It honestly depends on what it's going to be used for. If the end-user is getting their start in video or audio editing, I'd instantly recommend a Mac solely on the software that is only available on Mac. Garageband is fantastic to learn and really easy to pick up, and it's easy to move up to the more professional products when the time comes.

My efforts searching for a Windows equivalent that's as easy to use as Garageband (for my aspiring musician friends) has proven difficult. (Any suggestions would be appreciated.)

What boggles my mind is the missed opportunity at iOs/Android apps.

Have one unit as the "DM". Other people in the same area/LAN can be flagged as players. DM can see everything, players can only see relevant combat data and their own character sheets. You could literally replace all of the paper with a well-written iPad/Android suite and they'd make boatloads of money doing it.

Unfortunately WotC seems content to just re-release the game every five years and clean up on the sourcebooks. It's vile.

As an explanation for the sheer depth there is in 3.5, did you know there's something on the order of 700+ classes and prestige classes in that edition? And that's just in the official sourcebooks.

3.5 is pretty much the standard in my gaming circles, but Pathfinder (a.k.a. 3.75) is gaining traction. People really like what Paizo has done with the rules and the setting.

I think this represents an interesting dichotomy for geeks.

For instance, you might have the whole "going to dinner parties with the wife" thing in order to maintain a social norm. Meanwhile, you'd rather be in your garage tinkering with a Raspberry Pi or Arduino or something in your garage and making an anti-squirrel turret for your backyard.

As I'm getting older I'm realizing more and more that the hobbies I find intellectually satisfying are rarely something that can be plugged into a social component. As good (and intelligent) as my friends are, most of them wouldn't want to spend an afternoon learning something interesting in Perl or building a robot for the fuck of it. We go out for drinks or to a diner or something like that. I'm finding that I have to divorce "intellectually stimulating" from "social interaction" more and more every day.

No wonder we spend all of our time in the basement. It's the only place we can get any of the really interesting shit done, and almost no one wants to join us.

Well, how about experiments conducted in a low-gravity environment?

How about telescopes and other such sensors that are capable of things we'd never be able to do on the Earth?

How about because fuck it, it's there, which is one of the most important driving factors in humanity?

Why did we climb Everest? Because it's the tallest mountain. Why does man try to skydive from ever-increased heights? Because we've never skydived from that high before. Why does the Heart Attack Grill make a Quadruple Bypass burger? Because honestly, a good cheeseburger has more calories in it than a month of your salary.

('< ~Hello, beautiful!

Wakka wakka!

Depends on the time of the month.

Sure, okay. He's making easy money in a legal grey area. Just like loads of bankers and businessmen have done in the United States and all over the world.

His only "crime" is not "contributing" to the war chests of politicians.

And if we could align them in a series, we'd have Internet in space! BRILLIANT!

Don't forget guitar amps. You're not gonna get the same aesthetics out of silicon. The best amps all pretty much use vacuum tubes.

Oh yeah? Well this morning, I played the Torchlight 2 beta and got an Engineer all the way to Level 12! And then I'm going to the dentist in an hour!

Man, fuck those guys that put my life into perspective. ):

On the first spacewalk, slyly plant a North Korean flag on some random american satellite, with the Korean for "BOOSH, BITCHES!". Wait a few months and watch NASA flip their shit trying to figure out how the North Koreans did it.

We have stuff like Truecrypt that, with a proper key, is pretty much uncrackable.

What happens when we have a filesharing client that reaches this apex? All it takes is some dedicated kid at Caltech or MIT or Basement U to come up with something that would basically be untrackable. Would the government make a completely legal program illegal? Massive spying?

It's going to happen and it will be interesting to see how its handled. I'd pay a hefty sum of money to see the face of the MAFIAA execs when a tech guy tells them "No, there really isn't any way to track this program. It's impossible."

If they were done right, I wouldn't necessarily see what's wrong with ID scanners.

I mean, sure, there's a business building a database of their customers. You know what, though? That already happens. Pay by credit and it wouldn't be all that hard to compile a list of everyone who paid by credit at a bar or club and find out about repeat business.

"Okay guys, I let you put your stupid cameras in my nightclub. Now tell me what the numbers were last night."

"Well, according to this, 134 police officers, 3 entirely separate instances of Prince somehow being there at the same time, 18 registered sex offenders, 22 donkeys, two thirds of the local city council, and an emperor penguin."