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HFT exists for nothing but to make money for a select, small fraction of traders. It has nothing whatever to do with adding value, providing liquidity, or identifying those corporations that are adding value to our world. It is a completely destructive mechanism, and should be eliminated by the simple expedient of placing a one-second delay in trade executions, the one-second delay being randomly specified as being as low as 0.5 seconds and as high as 1.5 seconds. We need to kill HFT - what we do understand of its consequences indicate that it is of no value to any but its practitioners, and we don't understand at all its negative consequences. See, for example, http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/02/high-speed-trading/.

"And it's never going to work on a device where you don't have a keyboard-type input."

Tablets have a keyboard. It's not just their main input. The touch screen is.

While Mr Gates is probably right that for higher education, the keyboard-type input is critical, we believe his prediction to be wrong for K-12. Younger students have other needs. Exploring, discovering have there a much bigger role.

New types of applications focusing on the touch screen can improve interaction with the students. As an example, we've developed a new type of game, where young students learn to solve equations by using simple input (click, drag&drop). Look up DragonBox. Check that Wired GeekDad review for further information.

Of course, "simply drop[ping] in tablet computers or other gadgets and hope change happen" isn't a good strategy. But for K-12, given appropriate applications, change of curriculum and teacher role, touch screen devices will have their role.

Disclaimer: I am obviously member of WeWantToKnow, hence the AC post...

It seems like a sizable number of people in this country couldn't give a shit less if Chinese people are flinging themselves off of buildings due to their dreary work conditions

Why should I care that that 17 employees (out of 1.2 million) killed themselves over a 5 year period? The rate is lower than that of the general Chinese population.

I'm not saying that Foxconn is a paragon of corporate citizenship, but don't drag out that meme to support your argument.

That is somewhat hard to do. The only proof possible is either a developer stating that is the case, or to take lack of attempts to get the game past the censorship board as proof..

or you could cite a game that is freely available in other countries, yet not Australia?

you know, the United States, where we actually have protected speech and fight for it?

Yes, your speech is very protected. as long as you're in a Free Speech Zone

Australia being the most screwed up country in the English speaking world false on this topic, when they are the only country in it to employ this censorship at all?

i think you'll find virtually every developed country has ratings boards (even the US), every country has laws regarding these. the UK has threatened to ban games based on failed ratings (modified versions were released in the U.K. I'll admit ours are worse than most. that's one area of law.
you have the patriot act & its secret interpretations, other secret laws regarding air travel, laws & regulations you're allowed to see if you pay for the privelege, or even laws removing your right to transit without any trial.

Because of the protests of people around the world against it? Given, this is a case where Australia is not alone (Britain is trying), but they were the first, and their proposed law was still the worst.

i think you'll find the protest around the world(which happened over a year after the australian legislation effectively died) were against SOPA, something proposed in the US. you might want to read up about it before telling me that Australia's proposed filter was worse (hint: Australia's filter would have only blocked access to content, SOPA would have done all sorts of other things, such as remove links from search engines)

you need to deal with the fact most people see some issues in your brand of democracy and would prefer what they have, which is working a damn lot better from where I am standing.

based off something we're in the process of fixing, and something that never passed into law?

I'm always amused when I see people, mostly web professionals, bitch about CraigsList.

The VC and bizdev types hate CL because "CL is just leaving money on the table. They need to understand how to make a profit."

Webdevs hate them because CL doesn't adopt whatever new design trend comes along, therefore CL "doesn't get UX", or webdevs hate them because of situations like this, where some webdev can't build his business off of someone else's platform.

This, compadres, is why you don't take your business public. CL has a staff of less then 20 people, they make plenty of bank while at the same time staying true to their own ethos, whether you agree or not. And the consumers seem to be coming back over and over. And yes, I have heard many people say that this is because CL has been around so long, that they are the 500 lb Gorilla that will never be moved. Uhh, are we on the same Internet? Tell that to Yahoo, MySpace, etc etc.

Here's a Wired article from 2009 that covers the exact topic of CL and site scraping. Maybe PadMapper should have read it first.

Wired Interview with Craig Newmark

There was a story a while ago this year about battleships with lasers powerful enough to burn through 20 feet of steel in 1 second. These are nuclear (under)powered battleships with enough juice to do this.

