to pull his head out and finally declare the Sun a terrorist? We should be lobbing bombs back at the Sun for firing on us not just once, but 3 or 4 times! Direct shots, no glancing blows. This obvious aggression against the US cannot be tolerated anymore.
Hmmm, I don't know about the placement of chewing tobacco near the bottom. I have never smoked but I used to chew. It was "addictive" though I ultimately "just said no" and quit. In any case, I remember the first time I popped the spattin weed into my mouth (while driving). Within seconds I had a big high. The nicotine transfers directly into the blood via the capillaries in the mouth and then it doesn't take long at all.
Though it has been YEARS since last I spat some tobacco, I still get a mild...craving...to do it again sometimes. Not only does spattin weed have the benefit of giving you a high (doubly nice if you sprits your big leaf chew - say Redman - with whicky) almost immediately, it is also nice and disgusting. Can't beat that.
A load of crap. I can go to radio shack and build a transmitter that will broadcast in any reasonable band at whatever power level I see fit to set it up at. No one is being stopped from being able to build a "jammer" in any freq range they see fit in. The problem merely comes when you actually use it and are finally tracked down. Then it is time to pay the fine.
As it is not illegal to go to radio shack or any other similar store and buy parts to construct whateverthehellyouwant, it is a totally bullcrap argument to "worry" about what other people MIGHT do with a piece of hardware (a wlan card) produced by.
I took apart my old microwave oven. Right there is a nice noise jammer in the 2.4 gig range. High enough power to cook meat (literally, of course). If I so chose, I could plug that sucker in and broadcast it into the air, resulting in the jamming of any nearby air surveillance radars operating on the same freq. It was not illegal for me to take out the microwave generator and the microwave company isn't responsible if I use their hardware to transmit noise into the air. I can look to get into trouble if I do it (repeatedly) so that my location can be reasonably pinpointed (the ATC radar can at least give a general bearing to authorities from any given day I transmit).
As I did NOT use it thusly, no harm done...and again, there was nothing preventing me from cracking open MY microwave to get at its guts. Intel (and others) are blowing smoke up our arses.
Ah, I see. A data point of 1. Very statistically robust. Perhaps if you try it on different wlans AND try the same coffee shop wlan on another day AND get the same crap results in all cases then you may have something there. You are perhaps too fast to blame the driver rather than the network. Come back when you have more data points.
Uh, hello? The driveloader is free as in beer. It contains open and closed source components (they have no control over the closed portion and are thus unable to release it - don't blame Linuxant). You are NOT paying Linuxant for the downloading/use of driveloader. It is FREE. They indicate that it is their intention to keep it free (beer) as well.
My first reply was to those who scream about the US violating this or that law, etc. It is NOT illegal to do bioweapon research for the purpose of defense (protective vaccines, treatment drugs, protective clothing). Weaponization and largescale production would be a violation. That said, this particular research was happenstance. Sheer good/bad luck. Trying something totally unrelated to bioweapons research and simply in the realm of bioremediation to try to control populations of rodents. Piff! A rather logical argument for adding IL-4 to increase antibody production instead leads to making the minor virus about as deadly (for rodents) as Marburg virus is for humans (60% fatality rate). Wasn't intended for weapons, wasn't even predicted. Shit happens and it is interesting.
of any anti-bio/chem weapon conventions. It is perfectly within bounds to conduct research with bio and chem weapons for the purpose of defense, that is, for the purpose of creating defenses such as vaccines and other drug treatments and protective gear.
As virtually anyone with any molecular biology training could potentially create bioweapon-type organisms, and this is not easily regulated, it would be crazy to assume that any and all forms of bioweapons that will ever exist have been created and thus any defenses already extant are good enough. Bullcrap.
Don't get worked up about research. Research for the purpose of determining what could be done and how to defend against it is valid and permissible. The end.
On the other hand, given GWBush's disdain for international law and agreements, it might warrant a closer look to make sure Bushy isn't pushing research into something blatantly against international law.
So...does this apply to would-be whistleblowers too? You work somewhere and there is unethical or even illegal activity taking place (perhaps animal cruelty, sweatshop conditions, some form of evidence of anti-trust violation inspite of legal rulings to prevent such, etc). You take photos and publish them. You get to be fired because it was the "right" of the corporation (a nonhuman, artifice that cannot have any "human" rights or Constitutional Rights as these ONLY apply to actual entities called "people") to hide their activities?
