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It was a claim made by Google's David Drummond, Senior Vice President and Chief Legal Officer. Basically, Apple and Microsoft banded together with some others to acquire the Nortel patent warchest to use against Android. See TechCrunch: "How Apple Led The High-Stakes Patent Poker Win Against Google, Sealing Ballmer's Promise". Apple and MS also banded together to acquire the CPTN patent pool. Why? Over half a million Android devices are activated every day. Half a million! How many winPhones and iPhones have been sold in total their entire history? Android is a huge threat to both Apple and MS, some would say the biggest threat, so it makes sense for them to work together.

http://motls.blogspot.com/2011/09/italian-out-of-tune-superluminal.html

"...the neutrinos are claimed to have arrived 60 nanoseconds before the light. Because this is claimed to be a 6-sigma signal, their total error margin of the timing should be 10 nanoseconds (3 meters over c); recall that the distance is 732 km. I leave it to the reader to decide whether this accuracy is plausible given the messy birth and detection of the particles. One nanosecond is the duration of one cycle of your iPhone microprocessor, among other things. Ten nanoseconds is 40% of the lifetime of the charged pion or 80% of the lifetime of the charged kaon. I can kind of imagine that they're doing something really silly, like imagining that each pion or kaon lives at least for the lifetime and then it dies. But some of them decay immediately; this error could erase most of the 60-nanosecond discrepancy."

http://anti-virus-rants.blogspot.com/2011/08/tavis-ormandys-sophail-presentation.html

If you want to read good and informatics blog, then read this one because its information is sound and effective. A large number of visitors come on this blog for getting bonafide information.
Tablet Android Honeycomb Terbaik Murah

Its not the only the browsers that need to support the newer versions of these protocols, but also the servers.

Maybe not. It appears that OpenSSL in 0.9.6d implemented a "fix" to TLS 1.0 that may not require a change to the server. The basic idea is that the browser injects message prefixes into the stream as a kind of "fake" IV, to keep the Javascript from having control of which messages get encrypted. This may stop the attack.

Furthermore, if the prefixes are formatted in a certain way --- total speculation --- it may be possible to get the server to filter them out even if it's not running the same software. Anyway, I can't imagine how OpenSSL would implement this fix if the servers don't support it. But I admit I'm just catching up on this aspect.

Here's a brief post describing the "fix":

http://article.gmane.org/gmane.network.openvpn.user/32566

And my speculation on how the attack works, in detail:

http://practicalcrypto.blogspot.com/2011/09/brief-diversion-beast-attack-on-tlsssl.html

I had posted this in another thread, but in case it's helpful --- this is my best guess on how the attack works in detail:

http://practicalcrypto.blogspot.com/2011/09/brief-diversion-beast-attack-on-tlsssl.html

Can't tell if trolling or just very ignorant. I could have modded, but I'd rather educate. First off, treating all GMOs as if they have the same traits is just stupid. There are bunches of different genes that have been inserted and potentially any gene could be used, so acting as if one trait should matter for every other one is beyond senseless. Second, the traits you're talking about were not designed for that purpose (although that was a side effect the companies no doubt considered), but rather was to prevent the flow of the genes to other people's crops (the very thing people are trying to sue Monsanto over now...they're evil bastards if they do, and evil bastards if they don't. Third, those traits are not in use anyway. Because most seed sold nowadays is hybrid seed (hybrid and GMO are different and commonly confused but not mutually exclusive things) farmers typically want to buy new seed anyway, as they have been doing long before GMOs came on the scene. Before you complain about something, might want to do some basic fact checking first. Fourth, I highly doubt the study you mention was done all that well in light of the hundreds showing no harm from GM food and the fact that the best causative mechanism for why GMO food would be inherently dangerous is...oh wait, no one has ever proposed any coherent way that could happen. Fifth, this new paper (assuming it is accurate) says nothing about GMO safety. There are thousands of genes for all sorts of stuff in every single thing you eat. I highly doubt transgenes are going to behave differently, especially considering that the only three traits currently in use (the Bt gene, an EPSP synthase gene, and viral coat protein genes) can very easily be found in non-GM food too. So basically, no, this has no relevance on genetic engineering whatsoever, but I have no doubt someone out there will cite it as such.

