Those tweet timestamps...
are they Musks' local time, or Brid-Ain Parnells? Because nothing good comes from tweeting at 3am, no matter what it's about.
Posts by mike 32
68 publicly visible posts • joined 15 Mar 2010
SpaceX billionaire claims Air Force official 'likely' made job-for-spy-sat-contract deal
Truck-sized asteroid slips silently between Moon and Earth
Grav waves: Moment when 'father of Big Bang inflation' learns he was RIGHT ALL ALONG
RSA booked TV's Stephen Colbert to give the final speech. This is what happened next
Ground control? My space helmet is FILLING WITH WATER!
Google launches broadband balloons, radio astronomy frets
Tuesday 18th June 2013 07:17 GMT
Re: SKA *isn't* in Australia (or NZ)
I'm well aware *part* of it is going to be in Australia - it's fortunate the engineering capabilities are such that the split isn't going to negatively affect the science aspect, otherwise it'd have all been in South Africa. The significant delay (and resultant "shared prize") was purely to avoid wasting the work done by and in Australia.
In the context of the article, however, it is extremely significant that the vast majority of the project is going to be in South Africa, with satellite posts throughout Southern Africa - a very large area, with very poor land-line internet access and a not-insignificant, relatively evenly distributed rural population, exactly the target demographic for Google Loon. With the to-and-fro over 20Mbps vs (up to) 1Gbps for the NBN, it would seem Australia is not much of a target for Loon, hence my initial point.
Monday 17th June 2013 07:32 GMT 
SKA *isn't* in Australia (or NZ)
The primary site for SKA is in South Africa, part of sub-Saharan Africa, and the entire region is exactly the type of area Google Loon is intended to provide internet access for. I doubt NZ (or Australia) are one of the primary spots Google intends on deploying large numbers of these balloons - the pilot is probably being done there because of infrastructure and favourable legislation, etc.
The long baseline configuration of SKA in Africa has dishes planned far to the north, in exactly the areas Loons would be most useful. To examine this impact purely from an antipodean perspective is to ignore the main impact of the idea.
In fact, it's unlikely Google would be able to operate this anywhere near Carnarvon, where the primary site will be - the SA government enacted fairly stringent legislation to protect the investment being made in radio astronomy.
The press release (prior to passing in the legislature),
http://www.ska.ac.za/releases/20071210.php
and the act itself:
http://www.ska.ac.za/download/aga_act.pdf
Brit adventurer all set to assault ex-Reg haunt Rockall
Next Tidbinbilla deep space antenna ready for hoist
Outsourced space trucks battle for US middleweight lifting title
Hydrogen on demand from silicon nanospheres - just add water
Google denies smacking Botswanan ass
Fatty French Kilogram needs a new-year diet, say Brit boffins
Nipper's toy train enjoys journey to edge of SPAAAAACE
Sculpted 66-pound jubs survive lightning blast, 26ft drop
Jubcropgate: El Reg in snake-fondling nude nipslip outrage
Swollen SUPER-GIGANTO PLANET sighted in Andromeda
NYU boffins demo tiny tractor beam
Tuesday 23rd October 2012 08:23 GMT 
Blown away...
I don't know if it's journalists keeping a closer watch on scientific papers/press releases, more scientists doing awesome stuff, or that we (science/society) are in a rich run of form for this type of thing, but on a weekly basis there is something new, totally mind-blowingly amazeballs being reported on.
This is one of those moments. The video of Curiosity's descent another. The analysis of Vesta. Pretty much anything Musk does.
I missed the moon landings by 11 years, but where we're going seems even more incredible.
US space programme in shock metric conversion
Oakley: 'smart' sunglasses ready to shine
Zuckerberg blew $1bn on Instagram 'without telling Facebook board'
New steganography technique relies on letter shapes
Nuke clock incapable of losing time chimes with boffins
Astrolabe backs off, timezone database safe
Revealed: Inside Apple-bothering Proview's crumbling factory
iPads seized from shelves by Chinese officials
IT guy answers daughter's Facebook rant by shooting her laptop
N Korea mobile phone subscribers top 1 million
‘Oldest animals’ show up in Namibian dig
Tuesday 7th February 2012 07:07 GMT 
Go Dr Brain!
Dr Brain is the grandfather of a kid I was friends with at school - he's been working on this for years. I remember the setup they had outside the kitchen, where his wife would grind bits of stone into translucent wafers, in which they'd find these things. Diamond grinding wheels, lots of black grime that stained clothes. Awesome for a kid to investigate.
Actually got to see some blobs through a (normal) microscope the one time, but to the uneducated, they didn't look like much.
Tame the gas monster with sensors, suckers and a spiffy new fan
Monday 6th February 2012 08:29 GMT
"Apparently, you can use it as an AC"
I really hope they do work as an aircon too - it's been 35-38C daily in Cape Town for the last few days, and a good number of days overall this summer.
With the missus determined to maintain a comfortable range between 22 and 28C when she sleeps during the day, the aircon in the bedroom is a major drain on power.
