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What color e-ink looks like in real life:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-media/product-gallery/B00756YMGU/180-3321600-8761936

If you think of it as a Bluetooth remote (NFC doesn't really give enough range that "remote" has any meaning) it's not really all that unreasonable. I spent a good chunk of my morning looking for a Canadian supplier of something not entirely dissimilar... remote music control, camera shutter trigger, and since it has Real Buttons it's a little more effective to control music and whatnot while driving.

But yeah, whoever decided to market this as a phone for a phone needs their head(s) checked.

In the book "The China Price", a factory worker is discussed who had his hand mangled in an injection molder. He was left to fend for himself with a tiny bit of "compensation" from the factory. No wonder smart people in China want to avoid factory jobs -- they are not like factory jobs in the USA. See:
"The China Price: The True Cost of Chinese Competitive Advantage" by Alexandra Harney
http://www.amazon.com/The-China-Price-Competitive-Advantage/dp/0143114867
"In this landmark work of investigative reporting, former Financial Times correspondent Alexandra Harney uncovers a story of immense significance to us all: how China's factory economy gains a competitive edge by selling out its workers, environment, and future. Harney's firsthand reporting brings us face-to-face with a world in which intense pricing pressure from Western companies combines with ubiquitous corruption and a lack of transparency to exact a staggering toll in human misery and environmental damage. This eye-opening expose offers, for the first time, an intimate look at the defining business story of our time."

China is already moving to increase automation. From a couple years ago:
http://ww5.plasticsnews.com/china/english/headlines2.html?id=1278958338
"In the wake of labor unrest, Chinese factories are adding automation to control rising labor costs. It was bound to happen."

The same issues will play out as in the USA with a declining need for most human labor in all areas. For ideas on what to do about it:
http://www.pdfernhout.net/beyond-a-jobless-recovery-knol.html

I also don't understand why China does not just print money to give out as a "basic income" to Chinese citizens so they can buy Chinese factory products (eventually recycled by taxes when the money supply grows to the right size). While in the past it might have made sense for Chinese factory workers to accept low wages as a sort of "tax" so China could learn how to make things based on Western know-how, it seems that has passed the point of diminishing returns. The big issue is that the Chinese don't have enough cash to buy their own goods, and that should be relatively easy to solve. I guess even the Chinese don't understand modern fiat-dollar economics, let alone the emerging post-scarcity economic model? Of course, I could say much the same about the USA, where there is a shortage of money supply because so much digital cash is either sitting on the sidelines parked in zero interest bank accounts or is in the zero-sum "casino economy" on Wall Street. Related links:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/an-emergency-program-of-monetary-reform-for-the-united-states/5494
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3p48upXJaA&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL
http://www.basicincome.org/bien/aboutbasicincome.html
http://www.moneyasdebt.net/

That's interesting about the Panduit product. Are you referring to this?

http://www.panduit.com/wcs/Satellite?c=Page&childpagename=Panduit_Global%2FPG_Layout&cid=1345565612156&packedargs=classification_id%3D311%26locale%3Den_us&pagename=PG_Wrapper

http://www.drillspot.com/products/678579/panduit_ds5_duct_seal_compound?s=1&catargetid=1623454804&gclid=CKzVgYq7hbUCFciDQgodhnUA5g

and this is Coax Seal?

http://coaxseal.com/product-informatio http://www.amazon.com/protects-types-cable-moisture-corrosion/dp/B0002ZPINC

I just looked at my NID installation and just noticed the riser cable is actually exposed outside of the house for around 1 foot before entering the building. The seal used is some sort of paintable silicone. So I need to get some of these products or some sort of UV-stable tubing to protect the homerun. Do you have any experience with Tygon R-3400 tubing? http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/item.aspx?itemid=23409&catid=864

Thanks for all the info!

His girlfriend said he had spent all his money on lawyers too. Probably his families as well. Dale Carson says this is what they never show on TV Law shows: Just how much the charade costs. http://www.amazon.com/Arrest-Proof-Yourself-Ex-Cop-Reveals-Arrested/dp/1556526377

How about they bring back 'Law and Order' with a few twists to make it more honest?
1. They add a 'Final Act' to each show where the accused - innocent or not - goes out and files for bankruptcy.
2. They have a running dollar total in the corner of the screen.
3. They replace the McCoy crowd with aggressive, publicity-hungry prosecutors who pass up on big time criminals to pursue small fry: "No, not him. He's rich. We'd be tied up in court for years, but what about this guy? College student. Family not wealthy. We can bleed him dry and make him cop anything. Plea bargain the sucker to the slammer, and I get the corner office with a view. Threaten him with 35 years in jail, then offer him 6 months. His family will thank us!'

