Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2007 July 11

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July 11

Picture tracer...!

Is there any other site than wikipedia which allows us to copy & paste the picture so that we'll get the clear information regarding the picture within seconds. I mean just like google we should get the result immediately the answer after pasting the image! Temuzion 04:50, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

The late Google Answers and Yahoo! Answers? --antilived^{T | C | G} 05:34, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Hemispheric Heat Waves

When an entire hemisphere is affected by a heat wave, can it be stated as that ? Read the new entries about the 2007 heat wave. This indicates that the Northern Hemisphere is experiencing a heat wave, as per what happened in the 2006 heat wave. 205.240.146.175 08:06, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

But 2007 heat wave redirects to 2007 South Asian heat wave and 2006 heat wave is a disambiguation page asking whether you want the European heat wave or the North American heat wave. Both fairly specific. Nothing about entire hemispheres as far as I can see. At the moment, there is no heat wave in Birmingham, UK. It is cold here!--Shantavira|^{feed me} 13:58, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Likewise summer 2007 in Boston, USA, has not been especially hot, but fairly near average so far, I think. I don't think that any heat wave this year is (yet) truly hemispheric. Marco polo 16:47, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Summer 2007 in Calgary has been (&#!!@ insane. One day it's 7C/46F and raining, the next day 35C/95F and hot, the next day 22C/75F and windy. I'm expecting hail the size of canned ham and a blizzard eventually. This is not terribly unusual, though. --Charlene 18:51, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

The concept that Britain's experiencing a heatwave this year is laughable. It's waves of a different sort that've been making front-page news here this so-called "summer". As I understand it, things have been similar for some of our N. European neighbours. --Dweller 10:47, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Yet Buenos Aires has seen snow for the first time in 90 years! (Remember that it's winter there - but even so). Here in Texas, we've had the rainiest season on record...following directly on from the end of one of the longest droughts on record. Some places are hotter, some colder, some drier, some wetter, others windier or more stormy. The only common finding is that an awful lot of long term weather records are being broken.

People get confused between the meanings of the word "climate" and the word "weather". Climate refers to conditions over large areas of the world averaged over decades. Weather refers to what the immediate conditions are in one fairly specific place and at one specific point in time. What's happening to the world right now is that the climate is warming steadily, pretty much everywhere - but the weather is going nuts - more violent swings, weirder combinations, weather of a type never seen in living memory in some areas. This is pretty much what global warming has predicted. The climate across most of the world is creeping slowly but inexorably up - but the weather may be colder than ever before - or wetter than ever before - or hotter - or bigger hail or more tornadoes - or no tornadoes at all...you name it - we're seeing it. As we get deeper and deeper into this looming catastrophy, we'll hardly notice a one or two degree long term average increase in climatic temperature because that's nothing compared to the immediate randomness that you see in the weather as a result. SteveBaker 04:41, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Dutch / Flemish "brouck"

I am trying to find out the English translation of the Dutch / Flemish word "brouck". I think it may be old dutch for bridge - can anyone help me?? The closest I have come is a town in France and as part of the surname Beerenbrouck (hopefuly I can translate this as Berry Bridge??? Thzanks for your help everyone. Regards Denise T

I was unable to locate it in any online dictionarys however Google searches for http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=%22brouck+meaning%22&meta= and http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=%22brouck+means%22&meta=, both seem to indicate it means marsh or swamp. Lanfear's Bane

My dictionary says the English word "brook" comes from: Origin: bef. 900; ME; OE brōc - stream; c. Dutch broek, German Bruch - marsh". --TotoBaggins 15:54, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

In modern Dutch, "beek" means "brook" or "stream". so Beerenbrouck might mean stream by the marsh? --Charlene 18:50, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Scratch that, I apparently cannot read. Beer=/= beek. Beer = errors in editing. :) --Charlene 18:55, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Music from "Carnal Knowledge"

who had a number one hit in the movie carnal knowledge

Were you planning on being "the tenth caller" with that answer or some such? In any case, IMDB can almost certainly tell you faster than we can and the Carnal Knowledge article links there. Atlant 11:18, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

IMDB has nothing to say about the soundtrack. Poor assumption. --Tagishsimon (talk)

Well, IMDB can be edited by the users, albeit more slowly than Wikipedia, so someone could fix that if they wished...

