As Steve Jackson will tell you, this guy is pretty much screwed. Anything they seize in the course of an investigation is pretty much theirs now and there's nothing you can do about it. Federal Law Enforcement is basically untouchable. Welcome to Amerika.
most (but not all) of the hardware was returned. The Secret Service kept one company hard disk, all Loyd's personal equipment and files, the printouts of GURPS Cyberpunk, and several other things.
In early 1993, the case finally came to trial. . . . And we won. The judge gave the Secret Service a tongue-lashing and ruled for SJ Games on two out of the three counts, and awarded over $50,000 in damages, plus over $250,000 in attorney's fees.
Yeah, it was a hassle, and yeah, it sucks, but you started with a good point and took it to the point of bullshit. I'd say $50k would cover a hard drive, some miscellaneous equipment not worth enumerating, and some printouts. Wouldn't you, or are you too mired in Amerika-Angst to think clearly?
You're attempt at damage control only made me laugh harder at your idiocy and the hilarity of the poster that 0wned you, in a humourous and polite manner.
Well, I don't find this particularly compelling either, but it is sort of interesting. It's about how media companies can use technology (affordable studios in the homes of remote "journalists" and newsreaders) to (arguably) mislead listeners and viewers.
Used to be that you actually had to be in the studio, or you'd have to phone in a report, which would sound distinctly different (read: crappy) than the in-studio hosts, so they'd pretty much fess up that this was a remote phone-in update right away. Now they can have anyone anywhere with very low lag and almost identical quality.
So, obviously, the fun for the discussion is to think about and discuss (1) what ways this is happening that we don't really know about, (2) what possible future advances will allow, and (3) where we draw the line between "using technology to give better reporting" and "utter fraud". It's interesting in that sense, at least to me.
For example, if they start using really advanced blue-screen technology and CGI to replace the typical reporter-outside-during-the-hurricane with a fake version of one dry and safe in the studio, but it looks perfectly realistic, and he says "I'm standing out at the pier now Bill, and I tell you the winds and rain are out of control . . . . just amazing!", etc. is it OK? Technically, if they have a screen behind him showing the raw footage they'll morph him into later in post-production, they're technically not lying. But to me, they are lying "technically" when they go that far. It's wrong, but I'm not sure how to stop it (other than people turning the channel), and I definitely don't want too much gummint regulation going on here. So, see, as a seed for thought (if you've got fertile ground ready -- perhaps not) this is pretty decent fodder on a slow news day.
But in this case, no one actually said the guy was freezing his ass off in Boston, but the quotes I read definitely implied that. And, while it doesn't really invalidate his comments (yes, it is cold here), or really hurt anyone, it is slimy. On the other hand, do they have to come out and say where everyone is reporting from? (Seems like they used to, almost as an issue of pride -- "look at how many remotes we can affort to cull from for you!"). Look, there's another interesting line of thought, to some.
The other interseting point (again, to me) is about "local" newscasts and such being post-processed national versions with local references edited in, such as "We'll be out at the mall today giving out T-shirts" is edited to insert town names and custom copies are distributed nationwide to dozens of "local" stations that actually have no local anything other than a transmitter run by computers. I think that's slimy too, but I can also see how it makes good business sense (highly cost-effective) . . . unless people actually backlash because of the sliminess.
So, I guess, besides those points for discussion, what I'm saying is STFU and stop threadcrapping. If you don't like it don't read it. And definitely don't post about it -- no one wants your complaints, just your insight and interesting discussion, which you are clearly lacking in this case.
Not much processing -- they do "real world" website performance analysis using distributed user connections from around the world. CPU usage on my machines never exceeds 1%, and the client is stable and inobtrusive. Not big bucks, but keep in mind it is multiplied by the number of machines you have on. Free $10-20/mo. for me (6 machines on 24x7) with no noticeable impact on CPU or BW. YMMV.
First, Centrino is a CPU, not a graphics card or GPU. Second, HP can invent new definitions of "MOBILITY RADEON 9200 brand" all it wants, but it's still false advertising in context of this, at least until ATI changes thier pages that clearly distinguish "MOBILITY 9000" from "MOBILITY RADEON 9200".
The MR9000 has a rv250 core. The MR9200 has a rv280 core. ATI's product portfolio quotes that the 9200 is slightly faster than the 9000 (10x vs. 9x, when compared to the slowest Mobility Radeon [1x]).
