay the "San Francisco wages".

What's really ironic is one of those "carpenters" is wearing a union carpenter jacket from... Kansas City.

There are a few problems... 1) They are on PRIVATE PROPERTY, as this Starbucks is co-located with a gas station, and 2) I personally thinks that any sort of "minimum pricing" or "minimum wage" is counter-productive to the market, and runs counter to capitalism.

Think about it... If the job don't pay enough to support someone, then that theoretical someone will NOT work that job, right? Unless he has some other jobs as well, but it's HIS call whether he wants to work cheap or not. Why legislate the minimum? Unless you think the individual is TOO STUPID to decide how cheap (or expensive) he wants to work for, and needs the government to help him?

Apparently, our "progressive" city of San Francisco thinks so. San Francisco's "minimum wage" is at $9.79 per hour, starting 1/1/2009. All employees who work in San Francisco more than two hours per week, including part-time and temporary workers, are entitled to the San Francisco minimum wage. And this has been going on for several years.

Apparently, they came up with this figure as a "living wage" in San Francisco... i.e. you need to earn this much for a full-time worker to live in the city.

And who have they prosecuted so far? Just a couple restaurants.

Post-Black Friday Rant

Image via WikipediaThis year's Black Friday is a real bust, not much good electronics and gadgets for sale at all. I bought myself a refurb Jawbone 1.0 for $54, and that's via online, even BEFORE black friday.

Which brings me to a rant on Bluetooth headsets.

I don't believe I have very strange ears, so why is it that very few BT headset fits me well? They don't fit comfortably, or they have lousy volume, or they have lousy battery life... The list goes on, and on.

Tried cheap ones, expensive ones, just not super-premium ones yet.

Tried Jabra for a while. Had like three different Jabras. BT125 keeps losing connection to my phone, so did a BT2020. Even that one that uses batteries didn't work that well. One of my friends had it literally smoking (too hot to hold in hand).

Tried third-party. Plugs are never universal, and the fit to ear is usually horrible. Argh! Tried two or three different ones from various sources.

Motorola at least standardized on one plug, but the older models are huge (and still don't fit the ears that well), and a mid-level model (about $40 retail) I got lost half of its volume, making it nearly useless.

Decided to try something a bit higher... Tried a Plantronics "rugged" model... Worked well enough for a week. Then the plastic cover no longer fits. Argh, and neither does the charge port cover.

So when I saw the Jawbone 1 refurb for sale, I decided to try it. New, they got for about $80-$100. 2nd gen Jawbone goes for $130 in stores. The refurb is $55.

First thing I saw is 4 different ear pads and 4 different ear hooks. Wow! And the earhook is metal, but with a rubber stretchy-section. 2nd, it has USB charge cable. In fact, the "home charger" is a 120V to 5V USB adapter. That's usually extra cost item but here it's free. Third, the packaging is very distinct, a clear plastic box with the accessories in black boxes encased below. I'll have to include a picture soon.

So far, it seems to drop connection a bit, but calls are coming in and going out clear, so not too much complaints so far. There's always wish for the smaller model. :D

Pre-Thanksgiving rant

This is a rant since nobody is cooking turkey this Thanksgiving, and looks like I'm not invited anywhere for their dinner. Not that I really like Turkey any way.

So what's about Turkey and Ham over Thanksgiving any way? Thought you all want people back home about Christmas?

Think about the troops who's still spending time in Iraq or Afghanistan! While the US military will ship them turkey and such, they need your help for stuff they can use! Simple wet wipes, daily sundries, home-made cookies, and more are great morale boosters.

I don't have much thanks to give this year. I guess I've managed to live through another year without getting much done. If you asked me what did I do this year, I really would have told you "I don't know", but at least I did think about it a bit.

Veteran's Day Rant

Today I heard what consider to be one of the dumbest statements I've heard in a while.

Some California House Rep claims that "she's pro-troop", but she demands immediate withdrawal of all US forces in the Middle East. She does not see any contradiction between the two positions... she love the troops, thus she does not want to see them in harm's way, "especially for some illegal orders".

What do you think soldiers do? "Make love, not war"? Soldiers fight! That's what they are trained to do! Don't tell me some blah blah about how some just went in for the scholarships. If they aren't prepared to go to harm's way when called, they should not have joined period! They knew the risks of being deployed. And they swore an oath to obey the chain of command, which includes the President of the United States at the top.

Which brings me to another topic: objectors.

I have no problem with conscientious objectors, if they are REALLY allergic to war. They would have stayed OUT of the military. I'm sure the government can find some place in the Peace Corp or other sort of civil service for you if you rather not serve in the military.

But those who joined the military, then refuse to go? (those who already went a couple times notwithstanding) Those are just cowards and should be sued by the US government to repay all the money and time spent training them, plus the loss of their use at times of need, if not dealt with by the military tribunal/court-martial.

They should be booted out, and ordered by the court to repay the government for lots and lots of money.

Which brings me to another topic: pacifism vs. terrorism

A lot of these objectors claims to have found Pacifism as a counter to the soldier's indoctrination/ orientation about fighting.

You have to keep in mind that so-called Pacifism assumes that your opponents are reasonable. If they are fanatics, then pacifism just gets you KILLED for no purpose. In other words, pacifists always loses. Their only hope is that there are so many pacifists that the terrorists got tired of killing them all, and found their heart, which is basically what happened to the Romans against Christians.

MLK jr. tactics worked because Americans are, above all, reasonable people, and recognize that equal rights only helps people, not hurting any one. Most people ARE reasonable, and tired to beating up on blacks just because.

Same with Ghandhi and the British Empire... British are reasonable, if a bit old fashioned and at least civilized.

However, you can't apply pacifism to the problem in Iraq or Afghanistan, and especially against terrorists. Terrorists are NOT, by definition, reasonable. No reasonable people will use terror to incite change. Attempt to apply pacifism to terrorists will only get you killed.

Fanatics / Terrorists are NOT reasonable. They plan on murder of dozens or thousands without an eyeblink, innocent or hostile, doesn't matter. Car bombs, kamikaze bombs, all the same to them. They don't even consider you as fellow human beings (purposeful distortion of the Q'oran, that says all non-believers are "infidels" and should be killed, even though "people of the Book", i.e. Christians, are specifically exempt) so they will kill you without an eyeblink. So how do you expect them to be reasonable and see your point of view?

And please don't tell me about Jesus. He died, remember? And had to be resurrected by you-know-who. We don't have that kind of "support network".

The only way to deal with terrorists is the Israeli way... kill the radicals who only knows how to kill and hope someone with more BRAINS than brawn rise to the top and actually negotiate a peace.