Do you consider yourself mature?

This is one of those times when Slashdot's +5 cap is not enough. Bravo.

Not necessarily. SCADA is "Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition", which simply means collecting process data for presentation and analysis. Yes, many packages (disclosure: including the one I work on) allow SCADA functions to be performed over TCP/IP networks, but it is not a fundamental part of SCADA. Everything can be done on a single workstation, if that's how you're set up.

I'm not interested in having the discussion. The writer of TFA — and by extension the person who submitted it, the editor who approved it, and you who are defending it — are the ones who are trying to. Yet all of you keep using this bizarre tactic of smacking me with one hand, reaching into my pocket with the other, and expecting me to thank you for both.

Don't be obtuse. You know what I meant.

Regardless of what you personally think of the other side, the other side exists. And thanks to certain economic and political realities, the other side is winning. Throwing your little temper tantrums and cursing the other side for not acknowledging your brilliance only drives them further away, which is a profoundly stupid thing to do since you need their money and cooperation to do what you want to do.

The writer of TFA is a well-known AGW advocate who routinely trolls everyone who isn't as pro-AGW as him, with all the charm and humor of a drunk fratboy. If you want to have serious discussion about this, find someone else to link to.

They (along with the federal government) tried that already, at least for a few months. It was called "Cash for Clunkers". It destroyed millions of perfectly good cars, severely disrupting the used car and spare parts markets and depriving many charities of donations, all without having much real affect on new car sales.

My goodness, aren't you just the perfect walking cliché...

While the doctor always had companions, it was never a show about a brooding sad doctor alone in the world having one romantic interest after another with all the intrinsic undertones.

The explicit romance may be new, but there has always been an undercurrent of loss and loneliness in the show regarding the Doctor and his companions. For example, the marriage of Susan, the marriage of Jo, the abandonment of Sarah Jane, the death of Adric, the nervous breakdown of Tegan... and those are just the ones I can think of at the moment.

Furthermore, the Doctor feels each loss more strongly now because after the fall of Gallifrey, all he has left are his companions. It is a very reasonable change in tone when going from a low-rated, half-hour kids' show to a top-rated primetime hour.

If you think that's a useful counterargument, then you completely missed the point of Dickens' works.

A minority of a minority of a minority, ranting about how no one else sees what they can see... That's pretty much the definition of a fringe kook, isn't it?

You can resell the game.

No, you cannot. To activate the game, you must associate it with a Battle.net account, and when you do, it permanently locks the activation key. You may re-sell the physical disc, perhaps, but whoever buys it will also need to buy a new key at full retail price. The disc is meaningless.

Sure, you can play offline without logging into Battle.net, but that's not what I'm talking about.

Can I install the game without creating a Battle.net account? Can I re-sell the game after I'm done with it?

Like I said, a fundamental design choice.

I'm still not going to buy a game that requires Battle.net lock-in for basic I-don't-give-a-flying-fuck-about-PvP usage, so stop asking. (And spare me the "guest login" nonsense -- that's at best a workaround for a fundamental design choice.)