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First of all, the Nature piece itself found Britannica to be superior – just not by as much as expected.

Secondly, it is a matter of record that Nature only examined science articles, many of them quite specialised. It is inexcusable to omit that qualification. There simply is no evidence at all that Wikipedia is superior to Britannica in other topic areas, and copious evidence within Wikipedia itself of how often articles are biased by special interest groups (just look at the history of Wikipedia arbitration cases).

Third, Nature chose to penalise Britannica for information that was omitted, but contained in Wikipedia: that was counted as an "error". As Britannica themselves pointed out, "Nature accused Britannica of 'omissions' on the basis of reviews of article excerpts, not the articles themselves. In a number of cases only parts of the applicable Britannica articles were reviewed." In other words, they butchered Britannica articles and then penalised Britannica for the fact that the remaining stump failed to contain some item of information that the full article would have contained.

Fourth, Nature noted, but chose not to penalise Wikipedia for, confusing presentation and bad style, essentially proposing that a haphazardly compiled jumble of facts should be considered equal to a well-structured, easy-to-understand introduction to a topic written by a world-renowned expert.

Lastly, there is by now a very long list of journalists and writers found to have copied spurious facts from Wikipedia. Where is a similar list of writers embarrassed for having gotten their information from Britannica? If Lord Leveson had looked up the founders of the Independent newspaper in Britannica, he would not have ended up ascribing that achievement to some unknown Californian student.

Beyond simple errors, there is very copious evidence of bias and covert paid editing in Wikipedia. The Croatian Wikipedia was taken over by right-wing extremists, to the point where the country's education minister warned students not to rely on it, as the country's history was thoroughly falsified by fringe groups. Those are all problems Britannica has never had.

I could go on. I have been a Wikipedian for nigh on ten years. I have seen the problems first-hand.

Yeah, I knew that. I heard Lester Grinspoon give a lecture in which he talked about Carl Sagan smoking pot. It might have been in 1996.
  http://motherboard.vice.com/bl...

Funny thing is, I went to Colorado this March for a medical conference which actually had a panel on marijuana. Denver is a great place, finally pot is legal, people were offering me grass, and I couldn't smoke any because I had to work.

Useful tip: Leela's European Cafe is a great bar.

Another useful tip: The Colorado newspapers checked and no one has ever been arrested in Denver airport for trying to bring pot home, airport screening notwithstanding.

Yeah, I knew that. I heard Lester Grinspoon give a lecture in which he talked about Carl Sagan smoking pot. It might have been in 1996.
  http://motherboard.vice.com/bl...

Funny thing is, I went to Colorado this March for a medical conference which actually had a panel on marijuana. Denver is a great place, finally pot is legal, people were offering me grass, and I couldn't smoke any because I had to work.

Useful tip: Leela's European Cafe is a great bar.

Another useful tip: The Colorado newspapers checked and no one has ever been arrested in Denver airport for trying to bring pot home, airport screening notwithstanding.

... what was actually going on here. The republicans are against lots of government regulation. They just don't like it in general.

You can't just blame the republicans.

As soon as the lobbyist Tom Wheeler was made FCC chairman and his former cronies from Comcast and Verizon made attorneys for the FCC, the fight for 'Net Neutrality' under Obama was lost.

The people who keep sending comments for 'Net Neutrality' to the FCC are either ignorant of that fact, or they're just naive. These industry lobbyists currently in charge of the FCC are not going to suddenly change side. This is not the Supreme Court. They're not guaranteed that cushy job for life. And once they stop working for the FCC, they'll start lobbying again for the industry to get paid off for what they did while they were in charge of the FCC. This revolving door of excessive pay offs is extremely well documented.

For those that were unaware, Dubai is an awful place to live.
The majority of low wage workers are shipped in from out of the country and are treated as slaves. They've no hope to leave and any question of the system will land you in prison. There are dozens of documentaries on the situation.

Vice has a good one: http://www.vice.com/vice-news/...
Caution, it's an auto-play video and it's got a loud intro.

How about we hire and promote based on merit and competency?

Because "meritocracy" was supposed to be satire because "merit" inevitably ends up being defined such that it holds up the status quo.

A good example of hiring on merit being difficult is blind auditions for orchestras. Auditions used to be done with the judges in the same room as the applicant; women were chosen much less often than men. Then a curtain was added between the judges and the applicant so the judges couldn't see that the applicant was a women; no change. Then a carpet was added so the judges couldn't hear the applicant's shoes (because high heels sound audibly different); suddenly women were accepted to orchestras in much higher numbers.

