Whoosh!

So if that provider is Verizon, and they save the .01 cents say, 100,000,000 times, that means they're saving about $1,000,000.00. Right?

Copyright != Patent != Trademark

Patents do not need to be defended in order to be considered valid. It is my understanding that the same holds for Copyright.
Trademarks, however, are more often deemed to be valid only if they are consistently defended. That is, if your company name is "Slashdot" and you let "Slashdot Wines" exist, but then you decide to go after "Slashdot Fruit Snacks", you will have a much harder time claiming the Slashdot trademark since it can be demonstrated that you failed to defend your trademark.

I am no lawyer. I am certainly not an IP lawyer. And I would NEVER be YOUR lawyer. Go find some expert, and let's all stop trying to be one on teh internet.

Facebook users can post and their posts will get to everyone who has not muted them

False. Facebook filters individual pages too. If you make a post, only about 15-20% of your friends will see it on their News Feed if they have their settings for you set at the default (How many updates? "Most Updates"). For friends that have you set to the most visible setting ("All Updates"), you will still only reach about 50-75% of those people.

Now, FB tends to be pretty good about knowing which 50-75% of your friends are most likely to notice that they're missing your posts (the people who are labeled as 'family', those who most often show up in photos with you, and those who are all more active are MUCH more likely to find themselves in the % that SEE your post). But they are NOT transparently passing your message along to all of your friends. And you are not necessarily seeing 100% of the posts that your friends make, even if you have your settings made for "All Updates" for a specific friend.

Yes and No.

If you (as an individual personal-account user) want to get any message out on FB to 100% of the people who follow you, you now have to pay for it. If you do not promote a post, it will reach approximately 15-20% of your friends who have you set to the default (How many updates? "Most Updates"; What types of Updates? "all are checked"), and about 50-75% of your friends who have you set to the max (How many updates? "all updates").

If you are a business page or other 'professional' account, any non-promoted post will reach 15-20% of your followers/likers/subscribers. Only if you PAY to PROMOTE your post will it reach the News Feed of 100% of your followers.

This from a friend who does a TON of work with Facebook's API and has made several requests for documentation directly from the powers-that-be at Facebook. So my source is secondhand, but he's getting it direct from the horse's mouth and I trust him--especially because this change is directly harmful to his business and he's pissed about it.

I've got Karma to burn, so it doesn't bother me too much. (Not that I was TRYING, mind you.) But I'm confused like you. Perhaps I should have linked to things? Let's try this again...

increased warrentless wiretapping of Americans, by giving retroactive immunity to telcos who aided in breaking the law, by fighting for punitive laws that would cripple the internet, by negotiating lousy treaties that would reduce freedom, by sending the FBI to foreign countries to seize property ...

There, that ought to satisfy the g^Hmods out there...

Yes, because Obama/his administration hasn't curtailed freedom at all through increased warrentless wiretapping of Americans, by giving retroactive immunity to telcos who aided in breaking the law, by fighting for punitive laws that would cripple the internet, by negotiating lousy treaties that would reduce freedom, by sending the FBI to foreign countries to seize property ...

I'm with you. The Republicans of the past 12 years have not been supporters of technology or freedom by any means. But neither have the Democrats.

You're willing to kill for a specific job, and you're calling other people morally bankrupt?

Turtles all the way down.

I'm not sure that they're the biggest source of BPA exposure--there's LOTS of BPA in our every day environment, from heat-printed receipts to dental sealants to toilet paper. See this article for details.

But yeah, as far as food/beverage packaging is concerned, a lot of companies did away with BPA-infused plastic bottles when the 'scare' came through back in 2009/2010. But the metal can manufacturers stayed under the radar and so had very little reason to do away with the BPA in their products.

IIRC, even the SIGG (and similarly-styled) aluminum water bottles had BPA linings even after Nalgene recalled all their water bottles made with BPA. At the same time, people were buying SIGG instead of Nalgene in an ironically misguided attempt to avoid BPA.

True. Most metal cans (the kind used for packaging, anyway) are coated with a layer of plastic to prevent interaction with the Al/Sn in the metal of the substrate itself. Particularly with acidic contents (tomatoes are the ones that come most readily to mind.) Can *ends* are manufactured separately and joined to the can bodies themselves after filling. Some can ends are coated with plastic over the majority of the surface, but others have perforations and other 'gaps' that allow for proper sealing/seaming between the can and the can end, and for tabs to break through, etc. Any place the plastic coating is missing and an acidic ingredient can come into contact with the metal, corrosion can occur (though slowly).

Source: I'm a market researcher specializing in food/beverage packaging in the US.

That's essentially a company-paid life insurance policy of 5x annual salary (slightly less, actually, since it's annuitized). When I worked as a call center grunt shortly out of college, we were given a 1x annual salary term life insurance policy paid for by the company. With an option of paying something like $0.35/month for 3x annual salary term life insurance.

This is really not the crazy-off-the-wall benefit that it's being made out to be. It's good, to be sure, but not unheard of.

Chicago got a ton of outside help to police the various protests--from the Chicagoland suburbs, from other states/cities (including New York), and even municipal police from Canada. That doesn't bug me. Chicago's police force is pretty sparsely staffed to begin with, and getting help was a necessary step. Chicago Police did most of the front-line stuff, while the other districts were used for traffic control and other non-confrontational areas. From all accounts, the police did a good job of de-escalating most situations--they were generally garbed in soft-gear (their regular uniform shirts) rather than riot gear/armor/helmets. It did a lot to make things seem more safety-related than "We're going to beat down the protesters", and kept things civil for the most part.

To be sure, there were arrests and confrontations and some bad crap. But it was a lot better than it could have been (and better than it has been in the past).

My biggest issue is that the TSA was involved. That, to me, is just bonkers. "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated." TSA ignores that, and it pi**es me off.

Just out of curiosity--I'm in Chicago and haven't heard of TSA running checks in our parks. A quick Google News search returns nothing. Can you point me to an article/example?
I hate TSA and would love to have more (local) examples of their idiocy for friends/family who think they're all rainbows and unicorns as they grope you...

The value is in the EXIF geo-location data. That is all.