I was thinking Minority Report. Have the retinal scan interface with Google and display ads while you walk through.

Do the research: he is pushing for education to be spared on budget reform. Can you provide a reference on your point? Besides, education budgets are being cut on the state level - nothing has taken place on the federal level yet.

Yeah, thats what a lot of states are doing and it isn't working. My former High School now is teaching 50 students per teacher. In theory it sounds like it works, but when you do the actual math on running a school (overhead of a building, faculty, etc) you'll find that typical American towns cannot afford to provide anything more than 3rd world country grade education.

The point being made is that as a country we are still spending $40,000 per inmate whenever schools across the country gets their budget slashed. My former High School had to lay off 40% of the teachers and are now teaching the kids in classrooms of 50 students. Its a satirical piece that while students are being sacrificed for the budget, prisons still have cable television and accessible health care. Its a call for more progressive thinking: cut the prison's budget before going after education.

For those who don't understand this (insightful) post, its based off a children's novel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_Was_an_Old_Lady_Who_Swallowed_a_Fly). There is an old woman who swallowed a fly and she keeps eating other animals to get rid of the previous animal until she eventually dies in the end (some versions have a censored ending).

I suppose you could say that, however "people like me" with a smartphone makes up 42% of users in the US. Most if not all smartphones require a data plan so they already paying for 3G service. To add a second device with a separate data plan would be double dipping in an identical service. My point is that you could consolidate that service and use two devices under it. $20/month adds up over time. My point isn't limited to the iPad. You could tether a netbook or a laptop with the tethering fee rather than be subject to a leased device tied to a service most people are already paying for.

Wifi only model and tether a data plan from your phone. I pay $10/month for the tethering service.. The 3G model isn't worth the extra money when a vast majority of iPad users have a cell phone on them at all times. My friend also tethers to his iPad for $0 via Bluetooth on his jail broken iPhone.

If you use this Netbook for more than 2 years, you could have bought an iPad. If you use it for 4 years, the iPad is cheaper with service. Its higher up front cost, but the iPad would be cheaper as a long term investment, plus has resale value. Its essentially the same situation as a lease vs buy scenario with a car.

I agree. As someone else has said, "Its Apple's walled in garden." I have to agree, but at the same time I have to admit, its a pretty nice garden. Its not for everything, but when it comes to gardening, its ideal.

Just to name a few products that came out of space exploration related projects - most of which were to assist humans while in space: cat scans, microchips, cordless tools, ear thermometer, frozen food, insulation, invisible braces, memory foam, GPS, scratch resistant lenses, shoe insoles, smoke detectors, and water filters.

Americans alone eat 60.4 pounds of chicken every year. I'd assume there would be plenty of fat as a byproduct to fuel a couple rockets.

Agreed. Very neat, but not up to my robot expectations when I've seen dog, Watson, etc...

Not $1, but definitely not spending more than $29.99. I opt to buy used games than new. I haven't bought a new $59.99 game in about 5 years now. All it takes patience - I'll probalby be enjoying Dragon Age II in 2013, but what is the benefit of playing it now and paying 30 dollars more? With that said, I never hesitate to buy a good game on my iPhone: World of Goo, Plants vs Zombies, Secret of Mana, etc.

Exactly. I have a blue ray player and me and my wife still bought the DVD version of a movie because it was $6 instead of $20. But DVD vs Blu-ray is honestly a pointless debate when I spend 20 times the amount of time and and money to watch Netflix streaming. Why? Its cheap and delivers a lot more meaningful content. If they managed to stream their entire library of movies including new releases, they could have charged as much as cable television and I would have signed up no questions asked.

I bet it will be solid state AND streaming. DVDs caught on because they were convienent. Taking it to the next level, a whole library of digital media in local storage and/or on the cloud for backups/remote access (via iphone, tablet, computer, etc) would take the convienence to the next level. The technology is there, but the convience of it all neatly packaged and cheaply delivered is not. A lot of close calls, but we aren't quite there yet.