That is wrong. Here is the hierarchy.
1. No security (OK)
2. Encryption (Better)
3. Encryption and Authentication (Best)
Saying that 1 is better than 2 is wrong. After Google connects to a server just once and stores the key, all subsequent connections can be encrypted and verified that they are made to the same server. This fear of encryption without authentication is very ignorant.

I really don't get all this "control of the internet" hoopla. The reality is that anyone can run a DNS server. These countries can run one of their own if they don't like ours. They can also put whatever firewall they choose on the lines going in and out of their countries. They already have as much control as they choose to have. What is the point of having some international governing body? I'm not getting it.

Almost. :) But then you blow all credibility with this:

!!! Holy hell, man, "Windows 95" was a steaming pile of crap. It is what drove me to Linux in the first place, and I never looked back.

That said, I'm thinking that for the first time in history MS has some competition, which may force them to really try to make 8 a functional OS.

http://www.jetpens.com/Uni-ball-Signo-DX-UM-151-Gel-Ink-Pen-0.38-mm-Black/pd/306

You worried that it will make a bulge in your strechpants?
Buy an "iPhone" or one of hundreds of other smaller handsets.

Additional storage slots give people the ability to store stuff on their own devices, not in Google's cloud. They give people the ability to store data rather than having to retrieve it (and advertising) over a carrier's network connection repeatedly.

I was going to buy a Nexus, but no SD slot, no sale. Sorry.

For the last few years I have only been buying Intel hardware because it just works out of the box with all Linux distros. Is this AMD thing going to work out of the box in Linux?
No, I'm not going to take time to download and install drivers. That crap is for M$ users. Yeah, yeah, I know Intel graphics are not the fastest thing out there. Save it for someone who cares. The Intel graphics are fast enough for the games that I write and play.

Dear Other Nations of the World:
Run yer own damn DNS.

I don't know who has been modding down the sl4a posts, but whoever it is, he knows what he is doing.
I have been working with sl4a lately because my son has an Android phone, and I can tell you that it is half baked. There is much functionality that is missing regardless of the language that you choose. Much of it just does not work. I made a python script to send an SMS message every 4 minutes. In the script I have a time.sleep(240). Ten minutes later... still no SMS message.

If you want real script programming, get an N900. Almost anything you can do on a Linux box, it can do. My N900 scripts grab data, send data, plot them using R or matplotlib, you name it.

That depends on what you want. The most useful part of having Linux on my router is that I can make it do what I want it to do. QOS, firewalling, those just scratch the surface. Someone who knows Linux networking well, or is willing to put a little work into it, can make a router that does virtually anything.

Another tremendous Open Street Map feature is that we get the data. When I need a map specific to my needs (treasure hunt for the kids, map for a flyer, etc.), I go to open street map, download the map as an SVG, open it in Inkscape, add/remove features, crop, edit to taste, save as PDF, mail and/or print.

Thank you, Open Street Map!

The best option is to use python and R, through rpy for example.
R rocks for statistical libraries and good documentation.
Python rocks for everything else.

Been there. I have an N900 that runs R, numpy, matplotlib. Handy for computing when I can't sit on the bus or subway.

Subject says it all

Another thing to consider: will your "whole house" surge protector protect you from internal surges?
The only surge that I have ever had blow out electronic equipment in my home was caused internally by an electrician who was supposedly fixing my wiring, not by an external lightning strike.