When facing that much cross-platform usage, Id go with Google Docs/Calander/Chat/Gmail for simplicity and ease of use. Its somewhat feature-light, but would provide the broad base and low cost you are looking for. It probably will never be Great, but it may be Good Enough, at least until the startup grows enough to make larger, more expensive packages worth it.
Having some sort of talk about the realities of racism is a sad necessity for many parts of the US, but that is a separate thing entirely from this guy's List. This is simply an example of a sheltered man who does not know enough to realize he is projecting his personal frustrations onto an entire race, and instead thinks they are somehow rational or justified. Some gems are:
(10g) Before voting for a black politician, scrutinize his/her character much more carefully than you would a white.
(11) The mean intelligence of blacks is much lower than for whites. The least intelligent ten percent of whites have IQs below 81; forty percent of blacks have IQs that low. Only one black in six is more intelligent than the average white; five whites out of six are more intelligent than the average black. These differences show in every test of general cognitive ability that anyone, of any race or nationality, has yet been able to devise. They are reflected in countless everyday situations. “Life is an IQ test.”
(13) In that pool of forty million, there are nonetheless many intelligent and well-socialized blacks. (I’ll use IWSB as an ad hoc abbreviation.) You should consciously seek opportunities to make friends with IWSBs. In addition to the ordinary pleasures of friendship, you will gain an amulet against potentially career-destroying accusations of prejudice.
(15) Unfortunately the demand is greater than the supply, so IWSBs are something of a luxury good, like antique furniture or corporate jets: boasted of by upper-class whites and wealthy organizations, coveted by the less prosperous. To be an IWSB in present-day US society is a height of felicity rarely before attained by any group of human beings in history. Try to curb your envy: it will be taken as prejudice (see paragraph 13).
The Propeller multicore Micro-controller can do all of those things and is now sold on the shelf at radio-shack. if you are not afraid of a little soldering, you can build it up and load it with software modules readily available as part of the Propeller Object Exchange, OBEX, (under the MIT license) for communication, displays, storage, and pretty much anything else under the sun (if not in the exchange, check the forums). There is even a modified Linux that will run on one.
This article is is very misleading. All the ruling states is that it is not innately Unconstitutional to allow prisoners to be searched before being admitted to the General Population of a Prison. It does not say its an open privileged of Law Enforcement, or that such things can not or should not be regulated at the state level (where nearly all privacy laws reside). And for those of you not for the US or ignorant of the terminology, this does not mean a strip search for any offense, nor does it mean unrestricted strip search privileges. Cops cannot go around picking people up for anything and stripping them down for fun. To be admitted to the General Population of a prison, you have been already charged with a crime, denied bail, and are in for an extended stay, or else have already been convicted of a crime and sentenced to jail-time. Then it must be proven that you are not a danger to the rest of the population from disease, contraband (ie weapons, drugs), undocumented gang affiliations (which will often intentionally get arrested to gain access to their intended victims), etc.
That being said, no system is perfect and accidents happen and sometimes people get sent to jail incorrectly. Those instances are tragic and every effort should be taken to avoid them. I had a friend in high school who was arrested for underage possession of alcohol. He was taken in and was booked while they contacted his parents, all normal. But then the the power went out and fried the computer systems, and suddenly the police station had holding cells full of people and no way to confirm who was who or why they were there; no way to tell the murderers from the con men from the minors having a bad night, and they were forced to lock up everyone until things could be cleared up. Long story short, that power outage and a bad choice of lawyer left him in general population for most of a week. Was it fun? Hell no, it scared him shitless. But at least he was reasonably safe.
Which headline would you rather see:
"Innocent Man Jailed, had terrible time in prison"
or
"Innocent man Killed in Jail with Smuggled Switchblade, Guards Not Allowed to Search Inmates Over Privacy Concerns"
If the Supreme court had ruled that the searches where unconstitutional, such searches would have to be unilaterally banned, which kills any hope of maintaining even a semblance of a safe prison environment. If they ruled that it was only allowed for certain offenses, then only a certain cross-section of the population would actually be subject to the safety, which makes it pointlessly ineffective. What they did was rule that the regulation of the searches should be left to a more case-by-case (or realistically a state-by-state) basis. I know that we all have a reflexive reaction to any perceived power or authority figure with the assumption that they will abuse whatever power they are given, but we forget that those positions of power exist for a reason. If we don't trust the people in those positions, we should be more concerned with preventing the wrong people form getting that job, not legislate away the power they need to do fulfill their role in society. Governments exist for a reason; We don't necessarily need a weaker Government, we just need a more trustworthy one.
