How could anyone realistically believe that there could be a pure a la carte cable setup? Cable companies are charged by the networks PER SUBSCRIBER, not per person who watches the channel. So it wouldn't matter if 100k of 300k watch ESPN, Time Warner would get charged for the 300k. To make a la carte work, Time Warner would have to pass the cost on to only those who pick ESPN in their lineup, meaning that those who would get ESPN would pay more than the $4 it costs Time Warner for that same person. The real solution, in my opinion, would be for cable companies to make more tiers of service (ie 50/100/200 channels), scale the rates their customers pay for the new tiers, then allow us to pick the channels we want in our tier. Because the cost to the subscriber essentially doesn't change much, the company still earns enough to pay the costs to the networks.

There is not clear cut way to respond to this. Providing training to employees to improve their accent so more customers can understand them is a business practice, where not doing so could drive people away from that company. Monitoring teachers to see if their accent meets some vague 'requirement' for maintaining a teaching license is discrimination in its base form, especially as its use in Arizona is targetted at Mexican and South American accents. The first is perfectly acceptable, as the employee can always quit if they do not like it. The second is not.

No, the Russian government said that, and they said that after everyone knew about it because the cloud had already made it to another country. This explosion was in a waste furnace. It doesn't produce radiation. The only risk is very local depending on how much contamination was in the furnace at the time, which wouldn't be a whole lot. This isn't a reactor.

Until a secretary can type at over 100 words per minute on a tablet/smartphone, the PC will not go away. And don't say that keyboard can be attached to the tablet, because that defeats the purpose of a tablet in the first place.

I'm sorry. I'm a worker at a nuclear plant that just recently had its license renewed by the NRC. 1) The renewing process is not a snap-of-the-fingers process. The sheer amount of paperwork that had to be collected and verified, calculations re-performed, plans made to correct potential problems, and general convincing that the plant could operate another 20 years took several years to complete. And we still have to put those plans into effect. 2) The public gets plenty of notice. The problem is that most of the public doesn't care to show up, other than those who will never support nuclear power. 3) The NRC has almost shut down my plant several times because of anything they perceive as a potential problem. This has ranged from wanting to be sure equipment would function properly if the temperature outside got above 90 degrees. As this is Wisconsin, it always does in summer. So, in this instance, the NRC has made us need to prove we can meet our requirements, not loosened the requirement. 4) More problems occur at plants because of the owners, not lack of NRC oversight. The Davis-Besse event mentioned in the report fails to mention that the NRC had already told the company that it had concerns that needed to be addressed, and the company blew it off until the NRC discovered the problem getting worse. 5) All this makes me concerned that the report researchers went into the project with the mindset that the NRC was not performing its function and ensuring safe operation of our plants. The report seems pretty biased, without trying to speak to the hundreds of instances where the NRC forced plants to become more conservative. My company just recently had to spend millions of dollars upgrading its electrical switchyard equipment based on future grid use projection and the possibility the plant could lose its power source from outside. So for a report to claim that the NRC is relaxing restrictions is misleading.

Government sponsored hackers do not brag about obtaining access to a small affiliated company, or to PBS. They do not want people to know they have gained access, as such knowledge will surely bring resources against their hack.

I miss the old days where a hacker was just someone who gained access to networks 'just because' and not to reveal the private information of strangers. And there is a big difference between hacking because someone disagrees with you, and hacking as a response to government intruding on freedom of speech. Lulz is just silly.

I know it has been mentioned, but maybe a merger needs to happen. The networks screw up most SciFi, and anything good gets cancelled typically because it will never get the audience needed for a network show. We shouldn't need to worry every year that a show such as Fringe may not get renewed. But a merger needs to make sense. G4 : Already mentioned. This would seem to be the likely candidate. Half the shows on G4 are barely watchable. The station is directed towards the same type of crowd, etc. They even sometimes get the rights to air repeats of the network SciFi shows. A combined channel will have SciFi content, technology content, and AOTS :) Spike : Man's station, so audience is very direct. However, SciFi watchers tend to lean towards the same demographic (not claiming this is an absolute obviously). Fewer shows though that would be commonly watched. Mega-merger (SyFy, G4, Spike) : Now this would be the channel, with content of each type being the 'primary' set for the night. You do not need to worry about continuously coming up with new content (like SyFy has to), you aren't focused too much on geeks (like G4), and you draw in those who like the manly shows. Yes, you'd still have wrestling (since both SyFy and Spike have that). But you don't need to fill 7 days of SciFi, and no need to make 'Cheesy Monster Movie of the Week' for every week. The problem, though, is that you still need something that will be shown during the day, when most people aren't home. This is where specialty stations have the most problems.

I think the reason SG:U failed is because people were tired of Stargate. The same thing happened with Star Trek on TV, by the time Enterprise came along, viewers already were turned off. SyFy thought that by taking successful shows, they could just make another derivative. This doesn't work with SciFi. You need original ideas. Hence why newer shows such as Eureka, Warehouse 13 and Haven have some audience.

Most definitely agree. I'm not that old and I remember when even graphing calculators were banned. And they wanted you to do simple arithmetic in your head. So, not only was it to prevent cheating when making graphs (who remembers how painful some graphs were in Calc?), it was to ensure we knew how to do it without technology because we wouldn't always have it available. Now, calculators are REQUIRED school materials, and my daughter whines that she doesn't have one available to do simple long division.

That is what it reads like. They forget to mention the numerous videos on YouTube that have helped give greater exposure to talented individuals who were never seeing the light of day. The forget the indie musicians whom never got to see the inside of recording studio. But, apparently, this is 'stealing' and stifling creative expression.

Sarcasm of my post missed? My point was that people complain about the government trying to force them to get health insurance, while many of them do not practice any healthy habits. I have my own unhealthy habits, but I have health insurance and am perfectly okay with forcing those who don't bother to get it to do so, therefore when I am old, decrepit, and no longer can work the government will still have money with which to assist me.

If this goes through, they should be forced to put stickers on the science books that mention such things reading: "This textbook contains material on intelligent design and creationism. Intelligent design and creationism are not only theories, there has never been any evidence discovered to support them at all. This material should be approached with an open mind, laughed at, and tossed in the trash."

What? A Republican wanting to punish people for not keeping themselves healthy? This has to be against the Constitution. I have every right to smoke, eat everything in sight, and sit on my lazy arse without the government getting involved. They just don't have a right to punish me if I don't have health insurance. God forbid I have to pay for something that will lower what the government has to pay because I refuse to do the right thing.

This is one survey. There have already been other surveys that have shown that even though support for nuclear power has slightly eroded recently, more than 50% still support it. You will never have a perfect survey on nuclear power until you can survey each and every American, because any survey will be contaminated by environmentalists, anti-nuke activists, energy company employees, etc. Half of what has been reported by the American media on what is happening in Japan has been spun to seem like it is Chernobyl all over again, which it isn't. What most people do not realize when there are these daily reports of 'radiation' found in soil/water/animals/etc is that the levels reported are not really hazardous at all. But all you will hear from the media is "1000 times worse than normal". When normal is essentially zero, 1000 times that is not much at all. It would be like going from a penny to $10.