Answering to an AC but so very much agreed I had to comment. It really stinks. It just doesn't flow when you say it. It makes you think of food. It just doesn't have a cool "STAND BACK! I'M USING SCIENCE!" name.

I'm assuming it refers to the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory?

That's a fair point. My guess is there is already entrenched prejudice against Hinduism (i.e. the wonderful history they have with their neighbour India) and illiteracy takes care of everything else.

Ummm...because if they censored the words "Prophet" and/or "Mohammed", that would be censoring a pillar of the Muslim faith? How would the righteous and moral doublegood citizens of Pakistan discuss the most important person in their lives? Or is this a test....?

Jesus is a prophet but not THE Prophet in Islam, so that's OK to make sure the infidels don't get to sell that silly concept outside of their strange cult.

More importantly though, this is actually a good thing. Why? Because we can look to Urdu - the national language of Pakistan - becoming the source of an entirely new and titillating orgy of euphemisms and slang that will defeat this list and that can never adapt effectively to counter it. The authorities have unwittingly introduced chaos and creativity into the very evolution of their national language. In less than a year, I make a gentlemen's bet that there will be their equivalent of the Number 1 Top 40 hit by their equivalent of Justin Bieber or Duffy belting out lyrics about "big tracts of land" and "brown roses with small petals" that will have the older generation pleased at the agricultural bent of the song.....and the young'uns practically creaming themselves in laughter.

It wouldn't hurt to email the makers of the GPU or the promoters of the offer and explain your issue. They may be kind enough to send you the DVD or BRD (sans any packaging, just the disc). Just ask nicely and don't expect too much and you might get sorted.

Good luck.

This. Absolutely this. It's called "Disruptive Technology" for a reason.

I figure robots and AI skilled enough to take-over low-level administration in everything from Accounts & Payable to Legal Services just proves to me that the current model of...um...what do I call it? Skill Topology? Career Pyramid?...is beginning to show it's age. It's obliquely considered in Iain M. Banks "Culture" novels and in Dan Simmons "Ilium" that I am currently reading: They present societies that are post-scarcity and have every imaginable "job" administered by a far superior AI. The "traditional" 9-to-5, expense account, vacation days job for a corp is totally unviable.

On the other hand, this may inspire a second Arts & Crafts Movement which brings back the small business/small skills trade (a good source of employment too). An AI will never replace the concept of another human making that pair of boots, jewelry or that dress for you. Just look at how succesful a company like Shapeways is.

None of this will happen tomorrow though. Unfortunately - or fortunately - I get to see the very early beginnings involving the birth pangs of a new structure of labour. You just know it deep in your heart, this annoys somebody who has something to lose, and they will hamper every step of it to make sure their millions and their mansions are untouched. But that's true of any age. Somebody just has to hoard the cookies and step on others to do it.

Agreed. Glen Cook's Black Company series was pleasure to read.

C.S. Friedman's Coldfire Trilogy as well for a very clever mix of Fantasy and SF

"Hogel" was the cowardly goblin that betrayed Sarah to the Goblin King (Oh he of the glorious traumatizing tights)

That's a shame. Must have been a chore to force yourself to finish it.

Red Letter Media definitely mentioned this in that brilliant cathartic hour of critique. It is the finest motion picture and character evisceration I have ever been privileged to enjoy.

Would you mind expanding on the Tom Clancy reference? Are you saying Tom Clancy's early works were some sort of group effort or had a strong editor to guide him? But when he got famous and got more clout, he started to ignore good advice?

The Force was never really specified and was kept mysterious which I thought was the point, the beauty of Marcia Lucas' woefully unsung influence. It wasn't attached to anything physical, anything ethnic (as in one species better than another) and for me at least tapped into a lot of that Bruce Lee/Alan Watts kung-fu mysticism zeitgeist floating around at the time.

Turning the Force into Pan-Species-AIDS-with-magickal-powers-LOLZ was for me, the worst thing to ever be done to the canon in Phantom Menace. It hamstrung the entire mystic element for the entire series and reduced it to some bland, soulless CDC bollox. For me, there is no stronger evidence that George Lucas did not actually understand what he was "fixing". This was a beautifully done storyteller's gift of defining a critical spiritual story concept just enough so that each audience member could fill in their own blanks. It is quite literally, George using bright red crayon and yellow Stabilo highlighter on the Mona Lisa to "fix" it.

Maybe in the cosmetic or "luxury" or "brand name" (e.g. Lasik) healthcare they do.

In the US, I had the feeling that the healthcare system charges so much just to survive spurious litigation. Doctors and hospitals don't necessarily need to charge as much as they do for the actual care itself. I think a significant portion ends up in a legal defense fund somewhere.

It's the logical assumption, I agree, but you are focused on the actors and forgetting the stage.

The setting of Vampire Hunter D is one of decline after some sort of Golden Age of space travel, technology and neo-feudalism where a vampire nobility lived in a post-Scarcity economy with humans as cattle. The best quality horses are mostly cybernetic with visors for eyes, there are laser weapons and combustion engines.

You've sideswiped a related point mentioning non-English speaking countries. The Vampire Hunter novels seem very promising (I haven't read them....yet), but have only been translated to English beginning with volume 1 in 2005. And that decision was probably only made worth the investment to Dark Horse because they knew an established fan base that guaranteed some level of ROI that made the risk worthwhile.

Here in the English-speaking world, I really have no idea if we've missed the Japanese equivalent of a Glen Cook somewhere because an anime or OVA was not based on it. Fantastic reading (on my 5th Garret PI novel at the moment) but just so unknown to most sc-fi readers I know.

I really hope you're right. According to the compatible devices list on CyanogenMod, there is still no Cmod available for my Droid/Milestone 2 and it's been out since November 2010. Granted this is a voluntary community and no phone gets tinkered with unless one of the devs actually owns it. But still. No one has even grabbed one off a friend?

This. Absolutely this. My office uses an outsource IT provider for all machines and general support. We recently upgraded 5 desktops to i5 3GHz machines with DDR3 memory, 4GB standard with a 64bit version of Windows 7. Some improvement in boot time and programme speed. But it ocurred to me too late that while meeting the numbers that look good on the spec sheet in terms of CPU and RAM, the HDDs were all gimped with the cheapest 5400rpm bricks they could get to meet their bottom line.