I do believe that an NDA is trumped by whistleblowing. Be that as it may, it IS absurd that M$ would fire him. It is imperative that M$ have Mac computers since they STILL produce software that is to run on...that's right, MACS! I would think that this would be no problem at all. M$ "develops" software (right, they TAKE it from those who actually create software and rebrand it) for platform X. Damn right they'd better have platform X on hand to test their handiwork. They should neither feel that this fact needs hiding, nor act as if they are harmed by someone innocuously indicating that they do this.
Richard Lugar, and received a long reply letter. It spoke of this support for this and that legislation that lead to, essentially, a push for electronic balloting systems with "easy to read and use interfaces", etc. In the long reply to my original message in support of HR 2239, seeking a companion bill in the senate. HR 2239 calls for an ironclad requirement for a hardcopy printout of one's ballot for two purposes: 1)the voter can check their vote and 2) to supply a hardcopy for secure storage in case of recount: the hardcopies would be used in any recount.
Lugar's reply made NO mention of hardcopy printouts, ignoring the primary thrust of my letter to him. All he indicated was that he would consider future enhancements to the law as they came along.
No hardcopy? Then I flat refuse to use the voting machine. I have acquired the necessary absentee ballot request and will be using this for all future elections until a printout is part of the process.
I downloaded my copies of the software and all the memos.
Got yours yet? The horses are out of the barn, etc. In short, it is too frickin late and, I might add, LOONEY for Liebold to try to recover the evidence of their incompetence and even criminality. Please let the lawsuits begin (against Diebold).
The MPAA is NOT for the First Amendment unless it applies to movies. When it means people freely exchanging "free" information about how this method of encryption works and its weaknesses, then they are entirely against free speech. They are against it in most important cases that do not DIRECTLY apply to movie making. They are behind the DMCA which, at its heart, is about prior restraint of speech and information. It is about preventing the talking about, or disemination of, any information that they deem objectionable as it might lead to someone somewhere taking that information and pirating some dumbass movie...or might lead to someone having the audacity to actually watch a movie they purchased on whatever device they frickin' want to (they purchased the movie and have the right to view it, and the MPAA doesn't get to tell them how or with whom or how many times).
Err...except the "vacuum" of space is NOT a pure vacuum. It is full of hydrogen molecules and virtual particles. At sufficient speed, the very rarified gas in space becomes important. There are also going to be dust particles of various sizes, something much more important than the gas.
Couldn't the watermark be very easily defeated simply by copy-pasting the code text into a new file and recompiling? You could also simply manually copy word for word the code anew and, poof!, no watermark.
To add a filter for the very open OO format. Nothing stops M$ from adding support for OO's file format, it is right there for the copying. This excerpt from the report:
However, the report recognised that establishing a existing alternative or a new format would be an uphill battle, given that Microsoft Office cannot read OpenOffice documents or other formats.
is real simple to correct. Start using OO format (via OO/SO) in government and M$ would be compelled by competition forces to support OO format...of be locked out of government. An OSS developer could also whip up an OO document "viewer" of small size so people could easily download this "plugin" and view OO government docs on their M$ systems (for those unwilling due to bandwidth constraints or obtuseness to simply install OO/SO).
It is wrong to essentially require people to spend lots of money for a specific, propriatory wordprocessor just so they can view government documents. It is another thing entirely for them to "have to" download and install a free-of-charge office suite to do the same (though a plugin would alleviate most unreasonable heartburn). Even if they didn't do either, the contents of the document are still fully available to them in a cluttered form if they simply unzip the OO document and look at the ascii contents. Can't do that with word docs.
Using an XML foundation doesn't assure openness of the file to other "interpreters", ie, other word processors. M$ may use XML as a basis for the layout of their docs, but they still fill it to the rim with closed, propriatory slop in an attempt to make it only renderable in Word. No good.
The desire for open + XML means that a document in this format would be fully transportable between wordprocessors. This is a good thing (tm), particularly in government. Anything else effectively gives ownership of all government documents to the company that supplied the closed, propriatory format. When that company goes under (ALL companies will die out at some point) it's file format dies with it.
Government documents belong to the PEOPLE for eternity, not to private companies. They must be accessible without artificial restriction (via propriatory, closed file format) no matter what happens to some vendor supplying the parent wordprocessor.
