Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2007 November 22

= November 22 =

Slapbands
I can to your site on how to find info on a certain 80's trend that was called a "slapband" (one of those bands that is "U" shaped straight but you can smack it and it will form a circle then unravel it and make it straight again) there seems that there was some sort of contriversy with it in the 80's that it was banned from schools. I searched all over the internet for other names to this "fashion statement" with no luck so I turned to you, but seems that there is no info.

But I certainly thank you for all the awesome info you guys do have and your doing a great job. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.133.34.201 (talk) 01:01, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Yup, I remember them. When we had them in the late 80s they were banned in our school due to a rumour (confirmation?) that the sliver of metal could slide out of the synthetic material outside and slit the wrists of the wearer. That having been said, I still had mine up until a year or two ago. I don't know what happened to it. I'll have to search... Steewi (talk) 01:33, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * See Slap bracelet. These are still made all over the world (google) and were originally trademarked under the name 'Slap Wrap'. The technique has been expanded to also include 'Slap on watches' and other items. 86.21.74.40 (talk) 01:56, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Always amazed at the plethera of knowledge to be had.

Thank you —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.133.34.201 (talk) 13:04, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Modern filmaking
Do modern large Hollywood studios such as Universal and DreamWorks use digital film-capturing devices? Or are they still using the traditional film? Thanks. Acceptable (talk) 01:18, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * They use both, but what is becoming increasingly popular is the use of a digital internegative for use in editing, digital colour timing and effects etc, so yes, these days most film is digitally scanned at some point even if the end product is based on traditional film stock. -- Web H amster 12:46, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

writing
hello, im a writerbut im on writers block is there any websites that give you plots but i can create my characters and setting? thanxs


 * If you find one, come back and tell us. I'd love to know about it. Bielle (talk) 02:32, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * You may be interested to read The Thirty-Six Dramatic Situations. At the bottom of the article are links to other plot lists.--Shantavira|feed me 09:00, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

need help please
I know you dont help on homework but i am helping my younger sister on a project and i have looked every where from the regular dictionary to every site online and i can not seem to find what we need. she has been given four symptoms, mouth and gum soreness, wounds and cuts will not heal, loss of appetite, and sore joints. i have looked at all the diseases she was given and none of them seem to fit all the way.the diseases are...cholera, dihtheria, leprosy, dengue fever, scurvy, malaria, and yellow fever. They all seem to have one or two of the symptoms. can you help or at least point me in the right direction? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.141.20.156 (talk) 02:05, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Sounds like scurvy.


 * Well, I don't know. There is no indication of joint pain or loss of appetite in our article on scurvy.  It says that there is an inability to make new collagen - and I could imagine that causing joint problems - but it's not listed in the symptoms.  But I agree that none of the other diseases cover the whole set of symptoms either.  Could this be one of those things where the patient has two diseases and you have to find the two that cover all of the symptoms without predicting symptoms that the patient doesn't have? SteveBaker (talk) 05:16, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The British Medical Association "Complete Family Health Encyclopedia" says that scurvy causes bleeding into muscles and joints thus causing pain. DuncanHill (talk) 05:19, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * And in the same vein (ouch, unintended, but I will leave it), mouth and gum soreness (along with the joint pain) could well result in a loss of appetite. A toothache alone will do that for me. Bielle (talk) 05:57, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It does appear to be scurvy. The giveaways are the lack of healing and the tooth and gum soreness. The lack of vitamin C causes loose teeth and gum decay, also giving extremely foul breath. You also get lethargy, and your body doesn't have the strength and resources to heal sores easily, so they linger. Leprosy's giveaway would be numbness and blackened extremeties, malaria's and dengue fever's are fever and delirium (recurring). Cholera causes sores to appear (among other things) and I don't know much about yellow fever. I'm off to read the article. Steewi (talk) 00:45, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It's not in our article about yellow fever, nor in our article about coffee ground vomiting, but one of the diagnostic symptoms of late stage yellow fever is the vomiting up of dried up blood (which looks like coffee grounds). See here. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that it's probably pretty unpleasant. Matt Deres (talk) 02:04, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

spelling help
When you say a person is full of knowledge, you can say "he is a "plefferer of knowledge".  How do you spell that?   Thank you —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.112.82.135 (talk)

plethora ? Hmm, bad redirect! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.76.162.232 (talk)