Atlant 16:22, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm assuming with the title Carnal Knowledge,the music is not the predominant feature to attract viewers.... :) Lemon martini 14:53, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

It's a trick question. It's not "who had a number one hit with a song from the movie Carnal Knowledge", it's "who in the movie Carnal Knowledge had a number one hit". And the answer is Art Garfunkel, with the execrable "Bright Eyes". --Richardrj ^{talk email} 14:58, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

How much can an image be blown up?

Should be a fairly simple question- how much large can I print something without the quality going to crap (looks pixelated, etc). Say, if I were to take something down to kinkos and have it printed as a photo, how large could I stretch 1000x1283? -_L^augh! 12:50, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

It's a matter of how much quality you want. If your original digital image is at 1000x1283 then on a typical home/office inkjet printer (which can probably print 600 dots per inch), the image would start to lose quality when printed at over 2" across! (1283 pixels / 600 pixel-per-inch is around 2")...so even if you print it as an 8"x10", your photo will be blurrier than the printer could have done it if your image was sharper. Worse still, the up-market printers that Kinko's use may be higher quality printers that might produce 1000 to 2000 dots per inch - which means that a 2" version of your image would look as good as it does on your home printer - but a 1" version would look even sharper!

The more you blow it up, the worse it becomes - but it's a matter of taste as to how much is "too much". Whether the image looks 'pixellated' or 'blurry' is something that Kinko's could (in principle at least) choose. When the printer has much more resolution than the photo it's printing, there are different ways to handle it. Suppose you have a printer with ten times as much resolution as the photo. Each of the original pixel in the image becomes a 10x10 dot area on the printer. If the printer simply prints a hundred identical dots for that one original pixel then you'll get a picture that looks 'pixellated' - it will appear to be made up of lots of tiny squares. However, most software can choose to blend between adjacent pixels instead - so if you had a red pixel next to a green pixel, the printer would produce red at one dot - then nine dots that would shade gradually from red to reddish brown to yellowish brown to greenish yellow to green. This image would not look pixellated at all - but instead would look like it was slightly out of focus. But there is no clear 'rule' for how much is "too much" - it simply depends on how much blur/pixellation you can tolerate.

SteveBaker 13:28, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

You can blow up reasonably small pixel-count images up to huge size and it will look fine - dependent on the viewing distance. The viewing distance places a huge part in just how big you can go. This is why shots from, say a 6 million megapixel camera can go onto advertising hoardings that are 10ft tall. I forget the term but obviously it is 'enlarging' I remember the word rasterization but that doesn't seem to throw up anything useful in google. ny156uk 15:40, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

You might be thinking of tiled printing, which is often called rasterbation. --Charlene 18:43, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

You might enjoy our article on bicubic interpolation as well as other articles linked from there.

Atlant 16:28, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Here's Abe Lincoln in only 180 pixels, so I say enlarge at will! --TotoBaggins 16:45, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Umm SteveBaker, I think you made a mistake somewhere in your calculation. For a inkjet printer to print it need many ink dots to produce one pixel of a colour, so it doesn't need 1 pixel at every single ink dot it produces. Most of the time 300dpi is more than enough for normal photographs, 200 is still acceptable and for murals and otherwise very large print, even 75 will produce a very good print since you need to stand so far away to view it. However it still depends on the quality of the image your camera outputs (amount of noise, focus error, motion blur etc.) and an image produced from, say Foveon sensor will require less DPI than ones from normal Bayer filter sensor. --antilived^{T | C | G} 22:52, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

missing text

there is an article on " QUR'AN " and a sub article on " SHIA VIEW OF QUR'AN "

there was a hadith stating that QUR'AN contained 17000 ahadith, narrated by imam Baaqir(a.s) o in a famous shia book Usool e kafi,

now after 7-8 days it HAS DISAPPEARED..(may be due to an edit)

now where can i get that TEXT BACK??? is there any way out? i want that deleted text.. for refernce

While you're displaying the article, click on the "History" tab at the top of the page. That will show you (essentially) all of the versions of the article that ever existed. Review some of the versions of the article around the date/time when you think you last saw the text.

