It wasn't wind and water that disassembled most of Hadrian's wall and a good chunk of the facade of the coliseum, it was people, to build houses, mills, and all manner of useful things. No matter how clear you try to make the writing on the wall, in a few thousand (or even a few hundred) years it will be nothing more than a curiosity in the middle of nowhere. The historians and scientists that would have some change of figuring out what it is might never get the chance before someone else finds a way to take it apart and sell it or use it.

The same probably goes for any recording device made of expensive metals or gems. Stone tablets won't work well either, 99.9% of them haven't survived even 4 thousand years, let alone one million. Recording it somewhere likely to be preserved (the library of congress, wikipedia, maybe even facebook and twitter) might work as long as there's enough civilization to preserve those things. It would only take one luddite-religious revolution to destroy all semblance of knowledge and throw us back in the dark ages, so I wouldn't count on that either.

A time capsule isn't likely to work, even if it's a time capsule in space (it'll just get lost with all the other space trash). I wonder if we could put a transmitter on the moon and power it for long enough to just continuously send a signal back to earth... I suppose even the best nuclear reactor can't run for a million years. Maybe it could be solar powered? How long would such a device last on the moon, or in space?

Those valuable metals will be quickly stripped away like the stones of old roman buildings.

Find a spot in the argument I replied to where he made an exception for "essential services". Surprise, you can't find one.

I suggest those who claim to agree with him go back and read the post I replied to. I simply said his argument is too broad, it would bar any and all regulation and taxation of businesses.

For the record, I think the NAD is doing themselves and anyone else who's hard of hearing an enormous disservice here. As stated in TFA subs will be required very soon anyway by FCC reg. By the time this works its way through the courts, even if they win, Netflix will ask for a reasonable amount of time to comply, which will turn out to be the FCC deadline. It's nothing but a waste of money.

Netflix supports CC already, at least when viewing in a browser. Not everything has it, so either they're not extracting it from some sources or the material isn't there to begin with (or they're receiving digital versions from the copyright owners and they're not including CC).

Some DVDs really truly don't have ANY CC data. I'm not even sure that movies are required to have them, but TV broadcasters usually are. However, TV shows from basic cable seem to often lack CC on netflix, I don't have cable anymore so I can't tell if that's normal.

I'd like to have more CC but if congress isn't going to require movie studios to produce DVDs with CC then I don't see why Netflix should have to pay to have CC added after the fact. As pointed out before "on the internet" should not necessarily change the law.

Your argument also allows supermarkets to have stairs but not ramps for the disabled. After all they're "peaceful traders" too. The ADA is intended to make sure that the disabled can live as normal a life as possible. It's rarely in the interest of a business owner to make accommodations, since the amount of revenue gained will not offset the cost. As a society we've decided that all men are created equal and therefore should all have the same rights.

Personally, I've run into far too many movies and shows on Netflix that lack subtitles (even though the broadcast and DVD version both have subs), I can hear fine but sometimes I miss a word with all the background noise, I usually turn subs on when they're available. I'd like to see more.

Apple was the first to use Intel Core CPUs, which were an enormous improvement over the cooking devices known as the Pentium 4. Apple has been ahead of PCs in the laptop market ever since. PCs have started to catch up in the past year or two, at the same time the iPad, iPhone and their clones have begun to replace PCs themselves.

Apple has its flaws, I swear my mac misses every fifth click or so, and it prompts me to 'identify' my keyboard far too often... but Apple is leading the market. The reason seems to be that nobody else is willing to put the money into new ideas that they are. Microsoft has the cash and the incentive to change things, but without control of the hardware they're left with most customers buying the cheapest hardware available and having a terrible (or at least mediocre) experience... thus the Surface strategy.

There was NO TSA prior to 9/11, it was created November 19, 2001.

Amtrak was created because all of the train companies were going out of business. Even today there are very few profitable train lines in the U.S. (Acela, the 'bullet' train in the northeast corridor, might be the only one).

