You're assuming that getting your real name for their own use was ever Google's goal. I see no justification for that assumption. Even if you assume that Google cares to know your real name, those other options aren't new.

No, I don't believe there is any mechanism in AOSP that would allow Google to remotely re-activate apps. I can't speak for the code as modified by OEMs, of course.

Is it really the case, or was this justification for conquest of the new world - I don't think the business world has changed significantly in the past few centuries - we put a new name on some business model, but the underlying goals and direction is the same.

In this case, I can clearly see it as "something to tell the people and our competitors" - if the mission fails, no hint is left that it is the "new world" that was failed, only what others have failed at before (ie, faster route to India). If the mission succeeds... well, again we want exclusive access the plunder and possibilities.

Yes, but I think BMW and Mercedes are better comparisons, at least with respect to price range.

I know several people who have Teslas, but no one with a Ferrari. I've not only seen, but test-driven a Tesla, but not a Ferrari. In fact, assuming you're not in a state that is making Tesla's life hard, getting a Tesla test drive is easy. A Ferrari, not so much.

Google does not do that.

Actually, Google eliminated it rather than just relaxing it.

Yeah, I've read the Belisarius series :)

In general, there's not much of Baen's top line that I haven't read, though I've slowed down since they changed the webscription model.

How is this not crapware that you are apologizing for? It was the scourge of the PC industry, we should not be welcoming it in mobile to a greater extent than it exists already.

I agree with you that the requirement to ship recent Android versions is absolutely needed, but 20 different applications sounds awfully overbearing.

Google doesn't give any of your information to any advertisers, so a statement of this sort would be empty.

I think it would be really good for everyone, including Google, if Google could find a way to make this point clear to everyone. Google sells ad placement, not user information. Advertisers don't get to control who sees their ads; they don't even have much capability to target specific demographics. Instead, they rely on Google to do the targeting which works well because (a) Google is better at it then advertisers would be anyway, (b) advertisers don't pay except when the user clicks (speaking of adwords here; there's also a smaller display ads business which works differently, but without giving advertisers more information or control) and (c) Google provides advertisers with great tools to determine their return on advertising investment. (c) is really what has made Google the powerhouse in this space: by allowing advertisers to see exactly how effective their ad campaigns are or are not, Google solved one of the oldest problems in advertising, the "I know half of my advertising budget is working, I just don't know which half" problem.

(Disclaimer: I work for Google but I am speaking for myself.)

I agree that processor speed has little if anything to do with it. It's clearly about software. If it were about speed only, then we should, right now, be able to build an artificial intelligence that runs very slowly. Perhaps it would think at a millionth of the speed of a human brain, but the processes of creative thinking would still be recognizable as such. Then we could know that we just need a computer a million times faster to match a human brain, and that further performance improvements would surpass the human brain.

But we don't know how to create an AI running at any speed, because we don't understand how intelligence works.

Yes, that is clearly fiction: If we have the knowledge necessary to create intelligence, there's no reason at all to suppose that we will only be able to do it once. That would imply that we didn't really know how we did it. Technological advances almost never precede the understanding of their function. It's the other way around. In fact, that is the reason AI research in the past has traditionally failed: We hoped that we could create intelligence prior to actually understanding how it works. my point you have to reach beyond any possible logic to pure fiction, where it all kind of breaks down

You're assuming your own conclusion, AKA begging the question. You're assuming that AI could only exist in pure fiction, and using that assumption to argue that AI could only exist in pure fiction.

Yes, the human mind works and is a system... but why is it such a far-flung conjecture to assume it can be constructed? It is constructed, every day, via reproducible physical processes. It is not a "far-flung" conjecture to consider that it could be constructed via a different mechanism, or from different materials, on the contrary it is a "far-flung" conjecture to suppose that it cannot, because that would imply that in some way human brains violate the laws of physics, or at least rely on some physical processes that are impossibly specific.

For example -- and note that I'm not implying that this is the best, or most efficient way to accomplish it, in fact I'm quite certain it is not -- imagine a traditional computer running a fully-detailed simulation of a human brain. This simulation is an exact replica of a real human brain, and simulates every neuron, every chemical reaction, etc. It even simulates the quantum uncertainty effects at the finest level of detail.

Why would that simulation not evince "free will" (whatever that is)? Even if it did so with agonizing slowness. Unless you can conjecture some reason why it would not be able to think, then you must suppose that thinking machines can take on other forms. Further, there's no reason to expect that the "hardware" of brains, the specific structure of neurons and neurotransmitters, is inherently required to carry out thought. Information processing can be carried out in a bewildering variety of ways, all of which produce exactly the same results. This means that we should also be able to create thought by implementing the same information flows in other physical systems, without resorting to simulating the physical system of the brain.

Unless, of course, there is some element of human thought, or free will, or whatever you'd like to call it, that indeed does not derive from physics. Something supernatural.

Apple pays a huge amount of tax in the US.

They ALSO pay a lot of tax in the EU.

The fuss form the US government is that UNLIKE ANY OTHER COUNTRY IN THE WORLD we like to double-tax foreign revenues for which tax was already collected.

The fuss from the EU is that the tax Apple pays they consider to be too low, because Apple has money and the EU does not.

That's the simp truth. Apple found the place that collected the lowest taxes and based international operations there. Doing something legal and having a huge pile of untouchable money angers bureaucrats (and irrational Apple Haters) to no end.

Until either the car doesn't start because it has no 3G signal to "Authorize" it.

Again, that's a technical issue, and if I can figure out how to avoid starting the tracking module why not also how to bypass that...

so you can't even work around it withot ripping out the ECU

As if that's even a slight issue, lots of people reprogram or replace the ECU today.

Relying on your wits to outsmart an organised group of people is hard

History has shown it to be ridiculously easy in most cases.

Far better to nip the problem in the bud

History has shown THAT to be impossible.

So that's just 16 half-liter donations, which spaced out every 8 weeks takes less than 2.5 years. There's plenty of time for Dad to donate that much between when he learns his wife is pregnant and when that kid needs to enter high school. (Plenty more if Mom donates, too.)

The big problem, as in everywhere else, is that paying for blood attracts donors with bad blood (literally), some of which will escape testing and get into the supply. "Thanks to the blood for grades program, China now has enough blood for your transfusion. Unfortunately, the blood you got had untraceable levels of HIV and now you'll get sick and die, but you can do so knowing that some unrelated kid got into a better high school for your suffering."

That's not to say the U.S. doesn't have some of the same problems. The incentive to give can be strong.

Your driving history only consists of the times you got caught.

And in the future my driving history will consist only of the times I've allowed the monitoring device to activate.

The future belongs to the technically inclined because we will be able to do ANYTHING without repercussion.