HA! "Fear will keep them in line"? Well, I'm sure the rest of the country has great faith in you if your response to a challenge of your position is to just get rid of the guy. Oh my god that's funny! Did you know that in my software development team, we challenge each other all the time and, no, we don't have our coworkers offed if we are wrong. Is Derek Khanna on his way to the gulags? Perhaps a Republican Rehabilitation camp in Fairbanks, AK?

He's 24 and probably still believes that United States politics offer an open and free forum where you can put forth ideas no matter what side you're on and the change that follows can be a good thing if the logic behind it is sound. Surely the worst that could happen is that your party would have to explain again logically why your brief was incorrect and unsound?

Boy it sure was hard typing that with a straight face.

They've publicly disowned the brief and now it looks like they're cutting off the hand that wrote it ... but have they actually put forth a logical and rationale rebuttal that explains why Khanna was so wrong that his termination was necessary?

If my employer came to me and said, "Pack it up, you don't have a job tomorrow." I'd be very interested in knowing why and being completely fine with my termination if they were just batshit insane in their reasoning. I'm sure I'm not the only one that suspects this came as an order from an industry lobbyist or at least in the form of "This is very interesting work by Khanna. On an unrelated note *cough* *cough* you might be hard pressed for campaign donations next election cycle."

Oh, and I am absolutely relishing the goodwill and lip service paid to the Republicans in the initial Slashdot comments.

This reminded me of a three year old discussion I had on Slashdot before about thorium's fuel cycle yielding uranium-233 ... not sure if new evidence has come to light, can't read the Nature article.

Not sure what a vector at the command line means but after 10 seconds of clicking through their help guide:

Why put him in a straightjacket? Crowds gather to listen to him rant and rave -- does that bother you? Why not let him opine for hours until he's hoarse if it fits his fancy?

I'm sorry, I didn't see anywhere in this actual article where he urges people to "Just run Linux" as you quoted, could you help me find it here? Whether or not he rambles about how people should use Linux seems a separate point from his (in my opinion) valid criticisms of Apple, wouldn't you say?

Or are you just trying to get to the talking points that you've learned to parrot ...

OH! Okay, I see you have little to say about what was discussed in the article so you fall back on the same old boring bullshit. Carry on. Let me help you with that quote:

Do I need to keep going or are you done with your "Freedom is nice but I'll totally trade it for some trivial shit" statements?

You're saying that everyone has the same design patents? I was under the impression that rounded corners on icons belonged solely to Apple? Or are you saying I can get my own patent for rounded squares that open up an application on a mobile device? I mean wasn't the whole logic in the Samsung Galaxy case about their devices being black with rounded corners and Apple's devices being black with rounded corners? I mean ... how does Samsung get their own design patent for that since you claim "everyone" has them?

I don't think you know what a mutual fund is. I don't think IV pays back to Apple, Google, Cisco, et al like they would if they were a mutual fund. And IV claims to be "helping the small guys" manage patent portfolios (although I can't find an example of this either). Furthermore, I found it really funny that you claim these large companies are their customers. Do you have any evidence of this? Because when This American Life did a story on them, they were having a hard time finding these imaginary revenue streams you speak of. Oh, you claim they have nothing to do with patent wars? Gee, it's super odd that on IV's site they have an article explaining how patent wars are a natural and necessary business expense and they've been going on since the beginning of time.

That orange trim really screams "THE YEAR IS 1968. THE YEAR IS 1968. THE YEAR IS 1968." Which, to be fair, was still the future in 1966.

Well if you want to get all LATFH about it, the first vehicle labeled "Batmobile" was a red sedan in Detective Comics #27 released in May of 1939.

Yeah right, you're trying to tell me that former Green Bay Packer Michael Anthony Hunt signed up for this? Mike Hunt received a total of two interceptions while playing only twenty two games. Mike Hunt knows how to play the field. It's ridiculous to think that we would waste Mike Hunt, a national treasure that has been enjoyed by millions of burly men, by putting Mike Hunt on a Mars suicide mission!

Oh, that's easy! I saw this hip new original television show called Hawaii Five-0 where the characters say "Bing it!" and the dialog flows so naturally in this scene you just have to see it. And when she looks up Clifton Bowles, she just has to push in "C" and then "L" and Clifton Bowles autocompletes because, let's face it, everyone's searching for Clifton Bowles and "CL" is more than enough to complete that search!

Oh yeah, as a viewer that product placement was natural and unforced and subconsciously I find myself saying "Bing it!" more and more in everyday conversations. I've also found myself buying a lot of Bing Crosby CDs, planning my trip to Bing, Iran and drinking a lot of British Bing Cola ...

And then people use Bing because they can't get to RottenTomatoes or IMDB through Google? And everyone says "Google is broken" and they show just how flippant they are when it comes to searching?

So they just went ahead and changed "Windows 8" to "Windows Lol!"? Sounds about right ...

No, it's not. It's not even close to that. It's a plastic lower receiver with the rest of the gun being not plastic.

As someone who's taken gun safety, I'm shocked he put himself at risk to test this. Making a shooting bench is fairly trivial. Automating a trigger pulling mechanism is a little more difficult but would require very basic knowledge. I'm surprised someone with access to a 3D printer would be stupid enough to pull a plastic lower receiver up to his face, put his hand on it and pull the trigger until it failed. In gun safety they show you what even an obstructed barrel can result in when firing a gun. That action mechanism would basically become shrapnel for your right hand, left forearm and face.

If these guys want to be taken seriously, they probably should 3D print something that will prevent them from winning a Darwin award.

There are only two options. Both options are super shitty and laced with lies or "half truths."