... is people not really paying attention to the facts.

  * This has been repeatedly stated to be an experiment in an alpha (i.e. testing only) release
  * Revenue gathering from the choice of search engine is nothing new (it's the main way Firefox generates revenue for Mozilla Corp)
  * The data gathered is which of the search boxes you use (the default firefox UI lets you search from the search bar, in the URL bar and the default homepage).

So basically this seems to be an experiment to figure out which of the search methods people are using most.

(disclaimer: I work for Canonical as a sysadmin. I'm not a developer and I don't work on Ubuntu directly, so I was not in any way involved in the planning/implementation of this, and I speak here only for myself as an Ubuntu user who's dismayed at the anger people are unbottling with little information)

How many Americans are fully aware of the secret wars the US fought in Cambodia and Laos?

I'm confused as to why these educated chinese would know of these things anyway. They're clearly not taught them in China (along with many other things as I have found out as an English teacher here), so I guess you're saying that the education they received in the west should have taught them about them. But does western history education really cover the Sino-Vietnamese war and how many Chinese died in Korea? I certainly don't recall them in my history lessons.

Unfortunately the term "overseas chinese" is such a catch all that it's hard to tell just what sort of peope you're talking about? Students from China or people who've emigrated to the West?

My wife and many of her friends would be considered overseas chinese even through they have been in the UK most of their lives and some are even born there. However, they all are very western and whilst they probably aren't aware of half the events you mentioned because we just weren't taught them in school, they certainly aren't waving the Chinese flag.

On a side note. It's fairly debatable about the Chinese losing the Sino-Vietnam war. Both sides claim victory (as is expected) but it's not like China was kicked back out of Vietnam. Neither did they surrender or sign a ceasefire. In fact on their way out of the country they did a lot of damage to Vietnam.

Admittedly their goal of getting the Vietnamese to withdraw from Cambodia was a failure but does that count as losing the war? Surely if that's the case then America lost it's war in Afghanistan when they failed to find Bin Laden.

I don't know why I'm even bothering to reply.

You're either a troll or just deaf. I'm not sure.

If you actually listen to his first sentence he says he finds it "incredible that we use the word race as a cultural determinant". He then expands on this further with "we've made the word race a way of expressing culture."

Need I really say more?

it was pretty clear he was using the term ironically. Just listen to the tone of his voice.

you clearly missed his point about race not being the same as culture by a country mile. Do the Caucasians in America all have the same culture? How about compared to caucasians in say Hungary?

listen to the tone that he says the word with. It's quite clear he's using it ironically.

This isn't double negation.

Who taught you grammar? BITCH!

I'd been meaning to register to Linked In for a while but just hadn't bothered.

I'm teaching English in China at the moment so am only interested in parttime freelance work.

After reading this story on Slashdot I registered two days ago. I gave it my MSN contact list and had it invite those already on Linked In to link to me.

Today I received a job offer from the company I worked for before I left the UK. They seemed to think I was back in the UK, I set them straight and told them I was only available for part time work as a freelancer.

They've said this is fine and asked me my rates and to figure out how I'd access the system from here.

For me that wins points for Linked In.

Facebook I would never use for career advancement though. I set it private apart from for friends. I even refuse facebook invites from my Students.

I'm a British citizen. I flew out of the UK on 24th December 2007 and flew back on the 31st May 2008.

I flew to Russia and back from Thailand. In between I'd traveled overland to Mongolia, China, Vietnam, and Cambodia.

Unless the UK has some sort of automatic data sharing with these countries then this database will really tell them very little about where I've been unless they get hold of my passport.

You run away from the Police when they show up? Do you get arrested for photographing offical buildings or people?

I've not been in the UK for just over a year but things must have changed an awful lot.

Yet it doesn't stop you coming over in large numbers to hang around outside Buckingham Palace taking photos of the Changing of the Guard.

Another way to write it would be.

Since 1998 he has been a member of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for Services to Literature.

get it now?

that's all folks