Way to totally miss the point. If it's advertised as a "400MHz DDR SDRAM" machine, how do you suddenly decide the options are "broken machine that needs PC100 with 400MHz DDR instead" vs. "working machine with PC100 RAM". It's advertised as 400MHz DDR, so it should include it, and work with it.
You're either dense or trolling. Or maybe trying to avoid eating the crow you should be chewing on given your previous posts in this thread.
So, someone has engaged in false advertising. Now will you stop the nonsense you've been spewing in this thread?
Yeah, for companies who will pay 10x the price for a guarantee (rather than deal with the 1% fallout of the unguaranteed version), a difference exists, but only on paper. For the rest of us, the two refer to the same product, with one deliberately (and reverseably) crippled.
You have no idea what the MP failure rate for XP parts are, so why do you try to put a precise number on it? The difference exist in testing and warranty, something that costs real money. Not just "paper".
More interestingly, you appear to defeat your own point here - A paper-only difference between the XP and MP line of Athlons counts as valid in your opinion, yet the paper-only name of an ATI product makes your fur bristle?
You are thoroughly confused. It's not "paper-only". One is sure to work in MP, one is not. One is tested to work in MP, one has not been. Tester time costs money. Test harnesses for MP cost more than those for XP. Clearly you have no clue about semiconductor manufacturing or the business models involved. Why you feel the need to try to justify false advertising is beyond me.
IBM XT didn't have an "Intel XT" chip in it, it had an 8088.
Er, you do know that there's no such thing as an "Intel XT" chip right? Oh wait, had you, you wouldn't have said anything so stupid. If they had put "ATI monkeychip 9999" on the laptop, we wouldn't be having this discussion. Now I wish they had done that . . .
Yeah, sorry. I saw "Centrino" (Intel) and "Radeon" (ATI), but I do realize neither of those companies makes laptops, so you're right (except the AMD/Nvidia thing -- I'd bash them for this just the same). It's still annoying, no matter for whom they are apologizing.
The grandparent and you are fighting an irrelevant battle. Please stop the distraction effort.
Whether or not you consider an XP and MP product as "different", they indeed are. The only cost differentiator in mass produced semiconductor parts from the same mask design is the testing done. This testing happens on multi-million dollar machines on which tester time is meted out in increments of seconds. Running that extra test costs a lot of extra money.
Moreover, the incredibly expensive test harnesses are different for XP and MP (obviously, one creates a multiproc environment and one doesn'). There is a huge difference in a product that is tested to work as you intend to use it (you can get it replaced if it doesn't work as advertised) and one not tested as you plan to use it (you can not get it replaced because you can't use it in a different manner than it was intended).
And, this bit about Centrino not supporting AGP 8X somehow making it OK to ship an AGP 4X part when advertising an 8X part is outrageous. As I pointed out in a post below, if your "400MHZ DDR SDRAM laptop" came with PC100 SDRAM memory instead along with a chipset that only supports PC100 RAM, is that OK? No, and neither is this.
That's weak. Buy my new laptop with 400MHz DDR SDRAM. But it's not 400MHz DDR SDRAM, it's PC100 RAM. But, oh, by the way, the chipset in that laptop only supports PC100 RAM. So it's functionally equivalent and OK with you, right?
I can't believe the ATI/Intel apologists in this thread. It's as surprising as it is disturbing.
Er, assuming you mean "Hardware Texture & Lighting Transform Engine" and I believe you do, then a GeForce1 will not run it, nor will some of the earlier ATI cards (not sure where the HT&L line is drawn in the ATI series, but it's there).
BF1942 requires hardware T&L, and it will not even try to run on a GeForce1.
If you're going to write, why not include all of Ms. Sweeney's colleagues, supervisors, school board members, select local press, etc.? Here's a nice to list for your cut&paste pleasure -- keep it sane, polite, and poignant please:
An EE degree would be better, IMHO, but I think some schools are merging EE and CS these days, letting students pick sub-emphasis, so you might be able to spin it that way if your physics background is strong enough. Anyway, assuming your physics (particularly EM field theory and semiconductor device physics) understanding is strong, and you have very good grades (B+ or better, prefer A's, especially in core courses) from an ABET school, you should have little trouble getting an entry-level position. Willingness to relocate is a big plus. Interviewing skills (communication ability, confidence, familiarity with a wide variety of EE topics) will probably play a big role as well.
