A lot of us think that, at least in it's current iteration, Glass is pointless, creepy, distracting, and unacceptably invasive to both the surrounding populace and the user themself.

The same thing was said when smartphones (especially those with cameras) started showing up on the market. People could suddenly take pictures and sometimes video of anyone, anywhere, and it would be hard to know. They could even surreptitiously take downshirt and upskirt photos without holding something that looked like a camera and then post them online. And they could look up people they had just met, maybe even during the conversation. And they were always paying attention to the phone, and not looking around at the world.

Roughly the same complaints come up about Glass, although I would argue it has the potential to be less distracting as the world is still there for you to see even while you're using it. It's still in very early stages, and competition seems to be coming around, so the uses for it will increase. I've had at least one opportunity to order, but I'm waiting for a hardware iteration. The current CPU is a TI OMAP 4430, which is no longer in production or really supported by TI as TI dropped out of the mobile processor market in 2012. Once they replace it with something that has a better chance of future Android support, I'll probably dive in. I will, however, keep an extra set of plain glasses with me most of the time (in the car or in a bag) in case I run into a situation where I can't wear Glass.

Firmware updates can also be installed via USB.

In the US, a finding of not guilty almost always immediately ends the trial process due to the prohibition of double jeopardy (trying someone for the same crime more than once). A person who is convicted can appeal to higher courts[1] who generally rule only on the law and not on the facts. Should the appeals court find in favor of the defendant, the case will be handed back down for either retrial (if going to the trial court) or rehearing (if going to an appellate court). If in the latter case, it can be appealed up again or sent back down to the trial court. Retrial can be for either determination of guilt or for sentencing, depending on what is being appealed.

Getting a not-guilty verdict set aside is almost impossible and hinges on the prosecutor proving malfeasance on the part of the judge or jury, a rare event. Even then, reinstatement of charges is not guaranteed.

In certain cases, a not-guilty verdict under state charges has resulted in federal charges being brought, perhaps most famously in the Rodney King case. There has long been a great deal of controversy over this. Some claim that it falls under double jeopardy because the defendant is facing trial twice for the same act, but others (including the Supreme Court) believe that it's not as the federal charges are generally of violating civil rights and not for the action itself (i.e., murder or assault).

Anyway, based on this, I would expect the US to oppose an extradition request based on US law. While Knox might have been extradited had she made her way to the US before the trial began in Italy, since she was found not guilty once, she would be considered untriable in the US and therefore extradition could be blocked.

[1] This sequence is generally to an appeals court of three judges, occasionally an en banc appeal to a hearing of as many as 11 judges, and then the Supreme Court. The process is effectively the same with both state and federal trials, except that those appealing a state conviction may also try to appeal through federal appeals courts. This rarely works, though.

He's in the UK, in the Ecuadoran embassy. Embassies are not extraterritorial soil, but are protected under the Vienna Convention. Under the Convention, the UK can't enter without approval from Ecuador, which makes it similar in practical effect, but it's not the same as being on Ecuadorian soil.

What part of "trends that some say have been accelerated by increasingly strict federal regulations" don't you understand? Big government strikes again . . .

Actually, there's work underway in the form of the rewrite of FAR Part 23 (Airworthiness Standards: Normal, Utility, Acrobatic and Commuter Airplanes). Passed with strong bipartisan support in both houses of Congress, it directs the FAA to accept the findings of the Part 23 Reorganization Aviation Rulemaking Committee by the end of 2015. These are intended to reduce the certification cost by half while doubling safety by reducing the amount of prescriptive regulation and not requiring that small airplanes and add-ons be tested to extremes so unlikely to occur in general aviation flight that by the time they do occur, something much worse probably will have failed, or the pilot's judgment to begin with will have gotten everyone aboard killed. Standards would probably be developed by industry consensus (subject to FAA approval), which could cut the cost of small airplanes dramatically while allowing more rapid improvements.

There's also a move to allow private pilots to self-certify their health, though the FAA seems to be resisting that with significantly more force. Basically, if pilots can get a driver's license, they would be able to self-certify their medical state for a Class III certificate with some restrictions. I'm not entirely comfortable with this, but I can understand the drive for it. Some medical examiners mark up the most minor things, and getting the FAA to write up an exception can be such a costly and lengthy endeavor that many simply give up flying. But I've also seen a number of pilots who, at least outside of the cockpit, don't follow anything remotely like suggested healthy living, and I wonder how many of them are heart attacks waiting to happen. Maybe an age limit on self-certification would be appropriate as a middle ground.