Hey! You're on to something there... Warheads could use one set of RFIDs and decoys another. Anti-ballistic missile defense systems wouldn't have to figure out fancy-schmancy ways of telling decoy warheads from dummy warheads. An interceptor would merely need to get close enough to read the warhead's RFID and decide if it is live or memorex, and destroy the correct RFID setup appropriately.
Rather than making if based on physical lifespan, make it based on average normal lifespan and make it a flat 75 years OR physical lifespan up to 100 (and no longer, to ensure no shenanigans via molecular biological life extension at some future point). Dump the +70 (or 50) nonsense. Once your dead, your dead and any and all right to the stuff goes free when you are no longer capable of controlling it.
I am not talking about people getting locked out, just shuffled to appropriate servers with people with similar time schedules. It doesn't matter if you play an hour here, and hour there, then spend 6 hours on a weekend. The total average time per week is all that matters. You don't gain special benefit if you say you expect to play 8 hours a week and then actually do that much playing all in one session on a weekend when you have the time. You can only get 8 hours worth of game-"work".
If you actually end up playing more than you estimated, and do it consistently, then you could be notified of this and then shuttled off to a more appropriate server where your time is similar to that of others. They could move your character and its "earnings" to that new server without loss and you would end up on a server where you are "equal" with the others. Only your dexterity or puzzle-solving abilities would separate you from the pack vs simply having WAY too much time to spend online vs other players.
Generally, I would think that a person would have a reasonably consistent play pattern, depending on how "into" a game they are. Over time, this would average out to so many hours a week and that would set which servers are available to you.
You can get the oil you need without drilling. You can crank out RENEWABLE oil buy using renderings from chickens, pigs, etc. Not great for Vegans but overall, the crap that comes from these nasty industries simply goes into landfills, into incinerators (fired by oil), or partially reformulated into feed.
It is possible and virtually painless to change this garbage, plus virtually any other organic waste of any kind into sweet crude. No drilling and no net increase in atmospheric H20 OR CO2. You recycle the same H2O and CO2 again and again. With petroleum, you have a net gain in atmospheric CO2 (and other, nastier gases).
With this you can't lose. If you merely crack it into gasoline and burn it, you are still simply recycling the same atoms and not producing a net increase...and you aren't wrecking wilderness areas. Or, you can use it in powerplants or otherwise convert it into methanol with no net increase in greenhouse gases.
It is a thing of beauty to be able to use the massive amounts of waste material that we produce in overabundance for something useful to power our society, and only have to rely on our own consumption and farming output to do it. You cut the nasties in the Middle East out of the equation (and they too are perfectly capable of supplying their own needs by the same process).
So you'd have both carbon dioxide AND water as exhaust.
Which is exactly what you get from a 100% efficient combustion process. Currently, your engine combusts much dirtier than this pure combustion, and it is done from non-renewable resources so that there is a net increase in atmospheric CO2 (transferred from otherwise locked-away petroleum) vs what you get from methanol which simply recycles the same CO2 and H20 over and over. No net increase.
Perhaps future games could go some way to level the playing field a great degree by asking about (and then tracking) expected playtime/week (or day, etc). Based on the answer (1 hr/day or ~7 hrs/week), you are directed to a subset of servers to play against others with a similar schedule. For those lunatics with no life who can spend unlimited time online, there should be a subset of dedicated servers for them and them alone. They don't get ungodly advantage over most others because they are playing against/with others with near-equal time to spend in never-never land. It becomes more challanging and less unfairly spread in each game world.
As for the silly tasks that need to be accomplished to get levels, I don't know the answer to this specifically, though it sounds like Blizzard with WoW may be on the right track. There should be a silly or painful target to reach just to level. It should be organic and somewhat hidden in the gameplay itself.
Re:Sorry: Most Hydrogen is produced from Petroleum
on
The End of the Oil Age
·
· Score: 1
Interesting and true. But not required. First of all, the ONLY reason Bush has gotten even a little behind hydrogen is because it is derived from petroleum. His project to increase research and development of hydrogen is focused entirely on the oil industry being the provider. Thus, both he and his buds continue raking in the dough, spilling oil into oceans, trying to drill the living daylights out of wilderness areas, etc, until there's nothing left to pump.
