What I've noticed is that my friends who have started using Google+ in addition to Facebook, are the same friends who also follow me on Twitter, and used LiveJournal back in the day. These are people who have used different social networks before Facebook, and continue to use more than one social network.
It's the friends who have never used any social network other than Facebook who are going to be the hardest to convince, and there are many such people.
Three of those 4 languages are of very little use unless you don't mind being confined to western Europe.
Actually, with a knowledge of Dutch, English, French and German, you'll probably be able to make yourself understood across most of Africa, depending on how well the locals are brushed up on the regional lingua franca. It's not just the British and Spanish that have a colonial past.
The European Commission is as democratic as the house of lords. The difference is the house of lords strikes down bad laws whilst the Commission creates them.
How would you know? The media in the UK ignores the EU completely unless they're bashing them. The BBC has good coverage of European politics on specialist programmes on the news channel at odd times of the day, but you will never see mature coverage of EU policy on any mainstream news programme or in any mainstream newspaper in the UK, even the scarce, relatively pro-Europe ones.
The truth is that people in the UK have no idea what the EU does, and wouldn't know how to engage with it if they even wanted to. And would probably miss it immensely if we were to leave.
Ending these subsidies won't put a penny back in the hands of taxpayers, it'll just go back to the treasuries of the member states.
The EU has the same problem as any level of government that doesn't raise its own taxes, in that if they lower their budget one year when the money isn't needed, it'll be nigh on impossible for the to raise it again later when it is needed. So while I don't necessarily like the situation, I understand why the EU wouldn't want to just hand the money back.
Local councils in the UK have this problem. They raise a proportion of their income through Council Tax, but the majority comes from central or devolved government. They will waste an inordinate amount of money in order to justify the maintenance of their budget.
I used to use a desktop mail client, because that was how I got new mail notifications.
(I found using Gmail notification widgets that then sent you to the Gmail web page too clumsy - if there's going to be something running on my computer, it might as well be a fully fledged mail app.)
Nowadays I get my mail pushed to my phone, so I don't need a notification on my computer any more. If I want to type out an email on a computer I just go to the Gmail website. It doesn't need to be open all the time.
I don't think giving your real name on the internet is a good idea, at all.
That depends on how common your name is. If your name's John Smith, there's really not that much to fear.
My name isn't particularly common, but it's common enough for its Wikipedia page to list several sportsmen (one of them moderately famous), a politician, a musician and an actor. Criminals may be able to collect a lot of information about people with my name, but how will they be able to tie that information to me?
Facebook requires you to be male or female, but there's a checkbox titled 'Show my gender in my Profile', so you have the option of not making it public. From what I've read, your gender is both required and public on Google+.
What I'd like to know is whether there are options for transgendered or intersex individuals, who may not be comfortable identifying with either gender.
My Google account is a Google Apps account, so Google Profile and Google+ are still completely unavailable to me, so I'm not sure how it works.
Having looked at a few American roundabouts on Google Street View, I think part of the problem is that the designers have assumed that Americans will be confused by them, and have decided to give them as much help as possible. The end result is that they've gone crazy with line painting, and so there's a severe case of information overload on approach.
Apple gets round the problem by compiling code for x86 in order to run it in their iOS Simulator. Is there any reason that Google couldn't do the same?
For instance, does the increased freedom given to Android developers relative to iOS make it a more difficult thing to implement?
"Our" soldiers are there because the Americans said "Jump" and we said "How high?"
It's nothing to do with our freedoms, and everything to do with keeping the USA happy as a trading partner. As for the soldiers, well nobody was holding a gun to their head down at the recruitment office.
The Afghans won't see a real liberation for a long, long time. What we have in Afghanistan is what we had in Tunisia and Egypt before the Arab Spring - a government that the West can deal with, and nothing more. Don't expect that to change.
All my TV equipment is plugged into one of these. It detects the TV's power draw, and when it disappears for more than 20 seconds it powers everything off.
Its one drawback is that if I want to play some music through my surround sound speakers, I have to turn the TV on, but that's a pretty rare event. It also means that guests have to be given a crash-course in using the TV.
It depends on what the markup actually is, though. The last time I was in HMV, I considered buying a few DVDs, but I scanned them with Amazon's smartphone app in order to compare prices. It wasn't that HMV's prices were more expensive (which I had expected), it was that they were significantly more expensive.
As far as I'm concerned, HMV had the opportunity to make money from me. They had me in their shop, and they gave me the opportunity to walk away with my purchase rather than waiting for a delivery. And they blew it.
I did my CS degree in a Scottish university, and in Scotland there's a tradition of breadth in the education system so I did a bunch of subjects in my first and second years that weren't related to my degree.