They can enforce the rules as they wish (just like employers). Student should have used a private ISP, instead of the government-owned school network.
Three things:
1) He did not use the Schools network, he was at home and on his own computer. The school has a system that audits a student's Twitter Account any time they log in at the school. He made the Tweet at 2 AM from home. Then next day when he logged in to twitter at home, the school's system checked the account, found a tweet in it that it didnt like, and set off the alarms.
2)This was settled in the 1969 decision Tinker v. Des Moines, when some kids were suspend for wearing black armbands to protest the US in Vietnam. The Ruling determined that:
(from wikipedia)
The court's 7 to 2 decision held that the First Amendment applied to public schools, and that administrators would have to demonstrate constitutionally valid reasons for any specific regulation of speech in the classroom. The court observed, "It can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate."[1] Justice Abe Fortas wrote the majority opinion, holding that the speech regulation at issue in Tinker was "based upon an urgent wish to avoid the controversy which might result from the expression, even by the silent symbol of armbands, of opposition to this Nation's part in the conflagration in Vietnam." The Court held that in order for school officials to justify censoring speech, they "must be able to show that [their] action was caused by something more than a mere desire to avoid the discomfort and unpleasantness that always accompany an unpopular viewpoint," allowing schools to forbid conduct that would "materially and substantially interfere with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school."[2] The Court found that the actions of the Tinkers in wearing armbands did not cause disruption and held that their activity represented constitutionally protected symbolic speech.
Tinker remains a viable and frequently-cited Court precedent, though subsequent Court decisions have determined limitations on the scope of student free speech rights. In Bethel School District v. Fraser, a 1986 case, the Supreme Court held that a high school student's sexual innuendo–laden speech during a student assembly was not constitutionally protected. Fraser qualified Tinker in making an exception for "indecent" speech. Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier, where the court ruled that schools have the right to regulate, for legitimate educational reasons, the content of non-forum, school-sponsored newspapers, also limits Tinker's application. The Court in Hazelwood clarified that both Fraser and Hazelwood were decided under the doctrine of Perry Education Association v. Perry Local Educators Association. Such a distinction keeps undisturbed the Material Disruption doctrine of Tinker, while deciding certain student free speech cases under the Nonpublic Forum doctrine of Perry. In Morse v. Frederick, the Court held that schools may, consistent with the First Amendment, restrict student speech at a school-sponsored event, even those events occurring off school grounds, when that speech is reasonably viewed as promoting illegal drug use. [End Wiki Quote]
3)There is a Bill going through Indiana State Legislature, but not passed, to provide schools precisely this power, which the state recognizes is beyond the current bounds of Law. If they had the legitimate power to do this it wouldn't be requiring new legislation to grant. The (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/16/indiana-bill-would-allow-_n_1282790.html)
"House Bill 1169, the Restoring School Discipline Act, would permit schools to suspend or expel students for engaging in activities away from school and after hours that "may reasonably be considered to be an interference with school purposes or an educational function."
Under existing state law, school
I wonder what the power consumption increase is if you have to strap a heating laser to the write head. Lately the market seem to reward Technology that trends toward less power usage, not more
This is a useful map, it compares: AT&T, Cricket, Metro PCS, Sprint, T-Mobile, US Cellular, and Verizon.
One thing you should know however is that most of the companies actually share their networks to one degree or another, and there are options lesser known options that offer the same actual coverage. Check out: http://www.cellularbackdoor.com/alternative_networks.shtml
From the site: Same Network, Different Carrier -
These are separate, "alternative" companies that use the same wireless network, also known as Mobile Virtual Network Operators (MVNO), wholesale networks, or cellular "re-sellers", of the major carriers. You get your phone and customer service from these companies instead of the underlying carrier. Some companies use more than one network and the type of wireless device determines whether a CDMA, GSM or WIMAX carrier is used. All features may not be available. This is where to look if you hate your carrier but love their network.
Such is the case all technology. Cell phone carriers can still charge per message for a truncated text message, when the same device and infrastructure and contract allows you to send hundreds and thousands of times the data in email systems and streaming at a fraction of the cost.
In the industrial sector, which is their primary business and one where they have been leading innovation in for decades. They have these types of products, but they are geared toward serious use and not being a "fun toy" and so are priced above the average consumer level.
