Slashdot Mirror

Not in the US. In the absence of a contract/employment agreement to the contrary, you are free to leave immediately. You will get a bad reference from your former employer, but they do not have the legal right to compel you to stay for two weeks. See this article. Similarly, an employer doesn't have to give you two weeks' notice (or pay in lieu of notice) either, unless it is a mass layoff covered by state law or a contract is involved, though many do.

-Mike

Bill O'Reilly likes falafel too, so you should be safe.

"I would hope that a civilization that is able to travel faster than light, that is possibly thousands to millions of years ahead of us, has grown beyond the need to eat other living things."

Food (*cough*) for thought:

If I ate merely because I needed to fill my tummy, I'd be a vegan.

http://italianfood.about.com/od/beefbracioleetc/r/blr0228.htm

"If I'm wrong, I hope that I'm not very tasty!"

Start polluting your system with preservatives and chemicals! If they find you tasty, at least you might give them cancer!

--
BMO

Try zapping the PRAM

PRAM (or parameter random access memory) is where your Mac stores certain info while the power's off - various Finder settings such as time zone setting, speaker volume, display and video settings such as screen resolution and number of colours, for example. Sometimes the contents of PRAM can get scrambled, and that can cause all sorts of erratic problems.

Basically you tell your Mac to restart, and while it's busy shutting down position a finger over each of four keys - Option, Command (aka Apple), P, R.

When you hear the startup chime (oops, I should have said to make sure the volume on your Mac is set higher than 0) press those four keys and keep them held down. The Mac will shut down again and restart. All done, so you can remove your fingers now and let your Mac start up normally.

All the settings that are stored in PRAM will now be reset to their factory defaults, so you may need to reset any you've changed.

Here's Apple's page about the procedure if you want to review it first. It also mentions resetting the PMU for Powerbook users... it's unlikely you'll need to do that, but you may care to read up about it just in case.

Thousands of years ago into the future Christmas was the time for the Great Red Ape in Space to descend upon the white house, painting it with decorative red and green blood of Christmas elves, moving it to the north pole and claiming that "I fully understand those who say you can't win this thing militarily. That's exactly what the United States military says, that you can't win this military", which is absolutely correct. You cannot win christmas militarily which is why I have come from thousands of years ago into the future to kill that great red ape, santa claus and run for president. My job is a decision-making job, and as a result, I make a lot of decisions. Decisions like those that apply when considering the value of the social welfare of the Indonesian pierced spider monkeys, BUT at the end of the day I got a lot of Ph.D.-types and smart people around me who come into the Oval Office and say, 'Mr. Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past from the Future President, here's what's on my mind.' And I listen carefully to their advice. But having gathered the device, I decide, you know, I say, 'THIS is what we're going to do. We're going to sell the white house soaked in the blood of christmas elves to Glenn Danzig so I can make love to Sigourney Weaver....'

Thousands of years ago into the future...

Bushisms

synthesis is divine.

Now about that GM electric, would that be the one that they haven't been able to get right in 20 years?

Electric cars developed around the same time as IC cars did. Both competed against each other in the very beginning. So I'd say 100 years, not 20. Even earlier: The first 'practical' electric vehicles were produced in 1842. That's 165 years. Otto didn't patent his four stroke until 1876. Before that, cars were either electric or steam powered. Please note that I tried to select dates for commercial deployment, not one offs or unsuccessful ventures.

IC has been winning due to the little problem:
IC is a lousy engine; fantastic energy source: 30% efficiency@1000 'units' of power per pound of fuel.
Electric has a great engine; extremely lousy power source: 90% efficiency@10-20 units of power per pound of battery.

Other than the range problem*, electric vehicles have been perfectly practical for most purposes from an engineering standpoint for decades.

The killer was financial - battery depreciation costs exceeded fuel costs for decades. More expensive fuel and cheaper more efficient longer lasting batteries has narrowed the gap quite a bit.

*Hard to surmount, as more batteries add weight, more weight means more energy needed to move the vehicle, requiring more batteries... After a point you can't extend the range of the vehicle by adding more batteries. LiIon is a real help here. Even NiCad and NiMH help quite a bit over lead acid(of common rechargable battery types, has the lowest energy density by mass).