Odds are, of course, that someone took exception to that text and excised it. Lots of articles go back-and-forth in that way.

Atlant 16:26, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Tobacco

Tobacco plants are harvested at regular intervals, as with most cultivated crops, my question is: If one grows and harvests a tobacco plant as per the norm, and then smoke it. Which is greater? the contribution to help the atmosphere, though photosynthisis, or the pollution caused by the smoke. Thank you81.144.161.223 16:10, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Strictly from a carbon point of view, when you grow the tobacco plant it makes roots, stems and leaves, removing CO2 from the air. When it is harvested only the leaves are used for smoking. So only part of the carbon is returned directly to the atmosphere. CO2 in > CO2 out.

This also does not take into account the amount of carbon emmited by the energy needed to process the tobacco, transport it to market, or light it on fire. This of course would add to the CO2 output.

Finally no account is made for the particulate emmmissions, or health damage done by smoking. -Czmtzc 17:48, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

If you consider the work required to 'produce' the final product (farming, harvesting, processing) and then the final segment (smoking) I would suspect that the pollution caused by the smoke pales compared to the work expended to produce it. If, however you increase the economies of scale for the farming/harvesting/processing you should have reduced creation 'costs' per unit produced and the actual smoke-pollution may make up a larger portion of the pollution. Perhaps more interesting is why we have had mass-production as a cost-effective method of production for a very long time, yet the green movement is (across much of the green parties mainfestos) linked to batch-processing, localisation - at the expense of promoting using the very same mechanisms that allow cost-per-unit to reduce with size to have the same effect with pollution-output per unit. ny156uk 17:53, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Does the aforementioned pollution per unit "cost" for mass produced items include pollution generated during transport from origin to consumer? 161.222.160.8 21:58, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

I would say if you are looking at the full product lifecycle from a pollution point of view then yes it would have to. Much like cost-per-unit will include the cost of transit (and why the development of container shipping helped dramatically reduce transit costs). ny156uk 19:55, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Domain Name Trademark Laws

Hello. I recently purchased a domain name that is the same name as an up and coming race horse. I really can't believe someone else did not take it yet and the site actually draws in quite a few hits. My question is... Since the domain name is the same as the horse, there are no trademark violations on the domain are there? I don't know if this is ok to ask... But what is the best way to market this domain to the owner of the horse? I am assuming he has no computer knowledge. Thanks!!!

Mind you don't run afoul of anti-cybersquatting regulations in your jurisdiction. Your best bet is to hire a lawyer who doesn't mind taking such ethically shaky cases (also known as "a lawyer"). --TotoBaggins 18:07, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Toto, the parenthetical in your second sentence had me in stitches, laughing for ten minutes straight. Too funny. (JosephASpadaro 22:10, 11 July 2007 (UTC))

Everyone has heard this phrase: "The first thing we do, kill all the lawyers." Some know that its much older than we think, dating back to a character in Shakespeare's Henry VI. But few have heard the spin that lawyers can put on it: One legal firm states: "Contrary to popular belief, the proposal was not designed to restore sanity to commercial life. Rather, it was intended to eliminate those who might stand in the way of a contemplated revolution -- thus underscoring the important role that lawyers can play in society." yuuurk! Mhicaoidh 00:23, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I think what our questioner did is wrong - and I sincerely hope that he/she falls afoul of cybersquatting laws (that's why we have them after all). Names of web pages are supposed to be intelligently chosen to make navigation of the web easier - they aren't supposed to be 'property' and holding a name for ransom from someone who actually needs it is deeply unethical because it makes the entire internet just a teeny tiny bit worse for everyone. So questioner: I hope you lose every penny you paid for it...with luck you'll be paying their court costs too. At this point, the ethically reasonable course of action would be to politely ask the owner of the horse if they would simply repay to you whatever you paid for the domain name. SteveBaker 04:15, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