 * See plethora on wiktionary. 86.21.74.40 (talk) 02:52, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

I'd say "He has a plethora of knowledge" rather than "he is a plethora of knowledge".hotclaws 04:56, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * You could also say "He is the fount of all knowledge" - but I'm sure the OP wanted 'plethora'. SteveBaker (talk) 05:03, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Is pleffering legal in your state? &mdash;Tamfang (talk) 20:07, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

By the way, I've always understood the pronunciation to be PLE-thɘra, not plɘ-THAW-ra, but I hear people using the latter from time to time. Which is correct? -- JackofOz (talk) 20:56, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Emphasis is on the first syllable -- Web  H  amster 01:20, 24 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Thank you. --  JackofOz (talk) 23:24, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Salvia divinorum and the law
Hi, I live in Illinois where salvia divinorum, a hallucinogenic/dissociative drug, is becoming illegal on January 1st, 2008. I understand that Wikipedia does not offer legal advice and does not take the place of a lawyer, but I thought I'd ask a question. Once salvia becomes illegal, does a bong with salvia residue become illegal as well? As some of you might know, it's incredibly hard to clean something like a bong enough to get rid of any leftover smells from smoking something like salvia. I ask this because the act of smoking took place while the substance was legal (though I can see this being called into question as there is no proof), it is present in essentially near-trace amounts (as in, it would be impossible to get high from what's left over in the bong), and there are legitimate uses for bongs (such as hookah). Thanks for the help, guys! --pie4all88 (talk) 07:21, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Would it not be possible to contact your local police force for advice? I am sure plenty of other people must have been in similar situations in the past, so they must have some kind of policy on this. 130.88.79.77 (talk) 12:27, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Lol, I am sure you noticed this, but in Salvia divinorum it says people have suggested that the wording of the law banning the drug in Illinois will make possession of water extracted from the plant illegal. However, if you could extract the active ingredient from a different plant, or synthesise it, this would be perfectly legal! 130.88.79.77 (talk) 12:34, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I may end up contacting the police with the question. Just thought I'd ask here since it's more convenient.  And as for the wording on the bill, I'm pretty sure there aren't any other plants that make Salvinorin A, but it definitely is possible to synthesize it.  Honestly, I'm not surprised in the least that the law is badly written.  I can hardly make it through the "Controversy" section on the Salvia divinorum page what with all the biased, misinformed senators and sensationalist media coverage.  Anyways, thanks for the help with the question, man. :)  --pie4all88 (talk) 13:15, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

]p[-
220.233.83.26 (talk) 08:05, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Exactly. FiggyBee (talk) 08:26, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * He will be back, just gone for a pee perhaps.--88.110.17.80 (talk) 08:39, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I say the answer he's after is ;P Steewi (talk) 00:47, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * something to do with trr?Cryo921 (talk) 01:09, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

intel
Whenever an advert about a computer with an intel pentium 4 processor inside it or whatever, why do they always have to have the little intel tune? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.42.215.64 (talk) 14:11, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Possibly thanks to some deal between the seller and Intel, designed to make the customers think there's something remarkable about Intel processors. If so, the aural equivalent of the rather ridiculous "Intel Inside" visual thing. -- Hoary (talk) 14:18, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * They don't have to, but if they do put the Intel Inside thing in their adverts, Intel will pay for half the cost of the advert (as a result, Intel gets extra advertising and the computer company gets a cheaper advertising campaign - everybody wins). See Intel Corporation. In case you're interested, the exact tune goes "D♭ D♭  G♭  D♭  A♭".  Laïka  14:22, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

They have the "little tune" because the more senses one can engage, the more likely it is that the message will be noticed. Also, at any later time the hearing of the tune (or just a snatch) will tend to recall the ad, and therefore the product. Basic promotional technique.86.197.150.176 (talk) 15:06, 22 November 2007 (UTC)petitmichel


 * It's like a jingle. --antilivedT 21:45, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

I don't have a source for this but I've heard that Intel will pay the seller something like 70% of the cost of the Ad if they include the jingle. And of course at that price, they all accept Doh! Didn't read Smurrayinchester's coment above. -- DatRoot 01:04, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I also understand that they pay computer manufacturers if they put that 'intel inside' sticker on the computer/laptop. I heard that Apple refused because they think they would spoil the computer's design. Here's an article on it (http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/58900.html) ny156uk (talk) 10:04, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Very interesting. I've been wondering on and off how come Apple had avoided the sticker - I had assumed that it was compulsory. The financial explanation makes much more sense.


