I would not want to lend a netbook running Windows, Ubuntu, or Android to my hacker friend because he might install a keylogger or some kind of proxy, just for fun. Or to my grandmother, who might install malware by accident.

With a regular laptop, there's a mental cost in remembering to delete all my personal data before I stop using it. ChromeOS guarantees that your user state can't be accessed by the next person who uses the device.

There is value to having a computing device that you can use without worrying about its health and your data.

"Summary" is a required field when you report an issue. Type something and you can submit the bug.

The .dex format is very different from the .class format, and the differences are to optimize for memory and CPU on mobile devices so that you can run one lightweight VM per app. These aren't superficial changes.

Your description is the exact opposite of the way Google treats their fulltime employees. Their 401(k) match is at least 50%, they pamper employees with food and other benefits, and the few layoffs have been handled with delicacy. People are leaving despite a company that does its best to do the right thing to their employees.

They offer a few one-time numbers to use in case you lose your phone. If there is a chance that you'll lose your phone, you're supposed to write the extra codes down and put them in a safe place.

The major design decision of ChromeOS was to make it secure even when used casually. It's unfortunately hidden in the press releases and security documents of the ChromeOS project page. The idea is that you can lend or borrow a netbook and not have to worry about keyloggers getting installed or your friend later viewing your private data. To achieve this goal, Google requires a TPM chip installed on the netbook so that a user can easily tell that the OS is unmodified, and the OS is stateless (modulo careful caching). This design is what makes ChromeOS so difficult to reconcile with Android, which is a single-user OS for very personal devices.

I hope that ChromeOS becomes successful because I do care about securely sharing computers, but if not enough other people care about this use case (or even understand the security concerns), then I can see how it may fail in the market.

Google actually offers two-factor authentication with your cell phone whenever you're at a new browser. It's not perfect yet: you can't revoke access for a browser once it's been verified, and there are unprotected APIs such as GData and IMAP. But at least it's a step in the right direction.

The Brita pitchers are only intended to improve the taste of tap water by taking out chlorine and calcium, not to actually purify unsafe water.

Why is this at all insightful? You're blatantly taking the quote out of context to make an absurd strawman. The GP's point was that the ownership was obvious, not least due to the Apple branding and the fact that it's clearly not one of the 3 iPhone generations already on the market.

According to section 496 of the California Penal Code, knowingly buying property that was obtained by theft (defined by GP) is also a felony, and the punishment is prison and 3x actual damages.

For learning how to use Unix, I liked The Unix Programming Environment. Although it shows its age, the book helped me move from the opaque feeling I get from working with black-box GUIs to an understanding of the Unix philosophy: tools that are as simple as possible. It taught me to be comfortable with the shell and low-level utilities. And I love Kernighan's dense writing style.

This may not apply to you, but any resident of California can get a San Francisco library card, which gives free access to Britannica online. When I was in high school (right before Wikipedia took off), I used to use Britannica all the time to look up facts.

Of course, I never use Britannica anymore, even for free. Using Google and Wikipedia is much faster than logging in and using Britannica search over a proxy. Without single-sign-on, micropayments, and the ability of crawlers to access the text, I don't see how Britannica can survive on their current business model.

If a company makes a hackable device, it's in everyone's interest for that company to be rewarded, so that more companies will make open devices. The question of whether the government is wasting vast sums of money on subsidies is independent. But given that thousands of Slashdotters will be using their subsidies (if they haven't already), let's direct those funds constructively.

I wish I had known of a geek-friendly device. Just to keep my old TV usable, I bought a random converter box, and now both of them are off for weeks at a time. I would use a more flexible computer-controlled one much more often. If you can kill two birds with one stone, why not?

Not if his concern is to ensure that his panels are "still worth the time and money." If he conserves enough to get a lower marginal rate, then it may no longer be worth it to have solar panels! A household's load on the grid is linear in its consumption or production of electricity, but the bill is nonlinear. And solar companies would do best to market their products to the most gluttonous consumers of energy, not the ones who conserve greatly. Perhaps the state should revisit the set of incentives it wants to provide with respect to net metering.

At least for PG&E, the minimum is $0.14784/kWh, but it rises as you use more than the "baseline usage" until the marginal rate for usage above 3 * baseline is $0.41049/kWh, according to the tariff book. On the coasts, the baseline usage for gas-heated houses is 9.8kWh/day=408W. So yes, if you turn on a 2kW electric heater or use a bunch of appliances it is quite easy to rack up a large bill. Great incentive to insulate.