The fact is Honeywell has been making computer controlled systems like this for decades. Just because some little knockoff came along years later and packaged up a cheap version for consumers does not mean they have the right to infringe on legitimate proprietary designs. Which if you read the article include, specific control methods, the internal mechanism used as the actual thermostat, as well as some of the circuitry design used for power management.
Ive had good luck with demonstrations in Alaska of Sterling Engines and other external combustion technologies. They are quite popular for Alaskan audiences since the majority of the state has no central power grid, and in many cases no traditional running water, but will have a wood fire burning most of the year. Sterling engines for power generation, or even simple circulation systems that can be used to heat water for bathing (we filled a canoe with water and rigged a pedal power pump to circulate the water through a coil of copper tubing buried in the coals of a campfire)
They learned how to communicate meaning. The researchers taught them the words. the computers on board did not invent the words they used. In fact a computer would not do something as dumb as a spoken word but series of tones or even FSK.
When it needs a new word/label it generates it as a random combination of pre-programmed syllables that play the role of phonemes for the new language. English for example only uses 40 of them, but we combine them to make all the various words we know how to pronounce properly. It may not be a particularly sophisticated language, but I think it still counts well enough.
If everyone knows the origin story, I tend to have more respect for the films that just gloss over the origin and move on the the main plot. Both The Incredible Hulk and Superman Returns did this fairly well; they just accepted that these characters were known and understood by audiences as part of western culture. Now, if your whole goal is to reset and alter/update the origin, such as was done with the Batman reboot or the Spiderman franchise, then sure, go do your storytelling best. But otherwise it just wastes screen time, and ends up dragging down the whole film as we are subjected to what amounts to a regurgitated history lesson.
Since Microsoft people are the ones with the knowledge and resources to make the raid actually successful and a US Marshall realized they didn't. Hence the cooperation.
It's not a kick the door down and handcuff the drug-dealers sort of raid. Its a highly technical and fragile situation; the slightest misunderstood keystroke, unplugged wire etc. could destroy all the evidence they hoped to gather. If you were conducting a raid on a warehouse making bio-weapons instead of cyber-weapons, would you rather have the world leader in Bioengineering making the decisions, or whatever agent they can find that had a minor in that before going into law enforcement.
Despite that, I imagine it was the US Marshals waving the warrants around and not the Microsoft employees, as the article makes it sound.
That has to be one of the more ridiculous metrics I've seen. Most personal electronics are worth much more than their weight in a base metal. Its the nature of miniaturizing technology; value goes up with complexity and inverse to size. If anything, tablets are a slight step back, if compared to the iPhone etc. Silver is currently at about $315 a pound (converted from the Troy Ounces used for bullion). Most electronics considered portable would fall well above that curve. Certainly any smart phone you could name...
The Emotiv Epoch Headset (http://www.emotiv.com/) was rigged to control a wheelchair a few years back with decent success. And as someone who has spent time training with said EEG headset for controls applications (software in my case, but the function is the same) its not as bad as you would at first think.
The technology works on simple pattern recognition, and requires a good bit of training, both for the system and the user. A consumer is certainly not going to be able to drive one off the lot. It's not unlike a voice dictation software; the system needs to learn your particular patterns, and then uses simple "If A, then B" logic to trigger events. So you need to learn to have stable/repeatable patterns for reference.
Well, thats when its trying to detect by pure thought patterns. A much more reliable method is to use the same EEG system to detect specific facial patterns for control (ie blink the left eye to turn left). The aforementioned Emotiv headset can do that right out of the box, with just a few minutes to calibrate thresholds. And since that doesn't have to deal with the interference caused by the different facial ticks, it can be a much more reliable system. Not to mention that its easier to train up a good poker face than it is to control you're whole mindset, especially when spring comes around and all the joggers and sunbathers come out of hiding.
I can assure you that I do Engineer-level work on a daily basis without being a licensed Engineer. In fact, you have to do such work for several years as a requirement to get that license. Some people just need something to complain about.
Do you really want to trust Facebook as your sole backup? For that matter, do you want to trust them with EVERY picture you have? I still remember when every picture on MySpace got leaked and was available in one massive torrent.
Slashdot Mirror
When facing that much cross-platform usage, Id go with Google Docs/Calander/Chat/Gmail for simplicity and ease of use. Its somewhat feature-light, but would provide the broad base and low cost you are looking for. It probably will never be Great, but it may be Good Enough, at least until the startup grows enough to make larger, more expensive packages worth it.