SteveBaker, I am curious about your response above. Why would you differentiate this scenario from any other "item"? Example: You and I both walk into a car dealership. We both want the same exact car. I get to the salesman first, and I purchase the car. You don't. After we leave the car dealership, you and I are free to enter any transaction we desire over this car. Furthermore, the laws of economics dictate that you will only pay me as much as you think the car is worth to you, and no more. How is the horse domain name any different? I am just curious. Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 07:01, 12 July 2007 (UTC))

The difference is pretty obvious. In the case of the domain name, the owner of the horse has a right to that domain name - it's his intellectual property. This principle has been upheld by countless decisions of the WIPO. In the case of the car, neither party has the right to purchase it over the other. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 07:18, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Uhhhhhh ... how is that "obvious" exactly? I would posit that there are millions (nay, billions) of people in the world who are not familiar with WIPO, much less the decisions generated by WIPO. That being the case, how is the difference "obvious"? Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 20:10, 12 July 2007 (UTC))

An automobile is not part of a public infrastructure. Imagine if you and I had just built houses on a particular road. We both showed up at the post office at nearly same time, but you beat me there by mere seconds, and for some reason the postmaster decided to hand out addresses on a first-come-first-served basis. Regardless of the legality, or any nonsense about intellectual property, would it be right and proper for you to take the address that logically would be assigned to my house simply because you liked the number, or worse, because you intended to sell it to me? 69.95.50.15 13:48, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

If the owners of the horse had any sense they would have bought the domain name themselves. If they were too stupid to do this, then I say good luck to anyone who can get a few bob out of them. rich + stupid = fair game. DuncanHill 10:03, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Try that argument with WIPO, and see how far you get. It's not a matter of "first come first served", it's a matter of rights and of ownership. Say you see me accidentally leaving my wallet behind me in a shop one day. If you see me doing this, do you call me stupid for leaving it behind and keep it? Or do you return it to its rightful owner? --Richardrj ^{talk email} 11:12, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

The horse owners did not "accidently leave the domain name lying around". They are business-people who failed to take action to protect their investment in the horse. If another business-person takes advantage of their failure, then that's all part of the cut-and-thrust of the market place. DuncanHill 11:17, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Contrary to what you wrote in your edit summary, the horse owners do own the domain name, in the sense that they are the rightful owners of it. Numerous decisions of the WIPO have upheld this principle and transferred domain names from whoever registered them to their rightful owners. See, for example, this example concerning the novelist Jeanette Winterson. Like all legal documents, it's long and turgid but the basic principle is that the domain name at issue is identical or similar to a trademark or service mark in which the novelist has rights. In the case of the horse, the owner has rights to the horse's name, therefore he also has rights to the domain name. The only exception to this is where the domain name is a well known word in its own right. This is why Sting failed in his attempt to get control of sting.com. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 11:30, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

The analogy with the wallet is still false - you have earnt the contents of your wallet by your own efforts, and either bought the wallet with your own money, or been given it by someone who lovs you. The horse-owners have done nothing to earn the domain name - they are just using WIPO to acquire something that has been bought and paid for by someone who was quicker on the uptake than them. Surely also (and I'm not a lawyer) their rights to the name relate to its use as a horse name, and reasonably related businesses (gambling, dog food etc) - many race horses have names that could be applied to almost anything. DuncanHill 11:41, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm not a lawyer either, but I'm not sure that the idea of "earning" something is really relevant here. There are plenty of things that are legally mine which I have arguably not earned. By the same token, the horse owners don't need to have "earned" the domain name to acquire rights to it - it's rightfully theirs in the first place, by simple virtue of the fact that they already own the racehorse with that name. As for "using WIPO", yes, that's exactly what they are doing - having recourse to international law to recover their intellectual property. That's what the law is for. On your last point, we really need to know the name of the horse. If it's called Dobbin, then yes, the owners could hardly argue that they have rights over dobbin.com. But if it's called something unusual like Splendiferous Extravaganza, then they would indeed have rights over the name as a domain name as well as a horse name (and most horse names are pretty unusual). This is the point I was trying to get across in the Jeanette Winterson example above. The name of the novelist/horse is a trademark (it doesn't need to be a registered trademark), and the rights to the domain name come with the rights to the trademark. I liked your parenthetical comment about dog food, though. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 12:03, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

