Smart isn't what we get. It will be "Smart assed". As in: I wonder how long before we get some kid trying out different fireworks to see which one brings out the SWAT team?!
I suspect the system isn't looking for a "supersonic" signature as a pretty common setup is a pistol with subsonic rounds. (45 ACP)

So time to break out your crossbows or just go "full boat Hunger Games" on them!

What makes you think your "perfect fit" could get past the HR barricade?
There was a situation widely reported a couple years ago where a company was looking for a software engineer. They ran the 25,000+ resumes they recieved through their resume vetting service and found "they didn't have a single qualified applicant"! The internet and blind application of something they call "best practices" has made them stupid.
Anytime you automate a human ability the humans will lose that ability. Your cell phone has a contact list right? 20+ years ago the average competent adult had at least 20 phone numbers memorized (maybe more like 50). Now it is rare to find someone who knows more then 5 numbers. The exact same thing happened to HR. They saw easy resume vetting services and laziness and eagerness for the "next big thing" has now made them stupid and they don't even realize they are running an incompetent process.

A little secret for HR types: 95% of the people doing IT as a career are "members of the B team" and you can't tell the difference from the resume from an "A team" type. The difference isn't training or certifications. (Except that the A-Team guy likely doesn't have certifications. He was working.) The difference is the thought process inside their head. How does that person solve problems?

The list of certifications that they put on a job posting is ridiculous. Demanding certifications almost guarantees that you will get a lower level of experience and a less desirable employee. Why? The technologies that we are working with change year to year. An excellent IT tech will pick the new tech up on the fly, and he will pickup the one following that, and following that, ad infinitum. As mentioned before he won't get a certification for that new tech because he is on that endless treadmill WORKING! Almost every tech I've run across with any level of certification was absolute junk. They say the right words but they never see straight to the heart of an issue.
An extremely important fact will be impossible to explain to anyone but a good IT person". It is impossible for anyone but a really good IT person to determine if another IT person is truly qualified. And even that might take a bit as the results of their work are often the only arbiter.

Saying "cities" is a real push. The only real city in the US with a larger area is Anchorage Alaska. (I guess Juneau is considered a city as it is the capital but if you go there it is really just a town with politicians and extra land.)

Did you read what you cited?

That doesn't come close to addressing encryption, warrants, or search and seizure. What The Hell?

Excellent point. I did a search on the definition of terrorism and found this FBI page: http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/in...

The first bullet point of the domestic section reads: - "Involve acts dangerous to human life that violate federal or state law"

News flash! Base jumping is accurately described as domestic terrorism. Good to know!

I'm wondering if there is an official guideline that the administration has to spin anything into a child safety issue. "Just follow this simple flow chart before releasing to the press."

The whole "safety, safety, safety" bit has gotten so ridiculous and I am endlessly surprised by the fact that a majority of people haven't cried "bullshit" on it. We are in the safest time in history. The thing that has changed is that a single instance of some wack job doing something crazy is blasted out of every media channel and people believe that it is a credible threat. (That explains lottery ticket sales.)

Reality check: When you have 300,000,000+ people in a country every single day there are going to be a multi digit number of them that do something so horrendous as to drop your jaw. That doesn't make it a credible threat. Hell, if you were actually on a US domestic flight on Sept 11th 2001 you would have only have a 1 in 10,000 chance of being on a doomed flight. We aren't at a credible level of risk beyond your chance of slipping in the shower or down the stairs.

The government IS NOT a responsible agency to be given the master keys to your life (or even a valet key!). If you had a teenage child with the same level of fiscal responsibility and the same way of dancing around the truth, you would ground them for life.
Yeah, I will take a .00000001% increase in risk in exchange for .1% increase in safety from being screwed with by a government agency.

- First solution would be to use a Windows thin client. Set it up, write the configuration to flash and then lock it. If it goes BOOM just turn it off and turn it back on and it will be exactly the same as it was. Mail will have to be on the web because nothing will be saved locally.

- Second idea would be to use a terminal server / remote desktop. Give them just enough to log into a system that you maintain at your location. Make sure there are no visible links to a web browser (or anything else) on their local computer.

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One thing people should tell their parents/grandparents/non-techie friends, "Anything fun, cool, and/or free on the web is inherently dangerous. If you can't tell how they are making money then you should suspect everything you see."

Yup. That is it. He holds U.S. and international patents which they have blatantly ignored and his legal challenge was met with lawyers that basically made it into $ vs $$$$ and $$$$ wins.

(Told him he should find a high end patent attorney to take the case on contingency. He is so fed up with attorneys that he would rather shoot the next one he sees rather then talk to one more. He says he will never patent another thing.)

I know a guy that has patents for a wheel centercap that always shows the car's emblem upright. Basically it has a weight and bearings to insure that it doesn't turn with the wheel. Kind of cool item for anal car nuts. He also holds international patents for the same.

Some time after he started producing center caps for the aftermarket Rolls Royce starts putting the same type of non rotating center caps on their cars. His attorney approached them and tried to pursue getting some type of licensing, damages, or cease and desist, and ended up out his considerable attorney fees.

So to the question of "Are many companies stupid enough to willingly infringe patents? ...
Uhhh, yeah. Pretty much all of them.

Bingo!

Handing children a device unsupervised, that can access anything is more of the issue.

You don't watch TV do you?

Politicians, reality show 'stars', entertainment reporters, etc...
Basically TV's basic function is to glorify clowns.

It isn't that income has kept pace. The problem is that the cost of product liability insurance has risen to the point where what was a $15,000 plane in the 50s would be a $350,000+ plane now days.

Too bad that it hasn't reached the point where the attorneys have been crushed under the weight of the $$$ that they have skimmed off the general economy.

Where is "-1 Moron" when you really need it?

http://archive09.linux.com/feature/59196

Google solves everything!