I know this might be a tad predictable, but... Citation needed.

I hope this is a bit predictable too. Fuck off!

If you're here, you're interested in technology. Anyone in this century who's interested in technology should be well able to use a web search engine. Asshole!

Try this: "laser military" in ixquick.com yields this for starters.

Stop being such a fucking pussy!

My wife has severe PTSD due to being sexually assaulted by a doctor as a child, and is constantly trying to find better ways to cope and heal now that she's an adult. There are a LOT of victims (as shown yet again today by Joe Pa's trial) that could benefit from therapy like this if it could be effective for even severe trauma like that. Wired had an article about the idea of a pill to help you forget, but this article appears to be more just about therapy than medicine. Unfortunately it also says it was done on non-depressed victims, so I'm not sure how useful this would be to someone who truly has something traumatic in their past they really really want to forget but can't.

Living with a sexual assault victim, and in the process meeting other victims, and seeing the *profound* affect it can have on someone's life and happiness has drastically changed how I feel about the seriousness that people need to take that kind of crime.

Article has enough keywords to uniquely locate the original article

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/02/opinion/hack-the-vote.html?_r=1

Inviting Bush supporters to a fund-raiser, the host wrote, ''I am committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year.''

Also, instead of just saying that it is unsourced, you should attempt to find the source - in this case, I got a match on CNN, Wired, USA Today, LA Times and so on.

It also was sourced to begin with. First follow the "Voting Fiasco, Part 279.236" reference in the same paragraph, scroll to the "deliver the vote" link and click on it to arrive at http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0828-08.htm

I may be wrong, but as far as I understand DCMA only covers copy protection. All the jailbrake/root available would be illegal otherwise, and it is not: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/07/feds-ok-iphone-jailbreaking/

That's just what we need - medical devices and implants with NSA backdoors in them.

It's a matter of trust. I'd trust the NSA not to mess with my medical device far more than I'd trust a random device manufacturer to properly update a medical device over the internet. Only one of these organizations has a well deserved reputation for maintaining secrecy and security. Can the NSA sniff your internet traffic? Undoubtedly. But is someone at the NSA's Panopticon Central actually looking at your data? That's the key: you don't know for sure, and you will never know for sure. That speaks volumes for their security, and is a better reputation than these device manufacturers have.

Besides, the NSA has much less incentive to mess with your devices than other organizations, such as the FBI, FDA, police, TSA, etc. Just because one organization can doesn't mean the others get to.

Can you enter into a contract just by buying something? Isn't it true that EULAs have never really been tested in court?

The way I know, in civil laws, what it is not forbidden, then it is allowed. If that's true, then the fact that EULA hasn't been tested in a court as a contract (much less ruled that it is not), it means it is allowed to act as a contract.

(If you're right, then Apple/Psystar is an example, maybe I'll have to read more about this.) Can I sell you a book with an attached EULA that says you may only read it in a blue rocking chair, and if you violate that you have to give the book back with no refund, and you agree to the contract merely by purchasing the book?

By purchasing the software (by extension, a book would fall under the same) with a shrinkwrap license that doesn't allow you to read its terms: it seems the precedents indicate it is not enforceable.

But if you have had the occasion to read the license before buying it and/or if the seller offers you the opportunity to return it and get a refund in case you don't agree with the license, the answer seems to be yes, it is enforceable.

Under some debate: EULA's that require to give away some rights (e.g. bring class actions, enter arbitration instead suing, benchmarking/criticizing the products), the things are still evolving.

Virtual property is problematic in many ways.

Otherwise, I agree with you: dam'd ferengies with their rules of acquisition.

That sounds frighteningly accurate.
From a different Wired article: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/03/nsa-whistleblower/

NSA can intercept millions of domestic communications and store them in a data center like Bluffdale and still be able to say it has not “intercepted” any domestic communications. This is because of its definition of the word. “Intercept,” in NSA’s lexicon, only takes place when the communications are “processed” “into an intelligible form intended for human inspection,” not as they pass through NSA listening posts and transferred to data warehouses.

So, the short, accurate answer to Wyden's question would be "We're spying on everyone. Literally. It would take too much work to even calculate the number of people we're spying on. Go away."

