Putting this figure into context, $75 trillion is about $250000 per person in the USA. If the rest of the world wants to shoulder its share, it becomes a mere $12000 per person over the entire planet.
Why are they banning under-13's from using the site? Is 13 the age of consent in the United States?
No, but it is the age of consent in Spain and Iran. It's 12 or less in Angola, the Philippines, Yemen, and parts of Mexico. A few countries don't have an age of consent, requiring only that sex be within marriage (at any age). In most of the world, it varies from 14 to 16, and in the USA it varies from 16 to 18.
Seriously, I'm running Windows 7 on an 8 year old laptop right now, with 1GB of RAM. It's a 1.3 Celeron, and it runs just as good as XP did on the same machine
Hey, I've also got an 8-year-old laptop with 1GB of RAM and a 1.6GHz Pentium M. It's also got a 17" 1920x1200 display without a single dead pixel, and its battery is still in pretty good shape. However, when I upgraded it from XP about 6 years ago, I moved to Ubuntu which runs better than XP on this machine. It currently runs 10.04 LTS, and everything works fine. It's our "kitchen computer" and is used for rather more than just email & browsing - it can play HD movies (vlc) loaded from our server, and is used for editing documents (OpenOffice), processing photos (Bibble pro, Gimp), and vector graphics (Inkscape), among other tasks.
For his birthday party, we're going to play his rendition of Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds on repeat.
No, no, no; he'd enjoy hearing his own voice too much (however pathetic the actual words and lack of melody). Make him repeatedly watch and listen to Leonard Nimoy singing "The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins". Of course, Shatner might not reach 81 this way...
Also, let me add - this was 25 years ago. Schools seem to be much more twitchy about such things these days.
Yep. 35+ years since I was in high school. We played with all sorts of "dangerous" stuff in our poorly-equipped chemistry and physics labs. It included some organic synthesis and distillation as well as pyrotechics (the usual Mg, Na+water, etc.), and we also played a little with throwing around lightning, and spinning while holding heavy gyroscopes. Of these, the gyroscope sessions were probably the ones with the smallest safety margin.
This comes at the time when HTC are also stepping up their attempts at locking down their phones . The recently released LTE flagship — ThunderBolt is their most locked-down phone to date.
The submitter should know that the HTC Thunderbolt is just a customized variant of the HTC Desire HD provided for Verizon. Locking it up is almost certainly a Verizon-demanded attribute, and not an initiative from HTC. The Desire HD is unlocked in most of the world, and I doubt if a locked version can be obtained in countries with a more enlightened phone system.
But when you get to set them on fire yourself... it's "Holy SHIT!!! We got to BURN SHIT in CLASS TODAY!!!" and they'll talk about it for weeks. This is what is called a Golden Opportunity to actually teach them what's going on.
Exactly. And you don't have to do dramatic experiments/demonstrations every week. Just one spectacle per month will get your students interested in the subject and will earn you a reputation as the Teacher Who Does Good Shit.
Our older daughter's physics teacher recently got them to play with the van der Graaf generator (I have similar fond memories from high school). She was one of the eager volunteers for some hair-raising experiments, including shooting sparks from her fingertips. She told us that almost half the class was either in wide-eyed shock or cowering in fear during the experiments, but all of them were talking about it excitedly afterwards, and looking forward to their next physics class.
Nitrogen triiodide was what really kept my classmates' attention.
Cool if your high school chemistry teacher allowed you to synthesize NI3 or NI3(NH3) and then use it. Was he fired afterwards?
NI3(NH3) is impressive for stability demos and maybe even a very cautious practical joke. We did not make it until university, where one of the chemistry lecturers was slightly mad - the labs had to be evacuated on several occasions because of the experiments he encouraged.
the M4400 seems to enjoy having random drivers crash
You're lucky if that's all that goes wrong. We have six identical Dell M4400 laptops in our workgroup, none more than a year old. In that time, one had a motherboard failure, another had a hard disk failure (catastrophic: nothing recoverable), and a third had a display failure. A fourth one is behaving oddly, such as the occasional BSOD, but passes hardware diagnostics and detailed malware scans, so we have to live with it. Two of the six have been relatively problem-free.
A pox on Dell and the cheap trash it foists onto its victims.
First of all, the US does profile. I have a friend with the surname "Ali", and she has never been able to travel without getting pulled aside. She's on some kind of list... that is profiling. The US does it, and apparently sucks at it.