Because the inadmissable sample is a much cheaper lead that can be done before spending money on the real thing.

Alright buddy, I look forward to your response to this. Occam's razor is a funny thing--it bends every which way depending on how uninformed the user is. After the Deepwater Horizon spill, BP launched a $200 million whitewashing campaign, including a now-defunct youtube channel full of propaganda videos--
http://www.prwatch.org/news/20...
--but there's no way any of that would go towards paid trolls! Oh wait, there totally is.
http://tech.slashdot.org/story...

The slashdot summary doesn't even mention the death threats sent by BP agents in the original article.
http://www.aljazeera.com/indep...
"Billie Garde, BP's deputy ombudsman, in a letter to the Government Accountability Project dated December 18, 2012, stated clearly that "BP America contracts management of its Facebook page to Ogilvy Public Relations" and added, "Ogilvy manages all of BP America's social media matters". According to BP America, Ogilvy has a group of 10 individuals in different time zones that perform comment screening of the page," wrote Garde.

In spite of this, you want to tell me that, even though Samsung pays trolls:
http://www.techmtaa.com/2013/1...
http://www.valuewalk.com/2013/...

Even though telecoms pay trolls:
http://www.vice.com/read/troll...
Even though non-domestic propaganda contractors like Leonie Industries pay trolls to troll domestically:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetw...
"USA Today reports that in his campaign against the reporters, Chidiac created "fan sites" with URLs matching the names of the reporter and editor who worked on the stories and then filled those sites with content that criticized the journalist's past reporting."

...even despite all this, you somehow think that Exxon-Mobil, the second richest corporation in the world, wouldn't pay trolls for the purpose of PR cleanup?
If you don't think opinion here makes a difference, then ask yourself why every topic about the NSA is full of endless "fuck beta" comments and huge blobs of meaningless text with bolded sections telling you how to configure your router. Maybe it doesn't make a difference, but it seems like there are many with deep pockets who do not agree with you.

Regardless, you have a lot of reading to do before you're fit to tell anyone about occam's razor re: paid shills.

There is an ongoing study that involves having patients yell at computer generated avatars to get the source of their hallucinations to STFU. Perhaps it may interest you: http://www.vice.com/en_ca/read...

Just this year, a Federal judge ruled that the FAA has no authority to regulate drones outside of navigable airways. (Which are clearly specified on aviation charts.)

It doesn't matter whether the use is commercial.

The FAA has appealed the ruling, but since the judge appears to have ruled on solid Constitutional grounds, I doubt very much they'll win the appeal.

It's just a fact: FAA doesn't have jurisdiction over everything in the air. All of their authority is based on the Federal ability to regulate manned interstate airplane flight.

The conditioning is there on both sides. That's what happens in a conflict, nobody sits around and debates the finer points of bigotry. The enemy is the enemy and the dehumanization necessary to make killing the other palatable happens in every culture.

Check out Selfies for Hate -- pre-army teen girls calling for genocide on twitter.

Another cool effort, in SimCity 3000.

Another perspective, re: Zoe Quinn.

here: http://www.vice.com/read/profe...

Because the UK, nominally at least, doesn't extradite people to countries where the suspect could be tortured or executed. Whereas Sweden DGAF. And even if he's not extradited, it is perfectly reasonable to be reticent to subjecting one's self to Sweden's Star Chambers. Suspects can be held for long periods of time incommunicado on the whims of the prosecution.

http://motherboard.vice.com/re...

some fucking idiotic nerd will defend the abomination that is nuclear power as great for the environment or some shit.

Yeah, like the environmental science nerds at NASA "... researchers estimate nuclear power has prevented more than 1.8 million deaths due to air pollution between 1971 and 2009. Given our fears, the findings are counterintuitive. But they're persuasive ..."
http://motherboard.vice.com/bl...

BTW, you do realize you are every bit the science denier as climate change deniers. Nuclear deniers are no different. They merely form their opinion based on left wing **politics** rather than right wing politics. Neither the climate deniers nor the nuclear deniers are based in science.

This is a tactic they've been using for a while.

The telecoms offer cash grants to various groups who really don't know anything about the issue of net neutrality but if they want the money they have to sign off on it, often in the fine print somewhere. The telecoms get to pretend to be good guys for helping out needy non-profit groups and they get to put those groups on a list to wave in front of congressmen. In the past there wasn't enough publicity for those groups to even find out how their good names were being abused. But now people are starting to notice.

