I have basically liked all the D&Ds, so I'm a little biased. I even liked 4e, although I recognize that it was a very different kind of game in a lot of ways from the others.

But basically, if you liked D&D pre-4e, and hated 4e, 5e may be what you were looking for. It's a much cleaner system than 3e/3.5e/PF; simpler and clearer. It's not as complicated in some ways. It doesn't have nearly as much detail in the rules, it doesn't have as many formal definitions. But it's clearer and easier to read. And before you dismiss "easier to read" as unimportant, consider: I spent about 10 years on an ISO language standards committee. I assure you, I'm not afraid of formal language. But I like 5e's system better.

Most of the bonus stacking rules are gone, replaced by a mechanic called "advantage/disadvantage". If you have advantage or disadvantage on a roll, you roll 2d20 and take the higher or lower respectively. If you have neither or both, you roll normally. Most things that used to be +2-+4 bonuses of various types are now "advantage", and most things that used to be penalties are now "disadvantage". In practice, you get similar results with a lot less addition, and without having to check the bonus types of 8 different modifiers to figure out which ones stack.

Everyone I know who's played it has been really happy with it so far. The system is much less focused on trying to resolve every possible question; instead, the assumption is that the DM is not an idiot and is not playing maliciously. If you tend towards adversarial player/DM relationships, avoid 5e; it's not designed for that, and it would be horrible. But if you are playing with people who are basically clear on the idea that games are meant to be fun, and who can cooperate without epic rules battles, this is probably the best D&D ever.

The anon coward's "MMO Crap" comment is well past "baseless" into "completely incoherent". 4e had a few traits that sort of, if you squinted just right, looked like it was MMO-oriented, but mostly it was more like wargames than like any MMO I've ever seen. 5e is pretty much like a cross between 3e and Rules Cyclopedia D&D, with a much cleaner and simpler rules set, and a lot more interesting flavor to things.

Other things:

Lots of the "missing" complexity is rumored to be in the DMG as optional rules.

Casters as a whole are significantly nerfed compared to 3e, or for that matter compared to any previous edition. (Max-level caster? You get a ninth level spell per day. Use it carefully.)

There's some really crazy Internet drama about some of the consultants, which is best ignored, and has no basis in reality.

I have to disagree. If you do business with the government, you lose some of the privacy that you would have in a private transaction. Secrecy in government is just too tempting to abuse.

I knew someone would bring up OCZ's reputation. News flash: they've been wholly owned by Toshiba since January. Why they decided to keep the tarnished brand is a mystery to me.

The hardest part is the macro language. VBA is an unspeakable horror, but it is well-documented and there are 20 years worth of forum help posts online fixing whatever problem you are currently working on.

I'm not disputing what you claim, just saying that your use case is marginal. It's like snowmobiles. Some people use them for work. For the most part, they are toys.

I'm going to throw an assumption out there: very, very few people are doing this. Yes, you could - in theory - "dock" your phone/tablet and do productive things with it. But a really top-notch phone is going to cost you $600+ and a really low-end computer that can kick the shit out of it will cost $200. I think that anyone who can afford the monitor, keyboard, and high-end phone will probably not sweat the cheap cpu too much.

So in the end, while I'm sure there are people in the fringes doing productive things on their phones and tablets, for the vast majority they are toys. This is not meant to be a disparaging comment - I have a smartphone, I have tablets... but I don't do anything more productive on them than take short notes and check email. Mostly they are consumption devices.

There is, but it doesn't change anything, because you're still providing absolutely no evidence to support the claim. And it's still a good example of blaming people being "lazy" for a thing without any evidence. Just-world fallacy; insisting that all the problems are caused by people behaving badly, who therefore somehow deserve it.

Perfectly allowed? ISIS is being bombed by the US military!

(sorry for the obscurity)

Then add the bloody exception, because a man-in-the-middle attack is out of the question and that's precisely what it's for.

Wow, someone's ulcer is flaring up.

If you're using https, it's worthless without a trusted certificate. Blame who made your router. And psst... it can be bypassed with an exception, even permanently.

I don't use the Wonder from the North, but apparently the update can be postponed, and the whole auto-update mechanism can be disabled.

I know, right? So hard to find competent help these days. So fire them!

Have it your way

Corporations are government. They get their charter from government, and most of the big ones have very tight ties to government through lobbying and contracts. Corporations now do almost all of the actual work that we typically associate with government. It's a way of letting us have a ruling class while still maintaining the facade of democracy.

And I guess at the end of the day, we could always pass a law revoking corporate charters. Good luck with that, though.

What you said is true, but obvious. Effectiveness on global CO2 levels aside, the CA program has been a success by other measures. They intended it to be a pilot program, and it looks like it has mostly worked out from a technical standpoint. They have demonstrated that the system is workable from an administrative and bureaucratic standpoint. Few people are silly enough to think that CO2 emissions can be handled on a local (or even national) level - but having what is effectively one of the largest economies in the world to use as an example is a pretty good start.

Well, here you go!

On the surface, it has been quite successful. But you have to remember that most of the reduction has come from natural gas displacing coal - which thanks to fracking would have happened even without the carbon trading.