The Jeanette Winterson case is not directly parallel either - Jeanette Winterson is established in her own name. Horses names are changeable, and chosen for a variety of superstitious, commercial & personal reasons. The race-horse in question is "up and coming". The domain name purchaser may have bought in good faith - we do not know that he was even aware of the horse until after he bought the domain name. DuncanHill 11:54, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

The Winterson case is indeed parallel - she successfully argued that she had common law rights in her own name. The fact that she is established, while the horse is up-and-coming, is neither here nor there. If I was a novelist called Arthur Streeb-Greebling, I'd have the rights to that domain name whether I was established or not. You're right on your last point, though - one of the WIPO tests is whether the purchaser bought the domain name in good or bad faith. That is for the court to decide. In this case, it seems pretty clear that he's bought it to make money (his question was how to "market" it to the owner). WIPO would certainly take that statement into account in determining whether it was bought in good or bad faith. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 12:12, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I think if you were a novelist called Arthur Streeb-Greebling you'd want to change your name to avoid confusion with your much more famous namesake! DuncanHill 12:19, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I have been struck by a serious thought - there is no copyright in titles (to books), if one were to write a book called (for the sake of argument) "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone", about, say, a historian called Harold Potter and his researches into the history of alchemy - could one get away with that as a domain name? DuncanHill 12:27, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Copyright isn't really the issue here. The issue for the court to decide - assuming JK Rowling were to take the matter to court - is whether Rowling has common law rights to that title. Given the millions of copies the book has sold, I would imagine she probably does. But I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 12:43, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Hmmmmm. My original intent was definatley to profit from the domain name. I saw the $ that the horse has already won so I thought I could take advantage of it. I am not greedy, but I do like money and I am certain I need it more than them. However... I like to stay with in the law and if I would have know this was not proper I probably would not have done it. I figure you do what you can to get ahead. If they are to stupid to register the domain name than what is wrong with me taking advantage of that? The horses name is definatley unique... Am I pretty much out of luck?

Question to Richardrj: Throughout the course of this thread, you keep maintaining that the horse owners (through WIPO) have the right to the domain name; it is their property and no one else's. If that is true, then what exactly is in issue here? I am not sure even what the dispute would be? Regarding the domain name, the horse owner owns it and the original poster does not. End of story. So, what's at issue? Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 20:03, 12 July 2007 (UTC))

It's not a matter of property - it's a matter of efficient navigation. Ideally, one wouldn't have to pay for domain names at all - after all, it's just a handful of bytes on a name-server somewhere. However, there are some costs involved in administering the system and dealing with this kind of nonsense - so a small payment to the registration authority isn't all that unreasonable. What's gone wrong is that these things ARE regarded as property. This is the root of all problems. I wanted to get a domain name for my son for his 16th birthday - the obvious name was available (which was a surprise) - but the domain registry company thought it might be worth money and wanted to charge $350 for it (versus $25 for a less obvious name). Not that anyone else wants it or anything - just because it makes a nice URL. Hence my son's site has to have a less obvious name for absolutely no good reason beyond the greed of some speculator. Similarly, 'SteveBaker.org' came free - that would have cost me over $3000 - so I'm stuck with 'SJBaker.org' ($80) - not as nice! Does this improve the net? No! Definitely not. You want the best, most memorable names for web sites - with a minimum of fuss when two people actually NEED the same domain. So - if I wanted to look up this horse, I ought to be able to figure it out pretty easily...but no - some moronic domain name squatter has grabbed it. The argument that the owners of the horse should have jumped on the name first doesn't cut it - you are saying that everyone should go out and grab as many possibly relevent names as possible. If they have 100 horses - should they register all of them just in case one becomes famous? No! That's even worse for the future of the net because it results in even more people sitting on domain names that they aren't actually using.

