A non-denominational guy dies and goes to heaven. He is greeted by St. Peter, who informs the man that heaven is segregated by faith.

"Since you are a person of no denomination, we'll let you choose which group you want to spend eternity with."

The first area they walk past has one side filled with people drinking and having a good time; the other side was adorned with devices obviously meant for self torment.

"Catholics" the Saint remarked.

Saint Peter and the man continued walking past the different groups of heaven, with the man considering each one. Finally, the pair come to a massive wall, stretching as far as the eye can see in every direction.

"Who lives in there?" Asked the man.

St. Peter replied, "oh, those are the Evangelicals. They think they're the only ones here."

I think you have the concept of hipster exactly backwards. Usually hipsters seem to cluster around emerging trends and often seem to be influential enough that an ironic embrace of vintage/past products often produces a resurgence of that product.

It's debatable whether hipsters even exist, or whether it's a group that identifies products before they become popular or whether it's a group that's defined as clustering around products that became popular.

I don't know if its my perception or not, but it seems to me that very few products anymore have any persistence. It's not just a question of picking a loser -- it seems like so many products have an initial run and then disappear to be replaced by something else.

I suspect it's a byproduct of easier product design using computer aided design and the heavy use of contract manufacturing overseas. CAD makes it easy to tweak a design to create the new-car-model kinds of changes or just something different. Contract manufacturing lets vendors shop designs around for the best production cost and it wouldn't surprise me if the tooling/setup costs get eaten by the manufacturer.

Hey, thanks for your honest question. ... Wow, nuanced political debate coming up on slashdot - interesting! ...
I hope this answers your question:
I have absolutely nothing against any country or folks in our outside of Europe. And, funny clichees aside, I don't think anybody in Europe has anything against Greece or Italy or any other country. Most Europeans love Europe in its entireity. And also each country on its own, especially the differences. Europe would be quite a boring place if it weren't for those.
As for Greece, no problem at all. I would love for Greece to be a merry member of the Eurozone with no more problems than Germany at the moment. Part of this whole charade being such a waste is that we actually have enough problems in Europe without one country causing so much trouble.
The big problem though is that Greece has been living off emergency (!!) loans for quite some time now and has been unwilling to execute even the most elementary and pressing reforms. Their administration hasn't even started trying! To me and many other observers it seems that the Greek aren't really aware of how dire their situation is. An exit from the Euro is long overdue and I see absolutely no problem with that. Denmark and Norway have both kept their currency and AFAICT they're doing just fine. It's a drag to trade currency when I visit them, and I'd rather not have to, but I'll live and I still like to visit them and take the trading thing as an excersize.
As a currency, the Eurp is a tool. It's supposed to facilitate easyer trade amoung European Countries and move their economies closer together. The implementation of the Euro is buggy, no doubt, and it could've been done better. This Greece thing is an exception no one thought of, for instance. ... Well, except those who've been warning everybody else for years that is.

Bottom line:
Greece has to get its shit together, one way or the other. Just about now is the right time to call it quits and have Greece take the other way. At least that seems to be the broader opinion within the Eurozone and I can't blame them.

"If you locked 1,000 code monkeys in a room with Teletypes, could they pump out some Shakespeare?"

So, what you're saying is, I play guitar because all humans have an instinctual impulse to play guitar?

Because that doesn't really make sense.

Which kind of blows a gigantic hole in the "when robots do all the work we'll all just be artists" theory.

I'm pretty sure that was a high altitude joke sailing by at mach 1.

Idiots. The whole corrupt and incompetent lot of greek politicians. They frauded their way into the Eurozone and have been dragging their heels ever since. This whole Syriza stunt was the very last straw. They were the worst. They could've gotten real reforms on the way - they had the mandate by the people. Instead they kept fucking and bullshitting around, squandering the very last bit of good will with every gouvernment in the Eurozone. Even Italy is pissed - which actually is quite amazing in itself, because they're are almost right up there with Greece when it comes to mal-administration.

They could've gotten away easy - now they'll be left to their own devices.

At least it's a clear "No" by the people. Better a clear NO that a whishy-washy YES. Tsipras can use this to get some real internal reforms on the way. ... Although I doubt he will.
Well, at least we can finally make a clear cut. No more money for free for all. No more bizarely overpaid early pensioneers and nepotism. The Eurozone should finally cut their losses, have Greece move back to the Drachma and prepare for humanitarian help, like food supplies and such - at least that money won't be wasted.

Lets finally put the ECB goodies and candy to work for nations who are actually pulling their weight and can use a little help aswell, like some baltic nations.

My 2 eurocents.

what a ridiculous waste of effort. The DRM will be broken by pirates within months, if not weeks, of release, and eventually rendered useless, but meanwhile, regular users will get screwed when the shoddy implementations make the user experience suck.

Thanks for saving me the typing.

She won't give a shit. Most people voting for her don't understand what crime she committed and even think it's something great because ... terrorists, child molesters, whatever, I don't keep track of the boogeyman du jour.

Name her what you want. She'll laugh it off 'til someone misses the brakes accidentally next time she crosses the street.

Well, in a democracy a court could not just decide an election, so that example is not really a good one.

Again. The problem is not whether or not manipulation takes place. The problem is that someone can cry foul and there is no way to convince the computer unsavvy that he's full of shit.

You can verify your vote with some device not under your control. That alone gives room for doubt.

Political processes are complicated and intricate. That's already plenty of room for people wanting to claim that politics is all shenanigans and foul play because it's so complicated that most people don't understand it and rather follow someone claiming to understand it.

Voting, at least so far, is something rather simple. Take a sheet of paper, make a mark, toss it in a big box, then count the slips with the same marks when everyone tossed his paper into the box. That's simple enough that people understand it and that they trust such a system. Anything making the process more complex makes it easier for people wanting to create doubt in the process.

I have never heard this and am considering a Leaf (time frame is next year). I was planning to 120v charge so I did a little googling and still can't find it. Not saying it's incorrect, but it seems odd I haven't heard of it. I actually heard rumors of the opposite... fast charging was worse.

I didn't say that paper elections cannot be rigged. They can, and have been more often actually than there have been fair elections.

I did not even say that it's easier to rig electronic elections than paper elections. Personally, I'd expect it to be as long as you're the one calling the shots.

What is harder is simply to debunk cries of foul play. People can easily imagine what a paper election is like and how counting them (with representatives of all parties involved present) can be somewhat trusted. It is easy, on the other hand, to convince people that this is not the case with voting machines.

People don't trust what they don't understand. And trust is something a democracy needs urgently. People need to have faith in their system of government. Whether they like their current government or not, but they need to know that it was elected fairly and that it is what "the people" wanted. That's the whole problem here. Because without ... well, you see how Mexico is doing...