Thank you for the reply, ended up resulting in the funniest thing I encountered today.

The reply caused an email to my inbox with the subject:
[Slashdot] Reply to "Re:What a gang of assholes" by drinkypoo

After telling several people a writer friend of mine wants to write a book titled "What a Gang of Assholes" and use the fake name "Drinkpoo" as the author.

And the meta-comedy is that drinkypoo referred to a gang of assholes...

Holy Shit, Batman!

It is clever when you reply to Big Hairy Ian, due to the sigs (and vise-versa):

Big Hairy Ian:
Build a Man a Fire, and He'll Be Warm for a Day. Set a Man on Fire, and He'll Be Warm for the Rest of His Life.

Greyfox:
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?

Use a screen capture utility, I recommend Greenshot (and and full featured).

I enjoy Medium articles, but don't like the "style" they bring to presenting information.

He was impeached for it, and it related to his social life (and of no bearing on his job, other than giving the other side a reasonable blackmail setup).

Clapper lied to Congress about national security, which matters considerably more than sexual favors.

I doubt Congress could jail the President for lying to them, impeachment is their option (and possibly jail after leaving office I would imagine, but I am not familiar with those rules).

There should be several goals to K-12 education, including:
1. Love of learning, as you mentioned
2. A basic understanding of the world around us and how it came about (history)
3. At least a certain minimum level of language (verbal and written), and math (at least algebra, but I know a few people that didn't get that far or that couldn't handle it).
4. Offer a variety of electives including science, music, art, drama, and creative writing. Let the kids find their paths, the part of this I can't explain would be how to expose them to it to expose them and identify individual interests (maybe K-6 for art and music, science and creative writing at higher levels mostly due to advanced nature).
5. There should be some practical courses required as well such as personal finance and nutrition.
6. Computer education and classroom use is also important, but kids these days are already surrounded by and experts at certain technologies.
7. Provide the tools for kids to make informed decisions about their path after K-12.

I like Daniel Quinn's ideas about alternative approaches to education. He's very insightful.

I don't have a sterile view of education, I was only posing the question of why there would be a foreign language requirement. To that question, I can't say one way or the other if there should be such a requirement.

I sucked at Spanish in high school, harder than calculus. I got around language requirements in college via some comparative religion courses (which worked out great as one teacher turned me onto Hermann Hesse, changed my life).

The only problem I see with this change is called it a Foreign Language. If it was Alternative Language I wouldn't see anything wrong with it.

I see learning a programming language, which I assume mean learning some programming, as highly valuable to anyone. If taught properly (I've never seen this), it can provide a solid logic base (and, or, not) and a deeper understanding of decision making (conditionals).

My wife had a total of 8 years of French and spent a semester in Paris. She hasn't used it yet and is no longer very fluent. As for applied knowledge, her spreadsheet skills are good, but she trips up on logic and conditionals.

Why is there a foreign language requirement anyway?

Just call it the Handegg Bowl.

http://www.augmentedplanet.com...

Facebook is weird this way. I joined a while back and within 24 hours a Turkish college dorm roommate of mine (for a single semester, saw him at a U2 concert a couple of years later) friended me. He was back in Turkey, but he found me instantly. We never sent email between us, but I provided Facebook with details of my college location and when I attended.

I only use the site for birthday notifications, anyone that knows me (parents, etc.) expect me to forget their birthdays, but now I don't... Except for my grandparents, who are not on Facebook.

I update my "status" maybe one time every couple of years.

Sol's euthanasia scene is a classic in cinema (the visuals and the music - awesome and chilling - to see the beauty of what once was, to realize what now is, and to realize that all experience is now ending (as a conscious act); and the music was incredible). The rest is standard 1970s film making, but also a decent if not good environmental film, for its time.

Keep in mind when it was made.

I haven't read the book, didn't even know what it was based on (obviously a loose adaptation if Soylent Green was not people). I will have to check that out.

Did you like Logan's Run? Similar time (1976 vs Soylent's 1973) and message, both awesome in my opinion to this day.

Some movies I have nostalgia for are terrible, an example is True Genius. Terrible 1980s filming and some of the worst acting I've ever seen.

I'm still not convinced about the name, but it is interesting to consider (more below). Awesome screenshot by the way.

I read the Wikipedia page on the Lindows case, it seems the judge invalidated the trademark to Windows. And MS is certainly allowed to purchase trademarks they feel they need to ($20 million in this case).

As for the name. Microsoft is a company name trademark, and Windows is a Microsoft trademark on a software application. The two trademarks are inherently different with respects to usage and trademark applicability. I would have problems starting a software company called Microsoft, iMicrosoft (the Apple tradition),maybe even Microsoftware (not sure on that, I wouldn't chance it...), But I could create a company with Windows in the name, in fact there are thousands of such companies in the housing industry.

MS refers to Windows as Windows across its website, I can't find an instance of Microsoft and Windows combined. Google searches return "Microsoft Windows", but that is clarifying the company name (in case one is searching for house windows). My operating system is "Windows 7 Home Premium" with a Microsoft copyright notice below the name.

Here's what I see: The company name is Microsoft. The product name is Windows, and the trademark itself has basically been invalidated (I'm trying to think of ways to take advantage of this, looking for some settlement money, maybe a porn site called Sindows or something - Sin Windows, there is a Minecraft server called Sindows...).

I liked your historical screenshot a lot, here's another one (I don't know your age though, the next question may not apply). Did you use 123, Lotus 123, or just Lotus? I used the 2nd and 3rd commonly while in college, but never the first. But the software was simply called 123:
http://www.guidebookgallery.or...

Fun conversation, later.

http://www.guidebookgallery.or...

I've always seen our relationship with fossil fuels as a duel edged sword. First edge, they are the only reason we live in the advanced world we currently do. No oil or coal, no modern living as we now know.

But, they are a finite resource. Oil is what I worry about the most (if you buy into abiotic oil I've got quite a few bridges you may be interested in, on sale this week).

The other edge of the sword is the fact that we are fully dependent on fossil fuels. If alternative energy resources are not developed before fossil fuel resources decrease/"get really expensive" then we are screwed.

If alternatives can be developed to allow a smooth (where smooth can include a 3-day shadow, it cannot be easy given our current dependence) transition off of fossil fuel dependence then we can continue on our merry way (with less energy I guarantee, but if alternatives are mature enough before problems occur things will be much smoother).

Can the market pull it off? Maybe. I'm not too optimistic, I figure the banks would have to be involved in alternative energy development since they can't fail...

I saw the iFamily app Sky Guide in action this weekend, makes me wish I still had an iPhone. I'm going to purchase it for the iPad though, I'm interested in seeing whether the Night Vision (red) mode is effective, prior iApps would kill my night vision while I was trying to find my target in the sky (red headlamp and paper based star maps are my current setup - night vision takes longer to adapt as I've grown older)..

I'd be interested in your friends setup. That sounds fantastic (my cheap Canon mini can expose the night sky very well, my 3/4ths system Panasonic DSLR cannot accurately focus to infinity in star light - and the lenses don't have indicators and can be turned in either direction forever, never resulting in a focus on infinity).

Great analogy, it could be extended such that code faults leading to things like buffer overflows or SQL injection are "loopholes", basically unexpected consequences.

And patching the law is far more difficult than patching software.

So code is jazz?