I participated in Technocrat, and it had a number of problems including editors who were accused of deleting or editing posts that disagreed with them. It started a hard downhill slide when Bruce made a post about the 2006 election that essentially said that if you didn't vote Democrat, you were stupid, evil, or both. This resulted in some very strong words from Libertarians, whom he suggested were just wasting their votes. Most of us had no problem with him supporting his chosen candidates. It was when his tone turned abusive toward those of us who didn't support them that things went south. He folded it in January 2009 when it didn't turn into what he wanted it to be, which seemed to be largely a group that agreed with him. Slashdot has many faults, but editing and deleting posts that don't agree with the editors doesn't seem to be one of them.

That said, if you pop over to technocrat.net, he's posted both his e-mail address and a phone number. You're welcome to contact him either way to see if he'll bring it back.

I understand the frustration that comes with major features not working for many people or requiring JavaScript, but lynx? What portion of the community uses text-based browsers on a regular basis? If it's a tenth of a percent, I would be surprised, but even at that level, it's too small to cater to for most sites. At some point, you have to consider cutting off support for connections that are used by a minuscule portion of the population.

If you're referring to the Play Services (the one piece of the OS that is completely out of user control), Ars Technica talked about this recently. That was changed so that it would be more helpful to users in that Google would no longer be at the mercy of wireless carriers to upgrade certain parts of the operating system. By integrating Play Services at the core of the OS, they can theoretically upgrade almost any part they want without having to provide completely new firmware. That improves security, too, because they can install patches that the carriers would otherwise block for QA reasons.

Android is by far the smartphone OS with the widest distribution. While it was at one time pointed more at geeks, Google has to take into account a much wider range of users including people who get stuck a phone only because the price is the same as feature phones (free on contract), especially when they're added to a family plan.

I don't see many people mentioning AWACS here, which is a core component of US battle airspace management. Those stealth aircraft can be guided to their targets by the distant AWACS crew while retaining relative electronic silence, surprise the enemy, and at least knock their numbers down. The US did it in 1991 to enormous effect and it's only improved since then. Once air superiority is established, the hardpoints can be attached for greater payload (or older, less stealthy planes employed).

Modern air combat is about who can see the most. Those with effective AWACS (the US, Russia, Israel, and to lesser extents, China, India, and several European nations) are at an enormous advantage over those without. Stealth can complicate the balance, but those with better AWACS also tend to have better stealth. Battle between those of equivalent capability would be interesting, but would also largely involve powers that are unlikely to face each other at such scales.

Code execution in an unprivileged account is one small step away from executing exploit code to get root, and then you've got just about everything.

This depends greatly on whether you can skim tests. It works great on paper exams. Some computer-based exams don't allow you to do this.

But it's still a useful skill to learn because it's applicable to time management in general. Do the easy things first (if you can--priorities matter in the real world) as it gets them off the list and can provide a sense of accomplishment, and then work on the more difficult items.

Agreed. But the LandRover was designed for very different conditions than the average road car of the times. I would expect even longer lives now, though electronics would also have to be upgraded.

It wasn't just the number of people Kodak employed. It was also all the film developers. One-hour photo stops at Walmart and the like are common now, but it wasn't really that long ago that one took film in to be developed over a longer period of time (often at least a day) at camera stores and at dedicated shops like Fotomat.

I think that within the lifetime of many here, the structure of the economy, at least for the West, is going to begin a shift unlike any seen since the agricultural revolution. Current hunter-gatherer tribes often work for less than four hours per day on average, with the remainder spent on leisure or family activities. Contrast this with the average American's workload exceeding 12 hours when commute, meal preparation, and other mandatory activities are included. But as the resources that lead to useful output become commoditized, the number of hours required from humans to maintain a given level of society (ignoring the wage losses) will decline rapidly. Once we have robots that can efficiently clean, deliver mail and packages, and maybe even handle emergency operations like firefighting and rescue, and I expect that it won't be long before humans, at least in more advanced countries, become knowledge manipulators, making decisions that robots and computers find difficult or impossible.

There's an alternative where some Neo-Luddite movement takes hold and limits the ability of automation of work, not necessarily reducing us to a pre-industrial era but perhaps to at least the current level of work by setting maximum efficiency levels on machines such that humans can compete at some level. But that would also require a fundamental shift in human psychology that I see as even less likely than acceptance of technological replacements of our jobs.

I hear people complaining about this as much as ever, but cars are lasting a lot longer now than they used to. It wasn't all that long ago that a car that reached 100,000 miles was sold off or traded in as a junker. Now, any car that can't reach 200,000 miles at a minimum (with moderate care) is considered to be of poor quality. Maintenance itself is getting easier, with longer times between oil changes, tune-ups, and other general maintenance. Hell, even tires are lasting considerably longer.