I find the wording "customers who were impacted" interesting. Once something has leaked the problem doesn't go away by only plugging the leak and not cleaning up. Just ask BP.

You probably do not realize that the images Google Earth uses are largely collected by private satellites?
GeoEye is one of them, for instance. DigitalGlobe operates several as well.

As for hefty infrastructure on the ground; there are companies selling ground station services. I work for one of them and it doesn't cost you much to buy a time slot to communicate with your satellite. Heck, we offer the complete process, you only need TCP/IP (or ISDN if you are conservative). The launch does not have to be too expensive if you piggyback on the Indian launchers. But of course, you have to build it first :)

And Iridium has a decent ground network for something like this (we actually happen to host some of it too).

Questionnaires are tricky, very tricky. And the theory surrounding them is rapidly changing, Also there is a huge 'cultural' factor involved when answering the exact kind of of questionnaire as the one linked (rating something from 0 to 5 for example),
Americans have a tendency to rate things extremely good or extremely bad, rating it either 0 or 5 and rarely choosing 3. Norwegians tend to stick around the middle and rarely go beyond 4 on any rating ("thing can always be better or worse so I must reserve the most extreme option").
Cisco, for example, has such a questionnaire that their Silver and Gold partners must forward to some of their customer. In order to maintain their partner status they have to score X number of points on different topics, and they have chosen this threshold based largely on the feedback they have from American customers. In some countries even the best partners have no chance of even coming close to this number, due to the cultural differences when answering such questionnaires.
Also, people have become more accustomed to answering these questionnaires and might be less/more honest than they used to. Changes in how it is conducted might also skew the results (pen and paper at an institute vs. online questionnaire).

So things are more difficult than they might appear, thus I am wary of actually believing the numbers presented. I feel TFA touches too lightly on this before ranting.

The idea is good, but the suggested implementation is very bad.
We do oil spill detection in near realtime using satellites, and adopting it to detect a tsunami might be feasable. We detect and alert authorities usually in less than 1 hour from the oil spill is detected.
It can possibly be advanced futher by using floating sensors and AIS.

Organisation is not the hard part, it is already in place for oil spill detection and working great.

Heck, even most satellites launched these days use GPS instead of doppler and ranging measurements. Not that they ever used LORAN-C, but it ought to demonstrate that nobody believes GPS will be gone any time soon.

I have yet to experience a stable 3G on any phone or provider in Norway. Edge works fine, but 3G is buggy.
Tried different phones and providers, they all show the same.

Also, I would imagine the US operators are lobbying hard to put dirt on the phone to show you that it's always best ot get their branded ones.

If you are that sensitive to it, then you ought to wear a mask at all times.
As you point out yourself, the hazard is not only there the brief moment the nuts are consumed. Someone could have eaten them earlier and the particles got stuck on their clothing. They are released again when people takes off their jacket inside the cabin and then you are dead anyways.

I'll start eating peanuts and blowing in the face of people I dislike. I might get lucky.

Based on this, all you can say is that your allergie is real.

There are many, many ways you could have come into contact with nuts regardless of these M&Ms. What if a hand you shook earlier that day had been in contact with nuts? Or that hand touched the same doorhandle as you?
You even say that this happened at school, where one desk is used by several others throughout a day. Maybe someone ate something containing nuts a few days ago and there was some residue left on the desk. You could have contracted it via skin or gotten it on your fingers. Once on your fingers it's quickly transferred to some weak spot like eyes, nose or mouth.

The M&Ms are just indices, not evidence. And to you personally it's a reminder that you have to be careful. If it is within range that you can smell it, it's most likely also in range for physical contact and you deal with that.

And if it really is airborne, then how is buffer zones going to help? It can travel by air outside the zone and stick to clothing or hair and then drop off inside the zone.