Second, because they suck at it, it IS evil. This woman is no more or less of a risk than any other American mother with 2 kids and a hubby. The government has no business putting her on a secret list and hassling her when she travels. No one is safer as a result.
Similar problem here. I have a typical North European appearance, a distinctly Anglo name, and a matching EU passport, and am occasionally accompanied by wife and kids. Despite this, I get called out of the line in every US airport for the extra questions and frisking. You see, I have a beard, which I have had since about 1990 (before that, I sported only a moustache).
Reaction by security drones? A beard, a beard! The mark of a terrorist! Quick, isolate and persecute the terrorist!!! Persecute him some more, just to be sure...
Profiling as it is done in the US is pathetic. I avoid travel to the US as much as possible, but one or two trips per year seems to be the minimum I can get away with in my job.
And a cosmic ray zipping through the universe could knock a strand of dna off your body, and cause incurable cancer too. But you don't worry about that. The chance of the reactor doing the same is close to 0 as well. Especially now that people are on the ground and getting power wired back into the main pumps.
The daily average is 28-38usv/hr. There are places in the US, right now which are in the 60usv/hr range which is double. Anything above I believe 250msv/hr causes damage, I am tired and am at work while doing this, so posting from memory and not being able to search doesn't make it too easy.
I think some of the numbers cited should be per day, not per hour; let's not contribute to the deluge of misinformation hitting the public on this and other topics.
The average background dose is 2.4mSv/year = 6.5uSv/day = 0.27uSv/hour. The recently reported level in Tokyo can be found in this map and was up to 19uSv/day = 0.8uSv/hour when I checked. So it's higher than the average background, but not remarkably so (factor of 3-ish). Levels in the immediate vicinity of the reactors are much higher, of course.
The highest known background radiation is at Ramsar on the Caspian coast of Iran. Apparently it's mostly due to radium-226 in local hot springs which are piped into spas and are popular with locals and tourists. Although the dosage is close to the level where negative health effects should be measurable, the health and longevity of local residents seem to be better than average. The dosage in Ramsar reaches about 200mSv/yr = 547uSv/day = 22.8uSv/hour. In other words, the natural annual dose there is double the 5-year limit for nuclear workers in the USA. The hourly dose is almost 30 times the maximum reported in Tokyo.
While I'm certainly not opposed to the idea, both scores and recordings exists that are out of copyright.
Bach is probably one of the easier composers to get hold of both scores and recordings.
There are a few PD or CC versions there (among many which must be purchased). One problem is that the PD ones are mostly just bitmap scans of ancient prints, and the CC ones are PDFs. The PDFs are neater and cleaner than the scans, but neither of them is a "source" code - you cannot easily modify the score to make your own variations in tempo through a piece, for example, or add an extra instrument to augment the piece. That is probably the greatest benefit of releasing scores in XML or TeX format - the ability to easily adapt or modify them.
How free do you think the "free" phone is? As posters above have noted, the cost of the "free" phone in monthly increments to the basic service over the duration of the contract (typically 2 years) amounts to several times what the phone would actually cost. The phone is paid for, with a heck of a margin added on.
When the service plan costs you the same either way, you might as well take the "free" phone, because you pay for it even if you choose not to. and that is the reality of almost any provider in north america.
Percidere, emptor, moneo.[*]
I suppose that might be the new motto for phone companies in the US. They certainly seem to be living up to it.
[*] Rough translation: A reaming, customer, I warn you. It's based on the start of an epigram often posted with an effigy of Priapus on merchant's stalls in ancient Rome.
Dumb? Open your eyes. There's really no alternative. You either pay for what it costs...or you do without. Americans aren't dumb, they just have no alternative.
By your logic, a North Korean citizen is an idiot simply because their country has an evil totalitarian government.
Interesting point, but I'd modify it a little.
I have not met any North Koreans, but am willing to surmise that their intelligence as individuals has a similar range to that found in other countries. So individually, they are unlikely to be nearly all idiots. Collectively, however, they accept and endure a despotic regime, so as a nation they are indeed idiotic not to seek an alternative.
I have met many Americans, and they exhibit the usual range of intelligence, including morons as well as brilliant individuals. Collectively, however, I am beginning to suspect that they are becoming more and more idiotic due to widespread acceptance of objectionable situations because "no alternatives" are presented to them. This slope is rather slippery, but luckily there is still quite a way to go before they resemble the population of North Korea. Maybe it's not yet too late.