Not yet all of them, but soon: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/03/ff_nsadatacenter/

Has anyone ever tested if we actually need air conditioning for a server room?

You do need "air conditioning", since you do want to make sure the air is not too dirty or humid or dry or hot.
But yes you can do without conventional data center air conditioning:
http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150148003778920&_fb_noscript=1
http://www.datacenterknowledge.com/the-facebook-data-center-faq-newest-page/

They're also trying in a warmer more humid area:
http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2012/04/facebook-data-center-2/
Wonder how well that will work.

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/04/attacks-mac-security-risks/
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/23/a-new-variant-of-malware-targets-mac-users/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/24/mac-malware_n_1448561.html
http://www.macworld.com/article/1160085/apple_posts_mac_defender_fix.html

You don't even have to turn over a rock in the last six months to have heard about the 600k plus macs that are infected.

You can map out the US interests via Atlas 1, Abel, Abner, Baker, then onto NOMAD- PITS storage, BOGART, CUB, HARVEST, then the IBM, Honeywell years.
Finally you have the megawatt power demand...
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/03/ff_nsadatacenter/all/1
If you where really smart you could map out the voice, telex, fax, data bandwidth per landing/sat per year/decade and what kind of data the US sorted in real time.
Voice to text, text to dictionary, match and keep or dump.

That's why the underside of the drone was completely concealed with banners, and why BOTH wings had clearly been reattached?

Your definition of "quite perfect" must be quite different from mine. Your reply also doesn't address why drone flights had gone on for three years prior and continued uninterrupted if Iran had such a capability. I guess they downed it with their UFO technology!

Yeah--it's basically a smaller shuttle designed to carry astronauts/pilots. From Wired:

"At a conference in California last week, Boeing program manager Art Grantz unveiled plans for an 'X-37C' that would be nearly twice as long as the current B-model, with a commensurate boost in payload. A pressurized cabin would have space for five seated astronauts plus one on a stretcher — presumably for medical evacuations from the International Space Station (ISS). The C-model space plane could be robotic like its predecessor, or piloted by one of the astronauts.

'Once qualified for human flight, these vehicles could transport a mix of astronauts and cargo to the ISS and offer a much gentler return to a runway landing for the space tourism industry,' Grantz said, positioning the X-37C as a potential rival to Space Ship Two and other near-orbital vehicles being developed by a host of ambitious start-ups."

Also more info at Space Safety Magazine.

The X-37C makes me want to shout something like "The space shuttle is dead! Long live the space shuttle!"

The "death of manned US space flight" is proving to be anything but--probably quite the opposite.

If he committed a crime against some women he deserves whatever he gets and he needs to stop trying to hide because it makes him out to be a coward unwilling to face the consequences of his actions. No doubt his involvement with wikileaks is fanning the flames here but lets not forget that according to ex-staffers he's tried to change that organization into a dictatorship of sorts and attacked those who questioned his decision or motives. These are signs of desperation and paranoia. Wikileaks will survive just fine without its corrupt dictator. In fact it will probably become better.

I have no more sympathy for him than I do Joran van der Sloot.

That said, the example you are probably looking for is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_American_Regiment

U.S. Congress 1784: "standing armies in time of peace are inconsistent with the principles of republican government, dangerous to the liberties of a free people, and generally converted into destructive engines for establishing despotism."

U.S. Congress 2012: authorizes indefinite military detention, authorizes war with Iran (a nation that poses no threat to the U.S. and hasn't attacked another in over 200 years), and legalizes domestic use of military propaganda.

How times change.

I read a great article on something much bigger than what they currently do, and it's all perfectly legal according to the article. The NSA super compute center being built currently, scheduled to be on line 2013 has links already in place by agreements with the only provider for major telecom hubs in the US which is AT&T. According to the article the NSA will be snooping, storing, and even trying to crack the encryption for all internet traffic both foreign and domestic, and all without a warrant.

Simply put, if it's not legal now it will be next year with the activation of this new center.

>[citation needed]

I was talking about the iOS app store not Mac. Here are citations.

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2011/12/ios-revenues-vs-android/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/appsblog/2012/jun/10/apple-developer-wwdc-schmidt-android?newsfeed=true

>You really quoted a gawker article? You hopeless tool.