The verilog (and much less so, VHDL) are nice to know, but if you want to code, you will have a harder time finding work. If you want to be a physical designer you'll find more demand for yourself. Of course, as a fresh grad you don't know much about actual design (interviewers realize that), but if you have the background and foundation, enthusiasm, communications skills, and professionalism, they'll teach you.
There are a few things you could do to make yourself stand out: (1) maybe too late, but if you have a chance to make real hardware for a Sr. project, even a simple board with an FPGA on it, do it. (I made a PCI interface for an image processor for my project, and I took it with me on interviews, prepared to discuss every aspect of its design). (2) go to openeda.org and track down free/educational versions of design tools (Alliance, and CIRCUIT are pretty decent free ones if I recall correctly). Read the docs and everything else you can find on the web (there's a lot), learn the design flow, and take a few simple projects from netlist to GDS (synthesis, floorplanning, placement, clocking, routing, extraction, delay calculation, verification, artwork creation, final DRC/LVS, formal verification). Then SPICE your clock tree and learn about signal integrity. Understand each stage and why you did it. Your having done this will be obvious to an interviewer, and it's a huge gold star for you that few fresh grads bother with. Plus you'll probably learn more in the process than any school could teach you.
Oh, and learn Perl if you don't already know it. It's the favorite design tool of many, myself included (design databases are usually just huge text files, and sometimes you need to parse that database in ways that no commercial tools can).
Some Americans would be pretty happy with that. To be quite honest, I'd imagine the bulk of the complaints about closing America's borders completely would come from potential immigrants, not Americans.
Slashdot Mirror
As Steve Jackson will tell you, this guy is pretty much screwed. Anything they seize in the course of an investigation is pretty much theirs now and there's nothing you can do about it. Federal Law Enforcement is basically untouchable. Welcome to Amerika.
Huh, funny -- Steve Jackson told me something entirely different:
most (but not all) of the hardware was returned. The Secret Service kept one company hard disk, all Loyd's personal equipment and files, the printouts of GURPS Cyberpunk, and several other things.
In early 1993, the case finally came to trial. . . . And we won. The judge gave the Secret Service a tongue-lashing and ruled for SJ Games on two out of the three counts, and awarded over $50,000 in damages, plus over $250,000 in attorney's fees.
Yeah, it was a hassle, and yeah, it sucks, but you started with a good point and took it to the point of bullshit. I'd say $50k would cover a hard drive, some miscellaneous equipment not worth enumerating, and some printouts. Wouldn't you, or are you too mired in Amerika-Angst to think clearly?
warrants do show up on a standard background check done by most employers
{ding} says the bullshit detector
When I was being interrogated by the CIA
The CIA does a lot more than a "standard background check done by most employers"
Methinks you are confused.
Oh, I'm sorry for my other reply. You really are an imbecile. A thousand pardons. Time for your meds now . . .
You're attempt at damage control only made me laugh harder at your idiocy and the hilarity of the poster that 0wned you, in a humourous and polite manner.
Let's face it -- YOU FAIL IT!
You, sir, just made a friend for reading my mind and posting the result -- verbatim.
It's my pleasure to meet you.
Well, I don't find this particularly compelling either, but it is sort of interesting. It's about how media companies can use technology (affordable studios in the homes of remote "journalists" and newsreaders) to (arguably) mislead listeners and viewers.
Used to be that you actually had to be in the studio, or you'd have to phone in a report, which would sound distinctly different (read: crappy) than the in-studio hosts, so they'd pretty much fess up that this was a remote phone-in update right away. Now they can have anyone anywhere with very low lag and almost identical quality.
So, obviously, the fun for the discussion is to think about and discuss (1) what ways this is happening that we don't really know about, (2) what possible future advances will allow, and (3) where we draw the line between "using technology to give better reporting" and "utter fraud". It's interesting in that sense, at least to me.
For example, if they start using really advanced blue-screen technology and CGI to replace the typical reporter-outside-during-the-hurricane with a fake version of one dry and safe in the studio, but it looks perfectly realistic, and he says "I'm standing out at the pier now Bill, and I tell you the winds and rain are out of control . . . . just amazing!", etc. is it OK? Technically, if they have a screen behind him showing the raw footage they'll morph him into later in post-production, they're technically not lying. But to me, they are lying "technically" when they go that far. It's wrong, but I'm not sure how to stop it (other than people turning the channel), and I definitely don't want too much gummint regulation going on here. So, see, as a seed for thought (if you've got fertile ground ready -- perhaps not) this is pretty decent fodder on a slow news day.
