While I agree, none of the criminal's prior offenses included either violent crimes or crimes of a sexual nature.

His priors were for fraud and such. I'm not saying the mother was not an idiot, but it's not like she left her with a known pedophile or rapist.

OK, so humans become mobile power sources.

I really don't want to see a guy on the side of the road with wires shoved up his arse trying to jump his car to start because his battery is dead.
*clench* "Try it now!"

That said, I guess the BDSM scene can now do something useful after attaching the alligator clamps to their nipples.

Just because the update cycle is not annual, does not mean there is not induced obsolescence.

Do you still run DOS? No, it's obsolete, no modern apps run on it. In fact, I doubt you would even consider using anything before Windows 2000 at the earliest these days. And if you're not a Windows user, would you use a Linux with a 2.0.x kernel? Probably not, aside from the fact it does not support modern hardware (x86_64 and such), there are big advantages to newer versions of Linux.

Would you still use Office 95? Of course not, at least, not in a business setting, it cannot open the majority of documents that would be sent around today in the business world. Indeed, it's rapidly becoming inconvenient to use any version of office before '07, due to people starting to send/receive ooxml files.

So you want to talk about art then. Sure, you CAN play games from bygone years, but they start running into the same issues as other apps - newer machines are too modern for them, operating systems have changed and you need emulated environments. Or even if that's not the case, they just don't look as good as games designed for current hardware. So, except for the nostalga crowd, yes, Games have 'induced obsolescence' by virtue of the improvements in computing technology make older games just less appealing. And nobody would try and claim computer games aren't artistic expressions. Hell, I recently purchased Monkey Island again because they re-vamped it with newer graphics and such. Sure, I could have still played the older version, but why not get the updated look that looks nicer on hardware that didn't exist when the original was released. But I am still playing the exact same game, with the exact same puzzles and story line.

So there are many ways computer software can become obsolete without changing the media on which it is distributed, and trigger you to buy it again. But even media progression is a valid reason to re-buy media you own. Many people have re-purchased music they already own on cassette tape on CD, or videos they already own on VHS on DVD, because the media makes them much more convenient an they don't need to keep old clunky players around. Indeed, even re-buying books they own as eBooks so they can carry their entire library around on a single portable device. Or even bought stuff they already own on DVD on Blu-Ray because the movie they love looks that much better in HD. And I'm sure once 3D TV's become more prevalent, there might be another round of re-buying (mainly animated films which can be more readily re-mastered in 3D) to get the 3D experience their older DVD did not offer. It's still induced obsolescence, triggered by the advance in technology.

How is that any different to obsolescence induced by a change in fashion trends? The point TFA is trying to make is, there is enough other impetus to spur on the industry without needing to lock down content like they have done. Even despite technology advances triggering a subset of people to re-buy stuff they already own, a lack of copyright protection would also stop authors of creative works being so lazy, and force them to be more ambitious or adventurous (as she mentions many big-name designers have said they have had to become, and it has elevated both their creativity and bottom lines at the same time). When you can just create something, and lock it down, you have no real need to innovate and do something daring as a next project, you can just sit back and earn royalties or keep selling the same old stuff.

I miss getting the entire civilopedia as a separate book with the Civilization game. It was kind of interesting to read it.

At least in NY, the legal way to perform a left turn at an intersection (light or not) where you have opposing traffic, is to enter halfway into the intersection, and then when there is a large enough gap in the intersection, turn.

If you are at a busy intersection, you may not get a gap until the opposing light turns red - even if you entered when it was green. Not all traffic lights have a separate signal for left turns.

Does that make C a cougar?

I had the reverse, it selected Ookla for me, and my download speed was dead on, but my upload speed at 10-25% of what it should be.

I told it to switch to MLabs, and then it returned the correct rates (20/20) for my FiOS connection. I guess that's why they have two hosts - more than likely, one on each coast.

I'm on FiOS ... 20 mbit up and down. And sure enough each speed test I've done, both the FCC one there (though using 'alternate' (MLABS), because their default one didn't show accurate upload speeds), and independent ones like speedtest.net have consistently shown me actually GETTING 20mbit both ways. Nothing wrong with my FiOS. But then, I expect that, because it's a dedicated line unlike cable, so I don't have to share my bandwidth with my neighbors.

This would work best on assless chaps.

I don't 'touch type' properly, or use all 10 fingers - and don't even talk to me about the home row.

In fact, most of my typing is done with my index and fore fingers (the two closest to the thumb) plus my thumb - occasionally with some help from the others.

I don't hunt and peck though - I type by memory - I align my hands over the keyboard and my mind keeps track of where they are and where the keys are. I have tested myself and I know I get 100 wpm.

So it IS possible to get speeds like that without touch typing. But like the author, I would love to fix my technique because I think it could be better. I'm not specifically WORRIED about it, but it is still something I would love to fix at some point.

ahhhh ....

Thanks, I needed a geekgasm.

Try learning more about what goes on behind the scenes. The syntax is one thing, making useful code is another. Making EFFICIENT useful code is yet another.

I've never been a huge fan of Java because it does so much for you, and you never really understand what's going on behind the curtain. Worse, unless forced to, you never have to deal with or think about resource allocation/deallocation, I/O access & caching, and the other things the JVM is doing for you or hiding the real details of.

The amount of time I've seen Java coders, who never coded in anything but java, spend DAYS trying to figure out why their program keeps having 'spikey' peroformance only to eventually realize it's the garbage collector, and then spending weeks more trying to figure out how to minimize the 'damage' without having their application's resource usage go through the roof by either disabling it or reducing it's frequency to unacceptably long times.

Of course, if you don't care about efficient coding, then none of this matters as much, but the point is - if you understand what is going on behind the scenes, you can either avoid or mitigate these problems ahead of time rather than spending weeks trying to figure them out, then weeks more trying to figure out how to minimize them without having to re-write large portions of your code.

Interesting, so I could lay myself out 9.2 million times between where am I and where I was born. Of course, a significant portion of those me's would drown. And I don't have a cloning machine. And even if I did, after I made the second me, we would probably start arguing about which is the REAL me, and never get anywhere 9.2 million of me. But still, interesting I guess.

Just imagine it, more than an entire New York City's worth of me ;P

A rotten company will be a rotten company, no matter how many times it changes it's name.

You get customers back, and customers to like you by actually DOING something for your customers, even if it hurts your bottom line. Companies like Verizon know this better than anyone - Verizon was more or less a 'last resort' until they brought out FiOS, improved their customer service, and basically focused more on what their customers were demanding. That's not to say they're perfect, but a LOT better than before, and have the rep to back it up. And they didn't even need to spend millions of dollars changing their name to do it.

Telstra (in Australia) by contrast, spent all the money changing from Telecom to Telstra, but didn't improve a damn thing with customer service or the services they were offering. So the stink followed them through the new name.

When will companies learn, it's the customers, stupid!

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