In an ideal world, people would have to pay a flat fee of maybe $1 to register a domain name - and people would be polite enough to take only the names they actually need - when they need them. When two people need the same name, the domain registrar should provide a disambiguation page that points to the actual names the two people wound up with...just exactly like a Wikipedia disambiguation page. If that were how it worked, the guy with the horse would be the first link on the disambiguation page, fans of the horse might be second and cybersquatting would be a thing of the past.

Well, don't expect me to like this! What you are doing is evil - morally no better than stealing a painting and demanding a ransom to give it back. The horse owners came by their wealth by their own efforts - you aren't somehow entitled to your share of their fortune for spending 10 minutes at the domain registrar. People need to stand up and speak out when evil happens - that's exactly what I'm doing.

SteveBaker 22:13, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Since when did an art-thief pay for the painting? The OP paid the price requested and received the product. That's how market economies work. It ain't necessarily pretty, and it certainly ends up hurting some people, but in a market economy if a bussinessperson misses a chance, someone else will be along to take it. Don't assume from this that I'm any fan of this, but if a guy buys something, he's got a right to try to turn a profit. Maybe the answer is to change the way domain names are made available, but the OP is no worse than anyone who buys something with an eye to making money out of it, and a lot less bad than most big businesses. As for ethics and horse-racing, they ain't never even been introduced. DuncanHill 22:27, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

SteveBaker, your argument is emotional and, as DuncanHill points out, it completely ignores the laws of economics and free market supply and demand. No one (buyer) will pay more for a widget than that widget is worth to him; and no one (seller) will accept less for a widget than that widget is worth to him. That's the way it works, period. Your argument is tantamount to saying: "Geez, Bill Gates is a multi-zillionaire and I am a poor cash-strapped college student. It's only right that Bill Gates give me a free copy of Microsoft Office and Windows. Or, OK, I am willing to pay a small administrative fee of $10. After all, he can afford this transaction much more easily than I can." Makes no sense. (JosephASpadaro 01:10, 13 July 2007 (UTC))

Steve, I respect and agree with all the arguments you have put forward, but with respect, it is a matter of property. I'm sorry to keep banging on about WIPO, but it really is at the crux of this whole business. All the domain name registrars have agreed to be bound by its decisions. Of the approx. 10,000 cases that have so far come before WIPO, about 85% have resulted in a domain name being transferred to the complainant [1]. I'm just saying that the law is firmly stacked up against the cybersquatters, which is exactly how it should be.

In answer to Joseph's question above, what is at issue is whether a person holds common law rights to the domain name, through having similar rights to the original name. In the case of sting.com, WIPO's decision [2] was that Sting did not have rights to the domain name, because it was a well known word in its own right. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 07:59, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Richardrj, I did not understand your reply -- especially this part ("through having similar rights to the original name"). What does that mean? And -- Sting aside -- what is at issue in this case (a unique horse name which is not a common or well-known word)? Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 09:59, 13 July 2007 (UTC))

What I meant by the first part is this. One of the tests that WIPO uses to determine who is the rightful owner of a domain name is whether the disputed domain name "is identical or confusingly similar to a trademark or service mark in which the complainant has rights". This means that the complainant (i.e. the person who wants to get the domain name back from the person who bought it) needs to show that they have rights over their own name, or the name of their pop group or horse or whatever. This is usually fairly easy to prove. Once they've proved that, then they're almost home and dry, because the agreed policy is that you have a right to use the domain name that is the same as your own name (or the name of your pop group, horse or whatever).

That hopefully answers your second point as well. The bottom line is, if the horse owner can prove that he owns the horse with that unique name, then he has the right to the domain name that is the same as the name of that horse. There are a couple of other wrinkles, but that's the gist of it. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 10:55, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I see what you are saying. So, then, I am curious. What is the status of the holder of the domain name, in terms of property rights? If I went out and spend $1000 on the domain name, I legally own that name and it is my property. You are saying that, if the complainant can prove x, y, and z ... then the complainant has the rights to own that property. So, what happens to me? Who has the right and the legal authority to come into my home (figuratively speaking) and take away something that I own, have paid for, and is my property? And, next question, what happens in terms of money / compensation? (JosephASpadaro 21:33, 13 July 2007 (UTC))