Here in America, you're stupid if you don't get a free phone... the ONLY carrier that discounts service if you aren't leasing a phone is T-Mobile. If you buy a phone outright and use any other service, you're throwing money away.
How free do you think the "free" phone is? As posters above have noted, the cost of the "free" phone in monthly increments to the basic service over the duration of the contract (typically 2 years) amounts to several times what the phone would actually cost. The phone is paid for, with a heck of a margin added on.
I bought a Desire Z for my teenage daughter a few months ago, entirely separate to the phone/data service. She has an unlimited data plan (no caps whatsoever) that adds 3euro onto the monthly fee. Her base monthly fee is 0.66euro (thats 66 eurocents), and her calls and text messages rarely even reach 5euro. The service has nothing to do with the phone, and does not even care what kind of phone she has. At home, she uses our wireless network because it's faster than the phone internet link, and connects to our media server to load music & videos onto her phone (there are no issues with or restrictions on tethering).
The phone cost us just over 600eur including a 32GB uSDHC add-on. The monthly service including unlimited data is typically 7-9eur[*], giving a total outlay over two years of about 800eur including the phone. You do the math: how much would a comparable service cost over 24 months in the US with unlimited data, tethering, and a comparable "free" telephone (Desire Z or Desire HD or similar)?
[*] We get service for 4 phones from the same company, so they give us an additional 10% discount on the service. I did not factor this in.
What would you want it to be called? "Operation Naked Truth"?
Operation "Rough Penetration" might describe its intended relationship with the truth (bend over and spread 'em, citizen).
Plusgoodwise bellythinkful, verging bumthinkful. Approved fullwise.
The actual anti-fog coating itself is composed of polyvinyl alcohol, which is a hydrophilic compound that causes the individual droplets of condensation to disperse
Unless I'm waaaay off, I think they mean hydrophobic, as in "it doesn not bond with water".
Um, you are, indeed, way off.
A hydrophobic coating would cause condensation to coalesce into droplets minimizing contact area between the condensate and the surface. In other words, it would fog the surface: due to refraction and internal reflection, small water droplets in air are essentially opaque while large droplets act as distorting lenses.
A hydrophilic coating, on the other hand, causes the condensation to form a continuous film maximizing contact between the condensate and the surface. This would remain transparent and would not greatly distort images viewed through it unless the amount of condensate was very large.
The NASA image is incomparably better and definitely closer to reality.
Your "enhanced" version is excessively Disney-ish and reminiscent of the color-coding used in atlases, with shades of green and brown which could exist in Ireland only in paintings. I lived 20+ years in Ireland; in March, the greens are dull and/or dark and even when it's sunny the mountains are never such a bright brown. It could make an illustration of some sort in a geography schoolbook, where it is implicit that the colors are false.
TFS just links to somebody's blog with the low resolution image, and repetition of much of NASA's text. It has no links to better resolution images.
Here's a link to the NASA Image of the Day page, with the same image and much the same text, but with links for larger versions of the image such as this.
This would not kill patents; in fact patents are specifically intended to make what you're doing transparent. Anyone can look it up and read a clear description of your patented process. They just can't mimic it until the patent expires.
Actually, it would. In most of the world, you cannot apply for a patent on anything which has been publicly revealed before the date on which the application was filed. If there is zero privacy, then an invention can only be kept secret if it remains in your thoughts; as soon as it is put into a document, it is likely to be public. There is a loophole for the US and Canada, whereby the original inventor can apply for a patent up to one year after publication of the invention. It is expected that the loophole will be closed sooner or later, but if everything you do is non-private, then proving one is the original inventor is could become quite challenging.
...I'm still searching for an area in which trackpads (and trackpads-like devices like the evomouse) have re better than (or are even as good as) more traditional devices.
The only two I can think of are laptops, and rackmount keyboard/mouse trays
But the keyboard clit (curiously called a TrackPoint by IBM/Lenovo) is better than trackpads in every way.
The trackpad is one of the first items I disable on a laptop. Luckily with Dell laptops the "pointing stick" (yet another curious name for the keyboard clit) and trackpad can be independently disabled.
Slashdot Mirror
Only a mad man would compare evolution with radioactive mutation.
So, should we call it "intelligent design" then?
What do you mean by a ball chair? I need a new office chair and I'm assuming you don't mean this?