For someone with davidjbeveridge's experience, though, he could probably gain accelerated entry into third year and skip all the non-CS courses, especially as he's not likely to get much benefit from the CS courses in the first two years (certainly in the first year).
I should point out that I think the one I linked to is only compatible with the original iPad. There is a dock for the iPad 2, and it will connect to any bluetooth keyboard, but as far as I know there's no integrated product for it like this one.
And I have had it pointed out to me that the Eee Pad Transformer might suit your needs better, so look at that too.
If I were to nitpick back at you, I would point out that the GPP never said 'mousepad'. He said 'mouse'. And anyway, two out of three isn't bad. The GPP implied that stands and keyboards for tablets are unavailable.
One of the long standing arguments against the modern tablet, ever since the iPad came out, has been its lack of a keyboard. Everyone has entirely ignored the existence of this keyboard, and the ability to connect any bluetooth keyboard. I wanted to emphasise that every single person who claimed that you can't use keyboards with tablets, ever since modern tablets started coming out, was wrong.
I can foresee a situation in, say, 20 years' time, when vehicles without this technology are banned from motorways; similar to horse-drawn vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists.
I can't see it happening on normal roads for decades though. In the UK, it would require the tearing up of public right-of-way law. Motorways, and roads with motorway-style restrictions, require special legislation in order to make the rules effective.
Netbooks never really reached the impulse-buy kind of prices that everybody hoped they would. At the same time, suddenly everybody is now carrying a smartphone, and can do the basic tasks (like web surfing, email and basic document editing) that netbooks were meant to be for on their phones. Meanwhile, tablets have come out at a much lower price point than everybody had initially anticipated.
This is something I've always wondered. Getting a heavier car up to speed takes more fuel, sure, but once you're at that speed and maintain it (as is possible on a motorway), then doesn't the additional momentum give you an advantage in punching through the air resistance?
Depends. I've heard one theory (pertaining to recumbent tadpole tricycles I think) that if you drive or ride a vehicle that is sufficiently odd-looking, you're much safer because drivers will notice you. And slow down, stare, and exclaim, "What the fuck is that?!".
Slashdot Mirror
What I've noticed is that my friends who have started using Google+ in addition to Facebook, are the same friends who also follow me on Twitter, and used LiveJournal back in the day. These are people who have used different social networks before Facebook, and continue to use more than one social network.
It's the friends who have never used any social network other than Facebook who are going to be the hardest to convince, and there are many such people.
Actually, with a knowledge of Dutch, English, French and German, you'll probably be able to make yourself understood across most of Africa, depending on how well the locals are brushed up on the regional lingua franca. It's not just the British and Spanish that have a colonial past.
That depends. I wouldn't put it past them to use different page 3 girls in their Scottish edition.
How would you know? The media in the UK ignores the EU completely unless they're bashing them. The BBC has good coverage of European politics on specialist programmes on the news channel at odd times of the day, but you will never see mature coverage of EU policy on any mainstream news programme or in any mainstream newspaper in the UK, even the scarce, relatively pro-Europe ones.
The truth is that people in the UK have no idea what the EU does, and wouldn't know how to engage with it if they even wanted to. And would probably miss it immensely if we were to leave.
Ending these subsidies won't put a penny back in the hands of taxpayers, it'll just go back to the treasuries of the member states.
The EU has the same problem as any level of government that doesn't raise its own taxes, in that if they lower their budget one year when the money isn't needed, it'll be nigh on impossible for the to raise it again later when it is needed. So while I don't necessarily like the situation, I understand why the EU wouldn't want to just hand the money back.
Local councils in the UK have this problem. They raise a proportion of their income through Council Tax, but the majority comes from central or devolved government. They will waste an inordinate amount of money in order to justify the maintenance of their budget.
I used to use a desktop mail client, because that was how I got new mail notifications.
(I found using Gmail notification widgets that then sent you to the Gmail web page too clumsy - if there's going to be something running on my computer, it might as well be a fully fledged mail app.)
Nowadays I get my mail pushed to my phone, so I don't need a notification on my computer any more. If I want to type out an email on a computer I just go to the Gmail website. It doesn't need to be open all the time.
That depends on how common your name is. If your name's John Smith, there's really not that much to fear.
My name isn't particularly common, but it's common enough for its Wikipedia page to list several sportsmen (one of them moderately famous), a politician, a musician and an actor. Criminals may be able to collect a lot of information about people with my name, but how will they be able to tie that information to me?
Facebook requires you to be male or female, but there's a checkbox titled 'Show my gender in my Profile', so you have the option of not making it public. From what I've read, your gender is both required and public on Google+.