I think people that starve themselves thin are the exception. Most that get thin do so by eating better and exercise.

Well, fair enough, but I think you're crazy. I see very few thin people who are as fit as their weight would suggest. They don't look like marathon runners, they look like runway models. Go to a national park and watch "normal" weight people over age 25 or so hike up trails. Most get about 500 yards before they start puffing and thinking about taking a break. Given that our remote ancestors routinely walked 20 miles a day cross country, this is not good news. We weren't designed for such a low energy output lifestyle. It's like driving a Ferarri in 1st gear all the time.

Also, women carry more fat so 35% may not be unhealthy at all

Nope. Try here, or do a little googling. For women anything over 32% body fat is bad news. For men it should be under 25%. Optimal is about 5-10% for men, 15-20% for women.

I don't care if they drive without a license, if the license doesn't prove anything. I'd rather they go home so we can export the jobs that are exportable to them in their country rather than taking over the non-exportable jobs here at lower wages.

And what of the businesses immigrants start? Close them and put the legal workers out of a job? You do realize more immigrants start businesses in the US than native US citizens don't you?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E911

http://pcworld.about.com/magazine/1909p034id55986.htm

The US justice and social system needs some serious work. If you have 1 in 142 US residents in jail you have a problem. This equates to just under 2 million inmates and this is only based on 2002 figures, so I'd hate to see the current status.

This inmate population is enough to populate any of the 13 least populated states in the USA.

I am not saying what these people did isn't wrong, but the crime sounds more like revenge that punishment. This kids will be in debt and slaves to the system by the time the get out. Any time they would have had to think about what they did will be marred by the excessiveness of the punishment. Maybe the American society is just looking to continue slavery, but using other means to do it?

Ok, I've learnt not to hit "Submit" when I'm about to leave the house in a hurry.

I found an article called Britons named world's biggest emitters of CO2 from air travel. (I've already written to my MP [Member of Parliament] opposing the expansion of London Heathrow Airport, which is the busiest in terms of some statistic in the world.) At the bottom it says "But overall, US adults have the biggest annual travel carbon footprint in the world at 7.8 tonnes, more than double France's 3.7 tonnes, which comes in at number two. Third on the list, at 3.1 tonnes, is Britain." -- the USA is a big jump ahead of France there! I know you have sparse settlements (I have been to the USA, I liked some things, disliked others), but I really hope you find some solution to that. For instance, "If one in 10 Americans used public transportation regularly, U.S. reliance on foreign oil could be cut by more than 40 percent--the amount we import from Saudi Arabia each year." (source). This notes that public transport use in America has now got back to the level it was at 50 years ago -- I don't know how much settlement density has changed in that time, maybe people have left cities a lot (?), but if it used to be possible, why isn't it possible any more?

"The real Wiimote is on the right in this picture"

http://nintendo.about.com/od/industrynews/ig/Nintendo-Wiimote-Knockoff/Nintendo-Wiimote-Knockoff.--fE.htm

You don't say? You mean the one which says "wii" on it, is twice the size, and doesn't have the big black LCD screen at the top.

given the undeniable trend towards more-and-more web-based advertising, and given Google's dominance therein, the fact that they are well on their way to becoming a Microsoft-like monopoly is not only possible, it's very likely.

While I use Google more than any other search engine, I am not locked into using Google. Other SEs I use are About.com; Teoma, now Ask.com; and Mooter. It's real easy and quick to change SEs, however this isn't true for MS software. There's no way Google is a monopoly like MS. They may practice some of the same stuff, like looking over a small business under an NDA to possibly invest but come out with their own version of a product instead of investing but Google does not have any lock on either searches or ads.

And with their incredibly detailed databases on each and every one of us (from our gmail, our online office apps, our google search history, our google chats, etc)

All I use Google for is searching. I have no Gmail, no chats, and no apps. And even then I don't use Google's search exclusively, there are 4 SEs I regularly use.

they can make it virtually impossible for their customers (businesses) to switch to another advertiser, since the effectiveness of Google's ads will greatly exceed that of their competitors.

Ah but as TFA says Google's ads are loosing effectiveness. It's also easy for someone else to step in with advertising.