It doesn't have to be like that. You can get H2 from H20, this is elementary. You can get the e- to split the H20 from non-coal/non-oil/non-NG powerplants. You can get it from new generation, inherently safe, waste-consuming nuclear power plants. You can get it from solar plants, wave-power plants, etc. Even so, you wont eliminate the need for petroleum. There is more to oil than gasoline. It is a critical lubricant, a hydrocarbon source used in the chemical industry, plastics, etc. What you can do is reduce its size and influence, clean up the air and water, reduce the NEED to try to drill everywhere you shouldn't, etc. You can, of course, produce good petroleum oil from garbage, equivalent to the sweetest crude as well in any case. There is NO reason to prop up the petroleum industry in anything like the way we do today.
Government policy can be used to further hydrogen production and disemination, encourage other sources of needed petroleum that isn't so dependent upon drilling, and yet still retain petroleum production at the minimum size necessary to provide the real, non-gasoline supply of oil. You get the added benefit of cleaning up the environment AND reducing the economic influence of nasty and barely stable Middle East countries. Pluses in every column. It just takes vision and guts.
That sums it up. If I buy a tool, computer, TV, toaster, car, whatever, I OWN IT LOCK, STOCK, AND BARREL. I get to do ANYTHING I want with it. No matter what the manufacturer says or wants, I bought it, I own it, I am the master of that item's fate. Period.
I do a little woodworking myself. When I first read this crap I thought, "No way I will EVER buy their crap". Now I am rethinking it. I may buy it just so I can use it, lend it to my neighbors, to my father, etc. I may make a nifty template and give it away, make copies of the other templates and give them away. Eat me if you don't like it. I buy my tools or I rent them (big ticket items) as needed. If I buy it, that is the end of the control by the manufacturer.
Paper trails are NOT stupid. The printout isn't just so you can get a faked piece of paper saying you voted this way (while the machine counts it another way...or "someone" alters the vote database). The printout would/should be checked by the voter to ensure it accurately reflects their vote, then they deposit it into a secure box at the election station as they leave. In event of recount, the paper printouts are used, NOT the computer database.
This would remove a major issue that I have against using electronic voting machines. As it is, I will be voting absentee from now on until such safety measures are included. The only other issue that would need to be dealt with is the fact that ALL the electronic voting machines mentioned/used to date have a higher error rate than punchcard voting. I stick with absentee voting, thank you.
Slashdot Mirror
to pull his head out and finally declare the Sun a terrorist? We should be lobbing bombs back at the Sun for firing on us not just once, but 3 or 4 times! Direct shots, no glancing blows. This obvious aggression against the US cannot be tolerated anymore.
Nuke the Sun!
hhHmmm, I don't know about the placement of chewing tobacco near the bottom. I have never smoked but I used to chew. It was "addictive" though I ultimately "just said no" and quit. In any case, I remember the first time I popped the spattin weed into my mouth (while driving). Within seconds I had a big high. The nicotine transfers directly into the blood via the capillaries in the mouth and then it doesn't take long at all.
Though it has been YEARS since last I spat some tobacco, I still get a mild...craving...to do it again sometimes. Not only does spattin weed have the benefit of giving you a high (doubly nice if you sprits your big leaf chew - say Redman - with whicky) almost immediately, it is also nice and disgusting. Can't beat that.
A load of crap. I can go to radio shack and build a transmitter that will broadcast in any reasonable band at whatever power level I see fit to set it up at. No one is being stopped from being able to build a "jammer" in any freq range they see fit in. The problem merely comes when you actually use it and are finally tracked down. Then it is time to pay the fine.
As it is not illegal to go to radio shack or any other similar store and buy parts to construct whateverthehellyouwant, it is a totally bullcrap argument to "worry" about what other people MIGHT do with a piece of hardware (a wlan card) produced by .
I took apart my old microwave oven. Right there is a nice noise jammer in the 2.4 gig range. High enough power to cook meat (literally, of course). If I so chose, I could plug that sucker in and broadcast it into the air, resulting in the jamming of any nearby air surveillance radars operating on the same freq. It was not illegal for me to take out the microwave generator and the microwave company isn't responsible if I use their hardware to transmit noise into the air. I can look to get into trouble if I do it (repeatedly) so that my location can be reasonably pinpointed (the ATC radar can at least give a general bearing to authorities from any given day I transmit).
As I did NOT use it thusly, no harm done...and again, there was nothing preventing me from cracking open MY microwave to get at its guts. Intel (and others) are blowing smoke up our arses.
