Because most open source programmers (like, 90%) have a PC background, not a MacOS 6.x background. Most of us don't know HyperCard's capabilities and are therefore unaware that it might be worth cloning.

Actually, I want real network neutrality. I don't trust the government to provide it, they have proven to be entirely untrustworthy in that regard.

The U.S. government is only potentially an enemy of the Internet (and I will fight any encroachment on our freedoms). Whereas Comcast et al have already declared their intention to block websites when they are given the to power to do so: that threat is how they plan to extort some revenue from independent sites. Given a potential menace and an actual, proven one, I'll take the lesser of two evils.

I don't trust the ISPs, either, but every time there has been a problem with them blocking or throttling anything, it didn't last very long once people started complaining.

The blockages didn't last because the ISPs probably broke the law. If their actions ever became legal due to the death of net neutrality, look out. Do you really think our freedoms will be protected by the Great Firewall of Comcast?

> Yet somehow you're willing to go ahead and provide the government with even more control over [the Internet].

False. To me, net neutrality means nobody controls the Internet, and that is as it should be.

Why are you so anxious to kill net neutrality, giving Comcast and AT&T almost dictatorial powers over what websites their customers can see? If net neutrality dies, the Great Firewall of Comcast will rival the Great Firewall of China.

> That's a pretty far-fetched bit of tin-foil-hattery you have there.

This is what a member of the 1% would say, of course. Perhaps you are one of them, or perhaps their propaganda has so crippled your brain that you fail to see what is in front of your eyes.

As hard as you try, you cannot ignore the evidence. Why were the mainstream media so unified in their "WMDs in Iraq" message? Anyone who looked impartially at the issue was *easily* able to say that was nonsense. But apparently none of the major media saw the truth -- despite their reputation for supposedly good investigative journalism. Could all of them have been incompetent, all at the same time? Very, very unlikely. The most probable conclusion is that they were deliberately lying to us.

These days, only a fool can still believe that our media is free.

The evidence of media dominance by the 1% is blindingly obvious. So it follows that they will want to crush as many alternative voices as possible, especially those on the Internet. The death of net neutrality will silence them.

Net neutrality is about far, far more than some ISP's profits.

The death of net neutrality is the death of the last independent voice in U.S. politics. You doubt this? Remember the deafening shouts of "WMDs in Iraq !!!" from practically all the mainstream media channels. Where were the dissenting voices? Basically, only on the Internet.

If net neutrality dies, then companies like Comcast and AT&T will have the power to silence web sites they dislike. Since these are giant corporations, their agendas will of course align with those of the mainstream media, and all the protest sites will die. The U.S. media will have largely one voice, the voice of the one-percenters, and dissent will be silenced.

This outcome is undoubtedly the main intent of the one-percenters, especially in these days of the Occupy movement. The powers that be desperately need to kill net neutrality for the same reason that Mubarak tried to turn off the Internet during the occupation of Tahrir Square by the riff-raff. Our rulers know that good communication is essential to any successful revolution, and they are determined to cut off all possible channels of dissent.

Now perhaps you are one of the 1%, or work for them. Perhaps you like having a media landscape that rivals China's in its depth of censorship. But I don't.

You don't have to be a sinophile to notice that China is by far the most successful example of a country lead by engineers. Other nations may have had an occasional nerdy leader, but as far as I know, only in China have the engineers completely and continuously dominated for generations.

Which may explain why China has been growing so steadily despite the financial implosions occurring in the U.S. and elsewhere: engineers tend to cope better with reality than lawyers do. A good bridge stays up; and no amount of the sort of fakery that dominates American businesses these days can turn a bad bridge into a good bridge. I think it's high time the U.S.'s political and business establishments got a dose of engineering reality.

And everyone knows plenty of lawyers who are evil and corrupt. Does that mean all lawyers should be disqualified from politics? Of course not.

Now that we have China's successful example, we should at least consider allowing engineers to reach the top. An engineer as leader can be very good: the Hewlett-Packard company was founded by engineers and continued to be hugely successful while it was being run by engineers. But look at it now.

Serial ports are sloooow, especially if you have to do the programming repeatedly, such as when you are developing firmware. A USB-to-RS232 adaptor won't speed the downloading of your data, since the RS232 bottleneck is still there. Trust me, I've been there, done that (without the USB adaptor). I got really tired of transferring 64K bytes at 9600 baud every time I needed to do a bug fix.

My company bought a true USB programmer capable of 1 megabit/s downloads, and it was a huge improvement. The device was expensive at the time ($700) but very much worth it. I won't bother telling you the name of that programmer, since you should be able to buy the equivalent for $100 or less these days.

I agree. The major problem was the hurry with which the competition went to market. Apple spent *years* refining the iPad before attempting to sell it. HP and others tried to clone it in half a year, and predictably most of them failed. The survivors will be releasing second-generation tablets soon, and that is when I will judge the strength of the iPad's competition.

Well, you have to assume non-stupid engineering. If there are local hot spots in a fuel cell, we have any number of ways to move out the excess heat. At the very minimum, we can do what was done in your gasoline car: we can put a honking big radiator next to the engine.

Such ugly measures probably won't be necessary, simply because there is a lot less overall heat to worry about. So yes, a fuel cell should run much cooler, per watt of output power, than an engine that uses gasoline explosions.

You are jumping to conclusions, aren't you? The expense of Chen's method depends on how much platinum he uses. Without knowing the quantity, you can't conclude that his method is costly.

You really don't understand what I wrote, do you? I said that "most" of the truly rich are idle, and showed why.

Those who have amassed their fortunes have sacrficed more and commited more than you are probably capable.

I respect those who made their own fortunes. That, however, describes a microscopic minority of the rich. The overwhelming majority of the wealthy are trust fund babies who inherited their money and do basically nothing with their lives.

You are a useful idiot indeed -- useful to the rich, even as they sneer at you for being such a fool as to do their public relations for them while they are robbing you blind.