 * Incidentally, I also think that IBM may be missing a trick by not doing something similar (though hopefully more tasteful). How many people realise that the chips in every current games console are made by IBM? 81.187.153.189 (talk) 19:19, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The Wii has a little ATI logo frosted on the upper-left corner of the side panel due to the ATI Hollywood graphics chip inside (you can see it in this image). I can only imagine that IBM decided that it wouldn't generate enough extra trade. Laïka  12:19, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Effects of lethal radiation
Suppose if a human was blasted by an intense amount of gamma radiation, equivalent to power of those from a thermonuclear weapon, how would the body physical look as it dies? Would the person just drop dead or would a more dramatic death ensue, ie. body melts, bubbles, etc...? Thanks. Acceptable (talk) 16:19, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * You could have a look at radiation poisoning. Gamma burns from highly penetrating radiation. This would likely cause deep gamma penetration within the body, which would result in uniform whole body irradiation rather than only a surface burn.  Lanfear's Bane |  t  16:33, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The same article in the dosage section Radiation poisoning may also be useful. I would hazard a guess that as the particular type of event in the question has never been reported, that we just don't know what the effects would be (I doubt they'd be fun to experience tho). 86.21.74.40 (talk) 16:40, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Oh and also, see Gamma radiation. 86.21.74.40 (talk) 16:43, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I understand that exposure to gamma radiation causes the body to swell up, turn green, and become incredibly strong. 64.236.80.62 (talk) 12:00, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I would look at it as a kind of "sunburn turned up to 11". Sunburn is due to an overdose of electromagnetic radiation just as irradiation with gamma would be (though admittedly the UV in sunlight isn't normally described as "ionising radiation"). Really serious sunburn, blistering, etc. 81.187.153.189 (talk) 19:22, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * You might want to look for a copy of Eric Hall's Radiobiology for the Radiologist or a similar work in your local university or teaching hospital's library. There are only a handful of cases of human exposures to high doses of ionizing radiation that weren't accompanied by other insults.  (People at Hiroshima and Nagasaki who received large doses of gamma radiation, for instance, suffered serious injuries due to heat and blast as well&mdash;there was also little controlled clinical monitoring of their early symptoms.)  The few cases that are available are generally isolated military and industrial accident cases where doses are estimated after the fact.
 * Very high doses of ionizing radiation (roughly 5000 rad/50 Gy and up) delivered to the whole body are characterized by rapid nervous system and cardiovascular effects: the so-called central nervous system syndrome. Animal experiments have found that death occurs in hours (or less, with higher doses).  There is a rapid onset (within minutes) of nausea and vomiting, followed by disorientation, loss of coordination, seizures, coma, and death.  While you might see some skin reddening or blistering (if the patient lived long enough), you're not going to see charring or bubbling.  Even extremely high doses of gamma irradiation will deposit very little heat into the body.  (100 rad/1 Gy of absorbed dose is 1 joule of energy per kilogram of body weight; raising a person's temperature by 1 degree Celsius would take an absurdly high dose of about 4000 Gy.  For comparison, a 10 Gy whole-body dose is almost uniformly fatal, even with aggressive medical intervention.)  TenOfAllTrades(talk) 20:51, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