Actually, they've been saying stuff since March 30 of 2011:

http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2011/03/coming-soon-to-google-apps-1-button-and.html

Eric May, the IG Inspector has a track record of messing up environmental cases through ignorance.

Here's my description/speculation about how it works. Apologies for the blog whoring, I can't type it all up again:

http://practicalcrypto.blogspot.com/2011/09/brief-diversion-beast-attack-on-tlsssl.html

Google is your friend. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CyanogenMod#cite_note-31 http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2009/09/note-on-google-apps-for-android.html

There are 'buckets' based on resolution (small, normal, large, XL - roughly corresponding to 'old phone, newer phone, 7" tablet, 10" tablet) but for finer grained control you can also numerically specify screen widths in units of 'dp' (not 'dpi'), a figure based on the total number of pixels available at a given density. There's a good amount of info here, which was linked within TFA.

Tariffs can also help fix the national debt problem by putting the unemployed back to work.

"All ordinary people in America will benefit from pro-tariff policies. Such policies include:

        Increasing tariffs on manufactured goods to levels similar to levels in the 1800s and the early 1900s.
        A complete cessation of migration of new foreign workers from Central America/Mexico and the immediate deportation of foreign workers that are in the U.S. illegally.
        A complete cessation of the approval of H1-B visas and all other special workers' visas.

The effects of these policies will be to put the unemployed back to work in manufacturing, allow ordinary people to have good benefits, and maintain high and appropriate wages."

http://peoplestarifffront.blogspot.com/p/positive-pro-tariff-policies.html

Once the wealth accumulates to the top only, how will the economy survive without spending by the middle and lower classes? Won't a lot of business just shutdown because people don't have money to spend?

This has already happened, actually. Over the last thirty years, the income distribution has gradually shifted towards the rich, who have a lower propensity to spend. The real income of the lower quantiles in the income distribution were left out in the cold. The only reason that the recession of two years ago hasn't happened earlier was that consumption spending was propped up by pushing ever more debt onto the average citizen. The savings rate was actually negative in the US for some time! Needless to say, this was not sustainable, and was ultimately going to crash and burn.

Modern Monetary Theory economists predicted that a long time ago, but nobody listened.

Even Dems will fight to show Republicans in bad light and do not want this to pass. Check this cartoon.

I was thinking something more like this,

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_hN7X5gUktas/TARzweGSccI/AAAAAAAABpc/WVUmn6QuQwE/s1600/ControllerT-Shirt.jpg

35% is still a minority. What about the other 65% ?

This graph of ERCOT wind production versus demand illustrates the major problem with renewables. Although it is summer, when wind production is low, this is a real power grid with a huge number of large wind turbines. Notice that peak demand coincides almost exactly with minimum production. Notice also that "minimum production" basically means "zero production".

And while it's true that solar could fill the gap nicely, we will have to (optimistically) live through at least one more "lost decade" for the economy before solar becomes an economically beneficial alternative.

http://uprootedpalestinians.blogspot.com/2010/10/montreal-activists-launch-campus.html

... "an academic institution that not only places a major amount of its efforts in military technology, but also in promoting student/soldier cooperative programs, is therefore deeply implicated in the occupation and crimes committed by the military." ...

A comment on the Gosling blog has a link to a very clear picture from less than a second before the crash showing the left elevator trim tab missing, also possible smoke from under the rear fuselage in the vicinity of the tail wheel. There do not appear to be any major control inputs to my inexperienced eye other than a slightly depressed right aileron and possible up elevator, though the latter is hard to see. The view shows only the top of the plane and no background to show the plane's orientation. The pilot is hunched forward with his helmet at the front of the cockpit.

Another shot, less than a plane length before impact, shows the tail wheel deployed and the pilot's head is not visible in the cockpit, though the picture would show it if it were above the edge of the cockpit.

That tail wheel is normally retracted in race trim. Odds are control flutter from the unbalanced elevator combined with the high-G pull-up maneuver shook it open.

