This is why I love digital distribution platforms like Steam or Direct2Drive on the PC. I have gotten so many fantastic deals in the past from them. They heavily discount top rated games too, I've seen games like Bioshock go for $5, Fallout 3 for $25, Team Fortress 2 for $10, etc. It's too bad that console games stay so expensive, maybe the next generation of consoles will really push digital distribution to keep costs down so they can compete with Steam/Direct2Drive on their prices.

The python script crashes my Windows 7 RC machine (build 7100) at work quite nicely. I should mention that I needed to add "import socket" and change "s = socket()" to "s = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM)". My software firewall is turned off as well.

If the policy is the same as Amazon's MP3 store, you are paying for the "license" to read a book and therefore you don't own the book. Likewise, I don't own any of my MP3's from Amazon--I just have a license to listen to it. And I'm sure Amazon holds the right to terminate a license anytime for any reason. It's just now they have the technical ability to do this on every Kindle device out there.

I haven't been to a LAN party in about 10 years. It's really easy to get the same experience nowadays with broadband and a microphone. I don't see the point in hauling all my computer stuff over to a friends house when now I can just hop on Steam and round up a few people and play Left 4 Dead. 10 years ago when we were all playing Starcraft and Quake II, there was a definite need for LAN parties since we all had slow 33.6/56K dial-up internet which made multiplayer games extremely slow.

I am pretty sure that if you delete your PlayOnline ID you won't be able to use the code on your game again, and would have to buy a new boxed copy. It's not unreasonable to think that aztektum might of done this accidentally when he canceled his subscription. At least that how it was when I played the game when it first was released in North America.

If you RTFA, you will find that Manomio contacted Apple Europe before developing the app and they "seemed really excited". So here we have yet another developer wasting time and money just to have Apple reject another application despite approving others that do the same thing. I really hope Manomio decides to port his C64 app to the Android instead so some of us can enjoy it.

Mint requires unprecedented access to your bank accounts. I think it's a terrible idea to allow some 3rd party into your most private financial data. What if their security was compromised and now someone has ALL your account numbers? To me, budgeting software shouldn't be more than a glorified check register. You should enter all your receipts manually and then at the end of the month compare it to your bank statements to make sure there are no inconsistencies. I used to use www.indybudget.com for this, but they stopped updating the software so now I use clearcheckbook.com. Both of these sites require no personal data like your address or account numbers so you don't have to worry about identity theft/credit card fraud.

I think this is a great thing for Cisco. Okay, so nobody will buy their servers for regular stuff. But they will buy Call Manager servers and the like. At work we have 3 Cisco servers that are re-branded IBM boxes. One is for our Unity voicemail system and the other two are for Callmanager. When there are hardware issues, I need to call Cisco who then calls IBM to fix it. I think from a support perspective, it would be a huge benefit to actually MAKE the servers you are supporting that way support requests get processed more efficiently. Cisco doesn't just have IBM servers either, they have HP as well so that would be two vendors that they don't need to deal with anymore for support.

It would be nice if us international folks could buy an online-only UK television license and be able to stream shows from BBC's website and Channel 4 On Demand. But until then, a UK shell account and a SOCKS proxy over a SSH tunnel would suffice for now.