How much radiation would exist at ground-zero of a modern thermonuclear warhead? Acceptable (talk) 23:28, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * When? Immediately? Two hours later? etc. Time matters a lot in this because the highly radioactive bits are also the ones that die out quickly; the amount of radiation decreases greatly within the first few hours. It's also the difference between prompt radiation (caused by reactions in the bomb) and delayed radiation (caused by the remains of the bomb and its effect on the landscape) See 5.2.1 Radioactive Contamination and 5.3.2.1 Sources of Radiation here for a great overview. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 08:18, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

mba
what are your career goals?why do you want to do an mba?221.134.49.128 (talk) 16:47, 22 November 2007 (UTC)akanksha


 * That's not an appropriate question for this desk; each of us would have a different opinion. sorry. --Tagishsimon (talk) 16:58, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Clearly it's a question asked by an educational institution to a person applying to do an MBA there. If the best he/she can do is parrot the question word for word in a place like the ref desk, I don't see them having much of a chance of getting their MBA should they be accepted.  I hope that doesn't seem uncharitable, just realistic.  --  JackofOz (talk) 23:15, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I believe I am qualified to be the MBA because... well.. actually, I'm not. However I'd take that over being in the MBA any day. In short, I'd like to be the MBA because I don't want to be in the MBA. Thank you. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 08:10, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Google home page banner - incorporated event image
What do you call the incorporation of an event overlay or modification image which utilizes aspects or parts of a base image, in this case the two "o"s in the word "Google" displayed on the Google home page? (For today's event of Thanksgiving the tail feathers of two turkeys sitting at a dinner table are fanned out in the shape of the two "o"s.)

Also do the images of the turkeys at the table suggest it is okay for turkeys to practice cannibalism or in a reverse twist, okay to eat human? 71.100.8.2 (talk) 19:14, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Well, the turkeys seem to be eating a vegetarian diet, so I'm not sure it endorses either of those conclusions. As for the modification, I'm not sure it has—or needs—a specialized term. --140.247.11.24 (talk) 19:58, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Google calls them "Google Doodles". There's probably no official name, but depending on the context, it could be a mash up or image manipulation. Laïka  23:01, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Actually, Google just calls them holiday logos. The term Google Doodle refers to the special multi-day logos that tell a story. --Bavi H (talk) 02:55, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

Adobe/Acrobat reader
Why is Acrobat reader free? Not complaining or anything, it just seems a bit of a silly descision--Phoenix-wiki (talk · contribs) 21:54, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Why should they charge for it? There are plenty of free PDF readers out here, and it will lose all of their market if the reader is free. They mainly make their revenue through the software that make PDF, Adobe Acrobat. --antilivedT 22:02, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * The reader is free, but the creator is not. So it's partially because by creating a standard document format, then companies need to buy the program to make files into that format if they want to distribute in it. Then again, with programs like CuteFTP that will convert a Word document to PDF for free, that is a free alternative to Adobe's encoder. Guroadrunner (talk) 22:03, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * It's programmatically much easier to write a PDF than it is to read it, oddly enough. There are really not that many PDF readers out there—most are based off of a single codebase (xpdf's)—because the format is damned tough and full of all sorts of exceptions and special cases. It's one of those formats that's simple to write to in a given way, but since there are so many different ways to write to it it makes it quite hard to read. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 22:27, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * This is not so odd. Most file formats are much easier to write than to read. And not just file formats -- printing is much easier than OCR, and 3D rendering is much easier than computer vision. -- BenRG (talk) 13:15, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * ~My question is: Why is that silly format so damn popular? Keria (talk) 22:15, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Because there's no agreed-upon standard for distributing documents that won't change the formatting on each computer, and it allows me to send you files that you can read/print without having the software I used to make it (e.g. I could send you a Word file even if you don't have Word; I could send you an InDesign file even if you don't know what InDesign is) or the fonts I used for it. A quick real-time example: I want to a make a DVD label that prints on a specific brand of DVD sticker stock. I make the label in the lousy software that comes with the labels, but I want to print it off of a computer that doesn't come with said lousy software. What do I do? The easiest option by far is to just print it off to a PDF and then print that from the other computer; it's near guaranteed to work and to look the same as it would if I used the specialized software, and it's totally portable.
 * (Document security, perhaps Adobe's most touted feature of the PDF, is notoriously poor—in almost all cases there is no encryption whatsoever, just a flag that the reader software either abides or doesn't. It usually takes me a whole 5 seconds to disable things like passwords and "no copying" restrictions. One of OS X's core distributed utilities—ColorSync Utility—does not (or at least doesn't in 10.4.10) respect the security flags at all, so you can open just about any PDF up with that and then save it again to strip the document of all security features. Frankly I don't like the idea of using DRM to restrict people from doing things like copying-and-pasting—it interferes with the work of scholars and the "fair use" rights of the user, for one thing, and doesn't do anything to prevent wholesale copying of the document itself.)
 * Is it the best of such formats? Not really, but its ubiquity and relative ease of use at this point makes it the obvious one to pick for daily work. It also handles lots of little things that other formats don't do well—like bundling fonts and keeping color encodings correct and keeping OCR information along with the images, etc. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 22:27, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Even if you and I both have Word, the odds are vanishingly small that you and I could view or print the document exactly the same. WYSAWIG (What You See Ain't What I Get)! PDFs have the advantage that we'll probably see the same thing.