No you retard. They are telling this to anyone who comes to ask. It's fairly clear that you're trolling because you didn't do the exact thing I told you to do. Because that video, alone, shows the depth of your lies.

When vice guys with cameras came to Sloviansk alongside the Ukrainian troops and went around asking what happened, they got told this, straight to the face. Refugees tell pretty much the same, except most of them got out before the worst came down. It's the elderly that faced the reality, ones to weak and frail to leave before war machine started to really pound them. And they are the ones who are happy to tell the story to anyone that asks. That's why Western media pointedly ignores them and only "alternative news", which is basically a few guys with a handheld HD camera who have the balls to go with anyone who lets them in the region, even at risk of getting kidnapped and beaten up that report on actual news.

You know what, I'm going to make you face your own monstrousness. Here, these are your terrorists you monster. Look in their haunted eyes, shelled by Kiev's army. Tell them how it's their fault. Tell us how this is "Russian propaganda".

Truly, your kind is the reason for most atrocities committed by any side in the conflict. Because there are people like you on both sides that these atrocities are allowed to continues. So face your victims monster. Look in their eyes.

https://news.vice.com/video/ru...

And there's no shortage of Congress folk who will spread their legs really wide for telecom. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee is probably the spreadiest:

http://motherboard.vice.com/re...

You're (I believe inadvertently) painting an inaccurate picture when it comes to Tesla's stance towards unions. Even if they are neutral towards employee unions (more on that in a minute), NADA is still one of the largest unions in the automotive industry, and has made no bones about the fact that they are opposed to Tesla's business model. Unions have been attacking Tesla from the start and continue to do so even now. Factory employee unions may not be a part of the fray yet, but they're hardly the only type of trade union.

Moreover, on the topic of employee unions, Musk may say he's neutral, but Tesla's actions make it clear that it is hardly neutral. From another article (emphasis mine):

Musk's opinions on unionization aren't clear. When he announced the Fremont factory's purchase from Toyota, Musk told The Chronicle that "on the question of the union, we're neutral." [...]

Tesla's last annual financial report struck a far less welcoming note. It listed the possibility of union activity under "risks" to the business.

"The mere fact that our labor force could be unionized may harm our reputation in the eyes of some investors and thereby negatively affect our stock price," reads the report, filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. "Additionally, the unionization of our labor force could increase our employee costs and decrease our profitability, both of which could adversely affect our business, prospects, financial condition and results of operations."

[...] Other Tesla managers, [UAW President Bob] King said, seemed to be opposed. Musk, he said, was "very open and said he would respect what the workers wanted. But his operating management has done the opposite."

And, contrary to your claims regarding Uber, it has been facing issues from trade unions, namely taxi, limo, and other professional driver unions across the country that have been campaigning extremely hard to keep Uber out. I'll grant that they are almost entirely operating against Uber at the city and state level, but that pressure on the governments is originating from the unions. Without the unions campaigning, the city governments likely wouldn't be getting involved at all.

That said, I do agree with you that the summary grossly missteps by suggesting that the issue of state-level protectionist regulators has much of anything to do with the complaints of small-government folks.

This outstanding article at Vice by Matt Stoller is well worth reading,

http://www.vice.com/read/aaron...


http://www.thestranger.com/sea...

Happy birthday, Nikola, you crazy bastard!

You've said that you created the Application Quest program in response to the Michigan affirmative action rulings to help colleges keep diversity without giving preference to race. Are any colleges using the system or expressed interest? Have you had an backlash over your stance that the issue really isn't about race but about capacity?

Slaves yes.

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

http://www.vice.com/vice-news/...

The fact that it's a tough world out there doesn't excuse Dubai or UAE in general from acting like asshat clowns. They have the economy to take care of their foreign workers, but choose to screw them over. That's really not OK.

A robot doesn't replace 1000 workers.

A group of robots supported by a few human workers replace 1000 workers. They cost 1/3 the price, don't make mistakes, don't get sick, etc.

Other machinists don't agree with you on the replacement aspect.
http://www.goiam.org/publicati...

http://motherboard.vice.com/bl...
"That's according to a 2013 Oxford study, which was highlighted in this week's Economist cover story. That study attempted to tally up the number of jobs that were susceptible to automization, and, surprise, a huge number were. Creative and skilled jobs done by humans were the most secureâ"think pastors, editors, and dentistsâ"but just about any rote task at all is now up for automation. Machinists, typists, even retail jobs, are predicted to disappear. "

And that's not even addressing the 3d printing aspects.