Ah, I see. A data point of 1. Very statistically robust. Perhaps if you try it on different wlans AND try the same coffee shop wlan on another day AND get the same crap results in all cases then you may have something there. You are perhaps too fast to blame the driver rather than the network. Come back when you have more data points.
Uh, hello? The driveloader is free as in beer. It contains open and closed source components (they have no control over the closed portion and are thus unable to release it - don't blame Linuxant). You are NOT paying Linuxant for the downloading/use of driveloader. It is FREE. They indicate that it is their intention to keep it free (beer) as well.
My first reply was to those who scream about the US violating this or that law, etc. It is NOT illegal to do bioweapon research for the purpose of defense (protective vaccines, treatment drugs, protective clothing). Weaponization and largescale production would be a violation. That said, this particular research was happenstance. Sheer good/bad luck. Trying something totally unrelated to bioweapons research and simply in the realm of bioremediation to try to control populations of rodents. Piff! A rather logical argument for adding IL-4 to increase antibody production instead leads to making the minor virus about as deadly (for rodents) as Marburg virus is for humans (60% fatality rate). Wasn't intended for weapons, wasn't even predicted. Shit happens and it is interesting.
of any anti-bio/chem weapon conventions. It is perfectly within bounds to conduct research with bio and chem weapons for the purpose of defense, that is, for the purpose of creating defenses such as vaccines and other drug treatments and protective gear.
As virtually anyone with any molecular biology training could potentially create bioweapon-type organisms, and this is not easily regulated, it would be crazy to assume that any and all forms of bioweapons that will ever exist have been created and thus any defenses already extant are good enough. Bullcrap.
Don't get worked up about research. Research for the purpose of determining what could be done and how to defend against it is valid and permissible. The end.
On the other hand, given GWBush's disdain for international law and agreements, it might warrant a closer look to make sure Bushy isn't pushing research into something blatantly against international law.
The universe originated from the biggest and best "hummer" of all time!
So...does this apply to would-be whistleblowers too? You work somewhere and there is unethical or even illegal activity taking place (perhaps animal cruelty, sweatshop conditions, some form of evidence of anti-trust violation inspite of legal rulings to prevent such, etc). You take photos and publish them. You get to be fired because it was the "right" of the corporation (a nonhuman, artifice that cannot have any "human" rights or Constitutional Rights as these ONLY apply to actual entities called "people") to hide their activities?
I do believe that an NDA is trumped by whistleblowing. Be that as it may, it IS absurd that M$ would fire him. It is imperative that M$ have Mac computers since they STILL produce software that is to run on...that's right, MACS! I would think that this would be no problem at all. M$ "develops" software (right, they TAKE it from those who actually create software and rebrand it) for platform X. Damn right they'd better have platform X on hand to test their handiwork. They should neither feel that this fact needs hiding, nor act as if they are harmed by someone innocuously indicating that they do this.
Richard Lugar, and received a long reply letter. It spoke of this support for this and that legislation that lead to, essentially, a push for electronic balloting systems with "easy to read and use interfaces", etc. In the long reply to my original message in support of HR 2239, seeking a companion bill in the senate. HR 2239 calls for an ironclad requirement for a hardcopy printout of one's ballot for two purposes: 1)the voter can check their vote and 2) to supply a hardcopy for secure storage in case of recount: the hardcopies would be used in any recount.
Lugar's reply made NO mention of hardcopy printouts, ignoring the primary thrust of my letter to him. All he indicated was that he would consider future enhancements to the law as they came along.
No hardcopy? Then I flat refuse to use the voting machine. I have acquired the necessary absentee ballot request and will be using this for all future elections until a printout is part of the process.
I downloaded my copies of the software and all the memos.
Got yours yet? The horses are out of the barn, etc. In short, it is too frickin late and, I might add, LOONEY for Liebold to try to recover the evidence of their incompetence and even criminality. Please let the lawsuits begin (against Diebold).
The MPAA is NOT for the First Amendment unless it applies to movies. When it means people freely exchanging "free" information about how this method of encryption works and its weaknesses, then they are entirely against free speech. They are against it in most important cases that do not DIRECTLY apply to movie making. They are behind the DMCA which, at its heart, is about prior restraint of speech and information. It is about preventing the talking about, or disemination of, any information that they deem objectionable as it might lead to someone somewhere taking that information and pirating some dumbass movie...or might lead to someone having the audacity to actually watch a movie they purchased on whatever device they frickin' want to (they purchased the movie and have the right to view it, and the MPAA doesn't get to tell them how or with whom or how many times).