Eyewitness reports say Jimmy [Leeward] did everything he could to keep that plane out of the crowd. He was probably pulling on that stick with everything he had.

Curiously, the rear portion of the left elevator is not clear, although the shot is fast enough to freeze the propeller and the angle is a perfect left-side profile. The elevator may have been fluttering at an extreme rate, blurring the view, or it may just be a consequence of the low contrast of the elevator against the fuselage with identical paint. At the time of the crash the plane is right-side up, flying above the crowd from the back towards the front of the crowd, as if trying to pull out of a loop and it impacts at about a 45 degree angle.

Another video from the parking lot shows that the plane lost vertical control about 12 seconds before impact and first nosed up several hundred feet in 7 seconds before turning from vertical up to vertical down in less than three seconds, apparently at near full speed the whole way. The crash happened less than three seconds after the plane nosed down.

Also see: the gallery for the AP story "3 dead, 56 injured in horrific US air show crash" for high-resolution versions.

So it's basically months upon months of everything related to RIAA, especially legal proceedings.. ..then a 10 month hiatus.. ..and then submissions / comments on everything from paleontology to astronomy to general tech company musings.

Yeahhh.. what happened?

I mean, I guess Mr. Beckerman might just be trying to keep things to his blog ( http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/ ) rather than on /., but even that has seen more frequent posts in the past.

Also relevant photos showing the airplane was damaged before impact: missing elevator

Another photo series: impact

--jeffk++

Here are some interesting photos which may show that there was mechanical failure: Elevator trim tab missing

Another scary series of photos: Impact

--jeffk++

He was 74, not 80, and he held a current 2nd class medical certification from the FAA. Most private pilots only have a 3rd class; his health was fine and almost certainly had nothing to do with it. You can read more about his credentials here: http://www.av8rdan.com/2011/09/before-assuming-age-was-the-cause-of.html Also, photos are circulating that show control surfaces missing from the aircraft before the crash. Something went wrong mechanically - please do your research before making mindless assumptions. http://corduroyplanet.blogspot.com/2011/09/chilled.html

Plane appears to have lost a servo tab on the left elevator, and who knows what else.... so maneuvering was probably quite difficult
http://corduroyplanet.blogspot.com/2011/09/chilled.html

It was a mechanical failure:

http://corduroyplanet.blogspot.com/2011/09/chilled.html

Seems that the pilot had the option to eject but he stayed and tried to handle the plane out of the crowd.

over taxes and regulation. According to this blog (LOL, only "business relocation coaches" have secure employment in CA) companies leaving CA has increased 5-fold since 2009, an average of 5.4 per week! And Chief Executive magazine has again ranked California last of 50 states to have a business. 14 states have tasked their economic development agencies with luring away California companies tired of high taxes, profuse regulations, and an extortionate legal system. So let's not just make this about Amazon. Everyone is fleeing CA. In fact, WA is not even safe. With the NLRB's overreaching against Boeing, their next move might be to China.

There's been an avalanche of research published in the last year or so regarding these types of things, with a lot more scientific backing than the little bit I read in this article.

In one of many articles on the topic, this one raised a whole new series of questions about our ancestry:

Scientists unveil a newly-discovered, ancient human ancestor

Or check out these that all relate to different areas of genetic research, most empirical, one modeled, all relating supporting information about homo sapiens (that's us!) inbreeding with various offshoots and close relatives, with us apparently coming out the better? for it.

Neanderthal genes 'survive in us'
Sex with Neanderthals boosted human immunity
Neanderthals, Humans Interbred—First Solid DNA Evidence
Frontiers of Anthropology
Ancient DNA Reveals Secrets of Human History
Fossilised finger points to previously unknown group of human relatives

That was one of the greatest initiatives in British computing and education. Fantastic little machines, and a terminal interface actually teaches the kids how the thing works, rather than how to use GUI-x. I wrote something a few weeks back suggesting that the modern equivalent was rolled out - give each of the kids a linux VM of their own, and if they break it, big deal. The whole thing can be run from a single decent server and a bunch of terminals - whatever the school has lying around as long as it can handle a VNC connection.

While I'm sure there are lonely people who are not on Facebook, them going on facebook is not going to stop them being lonely.