How about find the same news posted on every damn news site? Why not address the facts, that Apple is making it harder for non App store programs on the Mac? What has Gawker to do with this except as a way to avoid answering my point? You dumb ass.

>Good thing there's an alternative that many find to be not just equal, but superior, which is available at a lesser cost.

You mean like Linux was always available for Windows?

>People are finding it less and less palatable. Apple is I think inadvertently doing us a favor because people get grumpy when Apple prevents them from doing things.

Maybe you should look at Apple's sales figures. http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/05/wow-apple-turns-over-its-inventory-once-every-5-days/257915/

A few geeks and devs are going to find it unpalatable just like used to find Microsoft unpalatable. It won't hurt the sky rocketing sales and revenues one bit.

Not so much, no.

Pakistani General: Actually, The Drones Are Awesome

Including the (non-trivial) civilian casualties that they don't like? Who cares about that, right?

Actually the innocent civilian casualties are a small percentage of the people killed in the attacks.

Pakistani General: Actually, The Drones Are Awesome

Dehumanizing people who are being bombed is a common strategy, but an evil one. And someone modded you up, too.

Aren't you demonizing the poster you are responding to, a sort of dehumanization? Could that be evil? And someone modded you up, too.

By the way, killing the terrorists in their hiding places with a small missile is completely legitimate whether or not they are called bad names and "dehumanized".

Drones are fine tools for finding and killing the enemies we already have, but this isn't particularly useful if we also create more of them with every use.

Which they don't particularly do.

Pakistani General: Actually, The Drones Are Awesome

“Myths and rumours about US predator strikes and the casualty figures are many,” Mehmood said, according to Dawn, “but it’s a reality that many of those being killed in these strikes are hardcore elements, a sizeable number of them foreigners.”

He even brought stats. According to the general, “about 164 drone strikes have occurred since 2007 — the New America Foundation tallies 226 since 2004 — have killed “over 964 terrorists.” Of those, 793 were Pakistanis and 171 were foreigners, “including Arabs, Uzbeks, Tajiks, Chechens, Filipinos and Moroccans.” (Filipinos? Huh.) Only “a few civilians” have been killed, he said.

Somewhere, Georgetown’s Christine Fair — full disclosure: a friend of this blog — is pumping her fist. Fair has been a proponent of the strikes as a sensible counterterrorism tactic. And she’s blamed the widespread unpopularity of the drones in Pakistan on a “disinformation campaign” by terrorist sympathizers in Pakistan’s intelligence service. (Also, she claims based on her travels in Pakistan that the drones are more popular within the tribal areas, but independent confirmation for that claim is dicey.) For a senior Pakistani general to embrace the drones is quite a vindication.

Like my right to sing "Happy Birthday" to my daughter?
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.07/posts.html?pg=7

So Netflix is starting to use its army of Flying Cloud Monkeys as a Content Delivery Network? No wonder the DVDs weren't making it to my mailbox!

Lifelock CEO here. My social security number is 457-55-5462.!

Wired had an article running about it already last year http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/08/ff_indiaid/all/1.

I meant that I can't believe this is news because I assumed people had been doing this for years.

Good for you. Too bad you didn't patent it. And I'm not being sarcastic.

As for the method employed: Wired had a big article on a/b testing last month which is probably why the summary was crap. It was written from the perspective of someone who already knew what a/b testing was.

Although the summary was poorly written, since I had seen the previous wired article I wanted to see what the new new hotness was.

Now to add to the actual discussion, my understanding from the wired article was that they give all candidates an even test run (of say a few thousand page views). Then based on performance they'll select one. Instead of dynamically weighting them immediately after the first performance feedback is entered. This would make sense for 2 reasons.
1) The computational expense of deciding which page to show on the fly based on it's most recent popularity is higher than getting a static sample run
2) Different pages may perform well in different demographics. If you introduce a new style and it gets downvoted to oblivion by the 10am crowd, you may never find out that it would have blown away all candidates with the 10pm crowd.

There are probably more reasons and I'm just pulling those out of my ass but there you go.

Here is some RNA: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/05/ribonucleotides/ Just give it a little more time, and it will get higher up.