I'm hoping he does NOT mean this or this or this.
because he won't come too soon...
Putting this figure into context, $75 trillion is about $250000 per person in the USA. If the rest of the world wants to shoulder its share, it becomes a mere $12000 per person over the entire planet.
Why are they banning under-13's from using the site? Is 13 the age of consent in the United States?
No, but it is the age of consent in Spain and Iran. It's 12 or less in Angola, the Philippines, Yemen, and parts of Mexico. A few countries don't have an age of consent, requiring only that sex be within marriage (at any age). In most of the world, it varies from 14 to 16, and in the USA it varies from 16 to 18.
I thought it said "Facebook bangs 20,000 kids a day", which is probably criminal.
But sending them to Myspace is almost certainly worse...
Seriously, I'm running Windows 7 on an 8 year old laptop right now, with 1GB of RAM. It's a 1.3 Celeron, and it runs just as good as XP did on the same machine
Hey, I've also got an 8-year-old laptop with 1GB of RAM and a 1.6GHz Pentium M. It's also got a 17" 1920x1200 display without a single dead pixel, and its battery is still in pretty good shape. However, when I upgraded it from XP about 6 years ago, I moved to Ubuntu which runs better than XP on this machine. It currently runs 10.04 LTS, and everything works fine. It's our "kitchen computer" and is used for rather more than just email & browsing - it can play HD movies (vlc) loaded from our server, and is used for editing documents (OpenOffice), processing photos (Bibble pro, Gimp), and vector graphics (Inkscape), among other tasks.
For his birthday party, we're going to play his rendition of Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds on repeat.
No, no, no; he'd enjoy hearing his own voice too much (however pathetic the actual words and lack of melody). Make him repeatedly watch and listen to Leonard Nimoy singing "The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins". Of course, Shatner might not reach 81 this way...
Also, let me add - this was 25 years ago. Schools seem to be much more twitchy about such things these days.
Yep. 35+ years since I was in high school. We played with all sorts of "dangerous" stuff in our poorly-equipped chemistry and physics labs. It included some organic synthesis and distillation as well as pyrotechics (the usual Mg, Na+water, etc.), and we also played a little with throwing around lightning, and spinning while holding heavy gyroscopes. Of these, the gyroscope sessions were probably the ones with the smallest safety margin.
This comes at the time when HTC are also stepping up their attempts at locking down their phones . The recently released LTE flagship — ThunderBolt is their most locked-down phone to date.
The submitter should know that the HTC Thunderbolt is just a customized variant of the HTC Desire HD provided for Verizon. Locking it up is almost certainly a Verizon-demanded attribute, and not an initiative from HTC. The Desire HD is unlocked in most of the world, and I doubt if a locked version can be obtained in countries with a more enlightened phone system.
But when you get to set them on fire yourself... it's "Holy SHIT!!! We got to BURN SHIT in CLASS TODAY!!!" and they'll talk about it for weeks. This is what is called a Golden Opportunity to actually teach them what's going on.
Exactly. And you don't have to do dramatic experiments/demonstrations every week. Just one spectacle per month will get your students interested in the subject and will earn you a reputation as the Teacher Who Does Good Shit.
Our older daughter's physics teacher recently got them to play with the van der Graaf generator (I have similar fond memories from high school). She was one of the eager volunteers for some hair-raising experiments, including shooting sparks from her fingertips. She told us that almost half the class was either in wide-eyed shock or cowering in fear during the experiments, but all of them were talking about it excitedly afterwards, and looking forward to their next physics class.
Nitrogen triiodide was what really kept my classmates' attention.
Cool if your high school chemistry teacher allowed you to synthesize NI3 or NI3(NH3) and then use it. Was he fired afterwards?
NI3(NH3) is impressive for stability demos and maybe even a very cautious practical joke. We did not make it until university, where one of the chemistry lecturers was slightly mad - the labs had to be evacuated on several occasions because of the experiments he encouraged.
the M4400 seems to enjoy having random drivers crash
You're lucky if that's all that goes wrong. We have six identical Dell M4400 laptops in our workgroup, none more than a year old. In that time, one had a motherboard failure, another had a hard disk failure (catastrophic: nothing recoverable), and a third had a display failure. A fourth one is behaving oddly, such as the occasional BSOD, but passes hardware diagnostics and detailed malware scans, so we have to live with it. Two of the six have been relatively problem-free.