This is exactly my point. It will often make them feel more lonely.

I think that part of this is that what lonely people crave isn't acquaintances, but friends. Social networking sites really aren't the ideal places for that; comparing who you think of as friends to the number others claim as friends doesn't do much for the self esteem. Neither does unfortunate occurrences of finding out that who you thought of as friends really only are acquaintances who value you slightly less than 137 others.

I'm sure there must be a backlash to social networking one day - I can't believe that the human mind is suited for spreading so thin or caring so little. The days when you got introduced to people and knew more than their nick before jumping into a conversation are over, but I think there's room for the pendulum to swing back a little. Cause there have never been more lonely people than now, when they have more "friends" than ever.

Yes it is, if you structure airport security correctly. Not that the below is what is being proposed, but it's what is needed to have it work.

It wasn't a failure of screening that allowed 9/11 to happen. The box cutters were legal at the time. The problems were inappropriate policies and training including:
1. Cockpit doors were not reinforced, nor always locked. Now they are.
2. Pilots were unarmed. Now they may be armed.
3. Federal Air Marshals were not used as extensively.
4. Airline crew and passengers had been trained to follow hijacker demands. This is no longer the case, now hijackers are to be stopped at any cost.

All of those problems have been addressed without the porno-scanners or "en-hands-ed pat-downs". The TSA screeners regularly fail to detect 80%-95% of contraband every time their tested. The scanners and groping have not improved their success rate. The passenger screening procedures in place by 2005 were just as effective as the screening today, and they were much faster, less invasive, less costly, and most importantly, they were Constitutional.

Additionally, you can't stop all attacks be a determined attacker, there will always be some that get through. It's up to the passengers, crew, and air marshals to be the last line of defense, and it will ways be that way no matter how much security or screening you do. No one wants to die, but now that they know that a hijack will likely end in their deaths (and many more) if they don't stop it, they have nothing to lose by fighting back. Right now, most cargo is not screened, so it's much simpler to get contraband into the cargo compartment than into the passenger compartment. That's actually the last place you want to have contraband. You want cargo and checked luggage carefully screened, so that if there is any contraband on board, it's in the passenger compartment where the passengers, crew, or air marshals have an opportunity to act and possibly prevent the attack, just as they did with the underwear bomber and shoe bomber.

The TSA should operate as an oversight and testing agency, with private screeners at airports. The airports should hire the security companies (or hire, train, and manage screeners). Then, the airports, airlines, screening companies, air marshals, NTSB, FAA, and TSA should collectively should establish nationwide screening and security criteria, including criteria for passengers, baggage, cargo, airport employees, and crew (should be different criteria for each). The TSA would periodically test security at each airport, fail the test and you get 30-60 days to correct it and get retested. Fail too many times or score too low and you get fired or lose the contract (depending upon if it's just a few screeners failing, or if it's widespread at that airport/contractor).

I have more TSA related info and recommendations on my blog (plus some TSA humor).

IPv6 has an alot? How nice.

OCP?

Funny you should ask.

"Robocop with breasts represents our post-911 DOHS society; reanimated from our economically decimated national Detroit, an impersonal conglomeration of technological and human elements. When we scroll down the page we are confronted finally with the seductive aspect of our super-creation. Do we consider these unreal, artificial appearing breasts to be attractive? Robocop seems to be trying much too hard to convince us that he/she/it is more human than machine. Behind our highly desired security apparatus, 9-11 happens without end. Our defender does not look at the tragedy but at us. The promised sequel does not happen; the original feature is remarketed over and over again."

Inbred royalty you say?

http://cannonfire.blogspot.com/2006/04/george-w-bush-barbara-bush-and.html

You are being far too kind to TSA. Sure, the post office may not be the very model of efficiency, but I still use USPS and honestly, I am rather happy with the service I receive from them. TSA? Not so much. (shameless plug to my blog, for those who are concerned about such things).

I care about this Alot.

