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At 17, Danville's Evan O'Dorney already has won the National Spelling Bee and a gold medal at an international math Olympiad, meeting two presidents along the way. On Tuesday, he claimed the triple-crown: the coveted Intel Science Talent Search's $100,000 top prize.

California has already tried term limits. The San Jose Mercury News did a recent series on the impact. One link and another link to start your reading.

Since I RTFAs, here's the basic point: lobbyists "guided" inexperienced legislators, writing bills and lining up folks to speak on their behalf. 1 of 3 bills was sponsored by lobbyists, and half of sponsored bills became law as compared to only 20% of unsponsored bills. The lobbyists are now the "privileged class" to use your words, and are guiding legislators to cut their clients big fat checks from the state treasury. So term limits are not the answer; they weaken our ability to support good people and vote out the bums, since the power moved to the unelected lobbyists.

I note that AMD CEO Meyer resigned.

Perhaps this agreement was the writing on the wall for him?

• http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11921220
• http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/dec/05/julian-assange-lawyers-being-watched
• http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/wikileaks-reveals-ugly-truth-about-iran-appeasers/story-fn59niix-1225966020409
• http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_16762752?source=rss&nclick_check=1
• http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2010/12/must-read-nyt-wikileaks-on-china-and-google/67499/
• http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Wikileaks+indictment+diplomacy/3927123/story.html

But even before I got internet I rarely used the white pages.

There remains a substantial minority of people who have opted-out of the life online.

In the latest report, the Commerce Department found that 23 percent of Americans don't use the Internet at all. An additional 8 percent use the Internet, but not at home. And 5 percent of Americans have only dial-up access at home.
Some of the demographic and regional breakdowns showed even starker differences. While 91.5 percent of American households with more than $75,000 in annual income had broadband Internet access at home, just 35.8 percent of households with less than $25,000 in income did.

Similarly, among households where the head of household has a college degree or higher, 84.5 percent have broadband access. Among households where the head of household doesn't have a high school diploma, just 28.8 percent have broadband access.
Among those who don't have broadband at home, the top reason was lack of interest, cited by 38 percent of those households. Others said they had no need or that broadband was too expensive, while still others said they didn't have a computer or that their computer was inadequate for accessing broadband.
  Among urban households, 65.9 percent had broadband Internet access in 2009, up from 10.5 percent in 2001. By contrast, only 51 percent of rural households had broadband access last year, up from 3.8 percent in 2001. The Western region of the country had the highest rate of broadband adoption at 68 percent, while the South was the lowest with 60 percent.
California's relative ranking among states fell from 2001, when it ranked No. 4 with 13 percent of households having broadband at home. Last year, California ranked 14th, with 68 percent of households having broadband access

More Americans have broadband but 'digital divides' remain [Nov. 9]

How dumb was this ill-conceived and poorly executed conspiracy? Let us count the ways.

1. There is no way that potential savings from these ridiculous schemes could have warranted the risks. Just how much money are we talking about saving by not losing a few important employees? Thousands? Chump change. Dumb.

2. Whatever the costs, we're talking about multinational corporations with billions of dollars in the bank. Really, they couldn't dip into those rainy day funds to counter a few offers? It's not just miserly. It's dumb.

3. We knew Apple was a bully. Turns out, it is an even bigger bully than we realized. According to the complaint: "Apple requested an agreement from Adobe to refrain from cold-calling each other's employees. Faced with the likelihood that refusing would result in retaliation and significant competition for its employees, Adobe agreed." Pissing off a key ally? Dumb.

4. Now, everyone working at one of these companies has got to be thinking the same thing: "Did I get screwed?" That's not exactly the kind of gung-ho, morale-building conversations you want going on. Dumb.

5. Those who do think they got the shaft may sue. And because this is an antitrust finding, the settlement will allow anyone who wins in federal court to "recover three times the damages the person has suffered." Say goodbye to whatever measly amounts the companies saved through these agreements. Dumb.

