Perhaps for online games like Halo 2 or World of Warcraft, once the game becomes so outdated that the company decides not to continue hosting it, they should allow fans to host smaller local servers, private servers, themselves. They could even charge a one-time fee to buy the software. Then fans of the game can still play the game with a small group of friends even if the company essentially gave up on the game servers.

Perhaps the people laughing are just doing so because they are brought up thinking gaming is a waste of time, or just a fun activity that has no other meaning in life besides entertainment. There is probably not much to learn about real world activities in a corporate environment by spending 16 hours a day playing Super Mario Bros. 3, but MMORPGs like World of Warcraft or Guild Wars are entirely different. You're not just playing a game where you have complete control over the situation (if you jump on the Goomba, the Goomba gets squished). You're interacting with perhaps hundreds of people, with different levels of skills and abilities, who all may or may not be working toward the same goal - a goal that one single individual may not be able to complete on his own.

In a game like WoW, you can track the stats and abilities of your guild members, decide who is good at what and where they should position themselves or what each person should be doing in a raid to get the best possible outcome. In a software development company, you can track the skills and abilities of your team members, decide who is good at what and which types of tasks (hardware interface code, design documentation, GUI design, networking code) each member should be assigned so you can produce the best possible piece of software. It's not about just running out there and swinging a sword at the bad guys for hours on end.

The same skills in WoW could be brought to sports. Lead a football team to victory by positioning each player where they best fit and tracking metrics from this. Should leadership in sports not be used in a resume?

Maybe you're hanging around the wrong crowd of gamers? I've played several MMORPGs and met plenty of people in the game who have a husband or wife, maybe some kids, full time job, etc. Not all MMORPG players play the games in their parents' basements 16 hours a day while eating twinkies and nachos. You can have a full time job, family to support, etc., and just spend a few hours a week casually playing a game like that.

Didn't know you could sync over wifi. I'll have to check that out. I'm still a bit new with smartphones.

I don't like the charging door either. It feels rather fragile, like I'll end up tearing it off just by tapping it. The charging port door usually doesn't fit all the way in to the port, and if it does, it's a tight fit and hard to get back out.

I'll have to look into the advanced gestures. I didn't see an option for those yet, just the back and up gestures so far.

I sure hope so. I just received two Palm Pre Plus smartphones in the mail today. So far they seem pretty good, but I've never had a smartphone to compare.

VirtualBox or VMware have always worked pretty well in my experience. VirtualBox is free, and VMware Server is free as well. I know there are Linux and Windows ports for VMWare Server (for the host OS), not sure about VirtualBox. The one problem with virtual machines is the students' computers will have to have enough resources to run the software plus the guest Linux OS that they install. Some students' home systems might not be quite up to par.

Perhaps another route, although a bit more expensive, could be to go with a computer-on-chip type system like Gumstix. They have entire kits that can be purchased for about the price of a netbook. The students would just need access to a keyboard, mouse, USB hub, and monitor. It doesn't run Ubuntu by default, but there are instructions on how to install it. That could be an interesting project as part of the class, even as a final project after the students learn how to install to the desktop. They can take that experience and apply it toward installing Linux onto an embedded device like the Gumstix. Just a thought :)

How many average home users actually use multiple user accounts? Any home computer I've ever been on (aside from my own), the owner just runs a single account that everyone shares. Maybe things are different in the Apple home user world. Most average users I know have Windows XP boxes with a single standard administrator account (e.g., Compaq_Owner). I've run into one single computer where there were separate accounts, but all were admins, and none had passwords.

If nothing else, THAT is the key to what makes BASIC so good as an intro language. With only a few simple lines of code, you can have a full program up and running getting input from the user and displaying things on the screen. I first got interested in programming as a kid because I thought it was awesome that I could write some text on the screen to make the computer do what I wanted it to do.

You get to learn about core programming concepts like loops, if/else statements, and the like without worrying about classes, structs, event handling, threads, and other similar things that although are helpful, are not necessary to create a program. Some languages (besides BASIC) don't even have some of those more advanced components.

It's nice that they promise up to 50%, but a 0% increase in efficiency meets that promise. So they can do nothing and still succeed. :)

Well I was going to write up a response about the reaction time of switching your right foot from accelerator to brake vs left foot braking, but that would only apply on automatic transmission vehicles. On manual transmission, your left foot belongs on the clutch. Downshift while moving your right foot to the brake to save that reaction time.

It's not so much the porn that needs to be blocked. It's the malware and the like that comes with many porn sites that needs to be blocked.

Downtime just KILLS a system's availability requirement.

Of course it can be quite a distraction for many drivers to try and hold a phone to their ear or type out a text while driving, What about hands free, e.g., bluetooth headsets? A quick poke of a button on your ear to answer a call shouldn't be any different than pushing a button to change the channel on your radio. If the phone is set to auto answer, it's not much different than having a conversation with a passenger in the vehicle.

I'm not familiar with ATA devices. I've heard of them, but that's about it.