Ok, so I have a question. I personally take this view as well: the government should own the infrastructure and allow free competition. Basically, it's like a road, and we can all compete with each other's shipping business.

The technical side, that I don't get ... is - is that actually possible? For example, say my neighbor wants to use FiberInternet2U and I want to use SpeedMAX as our ISPs. Is that relatively easily technically feasible?

My question comes mostly simply out of what I think is my understanding about phone lines. If we were talking about DSL, the phone lines all go to some central office somewhere (that pesky CO that you have to be within X thousand feet of ... with no load coils inbetween ...). In order to have two separate phone companies provide my neighbor and me service, wouldn't they have to be routed two different ways once they get to the CO ... or something?

You pretty much outlined exactly what I think *should* be the way it works, so I'm curious if you know how it technically could.

Oh, and also, force honest advertising, no more "up to" speeds :P and put any relevant data caps in the not-small-print.

Is that some kind of copyright thing with the console version?

In a comment about how spying is not stealing you then go on to suppose that it steals your privacy!?! How would that even work? Are you suggesting that origin actually has your privacy after taking it from you?

Where abouts on the spectrum do you lie?

Only if he is close to the first echo. Otherwise it could be any volume when it finally passes him by. That is just the price that he pays for his privacy.

Sounds kind of strange - America is not the only country in the west and as a brit I learned that the basic concepts of algorithms and algebra were invented in the arab world, although the actual forms that we use today were developed in the 19th century. The eastern front was where nazis were sent to die (from the historical documentry Allo Allo probably), and stirrups came west with the Mongols who used them as a decisive military advantage.

So you could equally conclude that American education is uniquely crap in the western world.

Grammar nazi mode: actually I think you'll find the plural of ex is oxen.

Given your level of understanding, it is probable that you have nothing useful or interesting to add to this discussion. Have you considered just reading other people's comments for a change?

The program knows your name.
The program stores your name.

Anthropomorphification is not much terser. However it is wrong - the intentional form implies many things that are not true. The non-intentional form indicates that the program works with a copy of the information. The difference between the two is where most bugs live.

Complete and utter bullshit. I can take you to have lunch in the United States and pay for it with money. Good luck doing anything useful or at least demonstrable with your "god".

Nobody is dismissing the idea; they're telling you that you're a fucking idiot for believing that the idea represents reality.

Non-idiots have been laughing at both of those things for years now.

As soon as you find one, please, let us know! That would be the biggest boon to science in history.

There's still some orchards I think, but small. And there is a fair amount of ag south of SV... but nothing compared to what it used to be. That said, the water issues first started back in the early 20th century when the crops and orchards changed to high-water-use crops like prunes. The area must have sure looked beautiful before sprawl + oak trees cut + orchards removed :)

Somebody with a Nobel Prize would disagree with you.

So you mean that they would need some way to stop people from seeing the reports that the torrent is fake?

Kind of like there would be some good content (accurate comments) and they would need to hide it somehow, maybe using some bad content.

Hmmm...... perhaps this is already a solve (non-)problem. We should get the astroturfers on it right away!

If it's not a volume problem then you just ain't packing her right. If it is a volume problem then you need to compress her to improve the density.