``Even if we were in the right and could win,'' said the former official, ``it could take a lot of resources away from other enforcement.''

A side effect of following up and taking an offending company to court just might be that other companies might clean up their act lest they suffer the same fate. ``Sternly-worded'' letters haven't done squat to end anti-competitive practices. The fines, though, have helped to make some money for the government. Not like that does anything to the groups who've been screwed by the anti-competitive practices. All they get is a warm and fuzzy feeling that some justice has been done. At least until a future Justice Deptartment decides to look the other way again.

Has anyone gotten a hold of a complete list of the manfacturers/vendors whose products are affected by this? The way this has been worded there are more than the five mentioned in the summary text. Have products from any vendors been found to be "safe". (At least, so far?) And what versions of BIOS have been found to be vulnerable?

``Why doesn't twitter just provide a button that a user can push when they feel relentlessly accosted by internet trolls. It would delete the user's account.''

Instead of an account being deleted due to the tweet recipient pushing a button, I'd vote for having that button send a message to a dedicated team at Twitter who would decide whether a user account should be terminated. Allowing `end users' to cause accounts to be deleted could be -- and almost certainly would be -- badly abused.

``Is there any accountability for those who use the tool?''

Sure. About as much accountability as there is for the people who create applications that allow morons to send unmoderated messages that others wind up finding objectionable, insulting, harrassing, etc. (IANAL but, IMHO, it doesn't much matter that posts can be deleted. Once sent the damage to the target has been done.) At least Twitter posts are identified and can be traced to an individual. Unlike Yik Yak where one can be harrassed anonymously by its users and there's no recourse for those who've been targeted. Wait until its creators wind up on the receiving end of a class-action lawsuit for that and its investors pull out after wondering why they ever gave money to people who don't appear to have given any thought to how their nifty software might be (mis)used. Due diligence? They've heard of it. Maybe. But my money's on ``no''.

You mean it's ``just a UNIX machine with...'', no?

I like Macs but I would be concerned about they're being so ``closed''. Need more onboard disk space? You need to buy another Mac. (I'm talking about the ``Airs''; not sure about the bigger, more expensive models.) Or another disk to toss into an external disk dock. (I love those things.) At least with a ``Lintel'' laptop, upgrading the internal disk is a simple matter. I'd opt for the big internal drive to avoid having to lug around a lot of external gadgets but that's just me. (Of course, I'd want at least one extra disk as big as the internal for backups onto the external dock waiting back in the dorm.)

If you're worried about being able to haul the laptop into a repair shop, then buy a Windows-based system known to work well with Linux (get the one with the smallest hard disk they sell), immediately pull out the hard disk, install a new one, install the Linux distribution (Scientific sounds appropriate for a physics major), and go forth and be productive. If any hardware problems arise, pull out the Linux HD, re-install the Windows HD, and have the repair guys work on it using an OS they're likely more accustomed to using. And no support hassles about having replaced Windows.

``What this means is that those who oppose systemd are only about taking away choice, control and flexibility from other users, they do not want other users to be able to utilize certain features. So these people basically want to keep Linux difficult to use, unconfigurable and inflexible.''

Your arm must be really tired from painting with that broad brush. As for those who oppose systemd being Microsoft ``agents'', the feature usurpation being done by the systemd developers seems to show just the opposite.

But... WTF does any of this have to do with SCO and their ridiculous legal arguments rising from the dead? Again?

IBM ordered source code to be destroyed?

Just what would that even accomplish? I get the source code to the Linux kernel with every set of CDs/DVDs that I've downloaded or purchased over the years. Is SCO seriously going to argue that that source code has been magically cleansed of the code that IBM allegedly ordered purged from IBM's developers' computers? That would only make any sense if IBM offered a Linux distribution -- tweaked, I assume SCO is thinking by the code they are alleged to have stolen from SCO. (SCO thinking... ha ha ha... I crack myself up.) Wait... I've never heard of an IBM Linux.

I stopped thinking about SCO and their delusions years ago. Looks like their legal department -- and that's likely all that's left of the company now -- hasn't and is still sitting in their office dreaming up conspiracy theories. It's all they can do now. Hell, it's all they've ever had.

The big Internet suppliers have done a bang up job of turning the Internet into TV anyway. Even better than TV from the perspective of the advertisers; you only see one advertisement at a time when watching TV. On the Internet they are able -- with the cooperation of the web page designer -- to have you seeing as many advertisements that can be fit on the screen. Content? Heck... that stuff just gets in the way of -- and takes away space for -- more advertisments. (More and more web sites seem to have used http://websitesfromhell.net/ as a design manual; especially some of the advertisement-heavy examples.)

The pathetic thing is that I don't know of a single person who clicks on ads -- except by accident.

We've managed to raise the global temperature enough to thaw the Arctic areas that are holding huge amounts of methane and have now allowed that to escape into the atmosphere. Unless somebody figures out how to stop further releases of that greenhouse gas, as David Letterman said on his show a year or so ago, "We're screwed."

I used to like tuning in the long-time radio show "Music From The Heart Of Space". When I could find it on a local radio station, that is.

I've done the same thing streaming French or German sites. The music is way better than anything I can get on local radio stations and the ads are innocuous because I can't understand 99.9% of what they're saying.

I don't know about that but the music samples tell me that I'd be bored to tears listening to that all day. I have some favorite CDs that I've found I can put on and play in repeat mode all day if necessary: Porcupine Tree's "The Sky Moves Sideways", Chapterhouse's "Blood Music", Eno's ambient recordings, most any Swervedriver or Ned's Atomic Dustbin, just about anything by J.S. Bach -- I've got a few hour's worth of Bach organ music that I find enjoyable to have playing while I'm writing code, documentation, etc. I'm sure everyone's got their own favorites.

... contribute to a monoculture by avoiding WebKit. Just so long as this isn't just going to be another form of developer lock-in. (Which I suspect it will be.)

And this food the people in the park are going to be selling? How did they get that? They are unemployed after all. Food ain't free for the taking. Or selling.

First he hires a communications director with a history of sending out ugly tweets (that are, apparently, being deleted in an attempt to keep Bush's potential campaign from imploding before it even begins). Then he publishes constituents' email addresses. Doesn't seem all that smart to me.