Having some sort of talk about the realities of racism is a sad necessity for many parts of the US, but that is a separate thing entirely from this guy's List. This is simply an example of a sheltered man who does not know enough to realize he is projecting his personal frustrations onto an entire race, and instead thinks they are somehow rational or justified. Some gems are:
(10g) Before voting for a black politician, scrutinize his/her character much more carefully than you would a white.
(11) The mean intelligence of blacks is much lower than for whites. The least intelligent ten percent of whites have IQs below 81; forty percent of blacks have IQs that low. Only one black in six is more intelligent than the average white; five whites out of six are more intelligent than the average black. These differences show in every test of general cognitive ability that anyone, of any race or nationality, has yet been able to devise. They are reflected in countless everyday situations. “Life is an IQ test.”
(13) In that pool of forty million, there are nonetheless many intelligent and well-socialized blacks. (I’ll use IWSB as an ad hoc abbreviation.) You should consciously seek opportunities to make friends with IWSBs. In addition to the ordinary pleasures of friendship, you will gain an amulet against potentially career-destroying accusations of prejudice.
(15) Unfortunately the demand is greater than the supply, so IWSBs are something of a luxury good, like antique furniture or corporate jets: boasted of by upper-class whites and wealthy organizations, coveted by the less prosperous. To be an IWSB in present-day US society is a height of felicity rarely before attained by any group of human beings in history. Try to curb your envy: it will be taken as prejudice (see paragraph 13).
http://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/imagerecords/55000/55167/earth_lights_lrg.jpg
Anyone ever notice the really bright spot on the norther coast of Alaska? The big swath north of Anchorage, out by Prudhoe Bay...
The Propeller multicore Micro-controller can do all of those things and is now sold on the shelf at radio-shack. if you are not afraid of a little soldering, you can build it up and load it with software modules readily available as part of the Propeller Object Exchange, OBEX, (under the MIT license) for communication, displays, storage, and pretty much anything else under the sun (if not in the exchange, check the forums). There is even a modified Linux that will run on one.
Propeller: https://www.parallax.com/tabid/407/Default.aspx
Free Code: http://obex.parallax.com/
Linux Based OS: http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?123795-spinix&highlight=linux
This article is is very misleading. All the ruling states is that it is not innately Unconstitutional to allow prisoners to be searched before being admitted to the General Population of a Prison. It does not say its an open privileged of Law Enforcement, or that such things can not or should not be regulated at the state level (where nearly all privacy laws reside). And for those of you not for the US or ignorant of the terminology, this does not mean a strip search for any offense, nor does it mean unrestricted strip search privileges. Cops cannot go around picking people up for anything and stripping them down for fun. To be admitted to the General Population of a prison, you have been already charged with a crime, denied bail, and are in for an extended stay, or else have already been convicted of a crime and sentenced to jail-time. Then it must be proven that you are not a danger to the rest of the population from disease, contraband (ie weapons, drugs), undocumented gang affiliations (which will often intentionally get arrested to gain access to their intended victims), etc.
That being said, no system is perfect and accidents happen and sometimes people get sent to jail incorrectly. Those instances are tragic and every effort should be taken to avoid them. I had a friend in high school who was arrested for underage possession of alcohol. He was taken in and was booked while they contacted his parents, all normal. But then the the power went out and fried the computer systems, and suddenly the police station had holding cells full of people and no way to confirm who was who or why they were there; no way to tell the murderers from the con men from the minors having a bad night, and they were forced to lock up everyone until things could be cleared up. Long story short, that power outage and a bad choice of lawyer left him in general population for most of a week. Was it fun? Hell no, it scared him shitless. But at least he was reasonably safe.
Which headline would you rather see:
"Innocent Man Jailed, had terrible time in prison"
or
"Innocent man Killed in Jail with Smuggled Switchblade, Guards Not Allowed to Search Inmates Over Privacy Concerns"
If the Supreme court had ruled that the searches where unconstitutional, such searches would have to be unilaterally banned, which kills any hope of maintaining even a semblance of a safe prison environment. If they ruled that it was only allowed for certain offenses, then only a certain cross-section of the population would actually be subject to the safety, which makes it pointlessly ineffective. What they did was rule that the regulation of the searches should be left to a more case-by-case (or realistically a state-by-state) basis. I know that we all have a reflexive reaction to any perceived power or authority figure with the assumption that they will abuse whatever power they are given, but we forget that those positions of power exist for a reason. If we don't trust the people in those positions, we should be more concerned with preventing the wrong people form getting that job, not legislate away the power they need to do fulfill their role in society. Governments exist for a reason; We don't necessarily need a weaker Government, we just need a more trustworthy one.