Not sure on the validity of this, as I read that this was due to Microsoft using the click stream shared by users using IE. See http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/02/bing-copies-google/ for more information.

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/05/google-nsa-secrecy-upheld/

Define malware.

From an Apple point of view apps with hidden features are malware, esp. if those features are locked down in iOS on telco request:
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/07/apple-approves-pulls-flashlight-app-with-hidden-tethering-mode/

So here you have a piece of software posing as A but having hidden feature B. Somehow the reviewer missed a flashlight app creating a server socket to receive connections, something a piece of malware might do (though opening a connection to a botnet is easier and less conspicuous) and a flashlight app has no purpose for. That really makes me doubt how Apple certifies apps, surely they can get an overview of all API calls of an application!

But since this app was not really evil and was removed after the real purpose got known I guess you will just ignore this example (and it happened so long ago ofcourse, this problem has been fixed by Apple for sure).

This is all a bit rich, reading the resolution, considering that is is coming from the country which unilaterally seizes domains at will.

Don't forget as well that this is coming from the same government that proposed a kill switch for the Internet. Sounds more like "nobody should control the Internet, unless it is us" (well, this arguably applies to the US part of the Internet).

The resolution also says: "Whereas the world deserves the access to knowledge, ... and the informed discussion that is the bedrock of democratic self-government that the Internet provides;"
I thought that WikiLeaks and cablegate were exactly the kind of things which promote a healthy discussion in a democracy, but I doubt that that's what they had in mind when they drafted this resolution, free access to knowledge and all.

This all seems more like a bit of patriotic posturing. Blah blah land of the free blah blah cannot trust anybody else to be as free as we are blah blah. Seriously, it does not matter one bit what will be proposed at this conference; how exactly are you going to *force* the US to relinquish control? Not going to happen.

Let's not pretend that the police will restrict their use only to situations where they would have used a helicopter. You really think the point of these things is to save money? You really think police departments are going to sell their helicopters? Think again. Think Tasers. They were only supposed to be used in situations where before they would have used a firearm. Instead they are used to torture someone into compliance or just to torture someone for insulting them or disrespecting them in some way or just for fun. The police force has no shortage of sick fucks who wank every night to torture porn. It will be the same situation here. Give the police a new toy like this and they can be relied on to abuse it in every way possible. And at least in the US no one can stop them from doing so.

Actually, the guy who springs to mind is Roland Freisler, who famously once burst out "Wir brauchen kein Gesetzbuch, Recht ist, was dem deutschen Volke nutzt." which translates as "We don't need any book of law! What's right, is what gains the German people."

Feel free to substitute beneficiaries etc as fits the case. Also keep this one in mind, Tomas NorstrÃm. Lookie, more fishy stuff in that context here.

Actually, the guy who springs to mind is Roland Freisler, who famously once burst out "Wir brauchen kein Gesetzbuch, Recht ist, was dem deutschen Volke nutzt." which translates as "We don't need any book of law! What's right, is what gains the German people."

Feel free to substitute beneficiaries etc as fits the case. Also keep this one in mind, Tomas NorstrÃm. Lookie, more fishy stuff in that context here.

May I present you the "trial" against the guy behind the Pirate Bay? Presided by none other than Thomas NorstrÃm? Fair trial my ass. This thing will be as rigged. We have a looooong history of such "trials".

Just check out the map of infected systems. Note that there are no infections reported in Jordan, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, U.A.E., Yemen, Oman, etc. What a coincidence that these countries are all friendly to the U.S. and/or support continued counterterror operations in their territory, and/or have actual bases for the U.S. in them.

The Saudi Arabia infections (10) could be in computers used by Iranian intelligence agents.

USA made flame. There's no doubt.

If Oxford Nanopore lives up to their hype, we can expect the price of instruments to fall dramatically. Their technology is supposedly very scalable, with the cheapest gadget packaged as a self-contained disposable $900 (!) USB stick sequencer:

http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2012/03/oxford-nanopore-sequencing-usb/

This isn't genome level, as it will 'only' do a few hundred megabases before it burns out, but the workhorse instruments will use many more replaceable nanopores in parallel, packaged in rackable server-like enclosures.

We may well reach a point where it becomes cheaper and easier to run off a whole genome than to do more than a handful of gene-specific assays.