When you replace several machinists, you have a few good ones out of the 12 you let go- and you take the one who is willing to work 24/7 for $10 to $15 bucks an hour.

I think they are off on "editing"-- it's partially being automated, partially being crowdsourced, and what's left- they just have stopped doing. I've seen "howlers" in professionally published (not self published) paper and hard back books increasingly over the last 10 years.

Agree with you entirely on the white-collar jobs which are not 90%+ creative. Jobs with less creativity will be combined and the creative parts done by consultants or designed out.

In this case, where motorists are looking to pedestrian signals to decide whether or not they can increase speed to beat a light, and rear-ending another in the process, the liability is obviously with the motorist. Pedestrian signals are in place exclusively for the management of sidewalk-to-sidewalk traffic. At no place in law, MUTCD, or HDM does it suggest otherwise. Thus, the motorist is at fault if s/he uses a pedestrian signal to measure how to drive an automobile on the road and, in doing so, causes harm to person or property.

Moreover, California Vehicle Code 21703 explicitly states: "The driver of a motor vehicle shall not follow another vehicle more closely than is reasonable and prudent, having due regard for the speed of such vehicle and the traffic upon, and the condition of, the roadway." That's the citation to resolve the rear-ending issue. Increase the fine, advertise it well, and watch these kinds of collisions go down.

But that's not even the underlying problem. The underlying problem is that there is an over-inflated value of life and convenience placed on the motor vehicle and driver in comparison to all others using the public right of way. This is why the pedestrian signal is being blamed for the issue, not the motorists themselves.

Drivers of motor vehicles notoriously go un-cited for killing bicyclists and pedestrians in the course of violating traffic law and, recently, some people are picking up on the pattern.

http://www.vice.com/read/you-c...
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11...
http://www.bicyclepaper.com/ar...
http://cironline.org/reports/b...

Moreover, the last 4 decades of city design have seen the expectation of free right turns and super-wide right turns-- both of which make traveling by automobile faster and more convenient, but also increase the amount of time it takes for a pedestrian to cross a road. With the increased crossing time requirements, it becomes more and more necessary to have countdown timers on pedestrian signals.

If you want an engineering solution to this problem, implement the 3 engineering change below:
(1) Tighten up corners to at intersections. This reduces the distance corner-to-corner, reduces the time needed to cross the street, and slows down automobiles so that they actually see the pedestrians crossing the street (http://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/intersection/signalized/13027/images/e91.png).
(2) Add pedestrian bulb-outs wherever there is street parking to further reduce the time needed to cross the road. (http://www.ci.richmond.ca.us/images/pages/N2674/Bulb%20Outs.jpg)
(3) Then, and only then, remove the count-down timer for pedestrian signals at that intersection.

Effects:
(1) The right-turning automobile is slowed, but red signal durations become shorter because it takes less time for pedestrians to cross the street.
(2) Pedestrians cross the street quicker.
(3) Pedestrians count-downs are removed due to lack of need thus removing the temptation from motorists to use them inappropriately.

The FAA's published interpretations show the multiple areas they are saying they can now regulate. They want to preclude the use of vision-enhancing devices, such as binoculars, night vision goggles, powered vision magnifying devices, and goggles designed to provide a “first-person view” from the model. They do acknowledge that standard eyeglasses are OK. Note that they are NOT prohibiting remote cameras, only the goggles which fit over the face.

Also, they are giving their interpretation that anything involving money removes the operator from the "hobby and recreational" exemption that congress granted. A pilot that gives a demonstration of advanced aerobatics and receives a payment is now not flying for hobby or recreational purposes. This is equivalent to saying a fly fisherman that demonstrates casting techniques and receives a payment is no longer a recreational fisher and now must be a commercial fisherman.

They also say if you take any pictures or video while flying, they have the right to decide what you do with the pictures or video can also change you from a hobbyist. Take a picture of you own [hobby only] garden to see where it needs watering, OK. Take a picture of your neighbor's garden and show him where it needs watering, commercial use. Take a picture of any commercial enterprise and post it online, commercial use.