My understanding is that Einstein was actually offered the presidency of Israel. http://judaism.about.com/od/jewishleaders/a/aeinstein.htm

And under your system stations won't try to overpower each other?

Such a thing as trying to overpower the competition would lead to an arms race none of those trying could win. It's rather easy to add power to a radio station up to a point. With a number of different stations broadcasting on the same frequency all anybody listening would hear is a bunch of garbage, interfering signals. Since there would be no clear signal advertisers would not pay to advertise. However by shifting the frequency a little there would be no interference, with today's technology radio stations can use much closer frequencies than was possible in 1934. The only reason to limit radio, and tv stations and require licenses is to limit competition. And of course big media like Clear Channel wants to limit competition.

Imagine if newspaper publishers and printers had to have a license, those granted licenses could have kept competition out. It being easy and cheap to print is responsible for creating thousands of newspapers and magazines. Heck, with DTP software anyone can create and publish a broadsheet. About 20 years ago a writers group I was in put together several short stories we had written and ran off copies, well Barnes and Noble ran them off, to hand out. Some publish broadsheets of only a few pages, or maybe only one or two pages, they can then sale small ads and hand out the broadsheet.

Now imagine someone starting up a small special interest radio station. A person with an interest in calypso, reggae, music could start up a station and sell ads to local businesses that sale the music, to a Cajun restaurant, or to a local band that plays the music. Another person could startup a talk radio station that is about model railroads and sale ads to hobby shoppes.

No I do not think it has a John Kerry mode.

However, like great music of other eras, its greatness won't be recognized until the creator is long dead.

Some great music now is being recognized. I don't listen to music much anymore but one performer I love is Norah Jones, who has performed with Willie Nelson and others. She released her debut album in 2002. In 2007 she released her third album, "Not Too Late" "which debuted at number one on the world charts."

There were in South Africa anyway.

Hmm...

"Perversion", I would have to assume, would imply a minority from the norm...

http://marriage.about.com/cs/masturbation/f/masturbatfaq3.htm

Oddly, this may be many Slashdot readers' first data point as to what a "Protestant" is...

I am a dynamic figure, often seen scaling walls and crushing ice. I have been known to remodel train stations on my lunch breaks, making them more efficient in the area of heat retention. I translate ethnic slurs for Cuban refugees, I write award-winning operas, I manage time efficiently.

Occasionally, I tread water for three days in a row. I woo women with my sensuous and godlike trombone playing, I can pilot bicycles up severe inclines with unflagging speed, and I cook Thirty-Minute Brownies in twenty minutes. I am an expert in stucco, a veteran in love, and an outlaw in Peru.

Using only a hoe and a large glass of water, I once single-handedly defended a small village in the Amazon Basin from a horde of ferocious army ants. I play bluegrass cello, I was scouted by the Mets, I am the subject of numerous documentaries. When I'm bored, I build large suspension bridges in my yard. I enjoy urban hang gliding. On Wednesdays, after school, I repair electrical appliances free of charge.

I am an abstract artist, a concrete analyst, and a ruthless bookie. Critics worldwide swoon over my original line of corduroy evening wear. I don't perspire. I am a private citizen, yet I receive fan mail. I have been caller number nine and have won the weekend passes. Last summer I toured New Jersey with a traveling centrifugal-force demonstration. I bat 400.

My deft floral arrangements have earned me fame in international botany circles. Children trust me. I can hurl tennis rackets at small moving objects with deadly accuracy. I once read Paradise Lost, Moby Dick, and David Copperfield in one day and still had time to refurbish an entire dining room that evening. I know the exact location of every food item in the supermarket. I have performed several covert operations with the CIA.

I sleep once a week; when I do sleep, I sleep in a chair. While on vacation in Canada, I successfully negotiated with a group of terrorists who had seized a small bakery. I balance, I weave, I dodge, I frolic, and my bills are all paid.

On weekends, to let off steam, I participate in full-contact origami. Years ago I discovered the meaning of life but forgot to write it down. I have made extraordinary four course meals using only a mouli and a toaster oven. I breed prize-winning clams. I have won bullfights in San Juan, cliff-diving competitions in Sri Lanka, and spelling bees at the Kremlin.

