"I respect your anatomical specificity and historical knowledge, but just to be clear Diana's bum is not technically part of her genitals."

At least not prior to the crash...

"Microsoft, past giant of the operating system industry, will die not to OS X, not to Ubuntu, not to FreeBSD, Redhat, not to ReactOS, Plan 9, Gentoo, Hurd, BeOS, the vengeful ghost of OS/2, but to an OS designed for cell phones."

MSFT can not be easily attacked where they are entrenched, but when consumers cease to want that space Redmond becomes vulnerable.

"Your MacBook Air came with a UPS built-in, it's called the battery."

Yet another brilliant example of Apple design!

In the South it's certainly relevant, like it or not.

F150s have had an aluminum hood since the 1997 model year. No problem, and no rust. (I have a '97 and a 2000 F150 and have wrenched on many more.) Plenty of those on farms.

Land Rovers survived African use (farms included) where presumably users beat the shit out of them as they would any other truck.

Modern vehicle body "repair" is mostly "component replacement", but if you need to you can certainly MIG weld aluminum. If one may judge by the kickass custom tool and equipment fabrication shown in magazines such as Farm Show, farmers will take it in stride.

Service and flatbeds would of course be steel, and those are aftermarket anyway. An aluminum cab wouldn't be an issue.

You might remind readers that their idea of a Land Rover doesn't include the quad cab and other truck versions:

http://www.landrover.com/content/australia/en/pdf/spec/defender_specification_2013.pdf

Only the ruthlessness of an Ataturk and the military which succeeded him can bring modernity and secular order to move such an Islamic country forward. Turks rightly admire Kemal Ataturk, but unless enough are willing to pick up a gun they will become prey for the fundamentalists. Theocratic superstitions (all of them) are only able to see democracy as a stepping-stone to their takeover of the State. Those who would resist superstition had better be willing to kill for their freedom. Ataturk and the Young Turks were willing, and they made tremendous progress. We shall see if that progress will be reversed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Kemal_Atat%C3%BCrk

Union trades have enough trouble with rats because so many tradesmen think they are special snowflakes. (Some are.)

Good luck with the cat herding, especially in a physically comfortable field such as IT which can be far more easily outsourced than physically demanding and manually skilled trades such as pipe welding.

Evolution preserved the trait.

What made, and possibly makes, it useful to the species?

If it weren't fun to ratpack and destroy people of enemy ideologies, it wouldn't happen.

In particular, stupid people who publicly expose themselves through vanity use of social media are seen as lulzworthy targets.

I find her fate amusing.

You can remove the USB key after booting to RAM, as it's no longer needed.

Technically true, but unless someone is targeting your specific machine it's doubtful that would happen.

You could also boot off CF card in an adapter after modding the adapter to disable writes. Any changes to the CF could be done using a different adapter.

These CF cards are available with a write-protection switch:

http://www.ritekusa.com/BusinessSolutions/IndustrialCFCards/CF300XSLCWriteProtectionSwitch.aspx

"I own two machines which cannot be upgraded for very good reasons."

What are those? I support a couple of XP machines for a friend who is content with his old CAM software because it does what he wants and the post-processor works with his old Fanuc control, but they no longer connect to the internet. Cut the cord, problem solved.

"certainly should run a fresh, clean linux install off a CD every time you start up, to reduce the chances your machine is compromised."

You can also boot an .iso image from a USB or other flash as well as CD and load it entirely to RAM with no persistent home.

Knoppix (nicely polished distro) has had the "toram" option for many years as do other distros it inspired.

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Knowing_Knoppix/Advanced_startup_options#Transferring_to_RAM

"I presume you don't live in quake country, or it would be preferable to leave them separated."

Their "foundation" is gross overkill heavy section ten-inch steel I-beam across the ends, resting on railroad gravel. Welding (not to "quake country" structural codes which specify a different wire nowadays) was done with stick (6010 root pass) then E71T-11 .045" flux core wire. Top corner fittings are welded together and the splice strip itself is thicker than the ISO roof skin and adds considerable strength. Since the beams themselves are unanchored, they are free to float if my area ever has a serious quake. I did it that way because if the shop ever settles after I add weight in machine tools (unlikely with railroad gravel) I can jack a corner easily.

  I personally like ISOs, but they are just steel boxes and there is more to building with them than meets the eye. Po' folks in the US didn't do well in "the projects" and even more spartan ISO construction is unlikely to take off for warehousing them. Even for the "homeless" you'll need wiring, insulation, plumbing, sprinkler systems, HVAC and waste disposal, as well as security and surveillance so they don't prey on each other quite so much.

Remember this has all been tried before, sans ISOs, many times!
Technical solutions to social problems with (initially) lavish funding were applied, and the result eventually turned more socially toxic than dispersed poverty.

http://www.nytimes.com/1987/11/28/nyregion/newark-rips-down-its-projects.html

By all means do an ISO structure for yourself. DIY economics can favor ISO construction and not stacking them slashes cost because you don't need crane rental. DIY homes are owned by people who have a personal buy-in to making them work. Modern insulation panels, spray foam, and so forth make ISOs practical in any climate. Adroit scrounging and human networking can turn up lots of quality material for free. They are fun to work with and complementary steel building kits (galvalume beats the shit out of Corten, but ISOs aren't expected to last decades without refurb as they are designed to be expendable) can integrate and protect them. I have a Steelmaster (there are many companies making the same rolled steel panel designs so shop around) building and would not hesitate to use their kits over ISOs. Two people with scaffold and pneumatic tools can erect one if you aren't in a hurry. See Youtube videos for various methods. I anti-seized the bolts and only had to cut a few when I tore mine down for relocation.

http://www.steelmasterusa.com/industrial/products/container-covers

Do get High Cube ISOs. The standard height version limits air circulation and has little room for vertical storage or lofted furniture options.

Lots of container info and useful parts such as corner clamps and twist locks. You could prefab end beams with weld-in twistlocks offsite then connect your ISOs to them, and to each other at the top with corner clamps if you want the option to demount and move them yet want "earthquake resistance" for your structure:

http://www.tandemloc.com/

Check the gallerys for ideas:

http://www.seabox.com/