"Try going 72 hours without food. You'll be amazed how *real* discomfort can focus the mind."

For some people, if you do it right:
http://curezone.com/forums/fm.asp?i=1137654
http://schizophreniabulletin.oxfordjournals.org/content/3/2/288.full.pdf
http://www.fastingconnection.com/forum/General-posts-to-Index/1184-fasting-and-bipolar-disorder

See Dr. Joel Fuhrman's work for how to fast correctly.
http://www.amazon.com/Fasting-Eating-Health-Medical-Conquering/dp/031218719X

Although ultimately people have to eat right:
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/natural_depression.aspx

If you want a real history, I suggest going with documentary Triumph of the Nerds.

It's better, but it completely omits the major role that Commodore played at the time. To my knowledge, Commodore has never had any significant mention in any documentary or movie.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0088CJT4U/ref=oh_details_o09_s00_i00

Put openwrt on this thing and it really works well. Thanks to the Atheros chipset, which is really quite good now on kernels Linux 3.6 or better.

-Hack

John Taylor Gatto's "The Underground History of American Education", IN FULL, online

* "education* was paid-for by the coal-industry, to eradicate autonomy from all "worker" population ( no more back-talk or independent thinking )

* it was modeled on the LOWER-caste Hindu education

etc...

( Benjamin Franklin was mostly self-taught, as was Lincoln...
and I've read the writings of historical slaves who were more learned than the modern "average" nowadays )

Wikipedia's copy of his Main thesis

What does the school do with the children? Gatto states the following assertions in "Dumbing Us Down":

• It makes the children confused. It presents an incoherent ensemble of information that the child needs to memorize to stay in school. Apart from the tests and trials that programming is similar to the television, it fills almost all the "free" time of children. One sees and hears something, only to forget it again.
• It teaches them to accept their class affiliation.
• It makes them indifferent.
• It makes them emotionally dependent.
• It makes them intellectually dependent.
• It teaches them a kind of self-confidence that requires constant confirmation by experts (provisional self-esteem).
• It makes it clear to them that they cannot hide, because they are always supervised.

---

Think about it:
any child who's ALLOWED to think autonomously...
is a threat to School's Authority(tm)...
and, once out of school, the "Authority" is different, but the principle's the same...

We geeks have it good:
science is a method, and it is objective
( appeal to authority is broken by Universe being itself, & testable )
but outside of our culture, anyone who holds to
Truth Is Testable, and ANYONE can discover what is more-true...

gets beaten on, broken, and maybe accused of being a "terrorist" too,
like that convicted felon "Jesus" you may have heard of...

Bullying leverages itself against all it feels to be threat, automatically,
and making certain that rural "education" leaves its product, many real lives as incapable of autonomy, functional planning, or even effective thinking, as possible is something I've seen too damn much of...

Any population dumbed-down enough is prevented from self-determination, or, in other words,
any population dumbed-down enough is subjugated to "authority" managing their resources & lives, helplessly.

Damage done through abuse or neglect doesn't get undone quickly or without great work/cost.

In the McCain/Obama election this was shown again:
many latinas live in a culture that disallows their personhood/validity much as the women of the suffragette era did to white women,
and they were committed to bloc voting for McCain/Palin...

Why? because in the animal-logic of the beaten,
simply having someone of one's kind appear in the "authority"-category feels animal-validating...

that they were committed to giving incorporated money greater rights & removing influence & wasteful/costly social-support from poor latinas, their entire category of people, was incognizable to all in their induced-condition...

Machiavelli was a pro, for his time...

what the standard is, nowadays,
would sicken him...