6. People maintained lists. They kept records. According to the complaint: "Pixar instructed human resources personnel to adhere to the agreement and maintain a paper trail in the event Apple accused Pixar of violating the agreement." Dumb.

7. Under this settlement, the Justice Department gets to check up on the companies just about whenever it pleases. Thought the federal government was interfering too much before? Well, congratulations. It will get worse. Dumb.

8. Did they really not think this would come to light? Dumb. Dumb. Dumb.

Original Source

[This Darwin award candidate] was struck and killed by a southbound Caltrain while crossing the tracks [...] Witnesses said at the time [he] rode his skateboard around a lowered crossing arm and was listening to headphones when he was hit.

There are other issues besides subsidies. For example, here in California wealth NIMBYs in southern Marin County (near San Francisco) have successfully lobbied to have the proposed high speed rail line either routed around or tunneled under their wealthy suburban communities,

Umm... The train doesn't go to Marin. It stops in San Francisco. Perhaps you're referring to the less wealthy, but equally NIMBY San Mateo county?

"Successfully lobbied?" Um... No once again. Not only have they failed at every turn, but they have no options than meritless lawsuits. Yes, the luddites can delay, but they can not stop the train. Just looking at the map of the of the route, shows no less than three plans, including the "dreaded" aerial viaduct. And yes, these are the current plans, as of two weeks ago.

I suggest you read up on the Cal HSR proceedings.

There are other issues besides subsidies. For example, here in California wealth NIMBYs in southern Marin County (near San Francisco) have successfully lobbied to have the proposed high speed rail line either routed around or tunneled under their wealthy suburban communities,

Umm... The train doesn't go to Marin. It stops in San Francisco. Perhaps you're referring to the less wealthy, but equally NIMBY San Mateo county?

"Successfully lobbied?" Um... No once again. Not only have they failed at every turn, but they have no options than meritless lawsuits. Yes, the luddites can delay, but they can not stop the train. Just looking at the map of the of the route, shows no less than three plans, including the "dreaded" aerial viaduct. And yes, these are the current plans, as of two weeks ago.

I suggest you read up on the Cal HSR proceedings.

There are other issues besides subsidies. For example, here in California wealth NIMBYs in southern Marin County (near San Francisco) have successfully lobbied to have the proposed high speed rail line either routed around or tunneled under their wealthy suburban communities,

Umm... The train doesn't go to Marin. It stops in San Francisco. Perhaps you're referring to the less wealthy, but equally NIMBY San Mateo county?

"Successfully lobbied?" Um... No once again. Not only have they failed at every turn, but they have no options than meritless lawsuits. Yes, the luddites can delay, but they can not stop the train. Just looking at the map of the of the route, shows no less than three plans, including the "dreaded" aerial viaduct. And yes, these are the current plans, as of two weeks ago.

I suggest you read up on the Cal HSR proceedings.

So many mediocre tablets from startups trying to cash in.

How about a quality unit from a top tier company?

BTW just read this bombshell.

Oracle is now suing Android over Java!!!

http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_15762198?nclick_check=1

Indian staffing companies are reporting record profits. When US politicians smell windfall profits, it's just like when sharks smell blood in the water.

When there is money to be had, the US politicians will think up some excuse to get their cut. Remember Godfather II? The way things worked in the old neighborhood, when you made a score, the local Don had an automatic right to "wet his beak." The same system was portrayed in that Goodfellas movie.

07/23/2010

> Indian software services provider Wipro said quarterly profit jumped 31 percent to 13.19 billion rupees ($284 million), beating expectations, as India's No. 3 outsourcer ramped up staffing to meet stronger global demand.

> Revenue for the April-June quarter rose 16 percent over the same period last year to 72.36 billion rupees ($1.56 billion) under international accounting standards.

> A Thomson Reuters poll of 23 analysts forecast quarterly profit of 12.15 billion rupees.

> "We are seeing strong demand ... across our industry," chairman Azim Premji said in a statement Friday. "We added the highest number of billable employees ever, in this quarter."

http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_15586063

Home burglary is almost dead. What's to steal?