But in this case, no one actually said the guy was freezing his ass off in Boston, but the quotes I read definitely implied that. And, while it doesn't really invalidate his comments (yes, it is cold here), or really hurt anyone, it is slimy. On the other hand, do they have to come out and say where everyone is reporting from? (Seems like they used to, almost as an issue of pride -- "look at how many remotes we can affort to cull from for you!"). Look, there's another interesting line of thought, to some.
The other interseting point (again, to me) is about "local" newscasts and such being post-processed national versions with local references edited in, such as "We'll be out at the mall today giving out T-shirts" is edited to insert town names and custom copies are distributed nationwide to dozens of "local" stations that actually have no local anything other than a transmitter run by computers. I think that's slimy too, but I can also see how it makes good business sense (highly cost-effective) . . . unless people actually backlash because of the sliminess.
So, I guess, besides those points for discussion, what I'm saying is STFU and stop threadcrapping. If you don't like it don't read it. And definitely don't post about it -- no one wants your complaints, just your insight and interesting discussion, which you are clearly lacking in this case.
Not much processing -- they do "real world" website performance analysis using distributed user connections from around the world. CPU usage on my machines never exceeds 1%, and the client is stable and inobtrusive. Not big bucks, but keep in mind it is multiplied by the number of machines you have on. Free $10-20/mo. for me (6 machines on 24x7) with no noticeable impact on CPU or BW. YMMV.
Yes sir.
First, Centrino is a CPU, not a graphics card or GPU. Second, HP can invent new definitions of "MOBILITY RADEON 9200 brand" all it wants, but it's still false advertising in context of this, at least until ATI changes thier pages that clearly distinguish "MOBILITY 9000" from "MOBILITY RADEON 9200".
The MR9000 has a rv250 core. The MR9200 has a rv280 core. ATI's product portfolio quotes that the 9200 is slightly faster than the 9000 (10x vs. 9x, when compared to the slowest Mobility Radeon [1x]).
Anything else I can do for you?
You are sadly mistaken, for about the 8th time in this thread. Please stop spreading misinformation .
Have you ever seen a Mobile Radeon 9200 that has AGP8x?
Yes.
Way to totally miss the point. If it's advertised as a "400MHz DDR SDRAM" machine, how do you suddenly decide the options are "broken machine that needs PC100 with 400MHz DDR instead" vs. "working machine with PC100 RAM". It's advertised as 400MHz DDR, so it should include it, and work with it.
You're either dense or trolling. Or maybe trying to avoid eating the crow you should be chewing on given your previous posts in this thread.
Wrong AC. There are other differences between an ATI Mobility Radeon 9000 and an ATI Mobility Radeon 9200. ATI refers to these parts as different, so why shouldn't laptop manufacturers?
There is a difference between an ATI Mobility Radeon 9000 and an ATI Mobility Radeon 9200. ATI refers to them distinctly, as should laptop manufacturers using one or the other.
Unless ATI specifically has a product called the "Mobile Radeon 9200"
They certainly do.
So, someone has engaged in false advertising. Now will you stop the nonsense you've been spewing in this thread?
Yeah, for companies who will pay 10x the price for a guarantee (rather than deal with the 1% fallout of the unguaranteed version), a difference exists, but only on paper. For the rest of us, the two refer to the same product, with one deliberately (and reverseably) crippled.
You have no idea what the MP failure rate for XP parts are, so why do you try to put a precise number on it? The difference exist in testing and warranty, something that costs real money. Not just "paper".
More interestingly, you appear to defeat your own point here - A paper-only difference between the XP and MP line of Athlons counts as valid in your opinion, yet the paper-only name of an ATI product makes your fur bristle?
You are thoroughly confused. It's not "paper-only". One is sure to work in MP, one is not. One is tested to work in MP, one has not been. Tester time costs money. Test harnesses for MP cost more than those for XP. Clearly you have no clue about semiconductor manufacturing or the business models involved. Why you feel the need to try to justify false advertising is beyond me.
IBM XT didn't have an "Intel XT" chip in it, it had an 8088.
Er, you do know that there's no such thing as an "Intel XT" chip right? Oh wait, had you, you wouldn't have said anything so stupid. If they had put "ATI monkeychip 9999" on the laptop, we wouldn't be having this discussion. Now I wish they had done that . . .
