Any practical lunar mining endeavour, no. With a naked eye the smallest feature you could expect to discern is in the order of 1 arc-minute across or about 110 km at the Moon, However, if you put the largest Earth open-cut mines (about 4km across) on the Moon then the pit would be visible through large amateur telescopes under good seeing conditions.

I did RTFA, did you?

Their reply, "We only accept Apps which uses our API. A workaround like this is considered a hack. Please have a read of the Panasonic VIERA CONNECT License Agreement, Section 2.4." From their T&Cs Section 2.4, "(iv) Licensee Application may only use Panasonic APIs for the sole purpose of developing one or more Licensee Application to be made available on VIERA Connect Platform (for the avoidance of doubt, Licensee may not use Panasonic APIs for any other purpose other than developing Licensee Application)" Also from the FA, "Their 'API' is just HTML, CSS, and Javascript." The OP relates that they claim jQuery was "not standard Javascript." confirming that 'standard' Javascript, and not use some independent Panasonic API, is their expectation. Their reply does not mention using XMLHttpRequest as being a violation.

jQuery is just a bunch-o-Javascript, uses only Javascript features, and does not seek to 'workaround' anything, and therefore only uses their 'API'. If using jQuery is a hack then, by their own definition their web site is a hack.

I think their real problem is that the half-arsed automated scripts they use to scan for obvious malfeasance are too broken to actual parse jQuery shorthand, that the reviewer is a muppet, or that there are numerous unwritten rules governing their 'API'.

Sod that. Just point them at their own web site, where jQuery is included in every page, and tell them they've been hacked.

I deal with two routinely: our State and Federal government (Downunder not murrican versions)

The issue here is that the dredge material, taken entirely from an already reserved port area, is to be be dumped in the marine equivalent of a national park. Imagine the reaction if a private mining concern was granted permission to dump their spoil, which after all is just rock moved from somewhere else, on top of Ol' Faithful in Yellowstone or in a Yosemite lake (a layer 2'6" thick over 1.5 Sq miles). How should/would the American people take that?

The GBRMPA is hamstrung by the ideology of both involved layers of government, to whom nature has no value unless you cut it down or dig it up and ship it off. On recent government performance the alternative would be to refuse permission and have the authority dissolved or the board replaced with more pliable members. Realistically the GBRMPA were unable to reach any other decision and have chosen the least shitty option available to them, preferring to lose this battle in order to continue to do good elsewhere.

Browser designers are encouraging this by merging the search and address bars and taking away the old address bar behaviour (i.e. treat it as a host name and perhaps try adding .com if there is no dot) and searching by default for anything that is not obviously a host name. One can only think the search engine provider kickbacks are worth annoying people like me.

No. Nothing to do with my opinion. There are three broad positions on the policy, not two; support, indifference, opposition. Only one of those positions could be said to offer "full support." The people that did not vote do not care about the policy enough to vote either for or against it, they are indifferent. It is as unreasonable to say non-voters offer "full support" for the policy as to say they fully oppose it. It follows that counting the indifferent in the "full support of millions" would be incorrect. If the claim was "some support" then you would have a point.

Quite possibly (almost certainly the bit about Slashdot), but they do not necessarily provide a majority with "full support" for the policy. The UK has voluntary voting. Only 65.1% of eligible voters voted in the 2010 election. Outright you can say the 44.9% non-voters are indifferent to the policy. If only 5.1% of the voters voted against this policy, or voted for it only because of other issues, then the majority of voters do not provide "full support" for it. There is no way to know for sure. Anyway, that's the electoral process they have, and the Government of the day sets the policy regardless of promises or actual majorities.

Youth, as they say, is wasted on the young.

In the United States you do not have to be the manufacturer to be sued for patent violation. Users are also at risk, especially if they have deeper pockets. Daft, but true.

35 U.S.C. 271 Infringement of patent. (a) Except as otherwise provided in this title, whoever without authority makes, uses, offers to sell, or sells any patented invention, within the United States, or imports into the United States any patented invention during the term of the patent therefor, infringes the patent.

(Emphasis mine) I am sure there will be a long discussion about whether someone using a device made with the patented process is themselves "using" the patented process.

Those documents are quite enlightening, Thank you. $1200 per employee for a end-user license: they truly were taking the piss. Obscuring the true identity of the PAE, making false claims about prior licensing, sending "second letters" and "third letters" without having sent the earlier letters, use of NDAs to stifle coordinated resistance... all smell of dodgy trade practises to me. Not surprised that NY , Vermont and the FTC took an interest

I am not aware of any other country replacing its smaller notes with coins for the good of individuals, their central banks/mints did it simply because the cost of keeping high turnover paper money in circulation (by replacing damaged notes) was far higher than maintaining the same volume in coins (usable life measured in decades). Other places typically have a note/coin $2 equivalent that helps reduce the number of coins in a pocket, while the US eschews its own $2 note. Inflation and production costs also doomed the 1 and 2 cent coin equivalents in many places. As an aside, polymer notes, used in some places, last about four times as long as their paper cousins.

BTW: Why is that United States continues to think of it self at 300+ million individuals flying in close formation while the rest of the world lives in societies?

Up there with belly button fluff studies IMHO

The difference being that the government does not require that you purchase non-bald tyres, car insurance, or clothing from a particular (monopoly) retailer.