Err...except the "vacuum" of space is NOT a pure vacuum. It is full of hydrogen molecules and virtual particles. At sufficient speed, the very rarified gas in space becomes important. There are also going to be dust particles of various sizes, something much more important than the gas.
Couldn't the watermark be very easily defeated simply by copy-pasting the code text into a new file and recompiling? You could also simply manually copy word for word the code anew and, poof!, no watermark.
However, the report recognised that establishing a existing alternative or a new format would be an uphill battle, given that Microsoft Office cannot read OpenOffice documents or other formats.
is real simple to correct. Start using OO format (via OO/SO) in government and M$ would be compelled by competition forces to support OO format...of be locked out of government. An OSS developer could also whip up an OO document "viewer" of small size so people could easily download this "plugin" and view OO government docs on their M$ systems (for those unwilling due to bandwidth constraints or obtuseness to simply install OO/SO).
It is wrong to essentially require people to spend lots of money for a specific, propriatory wordprocessor just so they can view government documents. It is another thing entirely for them to "have to" download and install a free-of-charge office suite to do the same (though a plugin would alleviate most unreasonable heartburn). Even if they didn't do either, the contents of the document are still fully available to them in a cluttered form if they simply unzip the OO document and look at the ascii contents. Can't do that with word docs.
Using an XML foundation doesn't assure openness of the file to other "interpreters", ie, other word processors. M$ may use XML as a basis for the layout of their docs, but they still fill it to the rim with closed, propriatory slop in an attempt to make it only renderable in Word. No good.
The desire for open + XML means that a document in this format would be fully transportable between wordprocessors. This is a good thing (tm), particularly in government. Anything else effectively gives ownership of all government documents to the company that supplied the closed, propriatory format. When that company goes under (ALL companies will die out at some point) it's file format dies with it.
Government documents belong to the PEOPLE for eternity, not to private companies. They must be accessible without artificial restriction (via propriatory, closed file format) no matter what happens to some vendor supplying the parent wordprocessor.
Hey! You're on to something there... Warheads could use one set of RFIDs and decoys another. Anti-ballistic missile defense systems wouldn't have to figure out fancy-schmancy ways of telling decoy warheads from dummy warheads. An interceptor would merely need to get close enough to read the warhead's RFID and decide if it is live or memorex, and destroy the correct RFID setup appropriately.
Rather than making if based on physical lifespan, make it based on average normal lifespan and make it a flat 75 years OR physical lifespan up to 100 (and no longer, to ensure no shenanigans via molecular biological life extension at some future point). Dump the +70 (or 50) nonsense. Once your dead, your dead and any and all right to the stuff goes free when you are no longer capable of controlling it.
I am not talking about people getting locked out, just shuffled to appropriate servers with people with similar time schedules. It doesn't matter if you play an hour here, and hour there, then spend 6 hours on a weekend. The total average time per week is all that matters. You don't gain special benefit if you say you expect to play 8 hours a week and then actually do that much playing all in one session on a weekend when you have the time. You can only get 8 hours worth of game-"work".
If you actually end up playing more than you estimated, and do it consistently, then you could be notified of this and then shuttled off to a more appropriate server where your time is similar to that of others. They could move your character and its "earnings" to that new server without loss and you would end up on a server where you are "equal" with the others. Only your dexterity or puzzle-solving abilities would separate you from the pack vs simply having WAY too much time to spend online vs other players.
Generally, I would think that a person would have a reasonably consistent play pattern, depending on how "into" a game they are. Over time, this would average out to so many hours a week and that would set which servers are available to you.
You can get the oil you need without drilling. You can crank out RENEWABLE oil buy using renderings from chickens, pigs, etc. Not great for Vegans but overall, the crap that comes from these nasty industries simply goes into landfills, into incinerators (fired by oil), or partially reformulated into feed.
It is possible and virtually painless to change this garbage, plus virtually any other organic waste of any kind into sweet crude. No drilling and no net increase in atmospheric H20 OR CO2. You recycle the same H2O and CO2 again and again. With petroleum, you have a net gain in atmospheric CO2 (and other, nastier gases).