I have played Hamlet, I have performed open-heart surgery, and I have spoken with Elvis.

But I have not yet gone to college.

Source

It would be dangerous to feed a hurricane more heat, that is exactly what they require to get stronger. If they fed a hurricane more heat, from some sort of microwave satellite they could potentially bring it beyond a category 5(worst case scenario, in my own personal opinion). At the very least though, who knows: miscalculate and accidentally steer it right into a heavy populated city along the coast and/or/maybe make it stronger. The idea for cooling the hurricane might be a little safer, or might feed it more dust to throw at things. Of course it could also be that nothing happens(nothing happening is much less likely), but either way the risk is too great. I don't know the results, these are just a couple of (at least to me) reasons not too even try it in the first place

Anyways, I agree with you. They still have enough trouble accurately predicting the weather as it is, and an old saying I heard somewhere. Just because you can do a thing, doesn't mean you should.

The Boy Scout motto is: Be Prepared. Which includes being prepared for emergencies. And I am certain that the Bible teaches being prepared too. One thing I have been taught all of my life is to prepare for emergencies. Get a emergency 72 hour food and supply kit ready in a water proof/airtight container. Along with more then enough water. And then build up a 1 year supply of food and water, in stages like 2 or 3 months first, then building beyond that to a full year supply or longer. And the food supplies don't need to be anything fancy, just cans of food, and other storage solutions, I know many people in several parts of the US alone that can/bottle their own food for food storage. Also rotating food supplies so it stays good is necessary as well. I know some people personally that while rotating food supplies use some of the oldest food supplies first, like one meal a day. Just to keep the supplies fresher.

http://lds.about.com/od/preparednessfoodstorage/a/72hour_kit.htm This site has 72-hour emergency kit information freely available for download in pdf format, that you are free to print out and give copies to your friends and family as you wish. That's the way LDS are with information like that. It's good solid information, and deserves to be checked out fairly, and with an open mind.

And no, I am not starting a religious discussion, I am doing my best to stay on topic, and give some freely available related information, that could benefit people for the better.

The media companies love standards when it suits them, such as when it limits the technology companies power (as in music DRM or content filtering). However, when the standards become, well, too standard, they want their own proprietary formats. NBC pulls out of ITunes because they didn't like the standard pricing. Sony tweaks its DVD's because it doesn't like the standard DRM (and I rented a coaster from Blockbuster recently, thanks Sony).

Viacom says "we believe in following the consumers". The real quote was "We believe in following the consumers as long as it pleases us. Otherwise fuck the consumers."

Hitler was very religious. Just go to the one book, written by himself, that steered a Reich...

This human world of ours would be inconceivable without the practical existence of a religious belief. The great masses of a nation are not composed of philosophers. For the masses of the people, especially faith is absolutely the only basis of a moral outlook on life. The various substitutes that have been offered have not shown any results that might warrant us in thinking that they might usefully replace the existing denominations. ...There may be a few hundreds of thousands of superior men who can live wisely and intelligently without depending on the general standards that prevail in everyday life, but the millions of others cannot do so.

- Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1 Chapter 10

Absolutely no room for interpretation there. It's documented up the wazoo.

Please, PLEASE, don't confuse what you think with what is real. That's how religions start. [/wink]

As for Stalin, Christopher Hitchens puts it like this:

For hundreds of years, millions of Russians had been told the head of state should be a man close to God, the Czar, who was head of the Russian Orthodox Church as well as absolute despot. If you're Stalin, you shouldn't be in the dictatorship business if you can't exploit the pool of servility and docility that's ready-made for you. The task of atheists is to raise people above that level of servility and credulity.

People are people. And people that want power will take advantage of what's in place to consolidate or improve their position. The same goes for every group, including the 21st Century Chinese. They will allow any religion as long as it isn't a threat to the Party. So following the writings of Lao Tzu or Moses is OK, but Falun Gong is seen as a threat to the established order so it's quashed because it's "jeopardising social stability".

You don't need a martyr and a temple to have a doctrine that people will follow, or are made to follow. You just need one person telling another person what to do (if they know what's good for them, that is).

It isn't unusual for even not so smart weapons to turn on their handlers. There are lots of very old historical precedents.