Well, the domain name registrars have all agreed to be bound by WIPO's decisions. Therefore, a decision to transfer a domain name from one person (the "respondent") to another (the "complainant") is binding and there's not much the respondent can do about it. I don't think the respondent could expect much in the way of compensation, but that would be something between him, the registrar and the domain name company I guess. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 08:57, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

So, Richardrj -- which of the following two scenarios are you saying exists? (A) The domain name registrars should never have sold me that domain name in the first place? or (B) The domain name registrars sell the name -- and I buy it -- subject to the understanding that someone else might be entitled to it later? Thanks. (JosephASpadaro 02:02, 15 July 2007 (UTC))

I guess it would be the latter. You can buy any domain name that's available. The whole arbitration thing only kicks in if someone complains and tries to get control of a domain name from someone else. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 06:57, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Got ya - thanks. (JosephASpadaro 18:02, 15 July 2007 (UTC))

name this image process

Consider this movie poster right here. What is the name of this process and which Wikipedia article talks about it. dr.ef.tymac 20:03, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Photomosaic. --Charlene 20:15, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

What she said. (danged edit conflicts!) --LarryMac | Talk 20:19, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Here's a famous one from a few years ago. --TotoBaggins 21:03, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, I was going to suggest our very own: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_logo_mosaic but it's broken and someone has protected it from all editing - so I can't fix it.  :-( SteveBaker 23:44, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

It seems to be working. Corvus cornix 17:04, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Awesome! The system works! I complained and like magic it got fixed!!! What's cool about that one is that many of the images are animated GIF's and they actually animate when you display it! SteveBaker 21:46, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

SatNav Speedometer

Why does my SatNav say that Im travelling at one speed and my car's speedometer telling me i'm travelling at another. The values usualy only differ by a few mph when driving around town, but then my SatNav can say 80mph when my speedo says 90mph! Why is there such a difference. This difference even occurs when there is full satellite signal. Which is more accurate?

The usual answer I've heard is that your GPS is closer to the actual speed. There is a certain error inherent in the car speedometer mechanism, and the manufacturers don't want to be in the position where you could be speeding but their instrument says you're ok. So they deliberately dial it down a bit - in my car at motorway speeds it's about 6 - 8mph above my GPS. PeteVerdon 00:28, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I would call a car speedometer dangerously defective if it was 10% off either way. Anyway, it's easy to check a speedometer: all you need is a road with mileposts and no heavy traffic, and someone (preferably not the driver!) to time them. If you maintain a steady speed of V mph from one milepost to the next, it should take 3600/V seconds. For example 72 mph is 50 seconds (and 50 mph is 72 seconds; and it also works in metric with kilometer posts, 72 km/h is 50 seconds for 1 km.) If you can maintain a steady speed over several miles, you can get a more accurate check. --Anonymous, July 12, 01:11 (UTC).

I don't see how a speedometer that reads 10% high could be dangerous - and in fact, I know for sure that most modern cars have speedometers that read high - this is a completely deliberate thing. The reason is our litigious society. There were a few cases where people got speeding tickets for going just a few miles per hour over the limit who sued car companies because they claimed that the speedometer was reading low - they believed they were driving at the speed limit when in fact they were speeding. Hence, the manufacturers set the speedometer to read a little high in order that if the thing were a little out of adjustment, it would still not ever read too low (although it might read much too high). Not only to car speedometers do that - but also those roadsigns you sometimes see that tell you what the speed limit is and flash up what your speed is. GPS systems tend to be accurate. On BMW's and MINI's, the speedometer reads about 10% high up to about 50mph - then 5mph over at higher speeds. It's also possible for the speedometer to accumulate yet more errors due to under or over pressurised tyres, the difference between new and worn tyres - whether your car actually has the correct sized tyres in the first place. Depending on how your cars' speedometer is hooked up, you can also get errors due to measuring the speed of just one of the wheels - meaning that you think you are going faster when turning to the left than to the right (this was a well known quirk of the classic VW Bug). SteveBaker 03:53, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Speedometer has information about these discrepancies. Looks like it needs more.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 09:25, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