Many of these changes are being published now because in March a federal judge ruled that the FAA has never published its restrictions of commercial use of hobby aircraft. [See FAA vs Pirker]. The FAA had previously issued "policy guidelines", but that was not enough to fine Pirker the $10,000 they wanted for commercial use of a hobby aircraft. http://motherboard.vice.com/re...

~~

Are you fucking kidding me?
"Nuclear is a stopgap" and "not poisoning the world for future generations"?

You know how many people have died over the past 60-odd years from radiation poisoning? Direct deaths, including incidents like assassinations and laboratory accidents? 10,000, maybe? Nope. 5000? Nigga we ain't even close yet. 1000? Keep going. 500? Hahaha, get real buddy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Over 60 years of nuclear power and widespread use of radioactive material and there are less than 400 (estimate 200-300) deaths from direct radiation exposure. You can bump it up to ~10,000-20,000 when you include estimates on cancer related deaths. But you know what? If we're going to count cancer related deaths for nuclear, then how about we count pollution related deaths for coal, oil and gas?

Think you can guess? Maybe 100,000 per year?
Try 7 million: http://www.who.int/mediacentre...

Even if you went batshit crazy with estimating nuclear's impact - with crazy greenpeace numbers like a million deaths that they pull out of their collective asses. You still come NOWHERE NEAR coal, oil or gas. In fact, by metrics like amount of power produced per death, Nuclear is the safest we have available. Nothing else beats it, including Solar, Wind and Hydro.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/ja...
http://nextbigfuture.com/2011/...
http://motherboard.vice.com/en...

Enough with your bullshit FUD. There is nothing wrong with, and there has never been anything wrong with Nuclear. All the facts are stacked against you and all you've brought against it are lies and bullshit fearmongering to convince people who are ignorant of what the nuclear statistics actually look like. I'm fucking sick and tired of you anti-nuclear liars. All you do is help ensure we keep guzzling oil, coal and gas. I don't think the oil industries could've gotten better shills if they paid for them.

Get serious. There is nothing in that paper about increasing geothermal flux. Nothing. Any rift under West Antarctica has been there for many glacial cycles. You really have no clue what you are talking about. Read my link. It has quotes from the authors of the paper you are spreading lies about.

No, Volcanoes Are Not the Primary Cause For the Melting Ice Caps

It is starting to look like this wasn't just a case of going after j random twitter user.
Instead, it was probably an attempt to discredit the local newspaper.

I bet he had a bug up his ass about the newspaper for some story they wrote in the past and so he convinced himself that the anonymous twitter user was really this reporter and that if he could expose the guy he would get even with the paper. That would totally explain why he had such an over-the-top reaction to the parody, he was already primed and looking for revenge on the paper and thought this was the ticket.

I hope the loses big time, that kind of vindictiveness does not belong in office.

http://motherboard.vice.com/re...
The government appeared to want it both ways, Andrew Crocker, a legal fellow at the EFF, told Motherboard. "They said [the Internet data collected under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court] is not relevant to our case, but they've also made statements, in asserting state secrets, that we touch on issues under the guidance of the FISC."

The only difference is that they don't like to share..

Yes they do, they even say so in their privacy policy: “[Apple will] make certain personal information available to strategic partners that work with Apple to provide products and services, or that help Apple market to customers.”

In fact, if you read their privacy policy, you'd realize Apple gathers up about as much personal information on users as any other big tech company. The main difference is they say they don't connect the dots.In fact, they've been and are being sued for sharing too much user data...

Personal user data big part of any technology company's business model these days. Even Apple.

http://motherboard.vice.com/bl...

That's a good point; everyone gathers data and everyone uses data. The crucial distinction is, Apple doesn't sell access to the information it collects to everyone and anyone. There's no way for a third party to buy their way in.

The only difference is that they don't like to share..

Yes they do, they even say so in their privacy policy: “[Apple will] make certain personal information available to strategic partners that work with Apple to provide products and services, or that help Apple market to customers.”

In fact, if you read their privacy policy, you'd realize Apple gathers up about as much personal information on users as any other big tech company. The main difference is they say they don't connect the dots.In fact, they've been and are being sued for sharing too much user data...

Personal user data big part of any technology company's business model these days. Even Apple.

http://motherboard.vice.com/bl...