Amtrak isn't the only train company either, it's just the only national one.

For first class ("standard") mail, they're required to charge 6x the price as USPS. It wouldn't be profitable to offer the same product at that price, so letter delivery by UPS/FedEx is limited only to same day, one day, or two day service.

If mail delivery is cheap and cost effective if you have the infrastructure, then I guess the USPS doesn't have it either. They're losing $3 billion per quarter and talking about shutting down some of that infrastructure.

(Error in my original post, and in quote, it should have been "wouldn't have to throw out all that junk mail")

That the USPS has a monopoly on 'first class' (standard) mail is well known. You can read about it at http://about.usps.com/universal-postal-service/usps-uso-executive-summary.txt (the USPS's own website). As mentioned in that document, they also have exclusive access to mailboxes.

Yes, the Universal Service Obligation exists. However, it seems this is somewhat flexible, as noted in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USPS#Universal_service_obligation_and_monopoly_status the USPS once distributed termination of service notices to an extremely rural area that could only be reached by airplane. The decision was reversed after vocal opposition, but nevertheless it seems that the USPS does not have to guarantee service *everywhere*. Besides, maintaining service to those areas could be done without the subsidies currently granted the USPS. The USPS is running a deficit of $3 billion per quarter , I'll bet individual delivery to every U.S. address not currently serviced by FedEx or UPS would cost not even a tenth of that.

Also, would it really matter if a letter costs $20 to deliver to a remote area? Shouldn't that be expected? With such a huge amount of commerce, banking, and government interaction happening online it seems like it would be more important to guarantee internet access than postal delivery. For those few letters that really need to be delivered by mail (maybe some legal documents based on arcane laws, driver's licenses, and credit/debit cards) the high cost of delivery shouldn't really be that much of a burden.

This is Google's Safe Browsing function. It's their attempt to flag potentially dangerous sites. IT's not intended to block access to the site entirely, merely warn that it's been infected. It's up to the people who manage the site to fix it.

Nice try, but UPS and Fedex are prohibited from providing standard mail service by Federal Law. Go ahead, try to get a quote for a letter to be delivered in 3-5 days from anyone other than USPS. Sure, they'll give a quote for 2 Day Air, but the same service from USPS certainly doesn't cost 'pennies'.

On top of that, USPS is basically funded now by delivering junk mail to your door on an almost-daily basis. They also sell contact information of people who file change of address forms, in addition to the barrage of advertisements they subject people who file the form online to.

Plus, the mail is not a societal problem, if the USPS was shut down all that would happen is I would have to throw out all that junk mail.

On an on-topic note: if security were handled by private agencies they would be subject to state & federal law. Airports with security firms that were doing things like making a woman breast-pump in front of others would be pressured to fire those firms. Instead we have TSA agents who act as if no law at all applies to them.

They need to replace "this app requires these permissions" with "pick the permissions you'd like to grant this app".

The phone then provides false responses to attempts to call non-permitted APIs. The user can also be prompted the first time the app tries to use the permission. Apps which try to exit when not granted enough permissions (instead of degrading gracefully) would be quickly removed from the official market.

"Security (and Privacy) through Dissembly"

This is just an example of why Brick and Mortar retailers won't survive. They focus so much on theft prevention that they don't care about customers anymore. Clamshell packages can be made easy to open, providing all the same benefits except theft prevention, but retailers won't hear of it. They see every customer as a criminal, which is why they've taken to demanding your receipt as you leave.

Companies that want to stay in business are going to have to learn to treat customers well, providing 'adequate' service isn't going to cut it anymore.

In the bank example the holder of the account the account holder still has to authorize the bank to provide proof.

I don't think we'll ever reach a stage where voting secrecy is gone entirely. I certainly don't want my votes published online, that provides for easy backlash from the other side.

However, it might be possible to allow people to vote from an insecure location (this is already true for postal voting). It would require criminal sanctions for anyone caught buying, selling, or coercing votes.