Yeah, sorry. I saw "Centrino" (Intel) and "Radeon" (ATI), but I do realize neither of those companies makes laptops, so you're right (except the AMD/Nvidia thing -- I'd bash them for this just the same). It's still annoying, no matter for whom they are apologizing.
The grandparent and you are fighting an irrelevant battle. Please stop the distraction effort.
Whether or not you consider an XP and MP product as "different", they indeed are. The only cost differentiator in mass produced semiconductor parts from the same mask design is the testing done. This testing happens on multi-million dollar machines on which tester time is meted out in increments of seconds. Running that extra test costs a lot of extra money.
Moreover, the incredibly expensive test harnesses are different for XP and MP (obviously, one creates a multiproc environment and one doesn'). There is a huge difference in a product that is tested to work as you intend to use it (you can get it replaced if it doesn't work as advertised) and one not tested as you plan to use it (you can not get it replaced because you can't use it in a different manner than it was intended).
And, this bit about Centrino not supporting AGP 8X somehow making it OK to ship an AGP 4X part when advertising an 8X part is outrageous. As I pointed out in a post below, if your "400MHZ DDR SDRAM laptop" came with PC100 SDRAM memory instead along with a chipset that only supports PC100 RAM, is that OK? No, and neither is this.
Can I get an overrated for the parent here?
"2200" != "2200MHz" == "2.2GHz"
"XP" == "untested and not guaranteed for multiproc" != "MP" == "tested and guaranteed for multiproc"
The issue in this story is false advertising. Period. No matter how much you want to apologize for Intel and ATI.
That's weak. Buy my new laptop with 400MHz DDR SDRAM. But it's not 400MHz DDR SDRAM, it's PC100 RAM. But, oh, by the way, the chipset in that laptop only supports PC100 RAM. So it's functionally equivalent and OK with you, right?
I can't believe the ATI/Intel apologists in this thread. It's as surprising as it is disturbing.
Er, assuming you mean "Hardware Texture & Lighting Transform Engine" and I believe you do, then a GeForce1 will not run it, nor will some of the earlier ATI cards (not sure where the HT&L line is drawn in the ATI series, but it's there).
BF1942 requires hardware T&L, and it will not even try to run on a GeForce1.
If you're going to write, why not include all of Ms. Sweeney's colleagues, supervisors, school board members, select local press, etc.? Here's a nice to list for your cut&paste pleasure -- keep it sane, polite, and poignant please:
Richard_Anderson@birdville.k12.tx.us; Pam_Ashley@birdville.k12.tx.us; Jean_Bentz@birdville.k12.tx.us; Dee Bowen@birdville.k12.tx.us; Mavis_Boyd@birdville.k12.tx.us; Matthew_Cho@birdville.k12.tx.us; Jim_Connor@birdville.k12.tx.us; Stephanie_Cuffia@birdville.k12.tx.us; Mike_Drysdale@birdville.k12.tx.us; Ellie_Gamner@birdville.k12.tx.u; Michael_Glenn@birdville.k12.tx.us; Lowell_Houston@birdville.k12.tx.us; Laura_Ingram@birdville.k12.tx.us; Juanita_Jarvis@birdville.k12.tx.us; Michael_Johns@birdville.k12.tx.us; Chad_Keener@birdville.k12.tx.us; Sarah_Kelley@birdville.k12.tx.us; Deborah_Key@birdville.k12.tx.us; Herb_Kirkpatrick@birdville.k12.tx.us; Linda Knowlton@birdville.k12.tx.us; Gretchen_Krug@birdville.k12.tx.us; Lynette_Landry@birdville.k12.tx.us; Kelly_Leach@birdville.k12.tx.us; Nell_Lindsey@birdville.k12.tx.us; Ann Loibl@birdville.k12.tx.us; Susan_Merrill@birdville.k12.tx.us; Lisa