And what, exactly, were his options...
... joining Bradley Manning (aka Chelsea Manning) in Extreme Solitary Confinement that has been described as cruel, inhuman and degrading by the United Nations and many others such as this very detailed report on The Torture Of Bradley Manning by Andrew Blake, or this article by Jesselyn Radack that catalogues exactly How the US Military Tortured Bradley Manning

Russia is the last place that I would have thought of seeking refuge... but I think that we must all trust that Snowden probably knew better than all of us which countries would have succumbed to US pressure to hand him back and which would have taken great pleasure in not doing so.

Now, if Snowden is a true patriot, he will fight for the right to come back home and have a fair hearing before a jury of his peers... and seek to be recognised and judged as a whistleblower.

so you should blame SFGate.

Don't make this about who's to blame. This is about public misinformation actively promoted by corporate interests and how and whether to counter it. Whether that SFGate, BfA or a combination of those two drives the misinformation is irrelevant.

Personally, I'd do nothing.

That says enough about you. But thanks for answering the question honestly.

I dunno, you tell me what you're willing to do in the name of "fixing misinformation".

How about defending an article exposing said misinformation? (Yes, The Fucking Article)

As opposed to implying that what's going on is just "companies presenting their point of view publicly" and people "[getting] their panties in a knot about [it]".

Combine it with this and dreams start to come true, scan yourself in first for added realism and then move on to scan in women you want to have virtual sex with! Obviously they'd need some method of simulating the nude version of a woman, as it's unlikely you'll find many willing to undress for a 3D scanning, but the future of cyber sex could be amazing. Amazingly invasive, too, but wouldn't it be worth it?

Imagine, in just a few short years, I could be banging your wife!

It would be better off on mars or in orbit or a salt dome or a facility in a salt lake in the middle of nowhere, like say, oh, Australia. Keeping it on earth means once the fossil fuel scaremongering leveraging of Fukushima dies down and we build better reactors we can just extract its energy. Hell, China might actually buy it, Isn't Billy G. building a traveling wave reactor or a molten salt reactor there? If anyone knows how to handle hazardous products it's Microsoft CEOs...

On Mars it could eliminate costly mining operations and be used in a power plant as well, or for use in RTGs on rovers, etc. We don't make it to Mars, then it's no different than sending it to the sun, aside from the expense of soft landing it. Blasting it into the sun is just as expense as parking it at a Lagrange point, which is expensive, but at least it wouldn't be lost and is outside the gravity well already. Nuclear material isn't outlawed in space, lots of things run on it up there. You don't really have to get that far away from radioactive waste before its emanations become indistinguishable from standard background radiation. It's radioactive waste, but it's not "Red Matter" or some sci-fi shit.

My prime concern would just be keeping it out of the hands of thugs. Some armed guards posted along a perimeter far enough from a concrete bunker to be safe, maybe some cameras and security guards and motion detection AI to keep an eye on everyone. Hell, they could see anyone coming from miles away out on the salt flats, no other life to speak of on the flats either, except for the odd race car enthusiast, but they're fairly harmless if kept at a safe distance.

Here you go: https://news.vice.com/article/... They talked to a few porn stars who had this happen in the article.

Lets tackle your premises one by one.

First point- services granting anonymity are not automatically 'bad' or 'evil' or used to commit crimes. Don't take my word for it, look at what the Turkey government did .

Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdoan, has continued going forward with the censor spree and is now blocking access to the Tor Project website. Just two days ago, Turkish Prime Minister, Erdoan, blocked access to YouTube, and the week before Twitter. Now Erdoan is continuing his censor reign targeting the Tor Project.

As Turkish ISP’s are begin forced into censoring users, Turkish netizens are finding ways around the internet blackout. Turkish users were using Google DNS to evade the censorship and access some of their favorite websites. Turkey has also enforced a ban on Google DNS. As Turkey continues to block popular networks, Turkish citizens are forced into using a VPN or Tor to access some of the largest networks in the world.

But wait- DarkMarket is different because it sells "opium and kitty porn and services to kill people", right? Wrong. Why don't we let its creators tell you what its for :-

In its place, the pair both believe that DarkMarket has the potential to act as a platform for a marketplace truly free from government control. In the demonstration in Toronto, MDMA wasn't the only product listed on DarkMarket. A species of tomatoes that is banned in the EU for safety reasons, marmalade made from soon-to-be-discarded produce from grocery stores, and an asthma inhaler were also listed, which, although seemingly innocuous, are all illegal to sell without regulation.

The last item in particular highlights the less obvious uses of this kind of market. When traveling to the US, it is nearly impossible to purchase an inhaler without a prescription, even if you know you have a condition that requires it. You would need to visit a doctor, be diagnosed, and then allowed to purchase one. “Why can't [someone who has asthma] just buy one, like he needs it?” Swanson asked.

