A lot of software that we have today can be considered as AI, but like everything there's various degrees. Siri is a form of AI, albeit a crappy one. Wolfram Alpha can perform basic reasoning. Asimo (that little creepy robot) does some stuff that even 30 years ago would have been considered science fiction. We have AI now, just not the Skynet or Sentient Intelligence that people expect from books and films.

Artificial Intelligence. The ability to react to stimuli and make decisions based on those stimuli is a solid definition of intelligence. Yes, there are others. The fact that it's programmed intelligence makes it Artificial. Trust me, it is AI and the argument over semantics is moot and unproductive.

This is what the vast majority of anti-automated car people forget: an automated car will actually drive in a way that results in a net gain to the system. Everyone benefits when people leave a decent gap between their car and the car in front (go read if you don't believe me). A human driver often won't because they want to "send a message" to the other driver that "they're too slow" or they don't want someone entering "their" territory and will actively move to block them - I see this every day. Automated cars have the advantage of not giving a shit about emotional considerations, and they won't instantly turn into arseholes the moment they get into the "safety" of a car like a lot of the people who seem to share my commute each day. Apologies for the large amount of quotation marks; they're meant to indicate me using an annoying air quotes voice.

DAMMIT! I have a deadline on Wednesday and this would have been a great excuse to blow it off and kick back with a cold beer...

Just to nitpick (a.k.a. correct your misleading comment) evasion and avoidance are two totally separate things. One is illegal. The other is not. If you are aware that Google are evading tax then you should inform the taxation authorities in the relevant countries and become the hero of many an anti-Google fanboy.

Google are known to be avoiding tax, and to many people (including me) that smacks of immoral behaviour. Taxes are there for a reason. They pay for shit that helps everyone. However, the tax system can never, will never and should never work on the "honour" system. If you leave loopholes that allow people and companies to legally avoid paying as much tax as everyone thinks they should, then of course they'll use them. I mean Jesus, it's not rocket science. Pay $X in tax, or pay $Y in tax, where Y is much, much smaller than X. Both are perfectly legal. Which one are people going to pick? Aside from a select few, anyone who says "Oh I'd pay more than the minimum because it's morally right" is either a moron, lying, or simply wouldn't benefit enough from a tax avoidance scheme to make it worth their while.

Maybe, but if they want to moderate Google's tax-paying behaviour then they should close the bloody loopholes that let them avoid it in the first place.

I'd say Asher's work (my opinion based on his Agent Cormac novels only) was much harsher and grittier than Banks'. There's less character development, less deep plots and the writing style is not quite as refined. However, I enjoy the work of both authors and would suggest you borrow a copy of Asher's first Cormac novel (or the first in one of his other series) and see if it tickles your fancy.

Vance mentioned further up. As I mentioned up there, an anthology of short stories from some fairly well known SF writers set in Vance's universe was published not so long back and is called "Songs of the Dying Earth". From what I understand (haven't yet read Vance's original works) it touches upon many of the characters and plots from his work so don't read if you're potentially upset by back stories that aren't as you imagined!

Having recently picked up and devoured "Songs of the Dying Earth" I can agree with this. I'd never read any of Vance's original works, and was initially a little taken aback when I discovered the book I'd scooped up from the Si-Fi section in a rush was more Fantasy than Sci-Fi (let's not argue over the dividing line today). However, the world Vance created seems quite incredible, and the guest authors producing short stories for "Songs of the Dying Earth" did a spectacular job. Once I've worked my way through the backlog of books I have right now I may have to invest in some of Vance's original works.

London may itself be a bit of a special case due to the large number of Universities, and cosmopolitan residents that are perhaps more inclined to enjoy the heft of a physical wad of paper in their hands than the cold and clinical smoothness of an e-book reader.

As for myself, I definitely prefer a paper copy of a book. Something I can stick on a shelf, give to my kids to read one day, lend to a friend, resell if the urge ever hit me and something I can leave in a bag on the beach without worrying about someone stealing it. Most of those things are made much harder, or more pointless, by having e-books.

Except brick-and-mortar stores don't really offer e-books, and Amazon is a skewed sample as they're pretty much the champion of digital book purveyance. So no, not fairly indicative at all I'd say.

Had to read that a couple of times before my internal parser came back with an approximate translation into lay-English.

I fear that this will be ammunition for the climate change deniers, which if I understand correctly is not the intention here. The gentleman in question is merely pointing out possible bias and error and the open invitation is to critically analyse and see if his theory stands up. You know, like real scientific method! Still, I'll sit back now and watch the fireworks in what promises to be yet another pitched battle between the deeply entrenched sides in a war where actual fact is not nearly as important as name calling and idealogical strength of will.

And the insults start in 3.....2......1......

Indeed. Most travel sites, and general shopping sites, initially organise things by what they call "Relevance", and in many cases this is a totally ambiguous term! Relevance for them can surely mean which supplier paid them the most for advertising. Organising results based on someone's hardware, if a correlation can be shown between the hardware and end choices for accommodation in this case, actually seems pretty sensible and less sinister than what I'd usually expect.

Looking forward to reading all the paranoid and rage filled comments though...