A few years back, a cadet had his hands blown off by a cannon at Fort Henry, Ontario. While he was tamping down the powder charge ,a few leftover embers from a previous shot touched off the powder and blasted away the tamping rod with his hands attached. Apparently this was a common way to be injured or killed on wooden warships.

I was not unusual for soldiers to be killed by accident with US civil war gatling guns which lacked a mechanism for locking the crank in place. As a result, the crank would occasionally make a quarter turn or so under force of gravity, popping off a few rounds. Tough beans for anybody unlucky enough to be in front of it. Automatic weapons can "cook off" a round just from the heat of prior sustained firing.

The Forrestal fire http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Forrestal_(CV-59) of 1967 was caused when an freak electrical surge caused a F4 to launch a missile across the deck, puncturing the fuel tank of another plane loaded with live munitions and touching off a chain reaction that ultimately killed 132 of the crew.

HERO (Hazards of Electromagnetic Radiation for Ordinance) http://usmilitary.about.com/od/glossarytermsh/g/h2814.htm has long been a concern for the military.

Are you implying that the scientific method is just a thinly-veiled form of faith? As experiments are repeated and results are confirmed over time, the probability of a result that hasn't "happened so far" approaches zero. Is it mere faith that the Sun will rise again tomorrow? That just because that that's what has happened "so far", it's still possible that when I wake up tomorrow the Sun will be replaced by a giant penguin? If that's not what you're implying, then you need to reword your argument. If it is what you're implying, then you need to de-ass your head.

If people want to believe in God, fine. It would be fine if their belief didn't affect non-believers, but it does. Extensively. It directly influences their attitudes toward science, education, and law.
Its not "fine" to me that belief in god is a criteria for who can become President (and presumably other political offices).
I'd rather not have my members of congress legislating with the guidance of some moral compass pulled out of their favorite fairy tale. So no, it's not fucking "fine".

I think you might've learned from a guy who's made a lot of mistakes like that.

Dude, give credit for a statement like that where it's due:

That sounds like a true BUSHISM!

Don't forget Garth Brooks' rock album: Garth Brooks In The Life of Chris Gaines. I dunno how well it sold, but he did do a rock album.

The picture on the cover is pretty surprising - You end up saying "THAT'S Garth Brooks??" WTF?

I'm a metalhead, but I do have to say I liked "Thunder Rolls", that was really a good song.

Nice troll.

http://www.rockonthenet.com/archive/2000/vh1hardrock.htm
#1 in "VH1: 100 Greatest Hard Rock Artists"

http://www.avrev.com/bands/
#1 in "AVRev Top Ten Rock Bands of All Time"

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/5939214/the_immortals_the_first_fifty
#14 on "The Immortals: The First Fifty"

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4595384/
#6 in "The 10 best rock bands ever"

http://classicrock.about.com/od/recommendationsandreviews/a/top100_bands.htm
#5 in "Top 50 Classic Rock Bands"

Not true! I think that disproves GP's claim that aliens aren't contacting us. They're obviously OK with the gays. Photographic proof, right there! ;^)

On a more serious note; University of Maastricht: don't let horny grad students near journalists. Not to mention, there's a big difference between sex with a robot, and marriage with a robot.

Now I'm feeling seriously stupid for posting seriously about this. This is a stupid article. Let's keep the blather stupid, shall we?

These guys spent decades and millions of dollars of their own and investors' money creating this machine. When they get it to market, General Electric and Hitachi just steals the idea and markets it. Pretty much destroying the company that was started by the inventors. They then sued over another decade or so finally getting a settlement. IF they just sat back, others would have profited off of their work. That's an injustice if I've ever seen one!

Without the inventor with the hopes of making it big and getting a return to their investors, they WILL BE NO INCENTIVE TO INNOVATE. Some of the MRI Story. (Wikipedia has some of the business stuff wrong)

more history

I don't care about the very few patent trolls or whatever, I know there's abuse, but we shouldn't throw the baby out with the bath water.

... Popular Mechanic's older, hi tech solutions.

Have you ever tried to catch mice?