This proposed metric for rating code during review is the best part of that whole slideshow!
They can enforce the rules as they wish (just like employers). Student should have used a private ISP, instead of the government-owned school network.
Three things:
1) He did not use the Schools network, he was at home and on his own computer. The school has a system that audits a student's Twitter Account any time they log in at the school. He made the Tweet at 2 AM from home. Then next day when he logged in to twitter at home, the school's system checked the account, found a tweet in it that it didnt like, and set off the alarms.
2)This was settled in the 1969 decision Tinker v. Des Moines, when some kids were suspend for wearing black armbands to protest the US in Vietnam. The Ruling determined that:
(from wikipedia)
The court's 7 to 2 decision held that the First Amendment applied to public schools, and that administrators would have to demonstrate constitutionally valid reasons for any specific regulation of speech in the classroom. The court observed, "It can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate."[1] Justice Abe Fortas wrote the majority opinion, holding that the speech regulation at issue in Tinker was "based upon an urgent wish to avoid the controversy which might result from the expression, even by the silent symbol of armbands, of opposition to this Nation's part in the conflagration in Vietnam." The Court held that in order for school officials to justify censoring speech, they "must be able to show that [their] action was caused by something more than a mere desire to avoid the discomfort and unpleasantness that always accompany an unpopular viewpoint," allowing schools to forbid conduct that would "materially and substantially interfere with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school."[2] The Court found that the actions of the Tinkers in wearing armbands did not cause disruption and held that their activity represented constitutionally protected symbolic speech.
Tinker remains a viable and frequently-cited Court precedent, though subsequent Court decisions have determined limitations on the scope of student free speech rights. In Bethel School District v. Fraser, a 1986 case, the Supreme Court held that a high school student's sexual innuendo–laden speech during a student assembly was not constitutionally protected. Fraser qualified Tinker in making an exception for "indecent" speech. Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier, where the court ruled that schools have the right to regulate, for legitimate educational reasons, the content of non-forum, school-sponsored newspapers, also limits Tinker's application. The Court in Hazelwood clarified that both Fraser and Hazelwood were decided under the doctrine of Perry Education Association v. Perry Local Educators Association. Such a distinction keeps undisturbed the Material Disruption doctrine of Tinker, while deciding certain student free speech cases under the Nonpublic Forum doctrine of Perry. In Morse v. Frederick, the Court held that schools may, consistent with the First Amendment, restrict student speech at a school-sponsored event, even those events occurring off school grounds, when that speech is reasonably viewed as promoting illegal drug use. [End Wiki Quote]
3)There is a Bill going through Indiana State Legislature, but not passed, to provide schools precisely this power, which the state recognizes is beyond the current bounds of Law. If they had the legitimate power to do this it wouldn't be requiring new legislation to grant. The
(http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/16/indiana-bill-would-allow-_n_1282790.html)
"House Bill 1169, the Restoring School Discipline Act, would permit schools to suspend or expel students for engaging in activities away from school and after hours that "may reasonably be considered to be an interference with school purposes or an educational function." Under existing state law, school
I wonder what the power consumption increase is if you have to strap a heating laser to the write head. Lately the market seem to reward Technology that trends toward less power usage, not more
http://www.cellularmaps.com/3g_compare.shtml
This is a useful map, it compares: AT&T, Cricket, Metro PCS, Sprint, T-Mobile, US Cellular, and Verizon.
One thing you should know however is that most of the companies actually share their networks to one degree or another, and there are options lesser known options that offer the same actual coverage. Check out: http://www.cellularbackdoor.com/alternative_networks.shtml
From the site: Same Network, Different Carrier - These are separate, "alternative" companies that use the same wireless network, also known as Mobile Virtual Network Operators (MVNO), wholesale networks, or cellular "re-sellers", of the major carriers. You get your phone and customer service from these companies instead of the underlying carrier. Some companies use more than one network and the type of wireless device determines whether a CDMA, GSM or WIMAX carrier is used. All features may not be available. This is where to look if you hate your carrier but love their network.
Such is the case all technology. Cell phone carriers can still charge per message for a truncated text message, when the same device and infrastructure and contract allows you to send hundreds and thousands of times the data in email systems and streaming at a fraction of the cost.
In the industrial sector, which is their primary business and one where they have been leading innovation in for decades. They have these types of products, but they are geared toward serious use and not being a "fun toy" and so are priced above the average consumer level.