Don't be so quick to assume illegal = evil. Remember that selling alcohol was once illegal in the US, during the Prohibition.

A good article from Vice also talks about how the FCC is being run by former communications company lobbyists and other insiders.

This will be Obama's true lasting legacy, unfortunately.

No it's not that. The best thing I can see to compare it to is 2:30 into this video: (watch til at least 4:00)

http://www.vice.com/the-vice-g...

Basically you have to pay them money in order to be allowed to do things that are already ethical, perhaps even legal to do. If you already can do these things, then you often have to put up lobbying efforts to make sure that you can continue doing them.

For example, recall how after Google introduced gmail, California senator Liz Figueroa wanted to ban it. In that case, it took some heavy lobbying in order to keep gmail legal.

Personally, it would have pissed me off if they would have banned it; look at how gmail has revolutionized webmail. Before gmail they used to suck horribly, the good ones gave you a whopping 10MB of storage and each action you took required an entire page reload, making them slow as fuck. Yet gmail managed to be faster than native desktop clients in everything it did, including things that native clients were horridly slow at, such as searching.

But you know what? Often the US government (or even some state governments, like California) don't give a shit about whether or not anything is good and useful. The only thing they care about is how well their palms are greased.

Yah, that's not a great move vs. a civil regulator like the FAA or FCC.

Considering that the FAA recently lost a Federal lawsuit over this very thing, I would think they would be the ones backing down. The judge ruled that it was legal.

Don't pretend that Republicans are not hostile to science.

Don't pretend that Democrats are not hostile to science either.

Following confusion as to why Mulgrew, a life-long Democrat,

Yeah, because we all know that by choosing a party affiliation, you suddenly become scientifically literate!

Don't pretend that Republicans are not hostile to science.

Just because I have a tattoo of a swastika on my forehead doesn't mean I'm a Nazi....

perfectly true, though unusual I'd say

by hacking into AT&T's computers

Except, by most standards, he didn't "hack" anything. AT&T employed pathetic security which a teenager could defeat.

This has been covered quite a bit.

Instead, they effectively discovered a major security flaw in AT&T's network. When given the proper query, the telecom's public website would cough up a registered iPad owner's email address.

"There is no unauthorized access," Kerr said at the beginning of his appeal. When anyone can access data simply by entering an address onto a browser, "it is effectively public," he said.

This is essentially accessing information available to anybody without permission. But to call it "hacking" is a complete joke.

Seriously, don't you think that a judge knows the law better than you, a random bloke posting on the internet?

Seriously, have you seen some court rulings? The ones which go to appeals or the Supreme court and get overturned?

I'm sorry, but my faith in the justice system to be able to competently discuss matters of technology is pretty low. My faith in government prosecutors evenly applying the law or not jurisdiction shopping and inflating the charges ... also pretty low.

I'm not denying their scientific acumen. It's obvious they are very adept at what they are doing. But the reason this program exists in BYU is to find proof that the native americans were really descended from a lost tribe of Jewish settlers who came to America. Even if the head of this program, who is a high ranking Mormon, isn't interested in this; the LDS would use this as a reason to posthumously baptize Tutankhamun.

Seriously, if your not a member of LDS, the idea of posthumously baptising is pretty whacka-loon and unsupported in any other religion I'm aware of, so what difference does it really make?
At Least when the Satanic Temple performed a Pink Mass at the gravesite of Fred Phelps’ mother,

a burgeoning community of worship devoted to the Dark Lord, has performed a “Pink Mass” over the grave of Westboro Baptist Church founder Fred Phelps Jr.’s mother. The Pink Mass is a Satanic ritual performed after death that turns the deceased's straight spirit into a homo one—it’s not unlike the Mormon practice of baptizing the dead, only much gayer.
Satanists Turned the Founder of the Westboro Baptist Church’s Dead Mom Gay

it was funny and deliciously ironic.

There's a joke site about setting up a cloned-celeb-meat sausage co:

http://motherboard.vice.com/en...

http://www.vice.com/read/this-...

"This brings us to the anus hotel. More specifically, the Atelier Van Lieshout, CasAnus, 2007, a conceptual one-room hotel made by Dutch artist Joep van Lieshout. The hotel lets its visitors fulfill their lifelong dreams of curling up to sleep in a giant butthole."