( hint: read "Women's Ways of Knowing", which identifies 4 modes of human-meaning, 1 of which is what our culture calls "battered women syndrome"...
and consider the places in the world where ENTIRE POPULATIONS are in that mode, where peace cannot be won unless it is imposed until the mind-damaged population is replaced with a syst

now a days it became easy to on-line shopping from at home. for more details pls visit http://www.amazon.com/

I recommend reading the book Oxygen: The molecule that made the world for a thorough understanding of ageing.

Among other things it explains the heartbeats of birds vs "finite number of heartbeats". We all have mechanisms for DNA damage repair. In humans, if I remember correctly, there are 3 such mechanisms, but in birds there are 4. This explains why birds live longer, even though they have more heartbeats pr. minute (i.e. oxygen consumption and DNA damage).

You mean like Snow Crash?

Where have you seen an external battery pack that's more compact than spare batteries? Another reader did post a link to an external charger:
http://www.amazon.com/5600mAh-External-Battery-Charger-Flashlight/dp/B005K7192G/
however it's still listed at 3.7 x 1.7 x 0.9 inches, compared to about 1 x 1 x 0.15 inches for a spare battery.

Taking the initiative (i.e., firing the first shot to surprise the enemy) and applying overwhelmingly dominant force have long been core tenets of US and Israeli military doctrine. It's not as if they've any reason to be humble about it.

I'm just surprised that Israel hasn't yet bombed the research facilities and turned Iran into a radioactive wasteland, ala Ian McDonald's "The Dervish House.". Send a loud message to all Muslims that only friends of the West can be trusted with nuclear energy.

You might want to check out your facts before you claim them.

http://www.dndclassics.com/product/110211/Dungeon-Delve-(4e)?src=FrontPage
http://www.amazon.com/Dungeon-Delve-Edition-Supplement-Adventure/dp/0786951397/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1358959369&sr=8-1&keywords=Dungeon+Delve+(4e)

Makes the Macbook air just as outrageous

...and it is. Except that Apple is desirable, but the top selling laptop on Amazon right now is the chromebook http://www.amazon.com/Best-Sellers-Electronics-Laptop-Computers/zgbs/electronics/565108/ref=pd_ts_zgc_e_565108_morl?pf_rd_p=1306419382&pf_rd_s=right-5&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_i=2956501011&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1RB1ZW709NBS28NH1KWN selling for a third of the cheapest surface.

I carry around a spare battery for my Android phone. Often, I'm traveling or otherwise away from home for long periods of time and I find it to be a lifesaver.

I got this cheap universal charger and it works great. I plug the charger into the wall and then plug in the dead battery. The charger also has a USB port, so I don't need a second charger for my phone. Overnight, just plug the phone and the second battery into the charger. When I wake up, both are charged.

It's only 650 mA, so it takes all night to fully charge both batteries. But that's fine with me.

As a bonus, it really is a universal charger. I've charged mine and others' camera batteries too. If it's a lithium ion battery and it physically fits, it charges.

Well that's just it. Nobody knows. Or else they spend 511 pages claiming that experience doesn't exist.

getting a webcam which implements the UVC (USB Video device Class)

Agreed. I was going to recommend a high-res Logitech that I have but it's not currently made. However their C920 has a tripod mount (finally!) is well-reviewed and has a higher resolution with the reviewers talking about the stability of the autofocus on extreme close-ups, so I'd probably buy this one with a heavy wide-base tripod (like this if I were going to try to do this kind of build. A clip-on light with a gooseneck will probably make things look better too.

getting a webcam which implements the UVC (USB Video device Class)

Agreed. I was going to recommend a high-res Logitech that I have but it's not currently made. However their C920 has a tripod mount (finally!) is well-reviewed and has a higher resolution with the reviewers talking about the stability of the autofocus on extreme close-ups, so I'd probably buy this one with a heavy wide-base tripod (like this if I were going to try to do this kind of build. A clip-on light with a gooseneck will probably make things look better too.

Somebody, animal, vegetable, or mineral, decided to stick a "Fedora 18" tag on some software. Why? Do they have a mission statement? What is their goal?

I suggest they adopt one and then go read The Inmates Are Running The Asylum.

Design a product and stop throwing wrappers around underlying APIs.

