What I'd like to know is, why haven't we PC gamers received the Grand Theft Auto 4 DLC - The Lost and the Damned? We're still waiting.

If you actually understood the opposition, then you would be neither a Slashdotter nor a sensible person.

Just to correct a little of what you said. Norway values privacy, but yet publishes everyone's name, age, income, tax paid, and wealth information on the internet that is accessible to everyone. No, I'm not giving out the URL, I'm on there, too. Norway, in theory, values freedom of speech, but enforces divergent opinions and speech socially. If you say something that Norwegians don't like, they'll let you know it through passive aggression.

It is legal to monitor internet use, but they've just stopped renewing the licences given to law firms to do this. Effectively, you could already share files and download as much as you want without fear of prosecution, but now the "large filesharers" don't have to worry, either.

Norway does have a high tax rate. We all pay a minimum of 36% tax, but most people pay 50%. Foreigners are able to take 10% off this up to a certain sum for their first two years here. As of 2003, you are no longer able to import your own car tax and duty free. You can drive a foreign-registered car for up to a year, apply for a one-year extension, but then you're out of luck. The average car here is 3-4x more expensive than in the United States, but it depends on weight, engine size, and CO2 discharge of the car. A new Range Rover that costs 70 000$US will cost almost 500 000$US here.

Health care is not free. Every time you see your GP or go to the "triage" centre for emergencies (legevakt) you have to pay a co-pay (egenandel) that isn't a trivial amount and varies according to the time of day and other things http://www.nav.no/page?id=354
Sick pay and short- and long-term disability is what really sets Norway apart from the rest of the world, but this is seriously abused. You can get a couple of weeks paid time-off for "problems with your neighbours" and very mild miscellaneous psychiatric diagnoses.

The 5-weeks holiday is not exactly mandatory, you do not have to take it, but you will be taxed at 50% for any work you do whilst you should be away, so almost everyone goes away. Depending on where you live, you get, for example, 12% of your salary so that you can go away on holiday. I will not attempt to explain how this works because it's very complicated, look up "ferieloven" if you want to know more.

Maternity leave is 12 months, minimum of 4 weeks for dad. The part about alcohol, which fits in nicely with a discussion about maternity leave, was accurately reported already. A bottle of 20$US spirits (liquor) will cost 100$US here at the State-owned and run off-licence (or liquor store). Interestingly, Sweden has to do away with these now as they are against the European Union's ideas of free trade.

The Winter here is quite depressing ALL THE TIME. If you don't like winter, then seriously do not come to Norway. This last one was hell, even in the southern part of Norway. Snow and cold every day for nearly six months! Dark, overcast days...you're asking for psychological problems if you are in any way affected by the cold and lack of light.

The poster I'm replying to mentioned "hoockers" (sic). You don't need hookers in Norway. It's number one in terms of one night stands. You literally just go out, buy some girls some drinks, and if they're in the mood, they'll ask you to go home with them. If they aren't and you are, then it's slightly more complicated. It involves getting drunk together at least twice.

The problems with Norway that can make living here unbearable are as follows. The Norwegian people up until 30 years ago were just farmers. They had no money, no culture, a poorly expressive language... Now, suddenly, there's a lot of money. The problem is, the farmer mentality prevails. There are, of course, exceptions, but the majority of the country is xenophobic, naïve, and follows the rules blindly. The people are very closed to outsiders, you as a foreigner will never be treated as an equal no matter how long you live here. In order to make Norwegian friends, you will have to be invited into the circle by a Norwegian, which almost never happens. Fortunately, there are enough spurned foreigners dying to make friends that you'll have plenty of friends in no time, but this will not help you to learn Norwegian. Norwegian is a difficult language only in that the definite article (the, in English) goes on the end of the word (a train = et tog, the train = toget, trains = tog, the trains = togene, that train = det toget, those trains = de togene). Well, not only that. The other thing that makes Norwegian hard to learn is that Norwegians do not correct you when you speak. It's a social taboo to be confrontational, to point out one's mistakes, to publicly show feelings or opinions, or to take sides. So you will go for a long time not knowing if you're saying things quite right. The language also lacks an expressive element to it because the people are not expressive. Going from English to Norwegian is seriously hell. You have to dumb down what you want to say A LOT and get used to not saying things the way you want or are used to. Norwegians do speak English, but most don't speak it well the way English should be spoken. They speak English the way they speak Norwegian, which is understandable, but sounds really funny.