Police impersonators invade Pleasant Hill apartment

"The intruders then rummaged through the apartment, took electronics and ran away to a vehicle driven by a third person."

"Investigators now believe that the robbers were familiar with the apartment and at least one of its occupants, and were looking for drugs, said Sgt. Scott Vermillion."

Same article.

Home burglary is almost dead. What's to steal?

Police impersonators invade Pleasant Hill apartment

"The intruders then rummaged through the apartment, took electronics and ran away to a vehicle driven by a third person."

The FTC lacks the legal authority to fine Intel unless they breach the terms of the FTC settlement.1 Also, the way this was brought as a section 5 investigation and not a standard anti-trust case had two major implications. One was that it allowed the FTC greater lattitude in what it could go after Intel for, but it also didn't create the opportunity for triple damages liability that a standard anti-trust litigation suit would have opened Intel up to.2 After a normal anti-trust case competitors can apparently go after the convicted for triple damages in certain cases. Not sure why that didn't apply to MS.

1. Limits on how many guns a non-dealer may purchase in a given time period. E.g., one gun per month per adult household member.
2. Waiting periods on gun purchases. If you buy a gun today, you can't pick it up until a week from now.
3. Close the fucking gun show loophole already; make all gun sales require a background check of the buyer.

None of these would prevent law-abiding citizens from owning guns. But guess what? The NRA is rabidly opposed to all of them.

1. And what's the point of that exactly? Somebody who is going to commit a crime with a gun only needs one gun.

2. California (my place of residence) has a 10-day waiting period on all firearm purchases, but even with this foolproof method of stopping gun crimes, people still get shot in California all the time. That article, posted two hours ago, was on the first page of a Google News search for "shooting".

3. What gun show loophole? You've been drinking too much of the anti-gun koolaid that seems to assume that gun shows have private parties peddling their wares.

The implications of this for net neutrality are important so I'm wondering how this effects the recent court ruling that stated the FCC didn't have the power to regulate them http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_15160454 Does this coming out of committee start the process that will allow a new law which will make the court ruling moot? If so, then hooray!

If so, then why are you giving them parole in the first place?

Because CA is under a court order to release 40-50K prisoners, although the Supreme Court might modify it when they get around to hearing it.

Given that CA already doesn't jail non-violent drug offenders, I find it hard to believe that they can release 1/4 of the prisoners without releasing some seriously violent criminals. Parole, even with fancy GPS monitoring, costs a small fraction of incarceration and might actually work if implemented right.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/us/10prison.html
http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_15293678?nclick_check=1

Right you keep posting that it is a start. I don't deny that but you linked to Jamie Oliver. He starts by trying to educate kids about food, and where the differences between healthy and not lie. He promotes preparing your own food, from fresh ingredients, so you know what goes in it. He also helps kids understand which ingredients are high in calories and which aren't.

Where is any of that in this toy ban? Here is where Santa Clara county was in 2005 with respect to applying nutritional guidelines to vending machines. The first bullet point under 'lessons learned' is about the challenge of explaining nutritional standards to the public. What advancement has been made in the 5 years since other than advancing to banning new things.

Mercury News links to the nutritional guidelines that will be used. So a meal with more than 485 total calories or more than 600 milligrams of sodium can't include a toy. Why 485 and 600?

At some point we'll have to demand actual accomplishments from people rather than letting them get off to good starts over and over.

The San Jose Mercury News (warning: pop-under ad) has more details. The ordinance does not ban Happy Meal toys per se, but rather bans toys distributed with meals that exceed nutritional limits (485 Calories, 600 mg sodium). Furthermore, it only applies to unincorporated areas of Santa Clara County. (There are no McDonald's locations in unincorporated areas of Santa Clara County.)

This seems like a good idea to me. Obviously, fast food restaurants give toys away only as a perverse incentive to attract kids. This ordinance, while largely symbolic, nullifies that marketing ploy. You want a toy? You can only get it if you forego the soda and the salt on the fries.