If you have, you will know how brilliant idea the normal mousetrap actually is. It's ridiculously cheap and efficient, and has practically remained the same for almost 100 years. Here is a link to the pantent:

http://inventors.about.com/od/weirdmuseums/ig/History-of-Mousetraps/James-Doubt---Mousetrap-Patent.htm

"When you see a raven dropping a piece of meat on the road bed in the spring time and guarding it until roosting time, check out the shoulders and see if it is a coyote crossing. Many a coyote has been ironed out on the asphalt because they stalled out in traffic to try to pick up a tasty tidbit glued to the road bed. Coyotes are creatures of habit. They will use the same road crossings daily while making the rounds. Ravens are a roadside attraction for sure."

http://birding.about.com/library/weekly/aa101899.htm

I see ravens every day. Some days they seem a lot smarter than others.

I see coyotes most every day. They never seem smart at all.

I've seen ravens do some very cool stuff. Using humans to help them hunt coyotes wouldn't surprise me in the least.

Yes, you're correct. Copyrights can be sold or transferred, as we should know.

No...
They are called Fatwa's (See Salmon Rushdie)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_well-known_fatwas#Fatwas_promoting_violence_against_a_particular_individual

and Jihad's
http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2006/11/islamic_jihad_i.html ...the Islam Defenders' Front says it is religiously permissible to murder ...

So that their religion will dominate
http://atheism.about.com/od/islamicextremism/a/daralharb.htm

And well, just kill you because you upset us.
http://2008vote.wordpress.com/2007/07/04/islam-versus-islam-violence-within-islamic-community-is-it-not-a-price-to-pay-for-hating-the-world/

Or even sillier, let's kill a lot of our own people because you upset us.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4684652.stm
At least five people have been killed in Afghanistan as protests against European cartoons mocking the Prophet Muhammad swept across the country.

Oh... yea... almost forgot.
They do incidentally set things on fire when they get mad
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/02/05/cartoon.protests/index.html
Muslims burning embassies.

http://www.biblenetworknews.com/africa/112202_nigeria.html
Muslim mobs burn churches, over 100 killed, Christians retaliate ...

http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/014647.php
School principal and teacher killed, bodies burnt in Thailand's Muslim south...

Of course, exploding random people who happen to be near other faintly valid targets* is more their lines. That and kidnapping random people and beheading them.

---
* while I don't want our young americans to die, I recognize that they are in a foreign country and are legitimate military targets. However, the children near them, the random shopkeepers (who are also islamic) are not valid targets by any shred of the imagination.

---
We get the message- piss christians off and they will complain, march, vote, etc. Some people that call themselves christians will murder but the rest of christians will be shocked and say it is a bad thing. In fact christians are much more likely to beat the hell out of each other for wearing a Teasip shirt into an OU bar (and it was an oklahoma church deacon at that!) than over a religious issue. And I say that as a non-christian.

But if I piss off a islamic people, those that do violence to me will be silently supported by the islamic community. Around the entire world, they repeatedly get caught bombing, murdering, kidnapping, etc. people. If it goes on, we really do have a war of civilizations setting up.

And for that reason, I'm glad that they are anti-science.

Obviously things have gone horribly wrong in the last thousand years. But then again we seem to be going in the same direction in the United States, with intelligent design etc. In fact in the article "Science finds every soil barren in which miracles are taken literally and seriously and revelation is considered to provide authentic knowledge of the physical world" sounds a lot like the United States, where over 50% of the population doesn't accept the theory of evolution (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/11/22/opinion/polls/main657083.shtml).

So this is something new? It seems to me that the US is moving away from religion, not towards it. Compare the laws and liberties that we have today and compare them to what we had over the past 100 years. Hell, when I was a child (1970's), I remember "blue laws" that would prevent grocery stores from selling anything other than the absolute necessities. I remember management would place carts to block off the toy and alcohol aisles. And yet, in November, 1971, a company called Intel publicly introduced the world's first single chip microprocessor, the Intel 4004 (U.S. Patent #3,821,715), invented by Intel engineers Federico Faggin, Ted Hoff, and Stan Mazor.

Yeah, I don't recall a great scientific medieval period in the US from 1776 to present.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the cause of so much mayhem and misery in this world has been mostly religion/cult on religion/cult.

