I would totally stop avoiding going to jury duty if they would pay me my hourly wage (I am a part time employee, I do not get paid if I do not work, and if I do not get paid I do not have money for my apartment, car, utilities, etc). As I understand it, Federal Jury Duty pays $40 a day, but I work 8am-6pm every day at an hourly rate of $16.50. That means I am out almost $120 for that one day of jury duty. That is two weeks worth of food stuffs, or a payment on my AMEX bill. It is money I simply cannot do without.

Maybe the fact that 90% of the time people don't have change on them? Society as a whole is becoming a lot more dependent on ATM cards, credit cards, etc as opposed to cash money. This means that people don't have coinage nor dollars, but instead a plastic card in their wallet. I have seen machines that take cards and coins and even dollar bills. This seems like the best idea. Any te

Please, for the love of God, bring us back REAL Wing Commander. III and IV, not Prophecy-like. Please? =(

Yeah, pretty much. You make it sound like it's an epic process. I can get Win7 reinstalled, configured, and setup with the software I _need_ (Office, Browsers, Security, some games) in relatively quick order. So what if there is no upgrade path.

I've been running Win7 exclusively (64-bit on Desktop and Laptop) and have had only two problems with any game I have tried to play:
One was Neverwinter Nights 2, where there is a known work-around [There's a problem with DirectX not properly detecting video cards - fixed by a dll replacement]
Two was with Tom Clancy's HAWX, wherein I'll launch the game, select my character, and the game will crash. I am working with Ubisoft currently to find a resolution [we are currently both stumped]
Win7 even properly runs my old favorites such as Wing Commander 3, Wing Commander 4, Warcraft 2, Starcraft, gods I don't think I've had any game (besides the previously mentioned 2) NOT work. And I have a lot of games.

I had the same problem with Neverwinter Nights 2.

To get NWN2 to run on Windows 7 - download this file - Click Here- take ownership of the original file (look in c:\windows\system32 or c:\windows\syswow64 depending on your flavor of OS), rename it (I recommend renaming the extension to something other than .dll in case you need the original file later on), then move the downloaded file into the same folder as the original. Good to go.

To get the NWN2 Toolset to function under Windows 7 - you need to manually install the actual DirectX 9.0c package. Best version to get is Microsoft's updated end-user redistributable, as this not only places the correct DirectX 9.0c files on your system, but will update any DirectX 10 files as well. The file can be found here - Click Here - download, unpack to any folder on your system, and run the dxsetup.exe file. The toolset will now run.

Neverwinter Nights 2 will now run after taking ownership and replacing the dxdign.dll file in c:\windows\syswow64\ (for x64 version).

It's a wonky problem with DirectX, not with NWN2 as I understand it.

-Post taken from broo2.blogspot.com.

It's interesting that you should mention that, as the FLIR article you linked on Wikipedia notes that "the use of a thermal imaging device from a public vantage point to monitor the radiation of heat from a person's home was a "search" within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, and thus required a warrant"(Kyllo v. United States).
So are they planning to completely ignore that, use a different kind of technology (which I think would still probably be not-quite-right by the spirit of that court ruling), or just haven't realized how blatantly stupid it is yet?

Including myself actually, don't even like to eat before flights. I must have a weak stomach because I can't stand eating before going on a flight - my stomach gets tied in knots! Drinking is ok though.

Wifi though, if it's cheap (or even better, free) I'll be a happy camper.

I am so sick and tired of listening to people whine about the way war is conducted. War is not some pleasant little tea time where people come out and politely wave flags at you and say "Hey I'm the bad guy! Please shoot me!" or "I'm the innocent bystander! Please let me walk by".

What I fail to understand is why people think we spend so much money on our military budget to just have people sitting around. The military is trained, equipped, and prepared to go in, do as much damage as possible, then get the hell out with minimal casualties. 1300 killed for 100 losses? Good for our guys, but you know what, that's 100 of our countryfolk who did not come home.

Furthermore, everyone remembers the 'massacres' the winning side may inflict upon the losing side (we have years to play armchair general and criticize every movement, every shot, everything basically) but no one seems to remember any atrocities that the losing side may have done. If I recall correctly the reason why the US went in was because we were searching for a group of insurgents/freedom fighters/whatever you want to call them we believed to be responsible for the attack on the Blackwater Security teams and contractors over there who were doing their jobs.

It's all about perspective here people. If you can't at least try to remain impartial then you've already failed at history.

Disclaimer: I work for a large university computer lab.

Three things keep labs open around here.

First of all, nobody wants to spend a ridiculous amount of money on software that the labs already have. Sure, -some- people will still pirate Office and Adobe, but we also provide support for people having problems with software. In addition we provide EVERY piece of software needed by any class at the University. Convenience still weighs heavily on the average student's mind.

Second of all, printing is a HUGE factor. Nobody buys a printer. And if they do, they forget to buy paper or ink. Having a centralized location they can always go to with printing available is one of the major factors that keeps our doors open. We've recently rolled out wireless printing too, and the students and staff love it. And once they come in the doors to get their documents they generally find something to do and sit down to do it.

Third, we provide a nice quiet environment to get work done. You really can't find that elsewhere on campus. We've also started transitioning from the "Pack as many computers in a room as possible" model to a "Collaborative Study/Workgroup" model, which students are loving. This involves switching from rectangular desks with 2 people per desk to circular desks with 5 or so people sitting at it, all facing each other.

Labs DO need to start offering more to students though - or their usefulness will decline to the point of no longer being necessary.

I wonder how long it took them to do this...

I also wonder how long it would take them to make DX10 work in Windows XP, which I'm sure would have had a much greater impact.

I dualboot Vista and XP on my desktop and I use Vista solely for gaming with DirectX 10. I would loveeee to use XP for everything and not have both OS's at the same time.

I guess that's probably too much to ask. Oh wait. Apparently Microsoft has an Alpha for DX10 on XP... ... Maybe I stand corrected?

OK I understand that the grease gun went off in the bag and covered the tools with goo and what not.

But... why not go inside before attempting to clean the stupid things off? I mean, the tools are still usable, if a little gunked up...

Kudos to NASA for having two sets of tools, one for each astronaut. ... Wait... You say they only have those two sets? No backups? ... ... -_-

Seriously?

What's next? If my PC crashes because your software is atrocious is that going to cost me too?

I'm an hourly employee and this pisses me off. If I'm in the building and can't be elsewhere then you WILL be paying me. It's ridiculous. There's plenty of stuff to be done while waiting for a machine to boot anyways. Talk to coworkers, get a feel for whats going to happen that day, etc.

What about all the people who go off and go for a smoke? Half the time they don't clock out for their smoke break. I don't smoke, and therein get more done, but we're being treated the same?

Gimme a break. Seriously.