Nuttall@birdville.k12.tx.us; Stephanie_Pennington@birdville.k12.tx.us; Theron_Pollock@birdville.k12.tx.us; Shannon_Houston@birdville.k12.tx.us; Stephen_Ritchie@birdville.k12.tx.us; Tommy_Rollins@birdville.k12.tx.us; Sharon_Ruiz@birdville.k12.tx.us; Ed_Santiago@birdville.k12.tx.us; Tamatha_Sims@birdville.k12.tx.us; Beverly_Sweeney@birdville.k12.tx.us; Angela_Tims@birdville.k12.tx.us; Andria_VerSteegh@birdville.k12.tx.us; Booth_Waddell@birdville.k12.tx.us; Jessica_Baker@birdville.k12.tx.us; Susan_Wilson@birdville.k12.tx.us; Monica_Woods@birdville.k12.tx.us; Chris_Yursasek@birdville.k12.tx.us; Nell_Lindsey@birdville.k12.tx.us; Linda_Knowlton@birdville.k12.tx.us; Laura_Ingram@birdville.k12.tx.us; Mavis_Boyd@birdville.k12.tx.us; Deborah_Roberts@birdville.k12.tx.us; nrhoscar@sbcglobal.net; communications@nrhtx.com; webmaster@tasb.org; dlieber@star-telegram.com; ralph_kunkel@birdville.k12.tx.us; wanda_strong@birdville.k12.tx.us; david_pokluda@birdville.k12.tx.us; mary_spencer@birdville.k12.tx.us; sherry_dunn@birdville.k12.tx.us; dolores_webb@birdville.k12.tx.us; kelly_hancock@birdville.k12.tx.us; Mary_Bull@birdville.k12.tx.us; Quentin_Burnett@birdville.k12.tx.us; jack_knowles@birdville.k12.tx.us; Betty_Grubbs@birdville.k12.tx.us; Toby_Howard@birdville.k12.tx.us; mark_thomas@birdville.k12.tx.us; jack_knowles@birdville.k12.tx.us; karen_hibbs@birdville.k12.tx.us; taresa_lucas@birdville.k12.tx.us; ron_israel@birdville.k12.tx.us; tony_rand@birdville.k12.tx.us; thalia_ross@birdville.k12.tx.us; charles_sanders@birdville.k12.tx.us; patti_mullen@birdville.k12.tx.us; ed_foster@birdville.k12.tx.us; jay_thompson@birdville.k12.tx.us; Stephen_waddell@birdville.k12.tx.us; dlieber@star-telegram.com; pcaballero@star-telegram.com; Robin_McClure@qm.birdville.k12.tx.us; reprints@nsba.org; webmaster@birdville.k12.tx.us
I watched all three (3) video trailers at your link and I have three (3) comments:
a. That's not video scratching.
b. Gorillaz called; they want their schtick back.
c. It kinda sucks, even for that genre.
An EE degree would be better, IMHO, but I think some schools are merging EE and CS these days, letting students pick sub-emphasis, so you might be able to spin it that way if your physics background is strong enough. Anyway, assuming your physics (particularly EM field theory and semiconductor device physics) understanding is strong, and you have very good grades (B+ or better, prefer A's, especially in core courses) from an ABET school, you should have little trouble getting an entry-level position. Willingness to relocate is a big plus. Interviewing skills (communication ability, confidence, familiarity with a wide variety of EE topics) will probably play a big role as well.
The verilog (and much less so, VHDL) are nice to know, but if you want to code, you will have a harder time finding work. If you want to be a physical designer you'll find more demand for yourself. Of course, as a fresh grad you don't know much about actual design (interviewers realize that), but if you have the background and foundation, enthusiasm, communications skills, and professionalism, they'll teach you.
There are a few things you could do to make yourself stand out: (1) maybe too late, but if you have a chance to make real hardware for a Sr. project, even a simple board with an FPGA on it, do it. (I made a PCI interface for an image processor for my project, and I took it with me on interviews, prepared to discuss every aspect of its design). (2) go to openeda.org and track down free/educational versions of design tools (Alliance, and CIRCUIT are pretty decent free ones if I recall correctly). Read the docs and everything else you can find on the web (there's a lot), learn the design flow, and take a few simple projects from netlist to GDS (synthesis, floorplanning, placement, clocking, routing, extraction, delay calculation, verification, artwork creation, final DRC/LVS, formal verification). Then SPICE your clock tree and learn about signal integrity. Understand each stage and why you did it. Your having done this will be obvious to an interviewer, and it's a huge gold star for you that few fresh grads bother with. Plus you'll probably learn more in the process than any school could teach you.
Oh, and learn Perl if you don't already know it. It's the favorite design tool of many, myself included (design databases are usually just huge text files, and sometimes you need to parse that database in ways that no commercial tools can).
Good luck!
Some Americans would be pretty happy with that. To be quite honest, I'd imagine the bulk of the complaints about closing America's borders completely would come from potential immigrants, not Americans.
What was your point again?