 * Atlant (talk) 17:09, 26 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It's a brilliant decision. Make the reader free. Make your format ubiquitous. Make it a standard. Then profit both off of the supplementary software and the name recognition. Charge for a reader and nobody will want to use your format—you'll lose the possibility of it becoming an industry standard and being widely accepted . -24.147.86.187 (talk) 22:27, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I wouldn't call it brilliant (since it's pretty obvious) but it's certainly the most profitable model for a format like this. Lots of other companies do the same thing, like Macromedia and Real. The company that creates the format gets to be first to market with authoring software, which is a huge advantage even after competing products appear (which might not happen for years). If you have patent or trade secret protection on the format then you may even be able to prevent competitors from entering the market, which is even better for you (though not so great for your customers). -- BenRG (talk) 13:15, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I was only contrasting "brilliant" with "silly". --24.147.86.187 (talk) 16:37, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * So how do they make so much money? One would only expect them to make modest profits this way--Phoenix-wiki (talk · contribs) 22:23, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't know exactly, but Adobe has a lot of various programs and made its money 25 years ago with the PostScript stuff for early printers. Guroadrunner (talk) 00:13, 24 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Practically every office that does any sort of e-business needs to have Adobe Acrobat installed on a good number of its computers, because PDF is one of the most standard formats on the internet these days and the ability to edit them or create complicated forms is pretty much restricted to Adobe's software. So they sell the software. It ain't cheap—the "standard" version costs $300, the "professional" costs $450. Obviously there are better deals one can get if you are buying a bunch, but the point is the editing software brings in a lot on its own. Factor into it the value of the brand name as the "industry standard" (Adobe is one of the best-known software brands out there, second maybe to Microsoft and Apple) and the fact that they sell a whole suite of expensive software (Photoshop: $640; Flash: $700; InDesign: $700; Illustrator: $600; DreamWeaver: $400) and it quickly becomes clear that they stand make quite a bit of money on software sales alone. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 08:08, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

What's this font?
Look at this image of the box for the video game Rock Band: http://www.engadget.com/photos/rock-band-crashes-at-our-pad/501769/. What is that awesome '80s font for the words "Start a band, rock the world" and the other font for the words underneath that, "Live Out Your Rock-and-Roll Fantasies (...)" Let me know, I'm really interested because those fonts look classic, like I've seen them before. Guroadrunner (talk) 22:03, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It reminds me of 1980s advertisements in comic books. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 23:09, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It looks like ITC Avant Garde, with ITC Avant Garde Alternate for the slanted A and very tight kerning and tracking. Laïka  23:38, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * That looks correct! I will see if I have the alternate on my computer, or if I can buy it cheap. Thank you. Guroadrunner (talk) 23:58, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * ITC Avant Garde is older than 1980, but (like Palatino) became more visible when it was included in the second LaserWriter. &mdash;Tamfang (talk) 20:05, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Try Identifont. --—  Gadget850 (Ed)  talk  -  12:11, 24 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Or WhatTheFont; if that fails, WhatTheFont Forum is like a Ref Desk for fonts. &mdash;Tamfang (talk) 22:19, 24 November 2007 (UTC)