Would such a device have really made a difference? Currently it looks like one of two scenarios, either someone commandeered the plane (growing increasingly unlikely) and disabled all of the communications systems or there was a sudden catastrophic failure that either destroyed the plane in midair or crippled all of its systems. I find it highly unlikely that this system could upload a meaningful amount of data through a satellite connection (not known for their reliability) in such a short time if it was a catastrophic failure or if it was a failure of all systems who's to say that it wouldn't have taken out such a device as well.

These **AA agencies truly have no shame, hopefully this little "oversight" lands a boot so far up the MPAA's rear that they'll think twice about their brazen and often completely false/misleading statements for decades to come. Sadly I'm not betting on it, they'll probably use some circular reasoning to "justify" why they can take advantage of off-shoring but others shouldn't, but one can always hope. At a bare minimum they've given the actual artists ammunition to use against them.

Perhaps they should focus on one incredibly ambitions plan instead of eight separate ones. I'm also a bit curious how big the receivers would have to be earthside to collect the beamed energy. I don't know if they've invented the microwave equivalent of a laser which is probably what would be needed to to keep the receivers less than 20 miles wide.

I can't say that I'm really a fan of the National Ignition Facility. The PR side of it is "a grand search into fusion power research", but the reality seems to be nuclear weapons research. Coupled with the fact that the project has had massive mismanagement and cost overruns from an original ~$1 Billion estimate to costing over $4.2 Billion. Advanced research is never predictable to be sure, and some cost overrun/failure is to be expected but a four fold increase in costs AND no ignition? Sounds like we're not getting much bang for our research bucks.

I am aware of that as a matter of law, but the premise was that a person can't be tried for the same crime multiple times in the US. That is false because there are stacks of cases where people are tried 2, 3, 4 or even more times, the law may say that the previous trial "didn't occur" but that doesn't erase the fact that it did. And there is technically no limitation to the number of times a person can be retried as long as a prosecutor can make enough of a case to avoid a verdict of not guilty (despite an hour of searching I still can't find the legal requirements of a finding of "not guilty" by a jury, is it 50%?). There are even cases where prosecutors have purposely caused (or attempted to cause) mistrials to prevent possible not guilty verdicts so they can retry a person in the future.

"nopee. the first court is the only court"

Tell that to the "Liberty City 7", that group of destitute morons that the FBI conned into becoming "terrorists". The charges and evidence were so laughable that two separate juries wouldn't vote to convict. It took a third, hand picked jury to finally convict some of them of some of the charges after two weeks of deliberations and two uncooperative jurors being replaced.

In some cases you would be right, there are definitely cases where a department acknowledged that there had been misconduct and was open with the fact & any evidence they had. However there are also MANY cases (Michael Deherra Beating, Hollywood FL framing, etc) where there were obvious instances of personnel not involved with the misconduct covering for those misbehaving by destroying and/or editing evidence. On officer video could have very positive impact on both punishing criminals and punishing officer misconduct, but only if the video is streamed to a third party database that provides access equally to police, prosecution, defendants & reporters. And there are SEVERE penalties for having "accidents" with your video equipment at an "inopportune" time.

I'm highly dubious as to the real world applications of this system. Every other laser "weapon" has turned out to be highly ineffective, prone to failure & unable to meet any of its design goals. Just look at the ABL (Airborne Laser), they burnt over $5 Billion and were well on their way to burning more until some in the military hierarchy noticed that you would need dozens of them positioned inside even a small enemies airspace to be effective.

Nuclear "earthquakes" are a hiccup compared to the real thing, the shaking only lasts a second or so and is only experienced in a comparatively small area. The 2011 Tohoku earthquake was equivalent to a 9,320 Gigaton explosion in terms of energy released and lasted about 6 minutes.

My geology is a little rusty, but I don't think any amount of human activity can "create" full fledged earthquakes. Some activities can encourage an already building earthquake to occur before it would naturally, but not create one from nothing or even enhance one that is building. In some cases this could actually be a plus, it would probably be preferable to have a few 6.0 quakes that you can roughly predict rather than one 8.5 quake that you don' t have a clue when it will occur.

"anything close to the miles-per-tank"

No, but are there any gasoline powered vehicles that can go around 100 miles on ~$3? That same trip will cost you around $15 and rising in even a more economical gas powered vehicle. True at the moment the economics don't quite work out, electric vehicles being more expensive than their gasoline counterparts. But its getting pretty close. Unless there are major advances electric vehicles won't completely replace gas anytime soon but they would suffice for most peoples daily commute and the more people that are willing switching to electric vehicles the longer those who need/want the range and convenience of gas vehicles will be able to afford it.

Yet another reason not to buy/network these "smart" appliances. I'm all for more use of the internet & connectivity, but not with basic utilities (HVAC, Electric, Water, Fridge/Freezer, Septic, maybe TV). Maybe some basic outputs, like sending out an email warning that your furnace is malfunctioning or your water pressure has dropped but only through unidirectional protocols that are impossible to hack or secondary health monitoring systems that even if hacked would be physically unable to effect the operation of the appliance. I don't want my fridge to try to talk me into helping out a Nigerian prince, my furnace being held for ransom by a piece of malware or my TV flashing male enhancement/porn advertisements when the kids are trying to watch a Disney show/film.

"gun related "accidents" happen all the time"

"All the time"? There were only about 613 fatal gun accidents in 2007. That compared to at least 67,740 incidents of self-defense with a firearm a year and possibly far more (NRA claims 2.5 M but likely inflated). Especially when you compare the number of private firearms (somewhere around 300 Million) with the number of crimes even vaguely associated with a firearm per year (~400,000) it amazing how rare firearm related crime is (0.1%).

Aren't judges supposed to be impartial adjudicators? This judges statements read like an NSA PR release touting all of the "wonders" of the NSA program without providing any evidence or noting any of the drawbacks.