The Register Comments Guidelines
Thursday 2nd February 2012 11:01 GMT
I thought posting on this article was disabled...
glad to see it isn't.
The changes to policy don't really affect me (I hope), but I like the "make writer aware of correction required" feature, sometimes commentards correcting in the comments was a littel tedious. Other times, of course, it led to some of the better comment-threads here...
Samsung reveals Advance-d Android ringer
Tuesday 31st January 2012 10:40 GMT
Well, yes...
But no, at the same time. Probably priced at those who can't afford the full-fat of the S2/S3?
The S2 is still a premium phone, and to be able to get handsets that look as good, and perform almost as well, into the hands of the less well off/kids likely to drop or destroy phones, then they've got a conveyor belt of premium upgraders in a few years...
Possibly?
Quad-core Samsung Galaxy S III set for April launch
Apple iPad 3 to sport LTE '4G'
Tiny frog claimed as smallest vertebrate ever
Reg hack cops a licking from the bosun's cat
Hollywood siren invented key phone tech TRUE
Thursday 1st December 2011 08:54 GMT
I only know of bluetooth that uses frequency hopping spread-spectrum, and I don't think it's really a solution for cellular tech.
Direct sequence CDMA is used much more, (ie WCDMA), which is also why 3G battery life is much less than 2G FD/TD multiplexing. Because everyone transmits simultaneously, the receiving tower needs all the incoming signals to be of equal strength, such that closer terminals don't drown out terminals further away. Leads to lots of fiddling with transmission power at the handset, hence reduced battery life.
From what I know, direct sequence CDMA also has it's origins in showbiz, although British, I think. Apparently Churchill and FDR used to chat over lines encrypted by playing a synchronised record over the voice - an inverted signal on the other side cancelled out the added LP, yielding clear speech to the listener, but no-one else.
Disclaimer:
I haven't done any work in this since final year elec eng, but I did get my old Bernard Sklar Digital Communications textbook out as a refresher. If there's any clarification on the invention of direct sequence, I'd be keen to follow any links provided.
Russia successfully launches Glonass-M
San Diego Baywatch rules out exploding dead whale
World Solar Challenge: Why the winners were so good
Monday 24th October 2011 09:51 GMT
I wonder if reversing the aerofoil effect would work?
Since the cars aren't going to take massive corners at speed, altering the aerodynamics to make the car *lighter* at top end speeds could save energy...
I wonder to what degree savings could be made using this?
From a safety point of view though, I'd imagine passing those road trains with a lighter vehicle, and such a big surface area parallel to the road would make it quite susceptible to turbulence.
Bog builder pushes out poo-powered motorbike
Amazon fans order three Fires for every E Ink Kindle
Tuesday 4th October 2011 07:45 GMT
I dunno...
I love my kindle - it's a viable replacement for a book, in terms of easy-on-the-eye use.
I'm (only?) 29, but I find I hold my cellphone further away from my face when I look at it, compared to years ago, or younger (teens) extended family members. My eyes are knackered after a day on my laptop without my glasses. A fondleslab would just make all that worse.
I don't have a fondleslab because between my laptop and my bb, I don't have the need to play games, browse photos surf the net or do whatever else people who *still use their tablets six months after buying it* do.
The kindle is a *book* replacement, NOT a crap-screene tablet, and it's damn good at what it was designed to do. I don't see them going anywhere.
South Africa joins the call for BlackBerry messaging keys
Wednesday 7th September 2011 23:36 GMT 
Details re the "London Conference"
The comments were made at SATNAC - the South African Telecommunications and Network Applications Conference, an annual conference hosted by Telkom, SA's monopolistic fixed-line operator, known for poor service, overcharging, poor broadband speeds (384kbps is still considered "broadband" here), hosted this year in East London, a city in the Eastern Cape.
RIM, please don't give up our privacy! The ANC has turned evil, and I'll bet this has nefarious intentions.
Further info here: http://www.satnac.org.za/
I presented a paper from my MSc at SATNAC a few years ago - seems a good party was had in general by all except me - hit by a strep throat right after I presented in the first breakout session.
Curved light drives boffin one-upmanship
Monday 15th August 2011 09:35 GMT
Not sure about being too picky, but...
The term "acceleration" is used wrt vectors - the light has both velocity (c), and direction. The velocity remains the same around the obstacle, but the direction changes - and a change in the direction of a vector is termed acceleration, even if the velocity remains constant. A change in velocity without a change in direction is also termed acceleration.
A scalar is like a vector, but without a direction - hence a change in direction of a scalar does not result in acceleration.
I hope that's all correct. It's been along time since first-year physics, but I stumbled over "acceleration" being a change in direction of a vector at first.
I don't have an answer to the question about whether the outer edge of the beam travels faster than the inner edge, will be interesting to get clarity on that point. Maybe the beam velocity remains at c for all points on the curve, resulting in a beam with a slanted leading edge, instead of straight?
Biting the hand that feeds IT