Who the f*** decided that sentences on the Internet shall no longer be formatted with two spaces after a period?!

Time will tell if your estimates are true, but Nokia N95 has a) been out 3 months longer,

You're point? Nokia's 2nd quarter is not the same as Apple's. The quarterly numbers I cited were Nokia's Q2: April/May/June. iPhone shipped two days before Apple Q4 began. N95 shipped a little over a week before Nokia's Q2 began. It's not an unfair comparison, and yes, time will tell indeed.

b) is available in way, way more markets than the iPhone.

Who's fault is that? If Apple sold an unlocked phone, it would be in every market, worldwide. If all Nokia sold were locked phones, I wouldn't have been able to buy one to use in the US. They aren't available here through any carrier.

The iPhone's success is unquestionable in terms of brand presence:

Brand presence != sales. Brand presence != quality product.

*everyone* knows about it, even non-gadget people.

In the United States.

To contrast, relatively few "normal people" know about the N95.

Relatively few "normal people" buy $700 phones. As long as those who might be interested and capable of buying one know about it, that's all that really matters. Making sure the rest of the universe knows about your new shiny won't sell more phones. Being an attention whore does make product failure a much more spectacular and embarrassing event though. The Segway comes to mind. Everyone knows about that "revolutionary new product."

La Griffe du Lion: A female Fields Medalist is predicted to surface once every 103 years.

Camille Paglia: If civilization had been left in female hands, we would still be living in grass huts.

Not necessarily.

Baby Boomers are often defined as those born from 1946 thru 1964,
which roughly correlates to an increase in the number of births that occurred after the end of World War II
http://geography.about.com/od/populationgeography/a/babyboom_2.htm/

Go to the CEA antenna selector site to check reception information for your area, and verify that the antenna you have is suitable (and pointed in the right direction): http://www.antennaweb.org/aw/welcome.aspx

Take a look at outboard ATSC tuners listed here: http://tv.about.com/od/accesspries/tp/topATSCreceiver.htm, or check on EBay - I picked up a Samsung SIR-T150 years ago for $100, and it works fine.

Understand that OTA HD can look a LOT better than cable or direct-to-home satellite - local broadcasters typically transmit at much higher bitrates, even if they're squeezing more than one sub-channel into their slice of spectrum, whereas cable/sat providers often do terrible things to their signals so as to squeeze more channels in. Also understand that not everything on an HD channel will, in fact, be HD - a lot of content is still up-sampled SD.

Signal degradation is not quite as graceful as analog, but also not "all or nothing" - forward error correction means a degraded signal will first exhibit digital drop outs before going away entirely. A signal with good reception is flawless, it's like being in the TV station.

Technically, here's no "up" or "down" in space... Uhm, never mind, it seems that sex in NASA vehicles is an urban myth... But now I have a mental picture of Adam and Jamie strapping in the next shuttle to test it :(

Word's designers never seem to have [...] heard that leader dots between an entry's text and page number is[sic] a sign of faulty design.

The LinuxJournal article is opening for me at the moment: http://www.linuxjournal.com/node/8012/print The article appears to be about how to create ToCs, Indexes and Bibliographies in OpenOffice's Writer. (author is a fellow named Bruce Byfield). A tutorial.

After trimming back the original URL I was able to finally get the NewsForge article at http://software.newsforge.com/software/05/08/16/2038242.shtml to come back up and now that I read the byline more closely... ha! it's by the same fellow. Maybe what we have here is just one guy stating his opinion as if it were some known fact or something?

Word's designers never seem to have [...] heard that leader dots between an entry's text and page number is[sic] a sign of faulty design.

The LinuxJournal article is opening for me at the moment: http://www.linuxjournal.com/node/8012/print The article appears to be about how to create ToCs, Indexes and Bibliographies in OpenOffice's Writer. (author is a fellow named Bruce Byfield). A tutorial.

After trimming back the original URL I was able to finally get the NewsForge article at http://software.newsforge.com/software/05/08/16/2038242.shtml to come back up and now that I read the byline more closely... ha! it's by the same fellow. Maybe what we have here is just one guy stating his opinion as if it were some known fact or something?

Here's a list of cars Apple users drive.