(as an aside, they also *massively* overestimate the impact they can have on the web, hilariously of the belief that Firefox making a stand will somehow stem the tide of H.264 video on the web... it'd be funny if it weren't so sad)

I think you massively underestimate the impact Mozilla had and continues to have on the web. You should look at browser user agent strings sometime. IE, Safari, and Chrome and Opera all claim to be Mozilla implementations.

Ultimately, you're on the losing end of this debate. Open video is where it's at. Google is the biggest video provider on the Internet and Google is all about the open web. In this regard, Mozilla and Google are in perfect alignment:

http://google-opensource.blogspot.com/2010/04/interesting-times-for-video-on-web.html
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/meaning-of-open.html
http://www.mercurynews.com/business-headlines/ci_14847976
http://www.0xdeadbeef.com/weblog/2010/01/html5-video-and-h-264-what-history-tells-us-and-why-were-standing-with-the-web/

This is how important Internet companies like Mozilla and like Google think. This is why YouTube will move to open video sooner rather than later. Join the 389 million people who have downloaded Firefox 3.6 so far:

http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/firefox.html

Use open video and be happy.

Meaningless, it's an AP story. Would you feel better reading it on The Stamford Advocate? Or the San Jose Mercury News?

I'd also like to point out that a knee-jerk accusation of bias sounds and awful lot like . . . bias.

-Peter

Mercury News: Blacks, Latinos and women lose ground at Silicon Valley tech companies

Mercury News: This database includes that Labor Department data for Santa Clara and San Mateo County-based workers at Hewlett-Packard, Sun Microsystems, Advanced Micro Devices, Cisco Systems, SYNNEX Corp., Calpine Corp., Intel, eBay, Sanmina Corp., and Solectron Corp. The database covers the years 1999, 2000, 2003 and 2005.

Silicon Valley is a meritocracy.

I wonder.

Sloan Dean David Schmittlein was interviewing Douglas Leone, a partner at the venture capital firm Sequoia Capital and Sloan alum. Leone was dispensing advice about entrepreneurism when he let slip a remark that made me do a double take.
Leone told the audience that Sequoia focuses on younger entrepreneurs because people over 30 aren't innovative. As a consolation prize, Leone said that the over-30 crowd could still make decent managers.
The tendency of the social media industry and Silicon Valley to look toward the under-30 crowd is what Wadhwa called "opportunity discrimination." By looking only to a narrow segment of the population, ultimately these Web 2.0 startups and the venture capitalists are harming themselves, as well as excluding others.
Even Leone acknowledged the potential danger of this when he said: "As soon as you find the pattern, and you lean on the pattern, there's a guy or a gal out of left field who surprises you." O'Brien: Age bias and Silicon Valley

Earlier this month, the technology sector hosted one of its largest annual events in Las Vegas.
The 2010 Consumer Electronics Show showcased the latest gadgets and innovations for the coming year.
However, many female technology analysts noted that women's place at the event highlighted the inherent discrimination of the IT industry, with many women in PR or technology hired as 'booth babes' to work on companies' stalls. Women in technology to gather for computing conference [Jan 26]

mercurynews.com is pretty bad, too.

I'm on XP using FF 3.5.7 and I don't see tynt in the NoScript menu. Seems odd. I even tried allowing globally just for the Wired page and still didn't see any scripts from tynt.com

I imagine that a big problem is the melting of the ice caps, and resultant rise in sea levels

The ice caps melting will have little impact, because they are largely already floating on the water. As an example, look at this graph to see that the antarctic ice coverage changes as much as 15 million square kilometers every year, without particularly changing sea levels.

The IPCC predicts that sea levels will continue rising at around 3 millimeters a year, which can sound a little worrysome when you add it up, but this speed is slower than geological processes happening: ie, continental drift moves faster than that, so either way it is something we will have to worry about, as we do now.

A 10% improvement in crop productivity or whatever isn't going to be much of a payback for a couple billion people having to pick up and move somewhere. Besides, even if the crops grow better, a warmer earth probably will mean more insects to eat those crops before the people can harvest them

This is all speculation. Maybe a warmer earth will cause more rainfall in the Owens Valley, opening up millions of acres to be farmed. Also, I don't think anyone is estimating that billions of people will be displaced.