I use a USB external battery. I'll charge it at night right alongside my phone and then I carry it along with me. It connects to my phone using a standard USB->microUSB connection. (Apple users could use a USB->Apple cable, but I have an Android phone.) I get two "30%->100%" charges out of this battery. (I'll rarely let it dip below 30%. Given that, with heavy use, it usually will take about 4 hours to deplete my phone's battery this much, I can wind up going for 12 hours before needing a recharge. (Since I bought mine, other models came out which would give me 3 or more phone charges.)

The poster says that USB external batteries are bulky, but how much bulk would keeping 2 batteries on you be? Not to mention the inconvenience of having to open your phone's case, shut down your phone, open the phone itself, replace the battery (making sure to remember which is the charged and which is the depleted), put everything back together, and boot your phone back up.

This is the one I bought ($30 on Amazon) in case anyone's interested.

I got sick of scooping dog food for my puppy out of the bag with my hand, so I grabbed a plastic cup and started using that instead. I call it the "puppy food cup".

Sorry to "cool story bro" you, but that stuff is kind of weak. "Buying a new battery", "overcomplicated solution to replicate this. (note the standing function. Works great for me while in bed.)", and "I just bought college dorm room furniture" don't really qualify as hacks. Unless the slippers I bought this weekend qualify as a "temperature hack for keeping my feet warm."

My sources are Overview of Category UPC Requirements (available to Selling on Amazon subscribers only) and Help: Adding UPCs and How to Obtain a Product Code (which I think are public).

I just checked, and it appears Amazon's requirement for a GTIN (UPC, EAN, ISBN) in order to get an ASIN has loosened since the last time I checked. Manufacturers of private-label products in certain categories who sell those products on Amazon as a Pro Merchant are now eligible for the Amazon Brand Registry, which provides Global Catalog Identifier (GCID) for their products, linked to the manufacturer's part number. Media items (such as books, music, and DVD) and a few other categories are not eligible for GCIDs, nor are individuals who sell fewer than 40 items per month (Pro seller subscription required). In some categories, such as consumer electronics, product bundles need their own GTINs. Did your "many many many products" refer to categories eligible for GCIDs?

My sources are Overview of Category UPC Requirements (available to Selling on Amazon subscribers only) and Help: Adding UPCs and How to Obtain a Product Code (which I think are public).

I just checked, and it appears Amazon's requirement for a GTIN (UPC, EAN, ISBN) in order to get an ASIN has loosened since the last time I checked. Manufacturers of private-label products in certain categories who sell those products on Amazon as a Pro Merchant are now eligible for the Amazon Brand Registry, which provides Global Catalog Identifier (GCID) for their products, linked to the manufacturer's part number. Media items (such as books, music, and DVD) and a few other categories are not eligible for GCIDs, nor are individuals who sell fewer than 40 items per month (Pro seller subscription required). In some categories, such as consumer electronics, product bundles need their own GTINs. Did your "many many many products" refer to categories eligible for GCIDs?

My sources are Overview of Category UPC Requirements (available to Selling on Amazon subscribers only) and Help: Adding UPCs and How to Obtain a Product Code (which I think are public).

I just checked, and it appears Amazon's requirement for a GTIN (UPC, EAN, ISBN) in order to get an ASIN has loosened since the last time I checked. Manufacturers of private-label products in certain categories who sell those products on Amazon as a Pro Merchant are now eligible for the Amazon Brand Registry, which provides Global Catalog Identifier (GCID) for their products, linked to the manufacturer's part number. Media items (such as books, music, and DVD) and a few other categories are not eligible for GCIDs, nor are individuals who sell fewer than 40 items per month (Pro seller subscription required). In some categories, such as consumer electronics, product bundles need their own GTINs. Did your "many many many products" refer to categories eligible for GCIDs?

Have you looked at eBay/PayPal fees lately? Amazon compares quite well.

For the categories that my employer sells in, both Amazon and eBay plus PayPal charge a final value fee of about 15 percent. (Current Selling on Amazon subscribers can view the fee schedule.) Amazon also has a price parity policy, meaning a seller who also sells on his own web site can't raise its prices on Amazon to cover these fees unless the seller raises the prices on its own web site in parallel.

> The decision whether to charge a defendant, and with what -- is almost entirely discretionary. ... > Hope you enjoyed that freewheeling culture while it lasted, kids — now Everything is a Crime."