The fact is Honeywell has been making computer controlled systems like this for decades. Just because some little knockoff came along years later and packaged up a cheap version for consumers does not mean they have the right to infringe on legitimate proprietary designs. Which if you read the article include, specific control methods, the internal mechanism used as the actual thermostat, as well as some of the circuitry design used for power management.
Ive had good luck with demonstrations in Alaska of Sterling Engines and other external combustion technologies. They are quite popular for Alaskan audiences since the majority of the state has no central power grid, and in many cases no traditional running water, but will have a wood fire burning most of the year. Sterling engines for power generation, or even simple circulation systems that can be used to heat water for bathing (we filled a canoe with water and rigged a pedal power pump to circulate the water through a coil of copper tubing buried in the coals of a campfire)
And I thought the childhood fights over the Zelda save slots were bad...
They learned how to communicate meaning. The researchers taught them the words. the computers on board did not invent the words they used. In fact a computer would not do something as dumb as a spoken word but series of tones or even FSK.
When it needs a new word/label it generates it as a random combination of pre-programmed syllables that play the role of phonemes for the new language. English for example only uses 40 of them, but we combine them to make all the various words we know how to pronounce properly. It may not be a particularly sophisticated language, but I think it still counts well enough.
Is it just me or does that make you really interested in the remaining 21 detainees?
If everyone knows the origin story, I tend to have more respect for the films that just gloss over the origin and move on the the main plot. Both The Incredible Hulk and Superman Returns did this fairly well; they just accepted that these characters were known and understood by audiences as part of western culture. Now, if your whole goal is to reset and alter/update the origin, such as was done with the Batman reboot or the Spiderman franchise, then sure, go do your storytelling best. But otherwise it just wastes screen time, and ends up dragging down the whole film as we are subjected to what amounts to a regurgitated history lesson.
Since Microsoft people are the ones with the knowledge and resources to make the raid actually successful and a US Marshall realized they didn't. Hence the cooperation.
It's not a kick the door down and handcuff the drug-dealers sort of raid. Its a highly technical and fragile situation; the slightest misunderstood keystroke, unplugged wire etc. could destroy all the evidence they hoped to gather. If you were conducting a raid on a warehouse making bio-weapons instead of cyber-weapons, would you rather have the world leader in Bioengineering making the decisions, or whatever agent they can find that had a minor in that before going into law enforcement.
Despite that, I imagine it was the US Marshals waving the warrants around and not the Microsoft employees, as the article makes it sound.
To see the results with a few choice words added to the Carlin's Seven. Offhand "Kill", "Hate", and "Die" would probably show themselves quite a lot.
That has to be one of the more ridiculous metrics I've seen. Most personal electronics are worth much more than their weight in a base metal. Its the nature of miniaturizing technology; value goes up with complexity and inverse to size. If anything, tablets are a slight step back, if compared to the iPhone etc. Silver is currently at about $315 a pound (converted from the Troy Ounces used for bullion). Most electronics considered portable would fall well above that curve. Certainly any smart phone you could name...
The Emotiv Epoch Headset (http://www.emotiv.com/) was rigged to control a wheelchair a few years back with decent success. And as someone who has spent time training with said EEG headset for controls applications (software in my case, but the function is the same) its not as bad as you would at first think.
The technology works on simple pattern recognition, and requires a good bit of training, both for the system and the user. A consumer is certainly not going to be able to drive one off the lot. It's not unlike a voice dictation software; the system needs to learn your particular patterns, and then uses simple "If A, then B" logic to trigger events. So you need to learn to have stable/repeatable patterns for reference.
Well, thats when its trying to detect by pure thought patterns. A much more reliable method is to use the same EEG system to detect specific facial patterns for control (ie blink the left eye to turn left). The aforementioned Emotiv headset can do that right out of the box, with just a few minutes to calibrate thresholds. And since that doesn't have to deal with the interference caused by the different facial ticks, it can be a much more reliable system. Not to mention that its easier to train up a good poker face than it is to control you're whole mindset, especially when spring comes around and all the joggers and sunbathers come out of hiding.
...I can destroy the #*$%*%& machine in silence just as easy.
I can assure you that I do Engineer-level work on a daily basis without being a licensed Engineer. In fact, you have to do such work for several years as a requirement to get that license. Some people just need something to complain about.
...is that they don't understand why it works, just that their magic box makes more energy than they put in.
Im thinking more like a group of the girlscout mom's who sell cookies in the parking lot once a year, but ya...
Do you really want to trust Facebook as your sole backup? For that matter, do you want to trust them with EVERY picture you have? I still remember when every picture on MySpace got leaked and was available in one massive torrent.