There was a previous case involving BMG that was stopped because CIPPIC intervened and showed that you can't plausibly identify an individual based on an IP address, and that there were huge privacy violations involved in just handing over subscriber information. http://excesscopyright.blogspot.com/2011/09/hurt-locker-lawsuits-about-to-detonate.html We have a Privacy Act here in Canada that is supposed to prevent these sorts of things.

In this case the Voltage (movie production company) moved so fast that there was no chance for anyone to intervene, and the ISPs didn't put up any kind of fight, so the court process was mostly a formality. On top of that, Bell, Cogeco, and Videotron provided all the subscriber info within two weeks of the ruling.

Two weeks is a very short time. With the same situation in the US, I think Comcast and Time Warner said that it would take them months and months to find all the information.

My guess is that Voltage approached Bell, Cogeco, and Videotron much earlier and made sure they would not be putting up a fight. And possibly even got them to start collecting the information early. By making sure it moved quickly they minimized the chances that CIPPIC could get involved and block it as they did before. This is why they didn't include other ISPs, they wanted to make sure the ISPs they were dealing with were just going to just go along with it, and smaller providers like Teksavvy would have very likely stood up for their customers and drawn CIPPIC into the battle with them.

Now that they have all the information they need, I'm sure that individual suits will start. But the situation in Canada is a little different than the US, and the suits may not work as well. Here we have something of a precedent showing that this information should not have been provided in the first place. Furthermore, if the defendant is able to win, Voltage will be forced to pay the defendants legal fees so it's not quite the same extortion racket it is in the US.

what will happen to canadians who downloaded the movie and are with bel?????

(an article by the same author as TFA on the subject.)

I wrote up a plan for something like this about 2 1/2 years ago and posted on my blog about 9 months ago when it became obvious to me that as cool of an idea as it was, it wasn't something I wanted to work on.

The basic idea is to take a computational chemistry package and run it through a genetic algorithm to search for suitable candidates that solve certain problems.
Better solar cells, dielectrics for supercaps, or materials with specific properties.

The physics quickly went over my head and I was never able to get funding or grants for this without a PhD.

I am glad to see this is starting to happen.

Project - Mc Lab / Magic Chemist, in a Box.
  http://johnsokol.blogspot.com/2010/12/project-mc-lab-magic-chemist-in-box.html
  http://thegreentank.blogspot.com/2010/12/project-mc-lab-magic-chemist-in-box.html

I wrote up a plan for something like this about 2 1/2 years ago and posted on my blog about 9 months ago when it became obvious to me that as cool of an idea as it was, it wasn't something I wanted to work on.

The basic idea is to take a computational chemistry package and run it through a genetic algorithm to search for suitable candidates that solve certain problems.
Better solar cells, dielectrics for supercaps, or materials with specific properties.

The physics quickly went over my head and I was never able to get funding or grants for this without a PhD.

I am glad to see this is starting to happen.

Project - Mc Lab / Magic Chemist, in a Box.
  http://johnsokol.blogspot.com/2010/12/project-mc-lab-magic-chemist-in-box.html
  http://thegreentank.blogspot.com/2010/12/project-mc-lab-magic-chemist-in-box.html

"The wireless access point signals we use in our location services don't identify people..."
-Peter Fleischer, Global Privacy Counsel (9-13-2011)

Q. "But doesn't this information identify people?"
A. "SSIDs are often just the name of the router manufacturer or ISP with numbers and letters added, though some people do also personalize them."
--Peter Fleischer, Global Privacy Counsel (4-27-2010)

"What is the SSID for Google WiFi?
The SSID for the Google WiFi service in Mountain View is GoogleWiFi (case-sensitive).
The SSID for the WPA protected service is GoogleWiFiSecure (case-sensitive)"
--Google Wifi Help

"The wireless access point signals we use in our location services don't identify people..."
-Peter Fleischer, Global Privacy Counsel (9-13-2011)

Q. "But doesn't this information identify people?"
A. "SSIDs are often just the name of the router manufacturer or ISP with numbers and letters added, though some people do also personalize them."
--Peter Fleischer, Global Privacy Counsel (4-27-2010)

"What is the SSID for Google WiFi?
The SSID for the Google WiFi service in Mountain View is GoogleWiFi (case-sensitive).
The SSID for the WPA protected service is GoogleWiFiSecure (case-sensitive)"
--Google Wifi Help