Once to be charged with a crime there needed to be a criminal intent. No longer. There are so many ridiculous laws on the books now that you can't be a citizen without breaking some laws, and zealous prosecutors can pluck those laws out of obscurity to target anyone the don't like, or even just choose some unlucky sap they pick on to boost their career.

There's a good book by ex-FBI cop & criminal lawyer Dale Carson who explains these people have run out of big time criminals to prosecute, and so now the justify their existence by filling jails with poor saps who meet this criteria, or they would be laying off cops, judges and prisoners for lack of business: http://www.amazon.com/Arrest-Proof-Yourself-Ex-Cop-Reveals-Arrested/dp/1556526377

Here's a real life case where US officials made life hell for a California marine biologist for no other reason than they have big swinging dicks and they could: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/eo20120803gw.html

This has been going on for a long time. Aaron is the first person to draw it to the wider public attention: "Legions of government lawyers inundate targets with discovery demands, producing financial burdens that compel the innocent to surrender in order to survive. Silverglate, a civil liberties lawyer in Boston, chillingly demonstrates how the mad proliferation of federal criminal laws — which often are too vague to give fair notice of what behavior is proscribed or prescribed — means that "our normal daily activities expose us to potential prosecution at the whim of a government official." Such laws, which enable government zealots to accuse almost anyone of committing three felonies in a day, do not just enable government misconduct, they incite prosecutors to intimidate decent people who never had culpable intentions. And to inflict punishments without crimes. The more Americans learn about their government's abuse of criminal law for capricious bullying, the more likely they are to recoil in a libertarian direction and put Leviathan on a short leash."

This is the year...

...that Windows fucked gamers/steam, pushing users onto alternative platforms [and I mean Android], but providing an unpleasant Desktop experience, with a future that promises censored gaming, and alternative stores locked out. Ironically I'm counting 3 Linux console launches this year so far[one of them from steam], and Android the best known Linux is set to overtake Window in Market share this year [some figures claim it already had happened] http://www.tomshardware.com/gallery/IDC-GS,0101-366874-0-2-3-1-png-.html...not Desktop enough for you...in case you were still wondering the Chromebook is STILL the best selling laptop on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Best-Sellers-Electronics-Laptop-Computers/zgbs/electronics/565108/ref=pd_ts_zgc_e_565108_morl?pf_rd_p=1299888842&pf_rd_s=right-5&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_i=565108&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1J8F0Q3S9TFWX2J2ZRAD

Get over it the pack of four is all people talk about...and Microsoft is not one of them.

I don't know why anybody would hate on the C60, its frankly a kick ass netbook or mini-PC chip and when I couldn't find an E350 for my dad's GF year before last I found him an Acer with a C60 to give her and she just loves the hell out of the thing, like with my E350 EEE she has no intention of getting rid of it and why should she? Unlike the crippled Atom systems the C and E series support a ton of RAM (she has 4GB on hers, I went ahead and slapped 8GB in my E350) and have full VM support as well as does 1080P over HDMI. She loves hers because the C series gets even better battery life than mine, after 2 years she still gets nearly 6 hours whereas after 3 years mine still gets a solid 4. But I'm glad to see you enjoy the Bobcats, I can't count the number of office PCs and HTPCs I've built with Bobcats and they are just great, low power, full 1080P, hell I play L4D and the Portal and Torchlight series on my netbook when stuck at the doctor's office and its a fricking blast.

BTW Crosshair one place to keep an eye out besides Craigslist and eBay is to check out Cowboom which will have some insanely cheap AMD units from time to time. If you have never heard of them its the site Best Buy uses to sell all their returned and refurbed as well as trade in units and as you can see while they have a ton of dirt cheap Atoms they do get some AMD netbooks as well as the occasional full size. I picked up an Atom dual for $85 there that was like new, boy that was an easy unit to turn, as well as a C50 Gateway that was only $129 and also easy to flip. Its one of those sites you really just have to check daily as they constantly get new stuff and you never know what is gonna be there. The only AMDs they have now is a couple of single cores at $165 but last week they had a really nice E450 for just $130, you just gotta keep an eye out.