Hope this helps.

Great, I look forward to seeing an extra ZeniMax screen every time I fire up an ID game.

Just the name Jack Bauer instils fear in broke Pennsylvanian caffeine junkies looking for their next fix.

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I spell differently.

Call me pedantic, but I think this one is straightforward. Prisoners sentenced to death by hanging are HANGED by the neck until dead, pictures and art are HUNG on the wall. Juries can be HUNG, there's never been an instance of an entire jury that's been hanged.

Furthermore, it's a fascinating story so I took the time to read all the comments posted under the original story. The second story about the Review-Journal resisting the subpoena misrepresents many of the original comments.

We have strong labour laws where I'm working. I'm a doctor at a medium-sized hospital in a city. This is one of the busier hospitals in the country. Our work weeks vary, but the law says a working week is 37.5 hours a week. We often work more than that, but our schedule is made so that the six of us who work together rotate. We each get a week of compensatory time off every sixth week. This means that the number of hours we work averages out to 37.5 a week during a six week period. Every hour of overtime we work beyond what we're required by the schedule, we either get paid 1.5x our hourly wage, or we can choose to take that time off later. If someone calls in sick, and one of us takes that shift, we get paid double our hourly wage. Our night shifts are 19 hours at a time, so that adds up to a lot of money if someone is sick. We all work a lot and we work overtime because the hospital is so busy, so we all get sick, and the cycle continues. I, personally, do not take many extra shifts because I don't like to be sick. Getting a headache after so many hours on the job, or getting a cold or worse isn't worth the extra money to me. Plus, the government taxes us 50% of our overtime earnings. Since I'm American, I'll never get used to that. I don't use the social services here, many of which are great, but there are just as many I don't agree with. So I prefer not to work extra shifts and give the government 50% of what I earn in tax. Furthermore, we each get 14 days of sick leave a year. The best part is that there's no pressure on you when you're sick. No one asks you about the reasons, gets suspicious, treats you differently, and it's illegal to do so. You get to stay home and recover, the way it should be. Short-term or long-term disability is possible after those 14 days are used up, and you will get paid 100% of your salary. We also each get 5 weeks of paid leave a year, on top of our weeks of compensatory time off. You can imagine how much this costs the state, as they have to employ additional people during the times that we're sick or take off, or pay our colleagues more. I left a life of only work in the States and I've never been happier since doing that. I'll never go back to work in the US, no matter how much doctors there earn.

I'm really looking forward to this game, but I'm not looking forward to buying a Playstation 3 in order to play it. Given their recent history of releasing games only for the Playstation or handhelds, I doubt we'll ever see this come to the PC. I've been a fan of the Final Fantasy series since the beginning. I'm a happy owner of Final Fantasy VII and VIII for the PC and I've played them both several times. I was never interested in getting a Playstation when it came out. After Super Nintendo, I got a computer and never looked back. Final Fantasy IX certainly tempted me into getting the original PS, but I waited. After X and X-2 came out, it was clear the only way I was going to play these games was either by getting a Playstation 2, or waiting for an emulator. As it turns out, I bought a slimline PS2 a few months after they had hit the shelves. Until this day, the Final Fantasy games and Dragon Quest games are still the ONLY games I own for the PS2. I've even played all the Japanese Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest games for Famicom and Super Famicom, which could be done on the US consoles with just a cheap adapter :)

I thought the headline read "compressed air can nears trial". Imagine my surprise when I clicked on the link!