What I'd like to know is whether there are options for transgendered or intersex individuals, who may not be comfortable identifying with either gender.
My Google account is a Google Apps account, so Google Profile and Google+ are still completely unavailable to me, so I'm not sure how it works.
You could probably replace a lot of four-way stops with mini roundabouts, without needing to dedicate much or any extra space.
Having looked at a few American roundabouts on Google Street View, I think part of the problem is that the designers have assumed that Americans will be confused by them, and have decided to give them as much help as possible. The end result is that they've gone crazy with line painting, and so there's a severe case of information overload on approach.
Compare this American roundabout with this Scottish one.
The source was actually Dan Neil, motoring correspondent at the Wall Street Journal, whom the BBC were quoting.
Maybe whoever gained access to the account also changed the password?
Apple gets round the problem by compiling code for x86 in order to run it in their iOS Simulator. Is there any reason that Google couldn't do the same?
For instance, does the increased freedom given to Android developers relative to iOS make it a more difficult thing to implement?
"Our" soldiers are there because the Americans said "Jump" and we said "How high?"
It's nothing to do with our freedoms, and everything to do with keeping the USA happy as a trading partner. As for the soldiers, well nobody was holding a gun to their head down at the recruitment office.
The Afghans won't see a real liberation for a long, long time. What we have in Afghanistan is what we had in Tunisia and Egypt before the Arab Spring - a government that the West can deal with, and nothing more. Don't expect that to change.
All my TV equipment is plugged into one of these. It detects the TV's power draw, and when it disappears for more than 20 seconds it powers everything off.
Its one drawback is that if I want to play some music through my surround sound speakers, I have to turn the TV on, but that's a pretty rare event. It also means that guests have to be given a crash-course in using the TV.
It depends on what the markup actually is, though. The last time I was in HMV, I considered buying a few DVDs, but I scanned them with Amazon's smartphone app in order to compare prices. It wasn't that HMV's prices were more expensive (which I had expected), it was that they were significantly more expensive.
As far as I'm concerned, HMV had the opportunity to make money from me. They had me in their shop, and they gave me the opportunity to walk away with my purchase rather than waiting for a delivery. And they blew it.
I did my CS degree in a Scottish university, and in Scotland there's a tradition of breadth in the education system so I did a bunch of subjects in my first and second years that weren't related to my degree.
For someone with davidjbeveridge's experience, though, he could probably gain accelerated entry into third year and skip all the non-CS courses, especially as he's not likely to get much benefit from the CS courses in the first two years (certainly in the first year).
It's not universal, but right-of-way restrictions do apply on some US freeways in the same way as UK motorways.
I should point out that I think the one I linked to is only compatible with the original iPad. There is a dock for the iPad 2, and it will connect to any bluetooth keyboard, but as far as I know there's no integrated product for it like this one.
And I have had it pointed out to me that the Eee Pad Transformer might suit your needs better, so look at that too.
If I were to nitpick back at you, I would point out that the GPP never said 'mousepad'. He said 'mouse'. And anyway, two out of three isn't bad. The GPP implied that stands and keyboards for tablets are unavailable.
One of the long standing arguments against the modern tablet, ever since the iPad came out, has been its lack of a keyboard. Everyone has entirely ignored the existence of this keyboard, and the ability to connect any bluetooth keyboard. I wanted to emphasise that every single person who claimed that you can't use keyboards with tablets, ever since modern tablets started coming out, was wrong.
I can foresee a situation in, say, 20 years' time, when vehicles without this technology are banned from motorways; similar to horse-drawn vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists.
I can't see it happening on normal roads for decades though. In the UK, it would require the tearing up of public right-of-way law. Motorways, and roads with motorway-style restrictions, require special legislation in order to make the rules effective.
Oh, if only such things existed.
Netbooks never really reached the impulse-buy kind of prices that everybody hoped they would. At the same time, suddenly everybody is now carrying a smartphone, and can do the basic tasks (like web surfing, email and basic document editing) that netbooks were meant to be for on their phones. Meanwhile, tablets have come out at a much lower price point than everybody had initially anticipated.
This is something I've always wondered. Getting a heavier car up to speed takes more fuel, sure, but once you're at that speed and maintain it (as is possible on a motorway), then doesn't the additional momentum give you an advantage in punching through the air resistance?
Depends. I've heard one theory (pertaining to recumbent tadpole tricycles I think) that if you drive or ride a vehicle that is sufficiently odd-looking, you're much safer because drivers will notice you. And slow down, stare, and exclaim, "What the fuck is that?!".