I'd think that you could build a perpetual-motion machine if you could do this.

No, because it relies on the wind blowing: first to accelerate, and second to maintain whatever velocity it reaches. Once the wind stops blowing, it will slow down and stop. Here's a nice illustration of how this phenomenon works: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Yt4zxYuPzI&feature=related

Don't forget this isn't a record of Facebook users who broke up on each given day, it's a record of Facebook users who wrote a post (including the phrase "we broke up because") on each given day. Maybe people just don't update Facebook so much over Christmas.

For any other idiots who failed to realise the inevitable, hatetube is very NSFW :-(

You're correct. The Guardian has a better article, that touches on your point -- this approach will only work for those viruses that keep their protein coat once inside the cell; if they shed it on entry, they will not be affected in the way described.

Jesus guys, can't you just congratulate the Firefox devs on the great job they're doing? Just look at the rate of improvement over the past few months and give the JaegerMonkey/TraceMonkey guys kudos for a really impressive job of software engineering. Have a look at David Mandelin's recent post to get an idea of how much work and planning has gone into this project.

Sigh. These are well-known anti-AGW claims that mis-represent the evidence and the understanding of that evidence by climate scientists. If you've really been looking for answers to these claims, can I ask where you've been looking?

1. It has been well-known to climate scientists for twenty years that on long timescales trends in CO2 levels follow trends in average temperature by about 1000 years. This is because on long timescales the Earth's temperature is driven by its orbit around the sun, and these changing temperature causes changes to mechanical and chemical processes, which affect the amount of natural CO2 in the atmosphere. However, it is also very clear from the same records that on shorter timescales, rises in the level of CO2 lead increases in temperature.
2. It's well-known to climate scientists that the level of water vapour in the atmosphere is purely a function of temperature, and so is a (slightly lagging) indicator of global temperatures. Basic physics tells them this, and the climate records bear this out. Adding more water to the atmosphere causes more water to precipitate out, and the temperature remains unchanged. Adding CO2 to this atmosphere causes the atmosphere to warm up, causing more water to remain as vapour, and so increasing the effect of warming effect of water vapour. Water vapour's role in the atmosphere is to strengthen the impact of changes of CO2 levels, not to buffer it.
3. It's well-known that Greenland was slightly more habitable during the Mediaeval Warm Period, which was a localised warming around the North Atlantic. Greenland got settled then, and when the Warm Period ended a few decades later, everyone there starved to death.
4. There was some research (Fenton 2007) that seemed to indicate changes in climate on Mars. However this was based on two data points, and use of more data points makes it clear that there is no evidence of such a change. Even if the climate was changing on Mars, so what? Unless you can identify the mechanism, and explain how that mechanism applies to the Earth, it makes no difference to our situation.

Now that your misunderstandings have been addressed, I'm interested to see if you change your opinion on this matter.

Given that the existing Lala subscribers all had contracts with Lala, and any changes that Apple are making will be within the terms of those contracts, perhaps it's fairer to blame Lala for writing such evil contracts in the first place? If the founders of Lala had really been focused on the interests of their customers, they would have given them fairer contracts, or held on to their company, rather than selling out as soon as they got a good-enough offer.

The ECDL foundation run a computer skills accreditation programme that's widely used in Europe and has an increasing international focus. This covers a range of areas of computer competency; I can't see internet safety mentioned, but if you get in touch with them, they may be able to help you.

Gizmodo's payment didn't value the phone at $5000, it valued a day's access to the phone at $5000.

Don't worry, every chiropractor in the country is already feeling the backlash from the 'Chiropocalypse', as every one of them has had their promotional material reviewed for breaches of UK advertising standards and trading standards, as well as breaches of the published codes of practices of the various governing bodies of chiropractors. Choice quote from one of these bodies: "The target of the campaigners is now any claims for treatment that cannot be substantiated with chiropractic research. The safest thing for everyone to do is [...] [i]f you have a website, take it down NOW. "

Unfortunately for your case, both papers made it in, so it's actually a disproven fact.

I suspect that, given that this was a US mission, the resolution was originally stated by NASA as approximately 100 feet. This would later have been approximated to 30 metres for an international audience, and later still someone added the 90 feet approximation.

Yeah, sorry about that. I intended to vote against him at the secret meeting we held, but I was off sick that day.

"As part of war reparations specified in the 1919 Treaty of Versailles following Germany's surrender after World War I, Aspirin (along with Heroin) lost its status as a registered trademark in France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, where it became a generic name and can be spelled in lower case.[18][19][20] Today, "aspirin" is a generic word in Australia, France, India, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, the Philippines, South Africa, United Kingdom and the United States.[21] Aspirin, with a capital "A", remains a registered trademark of Bayer in Germany, Canada, Mexico, and in over 80 other countries, where the trademark is owned by Bayer, using a uniform chemical formula for all markets, but adapting the packaging and physical aspects for each.[22][23][24] Since the word "aspirin" has become generic in many countries, Bayer has embarked on an aggressive trademark protection campaign in the United States and owns more than 1,000 U.S. trademarks on various pharmaceutical drugs.[25]" from wikipedia

Wow, there's a Balrog staring at me out of that image!