With this you can't lose. If you merely crack it into gasoline and burn it, you are still simply recycling the same atoms and not producing a net increase...and you aren't wrecking wilderness areas. Or, you can use it in powerplants or otherwise convert it into methanol with no net increase in greenhouse gases.
It is a thing of beauty to be able to use the massive amounts of waste material that we produce in overabundance for something useful to power our society, and only have to rely on our own consumption and farming output to do it. You cut the nasties in the Middle East out of the equation (and they too are perfectly capable of supplying their own needs by the same process).
So you'd have both carbon dioxide AND water as exhaust.
Which is exactly what you get from a 100% efficient combustion process. Currently, your engine combusts much dirtier than this pure combustion, and it is done from non-renewable resources so that there is a net increase in atmospheric CO2 (transferred from otherwise locked-away petroleum) vs what you get from methanol which simply recycles the same CO2 and H20 over and over. No net increase.
Perhaps future games could go some way to level the playing field a great degree by asking about (and then tracking) expected playtime/week (or day, etc). Based on the answer (1 hr/day or ~7 hrs/week), you are directed to a subset of servers to play against others with a similar schedule. For those lunatics with no life who can spend unlimited time online, there should be a subset of dedicated servers for them and them alone. They don't get ungodly advantage over most others because they are playing against/with others with near-equal time to spend in never-never land. It becomes more challanging and less unfairly spread in each game world.
As for the silly tasks that need to be accomplished to get levels, I don't know the answer to this specifically, though it sounds like Blizzard with WoW may be on the right track. There should be a silly or painful target to reach just to level. It should be organic and somewhat hidden in the gameplay itself.
Interesting and true. But not required. First of all, the ONLY reason Bush has gotten even a little behind hydrogen is because it is derived from petroleum. His project to increase research and development of hydrogen is focused entirely on the oil industry being the provider. Thus, both he and his buds continue raking in the dough, spilling oil into oceans, trying to drill the living daylights out of wilderness areas, etc, until there's nothing left to pump.
It doesn't have to be like that. You can get H2 from H20, this is elementary. You can get the e- to split the H20 from non-coal/non-oil/non-NG powerplants. You can get it from new generation, inherently safe, waste-consuming nuclear power plants. You can get it from solar plants, wave-power plants, etc. Even so, you wont eliminate the need for petroleum. There is more to oil than gasoline. It is a critical lubricant, a hydrocarbon source used in the chemical industry, plastics, etc. What you can do is reduce its size and influence, clean up the air and water, reduce the NEED to try to drill everywhere you shouldn't, etc. You can, of course, produce good petroleum oil from garbage, equivalent to the sweetest crude as well in any case. There is NO reason to prop up the petroleum industry in anything like the way we do today.
Government policy can be used to further hydrogen production and disemination, encourage other sources of needed petroleum that isn't so dependent upon drilling, and yet still retain petroleum production at the minimum size necessary to provide the real, non-gasoline supply of oil. You get the added benefit of cleaning up the environment AND reducing the economic influence of nasty and barely stable Middle East countries. Pluses in every column. It just takes vision and guts.
That sums it up. If I buy a tool, computer, TV, toaster, car, whatever, I OWN IT LOCK, STOCK, AND BARREL. I get to do ANYTHING I want with it. No matter what the manufacturer says or wants, I bought it, I own it, I am the master of that item's fate. Period.
I do a little woodworking myself. When I first read this crap I thought, "No way I will EVER buy their crap". Now I am rethinking it. I may buy it just so I can use it, lend it to my neighbors, to my father, etc. I may make a nifty template and give it away, make copies of the other templates and give them away. Eat me if you don't like it. I buy my tools or I rent them (big ticket items) as needed. If I buy it, that is the end of the control by the manufacturer.
Paper trails are NOT stupid. The printout isn't just so you can get a faked piece of paper saying you voted this way (while the machine counts it another way...or "someone" alters the vote database). The printout would/should be checked by the voter to ensure it accurately reflects their vote, then they deposit it into a secure box at the election station as they leave. In event of recount, the paper printouts are used, NOT the computer database.
This would remove a major issue that I have against using electronic voting machines. As it is, I will be voting absentee from now on until such safety measures are included. The only other issue that would need to be dealt with is the fact that ALL the electronic voting machines mentioned/used to date have a higher error rate than punchcard voting. I stick with absentee voting, thank you.