Open up a dictation and it will record everything to text. The 4S has a special processor to even handle the filtering of noise. There's really nothing new here...

Most programs (I'd like to think) use a splash screen so that users know that when they started the program, something is actually loading since a lot of programs take some time to load (i.e. it's not "instantaneous"). Having something there to say "yeah, we're working on your request; give us a second or two.." helps pass the time. On the other hand, programs that have a splash screen just for the sake of a splash screen... then yes, that is additional bloat no matter how small.

Anyone claiming to have patents on fundamental aspects of the internet, even if said patent were valid, would and should not be given any benefit. If their patent is indeed valid, it would have had to have been given well before the internet ever came into being, so most of those patents would have to be well over 10 years ago. That is way too long to be sitting on a patent and not enforcing until now, after everyone has well been using it.

Instead of electing educated scientists and engineers (see China) to office, we instead elect people whose qualifications are in social sciences. That is, the politicians we often end up choosing are mostly good at manipulating people with their rhetoric (and the masses fall for it); but they are pretty stupid when it comes to technical details. Furthermore, your average Joe is intimidated by the nerds (hence the term "nerd"). We often say "Oh I suck at math" when that term is brought up, and that is too often the typical response by the average American. We're too proud of being stupid, and then we elect stupid politicians to office to run our country.

Then you haven't properly designed a secure system. If you already know that Grandma and many typical users have a tendency to do stupid things, the solution isn't AV -- it's either 1) educate the user (which isn't going to happen) or 2) redesign your system so that such a problem that has been known for decades does not perpetuate into newer versions of .

The point of an anti-virus protection is to fix or patch up an insecure system. The reason we have viruses is because there are design flaws that enable them to even be effective. On the other hand, even the most effective AV systems are out of date by design. At best, they can handle the viruses that are already in the wild. Any predictive feature of any AV system still relies on knowing where the virus writers might attack. But if you knew that much, why not just patch your system so it no longer becomes an attack vector.

What a crappy summary and crappy article. The wavefunction is no more a real object than any other mathematical function. The statement: "f(x)=x^2 is a real object" has no valid meaning whatsoever. To even call it a theorem is ridiculous. Likewise goes for the wavefunction. It is a tool to model our "real" world. Some models are exact and precisely describe the "real" world. Other models only work under certain assumptions and/or reference frames.

If you actually read the research paper, the authors consider the question of whether a quantum state is a physical property attached to a system. Said another way, do quantum systems actually exist? Or are they purely theoretical? From the article:

The gist of it is that they have produced a result (didn't read the whole thing to actually figure out what their result was) which relied mainly on three assumptions:

• 1. "if a quantum system is prepared in isolation from the rest of the universe, such that quantum theory assigns a pure state, then after preparation the system has a well dened set of physical properties"
• 2. "it is possible to prepare multiple systems such that their physical properties are uncorrelated"
• 3. "measuring devices respond solely to the physical properties of the systems they measure"

Since their result is incompatible with the statistical view of quantum states, it must due to one of the assumptions above. They don't actually make the claim that quantum states are physical properties (like length, width, height, mass, etc. are). In fact, they conclude with:

The dAmage has already been done -- the moment they decided to due for the account -- regardless of whether they are in the right

You would have to prove that followers were followers of the company and not the guy behind the handle. Good luck with that

All he needs to do is create a new account and tweet about the issue. "I am moving to a new twitter handle nsert new handle here so please update accordingly if you would like to follow me after this handle is returned to Phonedog" Problem solved

I know that Blizzard is well known for little jokes and references to the real world... so I couldn't help but notice the connection between the new race and their semblances to a very well known kung-fu fighting panda of the big screen. Any idea if this was the "inspiration" for the expansion?

I was having trouble understanding the title of the summary. Is that really the same as "Conflict between protesters and NYPD occupy Wall Street, and Escalating" ?

People writing the software and researchers aren't necessarily the same group. In fact, I think they're more likely to be two sets with no intersection.

I didn't read the article, but from the quote in the summary, you're mixing up developers with external security analysts (citizens vs entrepreneurs from another place trying to score a buck). But, to get to your point -- you're right, the analysts aren't injecting bugs into the software. However, they are very similar to the rat farmers in the sense that they might not care about the software being bug-free (or the city being clear of rats) and are only interested in the monetary gains.

You did miss something. The researchers are not injecting bugs. Instead, they are "farming for bugs" in the sense that they (presumably) put the software through a battery of tests (the "breeding" process). His point was that the bounty system was originally to motivate USERS to submit reports (like in S.A. where the point was to encourage citizens turn in rat bodies). Instead, you've now got security researchers who may have absolutely no interest in using the software itself but have a monetary incentive to report bugs. Similarly, the rat farmers have no interest in getting rid of the infestation problem, they're just there to cash in on the rewards. The difference, however, is that the rat farmers breed the rats, whereas the analysts merely look for bugs (more akin to someone from another geographical region relocating to S.A. so they too can catch rats and turn them in).