Oh and also keep an eye out on Amazon because as you can see here you can get some insanely cheap AMD E series boards there, I mean $70 for the Gigabyte with 4 SATA, or $95 for the Asrock with a PCI-E slot? way too cheap. If you are building an office PC I recommend the cheaper Gigabyte but for an HTPC you can't go wrong with the Asrock as hybrid crossfire works pretty damned good on those E series and having dedicated VRAM makes for a sweet HTPC, but as I'm sure you know both do 1080P just fine as long as you don't cheap out and buy 1066 RAM, I found running 1333 does make a difference on those APUs.

And if you do have an HTPC you ought to email me and I'll send you the links to the free programs I use, i tripped over some killer freeware that loads all the Metadata from IMDB into your media library so when you fire up WMC it has all the box art and synopsis filled in, hell of a lot nicer than trying to just find things alphabetically and since it loads all the metadata you can sort by genre, year, title, its a great way to enjoy your movies and TV shows.

This is nothing new at all for Atari, the company nearly folded in 1974 because Nolan appointed his brother-in-law, a psychologist to run Atari and went over like a lead brick... of course, then the huge profit losses in Dec 82' that nearly dragged Warner Comm down, and then its sale and split in July 1984... So this is yet another chapter in the long sorted drama of Atari... If you really want to know all there is to know about Atari, told directly by the employees themselves, you really need to head over to Amazon and pick up this incredible new book on Atari - Atari Inc. Business is Fun Check it out: http://www.amazon.com/Atari-Inc-Mr-Curt-Vendel/dp/0985597402

Good point. Or, ten or twenty trillion US$ in paper wealth disappeared as an externality of banking risk that some bankers made billions from and caused suffering for tens of millions of people:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/01/18/the-parable-of-the-frogs/
"What does it take to produce large-scale social change? Most historians, if you catch them in an honest moment, will admit that the popular levers of social change, such as education or legislation, are bogus; they don't really amount to very much. What does make a difference -- and then only potentially -- is massive systemic breakdown, such as occurred in the United States in the fall of 2008. It was the greatest market crash since 1929, leading to widespread unemployment (something like 18% of the population, in real -- as opposed to official -- statistics*) and the loss of billions of dollars in retirement savings. In fact, the crash wiped out $11.1 trillion in household wealth, and this is not counting the several trillion lost in stock market investments. It had been many decades since the middle class found itself in soup kitchens, and yet there they were. In the face of all this, however, very little seems to have changed. Americans are still committed to the dream of unlimited abundance as a "reasonable" goal, when in reality it is (and always has been) the dream of an addict. President Obama's upwards of $19 trillion bailout and stimulus plan funneled money into the very banking establishment that gave us the disaster; it rescued the wealthy, not those who really needed the money. And while he could have appointed economic advisers such as Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz (both Nobel laureates), who would have attempted to put the nation on a different economic path, he chose instead two traditional neoliberal ideologues, Timothy Geithner and Lawrence Summers, who believe in the very policies that led to the crash. "Change we can believe in" never sounded more hollow."

No doubt some of this is spin, but there is some truth in here:
http://www.infowars.com/100-million-poor-people-in-america-and-39-other-facts-about-poverty-that-will-blow-your-mind/

One of the links there goes to:
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2011/12/15/9461848-dismal-prospects-1-in-2-americans-are-now-poor-or-low-income
"Squeezed by rising living costs, a record number of Americans -- nearly 1 in 2 -- have fallen into poverty or are scraping by on earnings that classify them as low income."

I'm not saying the average US citizen is as bad off as most people in North Korea in material ways -- just that there remains a lot of unnecessary suffering in the USA which is being justified by a crazy ideological bubble. For example, if the USA redistributed half of the US GDP equally as a "basic income", then every citizen would have US$2000 a month, and the other half could be competed over. It's only a cultural mythological bubble that keeps most of the USA from seeing this:
http://web.archive.org/web/20120102011454/http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/?q=node/402
"That rationalization came in the form of a brand new science known as economics, which included a brand new mythology."