Phone Story is a game for smartphone devices that attempts to provoke a critical reflection on its own technological platform. Under the shiny surface of our electronic gadgets, behind its polished interface, hides the product of a troubling supply chain that stretches across the globe. Phone Story represents this process with four educational games that make the player symbolically complicit in coltan extraction in Congo, outsourced labor in China, e-waste in Pakistan and gadget consumerism in the West.Keep Phone Story on your device as a reminder of your impact. All of the revenues raised go directly to workers’ organizations and other non-profits that are working to stop the horrors represented in the game. Needless to say, the app is no longer on the App Store, and Apple is apparently being mum about why the app was pulled. We’ve got to admit, though, we’re a little uncomfortable with Apple banning this game based on its description. It doesn’t sound as if the title explicitly criticized Apple’s iPhone manufacturing process Affiliate Programs Review
, just the state of the smartphone manufacturing industry in total. And by stamping down on an app that was raising money for groups striving to protect the human rights of the people putting together our gadgets — including our iPhones and iPads — Apple has seemingly opened itself up to a lot of criticism about its commitment to its own ethical guidelines.

About a month ago, the HTC Sensation 4G smartphone got an Android 2.3.4 update. A new Sensation has now landed called the HTC Sensation XE. The Sensation XE has gone official and the smartphone packs in some cool features that the original Sensation didn’t offer. The new smartphone is the first to get the special audio tech from Beats Audio thanks to a new partnership. That custom audio processing hardware and software is also coupled with a nice set of earphones.Better audio isn’t all that is in store for the geeks that buy the new Sensation XE. The smartphone also has a faster processor with 1.5GHz clock speed. The smartphone also gets a new larger battery that should let you talk, play, and listen to music longer before the battery goes dead. I already mentioned those cool Beats earphones briefly.The smartphone will automatically switch to the Beats Audio hardware and software processing when the earphones are plugged in. The special earphones also have an inline remote that will let you control your music. A mic is also integrated for making and receiving phone calls Affiliate Programs Review. The Sensation XE is set for sale in Europe and Asia late this month. Pricing isn’t announced at this time.

Good read on the back of the recent WSJ article by Andreessen about 'Software eating the world'. The post makes the case that Cisco is 'doomed' on the basis that 'If the output of your hardware is information or the manipulation of information then you are going to get eaten. If the output is something else then you are not.'

http://brontecapital.blogspot.com/2011/08/software-eats-part-of-world.html

With Intel buying Fulcrum, Vyatta and other virtual networking plays entering this space, the current method of buying hundreds and thousands of standalone firewalls, load balancers, switches, routers, WAN accelerators, VPN boxes, SSL terminators etc. as seperate appliances is going to start looking antiquated quickly. There will be exceptions where dedicated single purpose hardware is still required but even those exceptions are shrinking.

Relevant rant: eBay Patents 10-Click Checkout

There is no efficient way to get distribute heat over a widespread area other than fossil fuels or electricity, therefore, if you want to convert off of fossil fuels, you either have to have direct solar thermal heat in every building, which is less efficient due to scale, or convert it to electricity, so my figures stand.

One of the links you provided elsewhere has them promising new PV panels at 18% efficiency, which while better, is still very low. And I did pick a bad example of solar thermal, one of the other towers on that page is about 2x as efficient. But, even if the better solar thermal and PV can cut that land use to 3%, that's still a whole lot of land, 3/4 the size of Arizona. And that still doesn't address the intermittent nature of solar during the day, the lack of any light/heat at night, and the storage and/or excess capacity you have to build to use it to replace base/peak load, nor does it address increased energy demand.

Solar roadways might reduce that somewhat, however, there are notable issues with those, lower efficiencies due to traffic, dirt, snow, rain, leaves, building/tree shadows, oil, and road film limiting the light reaching the cells, and even the lexan/plexiglass surface blocking 10% or more of the light. Then there is the cost of repairing or replacing the panels damaged by heavy traffic loads, tires, accidents, etc. Neat idea, but questionable if it'll ever be viable, and even if it is, it won't be as efficient so it won't reduce land requirements by very much.

