I preordered the Wii disc, and got it the first day. The quality is excellent. Not as good as a EDTV DVD, but damn good, and they correctly send anarmorphic widescreen versions, so I haven't had to screw around with view mode settings. Our Wii is set in widescreen mode and it all Just Works. Our DSL is quite slow (1.5 mbit, tops) and there is absolutely no stuttering or tearing. Much better than using our PC with Silverlight.

The kids are going nuts streaming tons of Scooby Doo (even my 3-year old can pick cartoons to watch), I'm catching up on 30 Rock, the wife is geeking out to Farscape.

To compete with the people who are doing it for profit. I have some small amount of control over my own information. If I "opt out", then plenty of other companies will do it for me.

Unlocking the platinum (expert) guitar icon at the end of the ESL2 requires playing 84(ish) tunes in a row, including Panic Attack, which is 8 minutes of fast, relentless guitar. That's more than enough endurance for me.

I love this 2-Wally story, but it sounds familiar. If that was you posting it before here on /, bravo, submit it to the daily WTF!

In UK English, companies are often considered as plural ("Google are"), while in the US we think of them as singular ("Google is").

Where does he say he's using wildcards? You have manually make new addresses without a wildcard address. I've been doing the above for years with no wildcard addresses.

I agree, since houses in good communities are free and good paying jobs easy to come by, it's really a wonder that everyone doesn't just live 1 minute away from their job. Each time you a change job, all you have to do is simply find a new house you like, kill the person who lives there and steal his deed. Then find a moving company, kidnap their children until they move your stuff there. Unlike the house owner, you have to kidnap the kids instead of just killing them, because if they're dead they obviously can't move your stuff for you.

Or maybe, just maybe, the economics are different for other people in different places.

The zero'th big reason is if you withhold too little during the year, you will get fined. For people whose income varies from season to season or month to month, withholding more than expected amount is insurance against fines when they have some unexpectedly good times.

Yes, LOW. Stop it using these stupid "X% of total tax" things make it look like the wealthy are unfairly taxed. All it does is show that 1% of people have 25% of the total assets. Income inequality is fine, but don't piss on the poor and tell them it's raining. If people pay the same share regardless of their income or assets then it's regressive and hurts people who make less.

This isn't splitting a restaurant bill, where you only consume the portion you pay for.

If you're going camping with your kids, you don't make them carry 1/4th of the total load and break their backs while you whistle Dixie, you give them a load proportional to their ability to carry it. That's because you are sharing a burden together that benefits everyone.

It's not even a technical reason, like a data format change. They openly discontinue Quicken's online services after 3 years, just for Mo Money. Years ago, they changed the protocol from directly downloading from your bank, to proxying through Intuit. And, they keep moving features from Basic into Deluxe. Gone are the days of buying Basic and using it for a few years. Now you have to get the latest and greatest, and oops, now you have upgrade your old computer too! Isn't that nice?

You don't even have to click the freakin' widget! I scroll my screen with the keyboard. As soon as a Flash object scrolls *under* the mouse (which are basically everywhere), it proceeds to eat the keystrokes, and I can scroll no more. It cannot tell the difference between a mouse that moves over the area to decide I am going to interact, it's merely sufficient for something to scroll underneath it. This should be a two-second fix.

So many things do this now, that I have to carefully "park" the mouse over the damn scrollbar in order to scroll normally!

Right on, but it's even worse than that. About a month ago, FB changed all the default privacy settings again. It means most albums are now open to the world, unless you go through and check every single album. I've been able to look through albums of friends-of-friends, even without the tagged-friend loophole.

Have I told anyone yet? Nah. People who post embarrassing photos online should learn the hard way.

Sigh. Either you haven't thought very deeply about human factors, or you're young enough that you've never had to experience any sort of back, neck, or eye pain.

I don't know about you, but when I sit and read a book for a few hours, I don't put it at arm's length on a coffee table or desk. Instead, I sit on the couch and drop it into my lap, resting my it arms. I'll switch positions around (everyone does it unconsciously) to keep from getting stiff in one position. Bring it up close to my eyes for some time, so your eyes focus at different length and don't get so tired. Handing a laptop to your friend sitting next to you, to say "Hey, check this out" is geeky and awkward. And so on.

I'll say it again, a clamshell design is a total fail for this sort of informal use. My old body starts hurting after a short time trying to use a laptop in such a way.

A phone is valuable because it's always on you, but it doesn't make a very good multitasking computer or book reader. A laptop is valuable because it's powerful, stores a lot of energy, and can multitask, but it doesn't make for a very good computer in the living room. There is an unmet need for something like that, something I really didn't notice until I had a laptop and cell phone -- which was only until very recently. For people like my sister, who don't use a land line or desktop, and multitask their computer use with everything else, it's going to be a hit. She _never_ sits at a desk to use her computer, ever. The laptop is there on the couch, 24/7.

If it's fashionable enough, Apple is going to cry all the way to the bank on this.

Sure: a netbook you can comfortably use while laying on the couch.

Really. The clamshell design of a laptop or netbook, fine for a desk, makes it difficult to use when laying on a couch, and nearly impossible in bed. Or maybe I'm just getting so old, that my body can't contort to the require viewing and keyboard angle necessary to use the damn thing. I'd almost rather use my phone, despite the tiny keyboard and difficult multitasking.

I was bored a few years ago, and transcribed the tune out. I did very little else to it other than picks some sounds that they might have used in the first place. So, it's only a four-voice tune, representative of the hardware of the time. It would be easy to fill out and make it thicker, but part of the charm of the tune that it sounds good, with such a limited sound technology. Enjoy.