Microsoft gives IE away for free. The only reason they want to "win back your business" is to take advantage of vendor lock-in. I'm not seeing where this is good for the business, especially considering that the security fix for Firefox 4 is well-known and free (upgrade to Firefox 5).

That photo should flat out be public domain at this time regardless of whether the photographer is a live or dead.

While I agree with the sentiment I can certainly argue otherwise. In 1959 photos were published under the 1909 copyright act. That act granted copyright for 28 years plus another 28 years if renewed. So at the time the photo was created the author could have reasonably expected to have until 2015 to recoup his expenses. He may have priced his portfolio accordingly.

giving someone, in the process of committing a crime, information to help them, is a crime.

What crime is that? If I tell a hostage taker to put down his guns and turn himself in I am helping him but I don't think anyone would consider that a crime. If the police say, "we've got you surrounded", that is not a crime either. Letting the suspect know there is no escape is not so different from telling him to surrender.

When will it end?

When you, and other people like you do the hard work of getting elected to congress and change the law.

I am actually quite surprised. I fully expected Siemens to hand the guy some hush money so he would cancel his presentation. This could be the first time in years that the black hat conference has run without canceling a controversial presentation.

Police - Your honor, I need a warrant to search the suspect's home.

Judge - What probable cause are you basing the warrant on?

Police - The suspect destroyed the evidence.

Judge - You saw him destroy the evidence?

Police - No, but there is no other way we could have missed it, the killer would have left a trail of blood. Since the suspect did it and we didn't find a trail of blood the only possible explanation is that he destroyed the evidence. To deny this warrant would be to reward him for committing more crimes.

Judge - ??

It doesn't work that way. The standards of evidence may vary but the presumption of innocence applies to the entire legal system.

Though I do have to admit that I frequently skip judges when I vote as I often don't have enough time to research their positions and records like I would like to and I won't vote an uninformed ballot.

You shouldn't need to research their 'positions'. Judges should make decisions based on the constitution, the law, and the evidence. They most decidely should not base their decisions on public opinion, which litigant donated the most to their campaign, or how the decision will affect their chances of being re-elected.

Given that, you should always vote for the incumbant to insulate the judge from public opinion.

Done right, we can take the high level nuclear products from older reactors and use it for more than triggering NIMBY knee jerk politics near Yucca Mountain.

Whose back yard is Yucca Mountain near? It is on the largest military base in the US. If you look south south-east about four miles you will see craters left over from some 900 nuclear bomb tests.

All MRIs look the same...

Most proprietary data and market plans do not benefit from copyrights that last 95 years. In fact, most of that material will never be published. Actual published works such as movies, music, books, and news are a tiny fraction of the US economy. Of that tiny fraction, a very small portion is for works more than 14 years old.

If you do that you also lose some of the advantages of owning a home. A business loan generally has a higher interest rate. It may be taxed at a higher rate. If you ever have to file for bankruptcy much of the equity in your home is protected, but not the equity in your business.

As much as rms's predictions used to sound silly and exaggerated, they have an unfortunate tendency to be correct.

The Right to Read was based on policies and laws that had already been proposed. It should be no surprise that it is actually occurring. If it sounds silly and exaggerated it is because the proposed laws are so astonishing that they are difficult to believe.

We will continue to get closer and closer to the world depicted in The Right to Read until there is an organized lobby to move things another direction. Frankly, we need a constitutional amendment that puts strict limits on copyright.

I understand some companies paid $699 for a Linux license not long ago

If you're referring to the SCO case, SCO didn't actually sell any licenses. There were people who tried to get the license but could not because SCO wasn't actually selling them. The license offer was just a publicity stunt.

Hello nuclear engineers, can someone explain why it takes so long to shut down a nuclear power plant? I think my high school physics book was written by a pro-nuclear lobby. It assured me a nuclear plant can drop some control rods into place and stop the reaction. That may be true, but it still leaves a huge safety problem if it takes several weeks or even months for the reaction to stop.

Proposals for 'passive' cooling systems involve putting a big tank of water over the plant. If the plant shuts down you let gravity feed the cooling system. If a major incident happens, such as an earthquake or tsunami, it is likely to damage the tank and let all of the water out. What good is a passive system that is subject to the same problems as the plant itself?

Why can't we build a nuclear power plant that requires an active system to keep feeding the reaction, and make the reaction stop within minutes rather than weeks?