The designs don't have to be lousy to have faults visible only in the design. The truly lousy designs have flaws visible whenever you try to use the things.
That said, there are two ways security could be affected by open design:
First, they said open design, not copylefted design. Someone could take an open design, change it just a little, and not list their changes. It could then be really tricky to determine whether the demonstrated flaw is in the open design or the hidden changes.
Second, many of the people who are most vocal about security believe (for good or ill) in "security by obscurity." You can't get that from an open design unless you secretly change it, which loops back into point one.

Remember the Microsoft mantra: "Embrace, extend, extinguish."

Oh, no. I'm sorry to hear that...
It's not right to have that steep a difference, to have that sharp a limit. You shouldn't have to have unlimited data to use your phone on the internet for map programs...

Will the directors stop putting in just-for-the-effect, in-your-face scenes meant only to remind you the film is "in 3d!"

Probably about the same time the technology becomes ubiquitous. Remember when Stereo sound was the cool new technology? One need only listen to an old Beatles album to be reminded about how that was abused.

Let's take that one step further and say guilt should be proven, not fished for.

...which is perfectly consistent with the previous 50 years of being able to get music for free.

You condition the consumer to the expectation that they can get entertainment for free then they are bound to continue thinking that.

It's just that now most any form of "broadcast" is also a "download". That's just the evolution of technology.

Pretty lucky here, no kudzu on the property yet, so haven't seen them eat it or tried to feed it. There's a lot down the street so eventually it will get here. I know they can eat it, theoretically, and so do deer and so on, goats whatever, but so far across the south, there's no group of animals that will eat kudzu faster than it grows unless you got them in such a small pasture as they would eat anything at all to keep from starving. Once it is established it takes over near as I can see, short of massive chemical warfare. The taproots they grow from get six feet long and a hundred lbs or so, hard to kill them off.

I have no idea what controls kudzu in japan. If there is an overlooked cheap and easy method, you could be a billionaire here by applying it.

Or they could stop rewarding millionaires with stock options, spend that loot on upgrading their POS network and make everyone happy.

You want to know why they stopped stamping labels directly onto citrus fruit?
It's nothing to do with the safety of the inks. Sometimes, I think people ink entire oranges to make them orange enough. No. It was determined that, if more than a certain number of people squeeze a given grapefruit, the ink smudges, leaving the label unreadable. This is worse than nothing no matter how you slice it -- especially now that large oranges are the same size as small grapefruit.
Using water-soluable ink on citrus fruit that is then left directly under sprinklers also creates problems...

No, premise is wrong. Some parts of "our" population have exponential growth rates and some have exponential decay rates. And projections are that the global population will start to decline around 2050.

If there's a reason to the music I like, I would like the computers to tell me. I like all sorts of music, from acoustic folk to pop to alternative rock to christian rock to screamo. I'll even listen to some country now and again. If a music recommender can understand that by my admission to enjoying 38th Parallel and Blindside, that I'd also enjoy something by Jack Johnson, I'd be amazed.

"The system remains down Thursday, with no ETA in sight.""

Can't find those 5.25" floppy disks for DOS 3.1 I see. Time to check ebay.

I'd weigh the cost/benefit of each. Odds are really good that I would do neither. The Mars program would probably take place in the absence of any economic launch infrastructure to space and hence, be hideously expensive. The national energy infrastructure would most likely be a boondoggle and a bad choice. It's better to allow the market to chose a energy infrastructure rather than impose a bad idea (especially one chosen on the basis of what selfish special interest groups are most powerful).

Instead, I would probably focus on spending reduction, not just of expensive, delusionally misguided military projects, but everything including entitlements.

Why would I ever want to run a pre-installed OS? Aside from the security implications, it's incredibly unlikely to be installed the way *I* want.

As much I like seeing companies out there trying to make money off of promoting and selling Linux, I think a good portion of the lunix users wouldn't ever run/trust a pre-installed OS.

Problem is, it can't be done when the battery is physically disconnected from the electric motor. When you turn the Prius off, there's a big honkin' relay that actually cuts the supply from the traction battery to the motor. That relay doesn't get connected until the start button gets pressed with a valid key present, plus about a couple of dozen more checks. For a Prius that's actually shut off to start moving would require a cascade of failures to occur just to even get the battery reconnected to the motor. Then, once that happens, the ECU would have to shift itself out of park, which it's designed not to do unless the brake pedal is depressed. So, again, a couple of failures have to occur simultaneously for that to happen.

A much more likely scenario is that someone gets out of the car and forgets to turn the car off because the engine's already stopped. Not saying it's impossible for what the GP described to happen. It's just about a billion times more likely for the driver to screw it up. Occam's razor and all that.