GP was talking about a totally different type of "splicing" that everyone in this thread knows more about than you. Also, they probably know more about genetic splicing than you, since you've conflated splicing with hybridising in your mind.

Now go play and let the grown-ups talk.

Cloud Computing is such a loosely-defined and heavily abused term that its "true meaning" is almost as open to interpretation as "Web 2.0," and virtualised resources are often included in the definition.

The ever-colloquial Wikipedia states that it "typically involves over-the-Internet provision of dynamically scalable and often virtualized resources" while Foldoc states that it is "A loosely defined term for any system providing access via the Internet to processing power, storage, software or other computing services."

I'm fine with people debating the issue of the term's definition and provenance, even with people saying that one meaning is correct and another isn't, but flatly denying the existence of controversy without bothering to cite your authority is not conducive to anyone's understanding. Please, explain your position rather than simply stating it.

The devious, insidious bastards. It's exactly the sort of thing your average armchair-spamming-fantasist would concoct before decrying that the world is full of idiots and they would make a much better criminal, if only they had the time to learn how to code. I mean, it's creative and ridiculous on a par with bad-scifi plot twists.

A bit scary but, well, I'm impressed.

Wouldn't it be nice if people WERE encouraged to post their vote-receipts to prove that they've voted? Not if it shows who their chosen candidate was, of course, but just a token to demonstrate that they've taken part in the electoral process and thus bucked the trend of political apathy.

Seems to me that harnessing that peer-pressure to encourage people to take an active interest would be very beneficial to the democratic process.

As long as we can trust it, of course...

I'm no apologist - I think climate change is a very serious issue that is being dangerously ignored - but you've just raised a classic straw-man and it's very annoying.

Almost nobody denies the existence, to a greater or lesser extent, of "global warming." The argument is now whether the observable changes are predominantly attributable to man's impact on the environment, or to the natural climatic lifecycle of the Earth.

It's very important before weighing-in to an argument that you understand what the argument actually is, from both sides.

He has a middle-of-the-road name - not exactly common, but not wildly inventive.

Just so happens that a man convicted of indecent assault against a minor has the same name and comes from the same county.

The worst thing to happen (so far) was that my friend's FB account was deleted, and he had to create a new one and fire a "WTF?" email at FB. It was all rather amusing and it didn't cause any lasting damage, but I haven't had the heart to take him to one side and say, "Dude, seriously, you were *lucky* that's all that happened..."

People are dumb, and computers are dumb, yet the two sets seem to trust each other far more than is warranted. *That's* where the problem lies.

The only people with a problem are the people who don't understand but still care, but then that's the problem with most topics these days.

I wish that would fit in my sig.

Absolutely - people will always need to do [stuff], and will always need devices that support [stuff] applications, ie personal computers.

Christ, I'm so sick of hearing the GP's argument (maybe I should get off /.) It only ever makes sense to people who think of these things in terms of "devices" and their inherent capabilities, rather than "functions" and their supporting devices.

...which pretty much defines most console fanatics.