The fundamental problem with this whole "humans will have to adapt" idea is that there's simply far too many humans now.

If so, then we are in trouble because we will have to adapt regardless of what the effects of CO2 on the environment are.

Google left the "miserable failure" link to Bush's official bio at whitehouse.gov intact for years. When Obama took office they realized the link pointed to the new president's bio. After years of it being okay to link to Bush the google bomb was disabled within a matter of days.

This shouldn't come as a surprise considering Eric Schmidt is a big supporter of Obama.

So don't be surprised now when a fake picture of Michelle Obama is taken down within days, but fake pictures of Sarah Palin still make the top of the list.

And ice can be a blistering 273 Kelvin! Wow, that's a huge number!

The AP has ~4k fact checkers. So you're looking at about 0.25% of the total AP fact-checking force to look at a new release political book. Whadda ya know, context means something.

Also, various news programs and reports from members in the McCain campaign, including John McCain himself, has criticized the veracity of several comments in the book. There are also email records directly at odds with her statements regarding the Tina Fey skits.

Finally, here's an AP fact check from yesterday, and a direct check on a speech in September. Took me 15 seconds on Google to prove you wrong. I somehow suspect you get all your news from Glenn Beck and O'Reilly. It has that familiar evangelical pundit feel of "translate every criticism into an attack on Obama, warranted or not, because OMGZOBAMASSOCIALIST and eats Christian babies".

In other words, pwnd.

Why don't we fire tax wasting superintendents like this one BEFORE we raise taxes? http://www.mercurynews.com/bay-area-news/ci_13734717

3) He is clearly being a jerk (second video 0:00-0:45) he repeatedly asks the officer questions and then when the officer is calmly trying to respond to them he asks another one.

Asking what the charges are is being a jerk? Maybe in the Soviet Union or NAZI Germany but this it the USA, the land of freedom. I tell you what, if you like how the officers treated this guy I'm sure Cuba or Zimbabwe will take you in. But in the land of feedom that is unacceptable.

Not knowing how laws work and then resisting a valid arrest and not liking the consequences is stupid.

What valid arrrest? They never said what he was being arrested for, nor did they give him his Mirand warning. That was no valid arrest.

Police officers do not want to wrongly arrest people, by resisting (not getting out of the car) he gave them exactly what they wanted, a reason to arrest him.

Oh really? How many unarmed people have police shot? How many officers helped that high school girl in CA while she was being raped by a bunch of people?

Falcon

California is holding legislative hearings on the legalization of Cannabis for non-medical use. Earlier this year Barney Frank introduced legislation in the US House that would have legalized small amounts of marijuana at the federal level. Public opinion in favor of legalization of marijuana is at an all time high.

Now I'm not saying it's going to happen any time soon, but there's been more progress in the last year than in my entire life time. But that wasn't really my point, my point is that we're going to have to suffer through decades of copyright warfare, wasting millions of dollars and people-years in jail, just like we have in the war on drug users.

Obviously the pilots should have paid more attention, but I suspect the reason they were trying to squeeze in a little extra work is that they weren't going to get paid to learn the scheduling system on their own time.

Pilots go through years of expensive schooling and have to repay their student loans like everyone else. Their salaries start around $20,000 if they can get hired in a very competitive market.

Remember the hero pilot who landed the plane in the Hudson, saving Flight 1549 and 155 people's lives?

the last talk [Capt. Sullenberger] had with his wife, Lorrie, before the crash... was about money.

Like thousands of airline workers, his salary had been cut in half and he lost most of his pension. At 58, the 29-year veteran faced having to find work outside the industry and possibly having to sell his house.

Many pilots take second jobs. Some are on food stamps:

He took home $405 this week. My life was completely and totally in his hands for the past hour and he's paid less than the kid who delivers my pizza.

