I concur. For me, religion died the moment someone told me there were several of them. I briefly asked around about them (there was no internet then) and they all seemed contradictory and presented equal proof to their claims (none at all), so I chose none. In my case, though, it was the internet that brought back my faith, when I found a good book in which all answers are contained. It is called tvtropes and it is my god.

For me it would definitely be "replace your SoC without needing to replace a still perfectly good, expensive screen and/or battery"

I hear you. LG's G2 is pretty much the same device as the nexus 5 but has a ~25% larger battery to accomodate the humongous display. It seems that pretty much the only companies not shooting for the highest specs possible today are Apple and Motorola, and they are both making pretty solid devices nevertheless. I also own a Nexus 4, and I'll hold out on upgrading until I see a Moto X2 or something like that. In fact, I was thinking about "upgrading" to a less powerful phone, like the Moto G, because shit, my Nexus 4 is underclocked to 1026MHz, undervolted and it still never lags, but drains my battery like mad. I love it, but only until the low battery alert pops up. Can't imagine making the switch to a device with a 1080p screen and 2.5 GHz quad-core processor.

I don't know about scary, but it's definitely weird. While both corporations and governments are, morally, ever-changing amorphous blobs, governments have access to the police, among other entities entitled to use physical force. Especially in the current tense climate of terrorism, shootings and kiddie porn scares, I'd fear the government getting wrongly suspicious of me and letting loose their brutal human-stomping machine much more than just being targeted by a corporation, even though I know some corps can also destroy your life by filing lawsuits until you're broke, if they so desire. It's a complicated scenario, especially since things aren't so black and white and the government tends to bow to lots of corporations and do their dirty work for them, but still the government worries me way more than some corp, be it Google, Microsoft, Monsanto, BP, RIAA...

Well, a Harley also doesn't offer enough protection to make it reasonably safe, and I think they sell pretty well in the US. Bikes sell about 500.000 units a year in there, that's a pretty ok number, roughly one in every 600 people seem to buy one each year (is my math correct? It seems too many people). There are lots of drivers, like me, ready to sacrifice safety for efficiency. I'm not saying it's a smart choice, but I think it's a choice made enough times as to create a hefty market.

Apparently this will be done on an approved device's universal IMEI range. Vetting individual IMEIs is neither practical nor legal, as you can't stop someone from using a government approved, legally imported phone from using it on all networks.

And how is XP, by the way? I'm running 98, but it's getting a little long in the tooth. I'm thinking about upgrading to XP this April 8, when I'll consider it to be fairly well tested.

Brazilian here. AFAIK, the only IMEIs blocked are going to be those of phones that didn't go through Anatel's (Brazil's FCC counterpart) approval process. Meaning mostly chinese knockoffs. It's highly unlikely that your S3 won't work here, since S3s are sold locally (in both US and international versions, BTW).

The easiest way to solve traffic problems is to reduce traffic. The US (and plenty of other large countries) should focus on giving people opportunity to live close to where they work, to where their kids go to school. Building more roads, making them more efficient and/or offering public transportation only postpone the problem when you consider population growth, if those measures are all you take.

It definitely looks nice, but I think they went too far. Protection from the elements and increased efficiency due to reduced air drag are wonderful things we should have equipped street bikes with long time ago. However, it's too heavy (360kg) and too expensive ($24,000), meaning it's more akin to a thin smart car than to a bubble bike. I'd bet a gas-powered 100kg moped can beat the C-1's city commute energy efficiency at a $1,500 price point, especially if we bring manufacturing into the equation. When we do that, the moped can end up being better for the environment, too.

If I want to keep something secret from the US, I'll just use ICQ, since it's owned by russians. Of course, the downside of using ICQ in 2014 is that my messages will stay too confidential for the purposes of communicating.

To be fair, a PC from 2009, like an Athlon II, can be indistinguishable from a 2014 Core i3 when you're running, say, Windows, Office and Firefox. By comparison, an ARM processor from 2009, like the one in an iPhone 3GS or Motorola Milestone, is frustratingly slow even to browse simple websites. Pit against a Nexus 5 to have an idea of how much faster the pace of phone processing power is happening at than tradicional x86 right now.

Also, I'm pretty satisfied with my Nexus 4, except for heat and battery life. If I could exchange its processor for a quad-core cortex A7 like the one inside a Moto G (the damn thing lasts over 5 days with light use), I'd be happy to do so.

False. The only difference is they are then called gangs.

How the fuck can people take a discussion about a UI element to fucking politics? It's not even a good political discussion, it the same stereotyped shit we read about everyday, where there are only two fucking views on each subject and they are both ludicrously inflexible. I thought for certain no one would fall for the obvious, weak flamebait of the first post, but lo and behold, the discussion has degenerated into things like

Come on, tell me the truth: you guys disliked the new design and are poisoning the content, too, so as to encourage our transition to a better place, right? Because no one can be that unproductively disruptive unless on purpose.

Of course it does. Happened to me. Since my Nexus 4 updated to KitKat, I sometimes lose 3g signal. So there I was on the highway, trying to send a text, when, again, whatsapp refuses to send my message. I get frustrated, connect the phone to my laptop, fire up ADB and, lo and behold, the car crashes. It's ridiculous. I'm going to fucking sue Google.