If you're playing catchup in terms of technology and your power is in ability to manufacture on a vast scale, corporate espionage makes perfect sense. It's unfortunate that here we only have technology to steal and not much in terms of production capacity. That's a substantial disadvantage.

Or is Microsoft being shrewd? there is no solid Office package for the iOS. The Office is one of the few appealing things on the Surface tablet.

If the stock price says it all then by tanking today it says the opposite of what you have in mind. By changing the name to Blackberry from RIM they've effectively showcased how limited an offering they have. And hiring Alicia Keys as Global Creative Director is nothing more than publicity stunt! After playing with the Blackberry tablet I dislike their attempt at uniqueness by ditching the home button and replacing it with the swipe!

You'll find that not getting a degree will hold you back down the road even if you manage to find a low level job now. If you can afford it, go to school, transfer as many credits as you can toward a 4 year degree, with summer school, etc., you should be out in 2 years. You have no job experience, which works to your advantage when you graduate a 4 year program. Try to get an internship while in school. That may be better time spent than summer school. You would be in worse shape if you were laid off, then went back to school. I see these types of people struggling to get hired.

Has Slashdot forgotten it has reported on Chrystler two years and a day ago? http://tech.slashdot.org/story/11/01/25/0019220/how-chryslers-battery-less-hybrid-minivan-works The Chrysler minivan compressed air hybrid is supposed to be arriving this year in the US: http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1053892_sergio-marchionne-hybrid-minivan-will-join-chrysler-300-hybrid-in-2013 And UPS has been running this for a while now (they started testing the vehicles 5 years ago!); it makes a lot of sense for heavy trucks. http://gas2.org/2008/10/28/ups-is-first-in-delivery-industry-to-test-hydraulic-hybrids/

While Iran is an example of single sided cyber war; you only have to look at China to see that it isn't all single sided. In many ways, through outsourced, etc. we've shipped off our technology around the world and one of these techs is computer science. The Chinese are damn good at this and presumably Indians are not far behind. Chinese cyber espionage is growing rapidly and the US seems ill prepared to counter it. Also, take a look at the Israelis; their cyber security is quite a bit more robust than the American one.

It is worth pointing out that Microsoft has promised a more regular windows release so the comment of a few years wait for next Windows isn't correct. (or maybe not, maybe Microsoft will not deliver on its "promise").

Everything has a camera on it these days. Why not authenticate with your retina? Authenticate everything from an authenticate device as Google proposes but don't make the Android phone the centerpiece of authenticating everything.

So far Redbox Instant has been a big bummer. I got my beta access, waited until a Friday night to activate it and watch something recent and voila! Fish Called Wanda was the best they had to offer. I just logged into my Netflix and got some other stale title rolling. At least Netflix has a selection of stale.

Sounds like the kid is living a good life at home; he's fed, he's got internet, presumably some pocket change. Time to cut off the internet, stop paying for the cell phone, etc. Kid needs incentive to get a job it sounds like; he needs to learn to appreciate what it takes to afford the life he's been living. Don't kick him out; that's draconian and it risks the kid winding up on a street with no food, etc. and no prospect of landing a job.

I recently opted to buy my own health insurance instead of buying into my company's group policy (small company, high average age, crappy policy choices). Anyway, while between my prior employer's health plan and my own, I was effectively uninsured for a couple of weeks. Sure enough my wife had an emergency in the middle of the night and went to the ER. She effectively left after receiving a pain killer. The bill was approx. $3000. That is three grand. Well, we did the most logical thing and bought a COBRA coverage (since it is retroactive). That same $3000 bill was "renegotiated" to few hundred bucks. What type of sense does this make? By virtue being an uninsured patient the hospital has zero insurance overhead. The insurance does not make the mandatory 15% profit. Yet, the bill is an order of magnitude higher for the uninsured? That's extortion. That is blackmail to purchase insurance. This is exactly wrong!

Back in the olden times the stereos were so basic all you could hope for was a tape adapter to plug in something external. A standard operating set of commands with a USB plug is all that's really needed. All the car needs to provide is an amplifier and speakers plus some basic functionality on its own like a radio. The external devices progress much faster than cars, for obvious reasons so save money on developing soon to be obsolete systems and just provide a standard the phone/accessory manufacturers can work with and just amplify the audio and provide power.

It's about time the large corporations sent a memo to developers to remove hard coded administrator access from its devices.