I told the guys that I have a whole section in my new movie about how pilots are treated (using pilots as only one example of how people's wages have been slashed and the middle class decimated). In the movie I interview a pilot for a major airline who made $17,000 last year. For four months he was eligible -- and received -- food stamps. Another pilot in the film has a second job as a dog walker.

"I have a second job!," the two pilots said in unison. One is a substitute teacher. The other works in a coffee shop.

The AP reported this a few days ago.

And today, they report that they are suing the potential buyers of Skype as well.

The AP reported this a few days ago.

And today, they report that they are suing the potential buyers of Skype as well.

They don't host ads... not for long! This is a typical dot bomb strategy - first you get lots of users, then you change the rules to start generating revenue, then you cash out quickly before everybody quits due to the rule change.

Instructor materials and supplements were not included. So, this is basically a setup/joke.

Your statement is literally true, but very misleading. The state didn't ask anyone to submit ancillary materials, so even if the ancillary materials exist, you're not going to see them listed on the clrn.org site. As a specific example, I submitted my physics textbook, and my ancillary materials are available here. They include a test bank, solutions to homework problems, and an instructor's manual.

This includes, support, Web sites for both students and instructors, assessment software, assessment preparation material, copious student assignments and solutions, automatic grading software, prepared lecture material, etc.

My book includes a web site, assessment software, lots of homework problems and solutions, and automatic grading software.

But, even in something like a math course, open textbooks run into the "staleness" issue. That is, students do the assignments or tests and then the solutions are passed on to the next year's students. Publishers do quite a bit of work to change problems. Do not underestimate the amount of work and editing/QA involved in such an effort.

In my own field, physics, your description is completely inaccurate in critical ways. Big commercial books like Halliday and Resnick come out in new editions every few years. The new editions typically have zero changes to the presentation of the material, and very few new homework problems. What they actually tend to do is renumber the homework problems so that it becomes a huge hassle to use the old edition side by side with the new one. This is simply to kill off the market for used books.

I'd also be interested in seeing your evidence for your statement that 'open textbooks run into the "staleness" issue.' Open textbooks are actually easier to change, because they're typically not produced and distributed via conventional printing. They're either distributed purely via the web or, in some cases, via print on demand services like lulu. In fact, one of the governor's big talking points in favor of free and open-source textbooks has been that they can be updated more rapidly, unlike antiquated paper books from traditional publishers. In fact, one of the issues discussed extensively at the symposium this week was the fear that open-source textbooks would change too quickly. The K-12 bureacracy is heavily oriented toward top-down control over textbook selection, and they actually want to impose a two-year freeze on digital texts once they're approved, so that the books won't change after having been blessed as conforming to state standards.

And they want it all automatically graded electronically. This can't be delivered by open textbooks.

Huh? This "can't" be delivered by open textbooks? This is particularly off base. In fact, automatic electronic grading was pioneered by open-source folks at universities. One of the first systems used for math and physics was LON-CAPA, which is open-source software that was first developed about 20 years ago at MSU, and is still being actively developed and supported. Here is a list of some open-source software for this type of thing. What's changed within the last few years is that the publishers have started offering these things as services that students have to pay for, and promoting them heavily in publications like The Physics Teacher. So if all you've been exposed to is sales reps' pitches, I can see how you'd be under the impression that it only exists in proprietary form, but that's completely inaccurate.

By that you mean the California voters who voted to deregulate to the system we got? I really wish I could blame the officials, but we did that to ourselves... sort of like our current budget.

Lest we forget...

Electricity deregulation began in 1996, not with an initiative as you implied, but rather with The Electric Utility Industry Restructuring Act (Assembly Bill 1890). Perhaps you were confused with 2005's Proposition 80 that re-regulated the industry.

Lest we also forget that this deregulation law was primarily written and supported by Enron and the utility traders. From that perspective, it worked perfectly. (Now tell me again why deregulation is axiomatically good?)