Possibly relevant here (in some minor way) is that thinking in a foreign language allows people to be more rational.

..."organic technology"...

Here you see them slicing wafers with the most basic tools..

And it tastes delicious!

A smartphone with a REALLY big screen -- http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/05/80-inch-windows-8-tablets/ . Steve Ballmer thought of it. They are going to release a line of clothing that will allow you to carry it, too - http://www.lockheedmartin.com/us/products/hulc.html .

Perhaps the driver could become the vehicle in another way. Imagine if a soldier with full battle gear and weaponry could "sprint" for 30 minutes without getting tired. He would be more formidable in many scenarios than most conventional ground vehicles including tanks.

That might be possible if scientists can come up with a cybernetic augmentation that prevents soldiers from getting tired until they run out of fuel[1]. Most soldiers can be very strong for a few seconds, the problem is they get tired.

Possible ways of reducing fatigue:
a) modifying various stuff: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muscle_fatigue#Metabolic_fatigue
b) Regulating the temperature of the blood and muscles:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/15.03/bemore_pr.html

[1] Peak sprinter/cyclist output is about 2 kilowatts. The amount of energy in a litre of oil or cooking oil is about 30-35 megajoules. Which is enough for 4 hours assuming 100% efficiency- impossible of course, but just to give an idea of the ballpark figures.

What actually happened was that the State Department purchased some anti-Al-Qaeda ads to run when certain key terms were also on the screen, similar to how AdWords works. It's a pretty interesting concept, really - the necessity of displaying advertising on a site can open the door for alternative messages/realities to reach the viewer.

I have to start by saying that I am extremely biased. Even though it is only a few hours away, my wife won't let me visit the Edison museum in Fort Myers for fear I would burn it down.

However Edison was a truly dispicable man. You can say what you want about Gates, Jobs, Elison, Zuckerburg and others but they are businessmen and often nasty businessmen.

Edison spent years trying to discredit A/C including killing animals as large as an elephant.*

One of his inventions was the electric chair which by it's very design is a device to kill.**

The nascent movie business actually pulled up stakes and moved 3000 miles to a little CA town called Hollywood because Edison's thugs would destroy any film or equipment being used for movie making unless he got a cut.***

I could go on but I think I'm getting a tad emotionally attached to this post. I think all of us are. Have you ever seen so many four and fives?

* Jan. 4, 1903: Edison Fries an Elephant to Prove His Point.
** Edison's Menlo Park Lab Invents the Electric Chair.
*** Edison's hires goons to shut down movie filming.

I have to start by saying that I am extremely biased. Even though it is only a few hours away, my wife won't let me visit the Edison museum in Fort Myers for fear I would burn it down.

However Edison was a truly dispicable man. You can say what you want about Gates, Jobs, Elison, Zuckerburg and others but they are businessmen and often nasty businessmen.

Edison spent years trying to discredit A/C including killing animals as large as an elephant.*

One of his inventions was the electric chair which by it's very design is a device to kill.**

The nascent movie business actually pulled up stakes and moved 3000 miles to a little CA town called Hollywood because Edison's thugs would destroy any film or equipment being used for movie making unless he got a cut.***

I could go on but I think I'm getting a tad emotionally attached to this post. I think all of us are. Have you ever seen so many four and fives?

* Jan. 4, 1903: Edison Fries an Elephant to Prove His Point.
** Edison's Menlo Park Lab Invents the Electric Chair.
*** Edison's hires goons to shut down movie filming.

of course it's true you moron.

1200km/50l is easily done, just pick up ANY VW TDI, say from 2009 on.
even my piddly tdi jetta does this

everyone else I know is getting 1400km/50l or better.

as for 300km/50l there's a host of cars I had that did this, form the ford focus to the toyota prius, i've driven about a dozen different cars that get this mileage on a regular basis.

don't believe me, check out the VW sites where drivers are posting their own experiences and do 46mpg or better on a regular basis.

and then there's this from 2008 - http://www.wired.com/autopia/2008/09/vws-prius-killi/

But the non-diesel VW doesn't get 300km/50l so why are you claiming that diesel gives 4 times better mileage? For around the same price as a VW TDI, you can get a Prius C and get over 1000km/50l