A pox on Dell and the cheap trash it foists onto its victims.
I mean profiling, it's evil or something. Anyway.
First of all, the US does profile. I have a friend with the surname "Ali", and she has never been able to travel without getting pulled aside. She's on some kind of list... that is profiling. The US does it, and apparently sucks at it.
Second, because they suck at it, it IS evil. This woman is no more or less of a risk than any other American mother with 2 kids and a hubby. The government has no business putting her on a secret list and hassling her when she travels. No one is safer as a result.
Similar problem here. I have a typical North European appearance, a distinctly Anglo name, and a matching EU passport, and am occasionally accompanied by wife and kids. Despite this, I get called out of the line in every US airport for the extra questions and frisking. You see, I have a beard, which I have had since about 1990 (before that, I sported only a moustache).
Reaction by security drones? A beard, a beard! The mark of a terrorist! Quick, isolate and persecute the terrorist!!! Persecute him some more, just to be sure...
Profiling as it is done in the US is pathetic. I avoid travel to the US as much as possible, but one or two trips per year seems to be the minimum I can get away with in my job.
And a cosmic ray zipping through the universe could knock a strand of dna off your body, and cause incurable cancer too. But you don't worry about that. The chance of the reactor doing the same is close to 0 as well. Especially now that people are on the ground and getting power wired back into the main pumps.
The daily average is 28-38usv/hr. There are places in the US, right now which are in the 60usv/hr range which is double. Anything above I believe 250msv/hr causes damage, I am tired and am at work while doing this, so posting from memory and not being able to search doesn't make it too easy.
I think some of the numbers cited should be per day, not per hour; let's not contribute to the deluge of misinformation hitting the public on this and other topics.
The average background dose is 2.4mSv/year = 6.5uSv/day = 0.27uSv/hour. The recently reported level in Tokyo can be found in this map and was up to 19uSv/day = 0.8uSv/hour when I checked. So it's higher than the average background, but not remarkably so (factor of 3-ish). Levels in the immediate vicinity of the reactors are much higher, of course.
The highest known background radiation is at Ramsar on the Caspian coast of Iran. Apparently it's mostly due to radium-226 in local hot springs which are piped into spas and are popular with locals and tourists. Although the dosage is close to the level where negative health effects should be measurable, the health and longevity of local residents seem to be better than average. The dosage in Ramsar reaches about 200mSv/yr = 547uSv/day = 22.8uSv/hour. In other words, the natural annual dose there is double the 5-year limit for nuclear workers in the USA. The hourly dose is almost 30 times the maximum reported in Tokyo.
While I'm certainly not opposed to the idea, both scores and recordings exists that are out of copyright. Bach is probably one of the easier composers to get hold of both scores and recordings.
There are several copyright-free scores at IMLSP (direct link).
There are a few PD or CC versions there (among many which must be purchased). One problem is that the PD ones are mostly just bitmap scans of ancient prints, and the CC ones are PDFs. The PDFs are neater and cleaner than the scans, but neither of them is a "source" code - you cannot easily modify the score to make your own variations in tempo through a piece, for example, or add an extra instrument to augment the piece. That is probably the greatest benefit of releasing scores in XML or TeX format - the ability to easily adapt or modify them.
How free do you think the "free" phone is? As posters above have noted, the cost of the "free" phone in monthly increments to the basic service over the duration of the contract (typically 2 years) amounts to several times what the phone would actually cost. The phone is paid for, with a heck of a margin added on.
When the service plan costs you the same either way, you might as well take the "free" phone, because you pay for it even if you choose not to. and that is the reality of almost any provider in north america.
Percidere, emptor, moneo.[*]
I suppose that might be the new motto for phone companies in the US. They certainly seem to be living up to it.
[*] Rough translation: A reaming, customer, I warn you. It's based on the start of an epigram often posted with an effigy of Priapus on merchant's stalls in ancient Rome.
Dumb? Open your eyes. There's really no alternative. You either pay for what it costs...or you do without. Americans aren't dumb, they just have no alternative.
By your logic, a North Korean citizen is an idiot simply because their country has an evil totalitarian government.
Interesting point, but I'd modify it a little.
I have not met any North Koreans, but am willing to surmise that their intelligence as individuals has a similar range to that found in other countries. So individually, they are unlikely to be nearly all idiots. Collectively, however, they accept and endure a despotic regime, so as a nation they are indeed idiotic not to seek an alternative.