As a California resident and a voter, I agree that the initiative process is a crock and prone to manipulation (Perhaps not quite as trivially easy as Oregon's. (I'm looking at you Bill Sizemore!)) using the extreme rhetoric ("Oh won't someone please think of the children!") and feel good measures that it's wrought the current budget crisis. Initiatives that tie the hands of the legislature when making budget cuts, a 30 year old initiative that limit property taxes at essentially 30 year old levels, and requires an asinine two-thirds majority to increase revenue in order to pass a balanced budget? And oh yeah and the minority party is so beholden to Grover Norquist's dogma to become completely irrational and oppose any long term solution to the state's sadly predictably recurring and worsening budget problems.

We are state ruled be the extremes of the political spectrum, and thus so throughly a reflection of the schizophrenic political views of the populace. We are state that wants it all, but at the same time refuses to pay for any of it.

Or as Walt Kelly put it, "We have met the enemy, and he is us."

If schools really cared about anything but profits, then we'd have a mandatory open-source textbook market where academia would be free to create and modify textbooks. These textbooks would cost nothing. Certainly, there would still be a need for private market textbooks (on arcane and/or rapidly changing subjects) but I can see a substantial portion of textbook requirements displaced by an open system.

The "mandatory" part doesn't make a lot of sense. You can't force authors to write books for free. And although a lot of free textbooks do exist already (see my sig), you can't guarantee that for a particular subject, the best book will always be a free book rather than a non-free.

But other than that, what you're suggesting seems similar to something California is doing now. Motivated by the California state budget crisis, Governor Schwarzenegger has announced a Free Digital Textbook Initiative, which has gathered a list of free, online high school math and science textbooks that are aligned with state content standards. The intention is to have the books used in classrooms in fall 2009. This article has some useful background, but it mistakenly suggests that the arduous state adoption process will be an obstacle to the FDTI; statewide adoption only applies to K-8, but FDTI is doing high-school books. There was a previous, unsuccessful effort called COSTP, which tried to produce a history textbook using Wikibooks. Here is a BBC article about the present effort, and here is a newspaper opinion piece by the Governor. This is a transcript of a speech by the Governor, with some interesting Q&A at the end. Twenty books were submitted (press release, links). The four books from traditional publisher Pearson are consumable workbooks, not actual textbooks.

"The train grossed $49,351,664 in ticket revenue in Fiscal Year 2006, making it Amtrak's highest grossing single train. With total expenses of $62.1 million, it is Amtrak's best-paying long distance train in terms of income in comparison with operating expenses."

We already have a working, proven solution in the United States to make this happen. All we need to do now is expand it.

Seems that a service which, in the best case, loses 26 cents for every dollar of revenue is hardly a "working, proven solution" that will necessarily scale.

Perhaps there are alternate similar solutions that could work, but I think in its current incarnation it is a proven failure. Just in this "best case" scenario, ticket prices need to be increased 26%, expenses reduced by 21% or some combination thereof to make it successful. If increases in ticket prices drive many consumers away, that likely won't work well. If decreases in expenses causes a reduction in service (less scheduled trains, more crowded trains, less maintenance etc.) and therefore drive many consumers away, that likely won't work well either. Perhaps expenses could be reduced without noticeably impacting service (such as more efficient scheduling or replacing workers w/inflated wages with workers willing to work for market rate) but one has to wonder why this hasn't been done already given the desperate fiscal performance of Amtrak for many years.

I'm not too sure what to make of these figures which indicate that Amtrak enjoys the highest "revenue per passenger mile" in 2001 (the last year data for all categories is shown) among several forms of transport.

• Air carrier, domestic, scheduled service: 13.2 cents
• Class I bus, intercity: 12.9 cents
• Commuter rail: 15.1 cents
• Intercity/Amtrak: 24.9 cents

Perhaps this is because of unique factors such as people stuck on trains for a long time buy food on the train (resulting in revenue that is counted in the passenger mile) while those traveling by plane buy food in the airport or off site because their travel is shorter? Perhaps this is because of the differences in routes served. Perhaps...

I like the concept of rail and use it where practical. However, I'm doubtful that it's a very attractive economic solution for extensive expansion in the United States.