A speedometer that reads 10% high could be dangerous because some people believe in obeying speed limits, and 63 mph traffic on a busy 70 mph road is dangerously slow. Also, if a person is used to approaching a certain curve at what he thinks is 60 mph, and then changes to a different car whose speedometer is accurate, the extra 6 mph may be enough to cause an accident. I do sometimes check the speedometers on cars I rent and have never seen a discrepancy anything like that large; in my opinion it should be illegal. --Anonymous, July 12, 2007, 23:41 (UTC).

I disagree - firstly, in a stream of traffic, many cars will have the same speedometer descrepancy as yours...maybe all of them. Also, if you are driving at the speed limit - then even if you aren't being fooled by the speedometer, the fact that most people drive around 10mph OVER the speed limit will mean that you are already driving much less than everyone else wishes to. If you rely on the speedometer reading to allow you to drive within 6mph of skidding off the road then you are already driving far, FAR too dangerously! Firstly, there might be a wet patch that could easily lose you 6mph worth of traction. But expecting two totally different cars with different amounts of tyre wear and different road-holding capabilities to be able to take that curve at PRECISELY the same maximum speed!!!! Yikes! That's insanity! There are curved freeway ramps labelled with 40mph cautionary limits that my 1972 VW Bug can't take at 30mph without the tyres squealing in protest! But my MINI Cooper'S will happily zip around the exact same ramp at 80mph...probably faster if I had the nerve! Yeah - that's 50mph difference in what the car is capable of - and at least one example of a car that can't corner at the advised speed! So if you had been used to a car that can get around a particular corner at 60mph - and blindly assume that some rental car will make it around so long as the speedometer reads 60mph or less - then YOU WILL DIE! With softer suspension, more worn tyres and generally poorer design, your rental car might only make it at 40mph...and you'll spin out, flip over the barrier and fall 100' into the oncoming traffic beneath. Kerspatt! So this is bullshit. You aren't (or certainly SHOULDN'T) be relying on your speedometer to tell you whether it's safe...you have to learn the feel of the car and the symptoms of an incipient skid - you need to drive strange cars FAR more cautiously than your own. So speedometer over-reading doesn't have any significant downsides and you are totally overreacting. Speedometers that read too low are a different matter - but that's the reason they generally read high to some degree. SteveBaker 04:19, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Hey, calm down! I wasn't saying people should drive in the manner I described, but that they might, because drivers are stupid, and that in these circumstances a defective speedometer would make them more dangerous. And I say again, a speedometer that reads 10% off is (1) defective and (2) contrary to my experience. How many speedometers' accuracy have you actually checked? --Anonymous, July 13, 2007, 07:31 (UTC).

It's also possible for the GPS to be lying (or at least misleading). The speed reported by the GPS is usually the speed along a theoretically perfect sphere with the radius of the Earth. But if you're climbing a (say) 25% grade (phew!), your wheels are travelling along the longer hypotenuse of a triangle and your speedometer will correctly report a higher speed than the GPS. But the usual answer is: the speedo's calibration includes the fudge factor discussed above.

Atlant 15:36, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I believe the reason that most GPS's don't deliberately overstate your speed is because they put up a "click through" disclaimer every time you turn them on (at least my TomTom 'GO 510' in-car system and my Garmin 'eTrex' hand-held both do - I guess other brands/models are the same). This gets them out of the stupid legal situation that car speedometers are in so there is no reason for them to deliberately introduce error. But you're certainly correct about driving up and down hills - some GPS's completely underestimate your mileage & speed on hilly terrain. My car nav system doesn't seem to know about altitude at all - in a trip I did through downtown Austin, Texas, I was on the upper deck of a two-level freeway and it kept telling me to turn off at exits that didn't exist on that level of the road. My Garmin hand-held provides an altitude readout along with your lat/long so there is nothing (in principle) to prevent GPS-based systems from getting your speed right up and down hills.

SteveBaker 17:00, 12 July 2007 (UTC)