Despite books like this by Moshe Adler:
"Economics for the Rest of Us: Debunking the Science that Makes Life Dismal"
http://www.amazon.com/Economics-Rest-Us-Debunking-Science/dp/B007F7WKV8
"Why do contemporary economists consider food subsidies in starving countries, rent control in rich cities, and health insurance every

"...it's also like a combination of the Truman Show and They Live. One massive reality distortion bubble that nobody is aware of.
And the whole discussion, just as the voting choices, always revolves around two options that are only differing in something entirely beside the point, giving the citizens choices for all aspects of their life, except those that aren't meaningless. Everything is condensed down from picking a fuzzy varying area in a multi-dimensional gradient space to a one-dimensional binary choice. With you being called at least "Hitler" for picking the "wrong" one. Let alone trying to think outside that box.
It's ludicrous."

See my comment posted earlier above, or also this by Morris Berman:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/01/18/the-parable-of-the-frogs/
"In the case of the United States, the imposition of rules and limits on individual behavior to protect the commons is not, at present, a realistic prospect; the population is simply not having it. But how much longer before this freedom of choice is regarded as an impossible luxury? In fact, no crystal ball is required to predict the future here. The tragedy of the commons -- what Hardin called "the remorseless working of things" -- is that a society such as that of the United States won't undertake serious changes even when it is sitting on the edge of an abyss. It has to actually be in the abyss before it will entertain such changes; i.e., it has to be faced with no choice at all. It seems unlikely now, but things are probably moving faster than we realize. In terms of population, energy, food, resources, water, social inequality, public health, and environmental degradation, a crunch of the type I am referring to may be only twenty years away."

By that author:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1118061810/
"During the final century of the Roman Empire, it was common for emperors to deny that their civilization was in decline. Only with the perspective of history can we see that the emperors were wrong, that the empire was failing, and that the Roman people were unwilling or unable to change their way of life before it was too late. The same, says Morris Berman, is true of twenty-first century America. The nation and its empire are in decline and nothing can be done to reverse their course. How did this come to be? In Why America Failed, Berman examines the development of American culture from the earliest colonies to the present, shows that the seeds of the nation's "hustler" culture were sown from the very beginning, and reveals how the very tools that enabled the country's expansion have become the instruments of its demise. "

BTW, Germany is a legacy of what the USA used to be:
http://www.salon.com/2010/08/25/german_usa_working_life_ext2010/
"How did Germany become such a great place to work in the first place?
The Allies did it. This whole European model came, to some extent, from the New Deal. Our real history and tradition is what we created in Europe. Occupying Germany after WWII, the 1945 European constitutions, the UN Charter of Human Rights all came from Eleanor Roosevelt and the New Dealers. All of it got worked into the constitutions of Europe and helped shape their social democracies. It came from us. The papal encyclicals on labor, it came from the Americans. ..."

Yet we in the USA should not lose hope:
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1108-21.htm
"In this awful world where the efforts of caring people often pale in comparison to what is done by those who have power, how do I manage to stay involved and seemingly happy? I am totally confident not that the world will get better, but that we should not give up the game before all the cards have been played.

Maybe you two can play words with friends together.

Did you know they even have a version you can play in real life now? Games are finally growing out of cell phones and into the third dimension! It's a really exciting time to be a gamer, with these new and innovative products.

More seriously, try board games! My wife isn't much of a video gamer, but board games were a huge hit with her. Look at things like Agricola, Ticket to Ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, and Settlers of Catan. They reward analytical thinking like video games do, so you won't be bored, I promise.

They should probably read A Whack on the Side of the Head and A Kick in the Seat of the Pants. Not to be more creative, but to learn that success can lead you to ruin.

Quote: "There is a greater need to extinguish arrogance than a blazing fire"!

They should probably read A Whack on the Side of the Head and A Kick in the Seat of the Pants. Not to be more creative, but to learn that success can lead you to ruin.

Quote: "There is a greater need to extinguish arrogance than a blazing fire"!

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_0_12?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=child+proximity+alarm&sprefix=child+proxim%2Caps%2C201

Yes. First came crony capitalism, now we have crony science. I'm still waiting for the other shoe to drop on HIV. The WHO did finally announce after 25 years that there will NOT be a heterosexual AIDS pandemic.(1) But they still have yet to explain how the virus knows what continent it's on, and why it only infects heteros in Africa. Peter Duesberg was right.(2) But in traditional crony science, they cut all his funding so they wouldn't have to listen to his science.(3) And people expect me to take government funded climate "science" seriously. ROFLMAO.