Solar alone (or even solar and wind) will not work without massive building massive amounts of excess capacity and/or massive amounts of energy storage into the grid. Nothing you say will change that, no matter how many times say it or try to get around it.

Nuclear does have risks, and it does require oversight. But the same applies to fossil fuels, hydro, and geothermal. Fossil fuel (mining and plant explosions, not even counting pollution) and hydro (dam failures) have killed more people per TWh produced than nuclear. In fact, by that measure, nuclear is the least deadly power source. Of course, our current uranium fueled model uses too little of the fuel capacity and produces far too much waste. As noted earlier, it was chosen for it's ability to produce weapons. Thorium breeders produce far less waste, and there is far more thorium on earth, so more fuel, more power, less waste. And if you use fuel reprocessing, you can split the wastes into short term and long term isotopes, with the short term stuff essentially inert in 400 years, and a whole lot less long term stuff having relatively low levels of radioactivity. It's a very manageable amount of waste if you do it properly.

The US has terrible energy policy. And if you read my posts, I clearly want to see us move to sustainable energy using renewables. However, misinformation and overly optimistic predictions from renewable energy proponents and vendors aren't any more valid than the artificially low "cost" of using fossil fuels. Lies and misrepresentations from either side are still lies and misrepresentations.

Most importantly, renewable energy sources can't yet sustain us without nuclear and fossil fuels. Of those two, fossil fuels (especially oil and natural gas) will run out much sooner, leaving cleaner nuclear as part of the near to mid term solution, and potentially part of the long term solution if we can't resolve the energy storage issues presented by solar & wind. There are some promising developments suggesting energy storage may improve significantly in the next 20 years, but until those are demonstrated to be scalable and commercially viable, they too are just pipe dreams.

You may also note that I've made no reference to ethanol as a replacement for gasoline/oil. My blog has my thoughts on that.

Here is one of such trivial scripts: http://okrasz-techblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/backing-up-with-rsync.html

Oh, but most IT-guys don't get it either. Computing has become mainstream, and it's hard to give up old thinking constructs (like more features being better unconditionally).

Yeah that just doesn't compute. I don't think I'll ever get it.

With a physical object it would be understandable, if more features were always better everything would be a ridiculous contraption like Homer's dream car - and a "jack of all trades but master of none."

But with computers we can get all the upsides of more features with none of the downsides (at least in software), so it makes no sense. It's like putting less books in a library if you had practically unlimited space and low fetch time.

I don't know in what manner Windows precisely goes out of their way to "push you" into new major releases -- other than Windows Update nagging you to patch flagrant security holes to prevent Grandma's PC from becoming a botnet, there's nothing in the OS that does that.

As far it being a treadmill, perhaps that was the case in the 90's. But now? Windows XP came out in October, 2001 with an EOL in April, 2014. Windows Vista came out on January 2007 and has an EOL in April 2017. Given the widespread installations of Windows 7 both at home and in the office, one could expect a similar lifecycle.

As far as the ability to upgrade across major releases goes, watch this video. The guy goes from Windows 1.01 all the way to Windows 7 in VMWare. Other than having to convert to FAT32 and NTFS via LiveCD, the only thing it broke was his desktop background. Doom II still worked in all versions.

http://rasteri.blogspot.com/2011/03/chain-of-fools-upgrading-through-every.html

Yup. You made two contradictory statements in adjacent posts.

looks like I haven't done a very good job of communicating.

Perhaps this will help http://motls.blogspot.com/2011/08/can-one-sharply-separate-forcings-and.html

Nope. That supports the second but contradicts the first... and frankly this whole diversion is lacking a point. It has nothing to do with the fact that we can measure the direct impact of carbon in the atmosphere.

Almost, but not quite - nothing can be deterministically known about non-deterministic systems. Simply asserting an explanation that always works (i.e., CO2 did it, or God did it) and that can never be falsified is pseudo-science at best.

Which is why you (and by that I mean you) can never know anything, and will never be able to prove what (if any) impact volcanoes have on the climate (even though the answer is obvious to the rest of us)