I have met many Americans, and they exhibit the usual range of intelligence, including morons as well as brilliant individuals. Collectively, however, I am beginning to suspect that they are becoming more and more idiotic due to widespread acceptance of objectionable situations because "no alternatives" are presented to them. This slope is rather slippery, but luckily there is still quite a way to go before they resemble the population of North Korea. Maybe it's not yet too late.
Here in America, you're stupid if you don't get a free phone... the ONLY carrier that discounts service if you aren't leasing a phone is T-Mobile. If you buy a phone outright and use any other service, you're throwing money away.
How free do you think the "free" phone is? As posters above have noted, the cost of the "free" phone in monthly increments to the basic service over the duration of the contract (typically 2 years) amounts to several times what the phone would actually cost. The phone is paid for, with a heck of a margin added on.
I bought a Desire Z for my teenage daughter a few months ago, entirely separate to the phone/data service. She has an unlimited data plan (no caps whatsoever) that adds 3euro onto the monthly fee. Her base monthly fee is 0.66euro (thats 66 eurocents), and her calls and text messages rarely even reach 5euro. The service has nothing to do with the phone, and does not even care what kind of phone she has. At home, she uses our wireless network because it's faster than the phone internet link, and connects to our media server to load music & videos onto her phone (there are no issues with or restrictions on tethering).
The phone cost us just over 600eur including a 32GB uSDHC add-on. The monthly service including unlimited data is typically 7-9eur[*], giving a total outlay over two years of about 800eur including the phone. You do the math: how much would a comparable service cost over 24 months in the US with unlimited data, tethering, and a comparable "free" telephone (Desire Z or Desire HD or similar)?
[*] We get service for 4 phones from the same company, so they give us an additional 10% discount on the service. I did not factor this in.
What would you want it to be called? "Operation Naked Truth"?
Operation "Rough Penetration" might describe its intended relationship with the truth (bend over and spread 'em, citizen).
Plusgoodwise bellythinkful, verging bumthinkful. Approved fullwise.
From TFA:
The actual anti-fog coating itself is composed of polyvinyl alcohol, which is a hydrophilic compound that causes the individual droplets of condensation to disperse
Unless I'm waaaay off, I think they mean hydrophobic, as in "it doesn not bond with water".
Um, you are, indeed, way off.
A hydrophobic coating would cause condensation to coalesce into droplets minimizing contact area between the condensate and the surface. In other words, it would fog the surface: due to refraction and internal reflection, small water droplets in air are essentially opaque while large droplets act as distorting lenses.
A hydrophilic coating, on the other hand, causes the condensation to form a continuous film maximizing contact between the condensate and the surface. This would remain transparent and would not greatly distort images viewed through it unless the amount of condensate was very large.
The NASA image is incomparably better and definitely closer to reality.
Your "enhanced" version is excessively Disney-ish and reminiscent of the color-coding used in atlases, with shades of green and brown which could exist in Ireland only in paintings. I lived 20+ years in Ireland; in March, the greens are dull and/or dark and even when it's sunny the mountains are never such a bright brown. It could make an illustration of some sort in a geography schoolbook, where it is implicit that the colors are false.
TFS just links to somebody's blog with the low resolution image, and repetition of much of NASA's text. It has no links to better resolution images.
Here's a link to the NASA Image of the Day page, with the same image and much the same text, but with links for larger versions of the image such as this.
This would not kill patents; in fact patents are specifically intended to make what you're doing transparent. Anyone can look it up and read a clear description of your patented process. They just can't mimic it until the patent expires.
Actually, it would. In most of the world, you cannot apply for a patent on anything which has been publicly revealed before the date on which the application was filed. If there is zero privacy, then an invention can only be kept secret if it remains in your thoughts; as soon as it is put into a document, it is likely to be public. There is a loophole for the US and Canada, whereby the original inventor can apply for a patent up to one year after publication of the invention. It is expected that the loophole will be closed sooner or later, but if everything you do is non-private, then proving one is the original inventor is could become quite challenging.
The only two I can think of are laptops, and rackmount keyboard/mouse trays
But the keyboard clit (curiously called a TrackPoint by IBM/Lenovo) is better than trackpads in every way.
The trackpad is one of the first items I disable on a laptop. Luckily with Dell laptops the "pointing stick" (yet another curious name for the keyboard clit) and trackpad can be independently disabled.