(1) http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/threat-of-world-aids-pandemic-among-heterosexuals-is-over-report-admits-842478.html

(2) http://www.amazon.com/Inventing-AIDS-Virus-Peter-Duesberg/dp/0895263998

(3) http://www.omsj.org/corruption/the-duesberg-inquisition

More than a quiet place to read, why is needed that library? For most digital books for your own e-reader, computer or phone, an access point and knowing where to get the books (i.e. Project Gutenberg) is enough. Even lending, if you want to do it, can be done online.

10 years ago I started getting stiffness and numbness from my right wrist up to the shoulder. I switched to an ergo keyboard which helped a bit, but the DynaFlex Powerball helped a lot. Since then I've gone through 3 powerballs. A couple of years ago my knuckles started stiffening and freezing up on me. To help with that I've been taking Fish Oil, which I didn't think was working until I stopped it for a week, and have been using this great ergo mouse.

Lovely book, on my shelf at home some where. Not always believable, but some good rationalisations ;)
"The Physics of Star Trek"

http://www.amazon.com/Physics-Star-Trek-Lawrence-Krauss/dp/0465002048/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1358307113&sr=1-1&keywords=the+physics+of+star+trek

look like an old Polaroid from the 60's after someone's cat peed on it.

I bought I Could Pee on This just the other week -- you must have too!

The WRT54GL is available on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Linksys-WRT54GL-Wireless-G-Broadband-Router/dp/B000BTL0OA and on Newegg http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833124190.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/pc/565108/?ie=UTF8&tag=bargainspot-20&linkCode=ur2&camp=1789&creative=390957 Thats funny. In that list the Apple laptops range from 1000 to 2000 dollars. The PCs on the other hand range from ~400 to 910 dollars. It looks like on average they cost twice as much as PC laptops. These are just the best sellers, sure maybe you can dig up an apple tv that has been slapped in a netbook case for 750 dollars, but it certainly is the norm that Apple computers cost more then PC computers. (You may be able to make a claim that they are better for whatever reason, but that does not deny the fact that they DO COST ALOT MORE.)

... Is a great book that helped me lose a lot of weight

The author, Gary Taubes, basically says that a south beach/atkins/low glycerimic index diet is the way to go. He does so by explaining the metabolism at hand, and providing studies to explain various points.

I read the book, shifted my eating habits, and lost thirty pounds rather easily. I then got lazy and sloppy and stopped losing weight- but my appetite and habits have been shifted enough that I haven't gained any back.

One of the key insights in his book is that you'd give the same advice for building up an appetite before a sumptous dinner as you would give to someone losing weight- ie:
1) Don't eat much before hand
2) Exercise a bunch to make yourself hungry.

Any scheme based on that alone is bound to fail. Any scheme where you can't eat whenever you want is bound to fail.

That leaves what you eat as the variable. Taubes explains why you should stear away from vertain foods. Good luck.

There is no meta-life. But life being an Infinite Game, it has multiple layers that are meta to each other, but not to the game per se.

Why do you even need a gym?

Exactly! For example: http://www.amazon.com/You-Are-Your-Own-Gym/dp/0345528581/.

I have that book. It's brilliant.

There is a good book about body weight exercises called Convict Conditioning, http://www.amazon.com/Convict-Conditioning-Weakness--Using-Survival-Strength/dp/0938045768. It has a progression of movements, so you can begin with easier exercises if say pushups are too taxing for you.

I bought a multi-point weather clock that did that. The only issue was that it didn't interface with anything else. I used it to measure the humidity in the crawls space to air it out if it got too mold-friendly and for fun to keep an eye out on the outdoor conditions from my nightstand. But yes, it would have been nice to have the temp and humidity accessible on the computer, and logged for future use as well. The one I had isn't available anymore, but this link is for a similar one from the same company http://www.amazon.com/Oregon-Scientific-Forecaster-Wireless-Thermometer/dp/B000E5R7UM

Dr. James Powell, co-inventor of superconducting Magnetic Levitation (MagLev), is also a co-inventor of a system called StarTram, that uses similar electromagnetic technology to launch manned and unmanned vehicles into space.

Links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StarTram
http://www.startram.com/

This is also described in the book "The Fight for Maglev"; see http://www.amazon.com/Fight-Maglev-America-Century-Transport/dp/1468144804/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1330015138&sr=8-1