Allergies are complex, that's why we have no cure. Some allergies are triggered by air (pollen), but that allergie is also very different from nut allergies. You react to different things. Also keep in mind that most allergies also cross react with other things, which we have not mapped out completely. Something else may trigger your nut allergie and nobody knows what. It is far too complex to tackle allergies by banning stuff.

Would that mean *paid* sick leave?
I'm just asking, as that is the rule here. Also, many employers are part of a new program that gives you almost unlimited days of sick leave without involving any doctors. Instead of abusing the system, the trend is less need for sick leave. People became healthier.
Also, if your kids are sick it's covered by the same rules. We generally do not lose any income due to being sick.

Relevant Norwegian info: ~28-30% income tax and no health insurance needed (and very few available on the 'market').

No, they did not. But devices have evolved. Instead of relying on the flight attendant to identify every possible device which may contain a transmitter or rely on you knowing which transmitters are harmless (which the airliners themselves do not know) there is a blanket ban.
Anything else would never work today.

And sadly, very few passangers are able to understand these explanations.

Heck, I'm not so sure every flight attendant do. That's why they have rigorous procedures and are not to deviate.

Of course things could be explained, but also you should accept the fact that the procedures are made up of diverse experiences the industry has made of decades.

This is in contrast to the the security measures put in place by the TSA, which are irrational actions based on irrational happenings. The industry measures are a result of actual research caused by actual problems.

You have a few limited points.
* Photos: All electronic equipment must be switched off. I bet it's a digital camera?
* Music: Same goes. If you have the plugs in your ear you are most likely listening and you were not able to hear the attendants telling you ti switch it off.
* Blanket: If there is an emergency that blanket will cost lives. Try exiting a seat row in a hurry when the person next to the isle has a blanket. Same goes for any larger item of clothing and shoes. Shoes are to be on during takeoff/landing for the same reason.
These things have nothing to do with terrorist paranoia. You could argue how much a digicam or MP3 player interfere with the instruments, but instead of relying on you or the flights attendants to recognize what is dangerous and what is not, it is way safer to keep it all turned off.

I've worked with a wide range of airports and knows some of this from the inside. I also know enough to be confident that the security measures in place after 9/11 are not that hard to defeat.
I have also declined visiting the US because of the hostility you are faced with even when coming from an allied country, but that is unrelated to airport security.

Also, I did WLAN installations at a range of airports as a hired consultant.
They only checked my police record before issuing me with an access to *all* areas on *every* airport in the country. Not even security officers matched my clearance.

To make it even 'worse': I had clearance to bring any item or equipment past the security checkpoint, except explosives. I had knives and all sorts of sharp/blunt objects.

On one occasion I also brought my car and got clearance to bring it on the same side as the airplanes. The security officer who was to inspect my car rolled his eyes to see it filled with ~60 boxes (containing WLAN AP) and decided it was too much of an effort to check the vehicle so I could just pass.

No interview, deep background checks, nothing before I got clearance. I suspect the cleaning staff have similar clearance (except their equipment might already be inside).

I guess I was just one of many... It then bothers me endlessly to be stripped of my toothpaste when flying civil (my clearance ended this summer, a ear after I switched jobs...).

Yes, agreed!
If they confiscate my toothpaste because they suspect it contains explosives, why the hell am I allowed on the plane at all?
I most certainly would not feel more secure if the 9/11-terrorists were on my plane knowing that even though their guns were confiscated they still have the intent of bringing my fligh down.

When they take away my toothpaste I would expect a full SWAT-team to appear and beat me to a pulp before taking me away and possibly sending me to Guantanamo.

Make up your mind, am I a terrorist suspect or not?

If you were living in Norway the law mandates a minimum 1/5th payment per hour you are on call, and overtime once you are called out. The minimum overtime compensation required by law i 40%, and the minimum amount of time is 2 hours.
That is the bare minimum guaranteed by law in order for your employer to demand anything at all from you. And even then you cannot be oncall 24/7.

Some are on call without any basic compensation, but without obligations. And some, like me, have way better benefits than this.