On a related note, California recently passed "Prop 1A to authorize issuing about $10B in bonds towards funding a $40B high speed rail system. Of course, a couple months after it passed, the rich folks (most of whom, by the way, voted for [PDF] it) in Palo Alto, Menlo Park, and Atherton were shocked, I say shocked, that it might actually run through their towns above grade and not be silently tunneled underground where they could ignore it.

http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_12049610

[SGI] lost $153 million during its 2008 fiscal year and its current bankruptcy filing lists $390 million in assets along with nearly $527 million in liabilities.
As part of its proposed purchase of SGI, Rackable has agreed to take on an undisclosed portion of those liabilities.

...Suddenly not peanuts anymore.

You can't buy the cheapest thing available and expect it to run WELL. Only to run.

Something Apple will be sure to point out if they choose to run new ads to counter Microsoft's latest advertising.

They don't have to reduce the price by double the difference, but there are laws in at least some areas. (I'm not positive, this is probably a CA law.)

This is covered often in the Action Line in SJ Mercury (and your local version probably covers it too). The only mention I could find is a 2 year old mention, but I know it's been covered more recently than that:
http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_4948570

I know that for example, Luckys Supermarkets now has to give you the first item free if it overcharges _because_ Albertsons, who they bought, were repeatedly overcharging. As the article I linked states, at least for us, even if it's a time-limited price sticker, if it's still up, they have to obey it. I've never tried to enforce that. I wouldn't doubt if most areas have similar laws.

I see nothing inappropriate about a Church encouraging their members to be active in a current political issue and last time I checked people are free to donate to whatever cause they like.

However, there have been some allegations of the church contacting non-members which must be reported to the state and wasn't.

Absolutely. The root cause of the entire Proposition 8 debacle was the naive and frankly dangerous way in which Californians make changes to their constitution. Constitutions are vitally important legal documents, any changes to which should be carefully debated, reviewed, revised and audited before being made.

Even in countries that have referendums to change constitutions, both upper and lower houses of parliament, as well as the head of state and possibly the supreme court, must all sign off on any proposed amendment before it is sent for a general popular vote. Even then, many countries require a 60% majority in order for the amendment to be passed. In Germany, they don't even have referendums! In California, you need only find, persuade or trick 8% of the population into signing any old rag of a proposition, and it will be placed right there on a statewide ballot.

The result is predictable. Demagoguery, emotion and populism rule at the Californian ballot box. Forget Proposition 8. Look at Proposition 2! Rules on poultry production?! I don't care what side of that debate you are on. A state constitution is not an appropriate place for any such legislation. But that's where it ended up.

Such an outcome scrawled all over the pages of the Californian constitution makes me question just how serious Californians are about the legitimacy of their state and its rights. I ask, in all seriousness, whether such a state as this, which allows such capricious changes to its core laws, should be considered as a legitimate political entity? I note that the state cannot even balance its books, a task which is practically fundamental to the existence of any political body.

In short, should Californians really be left to govern themselves anymore?

'WARNING: Excessive exposure to news about inept politicians who blame media for all their problems, and corresponding news that they can't do something as simple as balance a budget, has been linked to aggressive behavior.'

Agressive thoughts, anyway...

Nothing sad about it at all; this is pretty normal for his culture. He didn't even realize that it's illegal in this country.

Did you miss how we just passed Prop 1a to establish a high-speed train system running across the state? For a HUNDRED billion dollars?

How about the BART extension to San Jose?

Yeah, SF isn't Tokyo, or even Boston, and it probably won't be in the near future. But I don't think you can accuse Californians of ignoring mass transit.

Here is some non fox-news data for you. White powder envelopes. Old couple attacked. Here's some proof on the burning churches threat. Sorry you're not hearing this from Olbermann or Maddow, but those are the facts.

"You only have to look at Sun and IBM to see that they are on track with the need to change."

I don't know about IBM, but Sun's version of "being on track with change" includes massive layoffs and near bankruptcy.
Sun announces 6000 layoffs, 15% of its workforce (Nov 2008)

Microsoft, for all its "problems" and outdated/maligned business model, is hiring lots of people while its competitors are doing the opposite.